Giving The Law Into Our Own Hands
By Mirza Yawar Baig
02 October, 2010
Countercurrents.org
Muddled thinking is nothing new of course but the emails flying across cyberspace seem to have taken it to a new height. Aided and abetted of course by newspaper headlines which for once correctly reflect the confusion of the people. ‘Land Divided, India United’ screams one. Others say the same thing with different wording, making it clear that a ‘rose by any other name smells just as sweet’. Though the exact nature of the smell in this case depends on who is smelling.
For people to take the law into their own hands is illegal and must not be done. If done, it does not change the law. The law will still prevail, once the dust has settled with the additional fact that those who had taken the trouble to step outside the purview of their authority will now become culpable and punishable in law. This is entirely just and proper if one is to have rule of law in the land and not hand over law and order to those who are capable of strong arm tactics alone.
But what if the august personages of the representatives of the law, themselves hand over the law to the people to change it as they will, by passing judgments based not on what is just and provable legally but on what the litigants want to see? And the argument in favor of this strange action is that to do otherwise would have adversely affected the law and order situation in the land. The question then arises, ‘Is it the job of the judiciary when passing judgment in a matter to worry and be concerned about how the litigants will take it, or to pass a judgment according to what is just and proven and leave the litigant’s reaction to those agencies whose job it is to preserve law and order?’
It is almost as if the honorable judges said to themselves, ‘Leave facts and proof alone, let us see what will be acceptable by the people (in this case the majority of the people).’ If that logic is applied, then actually it makes the life of the judiciary very easy. In any matter in dispute, just ask, ‘What does the stronger party want?’ and pass judgment in their favor. Will save a lot of time and money. And after all, who cares what the weaker party thinks? It doesn’t matter what they think. The stronger party then need not take the law into their own hands because it would have been duly handed over to them.
In the case in point, idols were placed inside the mosque (the judgment itself calls it ‘in a surreptitious manner) in 1947. Then the ownership of the mosque was disputed because some people suddenly claimed that specific place to be the birthplace of a divine person. Then in 1992 the mosque was demolished in an entirely illegal manner and thousands of people lost their lives in massacres related to the incident thereafter. Now suddenly we have a judgment which says, ‘Alright boys, you take one piece and you take the other piece and like nice boys go home.’ Truly a holy judgment. As my Guyanese friends say, ‘It is holy because it is so full of holes.’
Naturally the point is, if that is all that there was to it, then why go through 60 years of litigation? Why the Archeological Survey of India’s excavations and the excavations of other independent archeological experts (which seem to have simply been ignored in the judgment)? Why all the evidence collected? Why anything? Sixty years ago it could have been said, ‘People believe that this is the birthplace of the deity they worship and so whatever it is that is on that spot must be demolished and a place of worship of that sect/community/group/ must be built.’ That would have been much simpler and quicker. Would it have been just? Well, that does not seem to be an issue at all anyway, isn’t it? What about other such claims in the future now that the door has been officially opened? Well, we’ll come to that when it happens.
How is all this supposed to unite India as our mindless newspaper headlines and all the confused garbage floating on the internet claims? Taking away property that rightfully belongs to someone by force and then passing a judgment legitimizing that action is a unifying force? I am sure there are a lot of people of all hues who are delighted at all the avenues that have now been thrown open to them to do what they used to at least have second thoughts about doing in the past.
What about history? Who is she?
What about facts and evidence? Who are they?
Justice? Well we know what that is. It is to do what will maintain peace at any cost. At the cost of fact. At the cost of history. At the cost of justice itself. And if we shout loud enough, ‘Land divided, India united,’ India will indeed become united.
What about all those who died? The dead don’t talk.
What about the future? That will be after I have retired.
Truly in the land of Bollywood and fantasy, anything is possible. Jai Hind.
