Devil's advocate with Ram Jethmalani. Interview by Sagarika Ghosh. Source CNN IBN
The media can’t be allowed to be the judge, says criminal lawyer Ram Jethmalani, who is defending Manu Sharma, the main accused in the Jessica Lall murder case. “You (the media) are not the repositories of the citizens of India,” he tells CNN-IBN’s Sagarika Ghose in an exclusive interview.
Sagarika Ghose: In defending Manu Sharma, are you in some sense defending or attempting to defend the indefensible?
Ram Jethmalani: Who the hell is the Press to decide who is indefensible? Courts decide that. And they decide that after hearing the lawyers; and the lawyer’s duty is to assist the court to arrive at a conclusion. The Press has no right in trying to determine this issue. The Press in trying to determinate and declaring it to the people is guilty of the highest form of contempt.
I am a great lover of the Press and a great lover of the freedom of speech and expression. But please recognise your limits. The worst contempt you can commit is the contempt of prejudicing mankind against a person who is standing in trial for life. You have no business in going around telling people that Manu Sharma's case is indefensible.
Every case is indefensible—how do you know? Who the hell are you to decide and I want to know. And I want to ask the proprietors who are running this show – what right have they? Have they the means of deciding? Have they heard the witnesses? Have they read the evidence?
Sagarika Ghose: But sir, aren’t you worried that you are going against the tide of public opinion?
Ram Jethmalani: I am not worried at all. It is my duty. I will be worried if lawyers of this country decided not to defend people. You don’t know the rule of the law, you don’t know democracy; you don’t know anything.
Sagarika Ghose: But the Press is only reflecting public opinion. Here is someone who in the eyes of the public is seen as someone who has committed a heinous crime.
Ram Jethmalani: I am sorry. But public opinion must stop. Did you see it?
Sagarika Ghose: Some people believe that the evidence so far points to the accused.
Ram Jethmalani: Some people may believe it but that's nonsense. There is no evidence. Why has the judge acquitted? You wait and see the judicial verdict and don’t jump at conclusions. It's none of your business.
Sagarika Ghose: But sir, you have gone against your own family, tide of public opinion, against the citizens of India. The Press is merely reflecting…
Ram Jethmalani: That is my courage. I have moral courage, and who are the citizens of India? You are not the repositories of the citizens of India. I decide according to my conscience who to defend and please understand and tell those people who are asking this question that there is a statutory rule of the Bar Council of India that a lawyer who refuses to defend a person on the ground that people believe him to be guilty is himself guilty of professional misconduct.
Sagarika Ghose: But as a criminal lawyer, don't you believe there is a lakshman rekha that even all criminal lawyers have to work under?
Ram Jethmalani: I am sorry. Please don’t talk of this bullshit to me. I know what my lakshman rekha’s are. I have read my rules of the conduct of a lawyer. It will be the saddest day when a lawyer refuses to stand between the state and the final verdict.
Sagarika Ghose: So what is precisely making you angry–that he should be found guilty in the eyes of the law and not in the eyes of the Press?
Ram Jethmalani: What is making me angry at the moment is what the Press is doing.
Sagarika Ghose: What is the Press doing?
Ram Jethmalani: You are carrying on a sedulous campaign of creating prejudice against a man who is standing his trial and who has already been acquitted in one court.
Sagarika Ghose: But sir, a number of lawyers, who have in fact been participating in the team, have pointed out to us that in fact the evidence that is there against Manu Sharma is enough. The testimony of Bina Ramani is enough, the fact that his pistol is not there…
Ram Jethmalani: Please don’t talk like this, I am not impressed. What you should do then is talk to the police, come to the court and give evidence if you have any. But don’t go on creating this confusion.
Sagarika Ghose: There are a few tapes that have been done by various investigative agencies that show witnesses are all falsifying their accounts.
Ram Jethmalani: Those tapes are not worth the paper they are written. Police can manufacture any confessions. That is why our law is that any confessions recorded and kept by the police are not to be looked at. You are trying to look at inadmissible material causing prejudice in the judicial mind when the judges have no right to look at that evidence.
Sagarika Ghose: The Press at the end of the day is only expressing the opinion of the Indian public.
Ram Jethmalani: Go on expressing that opinion. But I am Ram Jethmalani who does not go by the opinion of the Press. Please do not ask me to surrender to your opinion.
