LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

DNA Deoxyribonucleic acid

SC Supreme Court

USA United States of America

FBI Federal Bureau of Investigation

GOI Government of India

NDPS Narcotic drug and Psychotropic Substance

Cr.P.C. Criminal Procedure Code, 1973

IPC Indian Penal Code, 1860

IEA Indian Evidence Act, 1872

NHRC National Human Rights Commission

CSI Crime Scene Investigation

I/O Investigation Officer

VHP Vishwa Hindu Parishad

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 CBI Central Bureau of Investigation

CrPC Criminal Procedure Code

FIR First Information Report

GGVB Gauseva and Gauchar Vikas Board

GRD Gau Raksha Dal

HRS Hindu Rashtra Sena

HYV Hindu Yuva Vahini

PUDR Peoples’ Union for Democratic Rights

RSS Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh

SHO Station House Officer

SIT Special Investigation Team

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 LIST OF CASES

 Tehseen S. Poonawalla v. Union of India and Ors, (2018) 9 SCC 501

 Anti-Corruption Council of India Trust v. Ministry of Home Affairs &

Ors., Writ Petition (Crl.) No(s).191/2019
 Krishnamoorthy v. Sivakumar and others (2015) 3 SCC 467
 Archbishop Raphael Cheenath S.V.D v. the State of Orissa and another
 Mohd. Haroon and others v. Union of India and another
 Dulal Chandra Chakraborty v. The State Of Assam & 3 Ors WA No.231 of
2017
 Farah W/O. Naim Chaus v. The State Of Maharashtra And 2 Ors,
CRIMINAL WRIT PETITION NO.653 OF 2018
 Dr Ashwini Kumar v. Union Of India WRIT PETITION (CIVIL) NO. 738 OF
2016.
 Simran @ Meena Khan v. State CRL.A. 179/2011.
 State Of Bihar v. Sukhdeo Sah & Ors Govt. Appeal (DB) No.27 of 1994
 Mohini v. The State (Govt. Of Nct Of Delhi) & Ors W.P.(C) 3754/2015
 Nandini Sundar and others v. State of Chattisgarh
 Maheshbhai @ Montu Devsibhai v. State Of Gujarat R/SPECIAL CIVIL
APPLICATION NO. 9188 of 2019
 Arnab Ranjan Goswami v. Union Of India Writ Petition (Crl) No. 130 of 2020
 Kodungallur Film Society v. Union Of India WRIT PETITION (CIVIL)
NO.330 OF 2018
 Seema Bhuyan v. The Union Of India And 8 Ors PIL 38/2018

 Abdul Karim Telgi v. State A.I.R. 2007

 Shri. Ayub K. Nongkynrih v. State Of Meghalaya WP(C) No. 64 of 2018

 Dashrath Rajubhai Solanki v. State Of Gujarat, R/CRIMINAL APPEAL NO.
226 of 2019
 Dred Scott v. Sanford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857).

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  United States v. Cruikshank, 92 U.S. 542, 554 (1876).
 Strauder v. West Virginia, 100 U.S. 303 (1880).
 Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153, 184 (1976).
 McCleskey v. Kemp, 481 U.S. 279, 312 (1987)

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter Contents Page No.

1. Introduction 11

1.1. Literature Review 13

1.2. Statement of Problem 20

1.3. Research Objectives 21

1.4. Research Questions 21

1.5. Research Methodology 21

1.6. Scope and Limitations 22

2. Historical Background Of Mob Lynching 23

3. Theoretical Framework To Control Mob Violence In India 32

4. Theoretical Framework To Control Mob Violence In USA 50

5. Comparative Analysis Of India And USA 62

6. Issues and Challenges 70

7. Recommendations and Conclusion 76

8. Bibliography 84

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 1. INTRODUCTION

A democracy's smooth operation needs to have an effective administration of law and

justice. Under Article 124 of the Indian Constitution, a Union Judiciary in the form of
the Hon'ble Supreme Court was created for this reason. As we all know, the
Constitution also provides for the creation of several State High Courts (under Article
214) and other Sub-Ordinate Courts (under Part 6) to ensure effective justice delivery
and to assist the Hon'ble Supreme Court. The proper application of the law is a critical
aspect of governance, particularly in a democratic nation. The Executive, the third
pillar of democracy, is in charge of carrying out the government's policies. The Police
Force is one of these executive bodies, and it is in charge of ensuring that the law is
properly implemented and enforced in the country.

Law and order are also state subject as a result of the federal arrangement, which
ensures that the respective states and union territories are responsible for maintaining
their respective police forces as well as the enforcement of the law. While there is
some influence over the preservation of law and order at the level of the Central
Government as well. This is since the Ministry of Home Affairs oversees the majority
of India's law enforcement agencies.

The police force is one of India's most well-known institutions. The police force in
India is omnipresent, as can be seen. When a person is in a time of need, threat, crisis,
or confusion and doesn't know what to do or whom to contact, the police department
and a police officer are the most suitable entities to contact. If it's a minor dispute or a
major incident such as a terrorist attack, police are the first to arrive and the last to
leave the scene of the crime. However, some incidents that have become increasingly
common in recent years have hampered the country's effective administration of law
and justice, as well as the enforcement of the law. Many times, people often mistake

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 themselves for the judiciary and begin enacting their methods of justice administration
and law enforcement, which are often based on their social norms based on their
community, tradition, indigenous literature, and values.

A case of mob lynching is the result of such actions. This was also condemned in the
case of Krishnamoorthy Vs. Sivakumar & others, in which the Apex Court has laid
down that: In a civilised community, the constitution is the most powerful sovereign.
As a result, the excellency of law cannot be tainted simply if an individual or a society
starts to develop the way of thinking that they have been authorised by the principles
enshrined in law to take adherence into their own grip and subsequently become a law
unto themself, punishing violators based on their assumption and in the sense that
they see fit.

The word lynch is said to have originated at the time of American Revolution when
it was coined as Lynch Law, which is a form of punishment that occurs without a
trial. The terms lynch and lynch rule was coined by two Virginia-based Americans
named Charles Lynch and William Lynch. Charles Lynch wrote in 1782 that the
Loyalists who supported the British side were given Lynch Laws to deal with the
Negroes.

Under the pretext of faith, customs, fake kidnappings, and other factors, India has
seen an unusual rise in crime linked to gang violence. Cow killing, cattle theft, and
beef consumption are some of the strangest causes for lynching today. In India,
minorities such as Dalits and Muslims are disproportionately affected by Lynching.
The Oxford English dictionary refers to lynching as “the act of killing done by a
mob without any legal authority or process involved.”

The term "mob lynching" refers to a large group of individuals committing acts of
targeted violence. Attacks on the human body or possessions are considered violent
acts (both public as well as private). The mob feels they are penalizing the victims
for doing something wrong, so they perpetrate the crime; as a consequence, they
take the law into their own hands and prosecute the putative defendant in violation
of the law. As described by the Hon'ble Supreme Court as a "horrendous act of
mobocracy," mob lynchings have a pattern as well as a motivation. Because of

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 gossip, misinformation, or suspicion, innocent people are frequently targeted.

The tradition of mob lynching has long been a divisive one in society. When new
information about mob lynching emerges, a few key questions arise. Questions like
– what are the motivations that drive someone to commit such a crime? Isn't there a
law in our country that prohibits such behavior? Laws are in the place to prevent
such liolent activites of lynching? The increasing number of horrific lynching
reports has brought attention to the concern of mob violence, but many honest
people have been victims of mob lynching. Murder is always concealed behind the
lynching wall to avoid criminal responsibility.

Criminals in India have realized that the risk of being prosecuted is too remote due
to a lack of laws, so they are defying laws and orders. If the government wishes to
maintain the rule of law in the country, it must prosecute and punish criminals;
otherwise, any fair rule of law would be difficult to achieve. Indeed, a law that
prohibits mob lynching is required because the current law contained in Sections
302 (Murder), 307 (Attempt to Murder), 323 (Causing voluntary hurt), 147
(Rioting), 148 (Rioting with a deadly weapon), and 149 (Unlawful Assembly) of
the Indian Penal Code is insufficient to address the growing problem of mob
lynching across the country.

1.1 Literature Review:

Due to high-profile incidents of minority brutality in recent times, there's been an

increase in public awareness of mob lynching. “In July 2018, the Supreme Court of
India issued guidelines in situations of mob violence and lynching, after public
interest cases that examined the state's conduct of such incidents. The proper
application of a part of these principles necessitates the existence of comprehensive
data. The NCRB, which collects information on official infractions in India, has
allegedly decided to collect information on "mob lynching." The author of this
article examines the classification's selection, particularly in light of NCRB's

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 present analytical restrictions. NCRB, he claims, should be given the categorization
of "disdain misdeeds" since it is more applicable to the current problem and less
confusing than other classifications. Considering a few of the international data
collection techniques, the author suggests a combination of categories and
methodologies that will provide fairness to the future strategic plan on the subject.”

M. Mohsin Alam Bhat (2018)1 The principal issue with embracing the classes of
"crowd savagery" or "mob lynching" is self-evident: there is no exact meaning of
both of these expressions. These terms don't have a presence under any of the
Indian punitive laws; nor is there any transnational legitimate approach practice
that loans any definitional lucidity to them. In Tehseen Poonawala, the Supreme
Court characterized lynching in expansive terms, as "directed savagery and
commission of offenses influencing the human body and against the private and
public property by crowds under the attire of self-expected and self-designated
defenders of the law." This definition likewise mirrored the solid 'law and order'
strain in the judgment, where the Court descended intensely on mobs that "went
rogue." This meaning of lynching addresses a specific inspiration on a piece of the
supposed culprits, which is frequently found in the American lawful and
administrative history of laws against lynching.2

For instance, in the renowned Dyer against lynching charge, the bombed enactment
that intended to make lynching a public offense in 1922, the disallowed "crowd or
wild gathering" was characterized as "an array made out of at least three people
acting in the show to deny any individual of his existence without the power of law
as a discipline for or to forestall the commission of some real or assumed public
offense." NCRB has not embraced this definition for information assortment. The
possible class of "mob brutality" is similar if not more dubious. It isn't clear how
crowd brutality is not quite the same as "revolting," which is characterized as
savagery by an unlawful get together of at least five people. The second issue with
embracing these classifications, following what I contended in the past area, is that
1
Mohsin Alam Bhat, “How Mob Violence and Hate Crimes are Linked to Social Vulnerability”, The Wire,
July 23, 2018, available at: https://thewire.in/law/mob-violence-hate-crimes-and-social-vulnerability (last
visited on May 17, 2023).
2
Tehseen S. Poonawalla v. Union of India, Writ Petition (Civil) No. 754 of 2016.

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 these classes don't catch the exact idea of the issue. Mob lynching, as extrajudicial
viciousness, doesn't catch fundamental cases like Junaid's, or various situations
where Dalits were whipped for cleaning dead dairy cattle. In none of these cases is
there any culpability that is, even on the surface, trying to be forestalled or
rebuffed.

Robert A. Gibson (2010)3 The classification of crowd brutality is all the more
pointless. It seems to zero in on the method of viciousness and not the idea of
inspiration. The issue of imprecision is amplified when put with regards to the
procedure that NCRB embraces in gathering its information. Initially, NCRB
courses its information through police staff at the police headquarters level. This is
done through the information preformed that it courses heretofore, trailed via
instructional meetings. This information streams up from the station level to the
local, state, and public levels, where it is confirmed and arranged. Also, NCRB
gathers information dependent on FIRs. Here, it keeps the 'Head Offense Rule' –
police work force records the wrongdoing under the most grievous offense or
genuine criminal arrangement as reflected in the FIR. Thusly, while gathering
information dependent on FIRs decreases the police tact in information recording,
it personally connects information to normal policing.

Aggrawal A. (2016)4 At the end of the day, if the police in the standard course
aren't documenting FIRs or not recording them under certain criminal
arrangements, a similar dissimilarity will be reflected in the information also.
Curiously, the opposite of this additionally happens and makes unreasonable
motivations for the police. In India's public culture, higher wrongdoings
information is frequently seen to ponder seriously by the police. This is because
openly talk, higher violations information is erroneously deciphered to mean higher
occurrences of wrongdoings – and consequently defective policing. Political
pressing factors of keeping an appearance of good policing frequently push the
police to keep up low wrongdoing numbers, and thusly likewise a low number of
recorded police cases. As such, the impetuses of keeping wrongdoings information
3
http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1979/2/79.02.04.x.html Robert A. Gibson updated on 26 July 2010
4
Anil Aggrawal, Textbook of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology (Avichal Publishing Company, 2017).

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 low flood into the police regularly declining to record, explore and arraign genuine
cases.

Oliver, W. (1989)5 With a distinguishable ascent in media-covered occurrences of

mob violence against minorities, the question of disdain wrongdoings has started
into generally sharp core interest. The normal life systems of these episodes include
savagery towards people by crowds, frequently on the affection of cow assurance
or between confidence connections, who record and course the recordings of these
occurrences over online media. A significant number of these episodes have
included claimed culprits who are subsidiary with conservative associations and
ideological groups. Top to bottom media reports recommends that many cow-
insurance possess or Gau Raksha dals are coordinated and run as coercion tricks.
What makes this especially unsettling, as indicated by various common freedoms
and editorial reports, is the complicity and lack of interest of the police.6

The grave idea of the issue has brought the Indian Supreme Court into the debate.
Beginning a year ago, the Court had begun giving requests because of petitions,
basically to guarantee better policing to resolve the issue of cow-related mob
brutality. On July 17, 2018, the Supreme Court conveyed a definite request that
predefined an extensive rundown of rules for the police and the state governments
in the “Tehseen Poonawala Case”. These rules included preventive measures (like
assigned officials to forestall viciousness, official refinement, and anticipation of
disdain discourse), healing measures (like optimizing of cases and security to
witnesses and casualties), and reformatory measures (like order duty regarding
state authorities). It "suggested" that Parliament form "a different offense for
lynching and give 5 sufficient disciplines." One of the significant rules in Tehseen
Poonawala was that the state and police should utilize information to find areas of
interest and address instances of crowd brutality. This was not the first run through
the subject of information that had come up in the discussion around crowd
savagery. Since 2015, individuals from Parliament on various events have

5
William Oliver, “Black Males and Social Problems: Prevention Through Afrocentric Socialization” 20
Journal of Black Studies 15-39 (1989).
6

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 requested the Central Government to give information on the number from
instances of mob savagery, lynching and other fierce episodes including 6 cow
insurances, between confidence connections or kid kidnapping.7

Non-state resources, such as the mainstream press, have been key wellsprings of
knowledge regarding current mob aggression and lynching in the absence of
genuine information. The most widely circulated data, as “provided by the self-
contained media entryway” According to Indias pend., 308 persons have died as a
result of 94 instances of 8 cow-related violence between 2012 and September 3,
2018. Indiaspend.in is also working on a new online portal named 'Resident's
Religious Hate-Crime Watch,' that must be completed by September 9th, 2018 and
tracks religious-based hate crimes. Indiaspend.in gets its data from English media
outlets, therefore it can't ensure that its figures are accurate. Numerous definitions
are used by various sources. Amnesty International's haltthehate.com portal records
"disdain violations" from Hindi and English news organizations. Since September
2015, it has been monitoring violence planned against tight and standing minority
groups. Its statistics indicate a total of 603 incidents as of September 3, 2018.

Apoorvanand (2017)8 Beyond those judgement, gathering data on lynching serves

an essential policy goal. Hatred crime is frequently violent and has a serious
psychological impact on the victim. Hate crimes, as many academics have pointed
out, aren't only harmful to the criminal justice system's soundness, and also have
serious societal implications. They sever social links and cohesiveness, isolate
marginalised groups, and erode faith in the system. Hate crimes, as other scholars
have pointed out, do harm to people other than the immediate victims.
Because the victim's identification is entwined in the act, it creates risks and
vulnerabilities for wider populations. As a result, the Supreme Court acknowledged
the political and social consequences of lynching and mob violence.

7
Citizens Against Hate, New Delhi, “Lynching Without End: Fact Finding Report into Religious Motivated
Vigilant Violence in India” (2017)
8
Apoorvanand, “What is Behind India’s Epidemic of Mob Lynching”, Al Jazeera, July 06, 2017, available
at: https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2017/7/6/what-is-behind-indias-epidemic-of-mob-lynching (last
visited on May 17, 2023).

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 A news report published in The Hindu (2015)9 It was highlighted that such violent
acts generated a hostile atmosphere for regions and endangered the nation's fabric
of society. “Hate crimes, being a result of intolerant, ideology supremacy, and bias,
should not be tolerated,” the Court said. Each of these factors creates significant
pressure on the criminal justice system to keep records of violent attacks.
Additionally, as I will point out further below in terms of the challenges of calling
hate crime data, the experience across countries is that victims are most reluctant to
report hate crimes to the police. This is in part the result of the fact that it is mostly
the members of marginalized and subordinated groups that are subjected to hate
crimes. These groups tend to have worse relations with the police and other
institutions of the criminal justice system. They are not only more likely to feel that
reporting hate crimes is pointless but also have a genuine reason to fear both
indifference and animosity from the police. In light of these harms of hate crimes
and the obstacles for the criminal justice system to respond to them fully, it
becomes even more important to maintain unimpeachable data on them Citizens
Against Hate, “Lynching without End: Report of Fact-Finding into”

Wood, Amy Louise (2009)10 Every single wrongdoing twists the working of the
general public, yet at the same time with time, we have seen that individuals as a
rule resort to crimes to get their objectives satisfied. For the individuals who for
their narrow-minded necessities sabotage the joy and in most pessimistic scenarios
poise and life of others structure the most a shocking layer of development. Among
different offenses submitted against the human body, mob lynching can be named
to be the latest expansion. Crowd lynching suggests that cognizant extrajudicial
butchering meaning, the executing of a person by definitive trained professionals or
individuals without the approval of any legitimate proceeding or the legal system.
Extrajudicial killings are regularly zeroing in on any unquestionable political,
specialist's society, nonconformist, exacting, and social figures.

