IN our country it has become a common practice to add the soporific ‘honourable’ in mentioning an important personage in public life. Why do we need to embellish the names of public leaders to call them Honourable Prime Minister, Honourable Chief Minister, or the like? Is it high office itself that commands such obsequiousness, or, in politer words, expression of extreme respect?In court, it is customary for lawyers to address the sitting judge as ‘Your Honour’. An advocate might well challenge a contrary judicial verdict before a higher court in such flowery terms as perverse, biased and unsustainable in law. The counsel will, however, sugar coat his submission, referring to the judge who gave the adverse decision as ‘Honourable’ court, even as he attacks the judgment as bad, and even questions the basic understanding of the judge who delivered the decision. Such deference to judicial authority is understandable, based as it is on civility, convention, and an undercurrent of fear before the person wielding decision-making power.Democracy is a form of government of, for and by the people. Ministers performing executive functions are accordingly answerable to their electors. Before every voting they assiduously woo their constituents. Once the leaders assume office, the veneer of being chief servants of the public disappears. It seems that, in judicial terms, inducement, threat or promise — these are the unsubtle weapons available to secure obedience and respect. Hence we have the unedifying image of public figures, cringing before their patrons, and lionising them in speech as ‘honourable’ heroes.  Ironically, the figures continue to remain ‘honourable’ even when convicted of moral turpitude. All too familiar is the sight of convicted criminals controlling governments from behind prison bars.Could there be unintended sarcasm behind the terminology describing leaders as ‘honourable’? In Shakespeare’s play the killers of Julius Caesar publicly justify the assassination as an act of honour. Mark Antony cleverly picks on the impropriety of such wilful depiction as an honourable act. He instigates the mob against the conspirators, sarcastically dubbing the assassins ‘honourable men’. Repeated mention of the killers as ‘honourable’ infuriates the crowd, and turns the tide against the murder. In today’s context, the label ‘honourable’ can at best be seen to provide a crutch for the public image of the leaders that have been have voted to power. At worst, it would serve to cover their failings. Approbation, sincere or otherwise, clearly inflates the ego, even though it might not enhance the personality. In any case flattery is something that must influence, and appeal to all in the game. Alexander Pope writes: ‘Tis an old maxim in the schools,/That flattery is the food of fools:/Yet now and then, your men of wit/Will condescend to take a bit.