On the side of justice

Many thanks for regularly sending me issues of your magazine, which I receive quite promptly inside Tihar Jail. I have been seeing the issues for over a year and very much appreciate the stance taken by Parsiana against all forms of injustice within our community. Whether it is the question of the ban on priests or the issue of the Russian priest, or the Rohinton Mistry book issue or the Tithal Sanatorium issue, or numerous others, Parsiana has always been standing on the side of justice with those affected. Not only that, Parsiana has also been taking up and presenting democratic causes like on the Bombay Parsi Punchayet (BPP) issue, the election to the BPP and regular coverage of Maja Daruwala’s Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative.

I have been reading about all such issues with interest as also the articles tracing the historical roots of Zoroastrianism. After making the necessary notings, I pass on the magazine to the Tihar Jail Library, which also runs a big Indira Gandhi National Open University center. I am not sure many there would be interested, but it may just find an occasional reader.

It is now one year since you printed the article on my late wife Anuradha, whose third death anniversary fell on April 12. Unfortunately we never read Parsiana in those days, but she too would be impressed by the stand, as she herself was honesty-justice personified.

Not only Parsiana, there seems a very positive atmosphere in the country, with people from unexpected quarters coming forward against corruption and injustice. She would have been thrilled to see the huge response to social reformer Anna Hazare’s campaign, as also the upsurge for activist Binayak Sen’s release. And all this has come at a time when even the Supreme Court, led by the Chief Justice of India (CJI) Sarosh H. Kapadia, is standing up against the powers-that-be.

It is so sad Anuradha is not around to witness the cry for justice from so many varied quarters, as in her times there was much indifference, where even the judiciary, led by a corrupt CJI, bowed before money and power. In those days the cry for justice was a voice in the wilderness; today it is a rising crescendo. Anyhow, every year the Anuradha Memorial Lecture (held this year on January 14) adds its small contribution in this rising wave of justice.

But injustice too continues for the bulk of our people, 80 percent of whom live on a mere Rs 20 per day, and the likes of us who voice their agony. I have now been in jail for over one-and-a-half years and in the Delhi case even the charges have not been framed. It is a means devised to incarcerate one indefinitely, even before proved guilty. And inside jail, there is no status of political prisoner; one is treated like any other criminal. The situation is worse than that of the British Raj. Both judicial and jail systems are designed to destroy one, unless of course one is a Raja.

Anyhow I do spend my time mostly trying to sustain my health, enjoying the company of the birds and the cute squirrels in the compound attached to the ward. It is spring now in Delhi and all sorts of birds are here in gay abandon. The squirrels keep playing around chasing each other, the birds chirp and run around and I mingle in this atmosphere of nature’s freedom, imprisoned by human avarice and restricted by worsening health. But then, the memory of Anuradha gives strength; she too, like the birds and squirrels, was a chirpy soul, full of life, like spring in a rose garden.

Once again allow me to congratulate you on the consistent stand of the magazine for justice and truth.

KOBAD GHANDY

Tihar Jail, Delhi