Law in a democracy: an eventual choice between elective dictatorship or mob justice?

As a lawyer, one is hardwired to distinguish between what is legal and what is illegal. One is hardwired to defend those who society may view as despicable for their actions, which may be repugnant to one's sensibilities, but are not illegal. After all, as defenders of democracy, lawyers are hardwired to jealously defend the rule of law, against the rule of sentiment. Aren't we?

temporarily suspending the blog

Dear reader,

There are several stories that I want to write right now. And there is so much to think about. Alas, time is a scarce resource. I will temporarily be suspending this blog to dedicate myself to my PhD thesis, the deadline for which inches closer. It appears there will not be much I will write this year, and perhaps also a part of next year.

-Dhruv

Racist Gandhi?

Recently, I invited a Donald Trump admirer (who has the honesty to admit that she would have voted for certain elected dictators had she lived in those times) to read Gandhi's 'The Story of My Experiments with Truth'. But she said it was too long for her. So she tried German Wikipedia instead. Soon I received a text message from him: "Hey Dhruv, I have read the part where he is in South Africa - he seems to be a thorough racist."  She followed it up by some corroboratory evidence in an email which said: "They must have read Wilipedia: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-34265882".

an exceptional traffic story (the discovery of India road trip)

22 December 2015

Fabian was very keen to visit one of the waterfalls near Khajuraho, but Tim was not, since he wanted to write postcards. So Fabian, Joline and I decided to go. The drive lasted a couple of hours, but we never made it to the waterfalls. We did not correctly insert the address in the GPS device, and it took us to the end of the street on which our Ashram was situated. But that part of the street was perhaps the most chaotic little street I had seen. Scores of motorbikes, bicycles, feral cattle, bullock carts, busses, hand carts, hawkers selling vegetables. So we decided to properly enter the address for the waterfalls in the GPS device and we were set in motion. Very slowly.

Khajuraho (the discovery of India road trip)

22 December 2015

Of all the places we have visited so far, Khajuraho was the most overrated destination so far. I had expected to discover many more nuances about this city and its culture, but it seems to me that there isn’t much more than what has been published about it already. The only other culture on display was one in which touts chased tourists to sell their wares. The city is essentially a dust bowl, and a few temples from the Chandela Empire. The temples are pretty, no doubt, but the few that have remained have been so overexposed that there is almost no sculpture one hadn’t seen before in pictures. The sculpture of Varaha – the third avatar of Vishnu as a wild boar – was most impressive. One that I had not seen before, the sculpture was a stylised representation of a boar. The stone is minutely sculpted to bear distinct representations of about a thousand gods, goddesses over its body.

Koliwada (the discovery of India road trip)

Sunday, 13 December 2015

Incredible as it was, the last bit of the lawsuit work had spilled over, and I had to go to notarise my affidavit at 08:30, this morning – a Sunday morning. But once this was done, it was done, and finally, we were able to go to Elephanta. It took us all day and we took one of the last ferries back to Bombay. We were rather tired and hungry when we returned home at about 19:00.

Salty breeze from the Arabian Sea & Prince of Wales Museum (the discovery of India road trip)

Writing from memory at dawn on 18 December 2015

Friday, 11 December 2015

I am a witness for my father in a court case, and I was supposed to spend the morning at the lawyers’ offices. The plan was to thereafter visit the Elephanta Caves, and see some of old Bombay. However, the morning extended into the evening, and I returned home only at about 18:30. I was afraid that JF&T would be bored, and annoyed with me. But it seemed they were quite happy to have found the time to relax, and recover from the fatigue.