On the Difficulties Faced by Judges

Another one from the old TFT Miscellany-at-Law days. 

Readers will no doubt agree that judges have difficult jobs.  When they are not busy dealing with phone calls from frantic Law Ministers, they are elbow deep in listening to arguments or writing judgments.  It will also be self evident that each case, however different from another, must present before the judge the same dilemma: Whether to exercise their judicial discretion and grant justice, or to remain in harmony with the precedents set out in previously decided cases.  Both choices are fraught with difficulty.

Justice Nasim Hasan Shah, always mindful of the problems faced by the Bench, once invoked the aid of literature to persuade them of the need to look beyond the narrow scope of precedent to do justice.  Quoting from Shakespeare’s ‘The Merchant of Venice” our former Chief Justice relied on the earnest plea of Bassanio (Act IV, Scene I):

“And I beseech you,

Wrest once the law to your authority:

To do a great right, do a little wrong.” 

But, however eloquent such a plea may sound, it is not without rebut.  In the case of Syndall v. Castings Ltd. ([1967] I QB 302), it fell to be decided whether or not a man’s illegitimate son was his “descendant” for the purposes of a certain group insurance scheme.  Despite the decisions reached on this point in previous cases, the great Lord Denning M.R held that the child was entitled to the benefits of the scheme.  However, his reasoning did not persuade the other two judges – Lord Diplock and Lord Russell – sitting on the Bench at the Court of Appeal.  Lord Russell ended his judgement with the words: “I may perhaps be forgiven for saying that it appears to me that Lord Denning M.R. has acceded to the appeal of Bassanio in the Merchant of Venice.”  He then quoted the lines above.  “But,” as there is more in Act IV, Scene I than Bassanio’s lone plea, he added: “Portia retorted:

‘It must not be; there is no power in Venice

Can alter a decree established:

‘Twill be recorded for a precedent,

And many an error, by the same example,

Will rush into the State: It cannot be.’

I am a Portia man.”  It seems Justice Shah either sided purely with Bassanio’s camp, or had not read the scene completely.

Poetry, too, has been invoked to unchain the Bench from the shackles of blind adherence to stare decisis (previous decisions).  For example, in Van Kleek v. Ramer (156 Pac. 1108), Scott J. stated: “I may be permitted to suggest, for the consideration of courts and judges who feel impelled to sacrifice their sense of reason and justice upon the Golden Calf of precedent, the quaint philosophy of Sam Walter Foss, in the following lines:

‘One day through the primeval wood

A calf walked home, as good calves should;

But left a trail all bent askew,

A crooked trail, as all calves do.

Since then three hundred years have fled,

And, I infer, the calf is dead.

But still he left behind this trail,

And thereby hangs my moral tale.

The trail was taken up next day

By a lone dog that passed that way;

And then a wise bell weather sheep

Persued the trail o’er vale and steep,

And drew the flock behind him, too,

As good bell-weathers always do,

So from that day, o’er hill and glade,

Through those woods a path was made,

And many men wound in and out,

And bent and turned and dodges about,

And uttered words of righteous wrath,

Because ’twas such a crooked path;

But still they followed – do not laugh –

The first migrations of that calf,

And through this winding woodway stalked

Because he wabbled when he walked.

The forest path became a lane,

That bent and turned and turned again;

This crooked lane became a road,

Where many a poor horse, with his load,

Toiled on, beneath the burning sun,

And traveled some three miles in one.

And thus a century and a half

They trod the footsteps of that calf.

The years passed on with swiftness fleet,

The road became a village street,

And this, before men were aware,

A city’s crowded thoroughfare.

And soon the central street was this

Of a crowded metropolis,

And men two centuries and a half

Trod the footsteps of that calf.

Each day a hundred thousand rout

Followed the zigzag calf about;

And o’er his crooked journey went

The traffic of a continent.

A hundred thousand men were

By one calf near three centuries dead,

They followed still his crooked way,

And lost one hundred years a day;

For thus such reverence is lent

To well-established precedent.

A moral lesson this might teach,

Were I ordained and called to preach.

For men are prone to go it blind

Along the calf paths of the mind,

And toil away from sun to sun

To do what other men have done.

They follow in the beaten track,

And out and in, and forth and back,

And still their devious course pursue

To keep the paths that others do.

But how the wise old wood-gods laugh,

Who saw the first primeval calf!

Ah! Many things this tale might teach;

But I am not ordained to preach.’”

