CANNOT WE CORROBORATE CHRIST? Suvidutt M. S.

(This article was originally published in a law magazine INSIGHTS under the aegis of Govt: Law College, Thrissur) EXORDIUM TO THE TREATISE Human rights, the patois of the humanity are defined as the rights, which every human being is entitled to enjoy and to have cosseted. All civilizations and cultures have in the past developed some conceptions of rights and principles that ought to be esteemed and some of these rights and principles have been considered to be universal in nature. The struggle for acknowledgement of human rights and struggle against political, monetary, social and cultural oppression and repression against injustice and inequalities have been a vital part of the histories of all human societies. In succinct, human rights are as archaic as Homo sapiens but their current characterization is coterminous. The human rights are no heuristic bequest of the west as some scholars aver. They refute with noetic assertiveness that the antique world, be it oriental or Babylonian, Greek or Roman had no notion of human rights. Actually the west soaked thinkers are blissfully innocent of the basic principles of dharma, artha, Kama and moksha enclosed in Vedas and puranas and of the precepts of the Buddhism more than 2500 years ago prescribing karuna( compassion), samatha(equity) and pragna(enlightened discernment). Snub about the west and east. Let us however not fail to remember the universality of human values which links the past with the present. Human rights, springs from the spiritual nidus nourished, with a sagacity of balance, by contentment, which is sustained by prerequisite for all of basic material needs and other provision, which make for euphoria and ecstasy in life.

DEVOUT HUMAN RIGHTS Legal systems were influenced by religions and faiths. Rights cannot subsist devoid of legal order. Philosopher-kings, rulers who established religions and emperors who adopted and adapted religions and radiated enlightment, augmented and amplified human heritage through the centuries. Names of Hammurabi, Justinian, Augustus, Ashoka, Manu, Muhammad etc are some of a swarm that left behind system of justice surviving in the jurisprudential history of humankind. Hence it is pertinent to scrutinize the religious pedigrees of human values. The term dharma signifies upholding and sustaining of humanity in all its coherence and consistency. It is saturated with the notion of truth and rectitude. Hindu pleased with the prospects of egalitarian goodness, economic fair deal and secular nondiscrimination in the society. Overall, the continuum of legal cogitation covered by dharma did shield and safeguard human rights. Siddhartha renounced and relinquished his princedom becoming Buddha and preached eight fold path and his incandescent leadership gained scores of cliques and cohorts including emperor Ashoka. The edicts of Ashoka emblazoned and extolled in the rock pillars, bear the testimony to the noble rulers recognition of humanism. Commiseration for all creation and veneration for all creation and veneration for all lifethese are the source and strength of human rights. Ashoka, for historians of human rights was sui- generis beacon light from this perspective. Ahimsa, tolerance, clemency, humility and humbleness for living creatures, are the root and fruit of human rights. Vardamana Mahaveera, the architect of Jainism, nobly nourished these values. He crutched humanitarianism and kindness on its followers, making ahimsa the premier therapeutic principle and exalted humanity and divinity in living beings, with cosmic vision and action.

The right to modesty, self-expression and other freedoms even for the destitute and despised and for those branded, as harlot was integral to the cannon of Jesus. He propounded and proliferated the epistle of adoring, caring and sharing on one hand and contended against roman pharisaism and majestic Caesarism on the other. In his visionary empire there was to be no property, no privilege, no pride and precedence but only love, liking, loyalty towards human beings. It is imperative to perceive in this context that Jesus, the messiah, and Barabbas, the burglar was brought before Pontius Pilate, the roman judge; and Jesus was sentenced to crucifixion whilst Barabbas was pardoned off although culpable. We today reside in a planet of Judas Iscariot who betrayed Christ in return of thirty pieces of silver; we today abide in a Barabbasque cosmos with human justice nailed on the cross with human justice nailed on the cross. Cannot we corroborate Christ? Islamic bigotry speaking generally has the fury and ferocity that has frightened the enlightened world and operated asphyxiate human rights and gender justice. Yet, Islam and founding clairvoyant, Muhammad has done much to encourage reverence for human rights. He forbids all shameful deeds, prejudice, mutiny, female infanticide, promiscuity and intoxication. Equality, status of women, the right of less privileged- the shibboleths of our age- was reflected in the prophets message. It is fair to conclude that Islamic principles emphasized humanitarian comity. SAGA OF HUMAN RIGHTS ODYSSEY The human rights odyssey had faced many exigent adventures and has challenging adventures to confront. Reality is rebellious but verbalization is only liberation. Subsequent paragraphs are of blood blemished cataclysmic past making human rights the first martyr. Columbus, cook, Clive and copious other buccaneers, bootleggers, navigators, traders and military administers have by their invasions, voyages and ventures completely changed the direction and dimension of human history. About 5 centuries ago humanity

