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Tuesday, July 21, 2015

My comment on Wall Street Journal's blog post yesterday."Corruption Allegations Look Set to Disrupt Narendra Modi’s Agenda". I await its publication.

I notice that I am the first to comment.

No surprise, given that the Indian state appears to be staring into the abyss of illegitimacy, that her doltish and corrupt ruling classes have driven her into.

Anybody with even an iota of constitutional sense would have realised by now that the NDA campaign was fuelled by lies.

That India's political system has abused the amenities of a republic to such extreme dysfunction that people can do no more than roll their eyes and change the subject.

Narendra  Modi came to power promising good governance.

Good governance sans legitimacy? Good governance where satraps suspected of stunning venality and heinous crimes bulldoze a rotted and delegitimized  ‘opposition’ ?

Scary!

Since the last couple of years, I have intimated the Rashtrapathi, Prime Minister's Office and the Supreme Court of India about a corrupt judge in the Supreme Court.  http://goo.gl/uDFdr   http://goo.gl/WNw1e 
 
Little has happened  !

Corruption is a well organised conspiracy of silence. Whistleblowers risk their lives. Many are killed.

For close to three decades I have, as an unsupported, conscientious citizen written about, demonstrated and organised against corruption.

Oddly, India's editorial classes have been most prominent among those who have disparaged and muffled my efforts.

Emboldened by the corruption of the Press, the Judiciary, Rashtrapathi Bhavan, the Prime Minister's Office the Chief Information Commissioner and State Information Commissioner have all actively and maliciously conspired to violate my rights, humiliate and hound me.

The Government  and judiciary have dodged my various Right To Information petitions.

A massive, close to three decade long demonstration of the miredness, impotence and destructiveness of India's powers that be.

A former Governor , who I had petitioned for help, turned around and instigated my Apartments' Association to cut off my water supply.

Since April 5 2002, I have had to physically fetch water for my flat every other day .

Prasar Bharathi abused a stretched judiciary by pursuing a silly, motivated litigation that it has continued for decades.

In other words, it is impossible to earn an honest living in India today.

Riches beyond the dreams of avarice, such as for instance, showered on the players and hustlers of cricket, await those willing to violate India's trust.

My "no excuses", ultra peaceful, non partisan, individual sathyagraha against corruption and for the idea of the rule of law in India.  httphttp://goo.gl/qZup7   http://bit.ly/orCEMV


Now in its 25th year.

Monday, May 25, 2015

You failed once and you are failing again. My letter to Shri Bandaru Dattatreya Garu. He has not replied.





Shri Bandaru Dattatreya,
Minister of State (Independent Charge) 
for Labour & Employment
Government of India.                                                                                                        11/18/14


Dear Shri Dattatreya Garu,

I am delighted to convey my heartiest congratulations to you on your well deserved elevation to the Union cabinet.

I have no doubt that with your deep experience and grass roots political reach you would be a valuable asset to the Hon'ble Prime Minister's team .

There is a clear consensus that the massive mandate for the present government is because the people of India and the world at large are exasperated by the huge delays, damage and injustices caused by rampant and pervasive corruption of India's political economy.

During the previous NDA regime, our then AP contingent, including Shri Ch Vidyasagara Rao Garu, Late Shri Bangaru Laxman Garu and your kind self had valiantly tried to ensure that I received a modicum of justice for the gratuitous harassment at the hands of Doordarshan, because of my resistance to, by now well documented, corrupt mores of the Doorsdarshan management.





You had been kind enough to convey me to the late Shri Pramod Mahajan's official residence in your official car and introduce me to him, but he chose to snub all of us.

In other words,while the efforts of the Andhra Pradesh contingent of BJP on my behalf, were undoubtedly, sincere, gracious, memorable and exemplary, they failed.

You failed not because you were wrong, but because you were absolutely and unequivocally right.

You were defeated by forces that were immensely more powerful than you.

Those "Shining India" forces were in turn, decisively repudiated by the people of India and by other circumstances.

I was, unfortunately, in contrast to the earlier enthusiasm,  left to wage a lonely battle , against the prevalent idea that "corruption is a way of life" in India.

And I did that. 

Corruption is a conspiracy of silence.

I have been among the very few Indians, who have written, demonstrated and campaigned against my horrendous mistreatment by Doodrdarshan and all the other authorities in India, the Press, the judiciary, and thus non cooperated against corruption.



