CJI Chandrachud On Women In Judiciary, Colonial Era Justice, Netflix And Cricket | HTLS 2023

[Music] [Applause] he needs no introduction after having earned the distinction of being the longest serving constitutional court judge in the country now Justice chra chur during his combined 23 years as a and high courts has rendered some of the most Progressive fiercely independent as well as a judgments which did not only go on on to unfold new set of Rights and a certain dignity privacy autonomy for the people but also expanded the Juris Prudential boundaries and set novel standards of judicial determination now when we talk about Justice jju there's a lot that we can say now it's really an honor that we have him with uh we have him here at the summit now most of you would already know more about Jus Chandra than a brief introduction can ever spell out now when we when he was here at the last time in the summit he was almost couple of days away from taking over as the Chief Justice of India it's been almost a year that he's he's been there at the Hem now ushering in a Spate of institutional reforms and bringing a digital revolution in the Judiciary while his judgments continue to Mark watershed moments in right jurisprudence in the country and worldwide ladies and Gentlemen please give the honorable CGI a warm Round of Applause for addressing the summit thank you thank you very much thank you so we'll begin this conversation with the theme of The Summit that we have which is beyond barriers so when we look at the diverse barriers that we have in the legal system we can see if we talk about women and marginalized communities now uh the government official data reviews that we have only 133% women judge across the 25 High courts a parliamentary panel report recently also underlined that of 601 judges that were appointed across the high court since 2018 we had just 3% of them from scheduled cast uh around 1.5% from scheduled tribes 12% from obcs and just a little over 5% from religious minorities so how do you see that how and when are we going to see more women and candidates from marginalized communities as judges in the Constitutional Court thank Youk it's been a it's really a pleasure to be here for the second year in running I must share with the audience that I've uh taken the uh bold step this year of not having a prepared text to speak from and have this conversation so I'm pretty much at utkarsh is Mercy this morning so uh well uh let me Begin by saying something at a conceptual level conceptually and this is something which really emanates from a book which I'm reading at the present point of time which is called the tyranny of Merit it's by uh Professor sandelman who is a professor at the Harvard Law School and his whole thesis is that if we have to provide better opportunities for marginalized or those segments of our society who do not have a share in governance particularly in public institutions like the court we need to first and foremost redefine what Merit is do we Define merit in the conventional sense for instance for appointment of Judges based on how much money you make at the bar what's the volume of your practice or do you define Merit in a more inclusive sense that Merit itself postulates bringing into important areas of decision-making responsibility people who were or segments of our society who were hither to excluded from the political and governance process so if we Define merit in terms which are conventional for instance law school admission test CES or medical school admission test CES or your 12th standard grades when you are seeking an entry into higher education you will have exactly those people who come to the four because those scores do factor in your political Capital your Social Capital your cultural capital your economic resources as well but we therefore need to redefine Merit in an inclusive sense now to go to your question uh straight away yes it's true that we do not have adequate women in the higher Judiciary why is that so first and foremost or we do not have as many people in the from the marginalized sections why is that so first and foremost there are structural barriers at the very point of entry into the legal profession you have the common law aptitude test which defines who will get into law school the prize law schools for instance most of those tests are conducted in English and therefore they are basically basically Urban Centric and they privilege the already privileged in our society so right at the threshold the standards or the parameters which we are laying down for entry into the legal profession are in that sense wared or they are loaded against those who do not have access to a good english-based education once people do enter the profession you have barriers all over again for instance entry into senior Chambers chambers of senior Council doesn't follow again Merit it's an old boys club uh it's informal networks which Define who will gain admission to seniors Chambers these are some of the hard facts coming straight to the Judiciary now I must tell you something which is very heartening and which is that in the recruitment to the district Judiciary across India more women are being recruited than men if you look at the national law schools most of them you find that more young women are entering into the entry classes than men in the district Judiciary this is very heartening in States like Rajasthan or utar Pradesh or Maharashtra for instance in Maharashtra over 70 out of 120 recruits were women recently the same figures are applicating all over the country which really means that if