Posted on 22nd October, 2024 (GMT 12:30 hrs)
ABSTRACT
The article critically assesses Chief Justice Chandrachud’s legacy, emphasizing its contradictions. While he is praised for apparently being “progressive”, his tenure is also marred by decisions that seem to align with the present ruling party of India, the BJP. It discusses his ambivalence in upholding the secular constitutional values versus religion-oriented actions that favor the crony oligarchical as well as religious extremist establishment. The piece highlights his complex role in balancing judicial independence with executive influence, casting doubt on the long-term impact of his legacy.
In the above poster, the sculpture of Gandhari (on the left) is by artist Krishen Khanna and the original cartoon of CJI Chandrachud is by DH Illustration.
The Goddess of Justice: Themis!
We see her, with our own eyes, eyes that no longer suffer from the dystopic sterility of social myopia…
She has an opaque blindfold over her eyes.
Someone approached her, and took off the blindfold almost immediately.
That person made her wear a distinctively Hindu attire.
She also has eyes now. She ‘sees’.
What does the new ‘lady justice’ statue signify? | Explained VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 21st October, 2024 ©The Hindu)
What could be seen, and what cannot? What are we “allowed” to see? How much do we see? The quantitative and qualitative mapping of such “seeing”, or rather “gazing” cannot always be grasped well.
Earlier, she was ‘impartial’ (on principle) to all in championing the notion of “equality before the law”—even to the alleged accused until he/she is proven guilty (though the difference is not understood by many nowadays, e.g., the Hon. CM of West Bengal).
Who removed the cover from her eyes? To let her see or witness what?
Is she an incarnation of Saksicaitanya, the witness self of the overt viewer?
Once we found the person, the one who masterminded this, we immediately thought of our earlier appeals, pleas, earnest recommendations and suggestions to him, directly and/or indirectly:
He is the ‘about-to-retire’ CJI: Mr. D. Y. Chandrachud. He calls the Goddess as “Lady Justice”.
He attended Hindu temples wearing a saffron robe in terms of a public display, and that too, multiple times.
He praised the Hindu saffron “dhwaj” or flag as representing the idea of Indian unity or nationhood (a derivative of European notion of ‘nation’).
He worshipped Lord Gaṇeśa at his residence in the company of the PM Modi, carrying out a publicized spectacle of the same for all to see.
CJI Chandrachud’s bench allowed the worship of Hindu deities within the premises of the Gyanvapi mosque without questioning what such an act of worship by the majoritarian religious community would entail for Indian politics of religion!
SC refuses to stay Hindu prayers in southern cellar of Gyanvapi mosque VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 2nd April, 2024 ©Business Standard)
He recently remarked that on the day of the Ram Mandir Verdict⤡ ⤡ ⤡ ⤡, he sat before the “deity” and prayed for the resolution of the Ayodhya dispute in favour of the majoritarian Hindus. We remember that he along with other judges did not sign the Ram Mandir verdict– it is, peculiarly enough, an anonymous verdict. Why is it so? Is it not an instance of “will to hide” (erit celare)? Yet he chooses to celebrate this evident event of communal erasure without a shred of hesitation. We would like to request the CJI to kindly view this documentary by Anand Patwardhan before legitimizing alleged “oracles” from the Hindu Gods:
“I Sat Before The Deity…”: Chief Justice On Ayodhya Dispute VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 20th October, 2024 ©NDTV)
Justice Chandrachud Should Not Blame God for His Own Awful Ayodhya Judgment VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 22nd October, 2024 ©The Wire)
After this comment, SP Leader Ram Gopal Yadav has apparently attacked the CJI by “badmouthing” him⤡. Justice Anjana Prakash⤡ has also made a legitimately scathing attack on CJI over this remark of his by calling him immature and unwise. She remarked: “Where did God come into this picture?” She further said that the CJI’s “laughable” and “filmy” statement defeats the ethos of the Chief Justice’s Oath that promotes the secular allegiance to the irreligious Indian Constitution. She noted that even the new “blindfold-less” sculpture of “Lady Justice” is not aesthetically appealing in any manner, and is an endeavour that tantamount to a joke! Even the idol (not a sculpture as it is far from being a sculpture) immaturely follows Greco-Roman crafting without knowing either western standard of art or South-Asian ṣaḍaṅga (six organs) of art for constructing a work of art. Former Judge of SCI, Justice Markandey Katju condemned the CJI’s comment by tweeting the following remark:
What if a CJI belonging to an “excluded” minority faith (the other) in contemporary theocratic India said such a similar thing? We are quite sure that in such a scenario, the Sangh Parivar and its political overlords would have constantly targeted him/her in derogatory terms that would have entailed a regressive politics of hatred, intolerance and narrow-minded dogmatism. This proves that we are evidently moving towards a Saffronized judiciary within the failed state of India!
