The family of a 16-year-old Dalit boy, who died by suicide on November 3 in Tamil Nadu’s Pudukkottai district, has filed a police complaint that stating that he faced caste-based harassment and was assaulted by students belonging to the Other Backward Community (OBC). The assault was allegedly a consequence of the Dalit boy seen speaking to a girl, who belongs to the OBC community, his family said.
The victim, a class 11 student of a government boys higher secondary school in Keeranur, hailing from a poor family. The girl studied in another government school where the victim had previously studied up to class 10. “They had beaten up my son because of our caste,” his mother Uma told reporters.
“He had gone to school normally. But after the returning from school, he was unable to bear the assault. So, he died by suicide,” she said.
Initially, the police had registered a case of unnatural death but have now altered it to include sections under the SC/ST Prevention of Atrocities Act and section 306 (abetment to suicide) of the Indian Penal Code.
“The case came to me after being altered. We are conducting the investigation, questioning witnesses and cross verification is on-going,” the investigating officer said, seeking anonymity.
“We will soon make arrests, so until then we do not want to reveal any information as it may affect the enquiry process,” the officer said.
{{/usCountry}}“We will soon make arrests, so until then we do not want to reveal any information as it may affect the enquiry process,” the officer said.
{{/usCountry}}The victim’s body was sent for post mortem on November 4.
The development comes a week after, in another incident, six men belonging to the Backward Community were arrested by Tamil Nadu’s Tirunelveli police for allegedly stripping two Dalit men and urinating on them before robbing them of their cash and mobile phones.
Concerned over a series of such recent atrocities against Dalits in Tamil Nadu, the Dalit Intellectual Collective based in Chennai has urged chief minister MK Stalin to call for an all-party meeting to consult ways to end this. “The lukewarm response of the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) government is alarming,” C Lakshmanan, convener of the collective said in a statement. “The series of violent attacks and humiliation against Dalits is consistent with the observation in ‘Caste Pride’(a book published in 2023) that Tamil Nadu provided a template of atrocities against Dalits for the entire country.”