you open up a Level Playing Field for women they are capable of gaining entry into the bestest uh institutions of governance but we need to create that Level Playing Field for women uh very often you find for instance when women are recruited into law firms or or into seniors Chambers you find that there is a reluctance to employ women because there's a perception that well women have to bear an unduly large part of the share of child rearing familial responsibilities or societal responsibilities that is something therefore mindsets have to change so far as the higher Judiciary utar is concerned we can choose from the available pool of talent for the Supreme Court broadly speaking unless you choose people from the bar which we have been doing and we had justice indu motra for instance who was a member of the bar who has chosen straight for the Supreme Court our available pool of talent is the high court judges so unless we start by increasing the inflow of marginalized groups including women at the lowest level we're not going to have a change for the future but change believe me there is taking place all across India because when we find today that in the district Judiciary across India in states where Women's education is gaining ground as I said Rajasthan madhya Pradesh Maharashtra of course the southern states you will find in the next 10 years that these women are occupying positions of uh responsibility as we have uh you know women officers from the Armed Forces here who are occupying important positions of responsibility but then you open up the space you will find these people uh accepting and and achieving better positions of responsibility so you mentioned women officers and I mean I'm sure that it's by virtue of your orders your judgment in the Supreme Court that these women officers they got their due most of them are now holding the command positions so you also mentioned about structural barriers so I just wanted to bring that up um the structural barriers will it will consist of gender stereotypes discrimination lack of institutional as well as infrastructural support and we will also have barriers such as religion religious identity cast class so when you we talk about judicial orders and judgments how far can a Judicial order and judgment they can create an environment a system wherein these barriers can be eliminated or is there something more that needs to be done well you know courts as I would like to share with everyone present here perform three critical functions not just that one question or one function of deciding cases the first and the most important function of courts in a Democratic Society of like our govern by the rule of law is the cases which we decide but there's something far more subtle and more important which is going on in the process which we must understand courts have become important platforms for social engagement not just for the verdicts which we deliver but for the fact that we create a space for reason dialogue between diverse segments of society between cross-sections of viewpoints that's a second important aspect of coures and the third which is a less known fact is the work which we do in our administrative capacities so the work which we as judges do in our administrative capacities is extremely crucial uh for instance I'd like to share with you just one thing that we have been doing of recent times one of the critical barriers to understanding the court process or to access to justice is language the Supreme Court of India conducts all its proceedings in English and the Constitution did so for a a valid reason which was that in a country where you have 22 languages recognized by the Constitution you have diverse judges coming from different parts of the country for instance I I don't know whether I belong to Maharashtra because there after I grew up in Delhi I was born in Maharashtra I served as Chief Justice of the alabad high court so I'm equally attached to up uh but I'm sitting with a colleague who comes from Gujarat another colleague who comes from utar Pradesh so we are diverse uh segments of society diverse regions that we come from from but English was therefore consed by the Constitution makers as one Central Language which could bind the institution together but that's not the language in which people speak and therefore that means that we are not able to reach out to people in languages which they understand across India so one of the key things that we have been doing over the last one year since I took over as Chas of India is that we have been in the process of translating all all the judgments of the Supreme Court there are 34,000 judgments of the Supreme Court since Independence and we are using machine learning we've been using AI assisted tools such as the bhashini software or the suas software which has been prepared for the Supreme Court for translating we have today about 34,000 judgment 31,000 judgments translated in various Indian languages the idea is that courts must reach out to people and in that sense we must open up processes so people understand what goes on in our courts coid was a game changer for us because most of our work had to be done on a video conferencing platform well that was a necessity during coid times but there have been huge positives from our learning curve in coid one of the things which we learned in Co times when we were on the video conferencing platform was that more women are arguing cases in court just because they don't have to waste the whole day in court waiting for the their cases to reach women as I said perform multifold responsibilities