There have been several instances of mobs taking the law into their hands in recent months, signalling a worrying decline in public confidence in the country’s justice system. On Wednesday, a mob of villagers in Bihar’s Vaishali district bludgeoned to death 10 men and critically injured another for indulging in crime. A few days ago, a mob blinded three youths in Gaya district when they tried to steal a motorcycle and two minors were beaten up and paraded on the streets for stealing from a shop.  Only some weeks ago a youth accused of snatching a gold chain in Bhagalpur was beaten up by a mob, then chained to a motorbike by policemen and dragged till he became unconscious. In Orissa, four ‘fuel thieves’ were tortured for hours by locals. These horrific incidents of street justice bring back memories of the infamous Bhagalpur blindings of 1979-80 when police blinded 31 undertrials by pouring acid into their eyes. The incidents are shocking and evoke deep revulsion for the level of brutality that the mobs have displayed in dealing with suspected criminals. Those who are punishing suspected criminals are violating the law themselves and acting outside the country’s judicial system. They should be punished under the law.

But punishing those meting out street justice alone is not going to arrest the problem. There is a need to understand the reasons behind the growing tendency for extra-judicial punishment and address these. People are taking law into their hands as the law and order and justice mechanisms have not delivered. People have lost faith in the state’s ability or willingness to bring the guilty to book. Criminals manage to get away unpunished. Criminal cases drag on for years. People are unable to turn to the police to protect them from crime as the police are often in league with the criminals. The quest for justice becomes all the more frustrating when the crime is carried out by the rich and powerful. In these situations, justice is not done.

It is the breakdown in law and order and the country’s criminal justice system that has contributed to people deciding to deal with criminals on their own. These are not isolated cases of anger exploding in gruesome violence. These are manifestations of deep and widespread frustration with the failure of the state’s justice delivery systems. If steps are not taken to reform the malaise gripping our criminal justice system, incidents of violent street justice will only increase.