Gujarat government passes bill to abolish superstitious black magic practices, provides up to 7 years jail

Ahmedabad: The Gujarat government on Wednesday unanimously passed the "Prevention and Abolition of Human Sacrifice and Other Inhuman, Evil and Cruel Practices, Black Magic Bill, 2024" in the state assembly.

This comes after Gujarat High Court had sought a response from the government related to a PIL seeking legislation to end black magic and other superstitious rituals like human sacrifice, among others.

The act has provision of imprisonment from six months to seven years and fine of Rs5,000 to Rs 50,000. The act also provides that aiding and abetting the commission of an offense or attempting to commit such offense would be deemed to have committed an offense and shall be punished accordingly.

Gujarat is said to be the seventh state in the country to have brought the law. The law exists in Maharashtra, Karnataka, Odisha, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Assam.

Minister of State for Home Harsh Sanghvi introduced the bill while stating that the government was "determined to protect the citizens from harassment in the name of superstition."

Presenting the bill in the assembly, Sanghvi said that many families in the state lost their family members including children due to "Kala jadu" (black magic) and other superstitious activities.

The government has given instances of such superstitious rituals resulting in deaths. Sanghavi said that there is a fine line between faith and superstition which has been clarified in section-2 of the Act. It describes conducting, promoting human sacrifice, black magic, tying a person with a rope or chain, beating with a stick or whip, smoking chilies or hanging from the ceiling by hair, or pouring hot objects over the body or drinking water soaked with shoes, human excrement as offense.

It explains that claiming to perform "miracles and making money out of it, deceiving people by promoting and spreading such miracles will be under the ambit of criminal offense. Claiming that the presence of a person as a witch or devil reduces the milking capacity of cattle, brings bad luck, disease, causing physical injuries due to the wrath of a ghost will be considered an offense.

"Some of the heart-pounding incidents" reported in Gujarat

Sanghvi gave instances of some of the cases registered in the state in the recent past. In one of the instances, in a village of Banaskantha district, a child was killed by a person on the promise that he would get married by performing human sacrifice.

In Gir Somnath district, suspecting that his 14-year-old daughter was possessed, a man kept her in his farm near the fire for two hours to remove the possession.

A 70-year-old woman was killed by her grandson for claiming to be a witch in Aravalli district.

Similarly, he said that in Surat, a tantrik sexually assaulted a girl on the pretext of finding her missing father.

Last month, while hearing a public interest litigation (PIL), a division bench of Gujarat high court had sought government's response while underling that there have been several instances of such practices.

The petition has been filed by Ashwin Karia of Akhil Bharatiya Andhashraddha Nirmool Samiti through advocate Harsh Raval.

The government had responded earlier this month that it would enact the law to prevent such practices.

The matter is listed for hearing this Friday.