By way of extracting elements of hope out of its opposite, it's perhaps a good thing that 'bulldozer raj' moved right into the heart of India's capital. At least it was bound to invite the kind of national scrutiny it didn’t when it was unfolding in more mofussil north Indian towns - the last being Khargone, Madhya Pradesh, which followed the example set by UP.
Everyone bound to the law wants miscreants brought to the book. But the law must play by the book - that is its highest purpose. The only thought civilian populations will be encouraged to harbour when they see JCBs moving into certain neighbourhoods - that too right after a riot - is that the entire system is biased against certain sections of Indians.
And that even the sacred protection of due process will be jettisoned in favour of a targeted punitive system, with the thinnest of legal veneers.
Luckily, the Supreme Court intervened and stayed the demolition in Delhi's riot-hit Jahangirpuri. But not before quite a few houses and shops had been pulled down. All ostensibly to remove encroachments. In the process, a juice shop owner with a legitimate MCD licence lost his livelihood, another whose shop
was within a mosque also suffered losses.
An old man whose house was pulled down didn't know where to get a roof over his family's head. Heartwrenching stories of similar collateral damage thickened an already intolerably hot Delhi summer air. If there were rampant encroachments in Jahangirpuri, why did the municipal body not act earlier? Why right after a riot?
Is Jahangirpuri the only place in Delhi with encroachments? Even in Khargone, the bulldozers came out right after a Ramnavami riot. The incidents bring no glory to the nation. Those who hold institutions must remember that compromising their integrity will bring long-term corrosive damage to the very thing they profess to hold dear. That is India.
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