We should strongly condemn the very highhanded and reprehensible act of the Goa Government in reprimanding police officers for having rightly charge sheeted Goa Sports Minister Ramesh Tawadkar in the 2009 Cotigao Wildlife Sanctuary rioting case.
Will be writing to the Chief Justice of India giving him complete details of this political interference in the Ramesh Tawadkar case, besides other criminal cases involving ruling politicians where the wheels of Justice have been malafiedly high jacked by the Government.
Ramesh Tawadkar the then MLA of Poinguinim Constituency was charge sheeted on June 10th this year under Sections 143, 147,451,353,224 and 225 read with Section 149 of the Indian Penal Code for having on 27th June 2009 along with a mob barged into the office of the Range Forest Officer at Cotigao Wildlife Sanctuary in Canacona and forcibly taking away two accused who were in the custody of the Range Forest Officer.
The Supreme Court has time and again ruled on the need for the police force to be functioning free from political interference. The law does not require that the police should seek government permission before charge sheeting any accused. Neither does the government need to be intimated about the charge sheet being filed. On the contrary the police should have been asked to explain as to at whose instance they dragged their feet for seven long years to charge sheet Ramesh Tawadkar.
Highly questionable is the presence of Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar and Additional Solicitor General of India Atmaram Nadkarni at that high level meeting called by Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar where police officers were given a dressing down for charge sheeting Ramesh Tawadkar.
Propriety demanded that Ramesh Tawadkar after being charge sheeted should have infact been dropped from the cabinet. In a landmark Judgment the Supreme Court in 2014 advised Governments not to induct as Ministers charge sheeted persons facing trial while highlighting that criminalization of politics destroyed people’s faith in democracy and that persons howsoever high could not be exempted from equal treatment.
The Supreme Court ruled that constitutional morality, good governance and constitutional trust expected good sense not to recommend any person with criminal charges for being appointed as a Minister while observing that criminalisation of politics is anathema to the sacredness of democracy.
The Supreme Court also observed that a democratic republic polity hopes and aspires to be governed by a Government which is run by the elected representatives who do not have any involvement in criminal offences.
But Politics today is no longer a mission, not even an honest profession. It has been abridged to a scoundrel’s last resort. It has become a ruthless business, with morals and ethics twisted, thrown to the winds, and long buried deep in the slush of ignorance and thuggery. Those belonging to a genre of politicians with qualities of head and heart cannot survive in today’s political pitch as he has to be thick skinned and a hypocrite to the core. Having to be always ready to breach and bend all the laws and rules to survive.
