The recent twitterati outburst on Salman Khan drunk and driving case was expected, but more astonishing was the reactions came from so called celebrities of Bollywood who went on to heights to defend the court’s suspended verdict. Many of us might have read those tweets from hypocrite celebrities who once acted or produced Vintage movies where a widow mother and son(heroes) often begged for justice and that was the common theme in most of the movies then. Farah Khan Ali and Abhijeet Singer went on to defend the verdict insensitively and illogically as if great injustice was done to beinghuman Salman Khan.
Many twitterati alike few e-media houses were appalled by the high court verdict. The Uber rich of India can afford witty famous lawyers to defend them even if they are at the wrong side but the poor cannot afford the same even if they are on the right side. It is known that fee of famous lawyers range from 30lakhs-50lakhs/Day where as a poor cannot even earn 500/day leave aside the lawyer fees.At one of the Ted talk show Bryan Stevenson said “Our criminal justice system treats you better if you are rich and guilty than if you are poor and innocent.” Which I feel aptly applies in this case also.
It should be observed that the High Court has suspended the sentence and not overturned the sentence. So it is not yet the case being called as “Justice denied for poor” legally .Of course justice delayed is justice denied but for whom?? For beinghuman Salman Khan or For the families of those who got injured and died in the incident?? .
We human beings mostly respond to a situation or crisis only when our dear ones are affected by it.We do not live in a era where we consider our fellow human beings as part of our tribe. The Same goes with the Bollywood celebrities as they never reacted so much to any other similar cases in India. Bollywood must understand that One cannot erase a criminal act by doing many good things. One of my friend while casual discussion said “few (Obviosly I don’t want to write their names(sic!)) actors are role models for the future generation. But how a prejudiced irrational person can be a role model for any??.Once the great Martin Luther King said “Injustice anywhere is a threat to Justice everywhere”. Hope the Justice is done in this case also by law of the land.
My Dissertate 