But this calf lyrical should not cloud our judgment.  Discretion, the opposite of following precedent, is sometimes a poor substitute for principle, however great the judge.  “The Discretion of a judge is the Law of Tyrants; it is always unknown; it is different in different Men; it is casual and depends Constitution, Temper, and Passion.  In the best it is often times Caprice, in the worst it is every Vice, Folly, and Passion to which human Nature is liable.”(as cited by Perrin J. in Conway and Lynch v. R. (1845) 7 Ir.L.R 149).  Such a warning is to be taken seriously.

Where, then, are our judges left?  Between the rock of precedent and the hard place of discretion?  The difficult quest for justice may be summed up by the words attributed to Bowen L.J., when, in determining a case, he remarked:  “When I hear of ‘equity’ in a case like this, I am reminded of a blind man – in a dark room – looking for a black hat – which isn’t there!”  Perhaps a solution is to be found in the ingenuity of the Bench itself; in a dose of common sense.

In 1893 it fell to be decided whether a launch in an artificial lake half a mile long was a “ship” within the English Merchant Shipping Act, 1854.  Lord Coleridge C.J. addressed the point with great clarity: “The Attorney-General has asked where we are to draw the line.  The answer is that is not necessary to draw the line at any precise point.  It is enough for us to say that the present case is on the right side of any reasonable line that could be drawn” (Mayor &c. of Southport v. Morriss [1893] I QB 359).  How true!

On Bias

This article was written over a decade ago, during the Benazir Bhutto’s appeal against her conviction by an Accountability Court.  Then, the Court convicting her was accused of bias.  I wrote this article - part of a series of columns for TFT on the miscellany of law - reflecting on some aspects of bias.

Recently, the Supreme Court has been criticised for being biased again.

The Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto is launching another attempt to enter Pakistan triumphantly, bringing allegations of bias against the judiciary with her.  Her lawyers who, at this moment, are prevaricating and delaying in our august Supreme Court, seek to introduce into evidence, amongst other things, alleged phone conversations recorded by (what our press likes to call) the ‘sensitive’ agencies.

Sensitive or not, these intelligence agencies seem to have tapped the phones of the judges hearing Ms. Bhutto’s case in 1999.  More interesting is the alleged phone conversation between the then Law Minister, Khalid Anwar, and the High Court Judge Malik Mohammad Qayoom.  Less interesting is Khalid Anwar’s tepid defense of his actions (published in the daily DAWN).

One of the rules of ‘Natural Justice’ is that everyone is entitled to be heard by a judge who is not biased or prejudiced in a way that precludes a fair and genuine trial.  This rule of Natural Justice was first set out by Lord Hewart CJ in what is now a familiar phrase: “Justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done” (R v. Sussex JJ., ex parte McCarthy [1924] 1 KB 256).  Of course, judges are only human, and it impossible to expect from them “the icy impartiality of a Rhadamanthus”, the cruel judge of Hell, who punished before he heard (cited by Bowen LJ in Jackson v. Barry Ry. [1893] 1 Ch 238).  Evidently, even Satan is unfamiliar with that other rule of Natural Justice, the audi alterem partem principle that no one should be condemned unheard.  But I digress.  Judges are not supermen, an astute observation made by our Supreme Court (for more on that particular farce, read Justice Akhlaq Hussain’s case PLD 1969 SC 201).  They are men, and hence liable to their individual temper, constitution and passion; which is why if and when these three emotions are exercised, a litigant is entitled to a new, unbiased trail.

The tests for bias are settled principles of law, but their development has thrown up the odd case or two of some interest. 

Take, for example, R. (Donoghue) v. Cork County JJ. ([1910] 2 IR 271) where the conviction by an Irish magistrate – and it is important to remember the Magistrate was Irish – of a certain defendant was quashed when it was shown that “a very bad feeling” existed between him and the defendant’s family.  DeSmith’s does not elaborate on the case, and reveals only that the animosity was the result of “a trespass by a fowl.”  Ghar ki murghi = conviction, I suppose.

The natural right of every litigant to have a fair trial is so fundamental to the practice of the law that even the most absurd allegations of bias have been adjudicated upon.  In R v. Dublin JJ. ([1904] 2 IR 75), the owners of a public house whose liquor license had not been granted by the licensing judge (in England, establishments that serve liquor must have permission to do so) brought a case of bias against him on the grounds that he was a teetotaler.  Their argument was that the licensing judge’s state of mind was “likely to prevent him from dealing fairly with applications before him”.  The challenge, however, was unsuccessful.

