The Hindu : New Delhi News : Mob justice on the rise

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Saturday, Nov 15, 2008
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New Delhi

Mob justice on the rise

In yet another incident of a mob taking the law in its hands and deciding to hand out instant justice, a teenaged boy was beaten to death and his friend severely injured by some locals who allegedly found the two stealing cartons from a godown in the Capital’s Nangloi area in the early hours of Thursday.

This is not the first time that the public has resorted to deliver “speedy justice”. In fact, there are numerous such instances of public anger spilling over and “justice” being meted out on the street.

A young woman who was allegedly criminally assaulted by her landlord was mercilessly beaten up by the relatives and neighbours of the accused in East Delhi this past April accusing her of levelling false allegations. The family of the accused, their neighbours and passers-by thrashed the hapless woman with slippers and punched and kicked her in full glare of television cameras. The ghastly drama continued even after the police reached the spot. Action against her tormentors was initiated only after the Delhi Commission for Women intervened.

In another instance, a woman teacher was almost lynched by hundreds of angry parents and protesters in August last year after a sting operation by a private TV channel showed her as being involved in a prostitution racket. Many vehicles were damaged and several people injured. The sting operation later turned out to be a hoax.

Moninder Singh and Surender Koli, the accused in the Nithari serial killings, were similarly beaten up by an angry crowd inside a court premises in January last year while they were being taken away by CBI officials after being produced in a court in Ghaziabad. And there are several other instances of Blueline bus drivers having been beaten up and buses being damaged by the mob after a road accident.

The growing number of such cases in the Capital shows that street justice is not just confined to villages and towns. The mob mentality has now transcended the boundaries to reach cities.

“People draw inspiration from the instant justice methods and take the law in their own hands only when they have lost faith in the system of governance. But the angry mob fails to understand that the revenge it extracts is not just illegal but also disproportionate to the crime committed. And sometimes the victim of their anger turns out to be innocent at the end. But with lakhs of criminal cases pending in various courts in India and an abysmally low conviction rate, it is not surprising that instances of vigilante justice are on the rise,” said a Delhi Police officer.

In some cases, police inaction and incompetence also provokes the common man to resort to instant justice. In fact, there are instances when the police have been accused of being a mute spectator to an act of vigilante justice and even promoting it.

Police failure to initiate action against the culprits involved in such acts also encourages the growing trend.

The temptation to take the law into one’s hand is greater when people believe they can get away by playing vigilantes.

When a mob takes the law into its hands -- no matter how extreme the provocation -- it reflects lack of public faith in governance.

The inhuman acts of street justice cannot be justified at any cost, and it is time law enforcement agencies sit up and perform their duty.

Ashok Kumar

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