Questioning what he termed as a “different interpretation of same letter” by the Supreme Court of India, Bihar Governor Rajendra Arlekar said that the court punished Manish Kashyap for spreading fake news and spared the Editors’ Guild for a similar offence.
“We all are pained when we come to know that one person who comes before the Supreme Court was denied relief and some other person comes on the same ground is given the relief. This has happened in Manish Kashyap’s case. He [Mr. Kashyap] was told that he had circulated fake news and he was punished for that. But when the Editors’ Guild [members] went to Manipur and came up with different notions, with the very same fake news, the Supreme Court gave them the relief... I think the Supreme Court should have taken into consideration human values, fundamental values and not fundamental duties and rights. It happens many times. We cannot interpret properly. Our interpretation differs every time. Why this different interpretation of the same letter? Because we have not understood the spirit behind the letter. We have not understood the values behind the letter,” Mr Arlekar said in his presidential remarks at Advocate B.B. Deshpande Memorial Oration organised at S.M. Pundit Rangamandir in Kalaburagi on Saturday.
He made the remarks when he was stressing the need to properly understand the meaning, and not just reading the letters, of any texts. Supreme Court Judge Justice Arvind Kumar, who delivered the B.B. Deshpande Memorial Oration, was present.
The event, Advocate B.B. Deshpande Memorial Oration Series, was organised in association with Vijnaneshwara Pratisthan Trust, Martur.
Dwelling deep into the universal human values, Mr Arlekar said that human rights and duties were state-specific which could be different from one country to another whereas the human values were universal which would be the same everywhere.
“Fundamental rights and duties are codified. But fundamental values are not codified. Human rights and duties can be codified as they are State-specific. They could be different from one country to another. But human values cannot be State-specific. They cannot be Constitution-specific. They are the same everywhere. In our country, human values are codified not in books but in our minds and culture. They are progressing for thousands of years,” Mr. Arlekar said.
Former Rajya Sabha member and the head of Vijnaneshwara Pratisthan Trust, Basavaraj Patil Sedam, Karnataka State Law University Vice-Chancellor C. Basavaraju and others were present.
