Twenty years after the serial bomb blasts that killed 250 people in Mumbai, the Supreme Court on Thursday sentenced the accused to varying periods in jail, but awarded the death sentence to only one.
Especially in light of this, it is debatable if celebrated Bollywood star Sanjay Dutt, whose involvement for possessing an assault rifle in his home is widely seen as a gross error of judgment in a specific situation rather than a desire to be associated with the horrible terrorist event, should have been sentenced to five years in jail, no matter if he will serve only three and a half years as he has done a year and a half already.
The man who is beloved of fans around the country for his portrayal of a gangster with a Gandhian bent named Munnabhai has come a long way in life through serious self-correction. He has chucked alcoholism and has fought other personal demons. He has also been an upright citizen and professional actor in the past two decades. As the purpose of jailing a convict is to protect law-abiding citizens and hopefully reform those being punished, Mr Dutt’s personal history could have been considered by the Supreme Court while sentencing him, although not in deciding his offence for which sufficient evidence existed. If the minimum of five years was unavoidable for the offence in question, it could have been exacted in the main through community service to maintain the spirit of the law and yet to set an example.