9
Internet Desk, “The Dadri Lynching: How Events Unfolded”, The Hindu, Oct. 03, 2015, available at:
https://www.thehindu.com/specials/in-depth/The-Dadri-lynching-how-events-unfolded/article60291071.ece
(last visited on May 17, 2023).
10
Amy Louise Wood, Lynching and Spectacle : Witnessing Racial Violence in America, 1890-1940 (The
University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 2009).

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 Report Of Vii State Law Commission (2019)11 This wrongdoing is in the domain
of significantly something beyond one individual being lynched, for evidently
having perpetrated something. It isn't one human that is lynched however his/her
whole family; a particularly horrible demise can't be a reason for bliss to any
family. Lynching isn't only one wrongdoing that takes one individual's life and is
finished with; however, it drains the life out of the group of the perished, driving
some to neediness if, if the provider is executed, kids are left as vagrants, ignorant.
Human existence should be of a higher worth than everything else on the planet.
Each human has a life option and it should be secured and heard cautiously. These
other related wrongdoings may, in any case, be perpetrated with or without
lynching yet at any rate there is one end, which is useful for a beginning.

Journal of the House of Representatives of the United States Volume 65

(1918)12 America was the primary nation to achieve lynching. Ireland tracked down
this a limit maltreatment of the general set of laws by 1493 when the city hall
leader of Galway, exasperated at the "law's deferral", hung his child a slayer from
the window of his home, pronouncing that" equity should be finished". He came to
such a choice when he saw protestors remaining external needing equity, and it’s
impossible that a crowd in such fury would not damage the wrongdoer, so Galway
James lynches put his child to execution as the best-served equity. This
demonstration got in some sense to the United States, yet runs in civic
establishments and doesn't respect the law.

Nitya Nand Pandey 2018)13 India is a nation known to be brimming with various
societies, religions, perspectives, and much more things, however, it is likewise
known for its crime percentages, one of which is known as the crowd lynching of
the suspicioned. Till now there have been no instances of fore sure transgressors
except for they were simply expected to be one, this appears to be truly
11
VII STATE LAW COMMISSION Lucknow, “Seventh Report on Mob Lynching” (2019)
12
LXV Journal of the House of Representatives of the United States 297 (Government Printing Office,
Washington DC, 1918).
13
Nitya Nand Pandey, “Mob Lynching: A New Crime Emerging in Indian Society” 5 Ijrar (2018).

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 untrustworthy of the public authority on its part, as they have not had the option to
come through with any change striking this very wrongdoing. This seems to have
been brought about by the people for their fierceness is over any law. This is
having all the earmarks of being run of the mill for people to contend this bad
behavior by and large to be aggregate and as India is a typical country its
perspectives to side any one religion can't be possible.

Aakar Patel (2018)14 However, this is no genuine method to offer value to the
innocent, or whether or not they executed a bad behavior they don't have the
privilege incredible a dreadful scene. They were no champions executed in war,
standard residents butchered by risky fear social affairs, or revolutionaries crushed
by state power. They were 'we', the people of the world's greatest dominant part run
framework, which were sought after, hammered the life out of and tortured by
noxious, dangerous gatherings. Lynching isn't the demise of one individual or
family; however, the residents of the very nation are dreaded to be in their old
neighborhood. It's anything but a protected country with individuals loaded up with
rage so high that they don't extra them any uncertainty. Not so much as one case in
India has been carried equity to or gotten to any end to finish this appalling
movement. This is requested the bodies that have been befouled, they pass on in
crazy fear and torture, contending guiltlessness and requesting altruism. Only for a
word, the Indian Penal Code (IPC) doesn't see: 'lynching'

Akanshit Jha & Aditya Agarwal (2018)15 India is turning into an incredible
country at a worldwide level yet appeared to be tormented with swarm bringing the
laws into their hand there is no preventing them from doing it. Lynching
throughout the planet has reached a close conclusion however India, a country so
wide and different, the wrongdoing proceeds, and there appears to be no closure
around. The privilege to life, article 2 of the common liberties act which intends to
defend the human existence, which is so fiercely demolished at no expense in
14
AKAR Patel, “The Story of India and its Lynch Mobs”, The Asian Age, July 01, 2018, available at:
https://www.asianage.com/opinion/oped/010718/the-story-of-india-and-its-lynch-mobs.html (last visited on
May 17, 2023).
15
Akanshit Jha and Aditya Agarwal, “Mob-Lynching and Massacre, Threats to the Nation: Can “Masuka”
Address the Issue?” 4 Rostrum’s Law Review (2018).

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 India, which additionally goes under the domain of the uniformity and basic
freedoms commission.

NCRB (2018)16 There has been no remuneration from the focal government, in any
event, there might have been a few limitations attracted up to stop this slaughter. A
portion of the state government even made up for the cases they thought to be
conceivable, however, that is no equity to the states and families who couldn't give
that arrangement all things considered. The public wrongdoing record department
couldn't characterize the crowd lynching as positive wrongdoing as a result of the
absence of proof and information, the greater part of the cases have not been
documented yet is known to individuals. The wrongdoing is terrible and is an
absolute fiasco for the assurance of human existence, which is the object willingly
to not be confronted with such a lawful offense and rather be saved and secured.

USCIRF (2019)17 The most endured is the person in question, individuals

annihilate the casualty's homes, and their families are destroyed. If if the bread
worker of the family is dead, how will the mother and kids manage their lives, they
will be left clueless ignorant for the remainder of their life. There is no law to save
the group of the lynched; in any event, the part that can't be fixed ought not to be
the justification for the enduring of the family. India has numerous wrongdoings
and exceptionally less need remuneration from the public authority this is one such
case and should be possible just when the public authority confirms crowd
lynching wrongdoing. Regular individuals are losing their lives in light of such
disdain violations and they frequently have no clue about being in a particularly
terrible circumstance of life and passing. As the word gets out quicker via web-
based media, individuals challenge such disdain violations via online media to
command notice to them and be the voice of the country all in all with no actual
viciousness. Such is the situation for lynching as well, #lynchistan to the NOT IN
MY NAME fight on Twitter had started, however, the issue was that no laws were
securing the protestors, which was stunning to individuals as lynching is plain
16
Ncrb, “Crime in India” (2018)
17
Uscirf, “Statement on Mob Lynching of Muslim Man in India”, UNITED STATES COMMISSION on
INTERNATIONAL RELIGIOUS FREEDOM, June 26, 2019, available at: https://www.uscirf.gov/news-
room/releases-statements/uscirf-statement-mob-lynching-muslim-man-india (last visited on May 17, 2023).

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 murder.

1.2 STATEMENT OF PROBLEM:

The complexity of culture and religion along with the vast population of the
country lead to inevitable dissent and clashes amongst the people of the country
which sometimes lead to mob lynching. Mob lynching is on high rise and that
emphasizes the fact that citizens have lost confidence and trust in the government,
judiciary, and related systems to the point that they are likely to take affairs into
their own hands when it comes to the law. In most mob lynching cases, communal
issues are raised and the people take authority of punishing someone which should
not be granted to anyone. Strong laws against mob lynching need to be enacted
and special focus should be kept on the system's flaws such as delay in filing a
complaint to the prosecution of the crime.

1.3 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES:

 To critically evaluate the current situation and current laws which are dealing
with the cases of mob lynching in India.
 To compare legal framework as well as case studies on the topic with the USA
and establish a foundation for the understanding of the topic.
 To Find out why a country like India desperately needs special law to deal with
cases of mob lynching/violence.
 To give suggestions and recommendations to be adopted by the government
and the judiciary system for better dealing with mob lynching cases.

1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS:

 What is the current scenario of mob violence in India?

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  What are the reasons which lead the mob to commit a heinous crime like mob
lynching?

 Whether the criminal law system in India has provided for adequate
consequences for mob violence?

 Whether the legal framework in India to deal with mob violence is sufficient Or
need reform?

 What are the suggestions for better administration of justice?

1.5 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY:

The methodology adopted in this research is Doctrinal. Various cases from India
and U.S.A. have been taken as the main reference along with a few Articles. The
Citation rule that has been followed for this research is the Indian Law Institute
Citation.

1. 6 SCOPE AND LIMITATION OF STUDY:

The conflict between religion, caste, sex has an impact on the social and economic
status of a country as well and its very deep roots in Indian society. In India where
people are residing in rural areas gives more significance to religion or castes over
humanity and human rights. Not only does it affect the individual who has lost his
life in mob violence but it also affects the peace and security of the nation. Mob
Violence in India is getting worse and it is spreading its wings in other rural areas
and also in cities and case of any conflict, the concerned bodies shall have a
prepared method or guidelines to deal with the same. Though it is not possible to
judge every case on similar guidelines they surely help with the question “where to
begin?” The researcher plans to use an objective method of questionnaires to shed
light on a better interpretation of the theory, which concerns respondents such as

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 students and intellectual academia also police officers, and public prosecutors
because they play a vital role in this case. And because the topic deals with the
universal human right and crimes like murder etc., the numbers of respondents also
include students who are having a background in law and also religious people
which would help in their knowledge and extent of ignorance concerning the
subject matter. The topic entails a vast quantity of qualitative studies which
contribute to the said conflict-related to mob violence. The scope of the study is to
comprehend the general knowledge that revolves around the issues related to mob
violence/mob lynching and also to find a balancing point for the need for special
laws for mob violence. The limitation of the study lies in the ability to seek the
views of the other stakeholders such as judges, law practitioners, lawmakers,
people who have witnessed crimes of mob violence, therefore there exists a lack of
miscellaneous opinion.

24 | P a g e
 CHAPTER 2 –

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF MOB LYNCHING

Introduction:

Lynching is a group's deliberate unlawful killing. That's most commonly used to

describe mob killings to punish an accused transgressor or intimidate a group. It's a
type of informal group social control that includes things like charivari, skimming
on, riding the rail, and tarring and feathering, and it's usually done in front of a
crowd for maximum intimidation. It is to be deemed a terrorist act that will be
prosecuted. Lynching and other forms of mob violence may be seen in any society.
In recent years, mob lynching has grown more prevalent in India. Lynching reflects
to the execution of a person by a crowd lacking lawful authorization. Race, culture,
region, politics, witch hunts, and intolerance are the main causes of mob lynching
in India. There have been notable attempts of mob lynching ranging from the 1857
uprising to the 1947 split, community riots to religious riots. Although there is no
nation wide legislation prohibiting mob lynching, sufferers are protected under
human rights and constitutional rights.18 Lynching is defined by the Oxford
Dictionary as "the act of murdering by a mob with little or no constitutional
jurisdiction or procedure involved."

Historical background in India:

The term "mob lynching" refers to acts of intentional atrocities inflicted by a large
number of individuals. Violent acts are the same as assaults on the human body or
possessions (private and public). The mob commits the lynching in the mistaken
belief that they are penalizing the offender doing something illegal; as a result, they
follow the matter from their hand to execute the claimed guilty without following

18
Vageshwari Deshwal, “Mob Lynching- a Desecration of the ‘Rule of Law’”, Times of India, Apr. 21,
2020, available at: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/legally-speaking/mob-lynching-a-desecration-
of-the-rule-of-law/ (last visited on May 17, 2023).

25 | P a g e
 the norms of law.19 Mob lynchings have a structure and a purpose, as described by
the Supreme Court as a "horrendous act of mobocracy." Innocent individuals are
frequently targeted because of rumors, ignorance, or suspicion.

The practice of mob lynching always has been a controversial one in society. When
new information on mob lynching emerges, a few key questions arise. Questions
such as - what are the motivations that drive someone to do such a crime? Isn't their
legislation in our nation that prohibits such behavior? The existing legislations is in
place to prevent such violence? The increasing number of brutal lynching stories
has brought attention to the subject of mob lynching, yet many innocent people
have been victims of mob lynching. Murder is frequently disguised behind the
lynching wall to avoid criminal responsibility.20

The rising number of mob lynchings appears to be weakening the foundations

constitution of India. The term "we the people," which is inscribed in the Indian
constitution's preamble, is called into doubt since lynching by a mob implies a lack
of "we" sentiment amongst these individuals. Similarly, the expressions of
"sovereignty" and "secularism" are met with the most vehement opposition.21 When
the subject of mob lynching arises, the term "fraternity" is challenged. When a mob
lynching occurs, fraternity alludes to fraternity, and it cannot remain silent. As a
result, news about this iconic issue has become much too routine to be confusing.22

Lynching is a type of extrajudicial killing by crucifixion conducted out by a mob

that exists separately between city cops and law enforcement. Indians have also
been subjected to Indian WhatsApp lynchings, which are a wave of mob-related
attacks and murders sparked by the propagation of rumors, mostly about
kidnapping and organ harvesting, over the WhatsApp messaging program. They
are categorized as organized hate crimes. According to an online source, there has
been a 10 percent increase in mob lynching instances connected to cow vigilantism.
19
VII STATE LAW COMMISSION Lucknow, “Seventh Report on Mob Lynching” (2019).
20
Nitya Nand Pandey, “Mob Lynching: A New Crime Emerging in Indian Society” 5 Ijrar 808, 809 (2018).
21
Geoffrey Abbott, “Lynching Mob Violence”, Britannica, available at:
https://www.britannica.com/topic/lynching (last visited on May 17, 2023).
22
Akanshit Jha and Aditya Agarwal, “Mob-Lynching and Massacre, Threats to the Nation: Can “Masuka”
Address the Issue?” 4 Rostrum’s Law Review (2018).

26 | P a g e
 It's worth noting that India lacks a thorough legislative statute against mob
lynching. Strong legal measures and prompt conviction in mob lynching instances
will serve as a deterrent to society. In India, mob lynching has been a felony with a
latent threat looming over people's heads. The majority fears the minority, and the
minority fears the majority, creating a cycle of fear that leads to the act of mob
lynching. Mob lynching refers to a group of individuals circumventing the legal
system to enforce what they feel is justice. In a short period, mob lynching has
increased dramatically in India. Many innocent people have been cruelly tortured,
and some have even died for no reason. Aggression, caste system, thievery,
extortion, rape, Homosexual squire, anti- nationalist, witch-hunting, class strife,
and political motives are all grounds for mob lynching. The rule of law is called
into doubt by mob lynching violence, in which a group of individuals becomes the
law, judge, and executioner. The presence of a crowd in lynching is certain, and the
method and kind of violence are likewise similar, even if the reasons, foundation,
and circumstances change.23 These crimes occur when individuals become
inflamed by hatred and fury and prepare to take the law into their own hands. Hate
crimes are acts of violence motivated by people's hatred towards a specific
community, religion, area, caste, or sex. It is critical to analyze why individuals
suddenly believe a person to be a threat to the entire order to take such severe
measures as murdering him or her.

Mob lynching is not addressed in the Indian legal system, and hence there is no
particular statute or punishment for it. Lynching is the act of murdering someone
without legal permission by a crowd. During the American Revolution, two
Americans called Charles Lynch and William Lynch used the term "lynch" or
"lynch law" to describe how they dealt with black people. Punishment without trial
was the motivation and purpose of this derivation (Quinion, 2008). In the Lynch
legislation, the Inferiorisation Procedure was used to target a certain group or
community of society, with blacks being the target in America. The
"Inferiorisation Process" was defined by William Oliver (1989) as "physical

23
William Hyde and Howard Louis Conard, IV Encyclopedia of the History of St. Louis: A Compendium
of History and Biography for Ready Reference 1913 (Southern History Company, New York, 1899).

27 | P a g e
 aggression in a systematic fashion in all political, judicial, academic, financial,
religious, military, and mainstream media arenas to bring all institutions under
White domination."

The criminal justice system is the bedrock of a peaceful society. Only when a
community is free of crime can every individual live in peace and use their
constitutional rights. This is only feasible with an effective criminal justice system,
which is a necessary component of good governance. The criminal justice system
must fulfill its obligation by swiftly prosecuting lynchers to instill trust and a sense
of respect for the constitution of law.

History of Mob Lynching in the USA:

Lynchings occurred in the United States of America before and during the
American Revolution, most often in States in the south and Western frontier
communities during the late nineteenth century. It was carried out without legal
process by self-appointed commissioners, mob, or vigilante groups in retaliation
for alleged criminal offenses.24 In the first documented lynching, which occurred in
Saint Louis in 1835, a black person called McIntosh was apprehended, tied to a
tree, and burnt to death in front of a mob of approximately 1,000 people on a
downtown corner lot.25

In 1919, a series of racial riots among white people and black sailors erupted in
numerous locations across the United Kingdom. After a black sailor was murdered
by three whites at a bar in Liverpool, his companions stormed the establishment in
retaliation.26 As a result, police searched lodging homes occupied by black people,
joined by an "enraged lynch mob." Charles Wootton, an African American
fisherman who was not participating in the assaults, was pursued into Mersey and

24
Lauren Gambino, “'Jim Crow Lynchings More Widespread than Previously Thought”, The Guardian,
Feb. 10, 2015, available at: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/10/history-of-lynchings-and-
racial-violence-continues-to-haunt-us (last visited on May 17, 2023).
25
William Hyde and Howard Louis Conard, IV Encyclopedia of the History of St. Louis: A Compendium
of History and Biography for Ready Reference 1913 (Southern History Company, New York, 1899).
26
Lynching": MSN Encarta. Archived from the original on October 28, 2009.

28 | P a g e
 murdered after being attacked with missiles by the mob chanting "Let him die!" In
his honor, Liverpool's Charles Wootton College was founded.

Although mob lynching is a novel term in the Indian context, it has occurred on
occasion throughout world civilization for ages. Lynch Law, which is thought to
have been initiated by Charles Lynch in the American hamlet of Lynchburg
(Virginia), has been the subject of discussion in a variety of nations across the
world, most notably in Mexico, Guatemala, Europe, Africa, Israel, and
Afghanistan. However, it was always viewed as a major adversary of society and
so attempted to still be regulated by it on occasion.27 In these nations, mob killing
could be attributed to concerns of race, ethnicity, and nationality. However, mob
lynchings throughout India have occurred over a variety of causes, as noted by the
country's political parties, and regardless of whether the location is on the street or
in the legislature, they utilize it to further their respective personal political
agendas.28

Lynching’s occurred in the USA before and during the American Revolution,
mostly often in States in the south and west coast communities during the late
nineteenth century.29 They were frequently carried out without fair trials by self-
appointed courts, crowds, or vigilante groups in retaliation for alleged criminal
offenses. In the first documented lynching, which occurred in Saint Louis in 1835,
a African black person called McIntosh was apprehended, tied to a tree, and burnt
to death in front of a mob of approximately 1,000 people on a downtown corner
lot.