Of course, the act of trying to bias a judge is a different story altogether.  An Indian case, reported as 45 Cr LJ 244 (RC) is quite succinct on the issue: Here, interference by a minister in a trial case was proved.   It was decided that the case was to be retried because of this alleged interference, even though it had not been proved whether or not it had been a cause of the verdict.  Of course, all this case puts Mr. Khalid Anwar’s rather tepid defense of his action in serious doubt, regardless of what Ardeshir Cowasjee or Amina Jilani may say.  

For the prosecution, on the other hand, the issues raised by these tapes are different.  To them it seems that the introduction of the tapes into evidence is only a means to divert attention from the fact that Ms. Bhutto and her husband are guilty of corruption.  Their argument before the Supreme Court will attempt to bar the admission of the tapes into evidence on the grounds that the phone tappings were obtained unlawfully. In the United States, for example, the Supreme Court has held that under the Constitution a conviction obtained on evidence disclosed an unlawful search (which include phone tappings) cannot stand. The zeal of the prosecution team can be understood.  For them, the threat is that Ms. Bhutto and her husband will be acquitted on a technicality.  The American Supreme Court judge Benjamin Cardozo once expressed a similar view on the American law in People v. Defore (242 NY 13), describing it as one by which “the criminal is to go free because the constable has blundered.”  But one wonders if the prosecution’s zeal has not clouded their better judgment: A convict is still entitled to a fair trial.  Denying Benaizir this right can set an awful precedent.  The rule of law cannot be denied, for even the devil is entitled to a fair trial.

Robert Bolt’s play, “A Man for All Seasons”, sets out an eloquent defense of the rule of law. Henry VIII’s former Chancellor, Sir Thomas More, refused to take an oath “renouncing all obedience to the Bishop of Rome” and acknowledging the King as head of the Church of England.  Of course, he was tried for treason (the analogies with Pakistan are so glaringly obvious that one need not dwell on them).

Richard Rich, once a friend of More’s, gave fatal evidence against him.  In the play, Rich’s treachery is forecast in a powerful exchange between More, his daughter, Margret, and her husband-to-be:

MARGRET (speaking of Rich): Father, that man’s bad.

MORE:  There is no law against that.

ROPER:  There is! Gods law!

MORE:  Then God can arrest him.

ROPER:  Sophistication upon sophistication.

MORE:  No, sheer simplicity.  The law, Roper, the law.  I know what’s legal not what’s right.  And I’ll stick to what’s legal.

ROPER:  Then you set Man’s law above God’s!

MORE:  No, far below; but let me draw your attention to a fact – I’m not God.  The currents and eddies of right and wrong, which you find such plain sailing, I can’t navigate, I’m no voyager.  But in the thickets of the law, oh there I’m a forester.  I doubt if there’s a man alive who could follow me there, thank God . . . (He says this to himself.)

ALICE  (exasperated, and as is pointing to Rich): While you talk, he’s gone!

MORE:  And go he should if he was the Devil himself until he broke the law!

ROPER:  So now you’d give the Devil benefit of law!

MORE:  Yes.  What would you do?  Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil?

ROPER:  I’d cut down every law in England to do that!

MORE  (roused and excited): Oh? (Advances on Roper.)  And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you – where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat?  (Leaves him.)  This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast – Man’s law, not God’s – and if you cut them down – and you’re just the man to do it – d’you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then?  (Quietly.)  Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake.

It’s a pity, then, that More’ faith in the law did not work out.  He was condemned to a traitor’s death, but ‘mercifully’ this was commuted to just execution.  Of course, Benazir’s case is not one of life imitating art, and so Thomas More (and his gory fate) cannot be used as arguments.  Our Supreme Court should give Ms. Bhutto the fair trail she deserves, and ensure that the rule of law is protected and preserved.

The Burning Platform of our Development Challenges

Nokia CEO Stephen Elop’s recent internal memo to his company begins with a story of a man on the platform of a burning oil rig in the North Sea. The man decides to take his chances and jump. In ordinary circumstances, no one would elect to jump into freezing water. But, as Elop explains, the man was not facing ordinary circumstances: The burning platform led to a change in the man’s thinking.

