A can of worms

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark – the famous quote from Shakespeare’s Hamlet rankles in one’s mind when some recent exposes relating to the Supreme Court comes upfront. What’s kept hidden from public view is now out in the open. The seizure of huge stocks of currency notes from the home of a Supreme Court judge, after the police and fire force reached his residential premises in the national capital following a fire in his outhouse a month ago, has chilled the nation’s conscience. Unruffled yet is the political establishment, notably Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who claims he’s ushering in Ram Rajya. Obviously, to compensate for Modi’s lack of response in the face of a grave situation, and certainly out of a prick of conscience, Vice President Jagdeep Dhankar has chosen to break the tower of silence. Dhankar, an eminent lawyer at the High Court before he took up political positions, called a spade a spade. He questioned the casual manner in which the establishment responded to the strange situation. As Dhankar cited, the government must explain why an FIR was not filed in relation to the seizure; why the whole scandal was kept under wraps for a full week after the seizure, until a media unit made the seizure public; why a kid-glove treatment was meted out to the accused judge; why a panel of judges took upon themselves the task of “investigating” the alleged corruption of the accused judge; and why judges should be treated as holy cows – even when the nation was made to suffer the stench from a can of worms, as Dhankar rightly put it.
In a scenario when the apex court itself faced a critical rupture to its credibility and the nation’s justice dispensation system as a whole came under a shadow, Jagdeep Dhankar was the voice of sanity. The Vice President lived up to his sense of commitment to the nation and its people. Obviously, he was also irritated over the way the Supreme Court took upon itself the authority to draw a line for the President, alongside Governors, and to dictate to them a timeline for disposal of files. This even as courts themselves are dragging cases through decades and show no seriousness to expeditiously dispose them of. The hapless victims of such indulgences by the judicial authority are the 1.4billion people that comprise the nation. India is increasingly turning into a nation where justice is denied to its citizens, thanks to this unacceptable, rather criminal drag, while vested interests rule the roost. It’s a pity that the nation under Prime Minister Narendra Modi through three terms at a stretch slept over such matters – resulting in the present ugly and shocking scenario. Jagdeep Dhankar raises several questions of extreme seriousness, all of which beg answers from the establishment, including the judiciary. The silence of the lambs is something that should not be taken for granted.