A few days earlier, Chief Minister Dr Pramod Sawant had spoken of promoting the use of Konkani in the courts in Goa.
India has ‘Official Languages’ at the State and Central levels but there is no one ‘national language.’ Hindi is the official language of the Central government in India, with English as a provisional official sub-language. Individual State legislatures can adopt any regional language as the official language of that State. In subsequent remarks on the Prime Minister’s suggestion, Chief Justice of India N V Ramana said it cannot be done “suddenly” but “over a period of time, I think, it will happen.” He added that this is a serious issue and it will take some time for implementing it citing that there are lots of hurdles, bottlenecks, hiccups in the implementation of regional languages in High Courts.
The Chief Justice of India also mentioned that the time has come for the legal system to introduce local languages in courts. Justice Ramana, who was speaking at the joint conference of Chief Ministers of the all the States and Chief Justices of the High Courts at the Vigyan Bhawan in Delhi, said the practice of law before Constitutional courts should be based on one’s intelligence and understanding of law, and not mere proficiency in language. He also reiterated that he has received several representations for introducing local languages in proceedings before High Courts. The Courts have been using English as their major language since British era. “I think the time has come now to revisit the demand and take it to a logical conclusion. The practice of law before Constitutional courts should be based on one’s intelligence and understanding of law and not mere proficiency in language,” the Chief Justice of India said.
He said he has been a strong proponent of “Indianisation of the justice delivery system”. By Indianisation, he meant increasing accessibility by moulding the system to suit the needs and sensibilities of the Indian population. It calls for inclusivity, providing access to justice, removal of language barriers, reforms in practice and procedure, development of infrastructure, filling up of vacancies, augmenting the strength of the judiciary.
Article 346 of the Indian Constitution recognises Hindi in ‘Devanagiri’ script as the official language of Union government. The Constitution also allows for the continuation of use of the English language for official purposes. Article 345 provides constitutional recognition as ‘Official languages’ of the Union to any language adopted by a State legislature as the official language of that state. Until the 21st amendment of the Constitution in 1967, the country recognised fourteen official regional languages. The Eighth Schedule and the 71st amendment provided for the inclusion of Sindhi, Konkani, Manipuri and Nepali, increasing the number of official regional languages of India to 18. Individual States, whose borders are mostly drawn on socio-linguistic lines, are free to decide their own language for internal administration and education. In 2004, the government elevated Tamil to the newly created official status of ‘Classical Language,’ followed by Sanskrit in 2005.
The Constitution of India now recognises 23 languages, spoken in different parts of the country. These consist of English plus 22 Indian languages which are Assamese, Bengali, Bodo, Dogri, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Meitei, Marathi, Nepali, Oriya, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Santhali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu. While Hindi is an official language of the States of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Uttaranchal, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chattisgarh, Himachal Pradesh, Haryana and the National Capital Territory of Delhi, Tamil is an official language of Tamil Nadu, Puducherry and Andaman Nicobar Islands. English is the co-official language of the Indian Union, and each of the several States mentioned above may also have another co-official language.
The Indian judiciary has been primarily using English from the British era as their main language for arguments in the Court and delivery of order. In judicial matters language does matter for those seeking and delivering justice. It is also a matter of great importance for those who are required to implement the Court orders. Normally, the local or regional language is seen to be easily understood and it requires less intervention of translators. Any move to bring in local or regional language in the function of judiciary will surely help understand the justice seekers easier and the language barrier will be broken for good.