Nokia was the giant in the mobile phone business not five years ago, but has been overtaken by Apple and Android technology and is being undercut by Chinese OEMs that, as Elsop writes, “crank out devices” in “the time it takes us to polish a PowerPoint presentation.”

The “burning platform” memo has become an instant management classic. According to Chris Zeigler in Engadget, a leading industry technology site, “it is one of the most exciting and interesting CEO memos we’ve ever seen.” In the memo, Elop likens Nokia’s position in the market as standing on a burning platform. And he draws attention to why it is necessary for the company to make a radical shift away from the practices that got it to where it was.

The state of our cities is a burning platform and there is an immediate need for reform and shift from the practices that got us to where we are today.

Why are cities important? About 35 percent of Pakistan lives in its urban areas. These urban areas account for nearly 80 percent of GDP yet constitute no more than 3 percent of the country’s overall land mass.

The state of these urban areas is abysmal. In the Punjab, the most populous province, it is estimated that nearly 50 percent of urban residents live in slums or katchi abadis. In Karachi, some argue that almost 70 percent of the people live in slums. One can be forgiven for not noticing: In Lahore, for example, the sprawl is well camouflaged. One third of the city takes up 90 percent of its land mass and one would have to go out of their way to see the conditions the other two-thirds live in. And it’s summer.

The potential of our cities is enormous. If one considers the contribution to the GDP from urban areas, imagine what the economy would be like if cities were more, for lack of a better word, efficient. Imagine how productive our cities would be if their people were allowed to reach their potential.

How can this be done? There are literally hundreds of ways. Mobility is one. Take Lahore, for example. In a city of nearly 10 million, the preliminary report of the ongoing JICA/Government of Punjab Urban Transit Master Plan study reveals that there are, on average, some 9.6 million “trips” a day (a trip is any movement, in whatever mode, which is at least 200 meters). This is an unusually low number for a city the size of Lahore and points to the fact that, because we don’t have public transport and appear to have developed an equally unusual view on the probity of women in public spaces, women are rendered effectively immobile – a violation of one’s Fundamental Right to mobility. Imagine what could happen if safe and respectable options of mobility allowed women to participate in the social and economic life of the city. Imagine what could happen if great public transport erased this prejudice about women in public space. But beyond giving, literally, half the work-force the opportunity to go to work, mobility in cities is crucial for the very reason it allows humans the opportunity and interaction that make cities the unique places of culture and trade that they are today.

Last year, the Planning Commission set up a Task Force on Urban Development under the Chairpersonship of Arif Hasan. Its terms of reference were to see how cities could be made more efficient. The Task Force made three broad recommendations: (1) Amend those urban laws, byelaws and polices that freeze up vast swathes of real estate capital so that land use can freely respond to demand; (2) Promote high-density mixed use city centres; and (3) Ensure public transport provides the human capital in our cities the connectivity, mobility and accessibility they require. In other words, enforce city limits, free up the real-estate capital that’s dormant under old laws and archaic policies and let a well-connected populace do the rest.

The Task Force’s report, which was announced in February of this year (and which hasn’t, unfortunately, seen much of the light of day) was submitted to the Planning Commission and has, in turn, been incorporated it into its new Framework for Economic Growth under the chapter titled “Creative Cities”.

The new Framework is an upgrade of Pakistan’s 10-Year-Plan approach to economic development. The previous platform was a relic of the 1950s whose approach to urban issues was framed in a Pakistan where there was little urbanization. Back then, Pakistan was a rural society with an agricultural economy. According to this world view, the problems of cities – housing, sanitation, employment opportunities, educational institutions, healthcare and recreational facilities – could be solved by providing the necessary infrastructure. According to Muhammad Imran, a transport planning specialist, this paradigm eventually became “path dependent” on your typical investments in hard, grey infrastructure (overpasses, underpasses, ring roads and the like) rather than on investment in green infrastructure (sewage treatment, water filtration) or social capital. This world view has also been taken by Pakistani planners as a means of absorbing millions of consultancy dollars while maintaining, as best as possible, the status quo.

Following the traditional approach to cities is no longer feasible. The current state of and challenges facing Pakistanis living in cities is critical. The traditional approach has been the medicine that’s been tried so far and it is what has gotten us to where we stand today. Our cities, their people and the role they play in the national economy are now complex issues that require innovative and forward thinking policies. The traditional approach has, to use CEO Elsop’s words, “poured gasoline on our own burning platform.”