You, Shri Vidysagar Rao Garu and others are personally aware that I have had to pay a massive price for my sane, loving, autonomous but lonely stand against corruption.

It is a reflection of the horrifyingly perverse conditions prevailing in our beloved country, that I have been humiliated to the extent of having my water supply cut , encouraged by none other than the Governor of AP's office, since 2002 !


Much has changed since then. The people of India have demonstrated their revulsion against corruption in many ways. 

I hardly need to point out that the mandate that you have received dictates, that the prompt and just resolution of my case, ought to be at the top of your agenda.

You'll recall that in our last meeting a couple of weeks ago in Hyderabad, you  had, despite being aware of my presence, made me cool my heels for hours.

Most unfortunate and quite a contrast to the Dattatreya Garu that I had known .





Finally,you had instructed your assistant, that a proper appointment be fixed -  I had even then, come only with the prior consent of your assistants - in order that we are able to resolve the issues that have been pending since your previous tenure in Delhi.

Alas, I have not heard from you since.

I hope I have been able to clarify the situation as it exists today.

I look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience.

With warm regards, I am,

yours sincerely,

Divakar S Natarajan

Thursday, April 30, 2015

Urge Pope Francis to abandon the canonization of Junipero Serra.

I signed a petition initiated by the The California Indian Environmental Alliance with the following statement:


I am a Hindu Indian.


A member of a non white, non Abrahamic, Dharmic civilisation that has made immeasurably rich contributions to guide and inspire humanity.


However, it has also suffered immensely from mercenary and racist invasions, enslavement, loot and pillaging for which both Islam and Christianity have provided religious cover.


Noteworthy, that these actions of unspeakable insanity were rationalised by the vandals as civilising missions.


Even as they looted and attempted to destroy a magnificent civilisation, they presented themselves as saviours.


Indians were in the words of a popular writer of his time, "The White Man's Burden".


As a survivor of successive holocausts of invasion and colonialism, I have a solemn moral obligation, to my wise and heroic ancestors and to our beloved children, to ensure that such horrors would never engulf humanity again.


Alas, the powerful Roman Catholic Church with its immense illegitimate wealth, its multi national organisation and its mesmerising religious cachet appears to suffer no such scruples.


Motivated by a shockingly myopic, parochial and divisive political intent and displaying a most disturbing madness, it seeks to abuse its immense power by brushing aside and trampling over the dignity and humanity of those valiant and vital few who have survived its depredations.


What an obscene picture !


This corrupt and ugly behemoth that has in one stroke revived memories of some of the most vicious cruelties of White Christian Supremacist savagery.


The Vatican cannot by any enlightened standard of ethics and morality be allowed to prevail.


All conscientious citizens must consider this savage obduracy of this putatively religious organisation as a personal affront to their dignity and to the safety, sanity and fearless, loving essence of their children.


They must do everything in their power to stop this brutality in its tracks and show Vatican a way out of its noisome mental cloisters.


Junipero Serra belongs in a dark and forgettable dustbin of history. And there he must be allowed to lie.

He has little to offer the future.

The following is an invitation to you to sign the petition.

Hi, 

As Native Californians, descendants of Mission Indians, we ask Pope Francis to abandon his plan to declare Junipero Serra a Saint. Pope Francis has indicated that he "Values Human Life" yet our people were suppressed, dominated and enslaved by Serra and considered collateral damage to the Church. This plan will not celebrate Hispanics (since Serra and his Soldiers were foreign invaders), welcome Native Peoples back to the Catholic Church, or honor our ancestors. It will re-awaken the post Inquisition, Doctrine of Discovery; a very dark, and brutal time in the history of the Catholic Church and Civilization. 

The passage of time has not made the reality of dominations and genocide of Indigenous Californians go away, nor has it made the Mastermind of the brutal Mission system a Saint. We respectfully ask you to urge the Pope to vacate this plan and open a meaningful dialogue with California Nations. We do not want an apology, rather, we need tangible policies from the Church to abandon the Papal Bulls the Doctrine of Discovery and to recognize the inhumane treatment of our ancestors. Abandoning the canonization of Junipero Serra is the first step. 

That's why I signed a petition to His Holiness, Pope Francis, which says:

"Pope Francis is coming to Washington, D.C., to canonize Junipero Serra as a Saint. It is imperative he is enlightened to understand that Father Serra was responsible for the deception, exploitation, oppression, enslavement and genocide of thousands of Indigenous Californians, ultimately resulting in the largest ethnic cleansing in North America. 

