Ethics, Morality and Spirituality

Technical Session - Law vis-à-vis Ethics and Morality

Title of the Paper- “Integrity and not Law shall guide them.”

Name of Author: Mr. Manav Bhargava

Designation: Student, Semester-V

Organization: Institute of Law, Nirma University, Ahmedabad

Address: 101, Bima Vihar, Lakhanpur, Kanpur, U.P.,

E-mail ID manav5186@gmail.com

Registration No. - 2011/07/PI/520

Abstract:

Purpose – Laying too much emphasis on a small thing gives it a big shadow; same is the case

with law. It is high time that we accept the fact that law is not all pervasive. The principles of law

themselves accept the preexistence of ethics and morality. For e.g. the principle "When the

reason of a rule ceases, so should the rule itself" presupposes reason behind a law, this reason is

nothing but norm which is ethically and morally correct. We need to understand that, we cannot

rectify everything that goes wrong in the society, for that matter it may be increasing crime rate

or the birth of a new kind of a crime every day, by resorting to a remedy available under law.

The purpose behind the research is to draw attention towards the importance of developing ethics

and morals within people and to acknowledge that law is not the only way to maintain peace in

the society.

Design/methodology/approach – The research methodology adopted is Doctrinal i.e. library

resources and available databases have been used to conduct the research.

Findings – The research has revealed a lot of legal principles which presuppose the existence of

ethics and morality for law. These principles would be used in the paper to develop and explain

the concept.

Research limitations/implications – The research has been conducted accepting the general

definitions and general understanding of the terms Ethics, Morality and Law.

Practical implications – The research would help to bring a change in the existing legal system

and help academicians to bring a reform in the education system which lays stress on ethics and

morals.

Originality/value – The research would significantly change the approach to tackle the

contemporary problems in the society.

Keywords – all pervasive, contemporary, rectify, presupposes.

Paper type – Research paper

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"Integrity and not Law shall guide them”

Law is not all pervasive.

It is said that the best gift parents can give to their children is the gift of

conscience. The saying lays stress on the person’s ability to differentiate

between right or wrong. The norms or standards which help people to

differentiate between right and wrong are ethics and morals. At the dawn of

civilization it was these ethics and morals which helped to maintain peace in

the society. Then with the birth of the concept of property (i.e. when the man

wanted to use the property at the exclusion of others) the classless society

remained no more classless and fragmentation of society began on the basis of

the amount of property a person owned. With advent of concept of property

their came greed and man began to submit to his selfish interests ignoring the

difference between good and bad. Thus law saw its evolution when the man

was no more god fearing and ignored even the basic moral and ethical

standards. Hence law was made to fight the most serious wrongs which the

whole society thought should be condemned. Due to this law only condemned

grievous wrongs and there was no sanction for acts which were not of serious

nature but were still ethically and morally incorrect. Moreover the standards of

morality were different for different classes of society and hence laws could be

made to condemn only those acts which all the classes looked down upon like

murder, theft and rape. So, it becomes clear from the beginning law as a

concept was not all pervasive. This can also be understood by a universally

accepted legal maxim "The law disregards trifles". The maxim itself accepts that

law does not take care of trifling acts which may thou

morally for e.g. law does not punish one if one tells a lie or breaks his/her

promise.

As law is not at all pervasive

for severe wrongs even which it cannot solve satisfactorily.

evolved and as the lawyers and judges put it is a dynamic concept, it has failed

to tackle the very severe of crimes may it be murder, burglary, kidnapping etc.

Year

Total cog.

crimes

under IPC

Murder

1953 6,01,964 9,802

2006 18,78,293 32,481

% Change

in 2006

over 1953

212.0 231.0

accepted legal maxim "The law disregards trifles". The maxim itself accepts that

law does not take care of trifling acts which may though be wrong ethically and

morally for e.g. law does not punish one if one tells a lie or breaks his/her

pervasive, the society can only depend on it to seek remedy

wrongs even which it cannot solve satisfactorily. Though the law has

evolved and as the lawyers and judges put it is a dynamic concept, it has failed

to tackle the very severe of crimes may it be murder, burglary, kidnapping etc.

Murder Kidnapping Robbery Burglary

9,802 5,261 8,407 147,379

32,481 23,991 18,456 91,666

231.0 356.0 120.0 -38.0

accepted legal maxim "The law disregards trifles". The maxim itself accepts that

gh be wrong ethically and

morally for e.g. law does not punish one if one tells a lie or breaks his/her

the society can only depend on it to seek remedy

hough the law has

evolved and as the lawyers and judges put it is a dynamic concept, it has failed

to tackle the very severe of crimes may it be murder, burglary, kidnapping etc.

