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Is the Supreme Court Getting Influenced?

In a democracy like ours, the Supreme Court has a very balanced path to chart. Conservative yet modern; proactive yet not activist; quiet yet alert; incisive yet independent. This is very critical [and of course difficult] to the democratic fabric of the country, because [ironically] one institution has to also always keep a leash on the popular sentiments and the powerful lobbies; lest they should run amock in the running of the executive [governmental] and societal [private – for profit or not for profit] institutions.

In the democratic traditions of more the merrier, the louder the better – there is one institution that is entrusted with the role of interpreting the broader tenets of the constitution without getting biased by the lobby power or popular power of a specific case.

When I had started blogging in April 2009, I had drawn attention to a piece a Supreme court directive [http://unmuddlings.blogspot.com/2009/04/this-supreme-court-ruling-isnt-among-my.html] which had left me disappointed. I had the feeling the Supreme Court missed out on the social context. There is another one which jolted me the other day.

Before I write more about that, the caveat first. Let me accept that the judges are human and they can err. Also the Court continues to gives great judgement [like the Babri Masjid case by UP High court last year; of course this is yet to go to the Supreme court]. It is just that, despite the recent loss of sheen in the judiciary, the expectations from the higher courts are akin to that of a six sigma tolerant machine.

The case in point is related to the Graham Staines and his sons murder case, which was widely reported. [http://www.ibsresources.org/articles/staines.shtml]. Last week the Supreme Court, expectedly, upheld the life sentence to Dara Singh one of the chief accused because of circumstantial evidence. [http://www.sify.com/news/sc-upholds-life-term-for-graham-staines-killers-news-national-lbvu4jgbged.html].

I am no legal eagle, nor do I have any ESP or any information network of own to know the facts of the case. There are conflicting views on the same coming from different people, depending upon from which side of debate zone they come from. One is the popular media, as per the first link and the other comes from the Saffron brigade. [http://arunshourie.voiceofdharma.com/articles/wadhwa.htm]. Probably both sides have their story right is some proportion.

However, I am happy to go by the judgements of the High Court and Supreme Court [which gave the same judgement]. Sipu [Sandeep Mishra of TOI] has written a nice piece on Dara Singh. I could not locate the web-link to that, but article indicated that Dara Singh had got into violent means with greater regularity in the last few years before the murder of Graham Staines and his sons by the mob.

What left me dazed was the Supreme Court’s retraction of the part of its reasons of the decision and the subsequent expunging from the order because it hurt the sentiments of Christian community. [http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/SC-changes-reason-for-awarding-life-term-to-Dara-for-Staines-murder/articleshow/7362606.cms]. The point is every judgement has two parties involved. One party maybe less satisfied than the other. And one or both parties maybe hurt in the process. Dara Singh and his supporters may claim to be equally hurt by the decision. Is that a reason to change any decision or in this case the reasons for the decision. Isn’t this a clear case of Supreme Court losing its bearing. Sentimentality is inappropriate, while sensitivity is pronouncing the judgement is of crucial importance. Once a judgement has been pronounced after due deliberation, after considering due precedence of similar cases. Changing them overnight based on popular perceptions – demeans the exalted institution no end. I remember a friend, giving the example of a learned judge of the higher court – who never read newspapers before giving judgement of important cases [so as to not get biased by popular opinion]. And here we have the judge of the highest court changing his views based on street protests or maybe a phone call or upbraiding by the ‘Invisible voice of the higher Gods’.

In a different note, the parallels in my last blog on SC judgement and this one, have one point in common. The Chirstian priests / religious leaders have lobbied effectively without creating any brouhaha. They got the job done without getting caught on TV cameras. The rest of the country should observe to learn what good repair work or effective protests could be. This could partly be due to connections with ‘higher-ups’, this could also be due to low fuss strategy and execution.

Bhubaneshwar
January 28, 2011

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