Retired Dalit officer’s car and furniture ‘cleansed’

The Kerala Human Rights Commission has registered a case and sought an explanation from the secretary, taxes department, after the office and car used by a Scheduled Caste state government officer was allegedly cleansed with cowdung after his retirement from service.

Former Inspector General of Registration A K Ramakrishnan, who retired on March 31, petitioned the rights panel, saying the “inhumane behaviour” had insulted him and all backward communities. The panel has sought a report by May 7.

Ramakrishnan said the incident took place on April 1, after the new IG assumed office. On the first day, a section of officials reportedly sprayed cowdung-mixed water on the office furniture, the threshold and the official vehicle. Ramakrishnan claimed that in order to refute allegations that this was done because he was a Dalit, cowdung-water was sprayed in the entire office the next day.

Ramakrishnan said a section of officials had borne a grudge against him since he took over five years ago, and cracked down on some of them. “That might have provoked a section in the office. On the day I retired, there had been celebrations by bursting crackers,” he said.

Calling it an insult to the SC community and a violation of their human rights, Ramakrishnan said if a senior officer could be treated like this, one could well imagine what officials at junior levels might be facing.

In a similar incident in November 2010, the chamber of the panchayat president at Elanthur had been found cleansed with cowdung-water after the president belonging to the SC community demitted office.