A Critical Analysis of the Supreme Court’s Interpretation of “Public View” under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989
-Ramphal Kataria
Abstract
The Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 was enacted as a constitutional response to centuries of structural humiliation, exclusion, violence, and social segregation imposed upon Dalits and Adivasis through the caste order. The recent judgment of the Supreme Court in Gunjan v. State (NCT of Delhi), Criminal Appeal No. 2446 of 2026, delivered by a Division Bench of Justice N.V. Anjaria and Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra, holding that caste-based abuses within a private residence and outside “public view” do not attract Sections 3(1)(r) and 3(1)(s) of the SC/ST Act, has reignited serious constitutional and social debate. This judgment raises a larger question: can caste humiliation occurring within private spaces be separated from the social structure that created caste itself?
This essay critically examines the historical origins of caste in Indian society, the role of religion, social institutions, village structures, khaps, customary laws, and Brahmanical texts in preserving caste hierarchy, and the long struggle against caste oppression before and after independence. It studies constitutional debates, the evolution of protective legislation, and the judicial interpretation of the SC/ST Act. The essay argues that limiting caste atrocity jurisprudence to the narrow requirement of “public view” weakens the transformative intent of the Constitution and undermines the lived realities of caste discrimination, much of which occurs within private spaces such as homes, farms, workplaces, kitchens, temples, and educational institutions.
The paper further analyses caste as a continuing political instrument in India, where electoral mobilization, social violence, economic deprivation, and institutional discrimination remain deeply tied to caste identity. It contends that constitutional morality requires courts to interpret protective legislation in a socially emancipatory manner rather than through rigid textual formalism.
“Caste is not merely a division of labour; it is a division of labourers.”
— Dr. B.R. Ambedkar
“Turn in any direction you like, caste is the monster that crosses your path.”
— Dr. B.R. Ambedkar
“So long as you do not achieve social liberty, whatever freedom is provided by the law is of no avail to you.”
— Dr. B.R. Ambedkar
Introduction
The Supreme Court’s recent judgment holding that caste-based abuses uttered inside a private residence and outside “public gaze” do not attract Sections 3(1)(r) and 3(1)(s) of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 has reopened one of the oldest wounds of Indian society: the contradiction between constitutional equality and caste reality.
The judgment rests upon a strict interpretation of the phrase “within public view.” According to the Court, insults or abuses occurring within the four walls of a residential house, absent public presence or visibility, fail to satisfy an essential ingredient of the offence under the SC/ST Act. Legally, the judgment draws support from earlier precedents including Swaran Singh v. State (2008), Hitesh Verma v. State of Uttarakhand (2020), and Karuppudayar v. State (2025).
Yet the larger social question remains unresolved.
Where does caste humiliation actually occur in India?
Does caste violence only occur on public roads, market squares, or visible streets? Or does it survive most powerfully in kitchens, farms, drawing rooms, temples, schools, workplaces, and private establishments where caste hierarchies are enforced daily?
The history of caste oppression demonstrates that humiliation has always been normalized within private social spaces. Dalits were denied entry into homes, temples, wells, schools, and fields not in public assemblies alone but through everyday private enforcement of social hierarchy. The caste order was sustained precisely because discrimination was embedded into ordinary life and protected by religion, social customs, kinship structures, and village institutions.
The SC/ST Act was enacted not merely to punish individual insults but to confront a historical system of graded inequality. Any judicial interpretation that narrows the meaning of caste humiliation risks diluting the emancipatory purpose of the legislation.
This debate therefore transcends technical interpretation. It touches the philosophical soul of the Indian Constitution.
I. Historical Origins of Caste in Indian Society
The caste system remains one of the most enduring and violent systems of social stratification in human history. While forms of hierarchy have existed in many civilizations, the Indian caste order developed into a rigid hereditary structure that determined occupation, social status, dignity, access to resources, marriage, habitation, and even spiritual worth.
The ideological roots of caste are traceable to the varna system articulated in ancient Brahmanical texts. The Purusha Sukta of the Rig Veda described society as emerging from the cosmic body of Purusha:
Brahmins from the mouth,
Kshatriyas from the arms,
Vaishyas from the thighs,
Shudras from the feet.
