April 1977 - Change of regime: With the coming of Janta Party into power at the center and swearing in of Shri Morarji Desai as the Prime Minister of India, there is a change in the air of Supreme Court. Niren De, Attorney General for India, has been replaced by S.V.Gupte, as Attorney General for India, he is an exceptionally respected Senior Advocate with a suave, sophisticated and aristocratic demeanor, Lal Narain Sinha Solicitor General of India has been replaced by Shri S.N.Kacker as the Solicitor General, a Senior Advocate from Allahabad, who like my father was short heighted and healthy and suffered from asthama as did my father. Shri Shanti Bhushan, a Senior Advocate from Allahabad, who had earned a great name and fame in appearing against Smt. Indira Gandhi in her election matter, was sworn in as the Law Minister replacing Mr. H.R.Gokhale, whose admission to SCBA was seriously objected to Shri C.K.Daphtry, Senior Advocate, a doyen of Supreme Court being former Attorney General of India and known for his great wit was the President and Shri B.R.Agarwal, who was a partner of Gagrat & Co. and had done a book on Supreme Court Practice and Procedure and who was a very close friend of my father was the Secretary of the Supreme Court Bar Association.
Lunch in the chambers of Mr. B.P. Maheshwari: Shri B.P. Maheshwari, an elderly advocate, having chamber on the right of our chamber in the front, was an old acquaintance of my father. In fact my father as an advocate was getting his cases filed through him as Advocate on Record. He was a very affectionate and a practical person. When I met him in the corridors of Supreme Court, he asked me to come into his chamber. As I met him in his chambers he inquired me as to where I was taking my lunch and I told him that I took a full breakfast and ate dinner when I go back home. Mr. Maheshwari candidly told me that, that did not work. The tendency was to eat ‘samosa or pakora’ in the canteen when one felt hungry and that was not good for health at all. He told me that there was a ‘tiffinwalla’ who was bringing tiffins consisting of 4 home made chappaties, daal, rice, one vegetable everyday and included kheer on Friday and that it would cost Rs.1.75 per tiffin per day and insisted that I must take lunch in his chamber, for I was like his son. This was one of the best solutions for my lunch I could have got. I used to reach home by 10 pm and used to take a bite in the Supreme Court canteen in the noon during lunch and evening after court hours. The routine was further set, now I had my lunch in the chamber of Mr. B.P. Maheshwari, with his junior Mr. Sethi and Ms. Rafat Hashmi, a lady lawyer from Delhi. Mr. B.P. Maheshwari’s son R.K.Maheshwari was an Advocate and was in USA. In spite of my several inquiries he did not tell me anything about him and went silent and his eyes went wet, whenever I talked to him about the issue. Someday I will know about the same
Supreme Court had delivered 54 judgments in 1950 and 78 judgments in 1951. Interestingly though Supreme Court Reports (SCR) was the Official Law Reporting Series by virtue of Law Reporting Act, 1875, but all the judgments of Supreme Court were not published in SCR. SCR published only reportable judgments, but since all judgments of Supreme Court were binding by virtue of Article 141 of the Constitution, a large number of judgments not published in SCR were published in All India Report a private publication from Nagpur since 1914. For 1950 out of 54 judgments, SCR published 40, AIR published 13 and 1 was published in Cr.L.J. My father’s library had the complete set of AIR since 1914 and we used to religiously clean them during summer vacations and put brown paper covers on them, as I was doing for my school books. AIR was publishing judgments of all the High Courts in India and we used to number each one of them so that they can be placed in series in the book racks and were not lost when carried with the cases to the court.
Apart from Indian and Foreign text books on all subjects, AIR Manual and Halsbury Laws of England, Ramamurthy & Co had subscribed for several other publications like Cr.LJ, LLJ, SLR, a recent publication introduced since 1969 was of Supreme Court Cases (SCC) and then there were cyclostyled judgments circulated by the Supreme Court Bar Association, every week. All ER (All England Report) like AIR was a private publication, while WLR (Weekly Law Reports) was the Official Series, US Law Reports Lawyers Edition, Australian Law Reports and Commonwealth Law Reports (Canada), Howard Law Review were also there. There was an independent section for bare Acts arranged alphabetically and loose volumes of the latest law reports.
