A system based on Justice!

A dream to imagine in this day and age!

If parties to the dispute act justly, the issues are solvable! 

By: Kashoo Tawseef

In the words of Martin Luther King, Jr., human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable... and he further adds that for every step towards the goal of justice; it requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals and such individuals make up the system or a nation based on justice. The various systems and nations that exist in today’s world are based on some sort of principle, but the underlying fact is that if any of such system or nation is based on justice, then only one can expect good out of it, otherwise it is not going to last for long and history bears witness to this fact, how systems and nations collapse. One should stand up for justice and side with the just and distance from in-just as Malcolm-X once said, I’m for truth, no matter who tells it. I'm for justice, no matter who it's for or against. There are various interpretations to this deliberation as to what justice is all about and how justice can be the principle of any system and how justice can be incorporated into nation building. 

When a system is based on justice, all the state of affairs of such a system or nation work efficiently and smoothly as justice is the principle of success of any system or nation. Question arises that what happens when there is injustice? When there is injustice of any shape or form either based on colour, race, religion et cetera, one can’t expect good out of such a system or nation and there are many example in the history. As Albert Einstein argues that in matters of truth and justice, there is no difference between large and small problems, for issues concerning the treatment of people are all the same. Everyone is equal and equality is based on humanity and that in itself is based on justice. 

In addition, the deliverance of justice is also important. The reason is to make justice functional, as they say “justice delayed is justice denied”, if justice is delivered on time that also helps to rebuild the broken societies, social fabric and systems. There’s a hidden concept called humanity. How important is that? When there is no humanity, you can’t debate or argue the lessons of anything, even lessons of faith or even convince someone towards a particular faith. This concept of humanity revolves around the pillar called justice. One can not impose opinion on others unless their argument is based on rationality, humanity and justice, unless you make others understand, what’s good about your opinion, and when you know your argument to support a particular system is based on justice, you have a lot of good at your disposal to explain. 

Such systems bring to the surface statesman and just rulers. When rulers/leaders treat their population as their brethren then only they will be able to do justice, and when there is a gap between the two, don’t expect much from such system or nation. Example of such a system is disputed region of Kashmir. If the parties to the dispute act justly then the issue of Kashmir would have been solved ages ago. The irony is that Kashmir’s are considered as third party to the dispute ignoring the fact that they are principle party to this long dispute in the history and any solution should be according to their wishes. It is so strange that parties to the dispute want to solve the issue without the principle stake holders. This is mockery of justice at its best and at its worst. But the fact remains that there is no justice to the ideas brought on the table to resolve the Kashmir dispute and the result is in front of us that the issue is lingering from decades. The people are suffering, people are dying, youth are unemployed, floods shattered the whole economy, but no one cares; because the system in place is not based on justice. When the rulers are ruling the masses at the cost of their innocent blood that should be enough to explain how much justice is in place. This is the best example of a mockery of democracy in Kashmir where people who rule are ruled by others and the common masses are left at the mercy of almighty.

Another example from present times can be that of Middle-East in general, the rulers are sold out lots and there is injustice all over and the result is chaos every where and killings and sufferings every where. People being killed for none of their mistakes, people who work there from sub-continent are being mistreated for being from poverty stricken places, rulers shaking hands with the worst oppressors of the century to help them in killing the fellow Muslims, injustice at it worst. 

One more example can be from western world, the states that kill innocents in the other world are the champions of human rights and irony is that they are given noble peace prizes, for what? That they are good in bombing and shelling policies in the other parts of the world where they are least bothered to care for. To the surprise one of the rulers once said that we want to make sure that “our” people are safe in Iraq as if the rest of Iraqis aren’t humans and if they die who cares, again injustice at its worst. The list of examples is endless. 

Lastly, let me conclude with the words of Muhammad Ali Jinnah, we should have a State in which we could live and breathe as free men and which we could develop according to our own lights and culture and where principles of Islamic social justice could find free play.

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