State cannot abdicate its duties towards citizens!

Be it monarchy, dictatorship, oligarchy, theocracy or democracy; there is one unwritten rule that obligates the ruler, and that is, protect thy subjects meaning the people or those ruled from all sorts of aggressions. The aggression may be from a foreign country or from within. The internal enemies may be in the form of religious, linguistic, regional or racist fanatics whose sole aim is just to overthrow the government of the day because of a variety of reasons ranging from differences in political ideology to just the economic loot. But a pious duty has been cast upon the rulers of all hues to protect the life and property of all people without any discrimination at any cost and at all times. A government can be pardoned for not performing other duties such as economic, social and cultural uplift of the people, but it can never be pardoned for any laxity in protecting the most precious life and property of its people.

Seen in this background, the recent communal violence unleashed by Jihadi elements and the crass negligence of the powers that be to curtail or crush the perpetrators of such violence, does not augur well for the biggest democracy in the world, that is India. Considering the built-in factors such as, large population , illiteracy and poverty of a majority of people, sporadic incidents by the fringe elements cannot be ruled out. However, the upward going graph of the communal violence is indeed, a worrying factor.

The recent incidents prove that owing to religious and political factors, the ruling clan at the States and the Centre, has been slow to say the least, to the cries of the harassed or targeted people for police protection in time. As a stitch in time is generally missing from the influenced or motivated police, the toll of human lives is escalating after every gruesome incident.

Indeed, the vanishing faith in the administration is the basic factor for the people looking for other available alternatives in a bid to ensure the safety and security of their life and property. Though by any yardstick this is not a good alternative, but then, in order to save one's life and property from the enemies within, there is hardly any choice left with the people. That is why self-proclaimed 'Messiah' of the gullible people by whatever names they may be called, Talibans, PFI, Bajrang Dal , VHP or RSS have sprung up all over the country offering free emergency services to the people of a particular religion in case of need. If the State machinery keeps its lethargic attitude on, a day is not far away when every street or village will have armed or unarmed groups having a field day and quite often they will clash against each other shedding a lot of blood.

Surely, this is not a mere rhetoric or figment of wild imagination, but a bitter possibility in a near future if the rulers fail to see the writings on the wall. To expect the judiciary to indulge in fire-fighting is certainly too much of the expectation. At best, the courts can give a call to the fire-brigade informing it about the eruption of blaze of fire which they have already done. Now, the fire-fighting on war-footing has to be undertaken by the elected governments keeping aside all political differences for the sake of the people and the Rule of Law. And to achieve the desired results no stone should be left unturned; including the deployment of para-military and military forces besides the regular police forces.

HC JUDGE THREATENED; ROARS BACK

The Karnataka High Court Judge, Justice Hethur Puttaswamy Sandesh has said that he was threatened with transfer for handling cases being handled by the State's Anti-Corruption Bureau.

In course of hearing of a bail petition of an accused who was allegedly caught accepting a bribe of Rs. 5 lakh, the judge found that the counsel for the ACB had failed to produce certain documents before the court, despite an undertaking given by him and the judge felt that this was a move to protect the accused.

Justice Sandesh revealed that he was threatened of a transfer and added similar threats of transfer were received by another judge also.

'I don't fear any one, I am ready to bell the cat. I have not accumulated property after becoming a judge. I don't care if I lose the position. I am the son of a farmer. I am ready to till the land. I don't belong to any political party. I don't adhere to any political ideology,' the judge roared. In a later development, ACB's Additional DGP Seemanth Kumar Singh has moved the Karnataka High Court seeking expunction of the remarks made against him by Justice H P Sandesh.

Indeed, this is a sorry state of affairs of our democracy where even the Constitutional authorities are not feeling safe and secured and their independence is under threat.

SC EXPLAINS ON EQUAL WORK, EQUAL PAY

The Supreme Court has clarified that an employee cannot claim parity of pay scale with another due to mere similarity of designation or similarity or quantum of work; but the doctrine of equal pay for equal work could only be invoked when the other employees were similarly circumstanced in every way.

Delivering the judgment in State of Madhya Pradesh Vs Seema Sharma, the bench of Justice Indira Banarjee and Justice J K Maheshwari observed that all relevant factors such as the mode of recruitment, qualifications for the post, nature of work, the value of work, responsibilities involved etc; too, will have to be considered.

In the present case, Seema Sharma was initially appointed as Librarian-cum-Museum Assistant, Government Dhanvantri Ayurvedic College, Ujjain. She claimed the UGC scale of pay after completion of 8 years of service, on par with the senior scale of Librarian . The High Court granted her the higher pay scale of Librarian but the State of Madhya Pradesh went in appeal before a division bench, which dismissed the Appeal. Hence, the matter was taken up to the apex court.

TS-HC ADVOCATE DIES IN HARNESS

K Govardhan Reddy, an advocate of the Telangana High Court suffered heart-attack in the court premises. Later, he was rushed to the Osmania General Hospital where he died. The Bar leaders expressed their anger against non-availability of emergency medical treatment and the ambulance. They appealed to the authorities to provide medical facilities including the medicines, doctors and para-medical staff besides a standby ambulance to cope up with any emergency to the advocates, court employees and visiting litigant public.