This symbolic hierarchy was gradually transformed into a rigid social order. Over centuries, thousands of castes and sub-castes evolved through the fusion of occupation, birth, ritual purity, and social exclusion.
The Manusmriti became one of the most influential texts legitimizing caste hierarchy and untouchability. It prescribed severe restrictions upon Shudras and those outside the varna order. The text normalized hereditary inequality as divine will.
Certain verses attributed to Manusmriti prescribed:
denial of education to Shudras,
corporal punishment for hearing Vedic recitations,
restrictions on property ownership,
social segregation,
ritual exclusion.
The text institutionalized the idea that social hierarchy was sacred and immutable.
The caste order was therefore not merely economic. It was theological.
Religion became a mechanism for social discipline.
Purity and pollution doctrines regulated food, touch, marriage, labour, water access, and habitation. Dalits were compelled to live outside village boundaries. They were assigned occupations considered “polluting,” including disposal of carcasses, manual scavenging, leather work, and sanitation labour.
Untouchability was not accidental. It was structurally produced.
II. Preservation of Caste through Religion, Social Institutions and Village Power
The caste system survived for centuries not merely because of scriptures but because social institutions actively preserved it.
1. The Village as a Site of Caste Discipline
Indian villages were often romanticized during colonial and nationalist discourse as self-sufficient republics. Dr. Ambedkar sharply rejected this romanticism and described villages as “a sink of localism, a den of ignorance, narrow-mindedness and communalism.”
The traditional village order operated through rigid caste segregation:
separate settlements for Dalits,
denial of access to common wells,
exclusion from temples,
prohibition on wearing certain clothes,
restrictions on movement,
separate utensils in tea shops,
denial of barber and washerman services.
The village economy itself depended upon caste labour.
Land ownership remained concentrated among dominant castes, while Dalits were largely landless labourers dependent upon caste Hindus for survival.
Economic dependence reinforced social obedience.
2. Khap Panchayats and Social Regulation
Khap structures and caste councils functioned as parallel systems of social governance. These institutions regulated:
marriage,
sexuality,
social interaction,
property,
honour,
caste boundaries.
Inter-caste marriages often invited social boycott, violence, and honour killings.
Even today, khap-backed violence against couples marrying across caste lines continues in several northern states.
The persistence of honour killings reveals that caste is not a relic of the past but a living social order defended through violence.
3. Religious Justification of Hierarchy
Brahmanical ideology linked social status with karma and rebirth.
The oppressed were taught that suffering in this life resulted from sins in previous births and that obedience to caste duty was spiritually necessary.
This transformed social inequality into moral destiny.
The caste order thus achieved something extraordinary: it normalized oppression among both oppressor and oppressed.
III. Resistance against Caste before Independence
Resistance to caste oppression emerged long before modern constitutionalism.
1. Buddha and the Rejection of Brahmanical Hierarchy
Gautama Buddha challenged ritual supremacy and hereditary hierarchy. Buddhism rejected caste distinctions in spiritual life and emphasized ethical conduct over birth.
The Buddhist Sangha opened pathways for social participation unavailable within Brahmanical orthodoxy.
However, over centuries, Brahmanical revivalism reasserted caste dominance.
2. Bhakti Movements
Saints such as:
Ravidas,
Kabir,
Tukaram,
Namdev,
Chokhamela,
Nandanar,
Guru Nanak,
challenged ritual hierarchy and preached spiritual equality.
Kabir attacked both Brahmanical orthodoxy and religious hypocrisy:
“जाति न पूछो साधु की।”
Yet Bhakti movements, despite spiritual radicalism, could not dismantle caste as a material social institution.
3. Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai Phule
Jyotirao Phule launched one of the earliest organized anti-caste movements in western India.
He exposed Brahmanical domination as a system of social exploitation.
His seminal work Gulamgiri compared caste oppression with slavery.
Savitribai Phule pioneered education for girls and oppressed castes despite severe social hostility.
Education became a revolutionary weapon against caste.
4. Periyar and the Self-Respect Movement
E.V. Ramasamy Periyar launched a radical critique of caste, religion, patriarchy, and Brahmanism in south India.
