No family stands higher in the ranks of Indian jurisprudence than that of Iqbal Chagla- son of the great Nationalist M.C Chagla and father of Bombay High Court Judge Riaz Chagla.
But M.C Chagla once made an innocent mistake. Jinnah had been called away to attend to his dying wife. Chagla was left in charge of negotiations with Congress. Jinnah felt Chagla sold the pass. But the older Hindu lawyers too were at fault. They had won by means of a cheap lawyerly trick and were crowing about it. This was counterproductive. Lawyers are occasionally required to act in a Statesmanlike manner. This means being attentive to the currents of history and acting in accordance with 'kairos'- timeliness. It is no use 'vilifying the vicissitudes of 'al-dahr', Time'. Rather one should understand that there is an Art to one's Vocation and Art is essentially kairotic. It is 'timely'. The 'lakshana', or affective modality it displays must be such as is auspicious for the resolution of the underlying problem of that Period. Thus, MC Chagla made a mistake because he didn't understand that his job as Jinnah's junior was to be obdurate. His own feelings were of no account. His proper 'lakshana' was to show Muslims could not be 'divided and ruled'. Ambedkar and other SC leaders may have had their own differences. But, we feel Dalits made, make, and will make a great contribution to our Polity precisely because they stand firm on the one issue where they succeeded but Jinnah failed. Yet Jinnah, like Chagla, was a Liberal Nationalist. It was because he could not trust people like Chagla, who was of very similar background, that he came to the conclusion that Muslims as a whole could not trust Hindus. I personally don't think he was right. Genuine, Right Wing, Hindus like Muslims because they think they are good fighters and devout people. India needs such to protect itself. We have plenty of virtue signalling Hindus who won't be happy till India offers its collective bum for sodomization by all and sundry. To do less is not just homophobic, it is a betrayal of Mahatma Gandhi!
Iqbal Chagla is 81 years old. He writes superbly. By his own account, his contribution to Indian jurisprudence has been exemplary. But this son of a Cabinet Minister is wrong to defend another son of a Cabinet Minister. Why? Because Prashant has not conducted himself as Iqbal has. Furthermore, the Times have changed. Vilifying the Bench won't make it anti-Modi. Why? Because young lawyers have turned against Bhushan type shitheads. This contempt charge was brought by a young lawyer who was associated with Subramanian Swamy. He represents the great mass of young lawyers. Bhushan, who failed in politics, represents nothing but the Rupee One Crore Lawyer (i.e. high priced advocates) who 4 Supreme Court judges mentioned as being as great a menace as a 'Master of the Roster' with a political or other agenda.
Chagla, however, sees Bhushan as cast in the same mould as himself. Sadly, this simply isn't true. Bhushan writes in a blustering and illiterate manner. Chagla writes like a gentleman. Judge for youself-
I write this with a deep sense of anguish, a cri de coeur from someone who has over 55 years of practice, held the judiciary in general, and the Supreme Court in particular, in the highest esteem, respect and regard. That my faith in the institution has on occasion been shaken cannot be denied — most notably when in ADM Jabalpur, the infamous judgment, the Supreme Court denied, during the Emergency, the citizen’s most fundamental right to life and liberty. That it took nearly 40 years to right that wrong and overrule that judgment is disappointing, but at the same time it recognises the ability of the Court to correct, revive and regenerate.
Chagla neglects to mention that extra-judicial killing on an industrial scale was used to scotch insurrections and certain Mafia networks. Judges were disintermediated. The 'encounter specialist' ruled the roost.
It is foolish to say that ADM Jabalpur was a 'wrong'. Rather it was a confession of impotence for a reason intended and designed by the framers of the Constitution. Many wrongs occurred during that period. What redress was gained by those killed or forcibly sterilized? Did Shanti Bhushan deliver any such thing? Don't be silly. Of course not.
Chagla, in my view, must- by 'Aumann agreement'- be conceded to have a very fine and noble heart. Our Bayesian 'priors' in this regard are univocal. Nobody, to my knowledge, has ever suggested anything different about members of that family. It is also the case that the Religion and cultural traditions and intellectual causes known to be associated with that family- and those they are matrimonially or otherwise aligned with- places the highest spiritual, moral, intellectual and aesthetic emphasis on the cultivation of such wonderful and tender qualities as are universally ascribed to the heart, not the head.
