Ranjona Banerji: Journalists as dogs, sniffing around for info???

By Ranjona Banerji

The stance of the judiciary to the media has become very interesting recently. In geneak, court proceedings in India are open to the public. It is rarely that cases are heard in camera, usually in exceptional circumstances. But ever since the Justices J Chelameshwar, Ranjan Gogoi, Madan Lokur and Kurian Joseph spoke to the nation about the problems within the judiciary, the question of “speaking to the media” has become like a giant horrific spectre, an act of treason to the family honour of the courts as it were.
How much sense does this attitude make for an institution which upholds and ensures freedom of speech and expression? The courts, we imagine, understand more than anyone else, that the fundamental right of freedom of expression includes the media. Yet, ever since the four judges disclosed what they thought was wrong with the functioning of the judiciary, they have been chastised for “going to the media” on par apparently with breaking the oath of Omerta.
The judges however did not “go to the media”. They went to the people of India through the media. Why the media – by definition, a conduit, an agency for transmitting something, an intermediary substance through which experience or force or impressions are conveyed – is being portrayed as the enemy is not new but in the context of the judiciary, interesting. Or, do some legal luminaries feel that it is not just the media itself as a series of news organisations and journalists, but the public of India themselves who must be kept in the dark about what’s happening in the judiciary?
This is a quote from a former judge in an article on the matter in The Times of India:
“There was a time when judges spoke only through judgments. No one would have dared to park a van carrying live telecast equipment outside a judge’s residence earlier. But once judges made themselves available to the media, it gave journalists an opportunity to attempt sniffing out details of what is happening even within the innermost chambers of the judges,” a former judge said.
This is extremely interesting as a comment itself – “no one would have dared to park a van”. That is, judges are outside the purview of media scrutiny. And that journalists have now been give “an opportunity to attempt sniffing out details…” because journalists are just dogs running about smelling lampposts and leftovers. I am not certain if the former judge has worked out his analogy properly because if journalists are sniffing dogs, why is he or she scared of what they might find in “the innermost chambers of the judges”?
Others have spoken about washing “dirty linen in public”, letting out “family problems”, all of which would make anyone wonder what exactly happens in the judiciary. And why the people of India must be kept in the dark about it. The Supreme Court owes all of us, citizens of India an explanation. It is not a stern grandfather to a nation full of pre-adolescent naughty children. Its power comes from us.
The funniest part of all this is that all the information which has come out in the media since the for judges spoke “to the media”, does not seem to have come from the four judges themselves. It appears to have come from those very people who have been chastising the judges for speaking to the people of India through the medium of dogs. If indeed the judiciary’s secrets were so sacrosanct, then all this leaking against the four senior judges is intriguing and amusing.
In fact, the murmurs in the judiciary mean that journalists must look with even more scrutiny at the case of Judge BH Loya’s death and all the points of conflict of interest being mentioned. With proper journalistic work, and even without sniffing lampposts and judges’ chambers or parking vans here and there or starting a laundry service, it is time to hold a mirror to the judiciary.
To that extent, those who fear what the senior judges have done are correct: we now know that too much secrecy just leads to more lies.
Freedom of expression is a fundamental right, right?

Ranjona Banerji is a senior journalist and commentator. She is also Consulting Editor, MxMIndia. The views here are personal.