The Brave Pedestrian

Thousands of convicts are detained for months or even years AFTER COMPLETION OF THEIR SENTENCES due to non-payment of fines. What right to Life & Liberty are we talking about? The common man has no real right to life and liberty! That's right, there are thousands of inmates who remain in jail even after completion of their jail sentences because they are unable to pay the fine amount! At the end of 2013, there were 3000 such prisoners. Of these, 1375 prisoners, or 45.2% had been in jail less than six months after completion of their sentences. On the other extreme, 240 were still languishing in jail for more than five years after their jail sentences had ended. If non payment of fines of a few thousand rupees can keep you in jail for months or even years, what justice is there in our country? (Thank you TOI for in-depth coverage of this issue.)

Our entire legal system -- unchanged since pre-Independence era -- discriminates between a ruling class and a servant class. Judges, politicians, government officials and the intelligentsia are the ruling class. India's British rulers did not design the judiciary for the understanding of Indian subjects and "natives". Nor did they design it to place themselves on an equal footing with the natives. They designed the judiciary to maintain an upper hand over the natives. This position continues unchanged... and that is why justice and equality remains a distant dream for most of India's 1.2 billion citizens -- especially rural people. This injustice is in the DNA of our judiciary, police and other governance structures. Until we rid ourselves of this historical curse, the judiciary will continue doling out injustice on a daily basis. Like  ·  Comment  ·  Share

Judiciary is designed for INTENTIONAL EXCLUSION of the litigant. The litigant is a "very UNIMPORTANT person" (VUP) in any Indian court. He is belittled, mistreated and deprived of every need and privilege, including information. Everybody else, including junior lawyers, clerks, peons and policemen, have priority over a litigant. Regardless of the merits of his case -- which is sometimes of great significance and public interest -- the litigant gets treated like dirt, and he i s kept in the dark about what is going on. His time, money and efforts get wasted without any consideration, and procedures and timetables are designed in ways that suit everybody else except the litigant. The work-flow, timetables, procedures etc. are decided by the constraints and the whims of judges and lawyers, and designed for their comfort (e.g. lengthy court vacations), greater privilege, convenience and profits. How can the common man even imagine that he will find justice here? ...

Judiciary is not like a pipeline meant for maximizing the output; rather, it is like a filter or a sieve that reduces the output to a thin trickle, and retains the maximum number of cases in circulation for an indefinite number of years. To deliver justice i.e. final judgments, is NOT the objective of the judiciary. Its true purpose is SYSTEMATIC DENIAL OF JUSTICE. As long as there is a superfici al appearance of a system for seeking justice, Indians are willing to tolerate an amazing amount of injustice! This deception and exploitation of Indian citizens has been going on since our Independence in 1947, when we adopted and continued the BRITISH COLONIAL SYSTEM of administration, judiciary, army and police WITHOUT ANY CHANGES

The common experience of litigants is that judiciary is NOT for implementation of the laws passed by legislature, and it is NOT for giving justice to the common man. More than anything else, judiciary is for the exercise of judge's discretionary powers, and their ability to grant "prayers" -- whether lawful or otherwise. It is for the judges' self-aggrandizement, and the enrichment of senior advocates. How can you reform a judiciary that considers law implementation and justice to be merely by-products? Like  ·  Comment  ·  Share

Judiciary is an institution for engaging the common man in an endless legal battle, from which there is no exit. It does not promise him justice, but it tells him that directly fighting against his oppressors is illegal, and therefore, he has no option except to go to court. By a subtle creeping process of institutionalized delay & procedure-based denial of justice, India’s common man is being convinced that he is insignificant, and that he can never get justice. Very slowly, year after year, as pendency increases and the possibility of getting justice grows more distant for the common man, he comes to believe in his own powerlessness. That is the creeping danger facing We The People. Like  ·  Comment  ·  Share

When members of the bar become judges in the same court (as is normal), their friendly relations or professional rivalries with their fellow-advocates will not suddenly cease. They don't stop being awestruck by their seniors, despising their juniors or hating their rivals. So, how can they be impartial? This is a structural defect in the judiciary.

If proof is needed that judiciary is completely unaccountable & shamelessly insensitive to the pain of the public, it is this: Court holidays for flimsy reasons, such as the passing away of the father-in-law of a judge or lawyer. Can't the judges, who declare such random holidays at will, see the agony of hundreds of litigants and undertrials, and their huge loss of money paid by them to lawyers? Does their unchecked power & privilege make them blind?