Activist Judge Krishna Iyer is 96 – may you live long!
54 Years ago, he was a Minister in the First Communist Government in Kerala. Fate brought him to the the Supreme Court Bench and since then judicial writing has been elevated to a standard hard to reach and impossible to surpass.
The Judge is exalted as law giver and Prophet in the Temple of Justice. He must have the wisdom of Solomon, the moral vision of Isiah, the analytic power of Socrates, the intellect creativity of Aristotle, the humanity of Lincoln and Gandhi, and the impartiality of the Almighty.
Measured by these expectations every Judge is something of a disappointment. But it seems there are three exceptions.
++ Late Lord Denning in England
++ Late Justice Douglas of the United States Supreme Court
++ Justice Krishna Iyer
He once told the Chief Justice, “one great lesson that appointing authorities must remember is that a person who is not able to weep at the sight of human suffering and respond with quick compassionate action should not be chosen as a Judge".
Born in a traditional brahmin family, Justice Iyer once held, “Daily trivial differences get dissolved in the course of time and may be treated as the teething trouble of early matrimonial adjustment. While the stream of life, lived in married mutuality may wash away small pebbles what is to happen if intransigent incompatibility of minds breaks up the flow of the stream? In such a situation we have the breakdown of a marriage itself and the only course left open is for law to recognize what is a fact and accord a divorce”.
“While there is no rose but has a thorn, if what you hold, and no rose, better to throw it away”.
"Islamic finance has proven successful in poverty alleviation and promoting sustainable growth in many countries, including the United States, and it is very relevant in our country where 20 million people are starving,"
Yesterday at the birthday function, Chief Justice of India Justice Kapadia said he had never dreamt that he would one day be sitting with Justice Iyer!