The Self-Respect Movement attacked:
priestly domination,
ritual hierarchy,
caste endogamy,
religious superstition.
Periyar argued that caste survived because religion sanctified inequality.
5. Dr. B.R. Ambedkar
No figure shaped anti-caste politics more profoundly than Dr. Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar.
Born into untouchability, Ambedkar transformed personal humiliation into a constitutional revolution.
His works including:
Annihilation of Caste,
Who Were the Shudras?,
The Untouchables,
remain foundational critiques of caste society.
Ambedkar argued that caste was not merely a social division but a system of graded inequality where each caste oppressed those below it.
He rejected reformist attempts to merely “soften” caste.
For Ambedkar, caste had to be annihilated.
He famously declared:
“You cannot build anything on the foundations of caste. You cannot build up a nation.”
IV. Was Eradication of Caste Central to the Freedom Struggle?
The Indian freedom movement contained contradictory currents on caste.
While many nationalist leaders opposed untouchability, not all opposed caste hierarchy itself.
Gandhi and Ambedkar: The Fundamental Debate
Mahatma Gandhi condemned untouchability and referred to Dalits as “Harijans.” However, he did not initially reject varna as a social principle.
Ambedkar strongly criticized Gandhi’s approach, arguing that reform without destruction of caste hierarchy was inadequate.
The Poona Pact of 1932 emerged after Gandhi opposed separate electorates for Depressed Classes proposed under the Communal Award.
Ambedkar accepted reserved seats within joint electorates under immense political pressure.
The debate revealed a deep ideological divide:
Gandhi emphasized reform within Hindu society.
Ambedkar emphasized structural annihilation of caste.
The nationalist movement often prioritized political independence over social revolution.
For millions of Dalits, however, social freedom remained incomplete even after independence.
V. Constituent Assembly Debates and Constitutional Vision
The Constituent Assembly recognized caste oppression as incompatible with democracy.
Dr. Ambedkar warned that India was entering a life of contradictions:
“In politics we will have equality and in social and economic life we will have inequality.”
The Constitution attempted to transform Indian society through principles of liberty, equality, fraternity, and dignity.
Key Constitutional Provisions
Article 14
Equality before law.
Article 15
Prohibition of discrimination on grounds of caste, religion, sex, race.
Article 16
Equality in public employment and affirmative action.
Article 17
Abolition of untouchability.
This was revolutionary.
The Constitution did not merely condemn untouchability morally; it criminalized it.
Article 21
Protection of life and dignity.
Article 46
Promotion of educational and economic interests of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.
Articles 330 and 332
Political reservation.
The Constitution adopted substantive equality rather than formal equality.
It recognized that historical injustice required compensatory measures.
VI. Evolution of Protective Legislation
1. Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955
Initially enacted as the Untouchability (Offences) Act, this law criminalized practices arising from untouchability.
However, enforcement remained weak.
2. Rise in Atrocities and Need for Stronger Law
Despite constitutional guarantees, caste violence continued.
Massacres, social boycotts, sexual violence against Dalit women, bonded labour, and land dispossession exposed the limitations of ordinary criminal law.
Parliament therefore enacted the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989.
The legislation recognized caste violence as structural rather than isolated.
The Statement of Objects and Reasons acknowledged:
continued indignities,
social and economic exploitation,
denial of civil rights,
violence and humiliation.
The Act created special offences specifically targeting caste atrocities.
VII. Important Provisions of the SC/ST Act
Section 3(1)(r)
Intentional insult or intimidation with intent to humiliate a member of SC/ST in any place within public view.
Section 3(1)(s)
Abusing by caste name in any place within public view.
Section 3(2)(v)
Enhanced punishment where offences are committed on the ground of caste identity.
Section 14
Special Courts for speedy trial.
Section 15A
Rights of victims and witnesses.
Section 18
Bar on anticipatory bail.
The Act was amended in 2015 and 2018 to strengthen protections and reverse judicial dilution.
The amendments expanded the definition of atrocities and reinforced victim rights.
VIII. Judicial Interpretation of the SC/ST Act
Indian courts have delivered both progressive and restrictive judgments regarding caste atrocities.