so it's far more efficient for a woman to be on a video conferencing platform than physically present in the court uh we have begun live streaming our court proceedings uh I'm sure a lot of you uh a good friend told me recently when we were doing the hearings in the uh in the same-sex marriage equality case he says you know watching your proceedings was better than watching a Netflix movie at the end of the day but the idea of the idea of live streaming Court proceedings really is to allow for people to understand what goes on in court and I do believe that this is part of the process of confidence building of ensuring that people for whom we really are intended to serve have an element of trust in the work which we do uh sometimes the work is very boring in the court but they must know that you know citizens small grievances whether it's about pension whether it's about you know uh the termination of a job whether it's the implementation of industrial settlement or a tax reassessment order occupies the same serious time of the Court as any other big ticket case which you read about in the newspapers so live streaming is one of the measures which we have taken as I said translation of our judgments which we have done we're now also providing for transcription of Court proceedings using again AI assisted tools so for instance in the more important cases before The Constitution bench we've just concluded judge we have just concluded the arguments in say the article 370 case the marriage equality case ended in a judgment we've got so many different judgments which are now in the process of being considered so we are allowing for transcription so simultaneously that a lawyer makes an argument the entire transcript is almost instantaneously prepared at the end of the day it's uploaded on the website of the Supreme Court so the idea behind doing this is to create a greater degree of transparency and accountability in the work of the Court recently had a case where a hearing impaired lawyer said that well I want to argue in the case but I can't argue unless you provide me with a sign language interpreter so we opened up our space for sign language interpretation as well for providing access to uh simple things and these are some of the lwh hanging fruit for instance you know for those who are visually impaired uh most of our websites rely on visual capture uh which means that they cannot access our websites so we have made we have tweaked our electronic software our websites to ensure that you know we are more available for for people who are visually impaired one of my own law clerks who was a road scholar gave me sort of suggestions and we have implemented that uh We've also uh in the last year I had a an accessibility audit conducted of the Supreme Court and the idea of the audit was to understand our courts is the highest court of the nation truly accessible to senior citizens to pregnant women to the queer community uh to the marginalized groups to women in general uh the it was chaired by a judge of the Supreme Court I've just got the report a few days before the judge retired and we are in the process of implementing it and I hope that we can uh we can do that uh in future as well uh one very interesting thing which I'd like to share with you and then I'll I I can talk so much more but I'll just conclude with that which is we have prepared two handbooks recently over the past year one is the handbook for lgbtq I plus individuals who access courts not in terms of their substantive rights but what are the barriers that they encounter when they come to a court or women a lot of legal discourse in our courts in our legal system is hugely hugely polarized against women for instance you call a woman a career woman what do you mean by calling a woman a career woman that is to it's perative it's sort of to give the impression that well if a woman is pursuing a career that's somewhat different for what a woman should be doing or you know there is there there words like oh she was a chased woman or a woman who has been raped is said to be ravished by by the you know by by someone who offended her uh her dignity so we've brought out this handbook on gender stereotypes as well to educate our judges to educate lawyers to educate everybody in the system that there's some form of discourse which is just not acceptable in the legal system in so far as women are concerned so the idea of all these initiatives is really to make our courts more more accessible to Society at large I think it's also a process of changing mindsets it's work in the progress but you have to make a beginning which we are hoping to do and we have done already so you also mentioned about the reforms in technology digital tools that the Supreme Court has been employing recently and especially during your tenure as the Chief Justice of India you were on it even before you took over but it has been on a war footing ever since you have have taken over so when we talk about barriers to access to Justice how do these tools technological tools especially when we talk about barriers of language comprehension distance there'll be economical and physical constraint for somebody from a far of remote Village in Kerala or someone from Gujarat to travel to the Supreme Court to attend his hearings how do these digital and technological tools they come to the aid of removing those barriers I think the most important aspect of technology is that technology today and the technology which we have deployed in the judicial system is democratizing access to Justice and for instance as a simple example