Sagarika Ghose: But what makes you so convinced about the innocence of Manu Sharma?
Ram Jethmalani: I don’t have to convince myself. I am only convinced that the man is entitled to a fair trial. He is entitled to the services of a good lawyer. Courts will decide and no Pressman, no editor or television will crew will decide.
Sagarika Ghose: It is the High Court that decided. The HC took suo motu cognisance.
Ram Jethmalani: You are talking such nonsense. The court has found him not guilty and you are going against the court. You are trying to become the court. I will not allow you to usurp the judicial function, which you are trying to do just because there are people who are afraid of making the Press their enemy. I don’t care. You can write hundred things against me. I will stand by my client and will defend him till the last breath of my life.
Sagarika Ghose: So are you basically fighting the Press?
Ram Jethmalani: No, I am fighting for my client. The Press is fighting for injustice and I will not allow you to perpetrate injustice.
Sagarika Ghose: But is this how you want to be known in the public eye?
Ram Jethmalani: I don’t care. Please don’t ask me how, why. It is my personal life, professional life. You have nothing to do with it. I will not allow the Press to control my life.
Sagarika Ghose: But it's not just the Press. It is your own family, which has said that they don’t want you to take this case.
Ram Jethmalani: Doesn't matter. It is between me and the Press. Please keep off it.
Sagarika Ghose: The Press has perhaps been taking an undue interest in this case. But the evidence that so far exists – Bina Ramani’s testimony, missing weapon.
Ram Jethmalani: I will not discuss evidence with you in the case. That evidence is to be decided by the court. If you have read the evidence and come to a conclusion, keep that to yourself, broadcast it on the television, but you will not influence me.
Sagarika Ghose: Is what at the end of the day is bothering you – The Press’s role?
Ram Jethmalani: Nothing is bothering me.
Sagarika Ghose: What is wrong with an activist Press—a Press that speaks for the underdog.
Ram Jethmalani: Go ahead, be activists. But it is my duty to inform you.
Sagarika Ghose: But why don’t you search your own conscience. A young girl was shot in the presence of a hundred people.
Ram Jethmalani: I am searching my own conscience. All this bullshit won't convince me at all. My conscience is mine and you are not responsible for it. And I don’t sell my conscience either to you or to anybody else nor will I change my professional etiquette because some chip of a girl comes and tells me that something is wrong.
Sagarika Ghose: But what about the case in itself - a young girl was shot in public. There are some witnesses who believe that Manu Sharma was involved.
Ram Jethmalani: I have told you it's none of your business—the courts will decide; you are not judges of judges and Gods. And for God's sake, you are over stepping the limits of your duty.
Sagarika Ghose: Tell us why you feel this is a case of public interest?
Ram Jethmalani: I am not going to discuss this matter with you. I am not supposed to discuss it with you. It will be wrong of me and wrong of you to invite a discussion.
Sagarika Ghose: But you aren’t giving me an answer – why are you defending Manu Sharma.
Ram Jethmalani: Because he is my client. I am a lawyer.
Sagarika Ghose: But why have you decided to take him on as a client?
Ram Jethmalani: I will because it is my right and my duty, because you don’t know the duties of a lawyer. You have not read the statutory rules of the Bar Council. You don’t know a word.
Sagarika Ghose: What about the Priyadarshini Mattoo case?
Ram Jethmalani: I have nothing to do with that case. I have not read it, am not involved and I don’t discuss other people’s cases.
Sagarika Ghose: So you have taken on the case because you are angry at the way the Press has been trying him by media.
Ram Jethmalani: Now that is very stupid and a big lie. I have never said it.
Sagarika Ghose: But you seemed to be so angry with the Press?
Ram Jethmalani: But I am angry with you.
Sagarika Ghose: Why me? I am just a voice of the people.
Ram Jethmalani: For the simple reason that you are creating a hype that the accused is guilty.
Sagarika Ghose: But in this country where the high and mighty get away with so much, where witnesses are paid off.
Ram Jethmalani: Did I come to you and told you not to do it? Just do you duty.
Sagarika Ghose: Where the high and mighty buy the process of justice, Press is the sounding board. It is the only recall.
Ram Jethmalani: You can give yourself all the tributes that you want. This is self-praise. By all means, adopt it, pocket it, publicise it, take credit it. But when you are doing something wrong, I will say you are doing wrong. I have the liberty in a democracy. People have the liberty to go wrong.
