बेबाक · Editorial
નાગરિકની છેલ્લી બરાબરીઃ ન્યાયની પહોંચ એક વ્યવસ્થા હોવી જોઈએ, મૂડ નહીં
એક અઠવાડિયામાં સર્વોચ્ચ અદાલતે હેરાન કરાયેલ ઉધાર લેનાર, એક જૂનો જમીન-સંપાદન વિવાદ અને પરીક્ષકોને સંબોધ્યા-પરંતુ પ્રજાસત્તાક તેની સર્વોચ્ચ અદાલતને રોજિંદા નિષ્પક્ષતા વેચવા માટે કહી શકતું નથી.
અઠવાડિયાનું ડોકેટ
એકસાથે વાંચો, સુપ્રીમ કોર્ટના આદેશોનું એક અઠવાડિયું લગભગ ચાર્ટર જેવું લાગે છે
The Other Signal
And yet, in the same season, the same Court denied anticipatory bail to RTI activists in Punjab accused of obstructing road work, and called their activism a "new business". The phrase matters. The Right to Information regime is the citizen's lawful instrument against opacity; to let a broad label overshadow individual facts risks chilling the honest seeker along with the abusive litigant. The contrast is sharp: an institution that defends the small borrower's dignity in one courtroom can, in another, treat the citizen-activist as a nuisance. Access to justice should not turn on which grievance a bench happens to find congenial.
Both Cases Heard
Both impulses deserve a fair hearing. The Court's concern about road work being obstructed cannot be dismissed; judges are entitled to examine whether a legal tool is being misused in a particular case. Equally real is that the activist, the whistle-blower and the litigating farmer can be important checks on an unaccountable office. The Bombay High Court's direction to the State to protect former judge Justice Patel, his wife and daughter in Mumbai shows how exposed even senior legal figures may become. The task is not to choose between vigilance and protection, but to separate the abusive case from the genuine one — individually, on evidence, never by category.
The Evidence and the Void
The pattern is concrete, not abstract. In the capital, a civic crackdown logged 217 demolitions, 237 properties sealed, 330 show-cause notices for unauthorised construction, 151 sealing show-cause notices and 91 demolition orders; the government took possession of Delhi's Jaipur Polo Ground only after a court refused a stay. Each act of state power lands on a home, a plot or a livelihood. Where the statute book is silent, even a willing court may have little to administer: the crash of Air India flight AI 171 has exposed the absence of a dedicated statutory mechanism for victims on the ground, leaving liability, quantum of compensation, timelines for relief, claims procedures and access to justice uncertain — which is why a statutory "Ground Victims Compensation" mechanism has been sought.
The Considered Verdict
The verdict is caution, not condemnation. India's judiciary remains the republic's great equaliser, and this week's record — addressing the harassed borrower, the land-acquisition litigant and the examinee — largely affirms that role; the decision to stay challenges to the Transgender Persons Act across four high courts and centralise them is itself a bid to avoid conflicting rulings. But the system is soft upward and hard downward too often, and access to justice cannot brighten or dim with a bench's temper. When the constitutional question of a serving Bihar minister's reappointment draws notices in one matter and a citizen's activism draws scorn in another, the signal about whose grievance counts grows muddled. Consistency is itself a form of fairness.
A Way Forward
The remedies are within reach and need no grand reinvention. The government should establish the statutory ground-victims compensation framework the AI 171 crash has shown to be missing, fixing liability, compensation, timelines and claims procedure before the next disaster, not after it. Regulators should hold every lender to one standard, so the small borrower is treated no worse than the large borrower. Demolitions, sealings and acquisitions should each carry clear notice, a reasoned order and an accessible, time-bound appeal, so the citizen need not climb to the apex court for routine fairness. And the courts can retire sweeping labels like activism-as-"business" for case-by-case scrutiny that punishes abuse and shields the honest. Power may act, but it must explain itself.
જ્યારે રાજ્ય કેસ જીતે છે ત્યારે કાયદાનું શાસન સાબિત થતું નથી; તે ત્યારે સાબિત થાય છે જ્યારે સૌથી નબળો નાગરિક પણ ભય વગર સત્તાનું પરીક્ષણ કરી શકે છે.
At stake is whether citizens can use RTI, courts and due process to protect speech, liberty, property and dignity without being chilled by delay, opacity or arbitrary state power.
Citizen Justice Safeguards Bill
Parliament should enact a Citizen Justice Safeguards Bill requiring public authorities, banks and civic bodies to give written reasons, disclose appeal routes and meet statutory timelines before coercive action affecting loans, property, examinations or livelihoods. The Bill should create an independent state-level access-to-justice grievance forum to screen alleged misuse individually on evidence, protect bona fide RTI users and whistle-blowers from category-based stigma, and recommend interim relief or compensation where the statute is silent, including for ground victims of aviation disasters.
તમારા બંધારણીય અધિકારો
આ વાર્તામાં બંધારણ શું બાંયધરી આપે છેAny citizen may ask any public authority for information and must normally receive it within 30 days. It flows from the right to know under Article 19(1)(a).
StatutoryEvery citizen has the right to freedom of speech and expression — including a free press and the right to know — subject only to the reasonable restrictions in Article 19(2).
Fundamental RightNo person shall be deprived of property save by authority of law — a constitutional (legal) right, requiring fair procedure and, in practice, compensation.
ConstitutionalNo person shall be deprived of life or personal liberty except by a fair, just and reasonable procedure established by law — read by the courts to include dignity, privacy, health, a clean environment and livelihood.
Fundamental RightWhat this editorial rests on
Drawn from our live multi-newsroom feed — read the reporting at source.
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