witness the world phenomenon of colonialism and annihilation of millions of humans and their human rights. These explorers in hunt of trade and colonies inaugurated the epoch of conquest and capture, denying to native populace the basic rights to be human. The influx of Vasco da Gama at Calicut who came via the Cape of Good Hope was a hope for Europe and hopelessness for Asia. Eventually Portuguese espoused terror campaign and plagiarized the Indian earth, ether and eddy. One European after another occupied India through trade and trickery coupled with Caucasian control and cathedral control. Decimation and diffusion of native population through monstrous and meretricious maneuvers were the process in vogue used to dehumanize and demonize the weak and meek by the British. In sum, Hitler was not the opening monopolist of throng violation of human rights. Every Europeans were his ancestors and associates. Many countries of Africa have affluent resources and therefore, their people were subjugated and their possessions and property purloined and plundered. The pattern of oppression and suppression were same. On the foundation of thralldom were the edifices of the colonial kingdoms where the colonial kings infringed all prerogatives of the aborigines. Salvation from slavery, from dust to dawn that is the saga of Homo sapiens in its momentous move forward. Empires and eons were established and experimenting in autocracy and plutocracy, revolt and revolutions, serene and sanguinary made history. The locomotion of civilization was fuelled by many motivations but the governing potentiality, as dialectical materialism divulges, was ultimately the production and apprehension of material possession and prosperity. Eugene V. Debs articulates: the master class had always brought a war and the subject class has always fought the battle. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to loss and the subject class has had all to loss and nothing to gain. After loads of victimization and victories, straddling long centuries, the globe has plunged into a dire disaster of W.W.1. It was the weariest, bloodiest, most tragic episode up until then. This macro war tore and mar nations, stunned statesmen and shaken the

conscience of human kind. Then the trauma of the holocaust W.W.II that beheld vista of melancholy and mourn, the like of which no eyeball had perceived and no heart conceived. The bombing on Hiroshima and Nagasaki startled and shocked the inner feeling of Homo sapiens as both the city goes down in the world victimology as the macabre felony on humanity creating a cicatrix in history. We are the legatees of great cultures drenched in of noble values. We have great masters like Leonardo da Vinci whose intellect is incredible, Albert Einstein, unique as humanist and scientist, Mahatma Gandhi, a marvel of all time in the cause of nonviolence. Horde of other superlative power houses has illumined the artery of advancement leading kindly light amidst the encompassing gloom. But the brutalities done by Franco, Tojo, Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Polpot and other butchers of populations have eclipsed our cosmos making solicitous statesmen ask: quo vadis humanity? PREVALENT PENUMBRA The global gendarmerie, U.S. proclaiming war on Vietnam, Cambodia, Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries has become a threat to the unique planets unity and tranquility. The pandemic crypto-terrorism perpetrated by various terrorist groups are breaching barriers and borders, bombing towers and temples, slaughtering and shooting innumerable immaculate innocents, hijacking and making hostages, which all have today become ubiquitous. Since all these, the world resembles an amphitheatre where a tragic play is on. More awesome is the ascending third world nuclear menace. The threshold nuclear powers like Pakistan and India skipping to join the nuclear club ignoring the peoples poverty and paucity and switching their meager resources for vile nuclear tests. Arms industries burgeon today while the right to life has no place in the budget. It needed Amartya Sen to advise India of the ethical economics of investment in human beings.

The eminent enemy of common peoples human rights G-8 Multinational incorporated is now globally governing which detriments humans all kinds of rights. Globalization is a grisly glorification, liberalization lashing the poor to utilize all assets and privatization leeching populace to siphon profits. What a voodoo overlooking the human rights of the descamisado? Media must be independent and impartial. However, due to plentiful pulls and pressures media is dependent today. Newspapers and views-papers promote big business, mute the interest of the masses and dooms democratic basics. Media spotlights on the small things of the big peoples and big things of the small peoples. The adivasis, bonded labour, children under torture, disabled people etc, any where do not move the pen or print whereas love story of an actress and an actor, sojourn in altitudinal zone by politicians, trivial hurt to cricketers are all big issues to be wrote and published. There is a news famine information drought despite numerous press, publishers and T.V. channels. Communal violence, a foe of human rights is a common act up surging in many parts of the world. In India, the friction between the Hindus and Muslims in few places is becoming hotter ensuing in riots and rape, arson and assassination, pogrom and persecution. Rife testimonies are the nefarious Godra carnage and Marad massacre, such iniquity is a vulnerability to the unity and secularity. Hence, everyone be aware and beware. OMEGA PERORATION The remedies for the malady of flouting human rights in direct and indirect ways are by extending education, economic and social reformation, vigilant government, political purification, expansion of health and medical services etc. preventive measures for buttressing human rights are population control, restriction on narcotic drugs and alcoholism, prevention of atrocities, control of violence, control on social evils, abolition of corruption, stringent punishment for violation human rights etc. if these are duly pursued, human rights cannot be insulted, ignored, injured or invaded by anybody.

If human rights are to triumph executives must be sensitized, legislatives ethicalised and judges rationalized. To emphasis on judiciary judges and justices, Olympian of judiciary, must give justice and judgment without fear or favour, neither with affection or aversion nor with taste or temptation. Justice can never be gratis where justices are not gratis. Equal justice beyond pressure or purchase is the product; effortless entre to the humblest and the hated and easy finality without exorbitant appellate procrastination is the process. The seven wonders of the ancient world, the seven wonders of the middle ages and seven natural wonders of the world makes human kind realize the oneness of its fabulous estate. However, the nifty and natty wonder which humanity loiter for ages is the actualization of human rights in local and global level which everyone everywhere could enjoy. Cannot we step forward and collectively make it realize? Cannot we stand for the cause of human rights by hoisting our voice and noise? Cannot we call crucified Christ, the pictogram of human rights and human justice and corroborate him?