Can we say the same for Bhushan? No. Father and son entered politics and were ignominiously ejected. Chaglas will cheerfully lose Income and Wealth so as to serve as Judges. But, Chaglas belong to the minority community. I don't mean they are Muslims- only God can tell Muslim apart from Munafiq and, we have the assurance of all Scripture that the majority of all created beings gain God's Grace- but that, because they set themselves a higher standard than average, it follows that they will always be, a priori, a minority, save by their own errancy. But to err is human! This is a case in point. Chagla is wrong in Law and wrong in every other way about Bhushan. He is being stupider than average. He is on the wrong side of the Condorcet Jury theorem. His heart is ghulaat. He fetishizes Bhushan- whom, it is true, many considered a smart man ten years ago. The 'Gandhian' Anna Hazare had started an anti-corruption campaign. Who would reap the political benefit? The Police-woman Kiran Bedi? The Lawyerly Bhushans? Swami Agnivesh? Baba Ramdev?
The answer was Arvind Kejriwal because he looked and sounded like the guy in a DTC bus queue. He was R.K Laxman's 'common man' updated for the Twenty First Century. But 'Lok Pal', ombudsmen, were a blind alley. Bhushan, infuriated by his political failure made the mistake of lambasting the Bench as if some alternative were still credible. But the times have changed. No one says 'bring Judiciary under Lok Pal'. Why? There is only Joke Pal and Kejriwal licking his lips- the cat that got the cream.
Chagla writes-
Prashant Bhushan, is, for me, another ADM Jabalpur moment when the Court, whom we have always proclaimed to be the defender of the freedom of speech, has by its judgment curtailed that very freedom by the exercise of its contempt jurisdiction — a jurisdiction where the Court is judge, victim and prosecutor.
ADM Jabalpur, Chagla says, stood for nearly 40 years. Chagla is writing off Bhushan. He is saying the fellow will be long dead before his claim is accepted.
Chagla is also quite ludicrously claiming that the Indian Supreme Court- which is obliged to come down heavily on even a deracinated Salman Rushdie or Arundhati Roy- never mind the type of hate speech which is epidemic amongst emic Indians- is the defender of freedom of speech! Why? Has he not read the First Amendment? Does he not know the role played by his own father in limiting freedom of speech?
Chagla, of course, is a lawyer. He is not obliged to know anything at all save the procedural and substantive aspects of the Law. Since Criminal Contempt is an offense where the Bench is at full liberty to decide both questions of fact and procedure regardless of any Legislative or other stipulation, Chagla must know he is lying, or else is a senile cretin, when he says-
I say so not only because of the judgment, but because of the manner in which it took up and conducted the matter.
But Chagla has no locus standi or other auctoritas. He is saying so because he is a senile cretin who doesn't give a shit about how others view him.
The following sentence shows that Chagla is either senile or is shit at expressing himself in English- even when writing for publication in a Newspaper.
Let’s be clear: Prashant Bhushan gives the clear impression that it treated Bhushan’s tweets as the occasion for the Court to flex its muscle and make clear that it will not tolerate criticism.
Clearly this was because the Law was clear. Bhushan broke it. He was found guilty. What is not clear is why Chagla is cri de coeuring in an incontinent manner.
The answer is because he is a stupid, cretinous, liar.
It appears that when it was found that his tweets regarding the Chief Justice of India and the motorcycle may appear to be too trivial,
Such a thing was not found at all! The guy was found guilty.
it brought up an 11-year-old contempt case against him.
That case was pending. Harish Salve- now a Q.C- brought it. Obviously, conviction in one case would mean that the very senior advocate (who served as Solicitor General 20 years ago) who mooted the other case would demand expedited hearing.
Salve's legal career throws Bhushan's into the shade. Why should the Bench favor Bhushan- who vilifies them- over Salve?
The fact is Bhushan tried to gain political office and power by posing as an anti-corruption campaigner. He and his daddy and so forth were basically saying 'Lok Pal is panacea'. This is why they recklessly countumed and scandalised the Bench. But Bhushan was rejected by the voters. The man is a nuisance. He has shit inside his brain. He is browbeating the Court for no good reason. The fact is, some young Gujju lawyer has brought this old windbag down. That Gujju may, like M.C Chagla or Shanti Bhushan, end up as Union Law Minister. Indeed, the fellow may like Iqbal's son, end up a High Court or even a CJI. Prashant is an extinct volcano tweeting in Trumpian fashion to a bunch of losers.
