Public Administration Mains 2020 : Model Question and Answer - 111

(Current Based) Question : Crime as punishment push democracy to the brink of lawlessness. Comment (15 Marks/250 words)

Model Answer :

A democracy is pushed to the brink of lawlessness , after the Telangana police shot down four men accused of raping and murdering a woman in Hyderabad.

The brazen choreography of events — the four men, unarmed and in police custody, are taken at midnight to the spot where the veterinarian had been violated and shot dead when they allegedly grabbed the policemen’s firearms — reflects an idea of medieval mob justice that was heard. It was an abdication of their role and responsibility as lawmakers sworn to the Constitution.

In the name of the people, the call is going out to junk due process and the established norms by which a civilised society decides to affix guilt and punishment, the checks and balances that stand up to the excesses of power.

The many lynching incidents in the last few years have already warned how a corrosive search for the “enemy” is leading to brutal violence, whether against “child-lifters” or “cow smugglers”. Moreover, in an iniquitous society, public outrage is easily gamed when those in the dock are the “others” — the poor and the working class. The same political class that cheers vigilantism is noticeably muted when the powerful are the accused.

If the impatience with a long-drawn out legal process is being used to justify police lawlessness, the judiciary must urgently step in to stanch this anti-democratic spiral. (Total Words- 227)

(Linkages : Democracy and Lawlessness; Civilised Society and People; Judiciary and Excess of Power)

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