The new growth strategy understands this and represents a radical shift in how planning in Pakistan – and not just urban planning – is considered. When it comes to cities, the new growth strategy recognizes, at its essence, that cities are places of human interaction; places where people can interact, share ideas and, by doing so, unlock their economic potential. This is just the type of radical thinking that can kick start a new growth process. It’s time for our cities to jump off their burning platform and into a new paradigm of development.

On Blasphemy

The recent public debate on blasphemy reminded me of an article I wrote, as part of a column called Miscellany-at-Law (A Diversion) that was published, for a while, in The Friday Times around about, I think, 2001/2002. There's an element of time-warp in the column because, I'm posting this on 12 Rabi ul Awwal and there's a cricket World Cup underway (the relevance of this becomes clear because of the case referred to in the last paragraph).

On Blasphemy

Readers will no doubt be aware of the recent violence in Nigeria, precipitated by some unwarranted comments about the Holy Prophet and the contestants of this year’s Miss World competition, scheduled in Lagos on 7 December 2002. The violence protesting against the blasphemous remarks cost some 200 lives, and has resulted in the competition shifting to the safer environs of London.

Readers will also no doubt be aware of the local pathans who had taken umbrage against an allegedly blasphemous letter written in the Frontier Post last year. Their overreaction to this letter has seen the destruction of that newspaper’s offices as well as (non-sequitor) a cinema. The law of blasphemy has had an infamous past in our country, and much has been written about the merits and demerits of this legislation. Notwithstanding the ludicrous over-reaction of the Allah-fearing tribesmen of Peshawar – what with going on a violent rampage when a more dignified response would have been adequate – there have been other occasions where these laws have been pressed into service with amusing (at least in these cases) results.

For example, Muslims are not the only religious community in Pakistan who have been subject to blasphemous remarks. In 1952, an advocate of the Lahore High Court, Khawaja Nazir Ahmad, published a book called “Jesus on Heaven and Earth”. The book was forfeited over a year later by order of the Punjab Government on the grounds that “it was a vituperative attack on four fundamental Christian beliefs.” The book said that “Jesus was born of the wedlock of Mary and Joseph, that he did not die on the cross, but was removed while still alive, that after his wounds had healed, he and his mother went to Muree where the latter died, that thence he proceeded to Kashmir where he also died, that Muree has been named after Mary who grave is also found there, and that the grave of Jesus is in Srinagar.” On a somewhat different note, the narrative of the book resembles the plot of one of Sultan Rahi’s famous films: Hitlar. In it, it is shown that Hitler did not, in fact, commit suicide, but instead retreated to the Punjabi heartland to raise an equally malevolent son.

The case was argued by the Khawaja Nazir Ahmad himself who, as Mr. Justice M.R. Kiyani of the Lahore High Court observed, needed “some little assistance by Mr. Yaqub Ali on the legal issue”. Justice Kiayani went on to describe Nazir Ahmad’s rhetoric as full of “religious fervor, touching occasionally the high-water mark of fanaticism, so essential for a missionary.”

Justice Kiayani found the contents of the book clearly fell into the mischief of section 295-A, but added by way of warning against the misuse of the blasphemy laws that “although the religious beliefs of the Christians have been insulted by this book, it will not be easy to presume on the strength of the words used, that the author had ‘deliberate and malicious intention of outraging’ their religious feelings. The intention is burdened by so many heavy adjectives that [sic] attack be very clearly abusive, obscene or vulgar before it can cause [sic] mischief of s. 295-A, or to Christians, or indeed to any religious body.”

Justice Kiayani also had a few words to say about the two Christians, Mr. C.E. Gibbon and Mr. S.P. Singha, both representatives of the legislative assembly, who sought to be made party to this case, or for that matter anyone who sought to bring a private prosecution for blasphemy. He felt that the matter was between the government and the publishers. He also had some advice for the government, which had taken two years to take action against the book: “It was unnecessary for Mr. Gibbon to file an affidavit, and it was futile to argue that Mr. Gibbon alone was offended. We do not expect Mr. Gibbon to arm himself with a kirpan and preach violence from the steps of the Assembly building to a very peaceful community. But if we look for resolutions and protests meetings, and processions carrying blackened faces on donkeys and fireworks and tear-gas before we take action, then we foster cold contempt and hatred and sap the foundations of the State.” Words that are relevant even today. (In the matter of the Book “Jesus In Heaven on Earth” and in the matter of Woking Muslim Mission And Literary Trust, Lahore and of the Civil and Military Gazette, Limited, Lahore v. The Crown PLD 1954 Lah 724.)

