”A husband sooner or later gets fed up. In fact a husband stops looking at his wife’s face, her body:
he looks at everything in the room except his wife. If you enquire into couples you can be convinced
of what I am saying. Just ask any husband, ‘How long has it been since you looked directly into
your wife’s eyes, her face?’ – and he will start scratching his head. ‘It is difficult; perhaps since the
honeymoon I have not looked at her.’
”But Lakshmana .... And it is just one side, that your elder brother’s wife is equal to your mother.
The other side is that the younger brother of a woman’s husband is known in Hindi as devar. Devar
means her second husband. In case the husband dies he has the first right to marry her. Var means
husband; devar means second husband.
”Just as there are presidents and vice-presidents – in case the president dies the vice-president
becomes the acting president – devar is simply a ready-made husband in case of emergency.”
A case was put against me, that I had hurt the religious feelings of the Hindus. In the court there
were many problems. The first was that I was asked to take the oath in the name of God, or in the
name of the constitution of India, that I would speak only the truth.
I said, ”Before I take the oath I would like to ask you: What about freedom of speech? The oath
goes against freedom of speech. You are binding me. You are telling me I can speak only the truth;
then why in the constitution do you talk about freedom of speech? You should have said, ‘You are
free to speak only the truth.’ Freedom of speech has no boundaries to it.
”How can I go against the constitution? I can take the oath that I will follow the constitution, use
freedom of speech, but I cannot say truth or untruth, because that divides freedom of speech in two
parts.”
The magistrate said, ”This is a little difficult. I have been a magistrate for twenty years, I have been
studying the constitution in every possible way, all its aspects, but that this oath is against freedom
of speech never occurred to me.”
I said, ”You don’t know what freedom of speech is. But,” I said, ”I don’t want to change the subject,
so just to continue I will take the oath. But remember, you can believe in my oath, but you cannot
believe in my other statements. On what grounds do you make the distinction? If I am a person who
lies, I can lie when I am taking the oath. Who prevents me?
”You know perfectly well that everybody takes the oath here and everybody is not speaking the truth.
Both the parties fighting in a case take the oath; certainly both the parties are not speaking the truth.
At least one party certainly is not speaking the truth; perhaps both are not speaking the truth. But
both speaking the truth is not possible; otherwise how are you going to make the judgment?
”You accept my oath – on what grounds? Do you know me, that I speak the truth? That I will take
the oath and will follow it? What gives you that guarantee? I will remain the same person as I
was afterwards, so it makes no difference to me. I can take the oath just so that we can proceed,
because there are so many problems.”
The judge said, ”Problems? For you or for me?”
I said, ”You have summoned me to the court” – and there were thousands of people who had come;
they were in the court and outside the court. And that man who had put the case against me –
a Hindu political leader, a Hindu chauvinist – became afraid seeing so many people sympathetic
towards me.
I said to the judge, ”Look: first, I was simply quoting a statement of Mahatma Gandhi, and an
explanation of Vinoba Bhave. If anybody has hurt the feelings of Hindus, they should put cases
against Mahatma Gandhi and Vinoba Bhave. I was just quoting them, without inverted commas.
”It was not my explanation. In fact I was offended by the explanation that Vinoba has given. Vinoba’s
explanation means that he thinks that Lakshmana has some sexual interest in Sita. That is purely
his explanation. Said in plain words, he is afraid to look at Sita’s face. Why? If he is not sexually
interested he should not be afraid. Vinoba is trying to make an explanation which is insulting.
”I am saying that Sita was so beautiful – anybody would have been interested. I would have been
interested. You would have been interested. Beauty is not something that one should not be
interested in. It is one of the gifts of nature; it has to be adored. And my feeling is he was touching
her feet every day because Sita was so beautiful; he was adoring her.
”And you know the meaning of devar – that he was the second husband. Now, if somebody is hurt,
then he should put a case against the whole Hindu tradition, that this tradition is in a mess. On the
one hand you say treat your brother’s wife as your mother – okay, treat her as your mother. But
when the brother dies, then? – treat your mother as your wife!
”And this man who has complained against me and forced me to come from Calcutta to here,
unnecessarily wasting my time – is he the only Hindu in Ahmedabad? These thousands of people
are here – these are all Hindus. You ask those whose feelings are hurt to raise their hands. And if
you don’t ask then I am going to ask.”
So the magistrate had to ask. Not a single hand was raised. I said, ”Now you can see: nobody’s
feelings are hurt. This man is a Hindu chauvinist.”
At that time the man became afraid and he told the magistrate, ”I want police protection, because
after the court this crowd can kill me.”
I asked the magistrate, ”Do you want any more argument that nobody’s feelings are hurt? This man
is afraid of Hindus, that they will kill him. They should kill me – I should ask for the protection of the
court because I have hurt the feelings of Hindus, he hasn’t. Why should he be afraid?
”And why should I have been called to the court? Why is Vinoba Bhave not being called? Of course,
Gandhi is dead – you cannot summon him, but he is not needed anyway. Vinoba is alive – why
has he not been called to the court? Just because he belongs to the party who rules the country?
Because he is a guru to all the politicians of the country, you didn’t have the guts to summon him?
”He was needed to answer whether I am quoting right or wrong. If he says that I am quoting wrong,
then certainly I have to be answerable for it. And my advocate had asked you to summon Vinoba
because it is most important and essential, what he says. Still you did not summon Vinoba. And still
you go on saying that the courts are impartial?
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