by making available video conferencing facilities to access the Supreme Court the Supreme Court then ceases to be the Supreme Court of tilak mar but it truly then becomes the Supreme Court of India uh I'll give you an example of the state of Orissa uh chief justice muraru just retired provided for accessing the the seat of the high court which was in the capital by having video conferencing facilities in every District opened up through which people could access the Court lawyers from across the state could access the court I have today lawyers from all over the country who access the court and that that results in a reduction in the cost of litigation the lawyer in the districts the lawyer in the high courts is a first point of contact for a citizen who has a problem when the case comes to the Supreme Court they shouldn't feel disconnected from the process of dis dispensing Justice technology is actually a GameChanger I've spoken about translation I've spoken about transcription of legal proceedings we are in the process of now digitizing the entire record uh across of the Supreme Court which is almost over of all the high courts and the idea of doing that is to provide a transparent and accountable Justice delivery mechanism to our to our citizens uh we are implementing phase three of the eots project which is a project of almost 7,000 crores for which the government has sanction funds to us and the idea of phase three is to have a more citizen Centric uh Judiciary uh the colonial model of Justice dispensation was that people must access our courts that's why you have these very beautiful buildings you know the colonial buildings where it's the Bombay High Court The Madras High Court or any other high court the Kolkata High Court which sort of strike a feeling of awe in the minds of people that model has to change and we must be closer to to our to to our own citizens in terms of sending emails I wouldn't bore you with the details of of the statistics but you would be fascinated to know the millions of emails which are sent by the court system to litigants who have cases before the court uh we use uh WhatsApp we are trying to communicate at our orders for instance our bail orders to the jails very often courts gr bail but that order is not implemented in the jail because the person for whom the order is meant is too poor to even get a copy of the order or he has to or she has to then move all kinds of things before bail is granted so we have developed a software called the faster software in the Supreme Court as a result of which our bail orders would be communicated to the superintendent of the jail in say gond or bah or some iur or you know wherever in Maharashtra or Tamil Nadu and the owners would be on the jail superintendent to inform the court as to whether the order was implemented so technology in that sense is a great tool of accountability which we are using we have the national judicial data grade in India uh the national judicial data grid is a complete repository of all pending and disposed of cases and we are increasingly opening opening up the space to private citizens because I feel that we as judges should not be keeping all this data close to our heart we must have open API so that people in the private space uh should be able to use the data which we are putting out subject of course to concerns about privacy and security uh for a more efficient uh process of dispute resolution in the courts so earlier you talked about how one of the roles of the Judiciary is to provide a safe Democratic space for people to raise their granes to be heard you also describe Judiciary as a stabilizing inl inuence in the evolution of our society so my question to you would be that when judges decide cases and the cases may not essentially involve questions of law they are more to do with forward-looking outlooks more to do with changes that the soci society should itself bring in do they dwell upon whether the society is ready for those changes or not when they decide cases well let me uh obviously you have something which we have recently decided in mind but let me answer your question by by just sharing this we are not an elected arm of the state and for a reason the elected arm of the state is equally important I'm not belittling the importance of the elected arms of the state the legislature and the executive because they ultimately have accountability to the people uh the legislature consists of account elected representatives of the people the executive in a parliamentary form of government is answerable to Parliament so they are vital institutions of a democracy and I respect that as a judge as Chief Justice of India but equally it's important to understand what role judges have to play the fact that we are not elected is not something which is a deficiency in our process but which is a strength of our process and why do I say that the reason for that is that there are certain abiding or Eternal values that is so Society must stand for and particularly a society like ours which is governed by a social transformative instrument like the Constitution and because there are certain abiding or Eternal values the courts are entrusted with the duty to protect those values now very often we do realize that we are ahead of the times for instance in say the area of Environmental Protection perhaps we are ahead of the times uh in my descent in the same sex marriage equality matter where I came to the conclusion that you must recognize the right to form unions which was not agreed to by three of my colleagues well that's part of the judicial process