hidden image

Bulldozer Justice!

Robert Clements Robert Clements
31 Mar 2025

The first time I saw a bulldozer, it was an awe-inspiring sight. A giant machine, powerful and imposing, tearing through mounds of earth with a mechanical efficiency that seemed almost hypnotic. It was a thing of purpose—used to build roads, clear debris, and shape landscapes.
Lately, however, the bulldozer has taken on a new role: judge, jury, and executioner.

A bulldozer used against someone accused of a crime is the equivalent of using a sledgehammer to swat a fly. It is brute force, untempered by logic or law.

It is not justice; it is vengeance. And if history has taught us anything, it is that vengeance has an insatiable appetite.

The practice begins subtly. It starts with criminals—real, hardened criminals, whom no one will defend. Their homes are razed, their possessions buried under the weight of state-sponsored retribution. And the people cheer. "Good riddance," they say. "Let the bulldozer teach them a lesson."

But justice, my dear reader, is a fickle thing when left in the hands of power without accountability. Yesterday, it was the criminal. Today, it is the dissenter. Tomorrow? Well, tomorrow it could be you. Because one day, you might find yourself disagreeing with someone in power.

One day, you might make a statement, write a post, or raise a question that doesn't sit well with the ruling forces.

And on that day, the bulldozer might come for you.

Will you cheer then? Or will you watch in silent horror, realising too late that by tolerating bulldozer justice for others, you invited it upon yourselves?

"Look at the crime," we are told, "Don't look at the method of punishment."
But isn't that the very essence of civilisation—that punishment must be fair, proportionate, and legal? Once the bulldozer becomes the gavel, the courtroom ceases to exist.

And when the courtroom ceases to exist, so does the very concept of justice.

Laws are meant to protect us, not pulverise us. They are meant to ensure due process, not dictate destruction. The moment we normalise punishment outside the legal framework, we exchange democracy for dictatorship, rights for ruin, and fairness for fear.

So, let's ask ourselves: Do we want to live in a nation where homes are razed at the whim of authority? Where punishment is carried out not in courts but in the streets? Where power is measured in the weight of demolition rather than the strength of the law?

The time to act is now before the rumbling of the bulldozer becomes the soundtrack of our silence. Before we wake up to find that justice, like the homes it once protected, has been reduced to rubble…!

Recent Posts

India's ambitious overhaul of its labour law architecture—by consolidating 29 existing laws into four comprehensive Labour Codes—is projected as a landmark reform intended to simplify compliance, prom
apicture Jose Vattakuzhy
01 Dec 2025
Across India, workers and unions are resisting labour codes that dismantle decades of hard-won rights. As corporate elites are celebrated, labourers face exclusion, precarity and silencing. The battle
apicture Prakash Louis
01 Dec 2025
I have always considered myself a temple-goer. That description may seem inadequate, for my journeys have taken me from the southern tip of the subcontinent to the Himalayan foothills, tracing not mer
apicture A. J. Philip
01 Dec 2025
Sixteen BLO deaths in three weeks expose the brutal human cost of an impossible SIR timeline. As overworked field staff collapse under pressure, the Election Commission denies responsibility, and an a
apicture Jacob Peenikaparambil
01 Dec 2025
Two Jesuit moments, a century apart, reveal a stark contrast: courage that welcomed Gandhi, and caution that silenced a Stan Swamy lecture. As we mark the feast of St. Xavier, we are asked not to judg
apicture Fr. Sebastian James, SJ
01 Dec 2025
O Father of India, on this sacred day, Not in prayer of sorrow do we gather, For your light is still dancing in our hearts. A fire that never dies, never ends.
apicture Dr Suryaraju Mattimalla
01 Dec 2025
As 2025 draws to a close, the Constitution's guarantees feel symbolic to millions. With courts, policing, voter rolls and land rights tilting in one direction, religious minorities confront a future w
apicture John Dayal
01 Dec 2025
Beneath the speeches of Constitution Day lies a nation in peril. Rights are eroded, institutions compromised, minorities targeted, and democracy is hollowed out. Ambedkar's warnings echo today, demand
apicture Cedric Prakash
01 Dec 2025
Aeschylus, the Greek tragedian, wanted to know how he was destined to die. Hence, he consulted a fortune teller who told him the truth and nothing but the truth. "You would meet your death under a fal
apicture P. Raja
01 Dec 2025
Picture two engines joined together. Both powerful, both capable of pulling a nation forward. But one engine pulls east and the other west. They strain. They struggle. And the train goes nowhere.
apicture Robert Clements
01 Dec 2025