Burglary Riots

147,379 20,529

91,666 56,641

38.0 176.0

The above table and the diagram shows that there has been an average 200%

increase in the above mentioned cognizable offences though, all of us know

that the sanction for the above mentioned offences have been made more

stringent and a law is modified or a new law is born everyday to tackle to a new

kind of a crime. Firstly, when the crimes of a certain kind increases the

punishment for the crime is made more stringent, this is what we have been

doing for the past fifty years, but as it is easy to observe the crime rate has not

decreased. Secondly when a new kind of a crime comes up there is a law made

for it. When there came in the use of computers, to tackle to crimes related to

it, there came the Information Technology Act, 2000, but still people are being

robbed in case of E-transactions. When came up the problem of stealing of

Intellectual property the legislature came up with the ‘The Copyright Act and

Trade Marks Act, 1999’, then the legislature to tackle the problem of man

degrading the environment for his selfish interests there came in the

Environment Protection Act to stop the degradation of environment and to

make the citizens aware of the fact that they need to preserve the planet for the

future generations, and there are still a lot of wrongs that are being

committed and the law has still not addressed those issues. In such

circumstances the question that arises is why even after so many existing

legislations we don’t have a crime free society

What is the problem?

To begin with like all the critics of the existing concept of punishment, we could

blame the Deterrent Theory and say that it’s not useful as an eye for an eye

makes the whole world blind and we need to fight the crime and not the

criminal and we need to resort to the reformative theory. If it is so then the

reformative theory was adopted in the late ninety’s and still the crime rate is

increasing.

Following the beaten path.

The problem is that whenever the crime rate increases we mechanically

seek its solution in law and the extent is that the law is now regulating

every sphere of mans life. It has now begun to tell one how to treat his

kids, how to behave within ones household the law now not only

regulates ones public life but also regulates ones private life. Seeing such

legislations which regulates even a man’s private life gives us the

impression that the man has no morals and ethics left which

necessitates such legislations, but the question that we don’t ask is

whether that man was given a chance to learn ethics and morals.

We assume that these ethics and morals will be taught to the children by

their parents but the problem is that in the modern society to runs ones

household both the parents need to work and they have hardly any time

for their children. The little time the parents have they generally spend in

getting their home work done or in recreational activities leaving no time

for moral education.

Though the reformative theory was a good step which actually deals with

the problem at the root level by trying to change a person and make him

fit for the society, but the problem with this theory is that it fails to

recognize the fact that after a certain age its very difficult for a person to

change and ethics and morals are things which a person has to learn at

the very beginning of his life.

Present Educational System

Earlier if not the father then the mother had the time to teach the

children the values may it be the cultural values, universal values,

personal values or the social values and prior to that if we talk about the

Indian civilizations the children were sent to the gurukuls to learn morals

and values. In the contemporary times where the parents have little time

for their children it was the educational organizations who needed to

take up the task of developing morals and values in the children.

Instead the present educational system has become more mechanical

and education is no longer seen as a service but it is now an industry.

The private schools and colleges have become a good source of income

for their owners. Since the school and colleges today charge a handsome

amount as their fee they target only on bringing results making their

students competitive and not responsible citizens. It is also not the fault

of the institutions they give the students what students and their parents

expect from them.

Today people are ignoring the very essence of education. We assess the

value of education in the same manner as we assess the value of a land

or of shares in the stock market. We only want to provide only such

education as would enable the student to earn more. We hardly give any

thought to the improvement of the character of the educated? As long as

we don’t change the way we look at education there is no chance that we

can understand the true essence of education which is building a strong

character and maintaining Integrity.

Now committing crimes is no longer the prerogative of the uneducated

and illiterate, it is now the educated class which is seen committing the

most heinous of crimes out of greed and to achieve their selfish motives.

Now one cannot relate to a person’s conduct to his educational

qualifications, this is because students today do not receive any moral or

value education from their schools.

Importance of value education

In today's fast paced competitive world, man seems to have compromised on

his values, integrity and character, in a bid to earn, use and possess more and

more of material wealth, as a result, we see rampant corruption, unlawful

activities, inhuman behaviour and immoral consumption, which is slowly

breaking the very structure of our society, nation and the world.1The saddest

part is that though some of the people who are compromising with values

integrity and character know what the terms mean the others don’t even know

the meaning of the terms. This is because they never got the opportunity to

learn the true meanings of the terms. Therefore, there is an urgent need to re-

introduce value education at the elementary level. This would be exact opposite

of the reformative theory which tries to teach values to the person after he has

committed the wrong. Moreover a child's mind is like soft clay and can be

moulded to any desired shape moreover teaching him values at the very

beginning also leaves no scope for him to commit mistakes. Teaching children

morals and values at the initial stage would leave lasting impressions on the

child mind and would help him to take correct decisions throughout his life.

