DY Chandrachud took charge as Chief Justice of the Indian Supreme Court (SC) on November 09, 2022. On this occasion many of the pseudo-liberals who claimed to be defenders of the democratic-secular polity of India manifested great happiness. They declared that the time of SC being an appendage of the RSS-BJP government headed by PM Modi was over as Justice Chandrachud was a liberal judge committed to the democratic-secular polity of India.
This eulogization had started when he was only a Justice at the SC Bench. A renowned constitutional expert representing this tribe of pseudo-liberals, stressed that “[SC] Judges have been not only fair but also sensitive to Muslim causes”. Justice D Y Chandrachud was described as a “scholar judge”. Faizan continued to elaborate:
“On June 20 [2022], Justice D Y Chandrachud was asked about the judiciary’s treatment of Muslims at King’s College London. Justice Chandrachud didn’t take offence to the question but answered it politely…our judges do not have the litigant’s religious identity in mind while dispensing justice.”
We find the pseudo-liberal fans keeping mum when the Chief Justice of India (CJI) Chandrachud on October 20, 2024, disclosed in a meeting in his ancestral village in Maharashtra that
"Very often we have cases (to adjudicate) but we don't arrive at a solution. Something similar happened during the Ayodhya (Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri Masjid dispute) which was in front of me for three months…I sat before the deity and told him he needs to find a solution."
How he found the solution was made clear by the following words of him: "Believe me, if you have faith, God will always find a way". He did not disclose which deity he consulted and whether Lord Ram was one from whom he sought guidance but it was clear Muslim God was not consulted! An illustrious former Judge of Delhi High Court, Justice Rekha Sharma talking to Karan Thapar (The Wire) stated that “I was dumbfounded, I couldn’t believe my ears and I felt I should hear it again and again to be sure that I had heard right”.
SN Sahu, a former Press Secretary to President of India late KR Narayanan, rightly asked that for Chandrachud:
“[The] principles of the Constitution, law and jurisprudence did not determine the process of adjudication, and a faith-based approach was adopted to invoke a divine figure to find a way out…Does the Constitution permit any judge, including the CJI, to find a judicial remedy to a dispute by praying to a deity who was a party to the dispute?”
Chandrachud’s term as Justice and CJI at SC is a narrative of his consistent devotion to the Hindutva ideology and its practitioners as we will see in the following.
Justice Chandrachud as author of Babri mosque-Ram Janam Bhoomi judgement delivered on November 9, 2019
It is established that despite irrefutable contrary facts corroborated by the SC in its own Judgment, the site of the Babri mosque was handed over to RSS-VHP.
“The exclusion of the Muslims from worship and possession took place on the intervening night between 22/23 December 1949 when the mosque was desecrated by the installation of Hindu idols. The ouster of the Muslims on that occasion was not through any lawful authority but through an act which was calculated to deprive them of their place of worship.” [Supreme Court Judgment dated November 9, 2019, pp. 921-22]
“On 6 December 1992, the structure of the mosque was brought down, and the mosque was destroyed. The destruction of the mosque took place in breach of the order of status quo and an assurance given to this Court. The destruction of the mosque and the obliteration of the Islamic structure was an egregious violation of the rule of law.” [Supreme Court Judgment pp. 913-14]
The Judgment also nowhere mentioned that Babri Mosque was built after destroying a Ram Temple in the past.
Supreme Court took a U turn handing over the site for Ram Temple building to the same group of Hindutva organization which had conspired in both the cases. Supreme Court ensured that no Hindu competitor of RSS-VHP is allowed any participation in latter’s Ram Temple project, disallowed claim of Nirmohi Akhada, the original claimant of Ram Temple at the site of Babri Mosque. [Supreme Court Judgment p. 925].
This Judgment legitimized the criminal acts of the Hindutva zealots; what Hindutva goons could not achieve on December 22-23, 1949, and December 6, 1992, was got delivered to RSS through this Judgment thanks to the guidance of a Hindu deity! It is important to note that Babri mosque-Ramjanma Bhoomi case was not a Hindu-Muslim issue which was made out by Hindutva organizations and later SC falling for it.
CJI Chandrachud facilitated Hindutva project of taking over major Muslim mosques
In the wake of aggressive Hindutva campaign for demolition of Babri mosque, Indian Parliament passed Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act, 1991 so that except Babri mosque no other place of worship as it existed on the 15th day of August 1947, will be disputed. Even Ayodhya judgement penned by Chandrachud upheld this Act. However, in Gyanvapi Survey case SC Bench headed by CJI (August 4, 2023), questioned its applicability thus opening flood gates of disputes over religious places, specially, mosques. Indeed, it happened with a flood of copy-paste petitions against prominent mosques.
