The Hindu Business Line : An ethical question

THE framing of charges against the Railway Minister, Mr Lalu Prasad, by a CBI Special Court at Ranchi in the multi-crore fodder scam has led to a strident demand from the leaders of parties constituting the National Democratic Alliance for his resignation. This is not surprising since there is no love lost between the NDA and the RJD, in general, and Mr Prasad, in particular. His supporters have dismissed the demand quoting the precedent established by some of the NDA Ministers who continued to function as such despite a similar framing of charges against them by courts in some criminal cases.

The Law Minister, Mr Hansraj Bharadwaj, has said, and rightly, that an MP is legally disqualified from being appointed or continuing as a Minister only upon conviction and not simply because charges have been framed against him. In the context of the suffocating pollution of public life, the question that arises from such instances is ethical, and not legal. It is based on the precept that persons occupying high positions should, like Caesar's wife, be above suspicion.

The importance of the ethical dimension will be clear from an understanding of the what the framing of charges implies, and the process through which, and the stage at which, it takes place. When the commission of a cognisable offence comes to notice, the police registers a first information report and starts an investigation. When the investigation brings out evidence sufficient to stand judicial appraisal, the police files a charge-sheet before the competent court, with a list of witnesses, their statements and other supporting documents.

The court then takes cognisance of the case, and begins examining witnesses and evaluating the corroborative material. When the court, after due application of its mind, is satisfied that there is prima facie evidence of commission of the crime by the accused, it frames charges against him and proceeds with the subsequent stages of the trial.

Thus, the framing of charges is a judicial act, based on a judicial scrutiny of the evidence up to that stage, and certainly casts a shadow on the accused. Voluntary resignation of accused Ministers will be a salutary convention in such situations, especially in the land of Mahatma Gandhi.

B.S. Raghavan

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