The injustice of the Juvenile Justice Act

Maneka Gandhi’s statement on juvenile justice and her resolve to bring to book juveniles who rape and murder is indeed music to the ears. I fully endorse the view that a so called kid who is into premeditated rapes and murders can by no stretch of imagination classify as a kid worthy of much reduced punishment. A rape is a rape and a murder is a murder regardless of the age of the person committing it and the perpetrator does not deserve any leniency whatsoever.

India is also home to a plethora of armchair enthusiasts who carry a view on almost all issues under the sun. It is these armchair enthusiasts who so far have been highly vocal against attempts to bring about suitable modifications in the juvenile justice act. I wonder what would be the response of the most vocal armchair enthusiast is his own daughter undergoes a fate akin to Nirbhaya, yet I am reasonably certain that his views would be taking a hundred eighty degree turn.

The Nirbhaya incident of the 16^th of December 2012 shook the collective conscience of the nation. Never before in the history of the republic the citizens emerged from the comfortable confines of their homes on the roads of the capital to protest against the incident. Yet justice is still awaited in this case and with the exception of the guy who committed suicide, the others are still cooling their heels and forever devising ways to delay the noose. The noose however would never await the one who was the most brutal of the lot, for the mere reason that he is a juvenile and therefore classifies for leniency under the juvenile justice act. What a travesty of Justice!

I abhor the double standards that we citizens generally tend to practice. The noose if our own kith and kin is involved and mercy or a total lack of concern if someone else is. I have always admired  instant justice the sunny deol style as witnessed in films and unless the same is implemented in real life scenario, innocents and the weak would continue to suffer.  

Spurred by the cover the act provides, juveniles have also become the favourite actors in cases of terrorism and organized crime. The act has already provided sufficient motivation to crime syndicates to bank on youngsters for their operations in India. During my stint as the head honcho of Delhi division of the railways the biggest headache was the nuisance and crime committed by the below eighteen group at almost all stations and yet we could not do anything in the matter.

For the sake of the society and also for the sake of my family I sincerely hope and pray that Maneka Gandhi does not fail in her efforts. 

Retribution at the holy Tihar

The death of Ram Singh within the precincts of the holy Tihar was perhaps the only death in recent times that brought smiles on the faces of many. Vicious it may sound but the fact remains that this news gladdened many hearts for the act of his suicide was perhaps the best retribution for the heinous crime that this animal had perpetrated. Maybe God intervened for want of a swift and just punishment for this heinous crime against the human race.

Mad dogs should be killed at the earliest and what better than the mad dog killing himself and in the process making it easy for the overburdened machinery. Perhaps ours must be the only country in the world where even an act of killing a top honcho or an attack on the parliament itself takes decades to be taken to the logical conclusion of punishing the perpetrator. Dispensation of justice is also perhaps as deeply tied in knots as development and education are and rightly so, we all hail from same societal structure, howsoever good or bad it may be.

The Nirbhaya case has displayed the extent to which a human being can be brutal, merely for satisfying his basic instinct. The extent of brutality perpetrated shocked not only the common man but also hard core criminals who throng the holy Tihar and regarded Ram Singh and his gang as the ultimate scum amongst scums. Newspaper reports at times highlighted the vicious treatment that the men of Tihar inflicted on all those who defiled humanity by the rape and brutal murder of Nirbhaya. To that extent the men of Tihar gained the appreciation of many of us.

The affected party in almost all instances has a different and perhaps an appropriate viewpoint, yet the rest of us impose our, the society’s viewpoint even if it may be contrary had we been directly affected. During an earlier tenure as the head honcho of a major sarkari setup, I had as always cracked down on sexual harassment within office premises and suspended and transferred the male in many cases without going through the motions of an enquiry. On being questioned by a union leader during a staff interaction, I agreed to enquiries in future provided the leader would also seek an enquiry and not demand direct action even if his daughter or wife was sexually harassed in the office she worked. He and all other armchair critics were thus suitably silenced.

I am also unable to appreciate the clamour of many arm chair enthusiasts for a humanitarian handling of the criminals who displayed animal instincts while violating the girl and worse still showed no remorse thereafter. That this is distinctly a behaviour definitely not worthy of mercy or condonation is not in doubt, yet statements seeking the protection of the juvenile interalia seeking legal rights to rape and murder by adolescents keep on doing the rounds amongst the intelligentsia. Such pseudo protectionism encourages criminal tendencies, a familiar scenario in the capital city that has juvenile act in force.

Why cannot we be like Singapore or Dubai, nations where criminals are treated like one and crime therefore makes extremely rare appearances. That sheer deterrence is indeed the remedy for such crimes is a fact that needs appreciation even amongst that section of the society that remains fairly insulated from all that affects the common citizens of the nation. It is also beyond doubt that all those who are in favour of a treating the juvenile with kids gloves and abolition of death penalty for even heinous crimes, would like a chameleon change their stance the day someone from their immediate family and friends goes through even a hundredth of what Nirbhaya experienced. 

Soft pedalling on issues and softer still on deliverance and economic growth has led our nation to such a pass that even miniscule nations cock their thumbs at us more often than acceptable, and the recent snub is a case in point. Gandhi, the father of the nation wanted to build an India based on the foundations of truth, value systems and character, yet nation building has perhaps remained the least of our concerns. 

Today morning enroute to my office I read a graffiti on an auto that said “Please don’t honk. The nation is sleeping”. How true, yet how sad!