Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan on Thursday said all political parties should come together to discuss the amendment to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, reported PTI.
The speaker used an analogy to explain the situation. “Suppose if I give a big chocolate to my son and I later realise that it is not good for him to have so much of it at one go, one will try to take back the chocolate from the child,” she said. “But you cannot take it as he will get angry and start crying. But some sensible person can make the child understand and take back the chocolate from him.”
“If anybody immediately tries to snatch anything given to a person, there may be an explosion,” Mahajan said.
Mahajan’s comment came the day several organisations called for a Bharat bandh to protest against the amendment. During the Monsoon Session of Parliament last month, the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha passed the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Bill to overturn a Supreme Court order that had diluted the Act’s provisions.
Mahajan said the matter must not be politicised since all parties had voted in favour of maintaining the basic structure of the Act.
“The Parliament’s work is to enact laws but all MPs should think on this subject [amendments made in the SC/ST Act],” she said while speaking at the Bharatiya Janata Party’s traders cell meet. She said it was the responsibility of people “to create a proper environment for this discussion”.
She said the present situation was not correct. “If injustice was done earlier with a section [of society], it does not mean that injustice should be done with other sections to settle score.”
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