Letters to the editor

SL Rao

Former director general, NCAER

A shallow nation

We remain a shallow nation that waits for a weekend to demonstrate its social concerns and a polity that cries out death penalty for crime against women to leverage popular mood than any practical concern or cogent measures to arrest such crimes. Our political system remains archaic and immature. Look at Ireland. In just a couple of weeks this conservative nation gelled together to put in a simple but effective law on exigent abortion. To tackle crime against women, we shrink from the hard groundwork that would transform the policeman at the local thana, to a concerned friend of the victim reporting an incident from a confirmed sympathiser of the culprit as is being perceived today. A stern handling at the thana level buttressed by refinement of existing laws and a demanding judiciary would bring in the results. But no one is prepared for this genuine long-haul toil.

R Narayanan