In the antebellum South, participants of the abolitionists and those opposed to

slavery were occasionally sufferers of police brutality. The biggest lynching at the
time of war, and also in all of US history, was indeed the lynching of 41 men in

27
Robert A. Gibson, “The Negro Holocaust: Lynching and Race Riots in the United States, 1880–1950” 2
Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute (1979).
28
29
Ed Falco, “When Italian Immigrants Were 'The Other'”, Cnn, July 10, 2012, available at:
https://edition.cnn.com/2012/07/10/opinion/falco-italian-immigrants/index.html (last visited on May 17,
2023).

29 | P a g e
 October 1862 at Gainesville, Texas. The majority of the sufferers were hung
following an extrajudicial "trial," although minimum 14 of them were not. The
guys were charged with rebellion or treason. Five other guys were executed as
members of the same operation in Decatur, Texas.30

White Southerners tried to maintain their dominance following the war.

Underground vigilante and rebel factions, like the Ku Klux Klan (KKK), sponsored
extrajudicial attacks and murders to maintain White supremacy and deter freedmen
from voting, working, and obtaining an education.31 They also occasionally
attacked Northerners, instructors, and Freedmen's Bureau agents. Between 1868
and 1871, research indicates that KKK was engaged in over 400 lynchings. The
period was one of instability and social turbulence, during which the majority of
White males were war veterans. Mobs frequently falsely accused Black people of
offenses for which they lynched them. However, in the late nineteenth century,
writer Ida B. Wells demonstrated that many alleged crimes were either overstated
or never happened.32

The bulk of those lynched from the 1890s forward were Blacks, along with at least
159 females. The Tuskegee Institute reported 1,297 white lynchings and 3,446
black lynchings between 1882 and 1968. Nevertheless, the lynching of Mexicans
was undercounted in the Tuskegee Institute's statistics, and the Chinese massacre
of 1871 and the execution of 11 Italian immigrants in New Orleans in 1891 were
two of the greatest mob lynching in American history.

As a way of maintaining White supremacy, mob violence emerged, and it regularly

crossed the line into systematic political terrorism "White supremacy was brutally
maintained by the Ku Klux Klan, paramilitary forces, and other Whites came
together because of despair and fury.”33 The scale of extralegal violence during
30
Allen W. Trelease, White Terror: The Ku Klux Klan Conspiracy and Southern Reconstruction
(Greenwood Press, New York, 1979).
31
Sarah L. Silkey, Black Woman Reformer: IDA B. Wells, Lynching, and Transatlantic Activism 1
(University of Georgia Press, 2015).
32
Dahleen Glanton, South Revisits Ghastly Part of Past, CHICAGO TRIBUNE, (May 05, 2002), available
at: https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-2002-05-05-0205050349-story.html (last visited on May
17, 2023).
33
Pildes, Richard H, “Democracy, Anti-Democracy, and the Canon: Constitutional Commentary” 17
University of Minnesota Law School 893 (2000).

30 | P a g e
 political campaigns grew to pandemic proportions, prompting historian William
Gillette to coin the term "guerrilla warfare." Throughout Rebuilding, a Ku Klux
Klan and others utilized lynch violence to keep Black people in check, forcing
them to labor for planters and denying them the opportunity to vote. The
Reconstruction-era Klan was substantially dismantled by federal soldiers and
courts implementing the Civil Rights Act of 1871.

By the conclusion of Reconstruction in 1877, White Democrats had regained

nearly complete control of state legislatures across the South, thanks to voting
fraud, coercion, and brutality. They enacted legislation to make voter rolls more
difficult, decreasing the number of Black voters on the rolls. Between 1890 and
1908, 10 of 11 South governments adopted new constitutional amendments and
modifications that effectively disenfranchised the majority of African Americans
and many impoverished Whites through mechanisms like poll taxes, land and
residence restrictions, and literacy tests. Some laws were selectively implemented
against African Americans, even though they were required of all voters. Many
states also enacted grandfather clauses, which exempted White illiterates from
literary exams for a short time. As a result, Black people were removed from voter
registers and left with no political options. They couldn't serve on juries since they
couldn't vote. They lacked formal political clout.

United States Senator Benjamin Tillman, who had previously served as governor
of South Carolina, expressed frankly in 1900 the philosophy underpinning
lynching, which is closely related to the denial of social and political equality.
We in the South haven't ever acknowledged, and will never accept, a black man's
right to rule over white men. We've never seen him as a white man's equal, and
we're not going to let him have our women and daughters without killing him.

After the conquest in the 1870s, lynchings fell for a while. Lynchings were on the
rise again towards the end of the nineteenth century, as a result of labor disputes
and disenfranchisement, as well as a persistent agricultural slump. The frequency
of lynchings surged towards the late nineteenth century, although the practice
lasted far into the twentieth. Between 1880 and 1951, the Tuskegee Institute

31 | P a g e
 recorded 3,437 African-American victims and 1,293 white victims in lynchings.
The Cotton Belt was the epicenter of lynchings (Mississippi, Georgia, Alabama,
Texas, and Louisiana).34

Because of the large number of lynchings, racism, and a lack of economic and
political possibilities in the Southern, several Black southerners abandoned the
region. During the Great Migration, 1.5 million southern African Americans moved
to metropolitan and industrial Northern areas such as, Cincinnati, New York,
Chicago, Detroit, London, and Pittsburg between 1910 and 1940. 35 The inflow of
southern Blacks into Northern cities altered the ethnic makeup of the population,
increasing racial tensions between Black and White People in the north. Many
Whites used brutality, intimidation, or legal techniques against Blacks to maintain
their space, while others moved to high racially homogenous areas, a phenomenon
called as White flight. In general, Black Africans in Northern cities faced
institutional prejudice in a variety of areas. Racial tensions erupted during this
time, most notably in Chicago, and lynch mobs’ executions drastically in the
1920s.

Rallies, marching, lobbying the government, publishing articles, counter-arguments

of so-called lynching reasons, creating women's anti-lynching groups, and forming
integrated anti-lynching groups were all used by African Americans to fight.
Between 1916 and 1935, 14 anti-lynching plays were written by African-American
playwrights, 10 of them were written by women.36 After the release of the film The
Birth of a Nation (1915), which romanticised lynching and the Restoration Klan,
the Klan reorganised. Unlike the previous iteration, it was well-liked by city
dwellers, particularly in the Midwest. In response to a large number of primarily
Christian and Jewish migrants from Southern Europe, the Klan developed an anti-
immigrant, anti-Catholic, and anti-Jewish stance, in addition to persecuting Black

34
Stephen J. Whitfield, A Death in the Delta: The Story of Emmett Till 41-42 (Free Press, 1991).
35
David Volodzko, “The History Behind China's Response to the Baltimore Riots”, The Diplomat,
available at: https://thediplomat.com/2015/05/the-history-behind-chinas-response-to-the-baltimore-riots/
(last visited on May 17, 2023).
36
“Officials Change Calif. Law After Activist's "Lynching" Arrest”, CBSNews., July 03, 2015, available
at: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/california-lynching-law-governor-jerry-brown/# (last visited on May
17, 2023).

32 | P a g e
 people.

Participants of lynching mobs frequently took pictures of whatever they had

committed to their captives to increase knowledge and terror of their authority.
Taking souvenirs such as rope, clothes, branches, and even parts of the body was
not unusual. Some of the pictures were printed as postcards and sold. James Allen
produced a book and an online collection of 145 lynching photographs in 2000,
with written comments and videos to accompanied the images.

History of Mob Lynching in Europe:

After the first World War ended in 1919, a series of racial riots erupted in
Liverpool amongst Blacks and Whites sailors, most of whom had been
demobilized. After a Black sailor was injured at a tavern by 2 American mariners
for refusing to offer them a cigar, his companions assaulted them very next day in
retaliation, injuring a police officer. The cops retaliated by raiding boarding rooms
in mostly Black districts, with both sides suffering casualties. 37 During the raids, a
White lynch mob formed outside the homes and dragged a Black mariner, Charles
Wootton, into the Mersey River, drowning him. In his honor, the Charles Wootton
University in Liverpool was established.38

Wolfgang Rosterg, a German inmate who was renowned to be critical of the Nazi
system, was lynched by fellow German detainees in Cultybraggan Camp in
Comrie, Scotland, in 1944. 5 of the offenders were hung in Pentonville Jail at the
end of WWII, making it the greatest simultaneous executions in 20th-century
England.39

In Germany, a picture is less clear in terms of reported "lynchings." State-

sponsored violence was occasionally portrayed as spontaneous lynchings in Nazi

37
“The Roots of Racism in City of Many Cultures”, Liverpool Echo, Aug. 03, 2005, available at:
https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/roots-racism-city-many-cultures-3528503 (last
visited on May 17, 2023).
38
Jacqueline Nassy Brown, Dropping Anchor, Setting Sail: Geographies of Race in Black Liverpool
21,23,144 (Princeton University Press, 2005).
39
“Execution at Camp 21”, Caledonia.Tv, available at: http://www.caledonia.tv/execution-at-camp-21/ (last
visited on May 17, 2023).

33 | P a g e
 propaganda. The most well-known example of the same was "Kristallnacht," which
the government described as a consequence of "popular fury" against Jews, but
which was taken place in a systematic & premeditated way, mostly by SS soldiers.
Similarly, the roughly 150 identified deaths of remaining crew members of crashed
Allied planes in retaliation for what Nazi propaganda dubbed "Anglo-American
bombing terror" were primarily carried out by German officials in charge of the
cops or the Gestapo, though innocent people were occasionally involved. In May
1944, Hitler personally ordered the death of enemy airmen without trial in certain
cases.40 Opposing airmen will no longer be safe from "public fury," it was declared
publicly. Secret instructions were issued prohibiting police officers and troops from
intervening in confrontations between citizens and Allied forces in favor of the
enemy or punishing citizens who participated in such activities.

40
Von Hans Michael Kloth, “KRIEGSVERBRECHEN: Systematischer Mord - DER SPIEGEL 47/2001”,
Spiegel Online, Nov. 18, 2001, available at: https://www.spiegel.de/politik/systematischer-mord-a-
1ca4f674-0002-0001-0000-000020794719 (last visited on May 17, 2023).

34 | P a g e
35 | P a g e
 CHAPTER 3

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK TO CONTROL MOB

VIOLENCE IN INDIA

Lynching is described as "the act of killing by a mob without any legal authority or
procedure established, “As per the Oxford English Dictionary. A "mob lynching" is
a form of premeditated violence carried out by a large number of people. Violent
acts include assaults on the human body or personal property (whether it is public
or private).” The mob feels that by committing the crime of violence or lynching,
they are punishing the victim who has done something evil or anything wrong. As a
result, people take the law into their hands to execute the wrongdoer perpetrator
regardless of the consequences. According to the Apex Court as a "horrendous act
of mobocracy," mob violence and lynching have a style and also a purpose.
Innocent people are frequently targeted because of rumors, misunderstandings, or
mistrust.41

Law’s rule is one of the important bases of democracy of India. Also, rule of law is
a pillar of our democracy. Everyone, including the government, must adhere to the
rule of law. The government cannot carry out a crime's punishment or penalty if it
is prohibited by law, no matter how serious or horrific the offense is. Even though
citizens have several protections and rights, there has been a rise in the number of
mob lynchings. Any individual who breaks the law can only be prosecuted and
penalized through the legal system. The crowd takes the law into its own hands,
enacting "justice" by executing someone solely on suspicion.

The rising number of mob lynchings appears to be weakening the foundations of

the constitution of India. The word "we the people," which is inscribed in the
preamble Indian constitution, is called into doubt because lynching by a mob
implies a lack of "we" feeling amongst these people. Furthermore, the expressions
41
Vageshwari Deshwal, “Mob Lynching- a Desecration of the ‘Rule of Law’”, Times of India, Apr. 21,
2020, available at: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/legally-speaking/mob-lynching-a-desecration-
of-the-rule-of-law/ (last visited on May 17, 2023).

36 | P a g e
 of "sovereignty" and "secularism" are met with the most vehement opposition.
When the subject of mob lynching comes to light, the term "fraternity" is criticized.
When a mob lynching occurs, fraternity alludes to brotherhood, and it cannot
remain silent. As a result, news about this infamous issue has become far too
routine to be alarming.

Mob lynching is comparable to hell in that a group of individuals or vigilantes

attack an innocent individual or families who are accused, abused for some
purpose, and hurts, kills, viciously beaten, and killed. Lynching and mob lynching
are phrases that are well-known around the world, but they only refer to acts of
violence rather than legal action or attempts to create laws that are safe for human
well-being. Lynching is defined as punishing someone or a family with no lawful
proceedings, procedure, or power. In basic term, it is to injure, threaten, and murder
somebody without their knowledge. The origins of lynching in America began in
the mid-18th century with two individuals William Lynch and Charles Lynch. Not
just in India, as well as in Nigeria, Israel, Afghanistan, Mexico, Europe, and the
United States, as well as South Africa. Black vs. white, lower caste vs. upper caste,
religious differences, Hindu vs. Muslim, killing, butchering, hauling, and
devouring beef (cattle/cow), child trafficking, and rumours blaming a sufferer of
killing someone or being involved in a crime are all examples of mob brutality.

The problems may differ, but the outcomes are scary if one looks at the statistics
and figures of mob lynching, which is disgusting and growing by the day. Now,
emerging nations such as India are coping with violent acts, events, and many
states in India are experiencing mob lynching on topics such as grudges, anarchy,
hatred, castism, and so on, and the figures are fast-growing. If we count all
incidences across the state, UP comes in front with 18 instances. Gujrat is second
with 13 occurrences, while Rajasthan is third. Such incidents occurred via media
and were then shared on social media, groups, participants, activists, and also the
mainstream press like news networks tried to telecaste the incident but only for
sake of TRP and did not make any attempts to find the reality behind the

37 | P a g e
 accusations, which also motivates, instigates, and an incident occurs on a very
wrongful mode.

2.1 LAWS DEALING WITH MOB LYNCHING IN INDIA:

Under Constitution of India:

Article 14 – “It guarantees the right to non-discrimination and the right to equality
to each person in the territory of India.”

Article 15 – “This article prevents discrimination based on religion, race, caste, sex or
place of birth.”

Article 21 - “No person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except
under procedure established by law.” It protects the personal liberty of the citizens
and prevents the state from depriving the right of liberty of citizens.”42

Under Indian Penal Code (IPC):43

Section 120A- “Criminal Conspiracy.”

Section 141 –“Unlawful assembly.”

Section 147 – “ Rioting.”

Section 148 – “ Rioting armed with deadly weapons.”
Section 149 – “Every member of unlawful assembly guilty of offence commit-ted in the
prosecution of common object.”
Section 300 – “ Murder.”
Section 302 - Punishment for murder.
Section 304a – “Causing death by negligence.”
Section 323 – “Punishment for voluntarily causing hurt.”
Section 335 – “Voluntarily causes grievous hurt.”
Section 339 – “Wrongful restraint.”

42
Constitution of India
43
Indian Penal Code, 1860

38 | P a g e
 Under Criminal Procedure Code (Cr PC):

Section 223a – “To prosecute people who are two or more in number for the same
offence under ‘the same transaction’”.

Section 357a – “The victims of such violence or their family members would be
compensated.”

39 | P a g e
 2.2 STATES WITH SPECIAL LEGISLATION TO CONTROL MOB
LYNCHING:

1. THE RAJASTHAN ASSEMBLY BILL ON MOB LYNCHING-

The Rajasthan legislative assembly passed a bill providing for life imprisonment
and punishment ranging from Rs. 1 lakh to Rs. 5 lakh for individuals charged with
mob lynching that resulted in the death of a victim. The Vidhan Sabha enacted the
'Rajasthan Protection against Lynching Bill, 2019' on a voice vote, despite vocal
opposition from the Opposition BJP, who desired that the Bill include a reference
to a select committee. The Bill was introduced last week during the state assembly
by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Shanti Dhariwal. 387 In response to Monday's
debate on the Bill, Mr. Dhariwal informed the House that while the Indian Penal
Code and the Criminal Procedure Code have procedures in place to deal with cases
of mob lynching, they aren’t sufficient. Apparently, the government has advanced
the Bill to include tougher discipline to rein in similar outbursts. It provides for life
imprisonment and a fine of up to 5 lakh for anyone convicted of mob lynching,
including the death of the victim.44

Referring to the Supreme Court's recommendation that a law prohibiting mob

lynching be enacted, Bill's announcement of its articles and reasons stated, "It is
proposed to prevent the evil from truly developing and to avert the spread of
disdain or implantation to crowd lynching by enacting exemplary offenses against
such acts." The Bill discribes a mob as a group of at least two individuals.
Lynching is also defined as "a demonstration or arrangement of demonstrations of
savagery, or those of assisting, abetting, or attempting a demonstration of brutality,
whether spontaneous or planned, by a horde based on religion, race, rank, sex,
place of birth, language, dietary practices, sexual orientation, political affiliation, or
ethnicity."45

44
Rajyasabha.nic.in.
45
“45 Government Urged to Ratify UN Convention Against Torture”, National Human Rights
Commission, India, available at: https://nhrc.nic.in/press- (last visited on May 17, 2023).

40 | P a g e
 The Bill provides for jail terms of up to ten years and a fine of between 25,000 and
3 lakh for the offense of an attack by a mob that results in the victim suffering
terrible injuries. In cases where casualties sustain minor injuries, the Bill proposes
detention for up to 7 years and a fine of up to Rs. 1 lakh. For bringing forth
connivance for Lynching or assisting, abetting, or endeavoring to commit such an
offense, the Bill seeks to rebuke the guilty individuals in a manner comparable to
that of a devoted Lyncher.46 Furthermore, the Bill allows the State Police Chief to
assign a state organiser in the position of Inspector General of Police to avoid
Lynching incidents in the state, with local Superintendents of Police serving as the
region's moderator, assisted by a Deputy Superintendents of Police, in trying to
take steps to prevent swarm brutality and Lynching occurrences. Bill390 also
includes other charges related to the Lynching, including as disseminating hostile
propaganda, fostering a dangerous condition, and obstructing court processes, all of
which would be penalised by 3 to 5 years in prison.

