Section Text
LEPERS ACT, 1898 LEPERS ACT, 1898 3 of 1898 4th February, 1898 "The expediency of segregating pauper lepers under suitable safeguards and of forbidding lepers generally, from following certain trades and callings connected with the bodily requirements of human beings was urged by-the Leprosy Commission which visited India six years ago, and since then steps have taken in some provinces to give effete to the recommendation of the Commission. Last year an Act was passed by the Bengal Council to provide for the arrest, examination and segregation in properly appointed asylums and lepers having no ostensible means of subsistence beyond begging for charity: for enabling local bodies to assist in furnishing funds for the maintenance and medical treatment of pauper lepers so secluded; and for restraining lepers from engaging in certain occupations of the kind already referred to. The present Bill has been prepared on the lines of the Bengal Act but so as to extend lo the whole of the India and to apply to any part thereof, and not before the issue of notification by the Local Government, with the previous sanction of the Governor-General in Council, declaring it to be applicable thereto. Where, Bengal, adequate provision on the subject has already been made, the proposed Act will not be so applied and the local law will be allowed to continue in force". - Gazette of India, 1896. Pt. V, p. 231. An Act to provide for the segregation and medical treatment of pauper lepers and the control of lepers following certain callings. Whereas it is expedient to provide for the segregation and medical treatment of pauper and the control of lepers following certain callings; It is hereby enacted as follows :- The Act has been declared to be in force in the Sonthal Parganas (now in Bihar) see the Sonthal Parganas Settlement Regulation, 1872 (3 of 1872),section 3; in the Khondmals District by the Khondmals Laws Regulation. 1936(4 of 1936),section 3and Schedule; and in the Angul District, by the Angul Laws Regulation, 1936 (5 of 1936).section 3and Schedule. Angul is now a sub-division of Dhenkanal District of Orissa since this Regulation was repealed by Orissa Act 19 of 1967. This Act has been extended to the new Provinces and Merged States by the Merged States (Laws) Act, 1949 (49 of 1949),