Cephalgia = Headache

When an ailing person goes to a doctor, he expresses his ailment in his own language. The doctor understands and treats him accordingly. He doesn’t ask the patient to present his problem in the language of medical text books, such as xerostomiath for dry mouth. The doctor even writes a prescription that the patient and the pharmacist, both understand. At no stage during his treatment is the patient required to hire a medical licensee to speak with the doctor, the hospital or the pharmacist.

The same is true of other specialised professions too. A client can speak with and express his needs in plain language to an architect or a designer. These professional understand the customer well without asking him to write down mathematical equations or a treatise in strength and properties of material. Yet they deliver exactly what was intended.

But, when an aggrieved person goes to a court of law, he needs the assistance of a lawyer even to write down his grievance. The judge wouldn’t read any document written in plain language; the legal system insists on a document that the poor petitioner doesn’t even understand. It is written in cryptic English, with huge dollops of Latin thrown in. The legal system has woven such a web of mystery and complexity around itself that it is impossible for the common man to find his way through the maze. He necessarily needs an expensive guide. What is worse, the guide speaks a language and takes a path that the litigant finds intractable too. 

In a case that I had filed in a District Consumer Forum, the judge asked me, “Where is your lawyer?” I asked the judge if it was mandatory to have a lawyer and that I could not afford one anyway. I told him that I was standing in the court and that I would present the case myself. The lordship had no option but to shut up. During one of the subsequent hearings (there were too many of them; I finally had to withdraw and settle out of court) the judge came to the court and promptly “retired to his chamber” saying that he wouldn’t hear any case that day. All the other lawyers present in the court started cursing him behind his back for wasting their day. Not knowing the ways of the court, I went to the judge’s “chamber” and asked him why he wouldn’t hear my case. I told him that I had come from a great distance and had spent big money on travel. I requested that that he must hear me out. The lordship was shaken out his smug stupor and came back to the court. The lawyers were very surprised and impressed with me for the feat of having brought back the judge sahib to do his duty! Sometimes it pays to be ignorant.

One of the biggest reforms that the judiciary can bring about is to enable the common man, with reasonable education, to be able to present his case in simple language and argue his side in a court of law. A good lawyer in a higher court charges upwards of ten lakh Rupees for each appearance. Some good ones may earn more in a day than the judge earns in the whole year. This expensive private club must be disbanded. Arguments that it requires a licensed lawyer to present precedents and bring forth mention of similar cases and judgements before the court are hollow. A person of average intelligence can find such references on the Internet without expert help. Besides, such arguments also applies to a doctor treating a patient. He too bases his advice and prescription on past cases and experience, but does that himself without asking the patient to do it for him. A good judge should be able to help the litigant present his case properly and also protect him from the legalese-attack if the other party decides to field an experienced lawyer. It requires a change in the mindset of our judges, who must transform into service providers rather than sitting stiff as uptight dispensers of punishments, reliefs, compensations or mercies. A doctor, who is an arbiter between the patient and his illness does it every time.

Since the judiciary repulses all external efforts to reform the system, it has to do it all by itself. Will such a day come?