and I respect that process I can't criticize it merely because my view was not accepted by the majority because I respect their right to take a view which they think that the constitution espouses but to really then sum up my answer to your question judges don't look at how Society will respond when they decide cases that's exactly the distinction between the elected arms of government and the Judiciary the elected arm of government is and is intended to be responsive to the people obviously the judges go not by popular morality as I call it but by constitutional morality and what do you mean by constitutional morality constitutional morality consists of those values of the Constitution which the courts are intended to espouse and which are those values of the Constitution broad values such as fraternity human dignity personal Liberty equality these are fundamental values of the Constitution which judges are intended to espouse and in that sense I feel that we exercise a stabilizing influence on the legal system because contrary to what has happened in many other countries across the world where the power of violence or the power of the gun has got the better of a stable and peaceful Society I believe the existence of Courts as institutions wedded to the rule of law and not just judges lawyers as well civil society which comes to our court this is a platform for engagement where people feel that they will at least have a space to exchange views ideas into producing a new synthesis of of change within Society so you talked about the distinction between an elector arm of the government and the Judiciary so Judiciary as you said that it also abides by certain Cardinal principles despite being the final word in the interpretation of the Constitution and laws so that takes me to the next question on the separation of powers the lakman it is often referred to as uh we have been witnessing a pattern recently that as soon as the Court decides a particular case in a certain way a law quickly follows it to tactically overrule that mandate sorry as as soon as the Court decides a particular case there is a law that quickly follows to overrule the Mandate of that judgment so how does that play out when we talk about the separation of power visavi the role and the duty of the Court as being the final Arbiter well let me make it very I'll try and answer this question not as a as a lawyer or as a judge but just very simply for everyone to understand because so many of the audience wouldn't be lawyers and judges here there is a dividing line between what the legis can do and what A legislature cannot do when there is a judgment of the court if there's a judgment of a court which decides a particular issue and that judgment points out seere deficiency in the law it is always open to the legislature to enact a fresh law to cure the deficiency what the legislature cannot do is to say that we think that this judgment is wrong and therefore we overrule the Judgment a judgment of a court cannot be directly over rued by the legislature but if and by the legislature I mean the state legislatur as well as Parliament but if a judge or a judgment takes a particular view of a legislation it is always open to the legislature to cure the defect and this is not happening now recently for the first time it happened the first time around I mean I might be wrong about the first time but it happened even in 1951 when uh the Supreme Court of India held that the provisions for reservation in our constitution the chakam D is that the provisions for reservation in India would not extend to reservation educational institutions therefore Parliament then came in and amended the Constitution to provide for reservations in educational institutions it's been happening constantly in the tax arena for instance when we rule on a particular Val say the validity of a tax let me give you a very simple example of what how it happens suppose a tax is challenged the validity of a tax is challenged on the ground that the state legislature was not competent to impose the tax but only Parliament can impose the tax all right therefore the tax is struck down by the Supreme Court or by the high court Parliament can then say all right the Supreme Court has said that we are competent to impose the tax we will reenact the law and now this time impose the tax is a tax imposed by Parliament and we'll legitimize the collection of Revenue by the states that is perfectly open to it because validating acts we call them in law validating acts these are perfectly permissible what the court has done and which cannot be undone by the legislature is to directly overrule a judgment that is completely impermissible so uh you if we talk about the Republic you often say that after seven decades of our being the Republic that the history of the Indian Judiciary is the history of the daily life struggles of the Indian people what is your vision for Judiciary in say 2050 when we complete the Centenary of our Republic well uh let me Begin by saying that you know the Supreme Court is not just a constitutional Court we're a final court of appeal and that role as I see is as important as our constitutional role uh in our appellate Powers we deal with cases ranging from say intellectual property to the insolvency and bankruptcy code we'll deal with cases ranging from labor to taxation we deal with cases from murder to uh you know assaults rapes so the wide variety of jurisdiction perhaps we are the only Court in the world which exercises this kind of wide jurisdiction and for a reason the Constitution intended that we should be a