Work

Truth clashes: caste atrocities, false cases, and the limits of hate crime law in North India

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: This article brings together theories of truth in legal anthropology and the anthropology of religion to highlight how legal institutions can co‐opt hate crime laws and reproduce patterns of sociopolitical oppression. Drawing on extensive ethnographic research on the social life of India's only hate crime law – the 1989 Prevention of Atrocities Act (PoA), which punishes violence against Dalit (ex‐untouchable) communities – the article argues that hate crime cases involve a clash between three different truth logics: attributive truth or credibility; formal juridical truth regimes defined by evidentiary technicalities; and a distinct mode of experiential‐discriminatory truth, which is defined by its processual character. As Indian police and judiciary conflate these truth logics in practice, they publicly and legally erase realities of caste discrimination and (re)construct marginalized communities like Dalits as greedy and unreliable narrators.

Source: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute

DOI: 10.1111/1467-9655.14094

Author: Sandhya Fuchs

Institution: Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

Language: English

Topic: South Asian Studies and Diaspora

Subfield: Philosophy

Field: Arts and Humanities

Domain: Social Sciences

SDG: Peace, justice, and strong institutions

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $4,120