The media can’t be allowed to be the judge, says criminal lawyer Ram Jethmalani, who is defending Manu Sharma, the main accused in the Jessica Lall murder case. “You (the media) are not the repositories of the citizens of India,” he tells CNN-IBN’s Sagarika Ghose in an exclusive interview.
Sagarika Ghose: In defending Manu Sharma, are you in some sense defending or attempting to defend the indefensible?
Ram Jethmalani: Who the hell is the Press to decide who is indefensible? Courts decide that. And they decide that after hearing the lawyers; and the lawyer’s duty is to assist the court to arrive at a conclusion. The Press has no right in trying to determine this issue. The Press in trying to determinate and declaring it to the people is guilty of the highest form of contempt.
I am a great lover of the Press and a great lover of the freedom of speech and expression. But please recognise your limits. The worst contempt you can commit is the contempt of prejudicing mankind against a person who is standing in trial for life. You have no business in going around telling people that Manu Sharma's case is indefensible.
Every case is indefensible—how do you know? Who the hell are you to decide and I want to know. And I want to ask the proprietors who are running this show – what right have they? Have they the means of deciding? Have they heard the witnesses? Have they read the evidence?
Sagarika Ghose: But sir, aren’t you worried that you are going against the tide of public opinion?
Ram Jethmalani: I am not worried at all. It is my duty. I will be worried if lawyers of this country decided not to defend people. You don’t know the rule of the law, you don’t know democracy; you don’t know anything.
Sagarika Ghose: But the Press is only reflecting public opinion. Here is someone who in the eyes of the public is seen as someone who has committed a heinous crime.
Ram Jethmalani: I am sorry. But public opinion must stop. Did you see it?
Sagarika Ghose: Some people believe that the evidence so far points to the accused.
Ram Jethmalani: Some people may believe it but that's nonsense. There is no evidence. Why has the judge acquitted? You wait and see the judicial verdict and don’t jump at conclusions. It's none of your business.
Sagarika Ghose: But sir, you have gone against your own family, tide of public opinion, against the citizens of India. The Press is merely reflecting…
Ram Jethmalani: That is my courage. I have moral courage, and who are the citizens of India? You are not the repositories of the citizens of India. I decide according to my conscience who to defend and please understand and tell those people who are asking this question that there is a statutory rule of the Bar Council of India that a lawyer who refuses to defend a person on the ground that people believe him to be guilty is himself guilty of professional misconduct.
Sagarika Ghose: But as a criminal lawyer, don't you believe there is a lakshman rekha that even all criminal lawyers have to work under?
Ram Jethmalani: I am sorry. Please don’t talk of this bullshit to me. I know what my lakshman rekha’s are. I have read my rules of the conduct of a lawyer. It will be the saddest day when a lawyer refuses to stand between the state and the final verdict.
Sagarika Ghose: So what is precisely making you angry–that he should be found guilty in the eyes of the law and not in the eyes of the Press?
Ram Jethmalani: What is making me angry at the moment is what the Press is doing.
Sagarika Ghose: What is the Press doing?
Ram Jethmalani: You are carrying on a sedulous campaign of creating prejudice against a man who is standing his trial and who has already been acquitted in one court.
Sagarika Ghose: But sir, a number of lawyers, who have in fact been participating in the team, have pointed out to us that in fact the evidence that is there against Manu Sharma is enough. The testimony of Bina Ramani is enough, the fact that his pistol is not there…
Ram Jethmalani: Please don’t talk like this, I am not impressed. What you should do then is talk to the police, come to the court and give evidence if you have any. But don’t go on creating this confusion.
Sagarika Ghose: There are a few tapes that have been done by various investigative agencies that show witnesses are all falsifying their accounts.
Ram Jethmalani: Those tapes are not worth the paper they are written. Police can manufacture any confessions. That is why our law is that any confessions recorded and kept by the police are not to be looked at. You are trying to look at inadmissible material causing prejudice in the judicial mind when the judges have no right to look at that evidence.
Sagarika Ghose: The Press at the end of the day is only expressing the opinion of the Indian public.
Ram Jethmalani: Go on expressing that opinion. But I am Ram Jethmalani who does not go by the opinion of the Press. Please do not ask me to surrender to your opinion.
Sagarika Ghose: But what makes you so convinced about the innocence of Manu Sharma?
