As this rather tumultuous week ends, it is heartening to see attempts at bringing the high and mighty to book:
- Amit Shah, Gujarat's Minister of State for Home, suspected of complicity in a fake encounter case, was chargesheeted and denied anticipatory bail.
- M K Kaushik, Coach to the Indian women's hockey team, was exposed as a sexual predator.
- Salahuddin Ayub, Principal of an elite private residential school in Andhra Pradesh, accused of raping a girl student several times over a year, was taken to the cops.
Common thread: all 3 events occurred this week, and all 3 events involve individuals in commanding positions (in their own respective worlds) who could well have been abusing the meek and defenseless under their control -- the very people who looked up to them for protection and leadership. In each case, powerful friends and allies of the accused have tried (and are still trying, as we go into the next week) to suppress their (alleged) crimes and misdemeanours, obfuscate the core issue in each case and divert public scrutiny by hurling counter-accusations at plaintiffs and/or investigators. We can only hope that justice is done in each case. What happened this week was just the first step, in each of the 3 cases, in what may well turn out to be a thousand mile journey. As we all know, it is not easy to bring to book those who have friends in high places and consider themselves above the law
Alan Watts once said (albeit in a very different context): "I'm in the business of effing the ineffable." Let's hope the Indian justice system is in that business too.
