California Governor vetoes anti-caste discrimination Bill

WASHINGTON: California Governor Gavin Newsom has vetoed a landmark anti-caste discrimination Bill recently passed by the state assembly, terming it “unnecessary” and underlining that laws to ban caste-based discrimination already exist in the US state.

The governor’s move has been welcomed by a large segment of the Indian-American community who were opposing the Bill based on the same argument.

“In California, we believe everyone deserves to be treated with dignity and respect, no matter who they are, where they come from, who they love, or where they live,” Newsom said in a statement on Saturday.

“That is why California already prohibits discrimination based on sex, race, colour, religion, ancestry, national origin, disability, gender identity, sexual orientation, and other characteristics, and state law specifies that these civil rights protections shall be liberally construed. Because discrimination based on caste is already prohibited under these existing categories, this bill is unnecessary,” he said.

For this reason, Newsom asserted that he “cannot sign” the Bill, known as ‘SB403’, which was recently passed by a large majority by both the House of Representatives and Senate of the California State Assembly.

California would have been the first US state to formally ban discrimination on the basis of caste if the Governor had signed the Bill.

The Bill was introduced in March by Democratic state Senator Aisha Wahab, the first Muslim and Afghan American elected to the California Legislature.

The Bill defines “ancestry” for purposes of the Fair Employment and Housing Act, the Unruh Act, and the Education Code to include “caste” and other dimensions of ancestry. The opponents of the Bill described it as historic and said such a move by the Governor has prevented the efforts of many to target the South Asian community and the Hindus in the state. ↔ More on P9