If he is not taught these values and morals he would have nothing to

base his decisions on and the difference between a responsible citizen and a

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criminal is just some wrong decisions. These morals and values are nothing

but dos and don’ts and standards to judge right and wrong. Moreover teaching

values at school is better because a child spends a considerable time of his day

in the school and its interactive environment the teaching does not remain

theoretical but he can learn it by experience too. For e.g. if one lies to much in

school one would at a very early age learn one’s lesson by loosing the trust of

one’s friends. Moreover a person needs to learn the difference between right

and wrong at an early age as it can cause great problems in future. A person

who just tells a lie at the age of four or takes out money from his dad wallet as

the age of ten may commit an offence like breach of trust or pick pocketing at

the age of twenty five.

Though it is essential to give value education at the primary level it does

not mean stressing on value based education is not important after that,

recognizing the importance of reinforcing value education after primary school.

Acknowledging the above fact, Special Subject Group on Policy Framework for

Private Investment in Education, Health, and Rural Development in India

stated, "Unfortunately, training of young minds on values has taken a back

seat in Indian society, given its obsession with material pursuits. Compounding

this is the fact that there are hardly any role models in public life. Today there

is a crisis of character in Indian society. To build a society with good character

and citizenship, it is important that value education is introduced in preschool

and reinforced in primary, secondary, and higher education."2

Even if a person does not commit serious offences it is very important for a

states progress that its citizens are honest, diligent and sincere and to develop

these qualities in the citizens it is important to give them value based

education. Further it is this value based education which tells a person what

are his rights and what his duties towards the society are and also how to

exercise his rights and how to perform his duties. It is value based education

and value based education only which can give our citizens a fair opportunity

to go and perform on the global platform.

Today we need value based education more than ever before keeping in view

the corruption in our country. We just went through “season of scams” it

includes the alleged theft of billions by officials behind last year’s

Commonwealth games in Delhi; $40 billion in revenues lost from the crooked

sale of 2G telecoms licenses; and over $40 billion stolen in Uttar Pradesh alone

from schemes subsidizing food and fuel for the poor.3 This tells us that the

corruption is everywhere politicians are corrupt; the bureaucrats are corrupt,

corporate are corrupt and even the normal individual are corrupt. Though the

problem of corruption is a serious one though it can be solved if our citizens

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have a strong character and they do not compromise with their integrity. The

citizens of our country need to learn that “ values are priceless, while valuables

have a price”.

Suggestive Measures

We need to stop following the beaten path and stop seeking remedy in

law for everything that goes wrong in the society. We need to understand

that law is a ‘cure’ and not ‘prevention’; that it comes into picture once

the wrong has been done and damage been caused while developing and

conscience and ethics in a person is ‘prevention.’ The legislature needs to

understand that making a new law to tackle new kind of a crime is not a

solution as then it would keep making laws and it would be difficult for it

to properly implement it. While if it develops a character in a person and

for e.g. tells him that he should not steal then it does not need to tell him

that he should not steal intellectual property; he should not try to evade

from paying income tax; he should not steal while he is selling food stuff

(adulteration) etc.

The best thing about developing integrity in a person is that whatever

happens and in whatever form it may be he would never compromise

with his principles. Such a person abides by his own principles and not

by the law i.e. he does not conduct himself properly because he is afraid

of the sanction which may be imposed by the law but, because his own

principles do not allow him to conduct himself in an inappropriate

manner.�

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Change in the existing educational system��

It is high time that there is a change brought in the educational system

at the elementary, secondary and the higher level and moral and value

education is included in the syllabi of the students. It is said that if

wealth is lost nothing is lost, if health is lost something is lost, if

character is lost everything is lost. Keeping in mind the proverb we need

to change are present educational system and re-introduce value

education at the elementary level and reinforce it at the secondary and

higher level. This would make sure that a student develops a strong and

a good character. The value based educational system should not only

make students learn about the universal values but cultural and

national values a well. So that the very essence of education is achieved

ad a citizen knows oneself and be himself instead of losing his identity in

becoming while trying to be somebody else. By learning cultural and

national values students would be able to learn who they actually are.

. moreover what is also to be insured that value education if taught as a

subject should not be taught as others and should not include only

crude cramming. The teaching method of value education as a subject

needs to interactive so that the student learn the true importance of

values in a practical sense. This could be done by giving situations and

asking students what would be their stand in a situation this would help

the teachers to know whether the student ha actually developed values.

value education at the higher and secondary level can be reinforced by

making students to take part in activities like ‘ each one teach one’,

‘share with the needy’ etc. college student can also be encouraged to form

societies which bring awareness in the people about the importance of

developing values in their children etc.