Sinners and their Treatment

Does God punish sinners ?

Apparently not.

There are many individuals who commit sins, I am talking here about grievous ones like rape or murder. Mostly they walk free due to the judicial system’s lack of evidentiary proof required to successfully prosecute. But the key thing is that powerful and rich people are mostly able to buy off the witnesses or even the victims, who generally belong to the lower strata of society.

Countries also commit murders, I have written about the same in the past. Again, mostly these are powerful or indifferent countries who have to achieve their goals, come what may.

Going back to politically connected, powerful, rich and famous sinners – it almost certainly is the case that they go scot free due to the laws getting applied differently to them : I do not mean that the judges are differential, it is the way things happen in practice. For example, these folks get into judicial custody (away from the pressures of the police custody) and then somehow almost always manage to get a bail. Their release back into the normal world helps in the process of silencing the witnesses or threatening the victims, etc., So, when the time comes for prosecution to argue the case, witnesses turn hostile, or the victim suddenly disappears !

Those who are based in Mumbai will know what I am talking about. Such cases happen in other parts of India as well, especially in Delhi.

The end result is that the rich and famous guy walks free ultimately, and despite the innuendos and difficulties faced while prosecution, is almost sure to be accepted back into the high society. Isn’t that a shameful practice ? Apparently not.

When God is not punishing proven sinners, why should high society punish ? Given that high societies in most metros has no scruples, conscience or guilt feeling whatsoever in the first place. It will always accept and felicitate returning rich sons !

Moral of the story : Get rich and famous and that too quickly, as the entry price keeps going up. Further there is no issue if you become a sinner, for neither God nor high society will punish you !

How ridiculous ?!!

The only way this is going to change is by effective and persistent prosecution. May be we should go and set up a Jury System, made up of normal citizens who have some standing in society. Common folks to judge the uncommon ones ! Cannot speculate on its effectiveness, as we have seen limitation on effective administration of justice even in the U.S. or the U.K. Many cases exist in the U.S. where the criminal has walked out scot free – the only difference being there is a wider distribution in favour of commoners rather than mostly rich and famous.

Prosecution and conviction rates have to go up in India, I believe the rate is less than 20% !

Well, hope the activistic Supreme Court of India will take cognizance of the poor situation and the case backlog across the country, and take effective action like it has done in so many instances. Criminals have to be convicted and cannot be let loose in the society, damaging the moral fabric of society. And injustice anywhere is going to affect delivery of justice everywhere in the country.

Have a good weekend,

Cheers,

Vijay Srinivasan
20th June 2009
Mumbai