The Concept Of Victor’s Justice And Indian Law
- IJLLR Journal
- Apr 3
- 2 min read
Siddhant Mukherjee, BBA LLB, OP Jindal Global University
British influence in Indian law is undeniable but as Rohit De argues “Constitutionalism is based on the desirability of the rule of law rather than the arbitrary rule of men.”1 This paper sets out to delve into the concept of ‘Victor’s justice’ and how the arbitrary rules of the British have affected Indian laws that are still applicable to date.
Victor’s justice, a term that is self-explanatory, means that justice is in a form, that the ‘victors’ of the war narrate. This theory in reality means that the victors of any war frame legal systems in a way that only calls for one sided accountability and exempts them from any scrutiny and accountability. The Nuremberg trials2 which took place after World War 2 were inherently a product of allied victory; this suggests that justice was served not on the principles of natural justice and morals, but rather on power. As Gary Bass puts it “all legal systems are based on a degree of force 3“ and what can be a bigger force than the ‘victors of the war’. These trials completely focused on nazi aggression rather than war crimes of the victors; the design of this system was to perpetuate a very ‘American’ form of justice. These trials were also severely criticized on morals and political justifications, the crimes committed by the Nazi’s were inhumane and as Hannah Arendth puts it “for these crimes, no punishment is severe enough” which highlights the power the victors had, that they tried to serve justice on acts that shatter any and all legal systems.4 The harsh reality is that this concept has not evolved yet from the Nuremberg trials which is an 80 year old phenomenon. This concept has well continued into the forms of justice delivered by the International criminal tribunal Yugoslavia5 and International criminal tribunal Rwanda 6where, in both instances there were selective trials of people only from the losing side, as Willam A Schabas puts it “Political choices are also made in terms of which parties to a conflict are to be targeted for prosecution.”7
