Courts and Governments.

Source- https://indianculture.gov.in/node/2824395

Maulana Azad’s Trial (1922)

 

(Maulana Azad was Charged under Section 124-A of the India Penal Code (Sedition)  for two speeches delivered by him in Mirzapur Park in Calcutta, on 1 and 15 July 1921 to protest the arrests of Hakim Saeed-ur-Rahman, Jagdamba Prasad, and Ajodhya Prasad.  He was held guilty and sentenced to a year’s rigorous imprisonment)

 

The Court Statement of Azad -

 

“Except the Government itself, no sensible man can deny the fact that in the present set-up there is no hope for justice from the courts established by the Government; not because they are presided by persons who do not desire to do justice, but because they are part of a system in which no magistrate can do justice to a person whom the government itself does not wish to be dealt with justly. Here, I wish to make it clear that non-cooperation is directed against the present system of government and its rules of governance and not with individuals.

 

History bears witness that whenever the ruling powers took up arms against truth and justice, the Court-rooms served as the most convenient and plausible weapons. 

The authority of courts of law is a force which can be used for both justice and injustice. In the hands of a just government, it becomes the best instrument for attaining right and justice. But, for tyrannical and repressive government, there is no better weapon for wreaking vengeance and perpetrating injustice.

Next to battlefields it is in the court-rooms that some of the greatest acts of injustice in the history of the world have taken place. 

From the holy founders of religions to investors and pioneers of science, there is no movement for piety or truth which was not arraigned before the criminal courts. Doubtless, the revolution which time has brought about ended many excesses. I accept that in modern times we have none of the terrible outrages of 2^nd AD in the Courts of Rome or the tortures perpetrated during the Inquisition of Middle Ages. But I am not prepared to accept that our times are free from the emotions which moved those courts. For sure, their edifices have been pulled down where were preserved dreadful weapons of torture. But who can change those hearts in which are buried the fearful secrets of human selfishness and injustice?

 

The list of injustices committed by courts is a long one. History continues to mourn them to this day. 

In the list we find a holy personage like Jesus Christ who was made to stand with thieves before a strange Court of his times. We find it in Socrates who was sentenced to drink a cup of poison for no other reason than that he was the most truthful person in his country. We find also the name of the great martyr to truth of Florence, Galileo, who refused to belie what he knew and learnt from his experiments, though their avowal was a crime in the eyes of the court of the time.

 

I have mentioned Jesus Christ as a person because in my faith he was a holy person who brought from the Almighty the message of goodness and love. But, in the eyes of millions of people he was even greater than that. What a strange yet majestic place is the dock of the accused in which letter, the most righteous and the worst of men are made to stand. It is not an inappropriate place even for a great person.

 

When I reflect on the majestic and historic significance of this place and find myself honored by standing in it, my soul bows spontaneously in praise and gratitude to God and He alone knows the joy and elation that fill my heart. In this dock for the accused, I am filled with a pride which would be the envy of Kings.

…”

 

How Contemporary...!!!

The Frightened Lawyer