Nandigram is not the only portent of how criminalised Indian politics has become. In Bihar, not so long ago, we saw Anand Mohan and his wife Lovely Anand being awarded capital punishment and a life sentence respectively for the lynching of the Gopalganj DM some 13 years ago. Then former UP minister Amarmani Tripathi and his wife Madhumani were given life sentences for murdering Madhumita Shukla in 2003. In J&K, a major sex scandal involving senior politicians, bureaucrats and security personnel was unearthed in August 2006. The controversial Tehelka sting bared the brutality of the Sangh Parivar soldiers in carrying out a pogrom against Muslims in 2002, and now you have CPM stormtroopers ‘taking over’ Nandigram through great violence and rape with active support from the state government.

Given this scenario, we have to be thankful, yet again, to the courts. Last month, as many as three significant judicial pronouncements were made on the theme of criminalised politics, and more recently the Calcutta High Court pulled up the West Bengal government for its handling of the Nandigram violence.

The judiciary has issued its indictments both on the employment of criminal elements and in the conceding of political space to them, as well as for resorting to criminal methods to protect themselves. The fact that the names of more than one party find a place on the dossiers of the Amarmanis, Anand Mohans and Shahabuddins, speaks volumes of the willingness of parties to flirt with winnable ‘outlaws’. While the motivation of a young poet in getting romantically involved with a married politician twice her age with dubious antecedents may not as yet warrant societal introspection, organised use of state machinery and stout defence of planned violence against those seen as ‘the other’ bodes ill for the rule of law.

... contd.