Courts Failed Us So Badly That We Need The Police To Shoot Rapists Dead

The four accused in the gangrape and murder of the Hyderabadi veterinarian have officially been declared dead. They were shot dead last night in a police encounter while the police were trying to recreate that fateful night on November 28th when the four men brutally raped, murdered, and then burnt the body of the victim.

According to reports coming in, the four men tried to stage an escape by snatching a weapon from the police and then running away. The police shot them in self defence.

This news has been greeted with celebration and joy all across the nation, which is completely understandable. Far too many women get raped and far too many rapists roam scot free because of long trials, botched evidence, and witnesses turning hostile.

Our judicial system, which is meant to provide justice in a manner prescribed by law, has failed us completely.

Nirbhaya rape case still stretching on

Take, for example, the watershed moment that happened after the horrific Nirbhaya rape case in 2012. The law was toughened and fast track courts established to make sure that justice in such cases was swift and decisive. Instead, seven years later, the rape trial is still not done yet. The death sentence has been pronounced but the rapists have not been executed yet.

In fact, their lawyers are planning to file a curative petition in the Supreme Court to review its decision to hang them. This will take another year at least. One of the rapists will file a mercy petition to the President. This seven-year wait, which many are finding long and stretched out, is actually supposed to be considered fast since this case was tried by a “fast track” court. What is the state of affairs with our judicial system when seven long years is considered “fast”?

It’s no wonder that the parents of Jyoti Singh, aka Nirbhaya, have applauded the extra judicial killing of the four rapists in Hyderabad. For them, the fight for justice has been long and hard. Seven years long.

Badrinath Singh, Nirbhaya’s father, says the Hyderabad vet's family has been spared the ordeal he and his wife, Asha Devi, have been put through in the past seven years.

Influential rapists are given special treatment

The Unnao rape survivor who has accused former BJP MLA Kuldeep Singh Sengar of rape has had a rough deal. Sengar is powerful, so powerful that Sakshi Maharaj, when he was contesting the 2019 Lok Sabha polls from Unnao, went and visited him in jail. Mind you, everyone including Maharaj knew that he was in there for rape.

Then, to rub salt into the survivor’s wounds, the victim and her lawyer were nearly killed in a road “accident” when a truck whose number had been wiped out with black paint had rammed into their car. So far, her father and two female relatives have been killed while her lawyer is severely injured after she reported the rape by powerful Kuldeep Singh Sengar. Her life is in tatters.

Let’s not forget Chinmayanand and the Shahjahanpur rape case. This case even has video evidence of him doing these awful deeds and the man himself has expressed shame at what he has done. What has happened in this instance? The victim has been jailed for extortion and blackmail for allegedly blackmailing Chinmayanand for money by threatening to release the videos. As for Chinmayanand, he spent a good portion of the time he was arrested in a comfortable hospital for “stomach pains.”

All the four accused in the Hyderabad rape case were poor young men who drove trucks and were cleaners for a living. Killing them is easy. The families are too poor to ask questions about complicated things like humans rights and constitutional legalities.

Our country has reached such an impasse that we do not trust our courts to provide justice according to law. The rule of law does not even exist anymore. Trials take so long that they have become a farce while rich and influential men who rape are able to twist the system and get away with it.