Iqbal, who is older than either Salve or Bhushan, has exposed himself to ridicule by writing this shite.
That Bhushan’s comments had not lowered the Court’s esteem or brought it into disrepute for 11 years,
Sez who? Iqbal? Is he not aware that there was an attempt to bring the Bench under the jurisdiction of a Lok Pal on the basis of a grass-roots political movement? Does he deny that the Bhushans were part of this but that Kejriwal gave them the order of the boot? The Bench acted in a circumspect fashion. But it can't refuse to hear petitions from those who want Bhushan punished. If they don't take suo moto action, sooner or later AG or SG will certify such complaints. Then the Bench will be seen as being forced to do justice. It will lose prestige.
that it did not merit disposal during a pandemic
Bhushan falsely said that the pandemic gave an excuse to CJI to close the courts for a mala fide reason. It was important that he be punished immediately.
when matters of far greater importance were pending,
If matters are pending it is because lawyers have caused them to be so. The Bench can't refuse petitions on the basis of Chagla's tender heart. It can't protect Bhushan from Salve or even some young Gujju lawyer.
was not a consideration. The pending matters were, among others, challenges to Article 370,
which are prima facie absurd
electoral bonds,
which may be so- but regarding which affidavits available are utterly illiterate shite
the Citizen Amendment Act
which is perfectly constitutional
and, of course, habeas corpus petitions and the fundamental rights of the people of Kashmir.
which don't exist because of Sheikh Abdullah's draconian 1978 Act.
The clear impression that the Court conveys is that
it sees that Bhushan is a nuisance. He has no popular support whatsoever. The Times have changed. The vast majority of lawyers, like the vast majority of voters, approve such decisions of the Bench which have ignited Bhushan's ire.
Bhushan must be held up as an example —
like Justice Karnan or Advocate Nerumpara &c
he is a senior advocate practising in the Supreme Court with an enormous reputation
No. He is a shite advocate who tried and failed in politics. His reputation is in tatters because he lied in a tweet.
as an activist who has made a lasting contribution to public causes.
This is the crux of the matter. Has Bhushan actually done anything valuable? No. Why? He was a shite lawyer. We gave him the benefit of the doubt at one time. Then all doubt was removed when 'Lok Pal' turned into 'Joke Pal' and Kejriwal kicked him and his Daddyji out of Politics.
The lesson must go out, loud and clear, that
It you tell stupid lies and don't accomplish anything then you won't just get kicked out of politics, you will also face legal sanction. Bhushan is a Horatio Bottomley.
if the Court will not baulk at disciplining someone of his reputation, then woe betide anyone who dares to criticise.
Nonsense! Some young Gujju lawyer just kicked Bhushan in his crotch. Had the Bench not taken suo moto cognizance, AG would have certified the next such kicking. But then the Bench would have declined into what it is in the UK. Indian Administrations prefer to keep it around as a 'flak catcher'. But, they may choose otherwise.
The significance of Prashant Bhushan is not that he has been found guilty of outspoken and trenchant criticism
Iqbal is lying. He has not been found guilty of criticism. He has been found guilty of criminal contempt. Iqbal may say that a man has been found guilty of altruistic, albeit arguably non-consensual, sperm donation. The Court says he was guilty of rape.
but the test that has been applied, and which, broadly, comes to this: If the words or conduct shake the confidence of the public in the judiciary the same constitute contempt.
Iqbal is lying. The test is if the Bench feels the tendency is of that type, then it is at liberty to apply the sanction so long as it itself feels it is doing so in a fair and lawful manner.
The Bench is entitled, in this particular, to act in a self-regarding- indeed 'self-dealing' manner- but so are we all in matters which pertain to our own safeguarding. The Law is an 'artificial reason' of a protocol bound, 'buck stopped', kind. So is every deontic logic which can have a concrete model.
Every criticism, therefore, no matter how measured and responsible, will always in that sense affect the public’s confidence in the judiciary.
Nonsense! Only such criticism as the Bench, following rules of self-regarding ratiocination, judges to be Contempt will be Contempt.
