Embarking on a tricky mission

JUSTICE GITA MITTAL

Recently appointed Chief Justice of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court, the first woman to achieve this honour, Justice Gita Mittal is known to always have been true to her calling.

Having completed her initial education from the Lady Shriram College in Delhi University, as a young woman, Mittal enrolled to study law at the Campus Law Centre of Delhi University. She began practising law in 1981. Now, more than 35 years later, she has become the Chief Justice of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court. She has picked up awards — not without controversy — and learning on the way but has consistently earned kudos for both her consideration and compassion towards the victims of injustice.

First the controversy. She became the first woman from the field of law and justice to be conferred the Nari Shakti Puraskar, India's highest civilian honour for women, instituted by the Ministry of Woman and Child Welfare. She received the award from President Ram Nath Kovind in 2018. The Nari Shakti award is presented for exemplary service to the cause of upliftment of women. The prize is just ~100,000. But should a sitting judge have accepted an award from a government in power? Does this not constitute a conflict of interest? Top lawyers had their own views on this, especially as no sitting judge has been considered for this honour. Former CJIs P N Bhagwati and M N Venkatachalaiah were awarded Padma Vibhushan only after they retired. Another former CJI JS Verma was conferred on Padma Bhushan posthumously but his family declined the award.

Another controversy found itself in the newspapers, via an anonymous letter supposedly from a litigant, accusing her of sitting on court work and delaying orders. The answer to this came in the form of a letter of support signed by a panoply of senior lawyers, challenging the veracity of these allegations and acknowledging her work.

Mittal’s contribution is especially significant in the area of child and women abuse cases. The Vulnerable Witness Courtroom Project was initially designed for the Delhi trial courts and later, as the outline for a witness protection set up. Justice Mittal was the chairperson of the committee that designed the project to provide protection, privacy, confidentiality and comfort to vulnerable witnesses in an in-camera atmosphere in sexual offence cases. This was in her capacity as acting Chief Justice after the retirement of Justice G Rohini in April 2017 and also earlier, as chairman of the court committees on the Delhi High Court’s Mediation Centre. She has written extensively on access to justice; protection of human rights; the impact of incarceration on women; the death penalty; the impact of religion, culture, on justice and other social issues.

The mission she is now going to fulfil is a tricky one. Jammu and Kashmir has a variety of grievances relating to religion, race and perceived discrimination. It is also a state torn apart by violence and it is an established fact that it is women and children who are doubly cursed by violence. It is the state which is expected to act in loco parentis and when it fails in its responsibility, society has to pay for the consequences. Mittal will have to bring to bear all that her insights into law relating to women and children have brought her, to empathically resolve the problem of families.

There are other problems, the enormity of which needs only one example. Two years ago, the Supreme Court struck down and termed ‘wholly erroneous’, an order of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court on the remit of the Securitisation and Reconstruction of Financial Assets and Enforcement of Security Interest Act, 2002.

The Supreme Court set aside the High Court verdict that had held that any law made by Parliament, which affects the laws made by the state legislature, cannot be extended to Jammu and Kashmir. “The High Court judgment begins from the wrong end and therefore, reaches the wrong conclusion. It states that in terms of Section 5 of the Constitution of Jammu and Kashmir, the State has absolute sovereign power to legislate in respect of laws touching the rights of its permanent residents qua their immovable properties,” the SC said.

It further said: “We may also add that permanent residents of Jammu and Kashmir are citizens of India, and there is no dual citizenship.”

It is knotty problems like this one that Justice Gita Mittal will have to resolve. Not an easy job!

The first woman Chief Justice of the J&K High Court, Justice Gita Mittal is known for her compassion towards the victims of injustice