The bill also spells out how the state government would compensate victims
through the Rajasthan Victim Compensation Scheme. It also requires the State
administration to make all reasonable measures to rehabilitate victims of mob
lynching who have been forced to flee their homes. The degree of the harm would
determine the severity of the punishment, which may range from 10 years in prison
to a fine of between Rs 25,000 and Rs 3 lakh in situations of egregious harm. The
unique legislation shall prevail above the provisions of the Indian penal code.

“Lynching” is defined as an act or series of acts of violence committed by a mob

based on caste, race, status, sex, birthplace, language, dietary practices, sexual
orientation, political vision, and ethnicity.47 The state's executive general of police
will assign the job of reviewer general to a state organizer to prevent incidents of
Lynch, the Bill stated. Each area's director of police will serve as the organizer,
assisted by a delegated administrator of police (DSP) in enforcing anti-crowd
viciousness and Lynching procedures.
46
“Rajasthan Assembly Passes Anti Lynching Bill”, The Hindu, Aug. 05, 2019, available at:
https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/rajasthan-assembly-passes-anti-mob-lynching-bill/
article28823205.ece (last visited on May 17, 2023).
47
Loksabha.nic.in.

41 | P a g e
 Additionally, the Bill proposes penalties for disseminating hostile information (one
to three years in prison), creating an unfavorable atmosphere (five years), and
impeding the judicial process (as long as five years). Parliamentary Affairs
Minister Shanti Dhariwal introduced the bill. The state government would
compensate victims underneath the Rajasthan Victim Compensation Scheme &
work toward their rehabilitation. If such offenses result in the deportation of the
individuals in issue, the Bill recommends that relief camps be established in secure
places for them.48

2. MANIPUR PROTECTION FROM MOB VIOLENCE ACT, 2018

Before Rajasthan, the first state to enact the Protection from Mob lynching Act was
Manipur. It was deemed unique legislation since there is no codified law against
mob lynching. In 2018, the apex court characterized the Lynching Act as a
"horrendous act of mobocracy" also established numerous rules for the State and
Central governments to follow. Manipur's law is consistent with Supreme Court
standards.49 The Act's primary characteristics include the following:
 The Act's definition of Lynching is broad and encompasses a variety of hate
crimes. Lynching was defined as "any act or series of acts of violence, whether
spontaneous or premeditated, committed by a mob based on religion, race, caste,
sex, place of birth, language, dietary customs, sexual orientation, political
affiliation, ethnic origin, or any other connected basis."
 It prohibited lone hate crimes and required that hate crimes be committed by
crowds.
 The legislation stipulated that each district would have nodal officers tasked with
the responsibility of policing the crimes and the persons associated with them.
 Said legislation makes the most significant & deserving contribution, making it
48
“Rajasthan Assembly Passes Anti-Lynching Bill, BJP Protests Read More At:
Http://Timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Articleshow/70544583.cms?
utm_source=contentofinterest&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=cppst”, The Times of India, Aug. 06,
2019, available at: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/jaipur/house-passes-anti-lynching-bill/
articleshow/70544583.cms (last visited on May 17, 2023).
49
The Manipur Protection from Mob Violence Ordinance, 2018.

42 | P a g e
 the first of its kind in India. It primarily establishes and specifies a new offense of
public official neglect of duty. It lays down that police officers who fail to stop
the crime of Lynching within their area or authority face a year to three years in
jail and a fine of up to $50,000.
 It also highlighted the need of protecting sufferers of mob lynching and witnesses
from pressure, intimidation, assault, enticement, and threats of violence. It
emphasizes the State government's obligation and responsibility to ensure the
safety of victims and witnesses.50

3. WEST BENGAL PREVENTION OF LYNCHING, 2019

The 3rd state is to enact a statute criminalizing mob lynching with severe penalties
consistent with Supreme Court standards.

 The West Bengal (Prevention of Lynching) Law, 2019 defines Lynching

as "any act or series of acts of violence, or aiding, abetting, or attempting
an act of violence, whether spontaneous or planned, committed by a mob
based on religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth, language, dietary
practices, sexual orientation, political affiliation, ethnic origin, or any
other ground."51

 The legislation stipulated a three-year to life sentence for those who attack
and injure another person. Additionally, the offense carries a fine varying
from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 5 lakh and a potential sentence of imprisonment for
life.

 Additionally, it established the West Bengal Lynching Compensation

50
The Manipur Protection from Mob Violence Ordinance, 2018.
51
Suhrid Sankar Chattopadhyay, “Bengal Assembly Passes Landmark Anti-Lynching Bill”, The Hindu,
Aug. 31, 2019, available at: https://frontline.thehindu.com/dispatches/article29308812.ece (last visited on
May 17, 2023).

43 | P a g e
 Scheme for victims. Additionally, it emphasized the need of protecting
mob victims and witnesses, and any danger, enticement, or intimidation
of them should be notified to the court's attention within 24 hours.

 Additionally, the law mandates the appointment of nodal officers

responsible for implementing and co - ordinating the avoidance of
violence, ensuring the comprehensive evaluation of regional intelligence
input data on startling and possibilities flashpoints, and ensuring that
lynching incidents are not investigated by officers below the rank of
inspector.

 What makes West Bengal's law severe is its zero-tolerance policy for hate
crimes. The legislation imposes a potential one-year prison sentence and a
fine of up to Rs 50, 000 on anybody found guilty of "publishing,
transmitting, or disseminating objectionable content by any medium –
physical or electronic."52

 Those who create a hostile atmosphere for an individual or a group of

individuals face a maximum sentence of 3 years in prison and a fine of up
to Rs 1 lakh.

52
The West Bengal (Prevention of Lynching) Law, 2019.

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 2.3 Reasons Behind Mob Lynching in India:

1. Religious vendetta against a vigilante cow

The practise of selling cow flesh has long been fraught with controversy in
community. It has frequently resulted in a mob attack. There has been an uptick in
cow vigilantism since the sale of cow meat was outlawed in 2017 under the
Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act. Twenty cases of cow-terror were reported in
the first six months of 2017, accounting for further than 75% of the total in 2016,
which was the worst year for such atrocities since 2010. According to the India
Spend report, these attacks have been recorded in 19 of India's 29 states.

Muslims accounted for 51% of aggression concentrated on bovine problems during

nearly eight years (2010–2017) and accounted for 86 percent of the 28 Indians
murdered in 63 instances, by an India spend thematic analysis of the English press.
As many as 97 percent of these incidents occurred after PM Narendra Modi's
government took power in May 2014, and nearly half of the cow-related violence –
32 of 63 cases – occurred in states governed by the BJP at the time the incidents
occurred, according to a report by the HT analysis of violence recorded until 25th
June 2017. A Muslim guy in Jharkhand was assaulted by a crowd after being
suspected of stealing a bike from a hospital. He was compelled to recite 'Jai
Hanuman' and 'Jai Sri Ram' by an enraged throng while being chained to a pole.53

2. Apprehension of child traffickers and social media rumors:

A mob attack has been sparked by rumors or fears of child kidnappers.

Thiruvannamalai in Tamil Nadu, Karbianglong in Assam, and Chittoor in Andhra
Pradesh are inextricably connected. The mobs murdered people in these three
districts. The culprits were locals, and the catalyst was a bit of message shared on
social platforms.
53
“Muslim Man Lynched by Mob, Forced to Chant Jai Shri Ram, Dies”, India Today Television, June 24,
2019, available at: https://www.indiatoday.in/india/video/muslim-man-lynched-by-mob-over-suspicion-of-
stealing-motorbike-succumbs-to-injuries-1555016-2019-06-24 (last visited on May 17, 2023).

45 | P a g e
 According to an India Spend study, 33 people were murdered and at least 99 others
were injured in 69 documented incidents between January 1, 2017, and July 5,
2018. There have been nine incidents of mob lynching on kid lifting rumors in the
first six days of July only, with five deaths, equating to more than one attack each
day. 77 percent of the 69 mob violence instances linked to rumors of kid
kidnapping that have been recorded may be traced back to bogus news propagated
on social media. WhatsApp, a popular mobile messaging service, was identified as
a rumor origin in 28% of the incidents, or 19 of them. 54 The propagation of rumors
such as children being stolen from neighboring towns for the illicit selling of
organs is aided by social media.

2.1 Social media's Role

It is a well-known truth that online activity in India is on the rise. The level of
interaction on social media is quite high. In light of the present scenario, social
media has proven to be a lifesaver in terms of amusement throughout this
epidemic. In the past, the sole means of distributing knowledge was via hearsay,
which had a limited reach. Social media, on the other hand, has taken over in recent
years, and information travels like wildfire. WhatsApp is a popular social
networking platform that connects people all over the world. India is WhatsApp's
largest market, with over 200 million users. It also includes ‘end to end encryption,'
which protects privacy of user and ensures that communications of users are only
shared with the individuals participating in the chat, making it nearly hard to track
down the source of the false rumor.

Following the deaths of 22 people as a result of fake news, the Ministry of

Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) has urged WhatsApp executives
to stop disseminating fake messages on their sites and apps. Whatsapp kept its end-
to-end encryption policy, but it reduced the scope of message forwarding.
Previously, the message may have been sent to up to 256 persons. Only five
54
Alison Saldanha, Jay Hazare, et.al., “Child-Lifting Rumours: 33 Killed in 69 Mob Attacks Since Jan
2017”, IndiaSpend, July 09, 2018, available at: https://www.indiaspend.com/child-lifting-rumours-33-
killed-in-69-mob-attacks-since-jan-2017-before-that-only-1-attack-in-2012-2012/ (last visited on May 17,
2023).

46 | P a g e
 individuals can get a message now, and the content is identified as "forwarded."
WhatsApp has also included a function that allows only admins to send messages
to a group, with users being unable to post messages to the group. Whatsapp has
been actively committed to promoting digital literacy and methods for avoiding
false information. Furthermore, a communication marked as "very forwarded" can
only be forwarded to one recipient rather than five.55 Is it, however, truly effective?
Even if the ability to forward a communication has been restricted, the message's
origin is still unknown. People rely on information provided on Whatsapp instead
of news channels, which is a terrible reality. If this tendency continues, people's
fates will be determined by the forwards, and the concept of "instant justice" for the
culprit would destroy our country's legal system and democratic nature.

55
Diya Ghosh, “WhatsApp Responds to MEITY; Full Text”, Medianama, July 04, 2018, available at:
https://www.medianama.com/2018/07/223-whatsapp-responds-to-meity-full-text/ (last visited on May 17,
2023).

47 | P a g e
 3. Lynching of a member of a minority group:

In 2016-17, there were 117 incidents of discrimination towards minorities and

victimization of minority group, as well as 505 cases of victimization of individuals
who belongs to scheduled castes across the country. Uttar Pradesh accounted for 42
of the 117 incidents involving minorities. The state of Uttar Pradesh was also home
to 221 incidents of discrimination against scheduled castes.56

In response to a query in Lok Sabha MP k Navaskani seeking details of complaints

received by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) regarding
harassment of minorities and Dalits, Minister of State for Home G Kishan Reddy
said the number of complaints in regard of minority groups had fallen from 117 in
2016-17 to 67 in 2017-18, before rising to 79 in 2018-19. Similarly, the number of
Dalits who filed complaints with the NHRC decreased from 505 in 2016-17 to 464
in 2017-18 before increasing to 672 in 2018-19.57

NHRC (National Human Rights Commission) reported the most complaints of

claimed harassment of minorities and Dalits in Uttar Pradesh, which also happens
to be the country's most populated state. In 2018-19, UP reported 19 incidents of
minorities discrimination and 311 cases of SC victimization, up from eight and 215
cases in 2017-18. Gujarat (8), Tamil Nadu (7), Maharashtra (7), and Haryana (5
each) were the other states where the NHRC received allegations of minority
discrimination in 2018-19.58

The major argument offered by the perpetrators is that it is a means of delivering

immediate punishment to someone who is accused of breaking the law. It is a claim
based on the judiciary's failure to complete cases on time and deliver justice to
those who have been harmed by it. This is unjustified since no one has the authority

56
“Minorities, Dalits Most Harassed in Uttar Pradesh: NHRC”, The Wire, July 19, 2019, available at:
https://thewire.in/rights/uttar-pradesh-cases-harassment-violence-minorities-dalits-nhrc (last visited on May
17, 2023).
57
Bharti Jain, “Cases Related to Harassment of Dalits, Minorities Increased in 2018: Govt”, The Times of
India, July 16, 2019, available at: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/cases-related-to-harassment-of-
dalits-minorities-increased-in-2018-govt/articleshow/70249232.cms (last visited on May 17, 2023).
58
Ibid.

48 | P a g e
 to take the law into their hand and determine an offender's punishment. The
majority of the aforementioned cases are based on rumors propagated on social
media sites. It is tragic how a WhatsApp circulated contents may result in a
person's death. Even if they are not killed in the attack, society will view them as
a criminal for the rest of their life.

This threat must be addressed since it affects not only the victim's life but also the
lives of his or her entire family.

2.4 Impact of Mob Lynching in India:

1. State –

 It goes against the ideals enshrined in India's constitution.

 Everyone has some fundamental rights, and any assault or brutality would be
a violation of those rights.
 In society, there is no concern for law and order.
 This might exacerbate feelings of sub-nationalism.
 Radical and extremist groups, such as ISIS, might profit from the
environment produced by such events.

2. Society –

 This influences societal cohesion and the concept of unity in variety.

 This creates a divide between the majority and the minority.
 It has the potential to exacerbate caste, class, and communal animosity.
 This might exacerbate domestic strife and, as a result, militarization.
 Such acts demonstrate a lack of tolerance in society, with individuals being
persuaded by emotions, biases, and other factors.

3. Economy-

49 | P a g e
  This hurts both international and local investment, lowering
sovereign ratings. Many international organizations have cautioned
India against mob lynching.
 It obstructs internal migration, which hurts the economy.
 Using a lot of resources to combat such threats puts a lot of strain
on the state budget.
 As a result of these occurrences, the investment will be distributed
selectively, potentially disrupting regional equilibrium.
2.5 SUPREME COURT’S TAKE ON MOB LYNCHING:

While underlining the importance of Unity in Diversity, the Court stated in St.
Stephen's College v. the University of Delhi 59 that "the goal of our Constitution is
oneness in diversity and to block any fissiparous inclinations for enhancing the unity
amongst Indians by absorbing the diversities. Geographic, religious, linguistic, ethnic,
and cultural differences would be included in the definition of variety in its broadest
sense. It is critical to emphasize that India comprises a diverse social, religious, and
cultural landscape.”

The Supreme Court ruled in the Krishnamoorthy case 60 in 2015 that “the laws are
indeed the mightiest sovereign in a civilized society. The magnificence of law
cannot be tainted merely because a person or a group develops the mindset that
they have been empowered by the principles laid out in law to take its enforcement
into their own hands and gradually become a law unto themselves, punishing
violators on their terms and in the manner that they see fit.”

The Supreme Court held in Nandini Sundar and others v. the State of
Chhattisgarh61 that “the States must try, persistently and consistently, to promote
brotherhood amongst all citizens so that each citizen's dignity is preserved,
maintained, and promoted.” The Supreme Court held that it is the responsibility of
governments to avert such tragedies. “It is the obligation of the State
59
(1992) 1 SCC 558.
60
Krishnamoorthy v. Sivakumar and others (2015) 3 SCC 467
61
Nandini Sundar and others v. State of Chhattisgarh (2011) 7 SCC 547.

50 | P a g e
 Administration in conjunction with the intelligence services of both the State and
the Centre to avoid recurrence of sectarian violence in any part of the State,”
according to Mohammad Haroon and others v. Union of India and others 62 If any
officer in charge of maintaining peace and order is proved to be careless, he or she
should be prosecuted.

A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court in the case of Tehseen S. Poonawalla

(constituting Chief Justice Dipak Mishra, Justices A.M. Khanwilkar and D.Y.
Chandrachud) laid out "preventive," "remedial," and "punitive" directives for the
governments of center and states, as well as authorities which look into
enforcement of law like police and courts, to combat the rising incidence of
lynching in India.63

1. Preventive Measures:

 In each district, the government of states shall appoint a senior police

officer, not below the rank of Superintendent of Police, as the Nodal
Officer. That Nodal Officer will be accompanied by several other district's
DSP level officers to prevent mob lynching. Authorities will create a
special task force to gather information on persons who are habitual to do
such acts or who are actively spreading hate speeches, contentious views, or
fake news.
 State governments must identify any districts, subdivisions, or villages
wherever lynchings and mob violence have happened recently, particularly
in the last 5 years. The process identification must be finished within 3
weeks from the date of this judgment; in today's fast-paced world of data
gathering, this period is sufficient to finish the work.
 If any incident of mob violence occurs within their territory, the Secretary
of the relevant State's Home Department will send directives to the Nodal
Officers of the affected districts to ensure that the Officer-In-Charge of the
Police Stations in the listed locations is exceedingly careful.
 Regularly (at least once a month), the Nodal Officer shall meet with the
62
Mohd Haroon and others v. Union of India and others (2014) 5 SCC 252
63
Writ Petition (Civil) No. 754 of 2016.

51 | P a g e
 local intelligence units in the district, as well as all Station House Officers
in the district, to locate and presume the presence of mob violence,
lynching, or vigilantism inclinations with in the district. In addition, the
Nodal Officer must seek to reduce hostile settings toward any minority or
caste that has been singled out in the past.
 By using his power u/s 129 of the Criminal Procedure Code, each
policeman should disperse a mob that, in his opinion, has the purpose to
engage in lynching or unleash the tragedy of violence in the guise of
vigilantism or anything else.
 State governments will also get relevant directives/mandates from the
central government, which may highlight the scope and severity of the issue
as well as the measures to be taken.
 The central government, as well as state governments, have a responsibility
to take measures for preventing the spread of dangerous and inflammatory
words, films, and other materials on social networking sites that could
incite mob lynching and violence.
 On television, radio, and other media sites, adding the official websites of
the home ministry and the State Police, the central and state governments
should make it clear that mob lynching and violence will result in severe
legal consequences.
 In light of previous occurrences and intelligence collected by the Director
General's office, the DGP will send a circular to the SPs on police patrolling
in anticipated locations. It simply means that patrols should be taken
seriously so that anti-social individual involved in these kinds of offenses
are prevented and keep within the law's bounds, rather than taking the law
into their own hands.