final court of appeal so that we perform the role of a People's Court there a very seminal book which has been recently published by uh by a professor at the um National Law School in Bangalore AA Chandra and William hubard and sial kalantri from the University of Seattle where they have assessed the court of the work of the Supreme Court of India as a People's Court and what they say is that in critical areas our court is truly a People's Court and they've done a statistical analysis between 2010 and 2014 which indicates that as between the government and the citizens as between the state as a prosecutor and the defendant and certain other areas they analyze the court has weired around to protecting people's rights obviously with aberration because no institution is perfect and if you ask me I can point out aberration in the history of our court which I'm not defending for a moment but that is really the perception which I see for the future that are the perception of the average Indian that this is a court for the people it's a court meant to understand the Grievances of the people is very different from say what the American Supreme Court does the the American Supreme Court say entertains about 5 to 8,000 cases a year entertains in the sense they come they they're in season of 5 to 8,000 cases in a year and they'll actually decide about 80 cases in a year to give you just some figures we have already this year disposed of over 72,000 cases so that just gives you the difference in the work which we do in India and say what the American Supreme Court does nine judges of the Supreme Court in the US deciding about 80 or 100 cases in a year we've already decided over 72,000 cases just this year and we still have 2 months to go November and December so that going forward I mean it's very difficult to answer a question like that because you know you it requires me to look at the whole issue in hindsight and with a certain degree of foresight uh but I think it's important for us as a court to continue to have the faith of citizens uh in terms of the work which we do which is one of the reasons why since I took over as chief justice last year I've tried to uh continue with a permanent Constitution bench not permanent in terms of the judicial Personnel different judges will hear constitutional cases but we have a continuous rolling constitutional Court dealing with cases through the year so the first half of the year we dealt with almost 55 Constitution bench hearings uh at that time uh for all of you who follow the news you know that we have been hearing some of the most difficult questions of our times as judges uh because my uh my my own personal uh mission is that we can't profess to be right as they say we are final not because we are right but we are right because we are final but there is no reason for the court not to answer the critical or the seminal issues of our time the work which we do is open to critique it's open to criticism it's open to a wider social dialogue and hopefully you know in that dialogue of critique a broader synthesis will emerge for the future but it's important that the court takes on its mantle of a key figure as a key institution in the Affairs of governance of the nation and that we can do by deciding cases but also in the work which we do as judges in in fostering a more uh a more open administrative culture in our court system which is by the way shielded from public scrutiny because that's something which people just don't know about so you mentioned judicial aberations in the past also about the fact that there are Constitution benches permanent Constitution benches to hear those cases of seminal importance so let's take that with the uh the retirement age of the judges in the Supreme Court I not to say that uh you being there and there's a year left for you to retire uh but I'll still ask this question that do you think that given the fact that we have these cases and also given the fact that we have judges from different High courts getting appointed to the Supreme Court they need some time to adapt and they also need some time to hear those important cases is 65 to young age for a Supreme Court Judge to retire and should there be a f 10 you know uh what the age of retirement should be for judges of the high courts or the Supreme Court I'm not Parliament so I'll not Hazard an answer to that but I'm not going to duck your question I'm going to answer the question nonetheless there are two models you have say one model which the American Supreme Court or the American Constitution provides of Judges who have no age of retirement and our constitution provides where judges of the uh District Judiciary retire at 60 the high courts retire at 62 and Supreme Court judges retire at 65 you know uh Alexander Hamilton in The Federalist Papers dealt with this issue as to whether you know having uh no retirement for judges of the Supreme Court will result in an unelected set of Judges controlling the life of the nation for the future and he tried to answer that we have followed a different model where judges retire but as someone who's been in the system for now 23 years as a judge I have a different take in a sense I think it's important that judges must retire and why do I say that because I think it's too much of a responsibility to cast on human beings in terms of their own infallibility by postulating that they shouldn't retire from Office uh judges are human beings you are prone to error societies evolve what was power for the course in the 1980s was no longer power for the course in 2023 and it's not going to be there