One thing which struck me was the fact that Mr. S.C.Agrawal, before leaving for conference with Mr.R.K.Garg or for the court, would briefly brush through the loose volumes and cyclostyled copies of latest judgments. I soon realized that one of the major issue during the hearing of the matter was, when the Hon’ble judge would ask the appearing senior advocate, if he has looked into the latest judgment delivered by the Supreme Court and it was very discomforting for the Senior Advocate if he had not. It was more embarrassing if the Judge would say that the judgment cited at the bar has been reconsidered recently and he must have a look into it. The judgments were delivered every day and were not available unless circulated by SCBA or published in a law report. To be respected advocate, it was imperative, to keep abreast with every judgment of the Supreme Court, before going to the court to avoid any humiliation or uncomfortable situation of any sort.
If a judgment was reported in SCR, the court would insist on citing SCR only. There was one Shri Gopi, an old librarian in SCBA, who had published a conversion table from AIR to SCR and SCR to AIR, which was quite in demand and use. Whenever a list of judgments to be cited before the court was given to the SCBA library to bring the books to the court, the SCBA library staff would get corresponding SCR with proper flags to the court. There was also an encyclopedia of Supreme Court judgments, which was very helpful to get the citations by name of the case alphabetically.
Another important issue for an esteemed advocate, was his capacity to keep constant track of follow up and over-ruled judgments. Mr. Ashok K. Sen, who had a better library than Supreme Court Judges Library, for he had some English Law Reports, not even available in the Supreme Court Judges Library, had in pencil marked on his personal law reports the citation of the judgments in which the judgment was followed, distinguished, referred, overruled, etc, like a ready referencer. He was also the law minister of India from (1957 to 1966 - Jawaharlal Nehru’s cabinet). Mr. S.C.Agrawal had it all in his memory which was updated every day along with judgments from UK, USA, Australia and Canada and that is the unmatchable bedrock and strength of Ramamurthy & Co. Several advocates, came and asked Shri S.C.Agarwal about the latest judgments on any issue, which he told with a great smile, which he was always bearing. Finding precedents on the issue in hand is a major activity in advocates office.
509 judgments were delivered in the year 1976 and 222 judgments between 04.01.1977 to 06.05.1977. There were 14 Constitutional bench judgments in 1976 and 3 in 1977. MISA judgment in 1976 where 13 judgments of the various High Courts, including one delivered by my father in the High Court of Rajasthan was set aside and in which Justice H.R.Khanna had given a dissent, was an important judgment. In 1977 the Supreme Court had delivered 3 Constitutional Bench Judgments. Constitutional Bench Judgment of Justice Krishna Iyer in Fatehchand Himmatlal dealing with validity of Maharashtra Debt Relief Act expounded the constitutional philosophy.
Summer Vacations: This was a leap year, the total working days for Supreme Court were 183 and total non working days were 183. There was a long summer vacation spreading over a period of 10 weeks from May 7 to July 18. During vacation, two Hon’ble Judge would sit singly for four weeks and two in the next four weeks and take up only very urgent matters. The long summer vacation has been a long tradition since the British days. The High Courts were working for 212 days and the sub-ordinate judiciary for 240 days. The only logic I could find out for this long vacation was that the judges from Britain, who were coming to India, must be travelling back during summers. Travel by ship would be taking two weeks one side totaling to four weeks either side and 6 weeks were left for actual vacation, to get a break from the court routine. The matters whose limitation expired during the summer vacation, were all prepared during the period, piled up and had to be filed on the reopening i.e. July 19, 1977. High Court had 6 week vacation and since my father loved and enjoyed to travel all around, he always had his itinerary worked out well in advance and would leave immediately as soon as the vacations started and would be back a few days before the reopening. He had gone around the world to Dubai, several countries in Europe, various places in USA, Hong Kong and Japan, as an advocate in 1971.