2. Remedial Measures:

52 | P a g e
  If the local police station receives information that a mob lynching or
violence has occurred, regardless of the precautions taken by the State
Police, the local police station must promptly file a First Information Report
under the relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code and/or other laws.
 The investigation into these violent crimes will be supervised by the Nodal
Officer, who should be in charge of ensuring that the investigation is
conducted in effective manner and that the charge sheet is submitted within
the given timeframe following a filing of the FIR or the arrest of the
perpetrator, as applicable.
 It is the responsibility of the Police Station Officer at whose police station
the FIR was filed to notify as soon as possible to the Nodal Officer in the
district, who would then look into that the victim's family members are not
harassed further.
 The trial court should often impose the maximum sentence authorized for
several offenses under the IPC provisions upon conviction of the accused
person to set a strong example in incidents of mob lynching.

 In incidents of mob violence and lynching, the victim(s) or next of kin of

the deceased may get legal assistance without any cost and choose any
counsel from the Legal Services Authorities Act, 1987, licensed in the legal
aid panel.
 On the application of an eyewitness or the PP regarding such witness or its
initiative, the courts which are conducting trials of cases of mob lynching
may adopt such steps as it suits perfect for the protection of witness and
concealment of his or her identity and residence.
 mob lynching and violence cases will be heard in Fast Track special courts
designed especially for the trial of mob lynching cases in each district. In
such courts, the case will be tried daily. Within six months of the date of the
taking of cognizance, the trial should be completed. State governments, in
particular Nodal Officers, will be responsible for ensuring that the
prosecuting agency fulfills its responsibilities in a timely and suitable
manner.

53 | P a g e
 3. Punitive Measures:

 Wherever “a police officer or an officer of the district administration has

failed to comply with the aforesaid directions, such failure shall be taken as
a sign of systematic misconduct for which appropriate action must be taken
against him/her, not limited to departmental action under the service rules,”
the court ruled.

2.6 Aftermath of Supreme Court’s landmark Judgement:

Over three years have passed since the Supreme Court's ruling in Tehseen S.
Poonawalla64, The court criticized India's "sweeping phenomenon" of mob
lynching. The Supreme court has delivered plenty of directions to the governments
of the center and states to put an end to the violence, and it was keeping a close eye
on their implementation. Furthermore, the Apex Court's perception of immediacy
in addressing the subject of mob lynching appears to have decreased in the last
three years, even though lynching continues to occur. In Tehseen S. Poonawalla, a
three- judge bench of the Supreme Court (including former Chief Justice Dipak
Misra, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud, and Justice A.M. Khanwilkar) outlined
"preventive," "remedial," and "punitive" steps for the state & central government
and authorities which deals with law enforcement, to address India's escalating
lynching rate. Most of the same remedies were time-limited, and the court acted
quickly in ordering the governments to react to and carry out its directives. The
court stated that "horrendous acts of mobocracy cannot be allowed to inundate the
law of the land," and that "earnest action and concrete steps must be enacted to
prevent people from the recurring form of lynching that cannot be let into

64
Writ Petition (Civil) No. 754 of 2016.

54 | P a g e
 becoming "the new normal." That same case was last listed on 24th September 2018
when the court issued several orders, including one requiring the state to file a
report of compliance within a week. The matter was supposed to be listed for the
next sitting in two weeks, but it was swiftly put on hold.

A three-judge Supreme Court bench refused a plea for an urgent hearing of a

contempt complaint against states which refused to follow the Tehseen S.
Poonawalla guidelines in July 2019. Due to a rise in mob lynchings that defy the
court's guidelines, an urgent hearing has been requested. The Supreme Court, on
the other hand, is said to have declared that there is no emergency and that the
matter would be heard following the normal procedure, Furthermore, half of the
allegations presented by lawyers seeking expedited hearings were deemed to be
fraudulent. The Supreme Court's statement came just months after a brutal attack
on a Muslim family in Gurugram and the brutal lynching of Prakash Lakra in
Jharkhand's Gumla district, a month after a violent mob killed Tabrez Ansari, and
amid a host of other mob lynching occurrences across the country.65

A two-judge bench of the Apex Court issued notice to the respondents, including
certain states, the NHRC & the center, about a week after declining to hear the
contempt plea on a priority basis in another petition presented to the court seeking
implementation of the Tehseen S. Poonawalla guidelines.66 Following Tehseen S.
Poonawalla, the Central government formed a Group of Ministers (GoM) to
discuss the matter, however, there is little clarity on the progress made.
Furthermore, when the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) released its 2017
report late in 2019, it denied releasing the data which was collected on mob
violence as a separate and particular offense.

Furthermore, despite the Supreme Court's recommendation in Tehseen S.

Poonawalla that parliament enacts unique legislation for lynching, no such law has

65
Pranjal Kishore and Sanjay Hegde, “One Year After SC Recommended a Lynching Law, is Anybody
Listening?”, The Wire, available at: https://thewire.in/law/supreme-court-lynching-law-guidelines (last
visited on May 17, 2023).
66
Ankita Ramgopal and Swati Singh, “Two Years Since SC Judgment, the Spectre of Mob Violence
Continues to Loom Large”, The Wire, July 19, 2019, available at: https://thewire.in/rights/two-years-since-
sc-judgment-the-spectre-of-mob-violence-continues-to-loom-large (last visited on May 17, 2023).

55 | P a g e
 been enacted. Bills passed by a few states, including West Bengal, Manipur, and
Rajasthan are still awaiting presidential approval. The only recent development in
this regard is the review being conducted by the home ministry's "Committee for
Reforms in Criminal Law," which has requested opinions on several issues,
whether mob lynching should be recognized as a particular or different crime under
the Indian Penal Code, is one of the issues being debated.

2.7 Way Forward in India:

Lynching is now a societal threat across India; as a result, the law should be
accompanied by the inside to control it. The law should be aligned with the
following arrangements: It is appropriate to condemn any wrongdoings, not just
lynching (for example, respect executing), regardless of the number of individuals
involved. Because the heart of what distinguishes these kinds of indiscretions is not
the number of assailants but the motivation for the breaches, the law should set up
a system for dealing with single individual infractions. The legislation should
advocate for a far more comprehensive system of compulsory sexual orientation
delicate restitution. The legislation should consolidate correctional activities
against experts who are accused of neglecting their responsibilities, such as failing
to care for lynching survivors. The money should be recovered from the
wrongdoers under the pay scheme for the persons in question. We advocate
unusual enactment to deal with respect killings, detest violations, witch pursuing,
and horde lynching every moment one of these wrongdoings occurs. Whatever the
case may be, the reality is that these crimes are merely execution, and the present
sections of the IPC and CrPC are sufficient to handle such offenses. We are well-
equipped to deal with crowd lynching, thanks to the regulations established for
Poonawala's circumstances. Whatever the case may be, what we want is an
understanding of the present laws' expected requirements and the implementation
offices' responsibilities. Crowd brutality is an unwelcome affront to our legal
structure. It stems from the irrational concept of vigilantism, which incites political

56 | P a g e
 unrest, and it should be stifled with an iron fist. In a civilized country, the
constitution is the most powerful sovereign. The greatness of constitution cannot be
tainted simply because an individual or a group of individuals make the decision
that they have been compelled by the standards set out in law to take complete
control over its requirements and gradually become a law unto themselves,
rebuffing the offender on their apprehension and in the manner that they deem
appropriate (Krishnamoorthy v. Sivakumar and others (2015)67. For any civilized
community to survive, the rule of law must be upheld.

CHAPTER 4

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK TO CONTROL MOB

VIOLENCE IN USA

At the time of Civil War and World War II, the United States lynched hundreds of
Black African. Lynchings were communal actions of humiliation that scarred black
people nationwide and were generally supported by federal and state leaders. These
assassinations were acts of terrorism. At the time of 1880 and 1940, “terror
lynching” claimed the lives of thousands of African - Americans, women, and
youngsters who were forced to face the dread, degradation, and brutality of this

67
Krishnamoorthy, Sivakumar, V., & Ors, (2015) 3 SCC 467 (India).

57 | P a g e
 widespread occurrence without assistance.

Lynching had a major influence on racial violence and altered African Americans'
geographic, political, social, and economic circumstances in manners that are still
visible today. During the first half of the twentieth century, terror lynching fueled
the enormous immigration of thousands of black people from the South into
metropolitan ghettos in the North and West. Lynching cultivated a frightening
atmosphere in which racial subjugation and segregation were perpetuated for
decades with little pushback. Most importantly, lynching perpetuated a history of
racial injustice in America which was never been fully addressed. The structure of
criminal justice, in particular, is inextricably linked to the past of lynching in ways
that continue to taint the judicial system's integrity and impartiality.

America has a heritage of racial inequity formed by thousands of black people

enslavement. Slavery was succeeded by years of barbarism & racist subjugation,
most notably by lynching. The civil rights movement and 1960s attacked the
legality of several racist behaviors and structures that perpetuated racial
subordination, but the campaign was not followed by a persistent commitment to
truth and healing. As a result, this heritage of racial injustice has continued, leaving
us exposed to a variety of issues that highlight racial inequalities and injustice. EJI
feels it is critical for us to begin discussing our issue of discrimination injustice
more objectively and to comprehend the consequences of the past in tackling
contemporary issues.

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 3.1 Second Enslavement After the Civil War:

After the Civil War, the country did little to confront the persistent evil of
American slavery: the story of racial difference. While involuntary slavery was
atrocious for enslaved people, white supremacist ideology was a far more serious
impediment to liberty and equality in many respects. Southern White identification
was founded on an inherent superiority of whites over African Americans. Right
after the war, whites responded harshly to the prospect of having to consider their
former human assets on an equal footing and compensate them for their labor.
Plantation owners assaulted black individuals for merely exercising their right to
self-determination. In May 1866, 46 African Americans were murdered in
Memphis, Tennessee; 91 houses, 4 churches, and 12 schools were set on fire; at
least 5 women have been raped, and many black citizens abandoned the city
permanently.

President Andrew Johnson declared in his 1867 annual message to Congress that
black Americans possessed "less ability for govt than any other race of people,"
that if left to their own devices, they would "relapse into barbarism," and that
granting them the vote would result in "a dictatorship like this region has never
witnessed." Rather than promoting black ownership of property, President Johnson
(a former Unionist slaveholder from Tennessee) promoted a new technique that
quickly supplanted slavery as the major source of agricultural labor in the South.

Officials battled to maintain control over increasingly violent and chaotic white
nationalist groups in their jurisdictions. Initially formed as separate "social clubs"
of retired Confederate soldiers, these organizations grew to be major paramilitary
organizations with thousands of members drawn from all sections of white people.
As historian Eric Foner put it, the "wave of counterrevolutionary horror that swept
through huge swaths of a Southern between 1868 and 1871 lacked no American
parallel." While white people targeted black voters, the US Supreme Court
launched an assault on Reconstruction's lawful framework.

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 Prior to 1865, the Court knocked down just two legislative actions as invalid; from
1865 to 1872, the Court struck down twelve congressional acts as unconstitutional.
An attempt in Congress to punish Georgia for the violence and corruption that
surrounded its 1870 election was blocked by a five-day blockade, and North
backing for federal action on behalf of black people in the South dwindled
significantly. Reconstruction was compromised by the U. S. Supreme Court and a
Senate that backed away from safeguarding freshly freed African Americans.
According to one black man from Louisiana, "the entire South—every state in the
South—had fallen into the hands of the exact individuals who kept us as slaves."
For thousands of black men, women, and children in America, a new period of
violence and tragedy had started. As Mississippi Governor Adelbert Ames foresaw,
"they will be restored to serfdom." A period of reintroduced slavery.”

3.2 Terrorism's Origins in Politics:

When Alabama revised its constitution in 1901, John B. Knox, the convention's
president, started the proceedings with a declaration of purpose: "Why it is
permissible, within the constraints given by the Federal Constitution, to create
white supremacy in this state." The South developed a system of local and state
laws and practices that established a ubiquitous and deeply entrenched system of
racial castes. The age of "second slavery" had begun in earnest. By using wording
in the 13th Amendment that forbids slavery and involuntary servitude "save as a
punishment for crime," legislators allowed white-dominated governments to collect
black labor through private leasing contracts or state-owned farms.

By 1890, the phrase "Jim Crow" had been used to refer to the "subordination and
segregation of black people in the South, most of it legislated and much of it yet
maintained via custom, habit, and brutality." Racial segregation sometimes resulted
in black people being completely excluded from public institutions, opportunities
and facilities. Throughout the decades that this racial caste system was in place,
perceived breaches of the racial order were responded with terrible acts directed at
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 black Americans—with lynching as the preferred weapon. Southern lynching had
acquired a racial flavor, ushering in a horrific period of racial terror.

3.3 The Lynching Era's Features:

Hundreds of Black People were brutally executed throughout 1880 and 1950 for a
variety of reasons, but in the number of cases, the circumstances surrounding their
killings fit into one or more of the following categories:

 Lynching Based on Fear of Interracial Sex: Nearly a quarter of all

African American lynchings in the Southern were motivated by
accusations of sexual assault. Even if the claimed victim cannot identify
the perpetrator, the mere accusation of rape might elicit a lynch mob. Since
white institutions, legislation, and most white Americans rejected the
concept that a white woman would freely give consent to an African
American, the concept of black-on-white "rape" in the South did not need
any accusation of force.

Keith Bowen was lynched by the "entire (white) neighborhood" in

Aberdeen, Mississippi, in 1889 for allegedly attempting to enter a room
where four white girls were sitting; even though no further allegations were
made against him, Mr. Bowen was lynched by the "entire (white)
neighborhood" for his "offense." General Lee, a black man, was murdered
by a white mob in Rivesville, South Carolina, in 1904 for just knocking on
the door of a white woman's house; and Thomas Miles was hanged in 1912
for reportedly requesting a white female to have a cool drink with him.

 Lynching Based on Minor Social Transgressions: Thousands of Black

Americans were lynched for minor offenses such as speaking
disrespectfully, being unwilling to step off the pavement, using profane
language, referring to a white person by an inappropriate title, trying to sue
a white people, trying to argue with a white man, crashing into a white

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 woman, and demeaning a white person. African Southern states during this
time were terrified of being lynched if they broke any social convention set
by a white person, whether intentionally or inadvertently.
Jesse Thornton was murdered in Luverne, Alabama, in 1940 for calling a
white police officer by his first name without using the title "mister."
William Little, a veteran coming from World War I, was murdered by a
white mob in Blakely, Georgia, in 1919 for refusing to remove his Army
uniform. Jeff Brown was lynched by white men in Cedarbluff, Mississippi,
in 1916 for accidentally bumping into a white female while running to catch
a train.
 Lynching Based on Allegations of Crime: Upwards of half of the lynched
victims identified by EJI were executed on suspicion of murder or rape.
During this era, deep racial hostility in the South centered prejudice on
black individuals, regardless of whether the evidence supported that
suspicion, particularly in incidents of violent offenses targeting white
victims. Historically, whites' allegations toward African Americans were
hardly taken seriously. Almost all of the hundreds of black individuals
hanged on rape and murder charges were executed without being officially
convicted. When Berry Noyse was charged with murdering the sheriff in
Lexington, Tennessee, in 1918, an enraged mob lynched him in the court
building square, dragged his body through the city, gunned down it
numerous times, and burned the body in the middle of the street beneath
banners reading, "This is how we do our part."
 Public Spectacle Lynching: Mob of white citizens, frequently in the
thousands, congregated to see pre-planned, brutal killings that included
protracted torture, mutilation, fragmentation, and/or flaming of the victim.
The white media rationalized and encouraged these carnival-like
celebrations, which included people selling food, printers making postcards
depicting the lynching and carcass, and collectors of the victim's body parts.
These were audacious, public crimes that involved the whole community
and communicated a reminder that African Americans were subhuman, that

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 their enslavement was to be accomplished by whatever means necessary,
and that whites who committed lynching would suffer no legal
consequences.
Luther Holbert and a black lady thought to be his wife were apprehended by
a mob in 1904 and transported to Doddsville, Mississippi, where they were
murdered in front of hundreds of white onlookers. Both victims were
chained to a tree and made to stretch out their arms while mob members
meticulously cut off their hands and handed them as souvenirs. Following
that, their ears were severed. Mr. Holbert was then violently assaulted,
fracturing his skull and leaving one of his eyes dangling from its socket.
Members of the crowd pierced the victims' corpses with a big corkscrew
and extracted enormous portions of "quivering flesh," during which two
victims were thrown into a roaring fire and burnt. The white men, women,
and children in attendance sat and watched the atrocities unfold while
snacking on deviled eggs, lemonade, and whiskey in a picnic-like setting.
 Lynching Targeting the Entire African American Community: Certain
lynch mobs targeted whole black villages, compelling residents to observe
lynch mobs and threatening them with a similar fate if they remained. These
lynchings were intended to have a widespread effect deliver a warning of
dominance, inspire terror, and, occasionally, force African Americans out
of the town. Following a lynching in Forsyth County, Georgia, in 1912,
white vigilantes circulated flyers ordering all black residents to leave or
face terrible repercussions; so many black families left that the county's
black population plummeted from 1100 to just thirty by 1920.
To enhance the terrifying effect of lynching as a display of control and
power over the black population, white mobs usually opted to lynch victims
in a conspicuous location within the town's African American
neighborhood. In 1918, a gang of white men in rural Unicoi County,
Tennessee, hunted a black man called Thomas Devert on suspicion of
kidnapping a white girl. Mr. Devert was shot in the head when the men saw
him bridging a river with the girl in his arms. The girl drowned. Insisting

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 that the whole black community see Mr. Devert's demise, the furious mob
carried his corpse to the local railyard and constructed a funeral pyre. The
white guys then collected up all 60 African American inhabitants and
compelled them to witness the corpse burn. These African Americans and
eighty black quarry workers were subsequently instructed to vacate the
country in twenty- four hours.
 The lynching of Black People Resisting Mistreatment (1915-1940):
Between 1915 and 1940, whites utilized lynching to repress African
Americans who demanded economic and civil rights individually and in
organized organizations.
When Elton Mitchell of Earle, Arkansas, refused to work on a white-owned
farm without compensation in 1918, “prominent” white people of the
community butchered him and hanged his bones from a tree. When white
landowners in Hernando, Mississippi, realized that Pastor T. A. Allen was
attempting to organize a sharecropper's union among the area's destitute and
mistreated black laborers in 1935, they organized a mob, kidnapped him,
shot him several times, and tossed him into to the Coldwater River.
Additionally, in 1935, Joe Spinner Johnson, the head of the Sharecroppers'
Union in Perry County, Alabama, was summoned from work and given to a
white gang that tied him "hog-style with a board behind his neck and his
wrists and feet tied in front of him" and beat him. Mr. Johnson's
dismembered body was discovered three days later in a field outside
Greensboro.