But this is also true of individuals. I listen to constructive criticism because it is in my interest to do so. I am not obliged to listen to a hooligan who addresses me as a fucking cunt and who tells me to go fuck myself. On the contrary, I may be justified in kicking his head in.
Chagla reveals something I have long suspected- viz. his Dad was a moral cretin by reason of a defect in Academic and Social Paideia of a type which has carried over into our own day. Daddy Chagla did not understand what his professional duties entailed. Thus he paved the primrose path to Partition where millions lost their lives. Sonny boy, adverting to his own condign professional actions, of a type the polar opposite of Bhushan's, precisely because they were 'kairotic', discreet, and, not contemptuous, but in the highest degree courteous and utile; this auspicious Iqbal always preparing proper 'Istiqbaal' for the Bench, this second generation Chagla shows why the second generation Bhushan fucked up in a vulgar and stupid manner.
If one might be permitted some anecdotal evidence of the maturity of approach in matters of contempt. In 1990, it fell upon myself to move resolutions against five sitting judges of the Bombay High Court, impugning their integrity and calling for their resignation. I was warned by friends
Chagla is being modest. He knew the law. But he also knew the Law provided him precedent and a defence. Moreover the thing was kairotic, not splenetic.
that this constituted clear criminal contempt and under the extant law, justification was not a defence.
Chagla is wrong. Justification was not a statutory defence. But it was a defence all the same.
My only raison d’etre was that one owed it to posterity not to sit idle even as the fountain of justice was polluted.
This was not Bhushan's motivating reason. He was grasping for political power.
The resolutions were passed, albeit with much-heated debate: One judge resigned, two were transferred and two were denied any further judicial work.
Like many older people, I know something of what happened and why it happened. Chagla, to my mind, substantially misrepresents the sequence of events. But, he is entitled to write in a self-regarding manner. He is not on oath. No crime is committed when a man speaks his own praise. True, Lord Krishna says this is a type of 'self-slaying' even if condign. But Chagla is not a Vaishnavite. Nor am I. We can disregard such strictures- whether Islamic or Hindu or whatever.
Fortunately, we had Justice Chittatosh Mukerjee as the Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court and Justice Sabyasachi Mukerjee as the Chief Justice of India.
It is sad that an officer of the Court thinks that the Bench can only serve its function if 'Fortuna' intervenes. Why not say 'Tyche'?
It is interesting that Chagla mis-spells the CJI's name. The fact is that man was a very aristocratic Leftist while the other was the nephew of Shyama Prasad.
This has always been the problem with Chaglas and Tyabjis &c. They have little understanding of the hinterland. They represent a peculiar littoral enclave.
An interesting sequel was when I called on the CJI in Delhi (I had become the president of the Bombay Bar Association). He received me at his residence. A grim-faced CJI and asked: “Mr Chagla, do you intend to do this again?” “Good heavens, no, Chief Justice, once was enough”, I replied. “Then, may I congratulate you? It needed to be done. Our own enquiries revealed they were bad eggs and deserved to be removed.” Contrary to my assurance, it fell to my lot, five years later, to move a resolution against a sitting Chief Justice of the Bombay High Court calling for his resignation on grounds of corruption. Again, the resolution was carried and the chief justice resigned.
So, Chagla was a discreet man. He showed politesse. I personally don't believe Chagla was the prime mover in all this. Indeed, I don't know anybody who was anybody back then who does. It is ludicrous to suppose that a Muslim lawyer, off his own bat, was getting rid of Hindu judges at that time and that place.
Bhushan is Hindu- not some 'Khoja' who is a tiny minority even among Muslims. He made a bid for political power. He failed. He vents his spleen against the Bench. Either they take suo moto action or the AG puts a gun to their head.
In the words of Lord Atkin, “justice is not a cloistered virtue”.
But Atkin did not consider that 'seditious' Indian barristers should not be disbarred. On the contrary, he was of the same mind as F.E Smith. Why is Chagla quoting a man who didn't think an Indian Peer by hereditary right should be allowed to take his seat in the Lords? Atkin's Justice was a Colonial- a Color based- virtue. It was grievously cloistered. Iqbal's daddy certainly thought so. Why does sonny boy, at the ripe age of 81, think differently? Is he utterly senile? Has he forgotten more than he ever learnt?
