Equality before the law is one of the plainest principles of a democracy. A monk, a minister and a market trader answer to the same courts, and no sentence can be softened because of the status of the person serving it. The Supreme Court’s decision to annul the presidential pardon granted to Ven. Galagoda Aththe Gnanasara Thera was an exercise of judicial authority, and whatever one thinks of the person, it deserves respect. He was convicted of contempt of court, and the rest of his sentence must now be served.

Applying the law and applying it wisely are not always the same thing, however, and the past few weeks have shown the difference. When the Thera was brought to court without his robes, the reaction was swift and, to anyone who knows this country, entirely predictable. Senior monks from the main chapters wrote to the Commissioner General of Prisons and then met the President. A group of monks walked from the Temple of the Sacred Tooth Relic in Kandy to Colombo, and the march reached the capital yesterday. Their call for his release is a matter for the courts alone, but the scale of the response says a good deal about how the episode was received.

The authorities maintain they followed the Prisons Ordinance and that no special procedure was applied. That may be true. Administrative rules are often drafted with little thought for the people they will one day affect. But the Mahanayake Theras argued that removing a monk’s robes is an ecclesiastical question, not an administrative one. They also pointed to prison orders which, as they read them, allow convicted prisoners to wear their usual clothing when taken to court. Rules that can be read in two ways, on a matter this delicate, are an invitation to trouble.

To its credit, the Government moved to fix the problem. The interim report of the committee reviewing prison regulations proposes a new Standing Order 356(A), giving the Commissioner of Prisons ten days to consult the Department of Buddhist Affairs before a monk’s uniform is dealt with. It also proposes an amendment to Departmental Order 550, so that a monk taken outside prison may wear his robes unless his own Nikaya says otherwise. The provisions are to be adapted for clergy of other faiths, which is the right instinct. A rule written for one religion alone would simply create a new grievance.

None of this amounts to special treatment for a convicted prisoner. His sentence is neither shorter nor softer, and he remains in custody. The penalty the court imposed is the loss of liberty. It does not extend to stripping a man of the outward sign of his faith. In a country where the robe is regarded with deep reverence, many Buddhists see its removal as a statement about the Sasana itself, however unintended. A police uniform is a badge of office. A monk’s robe is something far more personal and far more sacred.

The same sensitivity applies in the other direction, and it should be said plainly. One of the cases facing the Thera concerns remarks about the Holy Quran that allegedly insulted Islam. Buddhists who feel wounded by the sight of a monk in lay clothes are as entitled to the law’s protection as Muslims who feel wounded by such words. A State that takes one community’s sacred things seriously and treats another’s lightly will lose the trust of both. The lesson is not that religion should place anyone above the law. It is that those who administer the law must understand how deeply religious feeling runs here, and must act accordingly for every faith.

There is also a practical point. Heavy-handed gestures can turn a convicted person into a cause. The more the handling of his imprisonment appears careless or insulting, the easier it becomes for his supporters to cast him as a victim rather than a prisoner. That serves nobody, least of all the credibility of the judiciary whose rulings the State is trying to uphold.

Consultation costs very little. A conversation with the Maha Sangha and the Department of Buddhist Affairs before the first court appearance would have taken a day. Getting it wrong has produced a political storm, a long march and a damaging argument over the State’s respect for religion.

The courts must remain firm, and the law must be seen to be equal. But firmness without judgment is not strength, and a government that understands the society it governs will find that justice is easier to deliver, and easier to defend.