Life gets more and more bizarre with each passing day, with much to write about, realities that boggle the normal intelligent mind. A historian is brutally murdered in her home in Patna and the police remain mystified. Gunda gardi, as it is referred to in the newspapers, continues unabated on the Lucknow University campus where students come armed and with armed guards, and when the vice-chancellor closes down the institution till such time the arms are ?surrendered? and kept off the premises, all hell breaks loose.
The political class in the state is appalled that it has been asked to live by the law. Fortunately, the vice-chancellor refuses to buckle under pressure and has categorically stated that this move of his may begin the cleansing process in a state ridden with extortion and other such horrors that stem from a lack of sane governance.
Because governments have abdicated their responsibility and degraded the processes of plain and simple governance, the courts have taken over everyday lives. This can be hugely dangerous, particularly if integrity is on the wane.
A corrupt judge could damage a great deal with rulings that are based on partisan demands of people who push through illegalities with muscle and money power, people who have learned well how to ?buy? their way, bypassing the laws of this land. Anarchy spreads like wild fire and when fuelled with large dollops of cash it becomes uncontrollable, raging through the environment, damaging civilized and dignified life and living. The bullies take over and run amuck with weapons of personal destruction. Only strong, fearless and unselfish gover-nance can check the fire.
Madness and mindlessness seems to dominate decisions that affect hundreds of thousands of straightforward, honest-to-god people, who are the anonymous majority with no access to the powers that be. Last week, a judge of the Rajasthan High Court closed down the Ranthambhore National Park indefinitely. The order was based on a petition filed by some transporters who were protesting rules and regulations of the park authority. Instead of compelling the government to furnish a set of rules that pertain to movement within the park, asking for them to be made statutory for a specified period of time, and brought into play within a specified time bound period of even a week, this judge arbitrarily closed the National Park.
Incredible India has become Impossible India.
Travellers from far and wide have been held to ransom because of either an unthinking or a motivated order. It makes no sense at all in its present form and has thrown dignity to the winds. Visitors cannot leave and go to any other destination because there are no rooms anywhere for love or money. There are no seats on flights out of India. What do these innocent people do? Why is this kind of trauma being meted out to domestic and international tourists? It is well known that when parks are shut down, poachers and graziers enter these areas that are out of bounds knowing well that the indirect patrolling of visitors wandering through the forest and direct in-season patrolling of forest authorities are non-existent. Where has the common intelligence of this great civilization gone? Why are moronic decisions allowed to be taken with such sickening regularity, decisions and acts that plague ordinary people?
The answer is quite simple. It can be very dangerous when the courts enter the space and jurisdiction of the executive. When the executive is weak and indecisive, and the judiciary is governed by superficial and inadequate knowledge on the subject in question, only anarchy will prevail, destroying all that was and could have been productive.
The judiciary should stop governing from courts, and instead act to compel the government and its agencies to address complaints quickly so that corrective action is taken.
Take a look around.
India is in the throes of a very serious, possibly terminal, illness. An illness where the pain is causing dreadful contortions and side-effects. The Naxal/Maoist movement is one such truth, and there are many more that will overwhelm this nation state that may, in the future, initiate the Balkanization of the subcontinent as states get more and more disillusioned with the breakdown we are witnessing around us.