I believe the Supreme Court has missed a great opportunity to display judicial statesmanship.
Why does this elderly fool hold such an obviously false belief? Is it because Lord Atkin has convinced him that his Daddy was wrong to want Whitey to fuck off back where they came from? I can sympathize. So can millions of Indians and Pakistanis who ran the fuck away from the shitholes that Jinnah and Chagla and Nehru and Gandhi created.
But, if Bhushans are allowed to run amok, India will become more of a shithole. Chaglas too will have to run away. Why? For every Bhushan you like, there is an equal and opposite shithead who can gain a super-majority by kicking your Kula's Bhushans in the crotch.
While expressing its disapproval of whatever Bhushan had said on either occasion, and even though the words might constitute contempt under an archaic law,
Has this old fool not read the Kurle judgment? There is no 'archaic law' at fault. It is Ambedkar's Constitution.
the judges could nevertheless have said that their shoulders are broad enough to treat such comments with the contempt they deserve;
In which case, AG certifies prosecution and 'broad shoulders' don't matter shit.
or adopt the approach of Lord Denning
who was English- a country where barristers who step out of line in a Bhushan manner get fucked up immediately by their own peers even if they are in the right. Ask Rudy Narayan.
Fuck is wrong with Chagla? Does he really not understand that British Rule was Racist? That's why his Daddy was a Nationalist. Fuck did Denning do re. Racist Judges and Racist barristers and Racist Cops in the UK?
when he said that they would never use the contempt jurisdiction to uphold their own dignity for “that must rest on surer foundations”.
It did. That of the bar. British and Irish and other barristers are quite smart and make very good money. They know that if they vilify the Bench then they themselves will be disintermediated- they will lose money- because of jurisdiction shopping.
India needs to reform the Advocate's Act in terms much more drastic than the Law Commission envisages. Otherwise, the Law- which is merely a Service industry- will be disintermediated save for purposes of, not decision, but delay: not justice, but a sick joke on those stupid enough to seek it in such polluted purlieus as Chaglas and Bhushans permit to survive- but which will survive only by reason of their comic irrelevance and futility.
In words that bear repetition, he said: “We do not fear criticism, nor do we resent it. For there is something far more important at stake. It is no less than freedom of speech itself.”
India's First Amendment put paid to 'freedom of speech'. This cretin has been living in the wrong country for 70 years. He made some money. Good for him. But he really ought to have emigrated. His is a Fool's Paradise.
Instead, the judgment spells out a chilling lesson that undermines that most valuable fundamental right, the freedom of speech.
Indians haven't had that fundamental right. True, when I was young some silly deracinated people imported the American doctrine of 'chilling effect' but it was irrelevant to India. We can't even mention the Religion of a person who abducts a small girl and forces her to change her Faith. What fucking 'chilling effect' is Chagla blathering on about?
And so, where, indeed, do we go from here?
You go to the mortuary by way of assisted living or a hospice. So do I- unless mice eat my rotting corpse.
The Bench has to stop entertaining shite PILs from stupid illiterate failed politicians who are simply venting their spleen.
There are editors of leading newspapers,
Who are utterly shite
historians,
who are utterly shite
legal scholars
who are utterly shite
and intellectuals
who are utterly shite
who have in no uncertain terms criticised the Supreme Court.
But, because they are all known to be utterly shite, the Bench will be applauded for putting the nuisance Bhushan in prison.
They have, on various occasions, said that it has become “an institution that speaks the language of the executive, and has become indistinguishable from the executive”;
Why? The Executive, wary of 'wedge' issues, referred such matters to the Judiciary. The Bench could have invoked a 'doctrine of political question' and handed that shite back. But it didn't. So, the chickens have come home to roost.
“that the transformation of the Indian state into a repository of repression…
is simply false. There is a 80 percent Hindu majority which wants precisely what the Pakistanis or Bangladeshis or Sinhalas want. The complaint is 'repression' is inadequate. No doubt, the Bench will be disintermediated in such matters. Its period of 'activism' will either terminate or resemble the crazy shit Pakistan's CJ gets up to.
would not have been so easy without the willingness of the Supreme Court to look the other way, and occasionally to join in the project”;
Chagla writes as though shitheads like Bhushan have won elections- that they have broad-based support. The thing seemed possible at one time. But we now know these shitheads have no grass roots support whatsoever.
