NEW DELHI, July 25: Chief Justice of India Surya Kant has rejected claims that his controversial “cockroach” remark was directed at the youth, insisting that his words were taken entirely out of context.
Two months after the comment triggered a political storm and led to the resignation of the Union education minister in the BJP-led government, CJI Kant explained that his observation was never about young people.
“Completely out of context. Completely. Let me share the background. The matter being discussed concerned lawyers who had entered the profession on the basis of fake or false law degrees. By fake degrees, I mean unrecognised degrees. Some people had never attended law colleges. Sitting at home, they somehow obtained degrees. I am told there are about 48,000 such lawyers in the country whose law degrees were never issued by the universities they claim,” CJI Kant told Bar and Bench’s Debayan Roy in an exclusive interview.
“The matter being discussed concerned lawyers who had entered the profession on the basis of fake or false law degrees. By fake degrees, I mean unrecognised degrees. Some people had never attended law colleges. Sitting at home, they somehow obtained degrees. I am told there are about 48,000 such lawyers in the country whose law degrees were never issued by the universities they claim.”
According to The Wire, CJI Kant stressed that his remarks were misquoted and wrongly linked to the youth, reiterating that his concern was about the integrity of the legal profession.
Abhijeet Dipke, founder of the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP), thanked Chief Justice Surya Kant for his “cockroach” remark after the Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan’s resignation.
It was Surya Kant’s “cockroach” remark during a Supreme Court hearing that had inadvertently given the movement its defining symbol. A word intended to ridicule protesting students was instead embraced by them, becoming an identity around which a nationwide campaign would eventually take shape. (Agencies)
