| Friends,
Gangaajal, as most of is might be knowing, is a 2003 Hindi film directed by Prakash Jha, which has Ajay Devgan presenting the central character of Amit Kumar, the idealistic Superintendent of Police of some fictitious named district in Bihar. As a brief introductions, the film deals with two plots- one regarding the Goonda raj of a mafia-politicians euphemistically named Sadhu Yadav and other regarding the blinding incidence through the use of acid in the police station lockup.
Yesterday, I was watching this film once more when my daughter Tanaya quipped-"I don't know why the police officers like this film so much. I saw this in Ranchi, in Patna and here also" Yes, she was true there- I do like this film and many a times I have to cajole my wife to watch this film, while she has some other preferences.
So what is it that makes Gangaajal so heart-touching to police officers (as Tanaya claims) and to me (as I know for sure)?
The first reason that comes to my mind is that the film seems to have gone into detailed research and analysis of the police department and is successful in bringing forth many characters, procedures, ambience, sub-culture and responses as near as reality. Many things like the SP's residence and office, the police stations, the subordinate police officers and their behaviours, the public response etc. do help me taking back to my own days when I was also Superintendent of Police in some districts. This much of resemblance could not have been possible without what we might call some insider information. The wikipedia says that it was "the brain child of Mr. Mahendra Lalka". Mr Lalka is a retired IPS officer from UP and I seem to completely agree with information.
The second thing is that it also presents some of the real political mindsets and responses. Along with this, the external critical factors for the proper functioning of police department like Media, Civil society etc also seems quite natural.
But more than discussing the merit of the film, the fundamental question that I want to address is the issue raised by Prakash Jha about the blinding of the accused by the police and its immediate reactions and repercussions. This is one issue that concerns us all and I am sure many of the police officers would have faced such situations and dilemmas. Yes, it is absolutely true that due to many factors, including the political, administrative (which includes police) and the judicial system a very large chunk of Indian population does not seem to have great hopes of justice left in them. The slogan of "might is right" seems to have made its overwhelming presence. The way so many political dramas related with thousands of crores of scam unfold daily before us as soap-operas, with the powerful politicians staying completely defiant to any kinds of rules and regulations and the way each of them finally seem to end with whimper, these kinds of feelings only get reinforced. What is there on the bigger platform is also happening at smaller levels at each nook and corner.
In such circumstances, whenever public sees that some kind of "instant justice" is being delivered (in any form or format), they do seem to get immediately attracted to this. I have seen this happening during some of my own postings. And this is the most dangerous trait that we have slowly acquired. For certain reasons, the people seem to have taken the "Taarikh par taarikh" dialogue from another celebrated film Daamini as the representative of Indian judicial system has made them really desperate and frantic. They are in a lookout for any such ray of hope that has the ability to deliver whatever justice, be it the medieval justice of any eye for an eye.
OK, as a Human Rights votary I can and I must press for the Police to stick to its charter of duties and not to transgress the limits strictly imposed by law. But I must admit frankly that the kind of situation that Ajay Devgan faced when the public ire was so strong that it wanted public lynching then and there has also been faced by me more than once and in two situations, I very well remember that despite our best efforts, we could not stop the public from setting alight the house of the accused. May be because, I did not have the kind of moral authority that Ajay commanded in the film.
Summing it up, I would like to say that this aspect of the film needs to be taken very seriously by all those who are there in the process of the criminal justice system, otherwise we might come at a point of no-return. And the first thing that comes to my mind is speeding up of the judicial system. Just the way Mao Tse-tung closed all the Universities of China for some years and asked the intellectual classes to move to the villages to transform them, I personally feel we have come at a stage that more than accuracy, speed of justice delivery has become more important. Just as Blackstone's formulation "better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer" on which our criminal justice system is based, today's need might be- "Let all the pending cases be disposed than being absolutely correct in each of them." I say this only on common sense, which is the cornerstone of any legal system. If every year 100 new cases come and the courts are able to dispose only 40 or 50 (which possibly is the overall situation today), then we get have a backlog of 50. The next year, the backlog doubles and then trembles and then in a decade the system gets chocked and blocked. Can a living organism live with blocked arteries?
So, if this situation is not immediately changed (with each Court being held personally responsible) then the public fascination for Gangaajal can never get eliminated and the distortions that we live in will only get enhanced. .
Amitabh Thakur
IPS,
Currently at IIM Lucknow
# 94155-34526 |
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