Binayak Sen denied Bail by High Court...Justice in Tears!

This is the most painful moment for Human Rights future in India to receive the news of denial of bail to Binayak Sen by the high court yesterday. Denail of bail is a euphemism for denial of personal liberty to someone like Binayak Sen, who was committed to the cause of empowerment to the disenfranchised Indian citizenry. Someone whose commitment has been backed and appreciated by more than 40 Nobel Laureates across the globe! Legal vocabularies certainly possess the mask to hide the face of violence perpetrated by law itself. Alas, such vocabulary is scarcely available to the insurgent sections of Indian humanity. We all must attempt to expose and condemn this atrocious legal brutality in every possible manner. Thus, I fully share the urge to invoke the constitutional consciousness against such an archaic, arcane and anachronistic colonial law of sedition in the Indian Penal Code, 1860 which could make us relive Mohandas Gandhi’s plight in the post-independent India. Mohandas Gandhi remarked “Section 124-A, under which I am happily charged, is perhaps the prince among the political sections of the Indian Penal Code designed to suppress the liberty of the citizens.” (Selection from Gandhi’s closing statement on March 23, 1922).

I feel that it is the right moment that we need to re-evoke the vanishing Gandhian consciousness against the text and interpretation put to section 124-A of IPC. Having said that, I must confess that I find it difficult, if not completely fail, to agree with the hyper-globalizing media activities to oppose the denial of bail by way pressing a button on our mobile phones! This sort of 'sms-justice' (almost obscenely eulogized in the rcent Bollywood flick No One Killed Jessica) can hardly lead us anywhere in the pursuit of justice . What great purpose save a venting of frustration can be served by ‘issuing 'sms'-es’? I fail to see myself more than a human rights hysteric guided by the 24 x 7 media consciousness (to evoke the very apposite invocations of Upendra Baxi) in being part of collective 'sms' writings. And issued to whom – Media? And what serious purpose do we sincerely feel it will serve save some appeasement of anger that engulfs us?

But if I see any hope in, or any role of, intellectuals (especially legal academia) in this moment of Historic time then I see it in developing an acumen of asking right questions rather than plunging into action. The counter-productivity of too-much-action can be best illustrated by this oft-quoted instance: When a number of people were protesting against the Bush Administration for invasion of Iraq and they came on roads and shouted slogans, what did Bush said? He said that “This is great...That is why we are invading Iraq so that their people can also protest against the rulers there as well”! This is not to say demean the activistic potential but just to emphasise on the subtle way establishment can co-opt the language of protest as the justification to do what is protested!

I implore everyone need to think and find ways to address the issue. I feel that our seriousness demands that we should not end up wasting our effort nor let die down the anger by indulging in trivialities. I honestly feel the role of intellectuals today is to make a serious distinction between human rights hystericism and human rights activism.

I was seriously intrigued by Prof. Upendra Baxi’s comment in Faculty Development Workshop in Jindal Global Law School on January 4, 2011, when he said that he refrains to sign any Statement against the conviction of Binayak Sen by trial court as he fails to get an affirmative answer, from those who issue them, to the simple question – Have they read the judgment in full? This made me certainly learn one social responsibility as a budding law teacher of How not to Judge the Judges! We need to forge ways to transform this moment of despair into a moment of hope or potentiality to challenge the ill-logic of law itself in the text of the judgment. The task remains how to convert this potentiality into actuality. An arduous task indeed. Whether we can do that and if so in what manner? That's the question we need to find answers to...