PERFIDY: ISN’T THY OTHER NAME GOVERNANCE IN INDIA?

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CHIEF JUSTICE OF INDIA-

PERFIDY: ISN’T THY OTHER NAME GOVERNANCE IN INDIA?

Major (Retd) P M Ravindran, ‘Aathira’, Kalpathy-678003; raviforjustice@gmail.com

To write or not to write- the eternal dilemma! To write is to waste precious time and effort; but, not to write is to fail to fulfill a citizen’s responsibility in a democracy! So once again responsibility wins!

Ask me which is the worst organ under the Constitution of India? Or, which is the best example of ‘power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely’? Or, which is the institution that treats the Indian citizen most shabbily? The answer is the same- the Indian judiciary! Why? In the train that is the democratic society the politician is certainly in the driver’s seat but the guard is certainly the judge!

Of course, all the organs are rotten to the core. Much has been written on the politician-bureaucrat-underworld nexus. But unfortunately not much has been written on the judge-advocate nexus in our judiciary. The first quotable quote on this I came across in the Report of the National Commission to review the working of the Constitution, a judiciary-headed (the Chairman was M N Venkatachaliah, a former Chief Justice of India!), judiciary-heavy (six out of the 11 members were from the judiciary!) Commission that submitted its report to the Prime Minister in 2002! And here it is-'Thus we have arrived at a situation in the judicial administration where courts are deemed to exist for judges and lawyers and not for the public seeking justice'! And that’s not all. The report also states 'Judicial system has not been able to meet even the modest expectations of the society.  Its delays and costs are frustrating, its processes slow and uncertain.  People are pushed to seek recourse to extra-legal methods for relief.  Trial system both on the civil and criminal side has utterly broken down.' And this what Aravind Kumar, Jurist and lawyer, who, in 'Needed high speed legal redressal' (Pioneer, Kochi, 01 Aug 2006) wrote: Justice is an intrinsic human need. We suffer much privation but we cannot suffer being wronged. Absence of justice, we must not forget, is one of the causes of crime. Does that explain the growth of naxalism and maoism in the most backward of all regions in the country? And the deployment of armed forces, with the cover of the much misunderstood and much maligned AFSPA, in quite a few others?

Before I proceed further, it may also be pertinent to do an analysis, on the basis of first principles, of which is the worst organ of our Constitution. Amoung these three organs of our Constitution the law-makers are controlled by the people, bureaucracy (yes, bureaucracy, because without the active support of the bureaucracy no politician can do any wrong!) and finally the judiciary; the law-enforcers are also controlled by the law-makers and the judiciary. And then there are the ears and eyes of the people- the media, waiting to sensationalise every news involving the misdemeanour of these authorities. Inspite of such strict supervision and control all that we can hear these days are about politician-bureaucrat-underworld nexus even though the fact remains that none, worth the name, from this unholy nexus have ever been punished by the holier-than-thou judiciary.

So now think how bad a system can be which is not only NOT subject to supervision but also kept beyond critical observation. Well isn’t our judiciary is just that? And do I need to recapitulate that quip: power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely?

The judges, by the very nature of their task, have a lot of discreetion in deciding the outcome of a case. The absence of a system to check that this discretion is not misused is the most confounding shortcoming of our justice delivery system. While it may be argued that there is whole lot of processes known as appeals, review, revision etc all of them, at the most, can only undo the ultimate damage  of the first wrong decision. The issue of how such a wrong decision came to be delivered finally is relegated to irrelevance. And given the eternity it takes to get a decision from one level of the judiciary, ultimately what gets perpetrated is nothing but injustice! I need not quote those quips like ‘justice delayed is justice denied‘, do I? While getting a fair decision is a herculean task for those who can afford to enter the premises of a court in search of justice it is another fact of life that in the Indian context atleast the majority just cannot afford it, forget about the even greater majority who cannot even think about justice! (Remember Maslow’s Law of Heirarchial Needs? And the fact that public servants who have spent millions of tax payer’s money on smart toilets in their offices have the audacity to declare that  a person can survive happily with Rs 30/- in this country!)

A picture, it is said, speaks better than a thousand words. So does examples. So, just to illustrate what has been said in the last paragraph here are a few examples.