 Lynching in the South, 1877-1950

Between 1877 and 1950, this study details 3959 lynchings of black
Americans in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky,
Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee,
Texas, and Virginia. The data indicate significant trends across time and
location, such as the peak of lynching during 1880 and 1940. During this
period, Georgia, Mississippi, and Louisiana had the largest absolute number

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 of African American lynching victims. When the incidence of lynching is
compared to the overall number and African American population in each
state, the rankings alter. By overall population, Florida, Mississippi, and
Arkansas had the greatest per capita rates of lynching; by African American
population, Arkansas, Florida, and Louisiana had the highest per capita
rates of lynching, 25 nations with the greatest rate of lynching of black
Americans during this century are found in 8 of the 12 states examined:
Arkansas, Louisiana, Florida, Tennessee, Georgia, Texas, and Kentucky.
The lynching fear wasn’t limited to a few outlying states. Racist dread
threw a pall over the region.

3.4 Retreat, Resistance, and Refuge: Facilitating a Lynching Era

The effort to reestablish white supremacy fueled the lynching period, but Northern
and federal authorities who remained silent as African Americans were intimidated
and murdered aided and abetted this operation of race related terrorism. For more
than six decades, white leaders outside the South stood by and did nothing as
Southern whites utilized violence to impose a post-slavery system of racial
domination.
Congress never enacted an anti-lynching bill, rather caving into Southern
lawmakers who claimed that such legislation would represent racial "favoritism"
and would violate states' rights. Southern states enacted their anti-lynching
legislation to demonstrate the ineffectiveness of federal legislation but failed to
implement them. During this time, very few white individuals were convicted of
murder for lynching a black person in America, and just 1% of all lynchings
performed after 1900 ended in a lyncher getting convicted of crimes.
By 1886, a "New South" dominated by white supremacists politicians had been
created in major part. The prevailing political dimensions blamed lynching on its
victims, arguing that the only acceptable reaction to the rising problem of black
males raping white women was violent mob violence. Southern white leaders

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 resurrected white supremacist state governments through lynching and vigilantism
and successfully opposed planned federal voting rights safeguards. When the
Southern-dominated Democratic Party won the White House and a majority in
Congress in 1892—at a time when the nation wide lynching rate was soaring—the
Republican Party "completely defied the resurgent white supremacist order" and
regained power in 1896 by campaigning "strictly on economic interests, not civil
rights."

3.5 The Legacy of Lynching: America's Capital Punishment

“Perhaps the primary reason for the decrease of lynching is that it was supplanted
by a more acceptable type of violence.” By 1915, court-ordered hangings had
exceeded lynching for the first time in the former slave states. In the 1930s, 2/3rd
of those hanged were black, and the pattern persisted.

Between 1910 and 1950, although African Americans accounted for only 22% of
the South's population, they accounted for 75% of those murdered in the South
throughout that era. In McCleskey v. Kemp, the Supreme Court reviewed statistics
of data indicating that Georgia decision-makers were much more than four times as
likely to impose the death penalty for the murder of a white citizens as they were
for the murder of a black person. Accepting the statistics as true, the Court defined
racial prejudice in sentencing as an "inescapable component of our criminal justice
system" and affirmed Warren McCleskey's death sentence for failing to find a
"constitutionally danger of racial bias" in his instance.

Race continues to play a crucial role in the capital sentence. Although African
Americans account for fewer than 13% of the population, they account for
approximately 42% of those now on death row in America and thirty four percent
of those killed since 1976. In ninty six percent of jurisdictions where academics
have examined the link between race and the death sentence, they have discovered
a pattern of discrimination based on the victim's race, the defendant's race, or both.
Today's capital trials continue to be racially segregated; the perpatrator is

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 sometimes the only person of color in the courtroom, and illegal racial prejudice in
jury selection remains pervasive, particularly in the South and in capital cases.
Prosecutors in Houston County, Alabama, have rejected eighty percent of the total
of eligible black Americans from death sentence jury selection.

Over than 8 out of 10 American lynchings occurred in the South between 1889 and
1918, and more than eight out of ten of the nation's over 1400 judicial killings
occurred in the South since 1976. Efforts to combat racial bias and provide
constitutional recognition from racial prejudice in the administering of the capital
punishment continues to be blocked by familiar claims to state-rights discourse,
and local stats show that the expanded death penalty in USA reflects racial bias.
While modern supporters of the capital punishment in the USA prefer to focus on
the aesthetics of fatal punishment in order to improve methods and tactics, death
penalty is still founded on race terror— "a descendant of lynching."

 Dyer Bill:

Republican Congressman Leonidas C. Dyer of St. Louis, Missouri, sponsored the

Dyer Anti- Lynching Bill in the USA Congress in 1918. The measure was
approved by the U.S. House Of representatives in 1922, as well as the United
States Senate Committee gave it a positive report the following year. Its ratification
was thwarted by White Senate democrats from the Solid South, the only legislators
voted because the southern states occupied African Americans at the turn of the
twentieth century. The Dyer Bill impacted subsequent anti-lynching legislation,
such as the Costigan-Wagner Bill, which was also rejected in the United States
Senate.68 The Dyer Anti- Lynching Bill, as passed by the House, stated:

"Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of
America in Congress assembled, That the phrase mob or riotous assemblage,' as
used in this act, shall mean an assemblage composed of three or more persons
acting in concert for lynching."69

68
Robert L. Zangrando, “The Naacp Crusade Against Lynching, 1909-1950” 7 National Black Law Journal
(1982).
69
Anti-Lynching Bill," 1918". Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600–2000. Archived

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  Decline and Civil Rights Movement:

Despite the fact that the frequency of lynchings fell in the 1930s, there was a spike
during the Great Depression in 1930. Four people were executed in less than a
month in separate locations in North Texas and southern Oklahoma, for instance.
In his book Russia Today: What Can We Learn from It, Sherwood Eddy said, "In
the most remote areas of Russia today, Americans are frequently asked what they
are intending to do about the Scottsboro Negro men and why they lynch Negroes"
(1934). Following World War II, lynchings became more common as protests
continued as soldiers came home. Departing Black troops were subjected to an
attempts by Whites to re-establish White domination. The last recorded massive
lynching occurred in Walton County, Georgia, in 1946, when 2 war veterans and
their wives were slain by local White landlords.

The civil rights movement was taking on new traction by the 1950s. It was sparked
by the lynching of Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Chicago teenager slain while visiting
an uncle in Mississippi. His mother insisted on an open-casket burial so that
everyone can watch how severely her child had been battered. The Black society in
the USA became mobilized. "The trial of his murders became a show highlighting
the power of racial supremacy," Vann R. Newkirk wrote. The state of Mississippi
prosecuted two defendants, but an all-White jury acquitted them.70

According to David Jackson, the image of the "child's damaged corpse compelled
the world to confront with the savagery of American racism." The Soviet media
often reported on racial prejudice in the United States. The Russians replied to
American criticisms of Soviet Union human rights violations at the time by saying,
"And you are hanging Negroes."71 The historian Mary L. Dudziak stated in Cold
War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy (2001) that Soviet
Communist condemnation of racial discrimination and violence in the USA pushed

from the original on February 17, 2009.

70
Stephen J. Whitfield, A Death in the Delta: The Story of Emmett Till 41-42 (Free Press, 1991).
71
“When One Mother Defied America: The Photo that Changed the Civil Rights Movement”, Time, July
10, 2016, available at: https://time.com/4399793/emmett-till-civil-rights-photography/ (last visited on May
17, 2023).

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 the government to back civil rights acts and laws.72

 Civil rights law:

The civil rights conspiracy statute, Title 18, U.S.C., Section 241, makes it illegal
for 2 or more people to collude to harm, persecute, endanger, or frighten any
individual of any region, jurisdiction, or district in the free exercise or amusement
of any special privilege protected to him by the Constitution or the laws of the USA
(and because he has exercised the s). The crime is punished by a variety of
penalties and/or jail for any period of years up to life, or the death sentence,
depending on the circumstances of the crime and any resultant injuries.73

 Felony lynching:

Previously, the phrase "felony lynching" was used in California law to laid down
the process of removing somebody from the possession of a police officer by
"means of riot." The California legislature didn’t state that the individual taken
from custody would be slain, and in certain circumstances, this act was utilized to
prosecute those who attempted to release someone from police custody.74 There
have been numerous significant, some contentious, incidents in the twenty- first
century in which a Black man sought to liberate another Black man from custody
of cops. After unanimous agreement in a vote by state lawmakers, Governor Jerry
Brown approved legislation presented by Senator Holly Mitchell eliminating the
term "lynching" from the state's penal code in 2015.75 "It's been argued that strong
words should be kept for powerful concepts, and 'lynching' has such a horrible past
for African Americans that the law should only use it for what it is - murder by the
72
Mary L. Dudziak, VII Cold War Civil Rights: Race and the Image of American Democracy (Princeton
University Press, 2002).
73
“FBI Miami History”, Fbi, available at: https://www.fbi.gov/history/field-office-histories/miami (last
visited on May 17, 2023).
74
Barragan, James, “Murrieta Immigration Protesters Charged with Obstructing Officers”, Los Angeles
Times, Sept. 04, 2014, available at: https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-murrieta-protesters-
charged-20140904-story.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).
75
Tanasia Kenney, “Pasadena Black Lives Matter Activist Convicted of 'Felony Lynching', Could Spend
Four Years Behind Bars”, Atlanta Black Star, June 06, 2016, available at:
https://atlantablackstar.com/2016/06/03/pasadena-black-lives-matter-activist-convicted-of-felony-lynching-
could-spend-four-years-behind-bars/ (last visited on May 17, 2023).

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 mob," Mitchell said. The rest of the law remained the same.76

 Justice for Victims of Lynching Act

The Justice for Victims of Lynching Act of 2018 was a proposed law in the United
States to make lynching (defined as bodily harm based on perceived race, color,
religion, or nationality) a hate crime. Mostly symbolic law sought to acknowledge
and apologize for previous government failures to prevent lynching in the United
States.77 The bill was filed in the United States Senate in June 2018 by three Black
senators: Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, and Tim Scott.78 On December 19, 2018,
the measure was unanimously approved by the Senate. The bill died because the
House did not pass it prior the 115th Congress adjourned on January 3, 2019.79

 Emmett Till Antilynching Act

The Emmett till Antilynching Act80, a corrected version of the Justice for Victim of
Lynching Act, passed the House of Representatives by a vote of 410–4 on February
26, 2020. Representative Bobby Rush presented the Emmett Till Antilynching Act
(H.R. 35) in the U.s. House Of representatives on Jan 3, 2019. (D-Ill.). Emmett
Till, a 14-year-old black teenager, was killed in Mississippi in 1955, generating
national and worldwide outrage.

Senator Rand Paul81 of Kentucky has blocked the bill's approval by unanimous
76
Officials Change Calif. Law After Activist's "Lynching" Arrest”, CBSNews., July 03, 2015, available at:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/california-lynching-law-governor-jerry-brown/# (last visited on May 17,
2023).
77
P.R. Lockhart, “Why the Senate's Unanimous Passage of an Anti-Lynching Bill Matters”, Vox, Dec. 21,
2018, available at: https://www.vox.com/identities/2018/12/21/18151805/senate-lynching-legislation-hate-
crimes-booker-harris-scott (last visited on May 17, 2023).
78
Mihir Zaveri, “Senate Unanimously Passes Bill Making Lynching a Federal Crime”, The New York
Times, Dec. 20, 2018, available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/20/us/lynching-federal-hate-
crime.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).
79
Ali Zaslav, “Senate Passes Bill Making Lynching a Federal Crime”, Cnn, Mar. 07, 2022, available at:
https://edition.cnn.com/2022/03/07/politics/senate-passes-antilynching-law/index.html (last visited on May
17, 2023).
80
H.R.35 — 116th Congress, “Emmett till Antilynching Act” (2019).
81
, “Sen. Paul Acknowledges Holding up Anti-Lynching Bill, Says He Fears It Would Be Wrongly
Applied”, The Washington Post, Jan. 03, 2020, available at:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/sen-paul-acknowledges-holding-up-anti-lynching-bill-says-

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 approval in the Senate, citing his worry that a convicted criminal might face "a new
10-year sentence for... mild bruising." Paul demanded that a modified version of
the bill be rushed through, requiring "an effort to cause physical damage" for an act
to be constituted lynching, even though lynching is already banned under federal
law. Steny Hoyer, the House Majority Leader, slammed Rand Paul's stance on
Twitter, writing, "It is terrible that one GOP Senate is getting in the way of seeing
this bill becoming law." While advocating to have the amendment defeated,
Senator Kamala Harris stated, "Senator Paul is now attempting to damage a law
that has already been enacted – there is no justification for this."82

he-fears-it-would-be-wrongly-applied/2020/06/03/29b97330-a5bf-11ea-b619-3f9133bbb482_story.html
(last visited on May 17, 2023).
82
Clare Foran and Lauren Fox, “Emotional Debate Erupts Over Anti-Lynching Legislation as Cory Booker
and Kamala Harris Speak Out Against Rand Paul Amendment”, Cnn, Jan. 04, 2020, available at:
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/06/04/politics/anti-lynching-bill-fight-senate-floor-cory-booker-rand-paul/
index.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).

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 CHAPTER 5

COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF INDIA AND USA

Since at least 1900, lawmakers of the House and Senate have attempted to enact
legislation criminalizing lynching. The proposals were continually rejected,
postponed, or disregarded, and the ageing process has increased the symbolic value
of anti-lynching legislation. The House passed a bill to include lynching in the
United States Criminal Code. Last year, the Senate passed a version of the bill.
Once the measures are properly reconciled, they may be delivered to President
Trump's Oval Office, where he is anticipated to sign them into law. The Emmett
Till Antilynching Act was proposed in the House by Representative Bobby Rush,
an Illinois Democrat. The Senate bill, that approved overwhelmingly last year, was
proposed by Kamala Harris, a California Democrat; Cory Booker, a New Jersey
Democrat; and Tim Scott, a South Carolina Republican. 83 USA is coming up with
special Act to deal with cases of mob lynching, India also must come up with
special legislation like this, that is why the researcher is doing comparative analysis
of India with USA.

5.1 Laws and Measures in the USA to Control Mob Lynching:

Throughout most of American history, lynching was seldom punished because the
people who'd have to charge and serve on judges were frequently on the side of the
perpetrators or linked to them in the small communities where so many lived. At
the time, the case was prosecuted under state murder laws. In 1907–09, the United
States Supreme Court heard its one and only criminal case, 203 U.S. 563. (U.S. v.
Sheriff Shipp). When a mob in Chattanooga, Tennessee, killed Ed Johnson, a man
in jail for rape, Shipp was found guilty of criminal disobedience for failing to
interfere. Due to discriminatory voter registration and election processes adopted
by majority- white lawmakers in the late 1800s, who also passed Jim Crow

83
J Fortin, “Congress Moves to Make Lynching a Federal Crime After 120 Years of Failure”, The New
York Times, Feb. 26, 2020, available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/26/us/politics/anti-lynching-
bill.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).

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 legislation, blacks were usually banned from sitting on juries in the South.

Since 1909, federal politicians have presented over 200 proposals in Congress to
make lynching a federal felony, but they have all failed to succeed, owing mostly
to Southern members' resistance. Because white Southern Democrats forcibly
disfranchised African Americans at the turn of the century, they held all of the
South's allocated seats, virtually doubling the Congress representation that white
inhabitants alone would have been entitled to. 84 For decades, they were a
formidable voting group that held key committee chairmanships. To defeat the
Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill, Senate Democrats organized a bloc which repealed for a
week in December 1922, delaying all national activity. Except for the South, it had
cleared the House in January 1922 with wide support. The bill's primary supporter,
Congressman Leonidas C. Dyer of St. Louis, went on a nationwide speaking tour in
support of it in 1923, but it was defeated twice more by Southern Senators in the
next two sessions.

The Justice Department's Civil Rights Section attempted, but was unsuccessful, to
charge lynchers under Restructuring civil rights legislation during the Franklin D.
Roosevelt administration. In 1946, the federal government successfully prosecuted
a lyncher for a violation of constitutional rights for the first time.85 By that time,
lynchings were no longer a regular occurrence. Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. was
successful in getting an anti-lynching law passed in the House, but it was rejected
in the Senate, which was still controlled by the South Democrat group, which was
aided by the disenfranchisement of blacks.86

Between 1882 and 1968, "...almost 200 anti-lynching measures were filed in
Congress, three of which were enacted by the House of Representatives. Between
1890 and 1952, seven presidents petitioned Congress to enact federal legislation."
84
Elizabeth Dale, Criminal Justice in the United States, 1789–1939 117-118 (Cambridge University Press,
2011).
85
Elise Viebeck, “Senate Unanimously Approves Bill to Make Lynching a Federal Hate Crime”, The
Washington Post, Dec. 19, 2018, available at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/senate-
unanimously-approves-bill-to-make-lynching-a-federal-hate-crime/2018/12/19/b21aa68a-03c8-11e9-9122-
82e98f91ee6f_story.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).
86
Nnamdi Egwuonwu, “Senate Unanimously Passes Anti-Lynching Bill”, Scripps News, Dec. 19, 2018,
available at: https://scrippsnews.com/stories/senate-passes-justice-for-victims-of-lynching-act/ (last visited
on May 17, 2023).