Babri mosque-Ramjanma Bhoomi case was not a Hindu-Muslim issue which was made out by Hindutva groups and later SC falling for it
Renowned political analyst, Ashutosh stated that 1991 Act was expected to put at rest the Hindutva project of demolition of innumerable mosques. On the contrary,
“While hearing the Gyanvapi petition, Justice Chandrachud opined that the 1991 Act does not stop the ‘ascertainment of the religious character of the place’… Now anyone can go to court and put a question mark over the veracity of any mosque or temple or Gurudwara or church or a synagogue and request to change its status…Therefore the Supreme Court has practically made every religious place in the country suspect and disputed. Would it be correct to say that the Supreme Court in its deliberation has, mistakenly, been impacted by the majoritarian thought process?”
Saffron flag as the unifying flag: chief justice of India reaffirms commitment to Hindutva
If one needed another proof of his love for Hindutva we must take note of his love for saffron flag as flag of justice and not the National Flag; the Tricolour. While addressing the legal fraternity of Rajkot, Gujarat, Justice Chandrachud after performing pooja at Hindu temples of Dwarikadhish and Somnath with his family in Gujarat on January 6 (2024) had no qualms in stating:
“I was inspired this morning by the dhwaja [flag] at Dwarikadhish ji, very similar to the dhwaja, which I saw at Jagannath Puri. But look at this universality of the tradition in our nation, which binds all of us together. This dhwaja has a special meaning for us. And that meaning which the dhwaja gives us is – there is some unifying force above all of us, as lawyers, as judges, as citizens. And that unifying force is our humanity, which is governed by the rule of law and by the Constitution of India.”
It is to be noted that all the above referred temples fly saffron/yellow flags. Did CJI Chandrachud imply that Tricolour, the Indian National Flag, was not the “unifying force”? The above statement of CJI was, in fact, rephrasing of the statement of the most prominent ideologue of RSS, MS Golwalkar who while addressing a Gurupurnima gathering in Nagpur on July 14, 1946, stated:
“It was the saffron flag which in totality represented Bhartiya [Indian] culture. It was the embodiment of God. We firmly believe that in the end the whole nation will bow before this saffron flag.”
[Golwalkar, M.S., Shri Guruji Samagar Darshan (collected works of Golwalkar in Hindi), Bhartiya Vichar Sadhna, Nagpur, nd., volume 1, p. 98.]
This hatred for the Tricolour led RSS to declare the Tricolour as ‘evil’ on the eve of Independence. The RSS English mouthpiece "Organizer" demeaning the choice of the National Flag (14 August 1947) wrote:
"The people who have come to power by the kick of fate may give in our hands the Tricolour, but it never be respected and owned by Hindus. The word three is in itself an evil, and a flag having three colours will certainly produce a very bad psychological effect and is injurious to a country."
It is horrendous that CJI of Indian Supreme Court who is duty-bound to safeguard the democratic-secular polity of India with Tricolour as a unique symbol of it, is renegading on his oath which he took while assuming the office as the 50th CJI on November 9, 2022!
CJI invited PM Modi for Ganesh prayer at his official residence
The Supreme Court of India came into existence on January 28, 1950. Since its inception it never witnessed the spectacle which Indian nation came across on September 11, 2024, at the official residence of CJI in Delhi. During the Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations PM Modi was exclusively invited for puja (Ganesh worship). The visuals made it clear that it was not puja conducted by CJI or his wife or a priest but PM in the centre conducted the puja. It was again an open display of Hindu identity by the CJI and his devotion to the Hindu Hirday Samrat, PM Modi. It was no private puja as the national-international media was invited to record the event. CJI was not bothered that with Maharashtra Assembly elections approaching (November 20th) it would give electoral advantage to BJP and its allies. Of course, he was least bothered that he headed the highest court of justice of a democratic-secular India! The speculation may be right that CJI was looking for post-retirement sinecures from Modi known for his large-heartedness towards the kowtowing Justices. Will it be a seat at the Hague International Court of Justice? But the issue is at what cost!
The journey of DY Chandrachud as a Justice and CJI of the Supreme Court of India makes it glaringly clear that he retained all the characteristics of a Hindutva cadre throughout. He continuously indulged in double/triple talk, played majoritarian card, hobnobbed with the Hindutva rulers and bothered least about constitutional propriety. He succeeded in his designs as he had the advantage of being a High Caste Hindu.
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Formerly with Delhi University, click here for Prof Islam's writings and video interviews/debates and here for his books. Facebook: https://facebook.com/shamsul.islam.332. Twitter: @shamsforjustice. Blog: http://shamsforpeace.blogspot.com/. A version of this article was first published in the "Indian Express"
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