The reality of the California Mission system has yet to be accurately taught in California schools or recognized by the Catholic Church. Elementary school children tour mission grounds and are taught that native people were "docile and child-like savage pagans, saved by the kind and benevolent padres". In reality, the human remains of thousands of indigenous people are scattered beneath the grounds of the Missions that were built by Indian slaves as garrisons for the church and Spanish crown. Indigenous people died of rape, beatings and diseases introduced by the Spanish conquistadors in California. Spanish Priests did little to recognize indigenous people as humans and did not come to their rescue when women were raped by soldiers and settlers. With an over 90% indigenous mortality rate, Serra hardly "saved many souls". 



Will you sign the petition too? Click here to add your name: 

http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/urge-pope-francis-to?source=s.fwd&r_by=13040488 

Thanks! 

Wednesday, December 11, 2013

My comment on Roger Cohen's brazen PLUS defense that the New York Times would not accept.

I must have submitted the following comment about twenty times yesterday.

Usually the good moderators at the NYT are subtle. They put my comment into the cooler and let it out when they think  the traffic has waned  and nobody's around.

But this time, it was returned with a "Technical problems, try later."

Here it is. 

I have put in a little more than the prescribed 1500 characters, because my blog, thank heavens, does not have any issues with me.


I am astounded by Mr Cohen's gushing sentimental defense and unabashedly one sided, "politically incorrect" lament for someone  he describes as an " an honorable, talented, crusading journalist. "


Such hogwash in the face of damning evidence.


Why had these champions of  the rule of law and gender justice neglected to constitute a Visakha committee ?


It is that critical act of arrogant omission that revealed the entire Tehelka enterprise as a grotesque farce.


Cohen accuses the BJP government  of " respond (ing) with rare zeal smacking of political vendetta " but in the interest of balance he ought also to have referred to Tejpal's craven, nauseating missive to Sonia Gandhi.


Tejpal was no I F Stone, pursuing journalism as a vocation and independently 'crusading' for the public good.

The Tejpal groupies were only the front desk. Tejpal appears to have had friends in all sorts of  places. Tehelka became only one of his variegated money spinning enterprises

And they all catered to the plummy set. 

Oddly enough, for somebody who got his second wind as a wielder of spy-cams, in his latest and most ballyhooed venture, he sought to sell "intimacy" to a chosen few.

To prop up his fallen idols, Mr Cohen has sanitized the crime scene.


"An unconscionable and criminal act may well have occurred on that elevator."


Yes.


And Mr Cohen's repine like those of Mr Tejpal/Chaudhury's water bearing "friends" are unconvincing to the point of being a nuisance.


You want hounded, Mr Cohen ? I'll give you hounded.






India is a very big country, Mr Cohen  and it has a lot of people.


A lot more than your "liberal" "politically incorrect' buddies in Lutyens' Delhi.




You do them all a singular disservice.

You ought to be ashamed.

Thursday, April 11, 2013

The Wall Street Journal Finds the language of my comment objectionable. Huh ?

Mr Henninger's heart is probably in the right place - who's isn't - but his perspective is musty and cockeyed.

In this day and age, one doesn't have to jump to Africa, the moment one thinks of corruption and poverty.

There is plenty of both in the West.

The way, I read the evidence it is the  force of Western greed and moral idiocy - The Price of Offshore Revisited and Inequality Underestimated  - that has straitjacketed the rest of the world to conform just to survive.

Corruption is not just about handing out little keychains come festival time.

The forces of corruption, as anybody familiar with the work of Mario Puzo or Francis Ford Coppola will tell you, make a "reasonable" offer that may not be refused.

They say,"Take my money, or I'll have your life."

Your hosannah to the Pope - This pope, with every waking hour, cares about the shafting of the world's poor- may have warmed some powerful, old hearts, but the Pope is not the only messiah in waiting.

My own "no excuses", ultra peaceful, non partisan, individual sathyagraha against corruption and for the idea of the rule of law in India, now in its 23nd year, has seen Presidents, Prime Ministers and Popes come and go.

Your readers may want to acquaint themselves with my sathyagraha here. 1. Excellence Vs Perversity  2. The Handclap That Triggered The Avalanche

Can't say for sure, but I get a feeling you, Shri Henninger, may already be acquainted with my thoughts.

I know the tenacity and passion with which my grandfather, the late Shri T S Swaminathan, MA, FIA, FCII
resisted corruption. The Prithvi connection

He too was isolated and almost broken till his massive, versatile abilities saw him rehabilitate himself. He was professionally active till well into his nineties.