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 During this time, the Senate's Southern Democratic caucus precluded the passage
of any anti-lynching legislation. The Senate issued a public apology for failing to
enact an anti-lynching statute "when it was most required" in 2005, according to a
resolution introduced by Senators Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and George Allen of
Virginia and approved by voice vote.

United States Senate overwhelmingly passed the "Justice for Victims of Lynching
Act of 2018" on December 19, 2018, making lynching a hate crime for the first
time in US history. Tim Scott, Kamala Harris, and Cory Booker, three African-
American senators, had reintroduced the bill to the Senate as Senate Bill S. 3178
earlier that year. The measure, that failed to pass while the 115th Congress, has
been resurrected as the Emmett Till Antilynching Act as of June 2019. On
February 26, 2020, the House of Representatives passed it by a vote of 410–4.87

While worldwide demonstrations and social unrest erupted in response to the death
of George Floyd, the bill was still being debated in the Senate, with Senator Rand
Paul blocking it from passing by unanimous agreement.88 Paul counters the bill's
language because it is too vast, adding attacks that he believes are not severe
enough to be classified as "lynching," declaring that "this legislation will indeed
diminish the definition of lynching by defining it so widely as to include a minor
bruise or abrasion," and has suggested an amendment that'd apply a "significant
bodily injury norm" for a criminal activity to be classified as lynching.89

"It is terrible that one GOP Senator is getting in the way of seeing this bill become
law," House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said on Twitter, referring to Rand Paul's
position. Senator Kamala Harris spoke out against the amendment, saying,
"Senator Paul is now trying to undermine a law that was previously approved –
87
Gideon Resnick, “The Senate's Three Black Members Introduce Bill to Finally Make Lynching a Federal
Crime”, The Daily Beast, June 29, 2018, available at: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-senates-only-
three-black-members-introduce-bill-to-finally-make-lynching-a-federal-crime (last visited on May 17,
2023).
88
Clare Foran and Lauren Fox, “Emotional Debate Erupts Over Anti-Lynching Legislation as Cory Booker
and Kamala Harris Speak Out Against Rand Paul Amendment”, Cnn, Jan. 04, 2020, available at:
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/06/04/politics/anti-lynching-bill-fight-senate-floor-cory-booker-rand-paul/
index.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).
89
Ted Barrett and Clare Foran, “Rand Paul Holds up Anti-Lynching Legislation as He Seeks Changes to
Bill”, Cnn, June 03, 2020, available at: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/06/03/politics/rand-paul-lynching-
legislation/index.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).

75 | P a g e
 there's no justification for this."90 No bill has passed both chambers of Congress as
of August 15th, 2021.

State Laws:

In 1933, the state of California discribed lynching as "the removal of any person
from the legal custody of any private person utilizing a riot," with a "riot"
described as 2 or more individuals employing violence and the threat of violence. 91
It does not refer to lynching killing, but it has been used to charge those who have
attempted to liberate someone who is being held by the authorities, causing
controversy. Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill by Senator Holly Mitchell,
eliminating the term "lynching" from the state's penal code, into law without
commenting in 2015 after it won unanimous support from state lawmakers.
"Powerful words should be kept for strong notions," Mitchell argued, "and
because 'lynching' has such a traumatic past for African Americans, the law will
only use it for what it is - murder by mob." Aside from it, the legislation remained
intact.92

Indiana approved the anti-lynching law in 1899. Governor Winfield T. Durbin used
it to compel an inquiry into a 1902 lynching and dismiss the sheriff who was
involved. In 1903, he dispatched troops to Evansville, Indiana, to put a stop to a
racial riot that had erupted on Independence Day.93 Six hundred people tried to take
a black inmate from Marion County Jail in 1920 but were restricted by municipal
police.94 In Marion, Indiana, in 1930, Lawrence Beitler documented the lynchings
of Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith. Abel Meeropol was inspired by this sight to
90
"Senate Session". C-SPAN.
91
Officials Change Calif. Law After Activist's "Lynching" Arrest”, CBSNews., July 03, 2015, available at:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/california-lynching-law-governor-jerry-brown/# (last visited on May 17,
2023).
92
Barragan, James, “Murrieta Immigration Protesters Charged with Obstructing Officers”, Los Angeles
Times, Sept. 04, 2014, available at: https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-murrieta-protesters-
charged-20140904-story.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).
93
Tanasia Kenney, “Pasadena Black Lives Matter Activist Convicted of 'Felony Lynching', Could Spend
Four Years Behind Bars”, Atlanta Black Star, June 06, 2016, available at:
https://atlantablackstar.com/2016/06/03/pasadena-black-lives-matter-activist-convicted-of-felony-lynching-
could-spend-four-years-behind-bars/ (last visited on May 17, 2023).
94
David J. Bodenhamer and Randall T. Shepard, “The History of Indiana Law” Ohio University Press
(2014).

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 create the song "Strange Fruit," which was popularised by Billie Holiday95. In
response to these killings, Flossie Bailey lobbied for the enactment of Indiana's
anti-lynching statute in 1931. The legislation said that any sheriff who permitted an
imprisoned prisoner to be lynched would be fired immediately, and the victim's
family may sue for $10,000. Local authorities, on the other hand, neglected to
pursue mob leaders. When Indiana's attorney general, James Ogden, indicted a
sheriff, the jury declined to condemn him.96

In an unexpected turn of events, South Carolina enacted legislation in 1951 making

second-degree lynching illegal "Any act of violence committed by a crowd against
the body of another person that does not end in death is considered lynching in
the second degree and is a felony. Any individual convicted of lynching in the
second degree will be sentenced to hard labor in the State Penitentiary for not more
than 20 years nor less than three years, depending on the presiding judge's
discretion." However, by 2003, all but 2 of the state's 46 counties had prosecuted
black people with lynching, much outnumbering their population. 4,000 adults
were accused and 136 were convicted in the previous five years. The rate of
conviction for this assault offense was twice as high for black suspects as it was
for white suspects. There were 1,400 juvenile lynching accusations filed in
2002, with 231 black teenagers convicted, 10 times the number of white juveniles.
In 2006, five white youths in South Carolina were sentenced to varying prison
terms for second-degree lynching in a quasi assault on a young black individual.
The South Carolina Sentencing Reform Commission agreed in 2010 to rename the
statute "assault and battery by a mob," and to lessen the penalties in cases where
no one was killed or badly hurt in a single victim's attack by two or more persons.97

5.2 Laws and Measures in India to Control Mob Lynching:

95
Madison, James H, A Lynching in the Heartland: Race and Memory in America. (Springer, 2001).
96
“The Lynching of Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith, 1930”, Rare Historical Photos, Nov. 23, 2021,
available at: https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/lynching-thomas-shipp-abram-smith-1930/ (last visited on
May 17, 2023).
97
"SC panel softening lynching law, says it is abused". GoUpstate.com. Associated Press. January 11,
2010. Archived from the original on August 10, 2016.

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 State Laws in India98:

In this context, the Manipur government introduced its anti-lynching bill in 2018,
which included several provisions. In this context, the Manipur government
introduced its anti-lynching bill in 2018, which included several logical and
essential measures. To combat such crimes, the bill stipulated that nodal officers be
stationed in each district. Officers cops who fail to prevent lynching in their
territory face a sentence of one to three years in jail and a fine of up to $50,000.
Furthermore, the State government's consent is not necessary to charge them for
gross negligence.

Apart from launching rehabilitation programs and starting relief camps when a
society has been misplaced, it is the responsibility of the state to safeguard
sufferers of mob lynching and eyewitnesses from any enticement or pressure. The
deceased or their immediate relatives are entitled to sufficient monetary
recompense under the law. “After 2014, 86 percent incidents of mob lynching
registered in the country happened in Rajasthan,” says Parliamentary Affairs
Minister Shanti Dhariwal. However, the administration has not only adopted just a
handful of the Supreme Court's instructions, but it has also been mute on any action
to be taken against police personnel charged with misconduct.

West Bengal enacted a more rigorous anti-lynching law. The death sentence or life
imprisonment, as well as a fine of up to $5 lakh, are the penalties for lynching to
death. West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar has called a meeting this month
with the Chief Minister and leaders of all legislative parties to examine the Bill.
The State has embraced the majority of the Supreme Court's rules.

What Centre Can Do?

The Centre might do well to incorporate sections in the legislation for penal action

98

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 toward doctors accused of dereliction of duty, neglecting to visit to lynching
survivors, or writing up false reports without making a detailed and comprehensive
medical assessment of the victims, whether under police intimidation or because of
bias against coerced. The money for the victims' compensation must be gathered
from the criminals or charged as collective fines on the community where the
lynchings occurred under the victim compensation scheme.

The Centre might even legislate for penal measures against political figures found
guilty of inciting crowds while drafting the legislation. Until a zero-tolerance
policy is implemented in the face of mob lynching, the crime shall go to rise.
Punitive punishment against police personnel’s accused of misusing of of power, as
adopted by the Manipur government, might be duplicated in the Central law as
well, to prevent police personnel from behaving partisanly in favor of the lynch
mob.99

Comparative Analysis:

o In India, most of the cases of mob lynching have taken place against Dalits,
Minorities, Muslims, etc. on the other hand in the USA most of the cases of
mob lynching have taken place against blacks, Africans, etc.
o In India, there is no special law related to Mob lynching but some states like
Manipur, Rajashthan, West Bengal have their state laws to deal with Mob
lynching. In the USA the situation is the same like India, In the USA also
there is no special centralized law to deal with cases of mob lynching but
the same states like California, Indiana has laws to deal with the cases of
mob lynching.
o In the USA cases of mob lynching are going down and on other hand in
India incidents of mob lynching are on the rise mainly because of political
shifts in the nation.
o The main reason behind mob lynching in the USA was White Supremacy,

99
M.P. Nathanael, “Preventing Mob Lynching”, The Hindu, available at:
https://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/preventing-mob-lynching/article30577621.ece (last visited on
May 17, 2023).

79 | P a g e
 whereas in India the main reason is the supremacy of right-wing political
parties and organizations.

o Republican Congressman Leonidas C. Dyer of St. Louis, Missouri,

originally proposed the Dyer Anti-Lynching Bill in the United States
Congress in 1918. The measure was approved by the United States House
of Representatives in 1922, and the United States Senate Committee gave it
a positive report the same year. White Senate democrats from the Solid
South, the only legislators voted since the southern states disenfranchised
African Americans before the turn of the century, prevented its approval. In
India there is no such Bill Proposed by any party or individual related to
mob lynching, no positive steps have been taken on that side. On other hand
in India, there is no such bill has been proposed for law on mob lynching.

STATISTICS OF DEATH CAUSED BY MOB LYNCHING:

INDIA:

Incidents statistics by year100

Yea Incidents Total number Total number

r killed wounded

2012 1 2

2013 2 35

2014 5 13

2015 6 8 5

2016 5 2 10

Jan 2017–June 11 18 20
2017

2010–June 2017 63 28 124

100
Tommy Wilkes and Roli Srivastava, “Protests Held Across India After Attacks Against Muslims”,
Reuters, June 28, 2017, available at: https://www.reuters.com/article/india-protests-idINKBN19J2C3 (last
visited on May 17, 2023).

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 [
Reuters report

29 June 2017– 2 2 1

December 2017

2018 6 7 1

2019 10 6 18

2020 1 0 1

Total 82 43 145

USA:

According to NAACP data, there were 4,743 lynchings in the United States
between 1882 and 1968. Other reports, like as the Equal Justice Initiative's
thorough study on lynchings, count different figures, but because there was no
systematic recording, it's difficult to tell for sure how many lynchings
occurred. Many historians feel the real number is underreported.101
Mississippi had the greatest percentage of lynchings throughout that time
period, with 581 recorded. Georgia came in second with 531 points, while
Texas came in third with 493. Lynchings were not carried out in every state. In
Arizona, Idaho, Maine, Nevada, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wisconsin, no
lynchings have been reported.
Blacks were the most common victims of lynching, accounting for 3,446, or
around 72 percent, of those killed. They weren't the only ones who had been
lynched. Some white individuals were killed because they aided Black people
or were anti-lynching. Mexican, Chinese, Australian, and other immigrants
were also lynched.

101
“History of Lynching in America”, Naacp, available at: HISTORY OF LYNCHING IN AMERICA (last
visited on May 17, 2023).

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 CHAPTER 6 –

Issues and Challenges

Mob Lynching is a serious threat to Indian democracy which is spreading its arms
all over the nation. Mob lynching is a serious challenge for all the citizens and
lawmakers and all government bodies such as police, court, investigation
departments, etc.

SOME OF THE LYNCHING INCIDENTS WHICH SHOCKED THE NATION:

Mangalore Pub Attack, 2009:

On the 24th of January 2009, In Mangalore, Karnataka, the Shri Ram Sena, a
hardline group of 35-40 members, assaulted young boys and girls in a pub named
"amnesia-the lounge.", claiming that these young people were breaking traditional
Indian values. When asked why girls should attend pubs, consume alcohol, and
dress in westernized clothes, the founder of this group was unapologetic when
questioned by one of the respected media. The activists were acquitted a few years

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 later, in 2018, because of a piece of insufficient evidence.102

Dimapur Lynching:

The Dimapur Lynching in Nagaland stunned the nation when a mob of 6000-7000
people burst into the Central Jail of Dimapur and removed Farid Khan, a rape
accused. In the name of vigilante justice, he was compelled to walk naked on
streets, stoned, thrashed, and hacked to death, and many saw him as a shining
example of enforcing the law. The accused was also said to be an illegal
Bangladeshi immigrant in the case. The state's weak judicial system was also
blamed for the lynching, as the state had only a few rape convictions.

Dadri Mob Lynching:

On September 28, 2015, an event occurred in Bisara, a village near Dadri in Uttar
Pradesh. A mob of villagers attacked Mohammed Akhlaq's home since his
neighbor suspected him of snatching then butchering his stolen cow. Local people
stormed Akhlaq's house late at night with rocks, bricks, and knives, accusing his
family members of eating beef and storing cow flesh in his fridge. Even after the
family's repeated denials, the crowd dragged and abused Akhlaq and his son.
Among the first lynching by the mob in the cause of cows or beef is supposed to
have occurred here.103

Alwar Lynching:

Pehlu Khan, a 55-year-old dairy farmer from Haryana's Nuh area. On 1st April,
Pehlu Khan was thrashed viciously by a group of 200 cow vigilantes while
transporting cows for his dairy farm. He was suspected of smuggling livestock, but
he had instead purchased a cow with a receipt for milking. Although police were
102
Anusha, Mangalore, “Pub Attack: Sri Rama Sena Activists Acquitted Due to Lack of Evidence”, One
India, Mar. 13, 2018, available at: https://www.oneindia.com/india/mangalore-pub-attack-sri-rama-sene-
activists-acquitted-due-to- lackof-evidence-2657339.html (last visited on May 17, 2023).
103
“The Dadri Lynching: How Events Unfolded”, The HIndu, Oct. 03, 2015, available at:
https://www.thehindu.com/specials/in-depth/The-Dadri-lynching-how-events-unfolded/
article60291071.ece# (last visited on May 17, 2023).

83 | P a g e
 unable to apprehend those mentioned in Khan's dying declaration, vigilantes were
apprehended when footage of the incident came to light.

Palghar Mob Lynching:

A vigilante group killed two Hindu Sadhus and their driver on April 16, 2020, in a
recent case of mob lynching. Rumors spread on WhatsApp about robbers active in
the area during the coronavirus lockdown fueled the incident in Gadchinchale
Village in Maharashtra's Palghar district. The two sadhus and the driver were
murdered by a vigilante gang who mistook them for robbers. They also assaulted
the police officers who intervened.104

The lynching of D.S.P. Ayub Pandith:

A mob carried out the lynching outside the Jama Masjid in Nowhatta, Srinagar. On
a holy night for Muslims in Ramzan, Shab-e-Qadr, DSP Ayub was murdered
outside Srinagar's Jama Masjid by a crowd shouting pro-al-Qaeda and pro-
Pakistani chants. The 57-year-old DSP was assigned to keep a watch on the
worshippers who came to conduct night-long prayer, which was led by Kashmiri
separatist Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, who also served as the Mosque's custodian.
Around midnight, a mob began chanting in support of Pakistan and Al-Qaeda
operative Zakir Musa. DSP Ayub, dressed in civilian clothes, began filming the
individuals shouting slogans. When the mob saw this, they rushed at him with fists
up. DSP Ayub pulled out his service handgun and fired three shots below the
waistline, but the throng was too strong. The crowd undressed him and beat him to
death with edged weapons and stones.

Life is important, and the cutting-edge state is obligated to protection the lives of its
citizens. Under Article 21 of the Indian Constitution, the state bears the
responsibility of ensuring the lives of citizens of its country. However, the
legislation is being put to the test by the ever-increasing incidents of mass lynching
104
Zeeshan Shaikh, “Palghar Lynching: A Recap of What Happened”, The Indian Express, Apr. 24, 2020,
available at: https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/palghar-mob-lynching-mahant-kalpavruksha-giri-
6370528/ (last visited on May 17, 2023).

84 | P a g e
 and killing.105 These breaches should be investigated to guarantee that the country's
government is governed by the majority. Through our investigation, we have
determined that the rate at which man butchering is increasing necessitates the
enactment of novel legislation to combat the crime of crowd lynching and
slaughter. Furthermore, the country's customary law is insufficient to deal with
such transgressions. The legislature is the government's principal institution, and it
is responsible for making laws that are appropriate for the current state of society
and for resolving issues. There are several laws relating to various topics such as
constitutional law, the Indian Penal Code, the Criminal Procedure Code, family
law, taxation law, and labor law, to name a few. Several provisions in the IPC and
Crpc deal with mob lynching. These regulations, however, are insufficient to
address the concerns of mob lynching. Apart from that, the legislature has a slew of
difficulties and obstacles in dealing with mob violent events.106

1. Religious Biasness:

India is a democratic and secular country. Because Article 25 of the Constitution

states that "all persons are equally entitled to freedom of conscience and the right to
freely profess, practice, and propagate religion subject to public order, morality,
and health," every individual has a fundamental right to profess, believe, and
follow any religion they want.107 However, there have been several mob events
based solely on caste, class, religion, and other factors. 17 (9) (2020)3552 Khelanji
PJAEE The 2006 massacre, which was a communal act of violence, shocking
society. Women from the victim's family were humiliated and executed after being
paraded nude in front of the public.

