Authoritarianism sets in when society fears questions: Justice Bhuyan | India News
NEW DELHI: At a time when the opposition has branded the NDA govt authoritarian, Justice Ujjal Bhuyan Saturday said authoritarianism sets in when society fears questions, and stressed people must shed the binary of ‘us’ and ‘they’ and adopt the core constitutional philosophy of ‘we’ to preserve the country’s unity in diversity.Speaking at the convocation ceremony of University of Science and Technology Meghalaya, the SC judge said, “A society that fears questions becomes vulnerable to authoritarianism. A society that treats tradition as beyond scrutiny may fail to reform unjust practices.”Highlighting Article 51A of the Constitution that casts a duty on every citizen to develop a scientific temperament, Justice Bhuyan said, “It does not merely ask us to acquire scientific knowledge. It asks us to cultivate a temperament which is based on reason. It tells us to inquire, to question, to examine and, where necessary, to reform.”He said, “I believe, scientific temperament lays the foundation for the rule of law. This is because arbitrary power thrives on ignorance, fear and unexamined belief. A society that accepts claims without evidence is susceptible to superstitious beliefs and becomes vulnerable to misinformation.”Attaching great importance to debate, he said those who ask questions must also be willing to listen to a different point of view. “Willingness to reason together through a meaningful debate alone can make a society stronger,” he said, adding that questions followed by meaningful and healthy debates can happen only when people have access to information.Inspired by Nobel laureate Amartya Sen’s ‘The Idea of Justice’, which he quoted extensively during the speech, Justice Bhuyan elaborated on the difference between ‘institutional democracy’ and ‘functional democracy’ and said that a functional democracy requires public questioning and scrutiny. “Circulation of information and scrutiny by public reasoning thus becomes part of the due process by which a democratic society resonates with justice.“He said preservation of diversity demands shunning false narratives and the binary of ‘us’ and ‘they’.
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“For a more just and humane society, it is important that we move away from the destructive binary of ‘us’ and ‘they’ and embrace the idea of oneness,” he said.“Not for nothing, the Preamble to the Constitution starts with the expression – ‘We, the People of India’. The Constitution… speaks to all citizens of India as equal members of the constitutional order. Therefore, ‘we’ represents a larger idea of belonging in which our individual identities or group identities do not diminish our shared constitutional unity,” he said.In what could be construed as indirect opposition to Uniform Civil Code, he said, “It does not require that our individual identities should get subsumed in the larger whole. Diversity, therefore, is not an impediment to the constitutional project; rather, it infuses substance and meaning to it.”
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