Pandher, Oliver Stone and 'Natural Born Killers'

The first verdict in the cases relating to the most grisly and gruesome spate of rapes and killings in the sleepy outskirts of Delhi at Nithari has come. Both Surinder Koli and his employer Moninder Singh Pandher have been sentenced to death by the trial judge, Rama Jain, holding them guilty of rape and murder of 14-year-old Rimpa Haldar.
Koli had confessed to his crimes - rapes and murders - and chillingly added a nauseating dimension to his cold blooded streak by admitting that he was a cannibal too.Pandher, on the other hand, had denied any role in the crimes, which virtually was supported by CBI which gave him the clean chit in one case after the other in the Nithari serial rapes and murders.
But after the verdict and sentence came, many among the victims' families felt that the judge was right in giving death sentence to Pandher, who the presiding officer felt was equally liable for the crimes of his servant. For, it was the master's "hedonistic lifestyle" that activated the criminal instinct animal in Koli.
Was the Nithari case verdict inspired by the logic behind the failed law suit that was brought against celebrated Academy Award winning director Oliver Stone for the famous movie "Natural Born Killers" released in August 1994?
On March 5, 1995, two teenagers, Sarah Edmondson and Ben Darras, watched the movie repeatedly in a cabin in Oklahoma while being on a drug induced high. Next morning, the teenagers took their arms and drove off towards Hernando, where Darras killed William Savage by pumping two bullets into his head without any provocation. A little later, Edmondson let go a bullet at Patsy Byers, a store cashier, at Ponchatoula. Byers survived the shooting but ended up as a paraplegic until her death of cancer in 1997.
In July 1995, Byers filed a law suit against Edmondson and Darras. A year later, it was amended to include Time Warner Entertainment and Oliver Stone holding them responsible for inspiring people to commit murders.
The case meandered through various streets and layers of judicial fora and after seven years of litigation, the Supreme Court finally upheld the right of free speech and the trial judge found no evidence "that Stone or the film distributor Warner Bros intended to incite violence".
So, if Pandher had an abnormal lifestyle that was illegal, he should be punished for that. But, he cannot be put to sword for anything other than that. If it was rape, he should be punished for rape. But, if he has not committed murder, he cannot be punished for scripting a killing as was the case with the persecution of Oliver Stone.
The depiction of rapes by villains in our Bollywood movies could - and many sociologists and psychologists genuinely feel must - have incited frustrated young men to commit the crime. Going by the logic in the Nithari verdict, the villains, directors and the producers of these films as well as the theatre owners should face law as offenders like the frustrated young men who actually commit the offence.
Again, if this Nithari judgment logic epitomizing the unheard of vicarious liability in a criminal case was to be taken into account, health minister Anbumani Ramadoss would be happy to penalize Shah Rukh Khan and other film stars who smoke every time a person smokes in public after watching a film starring one of these stars.