The SC/ST Cell of the Centre organised the Second Ambedkar Memorial Event and Lecture on Tuesday, 30th April, 2019. The lecture, titled ‘Casteist Speech: Free Speech or Injurious Acts?’ was delivered by Professor K Satyanarayana, Dean of School of Interdisciplinary Studies, English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad. The lecture focused on the significance of the legal conception of caste speech in the SC/ST Act, 1989 and the limitations of the liberal framework of free speech/hate speech.
The recent Human Rights Watch Report (2016) was discussed at length as the report highlighted alleged contradiction between free speech and casteist speech. Locating codification of casteist speech in the context of Dalit social movements and the historic enactment of the SC/ST Act, 1989, Professor Satyanarayana argued that casteist speech is not simply speech but it is moral and psychological violence and it often leads to physical violence. The category of hate speech is limited and inadequate to recognize specificity of casteist speech. Professor Sunil Mani, Director of CDS, presided over the function.