Opinion Soli Loquies

Subtle censorship

No government relishes adverse criticism of its functioning and to prevent that,various means are adopted ranging from outright censorship to sophisticated devices like the one attempted in Romania. The Romanian Senate passed a law which required radio and television companies to broadcast one good news story for every bad news story. The purported justification was that reporting of too much bad news had a negative effect on the health and life of the people and therefore,law was needed to make the news media broadcast equal measures of good and bad news. The legislation created a National Audiovisual Council which was to judge whether the news was positive or negative. The chairman of the Council was perplexed and pointed out that such a half-good and half-bad recipe for all news broadcasts would be impossible because according to him,“news is news. It is neither positive nor negative. It simply reflects reality.” The law was challenged on the ground that it restricted freedom of the press. The Romanian Constitutional Court agreed and declared the legislation unconstitutional. That,of course,is good news,both for freedom of the press and independence of the Romanian judiciary.

Judicial witticism

Judges are generally regarded as erudite but dull persons,engrossed only in their judicial work. This is a misconception. For example,former Chief Justice Hidayatullah in his convocation address to the Indian Agricultural Research Institute,when he was Vice-President,was asked why milk,which used to cost about two annas a seer at one stage,was being sold at 30 times that price today. Hidayatullah replied that formerly,the mother milked the cows,the girls set the milk out in pans to bring the cream to the top and one of the boys sold it carrying it in a hand-cart. Then,in his inimitable witty style he said,“now,the department of agriculture is mobilised,the cow-sheds are sterilised,the cows are immunised,the milk is homogenised,the suppliers are motorised,the dairies are organised,the milkmen are unionised,the milk product exports are subsidised,the political leaders are energised and the result is that the Indian consumer is victimised.” This was Hadi at his best.

Judges at times like to embellish their judgments with literary quotes. Justice Krishna Iyer in one of his judgments bemoaned that a particular section was drafted in a jaw-breaking fashion and its cumbersomeness could have been simplified. The legislation he said reminded him of the old British jingle: ‘I’m the parliamentary draftsman/I compose the country’s laws/And of half the litigation,I’m undoubtedly the cause.’

Incidentally,lawyers can ill afford to complain of complexity in drafting being the cause of litigation,which after all is a steady source of lucrative income.