In India, one often hears of a courageous citizen, usually an "RTI activist" or officer of the government who has been butchered or put to crushing travails by the forces of corruption.

Chinua Achebe was a tireless campaigner against the abuse of power in Nigeria. I would be interested to know whether he has ever inspired the WSJ to rapture ?

The abuse of power and predatoriness is universal and pervasive, thanks to the insouciance of the West.

Till it hatches out of its narcissistic shell and gets real, I find it difficult to see any hope for the survival of the planet.

That was my reply to Daniel Henninger's latest column  Capitalism's Corruptions . 

Obviously, I had invested precious time on the exercise. Imagine my surprise when my comment was rejected with this admonition.




Huh ? 

Case closed. The marvelous moderators at WSJ appear to have seen the reason in my bafflement and have published my comment. Now, when are you sending your reporter, Editor saa'ab ?








Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Rape is only nominally a gender issue. It is substantially an impunity issue.

We pass laws. We imagine and sometimes create leviathan bureaucracies. We scream on television. Yet India and the world keeps rotting.

Why ?

Because of our casual attitude to pervasive corruption.

Because of pervasive corruption or the culture of buying impunity for a price, an entire syndrome of malevolence has materialised, an aspect of which is the worship of the monied and the powerful and a corresponding suspicion and contempt of the powerless, a manifestation of which is the casual abuse of women and children.

Corruption is the domination and control, rape, of the very idea of rule of law and makes a mockery of and cripples the authentic psychological evolution of the human race.

Corruption is fascist. And that is why, even in the 21st century, “the more things remain the same.”

Democracies have frittered away their immense moral advantage due to corruption and the people from top to bottom have all but given up on making the system function.

The problem is as humongous as the stash of illicit money reportedly circulating in India and in the planet.

This, by all credible accounts, gargantuan supply of illicit money, is the premium that helpless citizens pay for crime and insanity.

It is an awful reminder of how societies have stopped to function for you and me.

A relevant question is, can a Non Privileged Indian rely on any institution of governance, not to sell her to the highest bidder ?

How are we going to rein in this monster of impunity ?

How do we make India and the planet safe for civility and sanity ?

How can ordinary citizens demand and achieve transparency and accountability on tap, as it were ?

Only by understanding the depth, dimensions and ramifications of pervasive corruption in India and in the world.

If we are resigned to corruption as part of our DNA, then we must resign ourselves to inequality and injustice.

To a society of a few fat predators and the rest as bakras; prey.

A society in which the powerless will be reviled, hounded, starved, enslaved and consumed.

 Rape is only nominally a gender issue. It is substantially an impunity issue .

As a grateful father of a wonderful girl child - now a thriving professional woman - I have to exhort all lovers of life to not tolerate any encroachment of their right to equality under the rule of law.

There can be no question that even so called advanced countries are shot through with an almost comical patriarchial bias. But the gender is incidental.

The real issue that all humanity and all life on the planet is groaning under is the collusive impunity of the powerful.

Some of them may even be caring, charitable people. But that is cold comfort.

And hence my stand against corruption, which is now a “no excuses”, ultra peaceful, non partisan, individual sathyagraha against corruption and for the idea of the rule of law in India.

In its 25th year. 

I request your solidarity and support.

Any struggle against a predatory authority is humanity’s struggle to honour the gift of life.

You may also look in on me on @divakarssathya on @twitter.

Saturday, December 8, 2012

The Judiciary's RTI 'Quota' Fracas


At long last, the Supreme Court has let the cat out of the bag.  

It has broken the conspiracy of silence that shrouded the arbitrary and uneven administration of the Right To Information Act 2005. 'Loyal' bureaucrats being made information commissioners: SC .

Wajahat Habibullah, the first Chief Information Commissioner, is a well known courtier of the Congress party. As was CD Arha, the State Information Commissioner in my state.

I have documented how these sycophants abused their power to violate my RTI and shield the Prime Minster’s and Chief Minister’s office.

They may speak their peculiar Stephanian English and nurse their delusions, but on my evidence, these people are as much thugs and perverts as any making the news today.

The current State Information Commissioner, Jannat Hussain, was Principal Secretary to Chief Minister for six long years. He was a point man for a Chief Minister whose son is in jail, for alleged corruption.

I have met Janat Hussain repeatedly in his former office. He made sure, to not give me any reason to be favourably impressed by him.

