Question

What are the legal measures undertaken to check untouchability?

Answer 1

Hint: Untouchability is a practice born out of the caste system which prescribes social sanctions against persons born at the bottom of the purity pollution scale. The untouchable castes were considered impure and the other castes were prescribed to maintain distance from them. Untouchability consists of a host of other practices that are humiliating and discriminatory.

Complete Step by Step answer:
The makers of our constitution wanted to ensure that the evil practice of untouchability doesn’t continue in independent India and hence wrote various provisions in the constitution to abolish untouchability.Untouchability doesn't have an exact definition. Generally, it includes not allowing people of certain castes to enter public spaces, refusing to render services to them and promoting untouchability.

Article 17 abolishes ‘untouchability’ and forbids its practice in any form. It states enforcement of any disability arising out of untouchability shall be an offence punishable in accordance with law.
In that direction, Protection of Civil Rights Act 1955 was enacted which prescribes punishment for the enforcement of any disability arising from preaching and practice of untouchability.Another law in the similar direction is the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribes Prevention of Atrocities Act 1989 that has made strict laws against an extensive list of atrocities that are inflicted on SC and ST people. It is an extensive act that prescribes strict punishment against caste atrocities like not allowing these castes from entering public places, garlanding them with footwear, using casteist abuses and other acts that are derogatory to human dignity

Note: The Untouchability Offences Act 1955 was later renamed as Protection of Civil Rights Act in 1977.Apart from these legal measures, the state has taken other measures to uplift these castes so that they don't have to face caste atrocities like untouchability. Some other measures include
-Setting up of National Commission for Scheduled Castes
-Article 46 is a directive for the state to promote the educational and economic interests of SCs, STs, and other weaker section
-Reservation of seats in educational institutions, jobs and legislatures so that these communities are adequately represented.