IT is welcome news that a Dhaka court has ordered judicial probe into the incident in which some top shooters of the country, including the Commonwealth Games Gold medallist Asif Hossain Khan, were assaulted by the police.

There is, of course, no way to take this kind of police excess lightly. The incident took place on October 2 and the ace shooter of the country is now struggling to recover from the injuries inflicted upon him. Asif is likely to miss the next Asian games as doctors have said that he might require further treatment abroad. It is hard to accept that the brilliant shooter could miss an important event because of demonic treatment meted out to him by the police. There has already been a deluge of protests, particularly from the sportsmen's community. They have every reason to feel threatened by the unprecedented attack on the shooters.

Now, the question is how precisely society should set about the task of preventing such police action on innocent people. The state minister for home affairs did not go beyond expressing his sorrow, after the shooters came under attack. An outright condemnation or a resolve to punish the offenders was not forthcoming -- a sign of the administration being not tough enough to do justice to the aggrieved. That's surely not what people were expecting from the men at the helm.

What people are expecting, instead, is that the law would take its natural course, unhindered by any extraneous factors.

People are shocked by the law enforcers' tendency to apply force on citizens as though they are pitted against them. Numerous examples can be cited to prove the point. They are enjoying a kind of immunity not compatible with our democratic credentials.

The problem with letting the attackers go unpunished is that they might begin to believe that they can get away with all their misdeeds.

The culprits have to be brought to justice not only because they committed a punishable offence but also to convince people that the existing judicial system is capable of dealing with all violators of thelaw regardless of their positions.