Justice Rekha Sharma pointed out a “conflict of interest” in this appeal to deity/God by a sitting CJI! ⤡
Now, which “deity” was it? The unnamed phantom of the deity haunts us as ghosts never dies (sic), given the polytheistic idolatry characteristic to the so-called heathen “Hindu” cults. Did a “non-bio-logical” divine being specifically aid him in this regard?
He also said that the judiciary does not have to plead for the parliamentary opposition parties. Does that mean it can plead for the ruling party? Ufff…the vicious trap of binary thinking!
Supreme Court is people’s court… doesn’t mean we fulfil role of Opposition in Parliament: CJI Chandrachud VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 20th October, 2024 ©The Indian Express)
After seeing all this, many now call the “Supreme Court of India” as the “Sanghi Court of India”. Is this true, after all?
During his role as the Chief Justice, he did not order the arrest (or even questioning) of the sitting PM along with many BJP leaders for openly violating the Model Code of Conduct and the core principles of the Indian Constitution multiple times during the election campaigning, and how the Election Commission turned a blind’s eye towards the entire matter throughout the process.
He also did not take any substantial step in exposing the disparities between the votes polled and votes casted (as pointed out by the ADR) in the 2024 Lok Sabha Elections. The ECI refused to take up any democratic accountability, but the CJI did nothing in that regard as well. He never bothered to consider and act on the multiple petitions asking for banning the easily manipulable EVMs, or do a 100 per cent verification and matching of VVPATS.
It is being said:
“Justice Chandrachud had many opportunities to do the right thing, to restore the autonomy of institutions (appointment of election commissioners), to reign in rampaging state governments (the bulldozers of UP, Nuh and Uttarakhand), to prevent the illegal surveillance of citizens (the Pegasus ‘inquiry’ where the Union government dared tell him that it would not cooperate!), the restoration of statehood (in Jammu and Kashmir), to restore legitimately elected governments brought down by totally illegal means (Maharashtra), to restore faith and credibility in the electoral process (the repeated petitions to return to paper ballots or do a 100 per cent verification and matching of VVPATS), to question an unaccountable Election Commission on its dubious actions and decisions (delay in uploading voter counts, non-issue of forms 17C, mismatch in votes cast and votes counted, failure to take action under the model code of conduct against high functionaries of the government).”
SOURCE: A legacy that is best forgotten VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 19th October, 2024 ©National Herald)
In March 2024, The Supreme Court under CJI Chandrachud’s leadership declined to halt the appointments of Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Gyanesh Kumar, despite petitioners arguing that the government’s rush and lack of transparency in the process conveyed the impression that the two retired IAS officers were “favorable” to the current regime.⤡
We do not know what to say. Has the ruling party’s “faith” taken the precedence in the CJI’s discourses? Which faith is it? Does it reflect solely and only the majoritarian religious extremists’ fascist sentiments? Does it not align with the hearing-impaired people in power? We would further like to ask: does he have enough “faith” in himself?
