Why Does the Government Wake Up Only After People Die?
Why Does the Government Wake Up Only
After People Die?
Seven people are dead after a building housing students as
paying guests collapsed in Delhi's Satya Niketan. The owner and members of his
family have been arrested, five MCD officials suspended, and investigations
announced. Suddenly, there are promises of structural audits, inspections, and
firm action. Wow, what a change. But is it really? If dangerous construction
and regulatory violations existed before the collapse, where was this
administrative efficiency before seven people died?
This is becoming a disturbing pattern. In 2024, three
civil-service aspirants drowned in the basement of Rau's IAS Study Circle in
Delhi, a space reportedly sanctioned for parking and storage but being used as
a library. Arrests and investigations followed, yet nearly two years later a
court questioned why investigators had not adequately examined the
responsibility of senior civic officials. Then 15 people died in the June 2026
coaching-centre fire in Lucknow. After those deaths, Delhi suddenly sought information
on 923 coaching centres and ordered inspections. If hundreds of centres
required safety scrutiny, why did people first have to die for the government
to discover the danger?
We saw another version of this failure after the rape and
murder of an eight-year-old girl in Assam. Residents reportedly caught the
accused and handed him to police, then protested over allegations of a delayed
police response. Only after public anger did authorities suspend the officer in
charge of the nearby police post. The Swatantra Bhardwaj case raises another
uncomfortable question: after he was accused of assaulting the father of a
student activist and allegedly boasted about political protection, why did
sustained public pressure have to build before serious action followed?
A disturbing formula is emerging: people suffer, people die,
citizens protest, courts intervene, officials are suspended, and the government
announces that nobody will be spared. Then the headlines disappear and the
country waits for the next tragedy. That is not preventive governance. It is
government by obituary.
But there is an even deeper problem. Where are the
consequences?
Suspending an official is not justice. Transferring a
policeman is not justice. Arresting somebody for a few days and allowing the
case to disappear into the system is not justice. Justice requires an honest
investigation, prosecution based on evidence, a fair trial and punishment under
the law when guilt is established regardless of the accused person's wealth,
religion, political affiliation or connections.
Without that, nothing changes.
If a builder believes an illegal floor can be managed through
connections, why should he stop building it? If an official believes ignoring
violations will produce nothing worse than a transfer, why should he fear the
consequences? If a politically connected person believes the police can be
influenced, what exactly is preventing the next crime?
Law works because people believe breaking it has
consequences. Once the powerful believe consequences can be bought, negotiated
or politically managed, law becomes something that applies mainly to people
without power.
That is where Narendra Modi's leadership deserves serious
examination. When major crises confront the country, Modi and his Home Minister
increasingly seem absent from the difficult conversation. Instead of facing
independent journalists and answering uncomfortable questions, Modi returns to
speeches, controlled appearances and attacks on political opponents. Now we
have “angry fufa,” joining an expanding vocabulary of mocking descriptions for
opposition leaders.
Perhaps these expressions entertain political rallies, but
what do they solve? Calling an opponent another name does not explain why an
unsafe building remained standing until it killed people. Attacking Rahul
Gandhi does not explain why regulations were not enforced. A speech does not
explain why citizens repeatedly have to protest before authorities act. Name-calling
is not accountability, and diversion is not governance.
Leadership is easiest when inaugurating an expressway or
claiming an achievement. Leadership is tested when something has gone terribly
wrong. That is when the Prime Minister and Home Minister should be visible,
answering questions, demanding independent investigations and making it
unmistakably clear that political connections will protect nobody.
Instead, the impression increasingly created is that
responsibility travels downward while power protects itself upward. A junior
official is suspended, a policeman transferred, a committee announced and
nobody at the top appears responsible for anything.
Meanwhile, the machinery of government can move remarkably
quickly when citizens challenge those in power. Barricades appear, police
arrive, protesters can be detained and critics questioned. Where is that same
efficiency when illegal buildings operate, safety regulations are ignored,
children are endangered or politically connected people are accused of
wrongdoing?
This is why the Satya Niketan tragedy is about much more than
one collapsed building. India cannot inspect its way out of a system in which
people believe rules can be purchased. It cannot suspend its way out of
corruption. And it cannot arrest its way out of crime if investigations and
prosecutions do not ultimately establish responsibility.
The solution is not complicated, although implementing it may
be politically uncomfortable: investigate honestly, follow the evidence
wherever it leads, prosecute without fear or favor, give the accused a fair
trial, and punish those found guilty under the same law whether they are poor,
rich, politically connected or politically powerful.
Until that happens, the cycle will continue.
Buildings will keep collapsing. Regulations will keep being
ignored. People will keep dying. Officials will keep being suspended after the
fact. Politicians will keep promising action, and another tragedy will
eventually replace the previous one in the headlines.
A country does not become a banana republic simply because
crimes occur. Crimes occur everywhere. It moves in that direction when
criminals begin believing that justice is negotiable and the powerful begin
believing that the law is something meant for other people.
That is the real test before Modi and his government. India
does not need another nickname for the opposition, another speech or another
promise that “nobody will be spared.”
It needs something much simpler and much harder:
A system in which nobody actually is spared because of money,
power or political connections.
Until India restores that principle, the buildings may
continue to fall but what is really collapsing is something far more important.
The people's faith that justice still belongs to everyone.
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