The first of course has to be K G Balakrishnan’s stand as the CJI that his office was out of purview of the RTI Act. And recently we had this report about the just retired CJI, Altamas Kabir, reliquishing office with a bang, ruling that a common entrance exam for professional colleges would adversely affect minority rights! The list can be endless but hope these examples suffice to demonstrate how wayward even decisions of the ultimate authority on law in the country can be! One more example is required to prove beyond any iota of doubt how our justice delviery system has failed the citizens of this country. There are two principles of jurisprudence that is widely known: one, that even if  thousand criminals escape punishment one innocent  citizen shall not be punished and two, capital punishment is awarded in only the rarest of rarest cases. Now here is one case that proves that even these basic principles go for a toss in our judiciary. A primary school teacher was murdered in broad daylight by a group of assailants in his classroom before the tiny tots who where his students. The trial court sentenced four (or was it five?) to death. The High Court of Kerala upheld that decision. The apex court commutted the sentence of one to life and acquitted the rest. The one who had been sentenced to life was also set free soon, without obviously undergoing the full life term. And then soon he was arrested in another prominent murder case! And it is now in public domain that he had been the only one actually involved in the earlier murder case where three or four others had also been sentenced to death! While I am amazed at how, at the highest court, the correct culprit had been identifed and punished, it drives me mad to think how the trial court and the Kerala High Court sentenced innocent citizens to death in the first place! And worse, what about the others who had participated in the crime? Who was the investigating officer who framed the innocent citizens so effectively as to get them capital punishment? Who were the prosecutors and the judges who could not see the shortcomings that could be discerned by the apex court? And, what about compensating the innocent citizens who had to live in confinement with the fear of death during the best years of their lives?

If the above instances have gigantic dimensions in themselves there are a few which have gained such proportions because of the masses who are affected. Take the case of order of the Kerala High Court holding bandhs illegal. This order was upheld by the apex court too. And two political parties had been penalised Rs 10 lakhs each in Maharshatra on the strength of this order. But nothing of that sort has happend in Kerala and the High Court has remained a mute spectator though we have been having one bandh per day on an average somewhere or the other  in Kerala! And worse, the court has gone ahead  and held holding protests and meetings on roadsides also illegal. Why worse? Though this order is under review in the apex court, the police have started registering cases against individuals and small groups trying to get their problems into public domain while leaving the political parties and influential groups, like the merchants association, free to hold the public to ransom!  Incidently,  an order of the same court mandating use of helmets has been enforced under threat of contempt of court case against the DGP! But even here it has been reported in the media recently that a film star had conducted a motorcylce rally with 100 Bullet motorbikes without wearing a helmet and no case had been registered! To a query a responsible police officer had reportedly responded that such a matter had not been noted by the police! 100 youngsters on motorbikes holding a rally in the commercial capital of Kerala and the police were pretending ignorance about it! A new episode for Ripley’s Believe it or Not?

While on the subject of bandhs, protest and courts, I had recently applied for a copy of the orders of the high court and apex court from the Home Minister’s office in Kerala in the belief that being responsible for enforcing the orders they would be having copies. But horror of horrors!  The application had been transfered from one section to the other and there is no sign of the orders yet! Well, one copy of the application had been sent to the Kerala High Court too and the Public Information Officer of the court has written to say that it is a document related to a judical proceeding and hence exempted from disclosure under the Kerala High Court (RTI) Rules!

To cut this communication short, I shall conclude by refering to some of my blogs related to this subject.

1.       Justice Delivery System- FAQs at

http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/02/justice-delivery-system-faqs.html

2.       Reforming Our Justice Delivery System at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/02/reforming-our-justice-delivery-system.html

3.       Report of the NCRWC- a Citizens Review at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.in/2011/03/report-of-ncrwc-citizens-review.html

4.       Who will judge the judges? at

http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/03/who-will-judge-judges.html

5.       Parliamentary Standing Committee on Judicial Reforms at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/03/parliamentary-standing-committee-on.html

6.       The crime of non-governance and quasi judicial organisations (letter to CM, Kerala of 12 Jan 2010) at

http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/04/crime-of-non-governance-and-quasi.html

7.       Obnoxious functioning of consumer fora/commissions- letter to minister (of 8/1/11) at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/04/obnoxious-functioning-of-consumer.html

8.       Lokpal or not- the judiciary needs to be disciplined first at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/05/lokpal-or-not-judiciary-needs-to-be.html

9.       Indian judiciary-who said what at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/05/indian-judiciary-who-said-what.html

10.   Judges! no sermons please at

http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/06/judges-no-sermons-please.html

11.   Access to Justice-A Stake Holder’s Report at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.in/2012/02/access-to-justice-stake-holders-report.html

