Recognising peace and justice as collective rights
An important account of senior advocate and human-rights activist KG Kannabiran’s work also traces the journey of the civil-rights movement in India
Justice Madhav Reddy: Why should Naxalites who do not believe in the Constitution take shelter under it? Advocate KG Kannabiran: When such issues come before the court, it is your values and not their values that are on trial. It is the values enshrined in the Constitution and the values of the state that are under test.
A narration of this courtroom exchange is how I was introduced to KG Kannabiran (1929-2010), co-founder of the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL). On the one hand, his audacious response magnifies the position of the Indian Constitution while, on the other, it alerts the courts and the State of their heightened responsibility towards all citizens. The Speaking Constitution: A Sisyphean Life in Law showcases several such reallife instances of KG Kannabiran’s calibre as an advocate, his courage as a human-rights defender, and his belief in the “insurgent” possibilities of our Constitution. More inspiring are the references to his collaborations with friends and colleagues who, amid a spree of extrajudicial killings, detentions and arrests and fatal attacks on communities at the margins, continued their attempts in documenting, fact-finding and pursuing legal and administrative mechanisms for relief and justice.
This book recalls how several of Kannabiran’s associates were arrested and killed while he himself was subjected to surveillance, intimidation and physical assault. It may also nudge readers to wonder how they were able to give shape to the human-rights movement in such circumstances. The first two chapters of this autobiographical account of Kannabiran’s work and vision, translated and edited by his daughter Kalpana Kannabiran, narrate his story from childhood to his early days in legal practice. Thereafter, across 16 chapters, are events and proceedings of cases where he participated as an advocate or a human-rights defender. The cases are contextualised with commentary on the relevant provisions of the Constitution, and background history. Through a series of specific cases, chapters three to nine and the last chapter provide a broad historical account focused on the preTelangana state of Andhra Pradesh. The account begins in the 1960s, amid a rise in people’s discontent with governance, elements of judiciary and the lack of change in societal structures; and ends in the first decade of this century, which saw attempts at peace talks between Naxals and the government.
Chapters 10 to 17 cover varying themes including issues relating to the death penalty, adequate legal representation, rights of workers, reservations, and the conditions of tribals, Dalits and religious minorities. Kannabiran articulates how courts can never match the rationality and consistency required in imposing a punishment as extreme as the death penalty, and calls it the most premeditated of murders.
In the two chapters dedicated to religious minorities, he narrates his participation in various commissions and court cases. The chapters, while contextualising those events, point to the evidence of Constituent Assembly debates indicating that religious minorities were anxious about the standard of their citizenship before the formation of India.
Through the narration of different kinds of cases in which he provided legal representation, the author brings forth nuanced perspectives on several issues of criminal law, especially procedural law. From defending conspiracy allegations to proving conspiracy charges, the politics of jail courts, understanding and prosecuting “undue influence”, and the registration of FIRs in cases of extrajudicial killings, Kannabiran covers a range of issues through discussion on important case laws as well as the provisions of the Constitution. He also, vitally, shares his critical analysis of the law and the judiciary. For example, he raises the concern that, in cases involving allegations of violence by government officials such as police, some courts tend to dispense with the vigil that the Constitution requires them to hold, by assuming that all such officials are responsible officers.
Similarly, he illustrates how the principle of giving benefit of doubt to the accused is seen to be applied by the courts much more in cases involving the rich and the powerful. Despite being a busy advocate until his last years and a staunch believer in the Constitution, Kannabiran was acutely aware of the reality that justice can be delayed and denied using the law. He documents his discussions with judges and other courtroom proceedings. Such accounts give readers a glimpse of the fluid and subjective nature of processes. Though this is an extremely important documentation of not just Kannabiran’s work but also the journey of the civilrights movement, it has some limitations in terms of language and content. A collation of different incidents rather than a sequential life story, the book’s structure inevitably leaves gaps which may make it difficult for readers to fully comprehend the context.
The flow of the language is occasionally uneven and some legal terms are left unexplained, which may make it difficult for readers from a non-legal background to grasp.
Despite being an active member of civil society, Kannabiran was also critical of different strands of the civil-rights movement as well as the Naxal movement. His principled positions recognised peace and justice as the collective rights of society. He believed people deserved social, economic and political justice, and not legal justice alone. He links this broadened imagination of justice to the often-ignored directive principles enshrined in the Constitution and calls for a campaign on Constitutional values. He argues that the least the government should do is protect the space for citizens to freely deliberate upon such issues.