In absence of any communication with my senior Mr. S.C.Agarwal or Mr. R.K.Garg on the subject, as to how I should actually go about the profession, I had just continued to absorb everything I could, every moment I was in Supreme Court. Since the summer vacation were coming close and I had to vacate 60 South Avenue, I asked my senior Mr. S.C.Agarwal, to tell me as to what I should be doing during the vacation. He told me since, I had come directly to Supreme Court and had no experience of Trial Court, I must go to a senior in Trial Court and talk to Shri B.P.Agarwal, a senior Advocate in Jaipur. I had a feeling that my coming directly to Supreme Court was not a very acceptable decision, but I had no choice, the choice were made elsewhere, I could only do my best to my perfection.
I came to Jaipur, discussed the issue with Shri B.P.Agarwal and joined Shri H.M.K.Wali, advocate, who had his office at Wali Gardens and started accompanying him to the trial court in Jaipur. He had two juniors working with him Mr. R.K.Yadav and Mr. Amar Singh. It was amazing to find a wonderful, fine, magnificent and highly respected human being in Mr. Wali. He was totally unruffled and unperturbed and was always smiling and thinking deep. As soon as the matter would be reaching, he would walk to the pan shop, collect a bundle of pan and walk back to the court thinking, contemplating and considering the various aspects of the case. He used to eat almost 40 pan in every day. The judges would hear him with great respect and apt attention and pass the orders. Mr. Wali showed all respect to every judge and made his arguments clearly and precisely. Finally one day he gave me a voluminous brief to read and prepare. After carefully preparing my notes, when I discussed the issues and briefed him he put me a few question, just to test the direction or my understanding and was quite pleased and said that I must have learned all this in Supreme Court with the great seniors with whom I was working.
28.06.1977 – An uncomfortable experience -As I entered the court today just behind my senior Mr. H.M.K.Wali, the presiding judge recognized, me and almost jumped out of seat. He enquired as to what brought me to the court. It was quite a embarrassing situation. I told him that I had joined Mr. Wali and just walked out of the court, never to come back again.
01.07.1977 – Back to Delhi, back to Supreme Court, Stay at Indian Law Institute and shifting to Ashok Vihar - I read in the column of ‘thought of the day’ - ‘The eagle never lost more of its time than when it went to learn of the crow’. I showed the same to Mr. Wali and he told me that I had nothing much to learn in the trial court and it would be better if I go back to Delhi and practice there. He further expressed that learning will come as I will continue to work on cases as it came, each case was a learning process and every procedure and issue in it must be clearly understood.
Since I had vacated 60, South Avenue and had no place to live, I made enquiry and got accommodation to stay in a room on the side of Indian Law Institute @ Rs. 5 per day, for a period of 30 days, which was the maximum period allowed there. I met a few academicians there, who used to visit for attending conference or research at ILI and it was a great treat to talk to them and relate to some of my actual experience in Supreme Court. I thereafter, shifted to my cousins place in Ashok Vihar Phase 1, which was quite a distance from Supreme Court, commutation period was more than an hour in DTC bus. I used to take a morning 7.45 am bus to Shakti Nagar, if I did not get a direct bus , another bus to Tilak Bridge and walk to Supreme Court. Leave the chamber at 9 pm, walk till Tilak bridge, wait for the bus to get to Shakti Nagar, change to another bus to Ashok Vihar reaching back by 11 pm. Attend Bhartiya Vidhya Bhawan on Friday Evening and Sunday morning. All through the commutation, I used to read Shrimat Bhagwat Gita, which I had copied in my diary or various jottings which I took down from the books I had read and there were many.
