THE country was stunned by the remarks of two Bombay High Court judges. Justices Ravindra Ghuge and Gautam Ankhad, in a display of self-styled wisdom, delivered an astonishing rebuke while dismissing a petition filed by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), which sought permission to protest the genocide in Gaza perpetrated by Israel. From the Bench of the Bombay High Court, they asked the petitioner to “show patriotism for the citizens of our own country first.” In a patronising tone, they added, “Our country has enough issues to deal with. We do not want anything like this. I’m sorry to say that you are short-sighted. You are looking at Gaza and Palestine while neglecting what’s happening here. Why don’t you do something for your own country? Look at your own country,” and further added, “Be patriots. This is not patriotism.”
Enamoured by their own self-righteousness, the judges went on to point: “You don’t know the dust it could kick up. Getting on to the Palestine side or the Israel side. Why do you want to do this? It’s obvious, going by the party you represent, that you don’t understand what this could do to the foreign affairs of the country.” They continued: “You are an organisation registered in India. If you could take up issues like garbage dumping, pollution, sewerage, flooding. We are just giving examples. You are not protesting on those, but on something happening thousands of miles away from the country.”
Sadly, the judges appeared unaware of the history of India’s freedom struggle, or of the consistent foreign policy position taken by successive Indian governments in support of the Palestinian cause. They seemed blissfully ignorant of India’s longstanding solidarity with the Palestinian people in their legitimate struggle for freedom and their right to a homeland – land that has been systematically and continuously alienated by Israel over decades. They were equally oblivious to the growing international condemnation of the horrific genocide in Gaza – reflected by the considered views of the International Court of Justice and various bodies of the United Nations. Even governments in western countries, including France, have come under domestic pressure to speak out against Israel’s grotesque actions aimed at starving the people of Gaza into submission, in blatant violation of the UN Charter on Human Rights.
Now, even the Indian government has been compelled to acknowledge the severity of the genocide. On July 23, 2025, India’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations in New York stated, “The health and education situation is particularly troubling. WHO estimates that around 95 per cent of all hospitals in Gaza are damaged or destroyed. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights reports that more than 650,000 children have had no schooling for over 20 months.” So, it was not that the protest was “kicking up dust” over foreign policy – as Judges Ghuge and Ankhad felt – but rather that the government itself was biting the dust in the face of an undeniable humanitarian catastrophe.
It was not merely concern for foreign policy that drove the judges’ remarks; their outburst was clearly shaped by an anti-Communist mindset. Otherwise, they would have recognised that the very issues they so condescendingly suggested – such as garbage management, flooding, or pollution – are the basic issues taken up by Communists. CPI(M) activists are engaged daily in such struggles on the ground. But activism on local issues does not negate the fundamental right to protest and express solidarity on matters of global injustice – rights that are enshrined in the Indian Constitution.
In fact, the framers of our Constitution, through the Constituent Assembly, placed paramount importance on the clear separation of powers between the three organs of the State – the legislature, executive, and judiciary. In this context, Dr B R Ambedkar, while speaking during the Constituent Assembly Debates on December 10, 1948, discussing Article 50 concerning the question of resolving the idea of independence of judiciary, remarked, “With regard to the question of separating the Executive from the Judiciary, as I said, there is no difference of opinion and that proposition, in my judgement, we are committed to by the article that we have passed, and which is now forming part of the Directive Principles.” Further reinforcing this principle on May 24, 1949, Ambedkar declared, “There can be no difference of opinion in the House that our judiciary must both be independent of the executive and must also be competent in itself.”
Sadly, in these dark times we are confronted by not just the symptoms of the aberration demonstrated by the judges of Bombay High Court ‘whose ‘competence in itself’ is under a question, but also by certain orders of even the apex court. The judgement on the Ayodhya question or the usurpation of the rights of the people of J&K of statehood or the weaponising of the ED in validating the amendment to PMLA underline these ominous impulses. From the lower courts to the highest Court, we face the phenomenon of the judiciary falling to impulses for transforming itself to become ‘executive’ and even ‘committed’.
We cannot afford to forget the lessons of history, for to do so is to risk repeating them. This is where the Nuremberg Laws become alarmingly relevant. Enacted in Nazi Germany in 1935, these antisemitic laws stripped Jewish citizens of their rights and excluded them from civil and public life. While not judicial decrees in themselves, they fundamentally altered the administration of justice. The Nazi regime co-opted the legal system to persecute Jews and other minorities, and the German judiciary – save for a few brave exceptions – largely complied. Judges and prosecutors enforced these discriminatory laws, abandoning legal principles in favour of political expediency and state ideology.
Today, we face a similar threat to our democratic and secular republic from the vicious advance of Hindutva ideology. It aims to impose a majoritarian, fascistic order that seeks to transform the entire State. This threatens each of the organs including the judiciary. Therefore, we can ignore this only at our own peril. As one observer chillingly noted, “when the courts begin to use the logic of Hindutva, it is time to worry – it means the water has already gone above our heads.” Unless we confront and reverse this threat, we end up being strangulated.
(August 30, 2025)
