Sorry Bapu, your ideals don't work here!

While the whole world is devotionally celebrating the 150th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, our country, the citadel of democracy, has seen violent scenes in the last week in Parliament.

In the melee that ensued after the Lok Sabha-passed Bills for the welfare of farmers were tabled in the Rajya Sabha, not only verbal abuses were hurled at the treasury benches, but also at the Deputy Chairman, who was occupying the august seat. The acrimony culminated into rushing of the members to the well and tearing off the papers of draft Bills. Thereafter, in order to maintain order in the House, the Deputy Speaker had to call the Marshalls. While, the rest of the House was aghast to see the Marshalls being attacked physically by the unruly members of Parliament, the common man had only to curse himself for sending such worthless people to represent them in the temple of democracy.

This is not an isolated incident. Even in the past, ever since the Parliamentary democracy began functioning, there have been umpteen number of incidents of unruly behaviour by the elected representatives. What is worse is that, steadily such incidents are increasing day after day and that too with more severity and violence.

Gone are the days when a witty sarcasm ruled the roost. Now, the place of decency has been captured by violence, anger and total disregard for the democracy.

Following the latest incident when even the Deputy Speaker was attacked physically, besides the Marshalls, it must be said to the credit of the Deputy Speaker Harivansh Rai that he maintained cool and despite a No Confidence Motion moved against him by the unruly Opposition, chose to serve tea to the unruly and violent gang outside the Parliament which was staging a sit-in. In turn, the victim Deputy Speaker too sat on a token hunger strike for 24 hours.

Both the dharna and the act of offering tea to the perpetrators of crime are certainly called Gandhigiri. In any other civilised democracy, the gesture of the Deputy Speaker would have been highlighted by the media, but alas! our myopic media has yet to learn such niceties of Gandhian ideology. The agenda-oriented thick-skinned Opposition ought to spend a few weeks, if not months to understand the Gandhian philosophy of protest.

Let it be clearly understood by the anti-Modi, anti-BJP and anti-NDA forces that if they do not understand the Gandhian gestures as one shown by the Deputy Speaker, the innocent nation loving people of this country cannot be blamed if they go berserk to assert their rights in the wider interests.

And God save this nation if the heavy hammer of masses eventually falls on such rock heads who refuse to see the dire consequences awaiting their end. In such an eventuality, even if Mahatma returns in his physical form to this country, it would be a failure.

No driving licence, no claim

The Supreme Court in an important judgment delivered in Beli Ram vs Rajinder Kumar and Anr, has held that, when the owner of the motor vehicle employs a driver, he cannot wash off his hands from his duty to make sure that the driving licence of his employee is renewed timely.

In the instant case, the licence of the driver was not renewed for the period of three years and when the driver had met with an accident, his claim from the insurance company stood invalid as the SC observed that this proves the gross negligence of the owner of the motor vehicle which is in violation of Section 5 of the Motor Vehicles Act, 1988 and hence, the insurance company cannot be made liable.

Right to Shelter,a fundamental right

The right to shelter is a fundamental right said the Bombay High Court. The Court after taking suo motu cognizance of the building collapse tragedy in Thane's Bhiwandi area which took the lives 41 innocent people so far has noted that "We are of the prima facie opinion that the right of the citizens to live in safe buildings and environment would be a facet of the right guaranteed by Article 21 of the Constitution of India and it would be the duty of the civic bodies to bring about a situation that all buildings within their respective municipal jurisdictions are legal, sustainable and safe." The division bench of Bombay High Court, comprising Chief Justice Dipankar Dutta and Justice GS Kulkarni issued the notices and gave October 15 as the next date of hearing in the matter.

HC makes mask mandatory

The face mask, which has become an identity of Covid-19 pandemic all over the world, now gets a seal of approval from Allahabad High Court. The High Court on September 24 issued a writ of Mandamus for the State of Uttar Pradesh making wearing of masks mandatory 'no person should be seen outside his/her house without a mask on his/her face and he or she should check that the mask covers both the nose and the mouth.'

The division bench comprising Justice Siddhartha Verma and Justice Ajit Kumar gave this direction while hearing a Public Interest Litigation complaining about inhumane conditions at quarantine centres, and for providing better treatment to corona positive patients.

Mask apart, the court also issued a slew of directions including disposal of used masks, creating medical facilities during the Covid pandemic.

Lawyer slapped with Rs 10,000 fine

The Gujarat High Court on September 24 fined a lawyer Rs 10,000 for smoking a cigarette in his car during an online hearing. Justice AS Supehia saw JV Ajmera, a junior advocate from Surat, who was appearing for two petitioners seeking bail, smoking a cigarette while sitting in the car during online hearing.

"It was not expected from an advocate to be smoking in the car during the court proceedings. Such behaviour of the advocate is required to be strictly condemned." The judge also observed, '...advocates appearing through video conference are required to maintain minimum dignified decorum so that the majesty and dignity of the proceedings as well as the institution are maintained.'

The court also ordered the Bar Council of Gujarat and Bar Association of High Court to devise proper mechanism to maintain a dignified decorum before the court.

This incident brings us back to the Supreme Court where during an online hearing of a case, a senior lawyer, Rajiv Dhawan was found smoking hukka during online hearing and so far, no action has been taken against him.