Even the High and Mighty have not been spared. In the summer of 1977, the Chairman of WAPDA, Maj. Gen. Fazal-i-Raziq gave a rousing speech to the officers of WAPDA, impressing upon them the importance of “haqooq-al-abad”, the need to earn an honest livelihood and to complete Tarbela Dam as early as possible in order to rebuild the economy of the country (the more things change, the more they stay the same…). A few months later, one Riaz Ahmad filed a complaint against the Chairman under section 295-A of the Pakistan Penal Code on the grounds that the otherwise innocuous speech was a deliberate and malicious attempt to outrage the religious feelings of the Muslims of Pakistan. The law reports are silent as to his motives, but do disclose that, he had only recently been removed from his post as Superintendent of the WAPDA House in Lahore. Res ipso loquitor.

The complaint was quashed on technical grounds, with the Lahore High Court holding that prosecutions under section 295-A, as per the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1898, were to be taken up only on the authority of the Federal or Provincial Governments, and not by way of private complaint (Major General Fazal-i-Raziq, Chairman WAPDA v. Ch. Riaz Ahmad PLD 1978 Lah 1082). Readers will be aware that the other sub-sections of section 295 of the Pakistan Penal Code do not have such a safety provision, rendering the legislation susceptible to the abuse of private individuals. Readers will also remember that attempts to modify these laws in order to make blasphemy prosecutions the sole responsibility of the Government have been met with violence, much like that seen in Peshawar recently.

More recently, however, even the publishers of the Holy Quran have not been spared against allegations of blasphemy. In the case of M.M.K.A. Zai v. The Director General FIA (PLD 1988 Kar 505), the Taj Company itself was accused of blasphemy. The petitioner found that some of the hard-cover bindings of the Holy Quran hid “nude and indecent pictures” (what the Petitioner was doing ripping up covers of the Holy Quran was not questioned during proceedings), and sought the Company to be tried under section 295-B of the Pakistan Penal Code. An investigation of the Taj Company’s premises revealed three more Qurans containing “objectionable material”. Even the Taj Company was stumped.

Subsequent FIA investigations revealed that in 1980, the Company had placed an order of 12,500 copies of the Holy Quran from an Italian firm, If-Ghifo of Milan. This Italian concern, as things turned out, must not have been aware of the purpose for which they were being asked to prepare the bindings for so many books, and had used material from old art magazines. That explained the nudies. Justice Sajjad Ali Shah (as he was then) of the Sindh High Court held that as nobody in Pakistan was blame for this reprehensible act, and as the Taj Company was taking the necessary steps to recall the books, no legal action was needed.

Discerning readers will also be aware that M.M.K.A. Zai is one of the first public interest litigants in the country. In 1988, he filed a writ in the Sindh High Court, attempting to ban the broadcast of the semi-finals of the Reliance Cup (M.M.K.A. Zai v. Incharge, Pakistan Television Corporation Ltd. PLD 1988 Kar 307). He contended that the date of the match coincided with 12 Rabi-ul-Awal, and good Muslims should be “reciting Darood, Salaam and Naats” on that auspicious occasion rather than being distracted by cricket. Religious fervor must have made him overlook the venue of the match: Bombay. Dismissing the petition, Justice Sajjad Ali Shah, no doubt a cricket-lover, observed that Bombay “is not only outside the territorial jurisdiction of this High Court but it is also outside the country.” Case dismissed.

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For anyone's who's got this far, two confessions:

First, that the name of the column, Miscellany-at-Law was shamelessly lifted by me from the name of the wonderful series of diversions on the law by R.E. Megarry, V-C. Megarry's wit and marvellous grasp of legal trivia made, in many ways, my understanding of the law easier and infinitely more fun. In defence to any charges of plagiarism, I will happily reply by stating that imitation is the greatest form of flattery.

Second, almost every one of the articles I wrote in this series of columns, and I think they were over two-dozen, give or take, began with "On". Thus On Blasphemy or On Goondas or On Honour Killings and so on. I ascribed to this pretentious affectation because, I confess, of a great admiration of The Master Essayist himself, Michel de Montaigne. Montaigne started each of his essays (other than An Apology for Raymon Seybond) with "On", I was only happy enough to pretend to I could do so too.