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Offcourt...

NEW DELHI: Human psychology apart, family compulsions play a crucial role in certain crimes. Criminality has no face; it lies beneath one’s own reactions to different situation that an individual faces.

But now we have reached a situation when witnesses,whose testimony is crucial for convicting the accused, are also restrained from deposition for the sake of family pride.No definition has been coined for this peculiar tendency.

But Delhi High Court Justice A K Sikri has ventured to look into the psychology of a girl whose brother is charged with murdering her close ‘friend’ as they wanted to marry.

Her family objected to their alliance on two counts; caste and financial strength. The victim’s father was a bureaucrat and not as rich as the girl’s family.

Daughter of a heavyweight politician D P Yadav, Bharti is a material witness in the case against her brother. However, she has been evading cross-examination on various pretexts including that she cannot come to India as her studies will suffer. Besides,

Bharti is also wary of the media attention on the case.

Bharti may face “inner conflicts” in coming to the court.Abraham had also faced it. The judge recalled the famous story of Abraham and Isaac from the Bible. God ordered Abraham to kill his only son Isaac. Abraham loved Isaac but God too. Yet he was given a choice. But God saved him after Abraham had put Isaac on the pyre.

Could Bharti be facing the same dilemma? She has the court’s command to obey and she loved the deceased who was allegedly killed by her brother.

The judge quotes two broad patterns of socialisation of an individual. One is ‘repressive socialisation’ which is obedience under force and ‘participatory socialisation’ where a child has a say in family matters.

Bharti may be suffering from ‘repressive socialisation,’ and that could be the reason for her staying away from making a free and fair deposition which might not be palatable to her family. Who is Isaac, Abraham or God in this case? Only the court can explain.