Progressive Judicial Approaches
State of Karnataka v. Appa Balu Ingale (1993)
The Supreme Court recognized untouchability as a continuing social reality and emphasized constitutional commitment to social equality.
Arumugam Servai v. State of Tamil Nadu (2011)
The Court condemned caste-based abuses and held that terms like “Chamar” used derogatorily constituted caste insult.
State of M.P. v. Ram Krishna Balothia (1995)
The Court upheld the constitutional validity of the bar on anticipatory bail under the SC/ST Act.
Vilas Pandurang Pawar v. State of Maharashtra (2012)
The Court emphasized strict enforcement of the Act to protect vulnerable communities.
Prithvi Raj Chauhan v. Union of India (2020)
The Supreme Court upheld the constitutional validity of the 2018 amendments restoring protections diluted in Subhash Kashinath Mahajan.
Restrictive Judicial Trends
Swaran Singh v. State (2008)
The Court distinguished between “public place” and “public view.”
Hitesh Verma v. State of Uttarakhand (2020)
The Court held that caste abuse inside a building without public presence did not satisfy the “public view” requirement.
Gunjan v. State (NCT of Delhi) (2026)
The latest judgment extends this restrictive interpretation.
The Court held that abuse inside a residential house outside public gaze would not attract Sections 3(1)(r) and 3(1)(s).
IX. The Problem with the “Public View” Doctrine
The judgment in Gunjan raises profound constitutional concerns.
1. Caste Oppression Often Occurs in Private Spaces
Historically, caste humiliation occurred precisely within spaces considered “private”:
kitchens,
fields,
homes,
workplaces,
temples,
classrooms,
hostels,
landlords’ estates.
Dalit agricultural labourers often work on privately owned farms.
Domestic workers frequently face caste abuse within private homes.
Dalit sanitation workers encounter humiliation within gated institutions.
To exclude such spaces from the protective ambit of the Act risks shielding the most common sites of caste discrimination.
2. Formalism versus Constitutional Morality
The judgment adopts textual formalism.
But constitutional jurisprudence requires socially contextual interpretation.
The Constitution is not merely a legal document. It is a transformative project.
Constitutional morality demands that courts interpret protective legislation in light of social realities.
3. Misunderstanding the Nature of Humiliation
Humiliation does not become less violent because it occurs privately.
In many cases, private humiliation is more coercive because victims lack witnesses, support, or institutional access.
A Dalit domestic worker abused inside an employer’s home experiences caste domination no less severely than abuse on a public road.
4. Public Visibility Cannot Determine Human Dignity
The logic underlying the judgment implies that dignity violations matter less unless publicly witnessed.
This is inconsistent with Article 21 jurisprudence recognizing dignity as intrinsic.
The Constitution protects dignity even in intimate and private spaces.
X. Caste and Contemporary India
Despite economic modernization, caste remains deeply embedded in Indian society.
1. NCRB Data and Continuing Atrocities
National Crime Records Bureau data consistently records tens of thousands of cases annually under the SC/ST Act.
Crimes include:
murder,
rape,
social boycott,
assault,
land grabbing,
humiliation,
bonded labour,
forced displacement.
States frequently reporting high numbers of atrocities include:
Uttar Pradesh,
Rajasthan,
Madhya Pradesh,
Bihar,
Odisha,
Maharashtra.
Low conviction rates and delayed trials further weaken access to justice.
Many cases remain underreported due to:
fear of retaliation,
police reluctance,
social dependence,
political pressure.
2. Caste and Education
Discrimination persists in schools and universities.
Dalit students continue to report:
segregation in seating,
caste slurs,
exclusion from hostels,
institutional harassment.
The deaths of Rohith Vemula and several other marginalized students sparked nationwide debate about caste within higher education.
3. Manual Scavenging
Despite legal prohibition, manual scavenging continues.
Sanitation labour remains overwhelmingly caste-based.
Deaths inside sewers repeatedly expose the persistence of hereditary caste labour.
4. Inter-Caste Violence
Honour killings continue across several states.
Inter-caste couples face:
social boycott,
violence,
displacement,
murder.
This reveals the continuing obsession with caste purity.
