Carry on working

Case for overhaul

• Former Chief Justice V.N. Khare’s article ‘Justice after Jessica Lall’ (IE, February 23), made an excellent case for drastic change in our criminal justice system. If our politicians, police and bureaucrats care to reverse the trend of cynicism and complete lack of faith in the police and the criminal prosecution system in the public mind, immediate changes must be made to the statute.

— R. Venkatanarayanan Noida

Ripples, anyone?

• Even considering that the IPC and CrPC are 171 years old, is it not too much of a coincidence that only persons in high places are able to get away with benefit of doubt? It is only the poor and unfortunate who are dealt with strictly in accordance with the law and awarded the severest punishment.
And if a revered former chief justice like V.N. Khare could not initiate corrective action in a long and chequered career in the highest echelons of the
judiciary, whatever the reasons, is it possible the stirring piece on your editorial page will create ripples in the minds of those who matter?

— Gautam Mookerjee, Kolkata

Same difference

• This refers to the NDA blaming the UPA government for misusing CBI in the Ayodhya case. The Opposition should introduce a bill in Lok Sabha to make the CBI really autonomous. But since the Opposition also misuses CBI when it is in power, neither government nor opposition wishes to clip its own wings by providing the much desired autonomy to India’s premier investigating agency.

— Madhu Agrawal Delhi

Vote banks for all

• APROPOS of your editorial ‘Heading for trouble’ (IE, February 20), you have rightly observed that perceived fault lines of caste and creed lend themselves to facile and emotive mobilisation. In the aftermath of large-scale agitations against the Danish cartoonists, the sentiments of the largest minority in our country are being overtly converted into a vote bank. No political party wants to miss this opportunity. Even the BJP does not want to be seen as an exception. However, the Samajwadi Party is taking the lead in this controversy. Its leader and the CM of UP is hesitant to initiate legal action against his loud-mouthed minion, Yaqoob Qureshi, who appears oblivious of the norms of a secular polity.

— Shahid Hussain New Delhi

Missing justice

• Apropos of your editorial ‘So crime does pay’ (IE, February 23), the vote-bank compulsions of all parties to accommodate in the cabinet criminals like H.K.L. Bhagat, Sajjan Kumar, Jagdish Tytler, Shibu Soren and Yaqub Qureishi emboldens people to take to crime as the quickest way to become powerful. In Bihar kidnapping for ransom is a lucrative profession. In Mumbai, victims are killed even after ransom payments have been made. It is tragic that our courts of law only seldom are also courts of justice.

— M.S. Rajagopalan, Ahmedabad