THIS is apropos the letter ‘justice system’ (Oct 14). It is about an innocent person whom the Supreme Court has recently absolved of a murder charge, two years after his death in prison when he already had waited for 20 years to get justice.

Even if he had been alive today, who would have given him back the 20 years of his life, his health, and his youth, all lost behind bars for no fault of his own.

It is not an isolated example. It is the same tale with varying intensities whenever a resourceless person gets entangled in our justice system. His or her lawyer may become more interested in benefiting the opposite party, for obvious reasons; and the judge(s) may ignore or downplay the vitally important evidences and solid documents while accepting the frivolous arguments of the other party and interpreting the laws in ways favourable to them – also for obvious reasons.

Incidentally the same issue of the newspaper had the following incisive lines written by the Nobel laureate poet-singer Bob Dylan:

Hurricane, 1976

Rubin Carter was falsely tried / The crime was murder ‘one’, guess who testified Bello and / Bradley and they both baldly lied / And the newspapers they all went along for the ride / How can the life of such a man/Be in the palm of some fool’s hand? / To see him obviously framed / Couldn’t help but make me feel ashamed to live in land / Where justice is a game / It is about the land whose justice system is far better than ours.

Prof(Dr) Surayya Khatoon

University of Karachi

Published in Dawn October 26th, 2016