He is just another one of those guys, who can sit in front of a person who has single handedly struggled for decades against corruption and pretend to some kind of superior authority.

But the judiciary itself has been consistently hostile to the RTI. I have recorded the depravity of the Andhra Pradesh High Court .

My understanding of the shocking perniciousness of the judiciary was repeatedly underscored by Shri Sailesh Gandhi, former Chief Information Commissioner, the highest possible authority on RTI.

The former Chief Information Commissioner has disclosed how the judiciary has elbowed its way into the territory of the constitutional office.

India’s judiciary, by and large, could use a makeover.

It has been unable to effectively counter serious allegations of corruption.

Recently the columnist Sandhya Jain observed, “In the infamous Nira Radia tapes, there is an open allusion to a particular judge being ‘fixed’ with Rs 9 crore.

When senior advocate Shanti Bhushan submitted an affidavit in the Apex court charging eight out of 16 former Chief Justices of India of having been corrupt; no one demurred and many even said it was an underestimation.”

I recently requested some information from the Andhra Pradesh High Court. The very next day, I received a reply, speed of greased lightning by the shamelessly glacial, life wrenching standards of the judiciary, rejecting my postal money order.

The Court demanded that I pay them more than the sum stipulated by the Act. Also that I had to pay through court stamps. Once again violating both the spirit and letter of the Act.

There is a post office in my neighbourhood. It costs less time and gas to make a money order.

The nearest court house is kilometres away.

Jannat Hussain, could have taken suo moto notice of this egregious violation of the law by the judiciary. He is staying cosy.

So how many layers of corruption and maladministration can you detect in this little sliver of life ?

Of course, I sent in a fresh request.

Two months have passed and I have received no response. Andhra Pradesh High Court has arbitrarily and without showing any reason, refused my request.

Under the law, the Information Commissioner must order the disgorgement of the information that I have sought and fine and penalise the officer who has denied my request.

As State Information Commissioner, Jannat Hussain is the final appellate authority.

If he does not satisfy me, I can appeal to the Andhra Pradesh High Court.

What do you think are my chances ?

Of course, known, corrupt, sycophants are being appointed Information Commissioners in the States and the Centre.

But it is difficult to believe that the judiciary is motivated by any tender concern for the proper delivery of the rights of the citizen.

Its insistence on a quota for judges in the Commission is absurd, pathetic and further shreds whatever little dignity, judges are entitled to in society.

Incidentally, the very first person that I encountered in the Andhra Pradesh State Information Commission was the Member (Judicial). He was a retired district judge.

This narcissism and serial delinquency of constitutional authorities makes life unbearable and dignity impossible for the Non Privileged Indian.

Activists who have earned much fame and fortune for having introduced this “revolutionary”
law, cannot stay oblivious to its destruction.

Alas, they have not been as zealous in holding territory as the poachers.







Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Prashant Bhushan And The Tail Of The Tiger

In the autumn of 2009, Prashant Bhushan, revealed to Tehelka ("sensation") magazine that ‘Half Of The Last 16 Chief Justices Were Corrupt’ 

Prashant Bhushan has also gone to some lengths to explain why he considered the current Chief Justice Kapadia's conduct in the Vedanta case to be "morally unsound or debased."


All this is sensational beyond description. 

Had Prashant Bhushan seized a tiger - or was it eight or nine tigers - by its tail ? 

Obviously the Supreme Court could not let this pass, so it launched contempt proceedings against this "turbulent priest".

Now the father Shanthi Bhushan, former Law Minister of India, stormed in to aid his son.

Fuel to the fire - what would the Supreme Court do ?

Very little. 

The Bhushans had compiled a secret sealed envelope and jammed it in the craw of the gasping Indian judiciary.

And evidently, the Supreme Court of India can neither, as the old Tamil saying goes, chew it up nor swallow it. 

There was a moment of bathos, when the court helpfully suggested that Bhushan apologise and "close the chapter on the contempt proceedings"

The Bhushans roared back. They were willing to go to jail but would not apologise.

Prashant Bhushan had not provoked a sleeping tiger by pulling on its tail. 

Rather this canny Delhiwalla, with the wisdom of three generations of proximity to the ways of the decadent embedded in his genes, appears to have grabbed the mangy Indian judiciary by its throat. 

A Godsend for the Indian Press.  A Tehelka in spades.

But the Indian Press, that can be safely predicted only to erupt in regular spouts of self congratulatory clamour, has stayed mute.

