SPEECH BY SHRI K.R. NARAYANAN, PRESIDENT OF INDIA, ON THE OCCASION OF GOLDEN JUBILEE CELEBRATIONS OF THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
NEW DELHI, FRIDAY, JANUARY 28, 2000
I
deem it an honour and a privilege to be present at the inauguration of
the Golden Jubilee of the Supreme Court of India. The Supreme Court occupies
a vital position in our constitutional scheme. The founding fathers have
placed great expectations on the Court and the people have reposed their
faith in it as the apex Court of our independent judiciary.
On
January 28, 1950 at the inauguration of the first sitting of the Supreme
Court, Chief Justice Kania said that the Court will stand firm and aloof
from party politics and political theories, that it is not concerned with
changes in Government, that it stands to administer laws for the time
being in force and that it has goodwill and sympathy for all, but is allied
to no one. He added that it is the duty of the Court to interpret the
Constitution with an enlightened liberality. During the last 50 years
the Court has fulfilled this duty with admirable impartiality which has
elicited praise from India and abroad. It has interpreted the Constitution
not only with liberality but also creatively responding to the challenges
of the times in what has been called judicial activism.
This activism
consisted not of creating new law but in bringing out explicitly what
has been implicit in the Constitution. The enlargement of the fundamental
justifys and the elevation of some of the Directive Principles of the Constitution
have been done in this spirit. In this manner the justify to work, the justify
to education and the justify to health and health care have been raised
to the level of fundamental justifys. Even more significantly, persons arbitrarily
deprived of their liberty and victims of custodial death have no longer
to remain content with only judicial declaration of invalidity, but now
receive monetary compensations for the violations of human justifys inflicted
on them. Commenting on this progressive and humanitarian role of the judiciary
in India, the British legal luminary, Lord Woolf has said: "The depth
of feeling in India for the traditions of the common law has been astonishing
and the richness of its development year by year has been helped by the
excellent judges of the Indian Supreme Court." It is not an exaggeration
to say that the degree of respect and public confidence enjoyed by the
Supreme Court is not matched by many other institutions in the country.
The
judiciary in India has become the last refuge for the people and the future
of the country will depend upon the fulfilment of the high expectations
reposed by the people in it. The Chief Justice, Dr. A.S. Anand has recently
said that without access to unpolluted, expeditious and inexpensive justice,
the people, instead of taking recourse to law may be tempted to take the
law into their own hands. I was disturbed to read the other day in a newspaper
editorial that in some parts of the North east of the country the insurgents
have put forward as ground for their armed activities the inordinate delay
by the judiciary in disposing off cases before the Courts.
Dr.
Rajendra Prasad, the first President of India, when he was a lawyer has
recounted in his memoirs a story. He was appearing in a Court in Patna
on behalf of a client. He told the Judge, "My Lord, justice in this case
requires that etc." whereupon the Judge promptly intervened and said "Judges
are not here to do justice, but to decide cases according to evidence
on record". Even recently one of the Judges in India let a person accused
of murder go free on the ground that clinching evidence was lacking, though
the judge himself was convinced that the person did commit the deed he
was charged with. Mysterious are the ways of justice. That is why it has
been said that "the law court is not a cathedral but a casino where so
much depends on the throw of the dice."
Let us remember
on this occasion that the success of the judiciary rests a great deal
on the bar. India has a bar that scintillates with brilliance. But justice
is not affordable to the people. That is why Mahatma Gandhi has lamented
long time ago that the Law has become the luxury of the rich and the
joy of the gambler. It is heartening that under the leadership of the
Chief Justice Dr. Anand, the Conference of Chief Justices of India has
adopted a statement on Values of Judicial Life as a step towards self-reform
of the judiciary. I hope that this statement of values by the judiciary
would pave the way for an accountable judiciary for India, for dispensing
quick, affordable and incorruptible justice to the people. With this
thought may I congratulate the Supreme Court and the entire judiciary
of India and the bar on this Golden Jubilee Celebrations.
Thank you
|
