Amit Shah’s Salwa Judum Attacks: Oppn VP Candidate Sudershan Reddy Exposes Political Narrative
New Delhi: In response to the recent attacks from Union home minister Amit Shah for the Supreme Court’s 2011 Salwa Judum judgment, the opposition’s vice presidential candidate, Justice B. Sudershan Reddy, said that it was the apex court that had spoken through him, and that “to build a narrative”, attributing something incorrectly is “better left to the wisdom” of the home minister.
On Friday, Shah accused Justice Reddy and the apex court of “supporting Naxalism” through the 2011 judgment that outlawed Chhattisgarh’s use of armed vigilantes against the Naxalite insurgency, and alleged that the judge was motivated by “Naxalite ideology”.
On Monday (August 25), in an interview with ANI, Shah once again reiterated his accusation that it was due to the judgement that “Naxalism continued in this country for two more decades” and that Justice Reddy was chosen as the opposition’s candidate due to his “leftist ideology.”
In an interview, Justice Reddy said that the judgement was 14 years old and “nobody ever said that the judgement came in the way of fighting the menace of Naxalism.”
On the Supreme Court
“I don’t think that both of us [Amit Shah and Reddy] are competing for the office of the Vice President. I don’t know what is the reason why such a narrative is being built. This judgement is 14 years old, rendered in July 2011 – three or four days before I left office. Nobody ever said that the judgement came in the way of fighting the menace of Naxalism,” he said.
“It was the Supreme Court that was speaking through me. And making an individual judge responsible for a judgement and trying to build a narrative around it to paint an individual, attributing something which is not correct, is better left to the wisdom of the home minister, about which to reach disproportionately is dangerous,” he added.
On Monday, retired Supreme Court and high court judges also said Shah’s remarks wrongly projected the court as sympathetic to Naxalism, warning that such distortions could chill judicial independence.
Justice Reddy has come under criticism not just from Shah but several other senior members of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The former Supreme Court judge said that he did not expect the fight to become polarised, and the contest was “made ideological by the other side.”
On ideology
Justice Reddy is facing C.P. Radhakrishnan, a two term Lok Sabha MP from Coimbatore, who has served as the BJP’s Tamil Nadu president, and is now the Maharashtra governor. The electoral college combining both houses includes 782 MPs, where the majority mark is 394. The NDA (which has also got YSRCP’s 11 MPs support) has 438 MPs while the INDIA has 323.
“He is a veteran politician from a certain ideology. I do not share that ideology. I have been saying that I am a liberal constitutional democrat.
“For me, it (the fight) turned out to be an ideological one because of the initiative taken by the other side to portray that we have a candidate who is a quintessential RSS man. It was my duty to respond and tell the nation that I am a liberal constitutional democrat. Nothing personal about it. No personal ill will, no rancour, no disrespect,” Justice Reddy said.
“Since this is an election to the office of the Vice President I thought it would be a fair decent contest without any rancour or raising temperature. You will agree with me that I am not responsible for raising the temperature. I have been meeting MPs to request them to consider my candidature,” he added.
The BJP has also alleged that Justice Reddy’s nomination as the opposition candidate reeks of Congress’ hypocrisy as the party had once referred to him as Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar’s “yes man” while he was the state’s first Lokayukta in 2013. Justice Reddy said that there was no “political reason” behind his truncated tenure as Goa’s Lokayukta.
“The first complaint I entertained was against Manohar Parrikar. And he very gracefully gave his statement. I found no allegation made against him and dismissed the complaint,” the judge said.
On the Telangana caste survey
Justice Reddy also chaired the 11-member Independent Expert Working Group that analysed the Telangana government’s caste survey. While the group’s report termed the survey authentic and reliable, and that it could become a model for the country, it has not yet been acted upon.
“We presented our report, pending consideration from the government. What decision they will take I do not know but I must tell you that I informed the chief minister (A. Revanth Reddy) that this is a public document. I don’t know whether they are studying the report or making their own analysis and perhaps they are required to make a decision on which part of the report they are going to agree with and which part they won’t,” he said.
On post-retirement jobs
Justice Reddy’s nomination as the vice presidential candidate also comes amid increasing criticism of higher judges taking up post retirement jobs in the government raising questions about their judicial independence. However, he said that there should be a cooling off period between a judge’s tenure and another appointment in the government and it had been 14 years since he had retired.
“I retired 14 years ago. I believe there must be some gap between the office of the judge of the Supreme Court and entering another office,” he said.
“Apart from that, I am not seeking any job, nobody is appointing me. I am seeking the mandate from the honourable members of parliament to the high constitutional office of the vice president. So taking another job is not applicable in this case.”
The opposition INDIA bloc, while nominating Justice Reddy as their vice presidential candidate, said that the former Supreme Court judge “reflects fully the values that shaped our country’s freedom movement so profoundly and the values on which our country’s Constitution and democracy have been anchored.”
“All these values are under assault and therefore our collective and determined resolve to fight this election,” the opposition’s statement read.
Justice Reddy said that while he does not subscribe to the view that democratic constitutional institutions have collapsed, “they are coming under a cloud.”
“Something is required to be done to ensure accountability and a public audit,” he said.
“The country is becoming increasingly polarised, levels of tolerance have come down. Our values, particularly the dignity of individuals and the fraternity are slowly finding their place in the dustbin. We have to rebuild them and reinduct them into the polity and make them vital,” he noted.
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