Nemo me impune lacessit...

The Noida Ripper’s case is becoming more and more sordid by the day. Theories are flying back and forth. Some would have it that the culprits were part of a larger human organ smuggling racket, while others contend, on the basis of photographic evidence found, that child pornography is the real story behind the curtain. And politicians are dropping to unimaginably low depths, what with cash compensations to grieving parents and comments about the crimes being a ‘small and routine’ affair.

I sometimes find it odd that politicians can be so very detached from reality, so removed from public emotions. I mean, no sensible person, no reasonable individual would ever state the crime as a small and routine matter. Come to think of it, the patrician who uttered this beauty must be regretting this faux pas, because he ends up achieving quite the inverse of what he must be intending to do. Perhaps he meant to say that while this was a serious matter, the police wasn’t taking this to be a small and routine matter either, or maybe not. Notwithstanding his intentions, the message that the world got, and that too from none other than the brother of the Chief Minister of the state of Uttar Pradesh where the crime took place, is that crimes of such a serious nature are so very mundane. I shudder to think what would count as a serious crime in the eyes of the notable patrician.

Many saw with glee and amazement the fall of Laloo Prasad Yadav’s cliché in Bihar last year. Reasons for this event were numerous, right from the growing awareness of the people to the disinclination of the people to give a corrupt administration another breath of life, to the desire for change, and that too serious change. Maybe this all contributed to a great extent, but there is one thing that I feel turned the tables against Mr. Yadav. His cliché’s government failed to ensure public safety to such a basic level that even children were no longer safe from the arms of organised crime. Kidnappings were commonplace. Children were seized in broad daylight, and kept in captivity for weeks together.

In the end, man is a primitive being, given to the primeval instincts of survival. No human will bear in silence harm being done to his loved ones, and those who permit such harm to be done bear his wrath. The phrase of “Nemo me impune lacessit” doesn’t evoke strong emotions for nothing. And when a government shows itself of protecting even children, I am confident that no sentient soul would ever dream of reposing any faith in it, and so it was, and the result is there for all to see.

Why I chose to relate this particular tale is rather simple. Uttar Pradesh is similar to Bihar, and given reforms that have taken place since last year in Bihar, maybe even worse than it now. This incident puts into context the appalling state of affairs as far as law and order are concerned. The verdict seems inevitable; what remains to be seen is whether those who will emerge victorious will do anything to learn from the mistakes of the past.

Have we lost it...?

Two cases have emerged, which would shock and appal even the most hardened of souls. The serial kidnappings and subsequent killing of children in Noida, and the murder of an 11 year-old child by his friends serve to remind us what a disturbed world we live in. That no matter how much we may advance in technological terms, in the context of the mind, the intellect, we are more backward than even the primeval man.

The Noida kidnappings were at one moment mysterious, and yet so long as the skeletons of the children had not been found, there still existed a semblance of hope that the children would return to their homes, maybe not unblemished, but definitely alive. But the discovery of the skeletons must have dashed all these hopes. The local law enforcement authorities predictably failed in their duties once again, and the end result is that too much innocent blood has been shed.

To my mind, rape and sexual abuse have always been the most horrendous and horrible of crimes that an individual may perpetrate. Even murder pales before it, because at least in the case of murder, the victim is granted death, thereby releasing him from his agony. But a rapist offers no such solace, no such reprieve. He impales not only the body, but also the soul, the mind, and leaves not a person, but an empty shell in the wake of his cruel passions. Such a crime is not just reprehensible; it is plain abominable.

But nothing compares with abusing children. I mean, how can someone be so depraved as to blemish an innocent soul, to so torment that which has been so often described as God’s most beloved, with such a satanic act? Paedophilia is perhaps the worst that a dissolute mind can conjure from the depths of Hell. It is still possible for adults to emerge out of the shock, out of the pain that rape may induce, but it is impossible to imagine that the ordeal that the juvenile victim faces could vanish or even be reduced in the face of the passing years of Time.

I say, hang these degenerate criminals; there can be no notion of mercy in such cases. I have always been a strong proponent of capital punishment, but can and will permit the judiciary’s decisions to grant punishments other than this in crimes such as murders. But when it comes to such crimes, crimes which don’t just break the law, but also threaten the very normalcy of society, there can be no reprieve, because such felons do not deserve any kindness, because to do so would be to rub salt in the wounds of the victims and their families. We cannot afford doing that, not now, not ever.