Legal Bite

I was reading a Sanjay Dutt article on TOI's website. The article was run of the mill. It's "user comments" were not. Comments showed that there were fans, critics, stoics, law abiding citizens etc. letting a bit of their opinion grace the graceful space left by TOI. There's one guy who wrote, "There is no one above the law." That comment caught my attention.

Truly, is there nobody above the law? What if the law makers and the pronouncers of lawful edicts begin wearing leather hats, carrying colts, and smoking cigars with a badge on their breast to flaunt their legality in matters? Would nobody be above them? Would nobody stand up? Wouldn't anybody dare to say, "Enough's enough, and its time for the law to do for the people what it was meant to do in the first place"... I guess not. A large chunk want "Sanju Baba" in jail, and rightly so. He did buy guns from those who used cheap deceit to claim innocent lives. The law says, such a man should be put behind bars. And he, Mr. Dutt knew it. Maybe a bit of Gandhigiri did rub onto his skin...maybe he had understood the Mahatma's saying, "The biggest strength lies in knowing and acknowledging your flaws." (paraphrased) Now let me go back to the statement which was most amusing, "There is no one above the law." It is easy to say that. It is especially easy to say that when law's hands have not put us on the balance. Only when on the balance do we know how precariously the blind lady's "tarazu" swings. The same law that has put a screen actor for buying guns, whether knowingly or unknowingly, from Bombay's bombers (400 life killers and so much more injurers), does not recognize the crimes of the people who are the real threats to our society- Us, common folk- We are the origins of cowardice that feeds terrorism within our domain- but we do not want to hear of that. We are the swindlers without any scruples. We are the criminals. I am not being inspired by Gandhi here- his era has passed. His thoughts are still golden, but the thoughts that he professed are not his alone- those thoughts of love and honor, belief and courage, are immortal ideas of man... but the Mahatma preached them to us in a form the people of his time could understand and associate with... Starving to death will not quell our blood thirst...no wonder the new breed of leaders take to "fast until death" dharnas only to munch a sandwich in a posh hotel once their resolution is passed in the house... Let us now put a common digression into politics aside and look at ourselves. While pretending to be citizens with the belief that nobody or no people is above the law, we are the ones who run lights and pay bribes. We are the ones who know best how to hide our money from the taxman. We are the people who burn our own for the sake of dowry money. We are the people who drown innocent girls to make life "better". The law we speak of- does not touch us then- what use is such law that cannot lift the morals of its own people... isn't the justice system a ground for morality to bloom? Where is our law then? Where is that sacred law of our democratic nation? Is it dead? If it is... why is it still dispensing judgment on others. Let the lawmakers for once, begin by judging themselves... Hopefully they will inspire us to spark some dignity in ourselves by way of which we might strive to become better citizens of this land of ours.

"There is no one above the law"- I say nay! Law ceases to be a prudential tool for its people when people themselves are lost... otherwise we are left with a legal system that becomes a stage for disgraceful wolves to usurp greater power by putting the meeker lot of their kind to the gallows, thereby giving the lambs of society a fattening fair. One should remember that a wolfish pack feeding the lamb cannot have good intentions for the thirst on their tongue is too, simply put, bloody.

To end this, let me quote Mahatma Gandhi, "In matters of conscience, the law of the majority has no place."