Frank and fearless Jaiswal rules the court
| Date :02-Mar-2020 |
Adv Anand Jaiswal
The Hitavada Team :
AN ASTUTE lawyer, who floors the judges and his clients in court, when he brings his acumen to a prestigious cricket association and raises its eminence, it becomes an amalgamation that is rare and borders on being what dreams are made of. There is hard work, but there is immense happiness in the outcome too. The toil has only brought smiles on the faces of people - in court where he handles cases and on the floor of the Vidarbha Cricket Association of which is he is the President. That, in a nutshell, is what Adv Anand Jaiswal, an eminent lawyer, senior counsel and the most successful chief of the VCA is. In an easy flowing conversational tête-à-tête with The Hitavada editors at the ‘Confluence’, Anand Jaiswal ruled the floor with anecdotes and then on a serious note discussed what ails the legal system in our country.
The interaction was laced with his encounters on the sports field and the legal floor and then he faced a volley of questions with ease, never ducking the odd googly that the enthusiastic editors threw at him. In the T20 version where the lone batsman faced a team of more than the prescribed eleven, Anand Jaiswal was a clear winner - all the way.
The one thing that he stressed on in the hour-and-a-half-long interaction was that one should have no regrets in life for choosing a path, and once you have chosen a particular path, you should give it your best shot. And this philosophy, the learned lawyer, coming from a family of doctors, followed his entire life. “Back then when I was a student, it was blasphemous to do anything except engineering or pursuing the medical profession. But I took the path least trodden and wished to become a lawyer,” says he matter-of-factly. With complete parental support and Adv VR Manohar as his inspiration, he went on to pursue law, and made a name for himself in the chosen field.
As his reputation grew in the legal circles, a turning point came in his life when it was time to implement the Lodha Committee reforms in the cricket associations. As all the members of the Executive Committee of VCA, as per the Lodha Committee guidelines were disqualified, Shashank Manohar, whose tireless work has seen the blossoming of the Association asked Jaiswal to step in. “I was a member of VCA, but never a part of the inner administrative circle. But because I knew how much Shashank Manohar had invested in the project and needed my help, I didn’t hesitate,” he says, and that’s how he went on to become the President of VCA. While Law as a profession helped him broaden his horizons, his stint at VCA was a learning experience with a different perspective.
“As a lawyer I learnt to think from many angles - from my client’s, from what the judge might be thinking, from what the other party’s lawyer would be contemplating. This added to the exposure I had already received at St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai where I completed my graduation during which I got to interact with many luminaries in different fields. As the President of VCA, it has been an altogether different experience because these are a completely different set of people - players, coaches, support staff, international cricketers, people from different associations, BCCI members.
They too have enriched my life with their experiences,” says the salt and pepper haired gentleman, who strongly believes that being frank and fair has helped him in his growth - both personally as well as professionally. A well-read man, Jaiswal still relishes his P G Wodehouse and how well read he is reflects in his language, his expression and his conduct. Soft-spoken but with a quiet strength, he is of the opinion that electronic media can never nudge print media out of circulation. “You can read and digest a newspaper at your own pace and leisure. It gives you a sense of satisfaction to form your own opinion, vis a vis the electronic media that thrusts news down your throat, vociferously implying that what they are telecasting is the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”
And if he praised The Hitavada effusively for its unbiased views, the strength and conviction to state the truth, and for the local causes that the newspaper takes which lead to results, he also, in the same breath suggests that more presence of national writers will add more gravitas to the opinion. He also laments the big loss that the younger generation is facing vis a vis reading. A staunch supporter of ‘reading helps you to grow and develop your imagination’, Jaiswal thanks his school SFS as well as his parents for inculcating this habit in him. On being asked to comment on a recent dialogue from Bollywood film ‘Section 375’ - ‘We are in the business of law, not justice,’ Jaiswal is firm in his belief that law and justice are the same. The difference should be between business and law.
He then elaborates that such statements come forth because our systems are flawed. “Executive, Legislature, Judiciary - all three pillars have major flaws, not only because of the manner of their functioning but also because of the vested interest of a few people. Judiciary, however, is better of these three.” Listing the problems ailing the legal system, Jaiswal lays bare a few facts which need to be addressed on an urgent basis. “Judiciary is terribly overburdened. There are only 20,000 judges to hear cases. Each judge sometimes has a list of 100 cases in front of him. Is that even humanly possible to go through the entire lot? On top of it many lawyers who keep on taking ‘tarikh pe tarikh’ for their clients, fleecing them and slowing the judicial process down are the real culprits.” He also points to the fact that Indians are a very litigious society that does not believe in settling issues, but takes pride in taking someone to court. Lack of infrastructure impedes the functioning of the judiciary further. But despite the ‘no win’ situation, we are a country where the legal system is just and fair.
He happily notes that judiciary for most part is immune from governmental interference. In a democratic set-up, activism is necessary but when any vested interest comes into play, the activism loses its momentum. Public Interest Litigations (PILs) also fall in the same category. PILs cannot be a tool for temporary fame. Jaiswal is conservative in this case and feels that PILs should be an exception not a norm. PILs were an arrangement for those who received total apathy from the Executive and had to approach the court to settle the dispute. “Courts role is not to carry out administrative duties. Under the guise of PILs, courts are being advised to do just that, and that is not in public interest at all.”
As counsel for the State Government in the irrigation scam that is in the news, Jaiswal, for most part, was in the ‘no comment’, ‘wait and watch’ mode. But he was very open about the FIR that Nagpur Police had filed against the VCA for ‘not taking permission for the first international match scheduled under his tenure at the VCA stadium.’ “It was a case of them asking for more complimentary tickets, and the VCA denying them because the complimentary tickets are marked out and we didn’t have any extra in our hands that we could give them. I explained all this to the authorities, but two days before the match, the complimentary tickets given to them were returned and after the match an FIR was filed on little reasons.” But someone who has always stood for truth and justice, Jaiswal fought this and emerged a winner. He proudly states that under his tenure VCA has been winning matches at many levels.
But he doesn’t take all the credit. “The Academy provided the players world-class facilities, brought in coaches and this has brought about a whale of difference.” He specifically mentions Trevor Gonsalves, Usman Ghani, Ranjit Paradkar and Chandrakant Pandit - the coaches who have played a huge role in the blossoming of players at the Academy. And he is hopeful that in the next two to three years, players from Vidarbha will make a mark in the Indian team. “Right now it’s a winning combination and the Indian team wouldn’t want to mess with this. But mark my words, our players will don the national colours,” he avers. A travel buff, who loves to read and listen to music, Jaiswal says that many people have had a very positive influence on him. And he tries to take the best from those whom he interacts with. “Because there is something to be picked up from everyone.” When he is asked to comment on the two prestigious posts that he has held/holds - President of HCBA and President of VCA, Jaiswal is prompt in his reply. “VCA is much more challenging, because it is broader in expanse, has a national perspective whereas HCBA is limited, a small body as compared to VCA. However that is not to say that I did not enjoy being the head of HCBA.
It had its own charm.” As to finding a common link between life, law and sports, he chuckles and says, “Life is all encompassing. But Law and Sports are two different spheres, two different worlds.” But for this multifaceted personality, the twain did meet, helping him broaden his horizon, helping him expand his learning sphere, in the process helping him perform to the best of his ability, helping him give it his best shot.