“that the Supreme Court has let us down in recent times, through a combination of avoidance, mendacity, and a lack of zeal on behalf of political liberty”;
The Supreme Court has no business supporting some narrow clique in their delusions of grandeur. It must always let down the expectations of shitheads.
Political liberty could mean the killing of minorities. It could also mean the opposite. But it could also mean that the sodomization of senior citizens is an ineluctable modality of the secouth truth of Gramscian Grammatology in the context of a post-secular Society.
Future generations of Indians, like past generations, are likely to find themselves in an over-populated shithole of a country where the Supreme Court is, as it always has been, merely a cosmetic but useless joke.
They will disintermediate the Judiciary in the same manner that they always have done. Once the Bench is shown not to be able to use Contempt as a sanction against officers of the Court, everybody will defy that sanction. I may be an officer of the court. Who is to say? The Court? Fuck off! It can't 'self-deal' in such a manner. If Bhushan can't be sent to chokey, why should anyone else be? We are all Supremest Court Advocates!
What happens next? If Contempt is not a sanction, then the Judiciary has no indefeasible sanction of its own. It may be autonomous but it is also irrelevant. The Executive may get a judgment- or 'fatwa'- to legitimize a particular action. But, then again, it might not.
Chagla comes from a community which I know intimately and love wholeheartedly. But it is one which has thrived by disintermediating sub-continental jurisdictions. This does not mean that the Aga Khan himself would not intervene in an equitable manner even if the petitioner was Hindu or African or Chinese Communist or whatever.
“the Court of today may come to be viewed by future generations of Indians not merely as an executive Court, but as a collaborationist Court”;
What subsequent generations think is irrelevant. What the current generation thinks is all that matters. Nobody in their right mind thinks this is a 'collaborationist' Court. Why? Hindus are 80 per cent of the population. The ruler is Hindu. He is not Muslim. He is not European. There is no question of 'collaboration'. The Communist and Socialist parties, save where meritocratic and good at Governance, have been wholly obliterated.
Why is Chagla talking such worthless shite? I think, the answer is that he wants to show that his Dad too was a shithead. His son should have emigrated. It was foolish for him to become a High Court Judge. Some advocate could say 'this Muslim Judge is raping all the Hindu women who appear before him'. Such a statement would not be 'criminal contempt'. It would be on a par with Bhushan's gobshittery.
“that by convicting Prashant Bhushan for contempt, it (the Supreme Court) diminishes itself”.
Then the Bench was already diminished by using Contempt for any purpose- including that of imprisoning a Tamil Dalit High Court Judge.
If they won't do the same to an Upper Caste ' Crore Rupee lawyer' they are merely a Chagla-Bhushan type elitist club which is shite at Law.
Each of the above comments, as well as this article, may well be said
by an 80 year old cunt
to affect the confidence of the public in the Supreme Court.
We have no confidence in dynastic Chaglas or Bhushans of even Gandhis. They have sadly degenerated. They served no good purpose save by Executive tropism to inaction.
We are all, therefore, under the present dispensation, guilty as charged.
Chagla, like Bhushan, and other Legal dynasts is guilty of being utterly shite. India has a deplorable Judiciary. It has no legal scholars and the vast majority of lawyers are illiterate hooligans who get into fights with the Police over parking spaces.
Is this, then, what the Supreme Court in Prasant Bhushan sought to achieve?
Says a stupid 80 year old cunt whose Daddy's stupidity precipitated Partition. Khoja Mulsims lost by that.
And has it opened a Pandora’s box that will require the sagacity of a future Court to close?
Pandora's box was closed by Pandora. There was no method for bringing the evils that were released back into it.
Chagla has opened the Pandora's box of his own father's stupidity which, it seems is hereditary. His son is a High Court judge. Advocates of any type- perhaps those who command mobs- should, in the view of this senile cunt be allowed to not just show contempt for his son but kill his family.
Why is this cretin being published by Indian Express? Is it to stoke up Hindu anger against Muslims?
That is not an alethic or reasonable thing to do. Muslims in India are highly productive and are very good and Religious and Moral people. But they may well consider Chagla to be no Muslim at all.
The writer is a NOT a Senior Advocate nor a former President of the Bombay Bar Association which is why this post aint utter shite.
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