12.   Ravi's Laws of Criminality at

http://raviforjustice.blogspot.in/2012/06/ravis-laws-of-criminality.html

13.   Judicial freedom vs citizen's rights- an open letter to the CJI at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.in/2012/08/judicial-freedom-vs-citizens-rights.html

14.   Judges Subverting the Law: Order In Writ Petition (Civil) 210/2012 at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.in/2012/09/judges-subverting-law-order-in-writ.html

In conclusion, it cannot be denied that if the judiciary is ultimately responsible for delivering justice it is also responsible for the denial of it and the consequent growing crime rate.  Dearth of resources may be a claim that may be taken at face value by the ignorant but the judiciary needs to prove that existing resources are being used optimally before it can demand more resources. The judge to population ratio has been exploded as a myth not relevant to the Indian context. The following statistics prove it. While India with almost 5 times the population of US of A had only 13.6 million cases filed in 1999; in the US of A itself 93.81 million cases –almost 7 times the number filed in India-had been filed that year! And the docket’s per judge? India: 987 per Judge; USA: 3235 per Judge! Why, even a casual visit to any court will reveal the gross mismanagement of time and resources and the torture the litigants are subjected to in pursuing justice through our courts.  Case studies have been given in some of the blogs listed above and hence not being repeated here.

While I will not be surprised even if nothing happens as a consequence of this letter I must admit that I have not lost all hope. It is truly said, the person who tries to do something to correct what he perceives as wrong is definitely someone who has more hope that the correction can be made than one who simply curses and lives in frustration! And hope arises from the fact that the apex court, and apex court only, seems to be able to move the executive as seen in the alacrity with which the politicians have acted to amend the RPA Act in the wake of the recent SC verdict barring convicted politicians from holding the law maker’s post!

Regards and best wishes,

(P M Ravindran)

Hitelr, Stalin, Osama and Dawood become honourable!

Hitler, Stalin, Osama Bin Laden, Dawood Ibrahim should all be honourable gentlemen when compared to those controlling the reins of power in India, whether at the Centre or in the states, at the moment.

In Kerala, the Chief Minister , Oommen Chandy, who has been fooling the public with a much touted (at tax payer's cost, of course!) public contact programs even managed an award from the UN for the farce! To anybody viewing the event(s) objectively every case that came up during the program should have had heads rolling in the mazes that are government offices in this state. Three of my complaints (all in public interest, something like class action suit in the US!) submitted for his program in Palakkad, against Kerala State Information Commission (constituted under the Right to Information Act), District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum and Kerala State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (constituted under the Consumer Protection Act) and the District Collector's office, are published respectively at
http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/11/chief-ministers-public-contact-program.html
http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/11/chief-ministers-contact-program.html and http://raviforjustice.blogspot.com/2011/11/chief-ministers-public-contact-program_22.html




Needless to say I got totally unsatisfactory responses from the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum and the District Collector's office but none whatsoever from the Kerala State Information Commission and Kerala State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission!

Forget about doing nothing what they are supposed to do these criminals in public offices are also guilty of doing everything they are not supposed to do! In one case that I know of an activist got the Prime Minister's office to send a letter to the Govt of Kerala suggesting investigation of corruption in delay in implementing a bus cum lorry stand project in Palakkad. But the Govt headed by Oommen Chandy has not acted on it and forced the activist and a friend of his to protest by waving black flags at a function attended by Oommen Chandy. Now the police has been framing him in cases after false cases!

I too have been charged by the police in three cases illegally. The details are given below.

1. On 13 Nov 2012 I was arrested illegally and detained in the police station for almost 5 hours. I had gone to distribute a leaflet 'For whom the soldiers are making sacrifices' to those going into a hotel to participate ina function where the chief guest was to be A K Antony! The case, for which summons was delivered on 18 Jun,  came up on 19 Jun and has been adjourned to 20 Dec 2013! (The leaflet, in Malayalam, can be viewed at http://www.slideshare.net/raviforjustice/soldiers-against-traitors)

2. On 19 Jan 2013 Anti Corruption Movement Kerala had organised a function near the Martyrs' Column, Fort Maidan. For this, its Gen Secy had applied for mike permission in the 1st week of Jan. (No ack/receipt given!) On 15th Jan when he went to collect the sanction letter he was told that it was misplaced! He applied again on 16th and went to collect the sanction letter on 18th but was told that the file was with the DySP. On 19th he was told verbally to carry on with the function.

As the preparations for the function was going on both the SI and CI were there and to my query why they were there the SI answered that they expected trouble from the Congress party workers who had a score to settle with the Gen Secy who had on an earlier occasion showed black flag at the CM!