Faith as faithfulness no longer remains, as it is enshrouded by the faith as obedience and conformity, as well as the most protruding faith-as-opportunism—a yajmani, quid-pro-quo, patron-client relationship between the Executive and Judiciary? Are we living amidst a feudal (in the context of the South-East Asia) mentality of serving and being served by being a “man” (sexism intended) for another “man”?
What is this opportunism for? Post-retirement jobs and securing positions of power, movable and immovable wealth, security and fame, perhaps? Greed is the enemy—thus spoke the “Hindu” scriptures!
Former Supreme Court judges who were appointed as governors post-retirement VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 13th February, 2023 ©Business Standard)
Ret’d CJI Gogoi nominated to Rajya Sabha ⤡
Jaitley On Judges’ Post-Retirement⤡
As he is about to retire on November the 10th, he is worried how “history” will view him or what he is leaving behind. Does this question stem from his internalized guilt-feeling for not always remaining steadfast in his resolves? What is causing this worry? Well, according to our gaze, history is likely to view him as a markedly ambivalent jurist bordering on a hypocritical standpoint, who did not always have the spine or ethical ethos to stand for the rightful, the legitimate, and instead sided with the crony oligarchical as well as religious extremist regime, apparently for securing his own vested interests following his term as the CJI.
Fidel Castro once famously remarked: “Condemn Me. It does not matter. History Will Absolve Me.” In the present CJI’s case, it should be substituted with: “Will History Condemn Me?”
Many once believed that he is a progressive person at the time of his initiation. We also accepted that to be indeed the case! In his speeches and statements (or lip-service?), he consistently highlighted the importance of personal liberty, freedom of expression, religious plurality, constitutional protections, and the judiciary’s duty to keep the executive in check. Where exactly did he lose this projected “courage” when it came to real actions on the judicial plane?
He headed the bench that declared the opaque electoral bonds as “unconstitutional”⤡.
He was the one, who encouraged judicial debates on the question of queer marriages.
In his time, we also saw how the Supreme Court brought a blanket (?) stoppage to the “Bulldozer (In)justice” of the BJP.
During his reign, we have just seen how the uproar on “Tirupati Laddoos” was condemned by the Supreme Court of India, wherein it stated in clear terms: “Keep Gods Out Of Politics”. Did the CJI himself listen to this pronouncement during his service?
During his term and that too, quite recently, we found the Supreme Court refusing to grant Subramanian Swamy’s plea to delete the words “Secular” and “Socialist” from the Indian Constitution. No doubt, this verdict proves the non-monolithic features of our judiciary.
What Supreme Court said on plea to remove ‘secular’, ‘socialist’ from Constitution’s Preamble VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 21st October, 2024 ©Bar and Bench)
Supreme Court says secularism a core part of the Constitution VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 21st October, 2024 ©The Hindu)
Yet, he falters predominantly to maintain this otherwise projected stand in favour of a more critical, “anti-establishment” outlook of the “independent” judiciary. He, through his Hindu-leaning activities, attacks the fundamental Article 51A(h) of the Indian Constitution that promotes the scientific temper, spirit of inquiry, humanism and reform. In this way, he in fact blows its own trump for BJP-RSS-VHP’s ideological violence. The Hon. CJI now comes out and says with an extremely fatalistic tone: “God will find a way”! What is he trying to achieve here, again?
During his term itself, he wanted to resolve the plethora of pending cases at the Supreme Court of India, given the dictum: Justice delayed is justice denied. Yet, there are at least 10 crucial cases, including the RG Kar rape-and-murder, marital rape, Byju’s insolvency, same-sex marriage review petition, wealth redistribution and so on, which are being left unanswered by him. Not to talk of the thousands of other cases, which are lying unresolved in every corner down the judicial roads!
CJI Chandrachud’s Final Lap: 10 major cases await clarity as his tenure nears end VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 21st October, 2024 ©CNBC)
Despite repeated pleas of the DHFL victims⤡ ⤡ ⤡, who are hit by the unprecedented financial scam in the history of post-independent India, the CJI did not ever bother to hear their voices effectively. The Supreme Court of India seems to be giving an upper-hand to BJP’s close associate Mr. Ajay Piramal, the alleged adverse possessor of the DHFL, in this case!