XI. Caste and Electoral Politics
Modern Indian democracy simultaneously challenges and reproduces caste.
Political mobilization enabled marginalized communities to gain representation.
Yet caste also became a central electoral instrument.
1. Vote Banks and Caste Arithmetic
Political parties routinely calculate:
caste demographics,
caste alliances,
dominant caste blocs,
sub-caste mobilization.
Candidate selection often depends upon caste equations rather than ideological commitment.
2. Symbolic Empowerment versus Structural Change
Reservation enabled emergence of Dalit political leadership.
However, symbolic representation has not automatically dismantled structural inequality.
Landlessness, educational deprivation, and caste violence remain widespread.
3. Dominant Caste Assertion
Affirmative action policies triggered backlash from dominant castes in many regions.
Anti-reservation agitations and violence revealed resistance to social redistribution.
Caste therefore remains both a tool of oppression and a vehicle of political negotiation.
XII. Social Science Studies on Caste Discrimination
Multiple studies demonstrate the persistence of caste discrimination.
Thorat and Newman Study
Studies by Sukhadeo Thorat and Katherine Newman documented discrimination in:
housing,
employment,
urban rental markets.
Applicants with Dalit names frequently faced exclusion.
India Human Development Survey
The survey found continuing practices of untouchability in many Indian households.
Oxfam and Economic Inequality Studies
Dalits remain disproportionately represented among:
landless labourers,
sanitation workers,
informal workers,
poor households.
Caste and class overlap significantly.
Economic liberalization did not erase caste hierarchy.
Rather, caste adapted to new economic conditions.
XIII. Constitutional Morality versus Social Morality
Dr. Ambedkar warned that constitutional morality was not a natural sentiment.
Indian society remained governed largely by social morality rooted in caste.
The judiciary therefore bears a constitutional responsibility to protect transformative values.
The Supreme Court itself has repeatedly invoked constitutional morality in cases concerning:
LGBTQ rights,
privacy,
dignity,
gender equality.
Yet in caste jurisprudence, courts sometimes retreat into narrow formalism.
The “public view” doctrine risks privileging technical visibility over substantive humiliation.
The question should not merely be:
“Was the abuse publicly visible?”
But rather:
“Was caste hierarchy weaponized to humiliate and subordinate?”
XIV. The Soul of the Constitution and the Intent of the SC/ST Act
The SC/ST Act emerged from the recognition that ordinary criminal law was insufficient to address caste violence.
Its purpose was not only punitive.
It was civilizational.
The legislation acknowledged that caste humiliation destroys:
dignity,
citizenship,
equality,
fraternity.
The Constitution envisions fraternity as essential to democracy.
Caste destroys fraternity by creating graded human worth.
Any interpretation narrowing the protective scope of anti-atrocity law risks undermining constitutional transformation.
The Supreme Court has repeatedly affirmed that beneficial legislation must receive liberal interpretation.
In State of Karnataka v. Appa Balu Ingale, the Court recognized untouchability as a continuing national shame.
In Safai Karamchari Andolan v. Union of India (2014), the Court condemned manual scavenging as a violation of dignity.
In Indian Young Lawyers Association v. State of Kerala (Sabarimala case), constitutional morality was placed above exclusionary custom.
These principles should guide anti-caste jurisprudence.
XV. Reimagining the Meaning of “Public View”
The phrase “within public view” requires contextual interpretation.
A rigid physical understanding fails to capture caste realities.
Publicness may not depend merely upon open streets.
Caste humiliation inside a workplace, institutional space, residential complex, employer’s home, or educational establishment may still reinforce social subordination.
The law must recognize structural power relations.
Otherwise, the most invisible forms of caste domination become legally invisible.
XVI. The Need for Institutional Sensitization
Legal reform alone cannot eradicate caste.
Police, judiciary, bureaucracy, educational institutions, and media require deep social sensitization.
Implementation gaps remain severe:
delayed FIRs,
hostile investigation,
witness intimidation,
political interference,
low conviction rates.
Special courts often suffer from vacancies and delays.
Victims continue to face social and economic retaliation.
The struggle against caste therefore requires:
legal enforcement,
educational reform,
land redistribution,
social democratization,
institutional accountability.
