Just Mercy and Jai Bhim are the two films having a similar plot of false accusation against a person of minority community.
The theme of injustice – righting a wrong and punishing those who are not responsible for it, comes alive through these two stories.
The common thread between the two films is the role that justice plays in bringing together the people and bringing peace among them.
Judiciary is considered to be the supreme of one, not a fact but a legal fiction. The supremacy of Judiciary is based on its obligation that it ought to serve, that is ‘access to justice’. Justice is the cause and action of the judiciary and in the absence of which the Judiciary becomes a robot.
Under every legal system, justice to every class of people is made obligatory. Each and every person, of any social or economical standard must be given justice when the need comes.
However, in a country like India that is equally diversified by its different religious and ethnic groups, it is often difficult to arrive at the truth, or justice.
The movie Jai Bhim depicts the life of a retired Madras High Court judge and former Senior Advocate K. Chandru. The protagonist was a lawyer representing an Irular woman whose husband, a snake catcher, had been convicted of robbing a house he had previously visited and had since gone missing from police custody.
On the other, the movie Just Mercy is based on the life of Bryan Stevenson who initiated the Equal Justice initiative through grants to help death row convicts in affording legal assistance, and revolves around the judicial proceedings of a person named Walter McMilian who was convicted falsely and given a death sentence for the rape and murder of a white woman.
Both the films have similarities attached as in the case of Just Mercy, the trial was of an African-American who are the victims of apartheid and are considered abominable throughout the American history, while in Jai Bhim, the convict belonged to a Scheduled Tribe who have been given the status of barbaric and inhumane creatures since the time of the British India.
Under the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871, they were termed as criminals, however the Act was repealed later only.
The justice in both the cases is hard to serve as the adjudicator has the build-up conclusion that the minorities always do wrong when it comes to rendering justice to a majority-group.
Both films spotlighted procedural irregularities that became publicly known only after active steps were taken to deny the same, without which the convicts’ false accusations could not be proven.
Custodial violence in both the films is used to obtain confession from the convicts.
n Just Mercy, the sole eyewitness was unjustly imprisoned in a chamber close to the execution chamber because he feared burning, and being forced to smell the charred ashes all night compelled him to testify that McMilian committed the murder and was convicted.
In a very similar manner, in Jai Bhim, the convict and his two relatives are tortured in police custody, and the convict dies. The police cloaks the whole scenario by saying that the convicts escaped the custody and the procedural irregularities only come to an end when a cross-examination is done.
In conclusion, both the films aptly analyze the judicial system’s failure to protect minorities.
To this day, the illusion that our Constitution guarantees justice to each and every person is believed even though our eyes see the otherwise.
It is just as important in today’s time as it has ever been to have a legal system that is both fair and transparent and also capable of rendering justice to the wronged ones whether the petitioner or the respondent.
