Time for inconvenient justice?

These days, it is only in movies that David defeats Goliath

So it might seem for the victims of India’s man-made disasters. For not only is justice commonly delayed, but when it does come it often satisfies everyone except the victims. This convenient injustice could be dangerous for an India in which domestic and international corporate entities increasingly dominate the commercial and industrial space.

In what is clearly essential reading for the in-house counsel at every company with operations in India, this issue’s Cover story (Are your hands clean?, page 17) investigates corporate civil and criminal liability and addresses fundamental questions about the shifting ground between corporate and personal responsibility. Many lawyers argue that monetary sanctions and paltry penal provisions are insufficient; tougher legislation is paramount to deterring immoral and unethical business conduct.

So who should pay the price for corporate wrongdoings? And to what degree can criminal sanctions be imposed? “There is a need to evolve new forms of punishments which could effectively deter the corporate from engaging in any criminal activity,” argues Sachin Joshi, deputy director at the Confederation of Indian Industries’ Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Development.