Laws will be changed to curb mob lynching in India: Amit Shah

New Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah said that the Union government has written to various state governments and Union Territories to work on changing the laws in the country to prevent incidents of mob lynching.

Speaking in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday, Amit Shah stated, "We are working to bring changes in CrPC and IPC. The central government has already written to state governments and Union Territories. We have also formed a committee to look into changes required in CrPC and IPC. Once the suggestions come in, we will look into it to make the changes."

Meanwhile, the Home Ministry justified the reasons behind government not mentioning mob lynching deaths in the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data that was released earlier this year. Citing the reasons, the Home Ministry said the data on such deaths pertaining to mob lynching was collected but found to be "unreliable and prone to misinterpretation".

MHA said that data was collected under "various crime heads which are clearly defined under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and special and local laws". "NCRB for the first time collected data on some new additional parameters or crime heads Including mob lynching, etc. for the year 2017."

The statement further added that, "But it was observed that the data was unreliable and their definitions were prone to misinterpretation. Therefore, NCRB did not consider it appropriate to publish such unreliable data separately."

The notorious cases of mob lynching have been surfacing all across India, especially in the northern states, Many videos of right-wing extremists have been surfacing, where the victims often of Muslim faith are forcefully made to say Hindu chants and slogans. There has been mounting pressure on the Centre to address the issues and tackle it at the earliest.