Should we learn a lesson from the British?

Prince Abdel Aziz Bin Nasser Al Saud, whose father is a half-brother of the king of Saudi Arabia, has recently been sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment by a British judge for beating to death his servant in a London hotel. Pronouncing the judgment the judge observed that it was an unusual case but in Britain no one, prince or commoner, was regarded above the law.

We in India claim a Brownie point or two that we follow the British system of jurisprudence but that is where we stop, because in our country anybody who is somebody is above the law. A state governor's brother, who was charged with the murder of a rival politician belonging to the same political party, was allowed to go scot-free because the Central Bureau of Investigation, India's top investigative agency, had submitted in the court that it did not have prosecutable evidence against the accused. It is altogether different matter that two persons had given a sworn statement to the CBI that they had heard some persons, whom they named, claiming that they had committed the murder at the behest of the governor's brother.

Some distance we have to go!