It is always better to have a judgment reasoning why it has been made
Lavanya, a seventeen-year-old girl committed suicide in Thanjavur and following allegations that the case was not properly investigated by the police, the Madurai branch of the Madras High Court ordered the case's transfer to the CBI. The judge passed the orders after hearing the plea of Lavanya's father seeking a CB-CID inquiry into his daughter's death. The court pulled up the Tamil Nadu police for 'jumping to conclusions' along with politicians. The Supreme Court backed the High Court order.
The FIR described that Lavanya attempted suicide owing to physical abuse and exploitative work forced out of her by her hostel warden Sagaya Mary. Someone has recorded a video wherein Lavanya said that one of the nuns at the school, Raquel Mary, had asked her to convert to Christianity two years back, in the presence of her parents. She also said that her refusal to convert may be the reason why she was abused.
The judge observed that while the statements of the girl point towards the unfair treatment of the hostel warden Sagaya Mary, there was also an attempt at conversion to Christianity and that 'a counter narrative is being built as if the father and the step mother of the child are responsible for the suicide.' The information circulating on social media regarding her calls to child line, 'dent the credibility of the investigation' he said.
The order also heavily criticised Thanjavur SP Ravali Priya for holding a press conference, stating that the SP 'probably forgot the virtues of silence'. He further added that she had stated that the conversion angle was not made out, adding that such a statement was unwarranted. He also added that 'by stating that the conversion angle stood ruled out, the SP had brushed aside the petitioner's complaint made in writing and backed by the video of the child'. He asserted that the petitioner was justified in thinking that the investigation will be biased if it is continued by the district police.
Now when the case has been ordered to be handed over to the CBI, another round of criticism of the judgement has emerged. Some people felt offended by the harsh criticism of the judge on the functioning of the state government. Some feel that his comments appear to be a direction to the CBI as to how their course of inquiry should be.
But if one looks dispassionately, it will be clear that the comments on the judgement are unwarranted.
Generally , a judgement can be an analytic judgement where the subject matter is abstract or conceptual. Or it can be a synthetic judgement where the judgement reaches out to the real world, employing concepts to make a statement about how things are as a matter of fact.An evaluative judgement takes one further step.Beyond description of how the world is, an evaluative judgment expresses an attitude toward that world. So, it is always better to have a judgement with all the reasoning why such a judgement has been made.
Even Section 354 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (1973) stipulates that every judgement referred to in Section 353 shall be written in the language of the court and also shall contain the point or points for determination, the decision thereon and the reasons for the decision. There are number of cases in which the Supreme Court has prescribed that the judgments should be with proper reasoning.
In the present case, the judgement cogently describes all the reasons for making a conclusion and the society must welcome such reasoned judgements.
(The writer is a retired banker. The views expressed are personal.)