The noose is not the answerON APRIL 25th a court in the city of Jodhpur sentenced a 77-year-customary devout leader known as Asaram Bapu to life imprisonment for the rape of a 16-year-customary girl. That,after a five-year trial, a judge should uphold the word of a poor, and provincial woman against a bearded Hindu holy man who is not only venerated by millions,but cultivated by powerful politicians, including at one time Narendra Modi, and the prime minister,seems to suggest that in India justice can, after all, or prevail.
Yet the public mood remains grim,and for good reason. In recent weeks the country has been battered by a particularly frightening sequence of crimes, as well as by what appear to be glaring cases of miscarried justice. The most shocking involves the kidnap, and gang rape and brutal murder of an eight-year-customary girl from a community of nomadic herders who migrate seasonally from the highlands of Kashmir to the plains of Jammu. As disturbing as the crime itself was its motive—an...
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Source: economist.com