Ram Jethmalani: I don’t have to convince myself. I am only convinced that the man is entitled to a fair trial. He is entitled to the services of a good lawyer. Courts will decide and no Pressman, no editor or television will crew will decide.
Sagarika Ghose: It is the High Court that decided. The HC took suo motu cognisance.
Ram Jethmalani: You are talking such nonsense. The court has found him not guilty and you are going against the court. You are trying to become the court. I will not allow you to usurp the judicial function, which you are trying to do just because there are people who are afraid of making the Press their enemy. I don’t care. You can write hundred things against me. I will stand by my client and will defend him till the last breath of my life.
Sagarika Ghose: So are you basically fighting the Press?
Ram Jethmalani: No, I am fighting for my client. The Press is fighting for injustice and I will not allow you to perpetrate injustice.
Sagarika Ghose: But is this how you want to be known in the public eye?
Ram Jethmalani: I don’t care. Please don’t ask me how, why. It is my personal life, professional life. You have nothing to do with it. I will not allow the Press to control my life.
Sagarika Ghose: But it's not just the Press. It is your own family, which has said that they don’t want you to take this case.
Ram Jethmalani: Doesn't matter. It is between me and the Press. Please keep off it.
Sagarika Ghose: The Press has perhaps been taking an undue interest in this case. But the evidence that so far exists – Bina Ramani’s testimony, missing weapon.
Ram Jethmalani: I will not discuss evidence with you in the case. That evidence is to be decided by the court. If you have read the evidence and come to a conclusion, keep that to yourself, broadcast it on the television, but you will not influence me.
Sagarika Ghose: Is what at the end of the day is bothering you – The Press’s role?
Ram Jethmalani: Nothing is bothering me.
Sagarika Ghose: What is wrong with an activist Press—a Press that speaks for the underdog.
Ram Jethmalani: Go ahead, be activists. But it is my duty to inform you.
Sagarika Ghose: But why don’t you search your own conscience. A young girl was shot in the presence of a hundred people.
Ram Jethmalani: I am searching my own conscience. All this bullshit won't convince me at all. My conscience is mine and you are not responsible for it. And I don’t sell my conscience either to you or to anybody else nor will I change my professional etiquette because some chip of a girl comes and tells me that something is wrong.
Sagarika Ghose: But what about the case in itself - a young girl was shot in public. There are some witnesses who believe that Manu Sharma was involved.
Ram Jethmalani: I have told you it's none of your business—the courts will decide; you are not judges of judges and Gods. And for God's sake, you are over stepping the limits of your duty.
Sagarika Ghose: Tell us why you feel this is a case of public interest?
Ram Jethmalani: I am not going to discuss this matter with you. I am not supposed to discuss it with you. It will be wrong of me and wrong of you to invite a discussion.
Sagarika Ghose: But you aren’t giving me an answer – why are you defending Manu Sharma.
Ram Jethmalani: Because he is my client. I am a lawyer.
Sagarika Ghose: But why have you decided to take him on as a client?
Ram Jethmalani: I will because it is my right and my duty, because you don’t know the duties of a lawyer. You have not read the statutory rules of the Bar Council. You don’t know a word.
Sagarika Ghose: What about the Priyadarshini Mattoo case?
Ram Jethmalani: I have nothing to do with that case. I have not read it, am not involved and I don’t discuss other people’s cases.
Sagarika Ghose: So you have taken on the case because you are angry at the way the Press has been trying him by media.
Ram Jethmalani: Now that is very stupid and a big lie. I have never said it.
Sagarika Ghose: But you seemed to be so angry with the Press?
Ram Jethmalani: But I am angry with you.
Sagarika Ghose: Why me? I am just a voice of the people.
Ram Jethmalani: For the simple reason that you are creating a hype that the accused is guilty.
Sagarika Ghose: But in this country where the high and mighty get away with so much, where witnesses are paid off.
Ram Jethmalani: Did I come to you and told you not to do it? Just do you duty.
Sagarika Ghose: Where the high and mighty buy the process of justice, Press is the sounding board. It is the only recall.
Ram Jethmalani: You can give yourself all the tributes that you want. This is self-praise. By all means, adopt it, pocket it, publicise it, take credit it. But when you are doing something wrong, I will say you are doing wrong. I have the liberty in a democracy. People have the liberty to go wrong.
