Just because the State government had “fallen in error” in releasing the accused in the infamous Dharmapuri bus burning case and also those involved in the Melavalavu massacre, “the same error cannot be allowed to be perpetrated” by granting similar relief to M. John David, convicted in the 1996 gruesome murder of medical student Pon Navarasu, the Madras High Court has said.
Justices P.N. Prakash and A.A. Nakkiran dismissed a writ petition filed by the life convict’s gynaecologist mother, praying for his premature release, and concurred with State Public Prosecutor Hasan Mohamed Jinnah and Additional Public Prosecutor R. Muniyapparaj that there could not be negative equality under Article 14 (equality before law and equal protection of laws) of the Constitution.
They cited the Supreme Court to have said, in a recent judgement, that “a principle, axiomatic in the country’s constitutional lore is that there is no negative equality. In other words, if there has been a benefit or advantage conferred on one or a set of people, without legal basis or justification, that benefit cannot multiply or be relied upon as a principle of parity or equality.”
