In Rajasthan’s Shri Ganganagar district, a state government employee who alleged charges of corruption against a superior officer has himself been charged under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
Vijay Kumar Sharma, a veterinary assistant working for the government of Rajasthan filed a complaint against Dr Ramprakash Nayak, the Divisional Deputy Director of the Animal Husbandry Department and accused the senior officer of corruption. Subsequently, Vjiay Kumar Sharma was charged under the SC/ST Act and was sent to jail for 28 days.
The 65 year-old Sharma has said that he is now fed up with the SC/ST Act and has been forced to take his own life. He will take this extreme step on January 26, Republic Day, to create awareness in the nation on the ill-effects of the SC/ST Act, he said.
According to Sharma, he has been complaining regularly to the government about Dr Nayak’s alleged corruption, due to which Dr Nayak had threatened him several times. The latter then proceeded to accuse Vijay Kumar Sharma under the SC/ST Act, alleging that Sharma’s frequents complaints of corruption against him (Dr Nayak) were due to caste discrimination. Sharma then had to resign from his post and is now running from pillar to post. Sharma has said that he is currently out on bail, and that he is too old and tired to fight the legal challenge. Despite being the voice of truth against corruption, he was falsely implicated under the SC/ST Act and jailed, he added.
Preferring death over corruption, Sharma hopes that his death will send a message to people everywhere in the country on how the SC/ST Act is being misused against the common man.