in 202 in 2035 so it's important that you know you must pass on the mantle to succeeding Generations who would be able to point out to the errors of the past and rejig or to reset legal principles the legal framework for society to evolve because giving that sort of a power to unelected judges to continue for life I feel in the Indian context was wisely not adopted by the Indian constitution so as to allow for a source of change of transformation of of legal principles as new and succeeding Generations take and hold judicial office you you just said that you have been there as a constitutional court judge for 23 years so I I would want to ask you that given the fact that the Supreme Court that we know you hear almost 200 cases every month then there are case files to be read when you are back home you have to check orders sign orders write judgments also dictate those orders how does the aary of a Supreme Court Judge with someone like you who has been there for 23 years will be completing 24 years in March next year the aary of a judge coupled with their exalted stature that impact the social life and the family life of a judge you know um utash let me only correct you on one thing a judge in the Supreme Court doesn't decide 200 cases every month but 200 cases every week so that's the little change but um you know because you anywhere between 70 and 100 cases on a Monday and a 70 and 100 cases on Fridays uh you know it's the real Challenge and this is something which I'll share from you my experience it may not be the same for every colleague in the system the real challenge which you have is how do you balance the competing requirements on the one hand you have this huge inflow of work which you have to deal with and you can't say I'm not going to deal with that inflow of work because that's just going to accumulate on my pallet how do you balance that with the need to create space the mental space for deciding some of the most seminal issues that's the great challenge for a contemporary judge that you can't tell the litigant who has come with you with that small grievance about a pension about you know a termination of some Service uh some problem about the GST you can't tell them I'm not going to decide your cases because I'm hearing some important constitutional case at the same time important cases do require time and they require sense of space they require a little bit of mental space and that's I think the key problem which we as judges have to constantly confront because the real work of a judge begins after court Rises at 4:00 in the evening which is when for me it means say 3 or 4 hours of administrative work every evening administering the Affairs of the entire Indian Judiciary uh dealing with technology reading for the next day editing judgments on a Saturday dictating judgments which have been kept in reserve on Sunday reading the 70 or 100 cases which are going to be coming up for hearing on on Monday morning so on and so forth but I think the real challenge therefore is and we all have our own Manas I have my own Mantra which is not something which I'd like to necessarily share because I mean somebody else would say that this is not PA of the cause for me but ultimately you have to find that space to have a spot of meditative reflection in your day's work where you sort of retreat most of the work which we as judges do is in the public space where in the midst of lawyers in an arena of conflict the conflict between citizens conflict between citizens and government conflicts as we now have between two levels of government the states and the center how do you step back in that area of conflict and then produce something which will speak not just for the present but for the future of our society because that sense of vision of what you imagine a good Indian Society should be for the future you lay the foundation for that today and we are what we are because of what our predecessors laid down in terms of the foundation we deeply conscious of the fact that you know the Winds of Change are blowing so fast particularly in an age of Technology of of social transformation all Global societies are are transforming so radically and so quickly therefore in that area of you know radical change which is AC taking place across the world it's important that judges create that little space for them to sort of sit back and devote themselves to what we imagine should be the future cause of our nation so you talked about the retreat that meditative Retreat from work so what is Justice Chandra Chu's favorite leure activities I know it for a fact that you read books but what kind of books do you like you like fiction non-fiction you read more of law well actually you know I I have one regret utkarsh which is that I have this pile of unread books kalpa always tells me who A my best friend and and and guide and and true uh true partner in every way she always tells me that this pile of books now at your bedside is going to topple over your head if you move your arm too violently in the night to drink a glass of water something but I try and I try and read very diversely I try and create a space for about 45 minutes to an hour every night to read and I I like to read uh extensively um and I don't read books of a particular genre I mean it could be a book on History it could be a book on economics I love to read on contemporary Politics as well as I told you I've been reading the terum of Merit I just bought a copy of a book called uh the democracy and its discontents against by Again by uh sandlan uh so my Mantra actually in the leisure time is to read uh