THIS refers to your editorial ‘Accountability must start with PM’ (Jan 16).

While agreeing absolutely with your contention that the prime minister and his family need to be held to exceptional standards of scrutiny ahead of all other individuals, I would like to draw the attention of the honourable judges to some examples from daily life.

If a 10-year-old child speaks a lie, he is not treated at par with a 25-year-old youth guilty of the same offence. Likewise, the youth isn’t subjected to the same amount of condemnation as a middle-aged person would. Besides, a civilian government employee of any age losing his departmental identity card is not punished for that, but even an 18-year-old military officer is, I believe, dealt with very strictly.

Thus, the lawmakers can perhaps be classified into three or four tiers of responsibility. The president, the prime minister, the cabinet minister and advisers at federal level and their equivalents at provincial level may be put in tier 1; the NA speaker, Senate chairman, heads of various committees can be classified in tier 2.

Similarly, the length of time a legislator has been in the assembly can be used to classify them. Again, the amount of funds, if any, handled by each lawmaker can be another factor. Those who are so-called ‘back-benchers’ having very little responsibility can be placed in the lowest tier.

When subjected to accountability, the ones at the top must be dealt with most strictly. Those at the second level can be excused once for a wrongdoing while the lower ones may be excused twice, depending on the seriousness of their fault.

This should make it easier for the Supreme Court to decide who is Sadiq and Ameen.

Khalid Perwaiz
Karachi

Published in Dawn, January 19th, 2017