Satyameva Jayate

Another event which has taken quite a limelight recently is the case of Afzal and Supreme Court’s verdict for him. To refresh our memory – Afzal was arrested and charged for his involvement in the attack on Indian parliament. The charge claims he was among those who devised the plan to blow up the seat of Indian democracy – the parliament along with elected representatives of the nation. Afzal was sentenced to death by all levels of judiciary including the Supreme Court of India. Right now he is pleading for clemency to the head of Indian government, the President.
Those unaware of whole event might think, oh! so a case of debate between pro- and anti-capital punishment is about to unroll. Well, yes but not without a hint of secularism! It seems that while this case (a terrorist versus a nation) is worthy of nation-wide protests, debates on all levels, dharna, drama etc but the other cases (like that of Dhananjaya Chatterjee, given death penalty for rape of a minor, or of Santosh Singh to be hanged for rape and murder of Priyadarshini Mattoo) hardly made a blimp. So if protesters were against capital punishment then there should have been same amount of hullabaloo for Dhananjaya’s punishment too as they both committed ‘rarest of rare’ crimes. Unless of course they find war on a nation not as serious crime as a rape of a minor, which I am sure they do.
So then where lies the difference?
(to be continued)