And Justice For All.

Why is the law lenient on the rich and powerful in India? A rich and powerful person often gets away even the gravest of crimes while a common man has to run from pillar to post for getting justice. A

Are the scales of justice lopsided.

#swamichinmayanandagetsbail.

There are so many questions, some presumptions and postulates here.

Justice is available, only in the next world, here we have laws. As every woman and her husband knows laws are like cobwebs, only small flies are caught, while the larger wasps and hornets just go through. The question of the week is why is the law lenient on the rich and powerful. Is it really lenient, or is the work of a smart lawyer?

Let’s look at some cases where people have got away, 2015 Salman Khan was sentenced to 5yrs of imprisonment within a year he was acquitted due to lack of evidence. The cops had not followed protocol in conducting their investigation or collecting evidence. What was surprising here, was the fast track that it received,  particularly when the Bombay high court had 12,911 criminal appeals pending as of March 2015 and at least 50% was pending for 10yrs. What is more tragic is the treatment met-out to constable Ravindra Patil, he was the only one who stuck to his statement, this bravery or naivety cost him his life, he discredited and denied medical treatment and help both by Khan and the Mumbai police. He declared as an wholly unreliable witness by Justice Joshi since lot of things contradicted his testimony.

The famous Jessica Lal murder, Manu Sharma would have got away but for the media campaign that heighted the investigative lapses.

Sanjay Dutt who was convicted under TADA but a retried and given a sentence under a more lenient arms act, with 132days of furlough of mundane issues. It is a hard hitting fact that Sanjay Dutt gets away courtesy mama-papa’s contacts, when 68% of inmates have not been tried, and 40% pending trail simply because they are not able to secure bail.

Lot of factors result in our abysmal rule of law record.

• A co-opted non-independent constabulary, which controlled by the political class.
• Over worked judicial system incapable of timely handling of massive influxes of cases.
• Poor infrastructure.
• Outdated forensics

Be it the Aarushi case or the Salman khan case, the root of this lies in the absence of political will and this is the reflection of absence of real electoral repercussions.

The privileged treatment that Sanjay Dutt received did not alter the mandate of the people. Salman Khan’s fan still throng to the theatre to watch his mindless purposeless movies. The dialogue that cop Arjun shekhawat doles out in wanted is insult over injury to constable Patil, yet the masses are enamoured.

The lastest in the line Nirbaya while the trail is on, another 5yr. Child endures the same torture in the American embassy grounds no one is talking about it. No one questions where the money for the convicts legal battle is coming from?

Talking about poor investigative procedures on one hand, there is also the victim behaviour that is hugely inhibitive to ensure adequate investigation or forensics. Like recently we had a case of sexual harassment, the victim was upset that she asked to file a FIR, and the cops did ask her questions. She was angry saying I have already said all this to the counsellor, but the counsellor cannot share it with cops. Since she did not cooperate with the cops, the cops could not help her eventually she went to VHP playing the Hindu card.

Let alone these cases, I know of a National school of Law graduate who withdrew a complaint from a voyeur who would film random women in restaurants, because “he might trouble me later, he might throw acid on me.”

To ensure justice is meted, requires awareness of legal procedures, and respect of the same. Our constabulary should be devoid of political pressure, A country as large as India has one central forensic laboratory at Hyderabad, most others are not either equipped either with adequate staff or equipment.  despite what the Hindi movies like to tell us, the police department is handicapped by both quality and quantity of personal.  Getting into the police actually means bribing the anything from 3lakhs – 5 lakhs, the cop is then focused on ensuring that he/she gets the money back.

The police work in stations where there are no decent toilets, their duty hours being erratic. No funds are allotted to teaching them new skills.

Why are we ambling through all this, when the question was obviously about Chinmayananda’s release, now go through the points, has the girl filed an FIR? Does she have evidence that will stand in the court. Did her inability to blackmail him result in her becoming vindictive? There are so many layers to this. But the bottom line being, he still being revered by his followers. If he has met with the bail requirement then he is entitled to bail. If it bothers people then we have the option of filing a PIL that is a public interest litigation.