XVII. Ambedkar’s Warning and India’s Democratic Future
Dr. Ambedkar warned that political democracy cannot survive without social democracy.
Social democracy rests upon:
liberty,
equality,
fraternity.
Caste fundamentally negates fraternity.
The continuing violence against Dalits and Adivasis demonstrates that constitutional promises remain incomplete.
India’s democratic legitimacy depends upon its ability to confront caste honestly.
A democracy that tolerates humiliation cannot claim moral greatness.
Conclusion
The Supreme Court’s judgment in Gunjan v. State (NCT of Delhi) represents more than a technical interpretation of statutory language. It reflects an ongoing tension within Indian constitutionalism between formal legality and transformative justice.
The requirement of “public view” under Sections 3(1)(r) and 3(1)(s) cannot be interpreted in isolation from the historical structure of caste oppression. Caste discrimination in India has never been confined to public squares alone. It survives most powerfully in ordinary spaces of everyday life — homes, farms, schools, temples, workplaces, kitchens, and institutions.
To exclude such spaces from meaningful legal scrutiny risks insulating the very domains where caste power operates most intimately.
The Constitution of India was not drafted merely to preserve social order. It was drafted to transform society.
Article 17 was revolutionary because it recognized that untouchability was not simply a private prejudice but a national crime against human dignity.
The SC/ST Act carried forward this constitutional vision.
Its soul lies in protecting dignity, equality, and fraternity.
Any interpretation that weakens that protection must be examined critically.
The struggle against caste in India has been long, painful, and unfinished.
From Buddha to Phule, from Periyar to Ambedkar, generations fought not merely for legal reform but for the annihilation of caste itself.
That struggle continues.
And the Constitution remains its greatest moral weapon.
“Untouchability was not merely social exclusion; it was the organization of humiliation.”
“Caste survives not only in public violence but in private obedience.”
“The Constitution promised dignity. Society still negotiates it through caste.”
“A democracy cannot become socially just while humiliation remains hereditary.”
“The SC/ST Act was not enacted merely to punish abuse; it was enacted to confront a civilization structured through graded inequality.”
The battle against caste is not only legal or political. It is civilizational.
The question before India is whether constitutional morality will ultimately prevail over inherited hierarchy.
The answer to that question will determine the future of Indian democracy itself.
Important Cases Referred
1. Gunjan v. State (NCT of Delhi), Criminal Appeal No. 2446 of 2026
2. Swaran Singh v. State, (2008) 8 SCC 435
3. Hitesh Verma v. State of Uttarakhand, (2020) 10 SCC 710
4. Karuppudayar v. State, 2025 SCC OnLine SC 215
5. State of Karnataka v. Appa Balu Ingale, (1993) 2 SCC 349
6. Arumugam Servai v. State of Tamil Nadu, (2011) 6 SCC 405
7. State of M.P. v. Ram Krishna Balothia, (1995) 3 SCC 221
8. Vilas Pandurang Pawar v. State of Maharashtra, (2012) 8 SCC 795
9. Prithvi Raj Chauhan v. Union of India, (2020) 4 SCC 727
10. Safai Karamchari Andolan v. Union of India, (2014) 11 SCC 224
11. Subhash Kashinath Mahajan v. State of Maharashtra, (2018) 6 SCC 454
12. Indian Young Lawyers Association v. State of Kerala, (2019) 11 SCC 1
13. State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal, 1992 Supp (1) SCC 335
References
1. B.R. Ambedkar — Annihilation of Caste
2. B.R. Ambedkar — Who Were the Shudras?
3. B.R. Ambedkar — The Untouchables
4. Jyotiba Phule — Gulamgiri
5. Gail Omvedt — Dalits and the Democratic Revolution
6. Christophe Jaffrelot — India’s Silent Revolution
7. Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd — Why I Am Not a Hindu
8. Gopal Guru — Humiliation: Claims and Context
9. Anand Teltumbde — Republic of Caste
10. Sukhadeo Thorat and Katherine Newman — Blocked by Caste
11. Eleanor Zelliot — From Untouchable to Dalit
12. Periyar E.V. Ramasamy — Speeches and Writings