Our CJI did not even pay proper heed to the substantiated evidence of the Hindenburg Reports, which transparently exposed the scams committed by BJP’s closest crony tycoon, Mr. Adani⤡. Why so?
He did not take any step in the cases of Bilkis Bano, Umar Khalid (who, along with others convicted under the UAPA, completed 1500 days in the prison!) and IPS Sanjiv Bhatt, which could have been easily resolved within days under his supervision. His role as a “dissenter” in the Bhima Koregaon case is also being questioned at present.
It was noted in the previously cited National Herald article:
“The Koregaon accused are being released on bail in instalments, as if justice is a divisible commodity. Some of them have even died under these conditions (the 80-year-old Stan Swamy), or as a result of the inhuman treatment meted out to them while in custody, the most recent being Prof. G.N. Saibaba, a man with 90 per cent disability who was kept in jail for almost a decade without being convicted of any offence.
And the most outrageous of all these stains on the court is that, when Saibaba was acquitted by Bombay High Court, the Supreme Court took the unprecedented action of convening the very next day on a holiday, and stayed the high court order!”
In the hearings regarding Section 6A of the highly controversial CAA⤡ (a determinately religious exclusivist Act!), Justice Chandrachud’s bench upheld the constitutionality of the said provision. This is also being critiqued, for obvious reasons.
One might say that Mr. Chandrachud himself is not to be held responsible indiscriminately for all these “commissions and omissions”, since in many cases the conclusions were arrived at by the other benches. However, being the CJI within the power-structure of the SCI, he has to take a share in the blame.
During his tenure in the capacity of the CJI, the Supreme Court even legitimized the so-called “validity” of the demonetization move⤡, which actually proved to be entirely ineffective in dealing with the issues of black money, counterfeit money and terror funding. In fact, the BJP itself has been reported to be involved in terror-funding in the DHFL scam. Instead, what we have seen that superrich Ajay Piramal had got an instant and blanket stay order on the verdict of the NCLAT (27/01/2022), that went against him.
We have to say: He is no Justice Loya!
“Loya’s family, who questioned the circumstances surrounding his death and said that the judge had been offered Rs 100 crore ⤡ to give an order favourable to the prime accused, BJP president Amit Shah. The judge passed away on December 1, 2014 after a heart attack while in Nagpur to attend a colleague’s daughter’s wedding. In interviews to the magazine’s reporter, Niranjan Takle, members of Loya’s family listed what they said were inconsistencies in the facts surrounding his death.” VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 27th November, 2017, Republished on the 12th of January, 2018 ©The Wire); Death of Judge Loya: Video Testimonies from Family, Which Raise Disturbing Questions Regarding His Death VIEW HERE ⤡ (As reported on 21st November 2017 ©The Caravan)
At such a confusing juncture, do we still retain our faith in the Indian judiciary? Is it any longer a question of “do we”, or rather, a “can we” and “should we“?
Chiefly due to these questionable activities of his career, the demarcation line or compartmentalization amidst the judiciary and political executive has visibly got blurred, or nearly obliterated, thus setting dangerous precedents for the future of the Indian judiciary itself. This seems to be nothing other than a part of the Hindutva terrorist agenda to do away with the boundaries between religion as a private affair of the individual citizen and the realm of public politics.
He has crossed the watertight thresholds in-between the executive and judiciary by performing the de facto liminal rituals of being a Sanghi for securing the provisions for his post-retirement job.
Where lie (“to lie” as in lying in opposition to truth or “lie” as in being in a resting position— or perhaps, a lie that remains or rests in a form of pseudology?) his morals in such disillusioning conditions, anyway? Has he forfeited them once and for all? We feel that this very thought should at least bother a person of his alleged stature!
Candrāhataḥ Candracūḍaḥ?!
Once in a Blue Moon Academia 
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