Further Readings: I had already completed reading Complete work of Vivekanand in 8 volumes and had moved on to ‘Godfather’ by Mario Puzo, an amazing book opening the heart of underworld in USA, along with same came in ‘The Valachi Papers’ by Peter Mass and ‘Honor thy Family’ by Gay Telese, about a Bonano Family of New York, USA which finally ended in conviction held by the US Supreme Court. Also read ‘The Day of the Jackal and ‘The Odessa File’ by Fredrick Forsyth. Two books which really gripped and enthused me and which was found it difficult to keep it aside was ‘Fountain Head’ and ‘Atlas Shrugged’ by Ayn Rand. Her other books followed – ‘We the Living’, ‘Anthem’, ‘For the New Intellectuals’, ‘The Virtue of Selfishness’, ‘Voice of Reason’. The character of Horward Roark, Dominique Fracon, Peter Keating, and Ellsworth Toohey in Fountain Head and the characters of the three disciples of philosopher Dr. Hugh Akston - John Galt, Francisco and Ragner and the classic lines about them:
“Don’t be astonished, Miss Taggart… and don’t make the mistake of thinking that these three pupils of mine are some of superhuman creatures. They’re much greater and more astounding than that; they’re normal men – a thing that world has never seen – and their feat is that they managed to survive as such. It does take an exceptional mind and still more exceptional integrity to remain untouched by the brain – destroying influences of the world’s doctrines, the accumulated evil of centuries – to remain human , since the human is the rational”
This thought was solidly buttressed by the brilliant Essay on Self Reliance by Ralph Waldo Emerson. Dagny Taggart, Hank Rearden, Midas Mulligan, Richard Halley and many others were powerful characters as many in Ramayan and Mahabharat. Apart from the speech of Francisco on the concept of money, another statement by Ayan Rand formed the fundamental of my understanding:
“Ideas cannot be fought except by means of better ideas. The battle consists, not of opposing, but of exposing; not of denouncing, but of disproving; not of evading, but of boldly proclaiming a full, consistent, and radical alternative.”
Shrimat Bhagwat Gita was interpreted by all three propounders of main stream of Hindu Philosophy – Advait by Shankracharya, Vishsist Advait by Ramanujam and Dvait by Madhvacharya. Adviat philosophy was again expounded and taken to the English speaking world by Swami Vivekananda and the individual centric philosophy of Ayn Rand both demanding individual human being to endeavor for leading and craving for total perfection to the best of his ability, potentiality and capacity was in total contradiction, disagreement and inconsistent to what our chamber was known for and was propounding, welfare based on need. Mr. R.K.Garg with photo of Lenin hanging in his chamber, was all about nationalist socialism, providing the have not’s, a minimum basic for everyone. To understand socialism and the philosophy underlying it I bought three volumes of Das Capital, which I was not able to read, but read ‘The Grammar of Politics’ by Harlod J.Laski and the beautiful opening lines made so much sense and expressed the brilliance of the outstanding work. The lines read as follows:
“My husband once said, that every time an intellectual has the chance to speak out against injustice, and yet remains silent, he contributes to the moral paralysis and intellectual barrenness that grips the affluent world." Frida Laski w/o Harold J. Laski, author of ‘The Grammar of Politics’
It seemed that the two philosophies were in contradictions, but to mind there was none. Development or progress of the Self wholly supported the commitment to fellow beings. To understand the whole it was imperative to fully grasp the so called contradictions which were in fact complementary to each other. Contraria Sunt Complementa, was the motto on Bohr's coat of arms 'Contradictions are complementary” Bohr was a visionary physicist and developed the quantum theory, he was ready to see the dual nature not as a contradiction but as 'two sides of the same coin’.
I was in the most powerful chamber propounding a philosophy and was in need of some amount to sustain myself and the same was true with many others who had shifted to Delhi, but there was no money, for there was practically no contribution to the day to day working, except some errands, but that seemed to be process of learning. Money was not an issue with me, for my father had given me a blank cheque book, which I could fill with any amount and deposit in my account, but the issue was my earning on my own with dignity and there was none till date. There was, therefore, some error somewhere, between philosophy and practice but that did not make sense. Any philosophy which did not have practical application at individual level has no purpose to exist at national level.
