[lg policy] India: Breaking the legal language barrier

Thu Dec 21 20:13:29 UTC 2017

Breaking the legal language barrier
Tuesday, 28 November 2017 | Prashant Singh and Shobhit Mathur
<http://www.dailypioneer.com/columnists/author/prashant-singh-and-shobhit-mathur>
| in Oped <http://www.dailypioneer.com/columnists/oped>

[image: Breaking the legal language barrier]

It is time to accept the long-standing demand of the Department of Official
Language on use of regional languages in High Courts
<http://www.dailypioneer.com/nation/allahabad-calcutta-high-courts-get-24-additional-judges.html>

Communication of justice is as important as the determination of justice.
This recognition is imperative to ensure the integrity of our legal system.
It is a shame that in independent India, legal language has prevented
people from accessing justice. The complexity of statutory language has
made the legal system incomprehensible to the common man. The language
barrier limits the understanding of the lay man regarding his rights,
exacerbates lack of awareness and effectively prevents them from accessing
the justice system. To cultivate the confidence of the common man, the goal
of the legal system should to eliminate language difficulties making the
process of entering courts less burdensome and daunting for non-English
speakers.

The idea of providing judgments in the language of the litigant has been
advocated for a long time now by several High Courts. As per the current
constitutional scheme, English is the official language for higher courts
in India. However, serious concerns are being raised these days for
providing adequate language services in courtrooms for the common litigant.
The idea of prescribing the use of regional language in High Courts has
been pursued by several state governments and now, even the President has
made a strong case for it.

Speaking at a Kerala
<http://www.dailypioneer.com/sports/kerala-play-out-goalless-draw.html>High
Court function last month, President Ram Nath Kovind advocated for a system
where translated local and regional language copies of High Court judgments
are made available to litigants. The President argued that providing
certified translations would benefit litigants who are not conversant in
English, and otherwise would not be able to appreciate the linguistic
nuance of courts that statutes necessitate.

President Kovind's statement echoes a long-standing demand of the
Department of Official Language with regard to the use of regional
languages in High Courts. In February, the Parliamentary Panel on Law and
Justice, in its report presented to the Rajya Sabha, made a strong
recommendation for the use of regional languages in the High Courts. The
Panel's recommendation generated some controversy, as it challenged a
six-decade old convention being followed by the Centre that involves the
Chief Justice of India's assent on this matter.Determining the language of
the courts, Article 348(1) lays down that until Parliament otherwise
provides, proceedings in the Supreme Court and in a High Court are to be in
the English language. As an exception to the above-mentioned general rule,
however, Article 348(2) provides that the Governor of a State, with the
previous consent of the President, may authorize the use of Hindi, or any
other official language of the State, in proceedings in the High Court, but
not with respect to the judgments, decrees and orders passed by it, which
shall be in the English language as required by Article 348(1).Despite the
absence of the requirement of the judiciary's assent in this, the Centre
has repeatedly forwarded such requests to the Chief Justice, who has been
declining them. Two years ago, there were a series of violent incidents in
the Madras High Court premises, where protestors barged into court halls,
demanding that Tamil be made the official language of the Court.

At the heart of this debate lies the fundamental importance of adequate
language services in providing access to justice, a notion interlinked with
linguistic human rights claims.Amartya Sen, in his book, The Idea of
Justice, argued: “What moves us, reasonably enough, to devise so many means
of delivering justice is not the realization that the world falls short of
being completely just — which few of us expect — but that there are clearly
remediable injustices around us which we want to eliminate”.

The issue of language is one which can be clearly characterized as a
remediable injustice. Fair administration of justice and due process
constitutes the central plinth of our constitutional structure. In the
spirit of celebrating the remarkable linguistic diversity of India, the
judicial branch must repose confidence in the functional utility of
regional languages by authorizing their use in High Court. The language
apparatuses at International Courts have shown that it's possible to
incorporate translation services into the courts effectively. The costs are
definitely worth it. Taxpayers should not be compelled to seek private
translating services which enhance the cost of access to justice.

The consequence of continuing with the status quo has been the relative
marginalization of the other official languages. The current language
policy for higher courts has also stunted the development of a legal
vocabulary which otherwise could increase legal literacy. Presently, High
Courts in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Rajasthan, have already
been using Hindi as an optional language. However, for orders/judgments/
decrees passed, even these High Courts are not allowed to use Hindi. A
permanent change in this regard can only be brought about by a
parliamentary legislation. In India, all the scheduled languages enjoy
equality of status and hence, any kind of heavy-handedness should be
discouraged while deliberating upon language policy.

Lack of language access can deprive a person with the essence of justice.
In a multilingual country, intolerance by the judicial system towards
regional languages should not be allowed to remain a norm. It is about time
the Parliament reforms the language policy in our courts. The integrity of
the judicial system is at stake.

*(Prashant Singh is a law student at Jindal Global Law School; Shobhit
Mathur is co-founder and executive**director at Vision India Foundation, a
Delhi based policy research organization.)*

-- 
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+

 Harold F. Schiffman

Professor Emeritus of
 Dravidian Linguistics and Culture
Dept. of South Asia Studies
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305

Phone:  (215) 898-7475
Fax:  (215) 573-2138

Email:  haroldfs at gmail.com
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/

-------------------------------------------------
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/lgpolicy-list/attachments/20171221/0774bfb6/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
_______________________________________________
This message came to you by way of the lgpolicy-list mailing list
lgpolicy-list at groups.sas.upenn.edu
To manage your subscription unsubscribe, or arrange digest format: https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/listinfo/lgpolicy-list