Etiquette and Ethics in Democracy

 

There is the inauguration of the new parliament in Delhi next week and I believe the opposition parties are rightly protesting against the Prime Minister inaugurating the building while ignoring the Constitutional Head. I guess, it is probably a wish for the Prime Minister to see his name etched in the Parliamentary history of India by relegating his own candidate for Presidency to a namesake and as a gesture of tokenism. As for the Sengol, my personal view is that it is an attempt to snatch the legacy of Mr.Jawaharlal Nehru and make it his own and pleasing the citizens of Tamil Nadu. Thanks to the popularity created by the movie Ponniyin Selvan.Taking out a personal gift to Pandit Nehru from his personal museum and placing it in the Parliament is not good politics.  This act only reiterates  Mr.Modi’s misplaced personal contempt for the Congress party and his repeated attempt to diminish the legacy of the Gandhi family. Rahul Gandhi is more popular in Tamil Nadu than Mr.Modi. This is something Mr.Modi has to accept.

This is the similar to the attempt to snatch the legacy of Mahatma Gandhi when he toured the Sabarmati Ashram with erstwhile President of the United States, Mr.Donald and sitting with the spinning wheel. As a person who has faced a lot of humiliation in public and personal life, I always believed that respect cannot be demanded or snatched but earned through legitimate means.  People respect some politicians whether they win or lose elections. Personal charisma sustains itself and blatant narcissism does not make one a statesman. Mahatma Gandhi and Nehru are leaders that India and future generations will never be forgotten. Text books can be modified to suit one’s political and cultural narrative. The onus now falls upon teachers, parents and grandparents to present a reasonably accurate narration of our political and cultural history. Mr. Modi does not have a moral right to inaugurate the new Parliament when he is one among the elected members of the legislature. It is a wrong precedent and does not meet the standards set by our Constitution and is a terrible deviation from tenets of a  Parliamentary democracy.  

Attaining an equitable justice system...how difficult is it?

 

The Supreme Court of India has  reserved orders  in cases relating to same-sex marriages. Can the Supreme Court be liberal in its findings and conclusions on issues relating to personal liberties of citizens of  a democracy? 

 It would be  pertinent to remind the nation that the Supreme Court, had in the year 2006, made it mandatory to register all marriages irrespective of the religion of the parties. Subsequently only four states among the  Union have formally mandated the registration of marriages through legislation. When state governments adopt a lackadaisical attitude towards directives of the highest court of the nation, such governments should be refused the right to agitate their grievances before the very same court whose directives they chose to ignore and circumvent. 

The Supreme Court is yet to hear the extremely important case on electoral bonds that is directly related to the economy of our nation. It has spent nine days listening to same sex marriages when in the first place its directives on registration of marriages issued as early as 2006 have not been complied with by most States. It has clearly exhibited its stated position by refusing to stay the electoral bonds scheme and I believe that the highest court of our nation has taken  a political stance favoring the ruling government and failed in its duty to be equitable and dispassionate in deciding cases that have huge impact on the future of our democracy. 

Although it is argued that marriage under the Hindu Marriage Act is not a contract, it should be noted that when families of two parties arrange a heterosexual marriage between two people, most of the families have an event known as the ‘Nischayathartham’, or 'Engagement ceremony', the priest draws up a contract to record the agreement between the families to enter into a contract of marriage between two members of their families deciding on a date for the ceremony of wedding. Although cases are not filed based on the document signed by both the families if one of them calls of the wedding, it is nevertheless a contract with witnesses from both the family and friends. When it comes to divorce, an agreement is reached as to the custody of children, wealth and immovable property that is registered as a document of court for the parties to sever their ties to each other.  So, why is it contended that marriages under Islam and Christianity are contractual and Hindu marriage is a  sacrament unity. 

Considering all this, the complexity of deciding same-sex marriage can be resolved by courts by  pre-nuptial and post-nuptial agreements by any party wanting to enter into a marriage regardless of  religion or gender the parties. The sanctity in a marriage depends on the extent to which the parties are willing to commit themselves to each other and a signed contract does not reduce the relationship to being transactional.

If the Apex court is genuinely neutral in its outlook towards such politically sensitive cases, it needs to rise above all forms of compulsions and prejudices by initiating suo motu contempt proceedings against state governments that have failed to usher in police reforms as recommended by the Apex Court and initiate legislative efforts to  mandate registration of marriages and call for relevant amendments under existing laws on registration and  payment of stamp duty. 

Issues of national importance that call for political non-interference have been relegated to the backbench  to help those who focus  on vote-gathering  tactics and preventing politically inconvenient situations for national and regional political parties. As utopian  it may sound, failure of the highest judicial authority to take forward democratically valid reforms will lead us into becoming a dystopian nation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sensitising the society about reactions of women to violations.

  

The New York Times carried a news report on the case filed against Mr. Donald Trump whose lawyer questioned the victim asking “Why didn’t you scream”?.  I  believe lawyers handling rape cases need to be sensitised on aspects of victim psychology before venturing into defending the accused.  Many years  ago, I watched Penelope Cruz play the role of  a rape victim. Although the scene was so explicit and the movie otherwise dramatic,  the victim's  reaction to rape by  ‘freezing’. She neither consents nor protests, which  explained a lot about how rape victims could react during moments of such physical violations. The movie bothered me a lot but I thought Penelope was exceptional as was her performance in the movie Vanilla Sky. 

Legally, it is referred to as 'Detection Freezing' . When a woman trusts a man and travels with him to a specific location for a request that seemed with a genuine objective,  the last thing in her mind would be to have consensual sex. When the man takes her for granted only because she agreed to travel with him  and that she may be a willing partner shocks her into a freezing mode that prevents her from  screaming or protesting and  leaving the place with a lot of guilt that she may not disclose the incident even to her best friends.   Recent research claims that humans when exposed to extreme threat in some occasions tend to  react in an involuntary manner resulting in  temporary immobility including motor inhibition which in scientific term known as ‘tonic immobility”. No woman would like to admit that she was a victim of sexual assault especially if she is a professional and a married woman at that and more so if the accused is a colleague in the same industry. The incident leaves the victim with a  deep sense of guilt  since she believed that she had given the accused the opportunity to assault her by trusting him blindly and taking his words at face value. Rape victims who have come forward to file a complaint need to be applauded for their bravery in facing the society, defenders of the accused, and live with the stigma their whole life. Let us be more compassionate towards women who are helplessly struggling with the ‘frozen moments’ of their lives.