Senior advocate and a gay rights activist, Saurabh Kirpal has come into the limelight recently with the Supreme Court collegium reiterating his name as a judge of the Delhi High Court. In an interview with The Free Press Journal, Saurabh talks about bringing about change, the question of privacy, and the multiple identities that an individual has.
Q. Let me start with a very banal question. What's the inspiration behind the book “15 judgements: Cases that shaped India’s financial landscape”?
A. It’s a very apt question as to what motivates any author. I'm sure many people have many reasons for writing. For me, it is an endeavour to educate the Indian citizen. In my understanding following my interaction with people at large, most of the information comes from the WhatsApp University, while the other source of information is often newspapers. However, in matters relating to the law, that is also not very satisfactory as you often do not have lawyers reporting in newspapers.
On the other hand, you have judgements that are written in such an opaque language that no person can possibly hope to read a judgement and understand what it really says. Yet, I believe that if you have faith in the participatory democracy of our country, as I do, and you believe in the Constitution of the country, as most of us do, you need to have informed citizens. This book is my endeavour to help familiarise the reader with the salient features of how we reached the economic point we have today.
Q. I looked at the Aadhaar case that you have mentioned in the book. Why is privacy not accorded importance in our country?
A. I think there is a difference between the law and society on this one. As far as the law is concerned, privacy is sacrosanct. However, you're right. As a society, we don't seem to value privacy. That is for multiple reasons. I think it is because we generally are not particularly worried about our rights. We seem to take them as a privilege given to us by the powers that be.
We don't recognise the fact that the Constitution gives us these rights innately by virtue of being human and by virtue of being born in this country. Often, we just say that we're so grateful that someone has given us a right. We don't have a rights-based culture in our country. So, it's not just privacy. I think it is there even in matters of free speech. That could be because of the Indian setting. You're living in a crowded community and the idea of privacy in any case seems futile when you have no privacy at home. However, I think it is also a question of education as a citizen, as to what your rights are.
Q. I see that you are in headlines as someone who will be India’s first gay judge. But who really is Saurabh Kirpal?
A. There is no unitary conception of a person. I think we are many things at any point of time, a lot of which are also contradictory. I am a lawyer, I am a partner to a man I've been living with for 20 years. I am a son. I'm an author. I am the father of two adorable dogs. I am gay rights activist and I'm passionate about that. I also believe I try to be a human being who has empathy for people unlike me.
So, it's not just a question of believing in rights for the queer community. I believe in rights for everybody. That's why I can't put myself in a box. I don't want to put myself in a box. I'm also not who I was 20 years ago. I don't know where we'll be in 10-15 years. This idea that your personality, your ideas, your desires, hopes, ambitions, character is set at any one point of time makes for a very boring person. Above all, I hope not to be boring.
Q. You said you love the law. You've been a gay rights activist. Do you think that reading law has helped your activism?
A. Absolutely. I think I am an activist only because I'm a lawyer, because I find myself in a position where I can bring about change. I was not always, of course, an activist. I was gay and not closeted, but I wasn't screaming from the rooftops that I was queer. That was a journey for me. When I was more open and as acutely aware as I was of the language of discrimination and the law, which was written in into it, in Section 377, I found myself in a position where I could do a case and bring about that legal change.
In that process, I started meeting a lot of people. I heard stories of deprivation. As I said, I come from privilege, I come from wealth, I come from class, caste, and, of course, gender. The only thing that was slightly different was the sexuality. I then learned that a lot of what I had taken for granted was simply not true. Therefore, I felt compelled to try to bring about that change, which I could. In the Indian context, especially in the context of queerness in India, change is most likely to come about through the agency of the court.