There have been no further disclosures. No leaks. No hidden camera stunts.

Close to three years have passed and the litigation meanders on.

But the Bhushans, father and prominent son, have gone on from strength to strength.

Prashant Bhushan does very well on television. 

I myself have found his careful, systematic articulation, his dogged pursuit of every detail , his stubborn resistance to authoritarian airbrushing very attractive. 

Was a time, when watching Prashant Bhushan on television, surrounded and responding doggedly to the suave officers of the Indian state, I have felt our blood pressures rise and fall in synch. 

Indian television has made Prashant Bhushan a most powerful Indian.

Consider this: There are 782 members of parliament. 

But the number of lawyers whose names regularly figures in the media can be counted with the fingers and toes.

And among this rare species of Indian, the Bhushans are among the most favoured.

Such is the formidable, almost unique dominance of the Bhushans, especially Prashant on the grungy contemporary judicial landscape of India.

This dominance has been questioned. 

First came a mysterious CD. Clumsy paste up job ? We will never know. 

But to Vineet Narain, hero of the Havala scam, who bravely took on the might of not one but two of the most mighty legal grandees of India,  the CD seemed credible

 He said,  “I am not surprised by the content of the CD because I have burnt my fingers with the Bhushans during my Jain Hawala crusade...controversy and suspicion had arisen even earlier on the Bhushans...after initially helping me in drafting the petition (of Jain Hawala case), Ram Jethmalani and subsequently, his associates, the Bhushans, made several attempts to sabotage the biggest crusade against corruption and finally derailed the case.”

I am inclined to believe Shri Narain.

But not everybody does. 

According to Tehelka - Advocate Kamini Jaiswal says that Narain was “a dirty blackmailer, who’d filed ugly petitions and circulated in his paper Kal Chakra that a particular judge was a homosexual.”

Then there was the conflict of interest case, when Bhushan Senior was alleged to have been favoured by the then Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh Mayawati, even as he was litigating for the public interest against her alleged excesses. 

Once again there was some hot air on television: 




\   


This allegation too has been given "the quietus"  . 

Tehelka apologised; 

Even Mrs Sonia Gandhi conveyed her disapproval .


It was a rare chorus of indignation in favour of the Bhushans in a country in which activists using their Right To Information get swatted down like flies. 







and are carefully dishonoured afterwards.



Where honest officials get burnt alive.


Time


and again


Where journalists and their families are murdered,



and then forgotten.




Finally there was a case of  massive tax evasion by Bhushan Senior. 

Unlike the other two, this was a case in which no other VIPs were involved.

And in this case, the allegation stuck.


Hammers to a fly. Why ?

The Indian judiciary has been brazen in its extraordinary indulgence of  Chief Justice Dinakaran. 

The tortuous curial pussyfooting on the grave allegations against Ex Chief Justice of Supreme Court and current Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission K G Balakrishnan is a running sore and a grave embarrassment. 

So why is this scion of The House Of The Bhushans Of New Delhi, allying himself with another legal blunderbuss, Ram Jethmalani to, for all practical purposes, harass and stymy the career of a high court judge whose alleged misdemeanor appears innocuous, almost innocent, in comparison with the monstrous misdeeds  alleged and otherwise of his peers and superiors in the Indian judiciary ?

Why is Prashant Bhushan who flaked out of taking on the entire Andhra Pradesh High Court on its egregious misconduct against a single, unsupported citizen who had been stripped of the best years of his life for standing up for the idea of the rule of law in India, now going after a judge who even if for a brief moment and half-heartedly, lit a little light in that case ?

Is their action in the public interest ?

Is it motivated by the zeal to cleanse a diseased Andhra Pradesh High Court and restore it to a semblance of credibility ? 

Neither Bhushan nor Jethmalani can make any lofty claims. 

The Bhushans appear to have made a compelling argument that Chief Justice Kapadia or a "Amicus Curiae" Harish Salve can be accused of being  "morally unsound or debased." .

The Bhushans do not appear any less prone to abuse the judiciary to aggrandise themselves. 

Given their expedient torpor on the occasion when their considerable talents and individual consciences were more urgently required, it is fair to infer that the Bhushans are mere adventurers. 

They are mere pirates with a training in the law, backed by their ill gotten wealth and a dotty Delhi centric media, who are scavenging on India's irretrievably compromised and crumbling political establishment.

Sad. 

If there are any clean hands in India's decrepit, delinquent and depraved judiciary, they do not appear clearly visible to the naked eye.