Forgiveness vs. Justice: A Reflection on Corruption & Peace
In a thought-provoking reflection, writer Joy Sirshendu explores Kolkata’s recent wave of public repentance, examining the deep philosophical conflict between immediate forgiveness and legal justice. He questions whether true, lasting peace can ever exist without full retribution.
In the last few weeks Kolkata has been exciting. Every day begins with some sensational news of someone getting arrested for intimidation, extortion, corruption and worse.
But what I found tremendously interesting are the reports of erstwhile extortionists voluntarily asking for forgiveness and returning people’s money. I don’t know what to really think about these cases. While my heart feels uplifted the way it feels at the finish of a movie with a happy ending, my head says, wait a minute, that is certainly justice not done. It is just an act of cowards who are really afraid to face the consequences of what they have done. In Bengali you would describe their attitude as “Chhere de ma kede bachi”.
But then it brings up the really uncomfortable questions of retribution and whether it is essential for peace. History does not seem to agree. After more than five decades of most spectacular retribution for the holocaust is Israel at peace ?
What if in an instant, say an angelic energy burst from space made all of us on earth forgive all the hurts, all the vendettas and all the lines of deep hatred, will we still seek to bring about a legal closure just to satisfy our intellectual ideas of fairness ?
It is the nature of the world that worldly things will not and cannot remain distributed in perfect equality. Any attempt to forcibly enforce such an artificial equality has never worked in the history of mankind.
Can we not then accept our situations, forgive and move on ? I can immediately hear the chorus of my own soul protesting to that question – so what about those who have lost all and are in a situation of humiliating servitude or worse? Expecting them to forgive and forget while the haves of the world continue to enjoy the luxuries reeks of the same insensitivities that caused all the reprehensible excesses in the first place. Where will this cycle end?
Perhaps there is no easy answer to that. I like to believe that in spite of so many things that still dishearten us, the state of humanity is better than what it was a century ago. It has been a while since humanity has seen pogroms, inquisitions, Satis and complete obliteration of cities by rampaging murderous hordes. At least they seem to occur in localized areas of conflict and not with the impunity of more anarchic times. I like to believe that even though we have a long way to go to really be able to live in universal peace, joy and fairness but stumbling, halting, unpredictable and excruciatingly slow it may be, humanity is getting there.
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