Madras High Court Removes Observation In Judgment That Origin Of Caste System Is Less Than A Century Old

In the judgment uploaded on March 6th, Justice Anita Sumanth had observed as under,

"This Court agrees unequivocally that there are inequities based on caste present in society today and that they are to be eschewed. However, the origins of the caste system as we know it today are less than a century old…”

However, in the copy of the judgement that is currently available on the Madras High Court website, the above observations have been removed and instead, it has been observed as under,

“This Court agrees unequivocally that there are inequities based on caste, present in society today and that they are to be eschewed. However, the categorization of castes as we know them today, is a far more recent and modern phenomenon…”

The court had also observed that Sanatana Dharma connotes an uplifting, noble, and virtuous code of conduct and thus opined that the divisive meaning that was attributed to Sanatana Dharma by the Ministers/MP was erroneous.

The observations were made on quo warranto pleas filed by office bearers of Hindu Munnani Organisation- T Manohar, Kishore Kumar, and VP Jayakumar in their personal capacity. Though the court held the statements to be perverse and spreading hatred against particular community, it refused to pass quo warranto against the Minister and observed that since there was no conviction in the FIRs against the Ministers and MP, the writ was premature and thus the reliefs sought could not be granted.

The court had noted that the list of enumerated disqualifications under the Representation of People Act was like a Lakshman Rekha and the court was bound to follow it. Thus, noting that the Ministers/MP had not been convicted in the pending criminal proceedings, the court refrained from passing any orders against the office.