Off court
Whoever said the "law is an ass" or "laws are meant to be violated" wasn't wrong. So wasn't the one who said that "justice is blind". Believe it or not, Railway Minister and leader of RJD Lalu Prasad Yadav, who ruled Bihar for 15 long years, has been absolved of the charge of possessing Rs 45 lakh of assets beyond his known source of income for he attributed the riches to the dowry he had received from Rabri Devi's father in 1974.
Accepting and giving dowry may be a penal offence; Lalu said he had received as 'gifts' a pair of cows with two calves and some five acres of land. He satisfied the special CBI court Judge Muni Lal Paswan that by milking cows his family started a dairy business, the main source of income.
In his affidavit before the Election Commission, the RJD stalwart who is facing trial in the multi-crore 'fodder scam' case disclosed that his family owned 50 cows and 31 calves. The couple is happy. Their faith in justice system has been strengthened. It's not known whether Income Tax authorities' faith in the justice system has been equally restored.
The year gone by, 2006, was punctuated with the expression "faith in the justice system has been restored" or sometimes, "lost faith in the system". Chief Justice designate K G Balakrishanan felt most satisfied by directing cooked and nutritious 'mid-day meals' for school children. He doesn't attach great importance to his controversial verdicts upholding President's rule in Bihar or rejecting the pleas for cancellation of Lau Prasad Yadav's bail. The verdicts in some of the cases that hit the headlines such as murder of Jessica Lal, Priyadarshini Mattoo, Shibu Soren's PA, Delhi municipal councilor Atma Ram or the ghastly Mumbai blasts in 1993 had the punch line of 'faith' in the system restored.
Even the convicts who may have been sentenced to death or life imprisonment haven't lost faith for they have pinned hopes for justice from the last resort, the Supreme Court. Why is it called the 'Supreme' Court? When some school students asked CJI Y K Sabharwal, he replied that because it has the last word. Its decision might be wrong, but it can't be faulted.
The coming years may not change the basic perception about dispensation, but during 2007 courts would have as many holidays as last year except all the holidays fall on working days. Cheers.
