Socially embedded hierarchies trigger hate crimes, says legal expert

Bengaluru: Hate crimes in India involve perpetrators who are motivated by a hostility towards “real or perceived identities” that emerge from socially embedded hierarchies, Mohsin Alam Bhat, Assistant Professor at the School of Law, Queen Mary University of London, said here on Friday.

Speaking at a Friday Forum talk at the Alternative Law Forum (ALF), he drew inferences from hate crimes committed across the country after 2014 and said the language in which these crimes are officially reported should do more than documentation. 

The individualised targeting of communities, such as cow vigilantism, is justified using official discretion to build narratives while filing complaints and FIRs, he said. 

Speaking on the social ramifications of hate crimes, Bhat said more often than not, the message of individualised hate crimes was not meant for the victim alone, but the victim’s community at large. This emerges out of a larger social problem, he said. 

The session was moderated by human rights lawyer Manavi Atri. The talk was followed by a discussion involving ALF members, journalism and law students, social justice activists and writers.