I used to travel a lot unfortunately I have travel only for work now not so much for leisure but there scarely a place where kalp and I haven't treed in India we've seen rural parts of India we have traveled across India whether it's ladak whether it's sikim whether it's the Andaman nicobar island with lakad the heartland of India in in ut itself I love music as well music is a great bomb for the soul and I again as in Reading I try and listen to different kinds of music whether it's uh a nun Bajan or I I love Western popular music as well so I haven't forgotten my days as a college student so and you also have your ABA days sorry ABA days yes of course we talk about Mah and Priyanka now you have been traveling a lot ever since you have taken over so so when you go back home I mean do they complain about not getting enough time with you do they help you unwind how do you spend time with them oh our two little girls have really transformed Our Lives they've completely and completely transformed Our Lives they've I think they've taught me much more than what I have uh you know tried to teach them because they both special needs children and in so many which ways their own sense of empathy uh I always feel that you know when uh Destiny or nature God depending on which side of the uh fence of Believers you are uh doesn't give you what we regard as the fullsome existence of human faculties there's something else which nature gives you and every day of my life I learn from these girls that uh there's so much more that nature has given them in terms of understanding in terms of perception these little girls you know walk up to me and say something to me you know and uh figure out something which is occupying my attention that day I've not even uttered a word I say my gosh they've already figured it out even before my uh my my saying something so they've been a huge source of learning for uh for both kalp and me and of course I'm at work all day and kalp has uh sacrificed her own career to sort of tend to our two lovely girls so I think that it's been I mean whether it's but there things like you know I I open my mobile phone and I see that's there's some beautiful song which has been loaded on my cell and I realized that Mah has loaded the song you know for me and then I listen to it on my way to court every morning that's lovely to you sir so there's another thing which everyone is excited about the World Cup Cricket the men's Cricket World Cup you congratulated the team is and the scientific community in August for the successful chandran 3 mission so do you have a message for the Indian men's cricket team and do you watch cricket do you get the time to watch cricket well I saw them lift the the last World Cup in Mumbai what can a judge say to the Indian team notash I wish them the best the weight of expectations of 1.4 billions of 1.4 billion I a spec in that 1.4 billion also throwing in the weight of my expectations I'll say one thing U to the Indian cricket team and which is that you know there's something about them which I truly truly admire and that's not just the Indian men's cricket team but the women's cricket team as well uh you know and which is that uh their aspiration for physical fitness that's something which I admire which I think you can't be fit as a cricketer and you can't be fit as a judge unless you're physically fit and I admire truly whether it's you know I have a Mahi at home and then you have Mahi dhoni as well um you know the one thing which I admire about the Indian cricket team is just this ability to be mentally so fit and in a state of ultimate equilibrium and that's something which I think I as uh an officer of a constitutional post try and uh try and uh embe for myself which is to maintain a state of uh mental equilibrium so I just want to tell them that you inspire me so they inspire you and you talked about mental equilibrium are you at mental equilibrium after having been there at the H for a year how do you look at your one-ear tenor as the cji what have you accomplished what's still left to do U well uh utash it's been a learning curve as a judge the one thing which you realize is that every day of your life is a new learning experience because unlike say I dare say a surgeon in an operation theater uh there are no Givens for a judge every case which you open is a new case because it's dealing with a new human life and it's a new human experience which you are unfolding in your in your working life so for the last year it's been a challenge because I've tried to balance out the requirements of being a judge the Chief Justice of India is called the Primus interps that's a Latin phrase forgive me for using Latin it means first amongst equals because the Chief Justice of India is a judge first and foremost and as the head of the IND indan Judiciary I'm deeply conscious of the fact that my role first and foremost is to decide cases but that's not all that a chief just of India is expected to do because you have to lead the Affairs of the nation's Judiciary in terms of the changes which you want to bring into the Indian Judiciary which is part of my mission for the future in the time that I have before The Constitution tells me thank you it's time to go home and thank you so much sir for your valuable and unaged insights into a spectrum of issues surrounding the Judiciary and your contribution thank you so much please give him [Music] a

Channel: Hindustan Times

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Id: 9feGe0KzXpE

Length: 47min 36sec (2856 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 04 2023