Justice For All

It was with great interest that I read an opinion piece in The Hindu this week, Making The Law Easier For the Common Man. It is one of the most encouraging ideas for increasing access to justice that I have encountered in some time.

The article is about Restatement, a process by which a committee of Supreme Court judges, lawyers, and academics look at all the statutes and judgements related to a particular subject and redraft them in layman’s language, simplifying and clarifying them into a single volume. Yes, that’s right. I’m excited about a book of legal text.

I’m excited about it because it won’t read like legal text. At least, it won’t read like so much of the currently indecipherable law that is totally inaccessible to most citizens. Even lawyers struggle to wade through the numerous volumes, archaic language, contradictory precedents, and ambiguous judgements around complex legal issues. What hope then for the common man with little education but a great need for justice?

Enter Restatement. Now, for the first time, there will be an easy to read, easy to understand, accessible volume that clarifies the legal situation for all people. This is important because if people are unable to even understand what the law says, then it is obviously impossible for them to appeal to the law for justice. Such a situation makes justice available only to those rich enough to pay well-educated lawyers to do work on their behalf. Most people are left behind.

The other really exciting thing about this initiative is that it has all been done without any public money. This isn’t a government program, paid for by taxpayers. This is, rather, a voluntary, cooperative effort among concerned experts, consultants, and publishers, who have identified a need and developed a creative way to address it. They aren’t going to fix the entire legal system of India, and they aren’t trying to, but they have identified one particular area where they can have meaningful impact.

I love how this whole project, at every level, empowers people. It empowers everyone who will be more able to take an active role in ensuring justice and equal treatment under the law because they will be better able to understand the relevant legal statutes. But it also empowers those experts who have seen a problem with the complexity of law and figured out a solution. It’s people helping themselves and each other, not the government dolling out favours.

I hope we’ll see more of this sort of thing. I hope more citizens will come up with creative solutions to the problems they see around them. And I hope that this particular project will extend justice to more Indians, creating a more just society for us all.