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That was the essence of a lecture by chairman of the Press Council of India Justice (retd) Markandey Katju — recently in news for expressing his not-so-flattering views on the media — at Jawaharlal Nehru University on Monday. ‘
He saw this “extremely traumatic and agonising” transition — from the largely feudal society to a modern, industrial one — to be over in about 15-20 years.
Katju, who was the author of many landmark judgments in the Supreme Court, said judges had to play a special role during these turbulent times as they formed the only pillar of democracy that was not tied to “vote bank considerations” and did not have to pander to political masters.
“The judge must do whatever is in the national interest,” Katju said.
“Our country is in great distress. There are huge problems, relating to poverty, unemployment, price rise, healthcare, education... massive problems facing the country. Every patriotic Indian must come forward and contribute...,” he said.
Katju was speaking on the subject “What is India” while delivering the eighth Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial lecture. He dwelt at length on India’s glorious past, often inviting big applause from the students and teaching community.
Katju said the only way to regain India’s past glory was through rapid industrialisation and modernisation. “Unfortunately, the intellectual level of a majority of our countrymen is very low,” he remarked.
“We must promote rational ideas, scientific ideas and junk outdated, backward and feudal ideas. That is what I call being modern. If you want to win the respect of the rest of the world, then we must modernise our society and go for more industrialisation. The worst thing in this world is poverty,” Katju said.
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hi, all indians--pl be VERY careful of justice markandey katju. he seems to be heading for a magsaysay award. i pity all the indians who were victims of this man's judgements. capt ajit vadakayil ..
The intellectual level of an ordinary Indian is good,only the politicians intellectual level very low.
What can you expect???? When the leader of the ruling party is a professional waitress and the next in line is a dimwit who failed even an economic planning for the future course...
Justice Katju is absolutely right. By paying so much attention to what he is saying, and by interviewing him so much, the media have proved that they deserve to be censored. Let's start by censoring all Katju interviews. One doesn't become an "intellectual" just by quoting a poem or naming a European scholar. I find Katju's constant attempts at appearing to be "intellectual" quite vulgar. Many Nobel laureates are far humbler than he is. Scholars of history and philosophy don't brag about their "knowledge" quite to the same extent. His ideas too are foolish, laughable. To call thinkers like Rousseau "journalists" is ludicrous. To compare print journalism to broadcast journalism is pointless - print trumps broadcast any day, but perhaps someone should tell Katju that they didn't have television back in feudal Europe? And should somebody tell Katju about the Arab Spring? Maybe he should focus a little less on his cursory knowledge of "history" (read: delusion), and focus on the present
How can any man in his senses say that the transition from "feudal society" to "modern, industrial society" will be complete in 15-20 years? Forget the over-simplified dichotomy which this man pulled out of his bottom, how the hell did he come up with 15-20 year timeline? People have been trying to understand the differences between East and West for thousands of years and this "intelligent" man reduced it to "feudal" Vs "modern, industrial"? Why cant a society be both? Whats "modern" and "industrial"? A society that discriminates against Blacks is modern? A society that commits genocide (Jewish or Nuclear) is modern? Industrial perhaps? It is clear that Markandey Katju has succeeded in completely brain-washing himself by reading western literature. I wonder how many judgements made by western justices he copied while judging cases in India. Thats what scares me the most - how did this colonial coolie become Supreme Court Justice and how much damage did he do to India in his tenure.
This is one of the most relevant articles I have read - but are we listening?