Rights and duties

Clear-cut vision and a balanced approach towards one’s rights and duties is a must for any matured/civilized society. Rights and duties are so intriguingly intertwined with each other that one cease to exist without the other. One’s rights become other people’s duties and others rights his/her own duties. A fine and balanced tuning between rights and duties and having effective systems of checks and balances over arbitrary use of one’s rights is very necessary in a civilized society. Its balanced use automatically develops de-centralization of control systems and authority and prevents chaos.

To have a balanced outlook towards rights and duties is very difficult. It has been observed that usually, Western societies give more stress to “rights” of an individual. On the other hand, in India and eastern part of the world, societies put more emphasis on “duty”. Both the systems leaves something more to be desired. Too much importance to rights though gives more opportunities to enjoy life, but makes individuals selfish and unmindful of others conveniences. Too much importance on duties makes a person or a group too much humble, tolerant and submissive.

A human being is born free, but in real life, s(he) finds oneself in chains all the time. While living in a society one can not care for only one’s own liberty/rights/needs/conveniences, and unmindful of others. Why? Because, as Famous philosopher Aristotle says – man is a social animal. “if a human being does not live with men or amongst men, then surely either he is god or a beast.”