MUJRIM ALI PETER JOHN HAAZIR HO...

I was fascinated by courts till I was twenty-five. It all started when my mother who used to distill illicit liquor during the days of prohibition in Maharashtra - Ali Peter John

The police used to beg for their hafta every month and my mother used to pay them according to her own moods even though some of them called themselves ‘head constable' or ‘senior hawaldaar' when they needed a case desperately, they again begged of my mother to give them ‘at least one case' and they used to arrange the case by placing bottles of liquor in any part of our house or even on the roof and they brought their own witnesses who were known as ‘panchas' who at the time of the hearing of the case would give evidence according to the money paid by my mother to the lawyer who shared it with them and some said even with the magistrates who those days travelled by train and walked from Andheri station to the court which was dirtier than some of the public toilets and their salary was rupees two thousand and who wore the same suits for days without washing them and they couldn't afford a laundry at their salary.

The lawyers except for Shantaram Patil and Arvind Patanker travelled by cars and had their clothes well ironed.

I remember one lawyer arguing his case for bail for his client who had a black coat that was torn and stained all over and the magistrate, Mr Jal.H.Vakil who was angry screa screamed, “first dress and then address".

I visited the two courts in Andheri throughout my vacation and even the Sessions Court and High Court.

I was all for making a career as a lawyer till I saw two lawyers discussing how much money they had made at the end of the day.

The first said, “95 rupees only" and the second who was chewing a paan said, “mere to 50 rupaiye bhi nahi bane, khane ke vaande ho rahe hai".

That was the evening when I gave up one more dream. I would never be a lawyer even though the barber of the village, Birbal kept asking me,” baba, vakil banne mein aur kitna time lagega?"Birbal died, but I couldn't fulfill his dream.

The last case I sat through at the Sessions Court was the famous Daruwala case in which an highly educated Parsi young man was involved in the murder of four senior Parsi citizens who lived next to the building near the Metro Cinema.

The man argued his own case even though the Court had given him one of the best criminal lawyers to fight his case.

I was in Court for more than 40 days while the judge, Mr C.T Dighe heard the arguments of the prosecution lawyer, Mr Pheroze Vakil and Daruwala himself.

I can still remember the face of Daruwala when he was brought to Court in the morning and till that afternoon when the judge, Mr Dighe pronounced the death sentence on him and said,“Mr Daruwala, you have been found guilty of murder and you are sentenced to be hanged till you are death".

Daruwala was asked to say yes if he agreed with the Court's decision and there was a smile on his face which I have not forgotten during the last 44 years.

Little did I know them that I too would be recieving legal notices from lawyers and threats to be sent to jail for crimes I could not even dream of committing.

The first time I received a legal notice was when I had written something about a film called “Libaas" which was directed by Gulzar and produced by an editor of a trade magazine who didn't know the difference between ‘is' and ‘was'.

I lived with some kind of fear for some days till I went and met Gulzar and he turned out to be a better lawyer than any other lawyer I had met and the legal matter in which the learned editor and producer was trying to trap me was closed before it could open.

I needed the help of this brilliant lawyer Gulzar again. Raakhee, his separated wife had told me the story of her struggling days in Kolkata which was not very easy, but I found it an inspiring story and decided to write about it.

Soon I received three legal notices from a lawyer called Deshmukh from Panvel who had charged me with defamation as Raakhee Gulzar must have told him and shown him what I had written.

The legal notices kept coming as if the lawyer had no other brief. It was time for tension again for me.

I tried every way to try and solve the problem, but I had no lawyer who was willing to take up my case.

I finally landed in the Court where Gulzar was the lawyer and explained my case to him. He was very understanding and assured me that he would put an end to my ‘difficult' case that same night.

I was later told that Gulzar and his daughter Meghana had dinner with Raakhee that night and the case against me was dismissed.

How I wish I could some day come out with the truth about the condition in which Raakhee had told me her story!!!

The next time, it was a case involving the dream girl at sixty, Hema Malini. She had told me how it was her dream to work with Mahesh Bhatt and I wrote just what she told me.

But for the life of me, I still don't know why she was so angry and why she asked my editor to see that I wrote an apology to her in the same column (Ali's Notes). I had written about her earlier.

This time, I had God as lawyer and the case was suppressed and not heard of again. On the contrary, the dream girl had signed a film called “Zameen" which was to be directed by Mahesh Bhatt and had Anupam Kher in a key role. The film however was buried deep in some remote zameen.

It was a case where there was too much at stake and I didn't even know why I was being involved. It was about the story of ‘Kamla' in which a journalist from Delhi buys a Harijan woman to prove that such atrocities still existed.

The story had turned into a major issue with Vijay Tendulkar writing a play about it and then a film being made about it by Dr Jagmohan Mundhra.

I moved from one lawyer to another, all of them appointed by my company and I only knew that all was well when a lawyer told me that there was no need for me to come to any lawyer or go to any Court.

I felt as if the worst was over for me, but it wasn't. There was a case between‘Screen'and a producer going on for more than twelve years.

The journalist who had committed the ‘crime' had vanished from the scene, there were at least three changes in the post of the editor, but the legal notices kept coming.

I was taken aback when the bosses of my company literally begged of me to represent the company in Court which was in Hissar, almost on the border of Pakistan. For the first time I could make my demands before my company.

I said I would only travel by air, Executive class, I would stay in a five-star hotel and order whatever I wanted from the hotel. They agreed to all my conditions.

at Ali Peter John book launch in Mumbai on 28th Dec 2014 shown to user

I took the morning flight to Delhi from where I was put in a car in between two young lawyers and the long drive for justice took more than four hours.

I was really scared when I saw the atmosphere in the Court. It was difficult'to say who was the judge, who were the advocated and who were the criminals.

I was asked to just stand when the name of Indian Express was called out and I did so not because of any fear, but because of being in a place where even God couldn't be reached for help.

It was three o'clock when one of the lawyers accompanying me told me that it was all over and he had won.

I didn't know what we had won, but I knew that I was free from the hell that the Court at Hissar was.

Ali Peter John

I had to fly for two hours to reach Delhi, drive five hours to reach Hissar and these idiotic lawyers were telling me that I was needed in that filthy Court only for five minutes.

That evening I stood in a long queue to buy my quota of Vodka and drank myself to glory, especially when I came to know that my company had cheated me and put me in a guest house and had not kept their promise of giving me a one day stay in a five-star hotel when I was set to be a representative of the great company.

My mother always said keep away from men and women in black coats and other men and women in long white coats.

She had her own ways of teaching me lessons for a long time, she meant the lawyers and the doctors of mera Bharat mahan.

I hope I don't have any more legal encounters as I have many other encounters to face in the life left for me and then the final encounters with the Supreme judge whose justice is the only justice I have and will always have.

AISE TOH MERAA KAANOON PAR SE KABSE VISWAAS UDD GAYAA HAI. LEKIN AGAR MAI MERE DESH MEIN REHTAA HUN TOH MUJHE KAANOON PAR VISWAS TOH KARNAA PADEGAA NA?