The judiciary must understand its limit, prescribed in the Constitution of India. Though, this is not the case, and judiciary – be it Supreme Court, High Courts have always tried to overreach to either malign the image of particular politicians or party which doesn’t suit them. For last few months, there have been consistent overstretch of judiciary that compelled us to think on ‘Judicial Activism’ in the country.
It’s not ‘My Lords’ from where the constitution starts with, but with “We, The People of India”. Therefore, urging the judges of the country to – Stay Away from your unreasonable/unconstitutional encroachment in the executive domain.
Justice Govind Mathur, former chief justice of Allahabad High Court accepts the guilt of which he has committed during his tenure as judges of the most populated state of India. In an interview, Justice Mathur admits for being guilty of not been able to have the conclusion of CAA protestors issue that comes into the limelight when Justice Mathur himself took notice of the posters labelled at various part of the state capital Lucknow and he sat on holiday to hear the ‘suo moto’ cognizance of the matter.
The ex-CJ Mathur also heard criticising the “liberal use” of NSA and sedition law in the state. Expressing the concerns over the law and order situation in UP, he said, “government doesn’t accept the directions given by the court. I don’t know why the state government considers the judiciary as a rival, as it is another face of the state. The orders are not at all any effort to overreach, while it is passed with well-reasoned with details”. He added in the conversation.
In almost 30 minutes of excerpts, Mathur gives some controversial statements, precisely on ‘Kumbha Mela’ one of the most auspicious festival of our civilisation which is celebrated in a cycle of 12 years, marked by a ritual dip in the water. Govind Mathur believed coronavirus (Covid-19) will spread due to water as many people with same would have taken bath and the water floats in million of houses in the country.
Mathur went on lecturing on abuse of human rights, lawlessness, love jihad, liberal use of NSA, Cow slaughters etc. In a course of interaction with interviewer, he said If an ideological issue or an ideology is in conflict with constitutional provisions, then it is not a simple ideological issue… Like in case of love jihad, the court can’t say that we will not examine the case because it is an ideological issue.
If ideology is in conflict with law, we are required to protect the law. But this is not new. In Kerala, when the EMS Namboodiripad government introduced the education Bill, they were accused of implementing their ideology… Eventually, the enactment was set aside. So, this is quite common. Now we get more such cases… In the last few years, we have been in a very weird condition.
On the one hand, you want to decentralise power, and on the other you wish to centralise everything in your hands. Our bureaucracy is not interested in leaving its powers, which are available to it from the colonial era.
He also talks about the ‘Hathras case, ‘I am proud of the judges who took suo motu cognizance of the matter. An outstanding order was passed by them… I am of the view that honouring those directions would have enhanced the prestige of the state also. But what happened ultimately? When you talk about the position of law and order in Uttar Pradesh, I don’t think it is up to the mark… I am not saying things like there is jungle raj etc. But it is no less than that’.