NEW DELHI: The CPI (M) on Friday urged Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi to remove Justice Sudip Ranjan Sen of the Meghalaya High Court from judicial duties alleging that his recent utterances in a judgment were against the basic structure of the Constitution.
Sen on December 12 had passed a judgment with remarks that India should have been declared a Hindu nation at the time of partition in 1947. The Left party vowed to consult other parties in Parliament to move impeachment motion for removal of the judge.
“The recent utterances of Justice Sudip Ranjan Sen of Meghalaya High Court, in the form of a judgment are against the basic structure of our Constitution,” the CPM said in a politburo statement.
The party alleged that Sen reflected his political faith “akin” to the RSS ideology of Hindu Rashtra and added that he has lost his moral right to continue in the office. “The Supreme Court had earlier given a verdict that secularism, amongst others, is a fundamental feature of our Constitution. Justice Sen reflects his political faith akin to RSS ideology of Hindu Rashtra,” the party said.
It alleged that by making an obvious political statement on the proposed amendment to the Citizenship Act, the judge has both undermined the pre-eminent role of Parliament and the independence of the judiciary. “Such views will contribute to further provoking discord among the people in the North East,” the party statement said.
Our correspondent in Shillong reports: Judge SR Sen issued a clarification on Friday with regard to his judgment on granting citizenship without documents and said it was misinterpreted.
Stating that it is imperative to remove confusion from the minds of people, Sen in a clarification from the bench said secularism is one of the basic structures of the Indian Constitution and it should not further be divided on the basis of religion, caste, creed, community or language.
“Furthermore, I would like to make it clear that when I mentioned the government under Shri Narendra Modiji it is inclusive of the Hon’ble Ministers and Hon’ble Members of both the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. I also mentioned about the Chief Minister of West Bengal, which did not mean that other chief ministers of other states were not included. My request was to the policy makers and lawmakers of this country. I hope this will clear the confusion, if any, in the minds of the people,” he said.
In his judgment, Sen clarified that he has not said anything against secularism and his judgment makes references to the history and “one cannot change the history.”
According to him, owing to continuous diaspora, many Indian origin people may not have documents on birth certificates, hospital records or domicile papers.
“Thirdly, it is well known to all of us that India still lives in its villages, and most of the people in this country are yet to receive formal education and are not aware of the importance of certain documents or have not collected them or have no records of birth certificates/ hospital records / domicile,” he said.
The presence of the diaspora is primarily due to the religious persecution that they have been facing through generations, the judge observed.
He added that the “unfortunate people” have lost many of their near and dear ones as well as their property and livelihood and were forced to come to India and till date these people are continuously facing religious persecution.
“Therefore, those who could not come till date, in my considered view they may get the right to come and stay in India peacefully and with dignity. Again how the process of this would look like needs to be determined by the authorities and by due process of law,” Sen said.
“We should remember that whatever we call influx or foreigner, that is due to unwanted partition without proper referendum and wrong boundary demarcation and mainly on religious persecution,” he added.
According to him, it is not uncommon to find people living in India for generations and yet having no proper records or documentation.
“It would be inhumane to uproot them and displace them once again. Citizens of India are harassed in many aspects, like denial of birth certificates, permanent residence certificate, domicile certificate etc. The country needs its people to live in unity, peace and harmony,” he added.
Commenting on the contentious issue of influx, he questioned on why would one particular state or region of this country take the burden of influx alone and it should be shared by all the other states.
“Therefore, those who are not settled and are finding difficulty to settle in a particular State or region, they should be distributed to all other States and all the Indian States should accept and embrace them as brothers and sisters because these people like Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhist, Jains, Parsis, Khasis, Jaintias and Garos had to sacrificed their property, livelihood and lives of their near and dear ones for India to get its independence and their sacrifice cannot be forgotten by any of us,” Sen suggested.
He said as per the Constitution of India every citizen of this country has the right to settle in any part of the country and it totally depends upon the policy and lawmakers of the country.
Responding to allegations of nurturing political aims, he maintained that he does not belong to any political party and neither got any dream to get any political berth after his retirement nor is his judgment politically motivated or influenced by any party.
“Whatever is the truth, history and real ground reality, on that basis I have written my judgment to save the citizens of India irrespective of caste, creed, religion or language and people should understand the history of India and live in peace and harmony. I also mention that I am not a religious fanatic rather I respect all the religions because to me God is one,” Sen said. (PTI)