After the function was over police personnel in plain clothes came and sought the sanction letter for using mike and walked off with the PA system. The mike provider followed them. The Gen Secy, another activist and myself followed him. Nothing happened at the police station and the mike was returned by about 6.30 pm and we all returned home.

On 8 May the Gen Secy was handed over summons, for the three of us, for a hearing scheduled for 10th! The case is now posted for 31 Jul!

Meanwhile, under RTI Act I had got a copy of the application submitted on 16 Jan, file notings and the letter denying permission. The DySP's noting says that since the applicant is involved in a criminal case (the number quoted indicates Jan/Feb 2012 vintage1) the permission need not be given. The letter denying permission, however, states that the permission is being denied based on kerala hc orders! (incidently the Kerala High Court order banning road side meetings is on appeal with the apex court. In any case there is no dearth of such meetings anywhere in Kerala!)

The interesting thing is that while I am a member of the executive committee of ACMK, the other activist is not. He had just addressed the gathering. But then again, the retired tehsildar who had inaugurated the  function has been spared!)

3. The third case is one in which I was nowhere near the scene of the alleged incidence! On 21 Jan 2013 the GAIL Gas pipeline Victims Forum had gone ahead with a campaign using mike inspite of being (illegally) denied the permission for using mike. The case for which summons was delivered on 18 Jun, came up on 24th and has also been adjourned. (I am yet to find out the date from the advocate!). The interesting thing here is that the organisers do not figure in the list of the accused! The 6 accused includes 3 participants and 3 non participants (Dr P S Panikkar, one Syed and me!)

Now you can decide for yourself if the title of this posting is correct or not!

FROM BLACK DIWALI TO BLACK REPUBLIC DAY- KERALA EVOLVES INTO A TERROR STATE

FROM BLACK DIWALI TO BLACK REPUBLIC DAY-KERALA EVOLVES INTO A TERROR STATE-

MAJ(RETD) P M RAVINDRAN, KALPATHY-678003

Three months ago, precisely on 12 Oct 2012, shortly before 3 pm, I was arrested on the orders of the Dy SP, Palakkad, Mr Prasob, when I was in front of a hotel. Defence Minister A K Antony was scheduled to inaugurate the 50th anniversary of public life of O Rajagopal, Minister of State for Railways in the earlier Atal Bihari Vajpayee Government, at 3.30 pm in the auditorium of the hotel. My crime- having some leaflets titled ‘For whom the soliders make their sacrifices‘ to be distributed to those going into the hotel to participate in the function and also a banner to be displayed outside the hotel on the road side! (For more details please read my blogs  ‘Black Diwali 2012‘ at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.in/2012/11/black-diwali-2012.html and ‘Black Diwali-follow up‘ at http://raviforjustice.blogspot.in/2012/11/black-diwali-follow-up.html. And just for the records, an application under the RTI Act to provide information on action taken on the petition to the DSP elicited the reply that the petition has not been received by that office, though I have with me the acknowledgement card signed by their authorised person! The matter is with the 1st appellate authority!)

Today, that is 26 Jan 2013, the venue was Fort Maidan, Palakkad where Kerala Cabinet Minister Manjalamkuzhy Ali was to take the salute at a formal Republic Day Parade at the District Headquarters. Dr P S Panikkar, all of 70 years, a well known activist working in the area of conservation of ecology, human rights and other civic issues, was there to distribute some leaflets on the on going struggle by civic society to persuade the Government of Kerala to appeal before the apex court on an order issued by the Kerala High Court in the matter of Noorani Hindu High School Playground. The issue in brief is as follows.

In 1917 and 1951 the then Madras Government acquired and handed over 2 acres and 3.19 acres of land to the school for playground purposes. When the school stopped functioning in 1997, the management returned 3.19 acres of land to the government but retained the earlier 2 acres. After enough enquiries by the concerned authorities and enough opportunity being given to the proprieters of the school to prove their claim to the land and legal opinion tendered by the Government Pleader, the tehsildar took over the land on the orders of the then district collector, on 8/10/2007. The very next day the owners brought a stay order on the proceedings from the Kerala High Court. Later they got a favourable verdict too. The appeal by the government was also dismissed three months ago. The present government has not gone on appeal to the apex court and various sports clubs and civic society under the banner of Noorani Playground Protection Council has been agitating and also appealing to every authority possible, from the CM to the local MLA, to appeal before the apex court to retain possession of the ground already taken over and convert it to a sports complex.

