“Justice, truth and courage are the companions of the soul of Justice Jasti Chelameswar, seniormost judge of the Supreme Court. He is a sanyasi in court”, said former Chief Justice of India M.N. Venkatachalaiah here on Saturday.
These comments assume importance when the country is debating on the recent press conference held by the apex court’s four seniormost judges, led by Justice Chelameswar, who accused present CJI Dipak Misra of selectively assigning cases to judges of his choice without any rational basis.
89-year-old Venkatachalaiah has made these comments while speaking during the inaugural ceremony of Ramaiah Public Policy Centre (RPPC) where Justice Chelameswar was sitting next to the former CJI as a chief guest.
Disclosing that he stayed as Justice Chelameswar’s guest whenever he visited Hyderabad for many years, Mr. Venkatachalaih said that they discussed various interesting topics during such visits, and Justice Chelameswar will get a Nobel Prize if he writes a book on history of Telugu speaking people.
Crucial question
In his address, Justice Chelameswar said that the question of why public sector institutions cannot be maintained elegantly and efficiently like many private sector institutions crops up in his mind whenever he visited private and public sector educational institutions during the past 25 years. “This is a matter requiring serious attention,” he added.
On public policy, Justice Chelameswar said that the Constituent Assembly of India was the greatest public policy centre of the country that has created a well researched policy called Constitution of India. Stating that the task of safeguarding the Constitution is the responsibility of the younger generation, he said that any policy research will have to essentially ensure implementation of goals elaborated in the Constitution though the Constitution itself is being amended from time to time.
Former Chairman of Atomic Energy Commission Anil Kakodkar, who is the chairperson of RPPC’s advisory board, said that preparation of a policy on governance is a challenging task in the fast changing technological era.
M.R. Jayaram, Chairman, Gokula Education Foundation and Chancellor of Ramaiah University of Applied Sciences, said that aim of the RPPC is to become a leading evidence-based public policy centre for research on global public policies to influence policy makers for India’s social development.