2. Rise of cow vigilante:

105
E. M. Beck, “Judge Lynch Denied: Combating Mob Violence in the America South, (1877-1950)” 21
South Polls 117-139 (2015).
106
Nitya Nand Pandey, “Mob Lynching: A New Crime Emerging in Indian Society” 5 Ijrar 808, 809
(2018).
107
Tanvi Yadav and Nagendra Ambedkar Sole, “Mob Lynching in India: Sine Qua Non of Legal
Intervention” A Creative Connect International Publication (2018).

85 | P a g e
 One of the most common causes of mob lynching is the killing of cows. Some
prominent events connected to cow slaughter include the mob lynching in Dadri in
2015, the Jharkhand mob lynching in 2016, the Alwar mob lynching in 2017, and
others. Society has devolved into self- proclaimed vigilantes that take the law into
their own hands and continue to persecute minorities. Following the introduction of
a beef ban in some parts of the nation, cow vigilantes have grown more daring and
vigilant in their attacks on innocent individuals based on mere suspicion or
hearsay.108

3. Illiteracy:

Illiteracy causes individuals to act on rumors rather than think about what is good
or wrong (attacking beggars thinking that they had come for kidnapping their
children).109

4. Unemployment:

The major problem facing the legislature is unemployment. As a result, individuals

feel frustrated and lose their ability to regulate themselves, resulting in such events.

5. Spread of rumors by social media:

Social media has had a significant influence on the rise in crime rates. Due to
falsehoods circulated on social media, more than a dozen individuals have been
lynched. According to media statistics, 35 of the 60 attacks between 2010 and 2018
were based on hearsay. In 2019, the topic was debated in parliament, with the BJP
administration blaming social media as the only reason for the surge in mob
lynchings. Because there is no clear regulation on false news, how to ban social
media from spreading fake news and rumors is a problem before the legislative.110

6. No particular law or strong law:

108
Basu. D.D, Introduction to the Constitution of India (Lexis Nexis, New Delhi, 2011).
109
Upendra Baxi, “Socio-Legal Research in India-A Program Shift” 24 Indian Council of Social Science
Research 416-449 (1975).
110
Kant Neelam, An Introduction to Political Science (Central Law Publication, Allahabad, 1st edn., 2015).

86 | P a g e
 Lynching by a mob is considered a terrible offense against the community. In the
majority of cases, the accused were charged under sections 302 of the IPC
(murder), 307 of the IPC (murder attempt), 323 of the IPC (causing simple hurt),
and 325 of the IPC (causing grievous hurt), which does not appear to be fair in the
case of mob lynching because it is an offense against the community, not an
offense against the person. The provisions of the IPC and the Crpc are insufficient
to deal with mob lynchings since the crowd has no face and it is impossible to
punish the true perpetrators of these crimes.111

7. Lengthy procedure:

To cope with cases of mob violence, our legal system has a lengthy and difficult
procedure. The most pressing problem facing lawmakers is how to make the
procedure more straightforward.

8. Delayed Justice:

The legal maxim is "Delayed Justice is Denied, Justice." The main concern is
delayed justice, and the Delhi Rape Case is the best illustration. As a result, people
become judges, take the law into their own hands, and demand immediate justice.

9. Police Reforms:

The police had a critical role in preventing mob lynchings and other forms of
criminality in society. However, there are occasions when police officers fail to do
their duty.

10. Hostile of Witnesses:

Witnesses are those who observe something happen and play a critical part in
punishing the perpetrator. However, owing to fear, some witnesses turn hostile and
refuse to appear in court. As a result, the legislature's main concern is witness
safety.
111
S. N. Mishra, Indian Penal Code, 1860 (Central Law Publication, Allahabad, 21st edn., 2019).

87 | P a g e
 Chaos is a manifestation of the State's failure to stay true to its responsibility of a
feasible allocation of equity, as history has taught us via a series of occurrences.
Turning to mob lynching is an attack on people's respect, the protected
responsibilities guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution, and a serious
breach of every international human rights obligation.112

In July 2017, the Apex Court, in Tahseen s. Poonawala v. UOI {WP(C) No.
754/2016}113, outlined several preventative, therapeutic, and reformatory methods
to address lynching and horde viciousness. States were brought together to
establish allocated rapid track courts in each region to conduct solely with
instances including mob lynching. The court had also proposed the formation of a
special squad to gather intelligence reports on those suspected of disseminating
hate speeches, inflammatory speech, and false news that might lead to lynchings by
the general public. Victim compensation schemes for assistance and restoration of
casualties were also set up under several headings. After a year, the Supreme Court
sent a notice to the Center and a few states, demanding that they provide the steps
they took to implement the regulations as well as record consistency reports. The
states' lackluster response was irritating. To date, only 3 states, Manipur, West
Bengal, and Rajasthan, have approved anti-lynching legislation to combat mob
lynching.

112
Gautam Bhatia, Offend, Shock or Disturb Free Speech Under Indian Constitution (Oxford University
Press, Allahabad, 2018).
113
Tahseen s. Poonawala v. UOI (WP(C) No. 754/2016)

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 CHAPTER 6 –

Conclusion, Recommendations & Suggestions

CONCLUSION:

In a developing democracy like India, where culture and customs are diverse, mob
lynching is on the rise. This demonstrates that citizens have lost trust in the
legislature, courts, and government to the point that they are prepared to take the
law into their own hands. The law is the most powerful, and no one has the
authority to execute anyone for any reason whatsoever. Making this a societal issue
and playing the blame game will not lead to any answers, but only cause mental
distress to the victims of mob violence. The most pressing need is for strong
legislation against mob lynching to be enacted, which will reduce the threat to
civilization. We also need to work on the system's flaws, such as the delay in
submitting a complaint to the investigation of the crime and forgeries, as well as
delivering quick justice to the victims, by keeping a close eye on social media
platforms where some organizations propagate hate and influence people's
opinions. Place the burden on posts on social media and communications
transmitted in the chatting site would only assist if individuals are educated in
digital literacy. The government should enlist the aid of the media, such as
newspapers, radio, and television, to combat false news. According to the Supreme
Court's recommendations, the state government should create an anti-lynching
statute. Individually, we should reject such behavior and report any bogus news we
come across, while also raising awareness among our friends. There is no special
legislation to deal with cases of mob lynching in India for that reason there is no
special investigation teams, courts, proceedings to deal with the same that is why it

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 is hard and time consuming process to convict a person at earliest. In USA
Congress has tabled a bill called Emmett Till Antilynching Act. It will come into
force after the approval of president of USA. That is why USA is one step ahead of
India to make legislation to combat mob lynching cases.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

 The significance of Social Media

Most of the time individuals nowadays rely heavily on social media for
entertainment, communication, and other purposes. Nonetheless, as previously
said, social media has played a big part in the transmission of bogus news or
rumors, that can lead to a society turning to lynch. WhatsApp, one of the most
popular social media networks, has set a limit on the number of messages that may
be forwarded. The issue is that these social media platforms have a wealth of data
on their users, but WhatsApp uses end-to-end encryption to protect its users'
privacy. Some of the actions to curb the spread of false rumors should be taken
jointly by the public and the government. The problem is striking a balance
between privacy of users and societal well-being. Some of the methods include:
cross-checking the news with reputable news outlets or using the Google search
engine. Also, pieces of evidence are cross-checked for credibility, and it should be
examined if the messages have any credibility to support them up.

 Understand to figure out what the news is about. Is it to incite hatred,

outrage or targeting a community, or injuring societal sentiments? If this is
the case, the notification should be ignored and reported. Also, see if it's
backed up by a reliable source.
 Forward texts must be governed by social media platforms in such a
manner that they are treated as an exception, with the ability to encrypt the
forwarded message and identify the sender. In summary, for the sake of
society as a whole, the sent message should constitute an exception to users'
privacy.

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  The government should develop an internet platform that will assist in
determining the reliability of news and reporting it if it is found to be false.

 Role of mass media

Numerous lynching events do not receive adequate media attention since

lynching is no more viewed as a major news topic or something that needs to be
considered. Even in a democratic system, mob lynchings are only reported when
they impact the upper classes or a specific group, and the media believes it is
necessary to publicize it to increase attention. It is irrational and unethical for a
group of individuals to come together to murder someone. A genuine risk exists in
a varied country like India, where various groups have distinct grievances and
grudges that have been held for thousands of years by another set of people.114

Lynchings have been making headlines for decades, with the majority of recent
incidents being the result of aggressive Hindu mobs that believed it was ethically
justifiable to kill someone by accusing them of cow slaughter or selling and
consuming beef, as well as compelling someone to recite "Jai Shri Ram."
Lynching, on the other hand, is not restricted to a single faith or social class.
Hindus are also slain, as evidenced by the Palghar tragedy, which occurred lately.
Mob lynching is an offense that requires more than a single-pointer. Other types of
hate crimes have occurred, such as the notorious Mangalore Pub incident and an
instance in Guwahati in 2012 where a crowd groped a lady openly after she had a
dispute outside a pub.

The news channels and other platforms has a big influence on how people think.
The news on Indian television networks piques the interest of the Indian public.
They trust what they see and hear, and the technological era has exacerbated the
problem. These days, media companies are more corporate, intending to increase
the audience. By disseminating news on false reports and claims, the mass media

114
Crime in India 2018, NCRB.

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 may be utilized to raise awareness among the general public.

 Need for a Distinct Legislation on Lynching.

Because the offense is against state, it has a significant influence; thus, to bring
society within the discipline and create a welfare state, it is necessary to educate the
whole society by enacting distinct laws. Our groups are divided by caste and
religion. No question articles 14 and 15 are infringed upon. The constitution
requires legislation to uphold the ideals enshrined in articles 14, 15, and 21.

The lynching will be established as a constitutional offense once the statute is in

place. Because every region is diverse and has its requirements, the center is
responsible for drafting clear rules against mob lynching, which states must follow
according to their circumstances. Once enacted, the legislation should send a clear
message to the public that lynching is a serious crime. There would be a crime on
both hands if laws were not created. 115 On the one hand, when someone is lynched,
and on the other hand, when government in power fail to control it.

Mob lynching cannot become the new normal because of 399 laws. Before things
get out of hand, the federal government should take note of the increasing
tendencies. Before writing, it is also necessary to comprehend the reasons for
crime. It would be difficult to record without taking into account the following.
New rules might also ensure that such matters are dealt with quickly and under the
supervision of Supreme Court and High Courts.116

 Identification and Investigation

115
Indira Jaising, “Why Government Should Make New Law on Lynching”, The Economic Times, July 22,
2018, available at: https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/why-government-
should-make-new-law-on-lynching-soon-before-its-too-late/articleshow/65085294.cms (last visited on May
17, 2023).
116
Vakasha Sachdev, “Do We Really Need a Specific Law on Mob Lynchings? Yes and No”, The Quint,
July 25, 2018, available at: https://www.thequint.com/videos/q-rant/mob-lynching-law-supreme-court-
needed (last visited on May 17, 2023).

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 Just 2 people have been sentenced on charges related to mob lynching in 12 states,
according to research by the Dainik Bhaskar (29th July 2018). Between 2014 and
March 3, 2018, 45 people were slain in 40 incidents of mob lynching throughout 9
states, according to the Union Home Ministry. However, the ministry noted that its
statistics did not include information on the events' motives, such as whether they
were motivated by cow vigilantism, sectarian or caste hate, or rumors of kid
abduction, among other things. Similarly, the ministry in charge of internal security
has not divulged the site of the assault, the attacker's name, or the victim. The
procedure for identifying the offenders should be improved since it is clear that the
culprits are not recognized, giving them a chance to get away with their crimes. 117
Not only should the identification of the perpetrators be done with care and
responsibility, but so should the identification of the proof on the crime scene. For
the aim of identification, a special squad should be formed and entrusted with
forming an extraordinary force that will identify those who participate in lynchings
regularly. To prevent similar accidents, they must promptly collect information
& communicate with the investigative agencies. It is necessary to establish a team
to examine the matter to learn and comprehend the facts, which will aid in the
case's future investigation. It also allows for the detection of any political
conspiracies. A separate investigating panel must be established that exclusively
looks into incidents of mob lynching and is not responsible for any other concerns.
It is necessary to guarantee that these agencies are free of political influence. As a
result, when implementing new law, it must be assured that investigations aren’t
blocked, that processes are not ignored, and that no one is involved in the murders
and cover-ups.118

 Recommendations For Establishing A Special Agency To Deal With

117
Rasheed Kidwai, “Why We Need a Special Law to Curb Mob Lynching”, Observer Research
Foundation, July 31, 2018, available at: https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/42867-why-need-special-
law-curb-mob-lynching/ (last visited on May 17, 2023).
118
VII STATE LAW COMMISSION Lucknow, “Seventh Report on Mob Lynching” (2019).

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 Mob Lynching

The central government is planning two high-level committees to suggest strategies

and legal frameworks for successfully dealing with cases of mob lynching and
murder, according to the home ministry. Every week, the highest court ordered the
centralized government to create legislation to address murders and mob violence.

According to a home ministry proponent, the government respects the supreme

court's recent directions on the issue of mob lynching and has issued an guidelines
to state governments imploring them to necessitate efficacious measures to prevent
occurrences of mob violence and murder and to take strict action following the law.
The government must create appropriate measures to cope with the situation. A
high-level committee, led by the union secretary of state for the home ministry
Gauba, has been formed to consider the issue and provide suggestions. Members of
the committee are the secretaries of the departments of justice, legal affairs,
legislation, social justice, and authorization.

The committee has four weeks to present its advice to the board. According to the
proponent, the government has also appointed a Group Of Ministers (GOM) led by
home minister Singh to consider the proposals of the high-level committee of
secretaries. Area unit members of the gom include External Affairs Minister
Sushma Swaraj, Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari, Law Minister Ravi
Shankar Prasad, and Social Justice and Authorization Minister Thawar Chand
Gehlot. Prime Minister Narendra Modi can receive the gom's recommendations.

In response to reports of mob lynching, the ministry's proponent stated that the
center is concerned about occurrences of mob violence in various locations of the
nation. The administration has already denounced such occurrences and made it
plain in parliament that it is dedicated to upholding the rule of law and putting in
place strong measures to prevent them.

 On an individual level

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 The majority of lynchings occur since a small group believes it is appropriate to
punish a person or a group of individuals as they see fit. Individual citizens may
contribute by being more aware of and attentive to information distributed through
social media and other channels. On WhatsApp, there is a reporting option for a
forwarded message. On Instagram and other social media platforms, you may do
the same thing. Citizens must not believe in fake news, invalidated
communications, or news without first examining the source, which must be
trustworthy.

 Supreme Court’s instructions i n (Writ Petition (Civil) No. 754 of

2016), for preventing mob violence and lynching against groups or
communities.

A. Preventive Measures:

 In each district, the state governments should appoint a senior police

officer, not below the rank of SP, as the Nodal Officer. To resrtict mob
lynching and murder, such a Nodal Officer will be helped by one of the
DSP rank officers in the district. They will act as a STF to gather intel on
those who appear to be committing such offences or who are involved in
disseminating hate statements, inflammatory comments, and false news.
 Government should immediately identify Districts, Sub-Divisions, and/or
villages where murder and mob violence have been reported in the recent
past, say, in the last five years. The technique of identification should be
completed within 3 weeks after the date of this judgment; this inherently
basic time frame is adequate to encourage the work to be completed in
today's fast-paced world of information accumulation.
 The Secretary of the involved States' Home Department shall issue

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 directives/advisories to the Nodal Officers of the involved districts to
ensure that the Officer-In-Charge of the Police Stations of the known area
units are extra cautious if any instance of mob violence occurs within their
jurisdiction.

B. Remedial Measures:

 If the territorial police office receives notice from the state police that a
murder or mob violence has occurred, the territorial police office shall
immediately cause to lodge associate degree FIR under the relevant
provisions of the IPC and/or other provisions of law, regardless of the
preventive measures taken by the state police.
 It is the responsibility of the police headquarters officer in whose police
office the FIR was filed to immediately notify the Nodal Officer within the
district UN agency, who would then ensure that the victim's family
members are not harassed further.
 The investigation into such offenses shall be personally supervised by the
Nodal Officer of the UN agency, who shall be responsible for ensuring that
the inquiry is properly allocated.

SUGGESTIONS:

At the individual scale, the organisation can take steps to ensure quick
equity, such as filing the FIR immediately, suppressing cross-cases that
encourage exploitation of the effectively feeble and poor, and suppressing
bail applications by the blamed, as they pose a genuine threat to the people
in question and their families due to the disdain for the writ. Aside from
that, assistance and fair recompense should be offered to the persons in
issue or their families for the hardship they have suffered, and they should
be given proper guidance to ensure equity. The government should find a
way to pass the Manav Suraksha Kanoon (MaSuKa) law, which stipulates

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 that the law to be made for mob lynchings will be cognizable, non-bailable,
and non-compoundable, and will welcome a day to day existence detention
alongside a period bound tentative, expect to be paid to the groups of
casualties, and police activity to ensure the assurance.
MaSuKa would serve the same purpose for survivors of mob lynchings that
the SC/ST (Prevention of Outrages) Act, 1989 and the Protection of
Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005 did for ensuring equity and
ensuring a gathering. The parliament should respect the norms, but the
Supreme Court should design and adopt a new legislation to deal with cases
of crowd lynchings, which would impose a life sentence on the lynchers as
well as the officials who legally or implicitly participate in such cruelty.
The phrase "mob lynching" should also be defined in the new statute. There
should be stringent regulations in place that make mob lynching illegal and
punished. Certain modifications to our present legislation are required when
the term "mob lynching" should be explicitly stated.

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