Back to the day’s events, Dr Panikkar was forbidden to enter the ground by the special branch officers of the police. When he agreed and started distributing the leaflet on the road side he was forbidden to do that also. When he was returning helplessly, he was met by an acqaintence who had come with his 11 year old son to witness the parade. At this point the police sweeped on all three of them, bundled them up in their van and took them to the Town South Police Station.

Meanwhile, I, who had dropped Dr Panikkar near the Maidan and gone to get a camera returned and while entering the ground was stopped by the officers of the special branch. When I said I wanted to meet Dr Panikkar I was told that he had been taken to the police station. I was shocked and told them that I was going to the police station myself. On my way to the area where my motorcycle was parked I was handed over a copy of the day’s newspaper Madhyamam by some body who had been distributing it free of cost there. Even as I collected it and was about to move on a Dy SP standing there called me and had a physical check of my person. The waist band that I was wearing due to low back ache seemed to have aroused his suspicion. By then two police personnel in civvies came to me and asked me to get into their vehicle. They brushed aside my statement that I was going to the police station itself but on my own motorcycle. At the police station I joined Dr Panikkar, Syed and his 11 year old son, as a detainee.

Soon about 15 or so activists, including an advocate, Mr Shaji, gathered in the police station. At about 1030h the Dy SP came and all the activists followed him to his office. Thereafter Dr Panikkar, Syed and myself were also summoned. After some discussions, we were given to believe that the police acted in our interest, to protect us from from (some imaginary!) counter protestors and the ugly situation that could have followed! He later let us off with a snide threat that he could file an FIR if we wanted it!

Ever since my voluntary retirement in 1998 I have been an activist in the area of good governance and judicial reforms. With the promulgation of the Right to Information Act I believed that here was an opportunity to usher in democracy without bloodshed but suffice to say that the responses that I have received to my applications and appeals have convinced me that government has become a synonym for a group of people in offices of authority doing nothing that is required to be done by them and doing everything that they should never be doing!

For now I wish Anna, Kejriwal, Jai Prakash Narayan (of LokSatta Party)and Baba Ramdev would close ranks and help the masses to oust the thugs, scoundrels and traitors occupying the offices of authority of the state and usher in real democracy in this, my motherland!

PETITION TO DECLARE STRIKE BY GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES ILLEGAL

A section of the employees of the Government of Kerala has declared an indefinite strike from 08 Jan 2013. Their cause is genuine but means totally unjustified. So here is a petition I have sent to the Chief Justice of the Kerala High Court to declare the strike illegal and ensure that the rights of the citizens to get the services due to them from the government are not hampered or delayed.

P M Ravindran

2/18, 'Aathira', Sivapuri, Kalpathy-678003

Tele: 0491-2576042; E-mail: pmravindran@gmail.com

 

File: Petn/kerhc-strike080113-040113                                                                              04 Jan 2013

The Chief Justice                      Through e mail at hckerala@nic.in

High Court of Kerala

Kochi

PETITION TO DECLARE STRIKE BY GOVERNEMNT EMPLOYEES ILLEGAL

1.       It is understood from reports in the media that a section of the government employees will be on an indefinte strike from 08 Jan 2013. The reason for the strike is learnt to be their opposition to introduction of contributory pension.

2.       The Supreme Court of India has held that pension is a right because it is deferred wages. However, the court has not laid down any guidelines on the quantum or modus of payment of this pension. Hence the legality or otherwise of the government decision to introduce contributory pension is left for the judiciary to decide. But there is no gainsaying the fact that the principle has to be applied universally. It just cannot be limited to government employees. Strictly speaking the government would have done better to have introduced this scheme for the ministers, MPs and MLAs before forcing it upon the employees.

3.       More importantly, the services to be delivered by the government to the citizens are amoung the most essential services. It can even be termed the most essential service because there is no alternate source for such services. So while democracy admits the right to protest, government employees cannot protest by striking work, or in other words by refusing to deliver the services due to the citizens. Amoung the many means to protest available to them are working beyond working hours or even working indefinitley or staging protest through dharnas out of office hours.

4.       While the government has declared dias non (no work, no pay) for the striking employees this is practically a fraud being perpetrated on the gullible citizens because invariabley as  a condition for terminating the strike the government always gives in to the demand for withdrawing all cases against the striking employees as well as waiving the dias non condition.

5.       For reasons given above, you are requested to declare strikes by government employees illegal and protect the rights of ordinary citizens to the services due from the government without interruption or delay.

Yours truly,

(P M Ravindran)