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5th International Conference of Chief Justices of the WorldAddress byHon'ble Mr Justice A.K. MathurJudge, Supreme Court of IndiaI shall begin my address with the expression from Indian scripture i.e. “Om Shanti—Om Shanti— Om Shanti”, the expression here ‘Om Shanti’ is a message to the worldthat ‘Let the peace prevail all over the world’. Article 51 of the Constitution of India isnothing but a manifestation of the Indian habitat and culture. Right from the beginningIndia is propagating a message of peace. I’ll take you back to heritage and ancient history,the ‘Bhagwad Gita’ that forms Magnus Opus epic of Hindu religion and accepted allover the world, that is, it contains a universal truth. The ‘Gita’ says and gives the messageof peace for all mankind. Looking back to the Indian history, the first name that comes tomy mind is Ashoka the Great. There are very few emperors in the world who are designatedas ‘Great’. Ashoka after seeing the devastation of the Kalinga war, renounced wars andtook up the path of peace. He spread the message all over the world through Buddhism.Today, Buddhism has been accepted world over as a religion that preaches non violence and peace.Hon’ble Mr Justice A.K. Mathur, Judge,Supreme Court of India addressing theConferenceFrom Buddhism I come straight to the 19th century where Mahatma Gandhi the ‘Father of the Nation’ spread the messageof peace. Gandhi’s philosophy was that through the peaceful and non violence means India can achieve independence. ThisMessage of peace is now incorporated in Article 51 of Constitution as one of our foreign policy. The foreign policy of Indiais committed to the world peace and infact if we go back to history of incorporation of Article 51 in the Constitution, itrelates back to the 30th November 1939, the famous Havana conference. In the constituent assembly a draft wasprepared and sent to the assembly which reads “That state shall promote International peace and security by elimination ofwar as an instrument of national policy by the prescription of the open, just and honorable relations between nations by thefirm establishment of understanding of international law as actual rule of conduct among the government and by the maintenanceof justice and scrupulous respect for treaty obligation in dealings of organized people with one another.” This was themoving spirit based on the Havana conference which was delivered to the constituent assembly and keeping in thatbackground, the Article 51 came to be incorporated in Indian Constitution and I will quote Ambedkar who said withregards to the incorporation of this article “that the proposition contained in the new article are so simple it seems to besuperb arrogation to try to explain them to the house by any lengthy speech for the whole thing was summarized and whatmessage was given to our constituent assembly and on that background this article was incorporated which contains thetruth of life that if one want to survive in this world then it is only peace and non-violence methods that can take the worldto the advancement” .Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru took the message of the peace all over the world and implemented this article in letter and spirit andbelieved that peace should prevail all over the world. There should be harmony between mankind and territorial borders ofthe country should not endanger the peace and brotherhood. India has good fast track for this and after independence ofthe country we first took them to China, in ‘Panchsheel’—where the five principles were initiated and one of them was tomaintain peace and harmony between the nations. Therefore India has always been avotary of the peace. India had always maintained a cordial relation with the nations andrespected International Law and treaty obligations in all spheres. Even Indian courts havealways respected the International Law so long as it was not in conflict with the laws of thecountry.Hon’ble Mr Justice A.K. Mathur, Judge,Supreme Court of India being welcomeat Lucknow Airport upon arrivalIndia has adopted various international conventions incorporating legislation in order toeffectively implement them and I shall refer to some of the Acts. The first and foremost thatcomes to my mind is the Protection of Human Rights Act of 1993. The said act wasenacted in pursuance of International Convention for Civil and Political Right and human--42--
Hon’ble Mr Justice A.K. Mathur, Judge,Supreme Court of India receiving theConference Mementoaspiration adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations on 16-12-1966.The Human Rights Commission at the national level and at the state level in our countryis effectively performing and I would say very yeomen’s service being dispensed by thisinstitution. Next, that comes especially with the regard to retarded children, the IndianParliament also enacted Acts, ‘Persons with Disabilities, Equal Protection, Protectionof Rights and Full Participation Act 1995’ in pursuance of the Convention held at theAsian-Pacific Decade of the Disabled Persons convened by the Economic and SocialCommission for Asian and Pacific Region held in Beijing on 1st December 1992. Indiawas signatory to the said convention and it was declared that States should be responsiblefor the prevention of disabilities, protection of human rights, provisions for medical care,education, training, employment and rehabilitation of persons with disabilities and toremove discrimination against the persons with disabilities in sharing development benefits and to counteract any situationof abuse and exploitation of the persons. Therefore the concern of India for the human development is fully reflected byparticipating in this convention and implementing the same in India by enacting the aforesaid Act. Next, India is alsoconcerned about the environment to which reference was made, that humanity can live peacefully and without violating andendangering the laws of nature in any moment. The Environment Protection Act 1986 was enacted to give effect to thedecision of UN Conference on Human Environment at Stockholm. Similarly, also a Wildlife Protection Act was amendedand specially in order to give a boost to the maintenance of flora and fauna of India, the conviction on international trade inendangered species of wild flora and fauna, imposing complete ban on trade in ivory including imported African ivory toprotect the Indian elephant. That was a review to show that the Constitution of India respects the International Conventions,enacted laws so as to enforce the international conventions in India.Some of the international crimes which have been out to destroy the humanity, have also been taken care of by IndianParliament and to counter the same a law was enacted, known as ‘Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act1985’. This was enacted in pursuance of the Convention of the Psychotropic Substances of 1971. The drugs is a greatestmenace of the century and this would destroy the very existence of humanity if it is not checked in time. This evoked a greatresponse in India and the Parliament without any delay enacted the Act of 1985 to check this menace. Similarly, conventionwhich brings people together was also jeopardized by the act of unlawful activities of the people. Therefore, the Suppressionof Unlawful act against the safety of Civil Aviation 1982 was enacted to give effect to Convention on suppression ofunlawful acts and safety of civil aviation known as Montreal Convention of 1971. And then there was another enactmentto which I shall refer. That was the Anti Apartheid Act and punishment for the same. Then there was another enactmentwith regard to suppression of crimes against child. Therefore we can enumerate any number of enactments which theIndian Parliament has passed respecting international conventions. India has been always respectful to the internationalconventions and we have, as far as possible, tried to enact municipal laws in order to enforce international conventions. TheIndian record, one can say with greatest pride, is the greatest contributor for the development of international understandingand cooperating with the international conventions. These are only some of the conventions that I have brought to yournotice but at the same time I may also remind you that Indian courts are also very very active in enforcing internationalconventions. And in that regard especially I shall refer to a recent decision regarding checking the degradation of theenvironment and the illegal activities of the people who are out to destroy our environment and the flora and fauna. InVellore Citizen Welfare Forum Vs Government of India, 1996 1st Supreme Court pages 6-7, Your Lordship accepting theinternational concept of sustained development held that the traditional concept that development and ecology were opposedto each other is no longer acceptable, that sustained development is the answer. In the international sphere sustaineddevelopment is a concept that came to be known for the first time in the Stockholm Declaration of 1972. Thereafter in1987 the concept had been given a definite shape and World Commission on Environment and Development in its reportcalled “Our Common Future” the Commission has been chaired by the Prime Minister of Norway and as such, the reporthas been popularly known as the Brookland Report. All those conventions which go for development of the humanity havebeen respected by India and especially the Article 51 of the Constitution is a great saviour for the mankind and for restoringpeace and for maintaining peace and harmony. It is a different matter that the United Nations has failed, but we must keep--43--
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