Mahar Hussain, a human being from a developing country, was sentenced to death in 1997. After spending 17-years in jail, he died of a heart attack in custody. Before the completion of sentence, his heart stopped beating. A pretty normal thing to happen, to any of us. Human beings are, sarcastically, immortal beings. At least, this is what the inhumane world thinks right now, However, back to the story: two years after his death, the Supreme Court acquitted him as innocent. Okay fine, he has died now, nothing can be done to recover his loss. Now, another story, Mr Iqbal, another person from the same country, was arrested at 17. It took courts 21 years to realize that he had been a child at the time of offence and released him. While he was in the prison, Pakistan saw six Prime Ministers changing, Facebook and other social media platforms were invented. Nokia was replaced by tons of smartphones. Basically, by the time justice arrived, an entire generation was born and grown.
So can we call it a justice?
There is an old and colloquial legal maxim: Justice delayed; justice denied. Now, you all know the reason behind the 'colloquial' saying. Beneath those four words, lies one of the deepest moral questions a society can, always has, ask itself. What exactly is justice? Is it the truth that arrives after decades, after youth has faded, relations or loved one have passed away, opportunities have vanished and world has moved on? Has justice truly prevailed, or has it simply written a tragedy in legal manners without any option to undo?
The unstoppable time
Justice was never meant to be a destination; it was meant to be timely. A correct verdict delivered after decades is still better than a wrong one, but at the same time, it is still incomplete. The problem is that the law often counts years as numbers, any sane mind would do the same. But life, in a nutshell, counts them as moments, which were supposed to live and not survive. To a court, it was another 17 years, another figure in a case file. To a human being, they are seventeen years without freedom, without family, without festivals and the list goes on. Justice does not lose its meaning along the journey, it just loses part of its meaning because life refused to pause while everyone was moving.
Bail exists on paper but liberty depends on cash, paperwork and a bank balance.
Before moving any forward, there is another trial which happens behind the doors - one between a citizen and his wallet. According to the law, everyone is equal and luckily money describes the equal. For someone with resources, legal proceedings are mere fun to play, or a fight to win for the ego sake. For someone with no adequate resources, everything becomes existential. There is adjournment on daily basis, which results in another loan, another sacrifice at home and what not.
Oh it reminds me of Sunny Deol's masterpiece delivery in a courtroom: "Tareekh pe tareekh, tareekh pe tareekh, tareekh pe tareekh milti rahi h, lekin insaaf nahi mila, My Lord, insaaf nahi mila. Mili h toh sirf yeh tareekh." (Loosely translated as: Date after date, hearing after hearing, that is all we have been given, My Lord. But more court dates were all we received.)
The concept is pretty simple, a person accused of a minor offence can stay in jail simply because he cannot afford to leave. And a warmonger can be the ruler of the country.
"In a Court of Justice, both the parties know the truth; it is the Judge who is on trial." - Justice J. R. Midha
Read it again. Because this is one of the powerful sentence, I have read in my life. At first, it sounds so wrong. Like the accuased is suppose to be standing in the dock, lawyers argue, the victim is waiting for the finale. Surely, victim is the one on trial.
Then the reason behind being powerful begins. The victim already knows the truth behind (in most cases). The accused knows it too. Even if one, the truth is still there just buried. Even the lawyer with the not-so-limited information knows - Saul Goodman from "Better Call Saul" would agree. The only person walking into the courtroom without certainity or any hunch is the judge. Every piece of evidence, every testimone, every dispute is judging the judge's capability. The final judgement is not merely about guilt or innocence. It is more like a report card of the judge and the insitution itself.
Justice is the pursuit
Maybe this is the point where we become unfair to justice itself. Because, neither it is a mathematical figure, where every equation will be giving a right answer; nor the scales of justice balancing left and right side equally. Humans carry fear, memory, prejudice, love, greed, and sometimes, there are instances when good intetions result in terrible outcomes. Truth, therefor, is rarely visible rather it is an abstract phenomenon. It arrives in parts, spken through imperfect witnesses, lack of evidences and memories that fade away with time. Finding it is not easy, never was.
That is why I am not a big fan of blind criticism or admiration of judges. They, judges, are humans too, asked to make extraoridinary decission that can reshape a good sum of people.
The Society
Once again, the real failure begins much earlier than the courtroom. It begins in a society that celebrates wrongs over rights, power over principles and wealth over fairness. We often ask judges to repair the damage done by the society. The society? Yes, because of most the time, it is done by the politicians elected by us, broken insitutions made by us, poor investigations, corruption result of all that and infinite things. Indeed, a courtroom can interpret the law, though made by the executive body mostly, but it cannot single-handedly repair every damage that already eixsts.
So where does that leave us?
Probably with a little more absurdity than certainty, which of course is the rational approach. Because, justice is far more complicated than the slogans or facts written on the papers. Speed alone cannot correct it, just as delay cannot preserve it. A fast verdict may bury the truth, while a delayed one may bury the purpose itself.
That brings us back to the journey where we began. Mahar Hussain never lived to hear that he was declared innocent. Iqbal walked out of prisson into a world which never stood for him. One is dead; the other is just breathing. The courts delivered a verdict, but time was the winner.
So, one again: can we call it justice? I still do not know. Untill then, we hope because what other option do we have?
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Peace 🕊️
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Feel free to share your perspective.
