For over five decades, Indira Jai Singh has been one of India's most distinguished lawyers. She has been at the forefront of landmark cases that have expanded constitutional rights and advanced social justice. The noted lawyer Indira Jai Singh's NGO Lawyers Collective has had its license suspended for six months by the Home Ministry. We are being victimized for the legal work that we have done. The state is not claiming it on its own behalf. The state is executing the constitutional mandate. Dissent is increasingly constrained and the space for protest appears to be shrinking. How do you see that relationship today? I am not a dissenter. I have said it in my book. I am the one who is affirming the values of the constitution. And in my opinion, it is the people who are responsible for maintaining the rule of law who are derogating from it. Mahatma Gandhi, obviously, we all know what role was played by non-cooperation, what role was played by civil disobedience. In fact, he said it's your duty to defy an unjust law. You distinguish between democratic lawyering, feminist lawyering and secular feminist lawyering. Can you explain the differences between the three? Just talking about equality before law and equal protection of laws is not going to get anything for women. What do women bring to the table? They bring in epistemology, a knowledge system which is not available without them on the table. The present government has made the Uniform Civil Code a central part of its political project. And when it came to Zaira Banu, as far as I could see, the injustice of triple talaq, oral triple talaq, was so obvious to me. It was one of the biggest challenges I've faced in my life, arguing that case. It wasn't easy to argue the case. The government's proposal of expansion of the Lok Sabha and the accompanying delimitation exercise. Now how do you see this exercise? I can't see why seats are being expanded at all. Okay, how often does Parliament meet in a year? Exactly. What is it costing to maintain this mammoth organization called Parliament? Can we do an audit of that? What is the contribution of each member to meetings in Parliament? Do you see SIR as an indication of growing executive dominance and what many have even called that the Supreme Court is developing into an executive court This is by far the most difficult question to answer from the questions that you have raised with me. It's wonderful to be here talking to Indira Jai Singh. For over five decades, Indira Jai Singh has been one of India's most distinguished lawyers. She has been at the forefront of landmark cases that have expanded constitutional rights and advanced social justice, challenging discrimination, state excess, and systemic injustice. Her work has strengthened both individual liberties and institutional accountability. Her memoir, The Constitution is My Home, co-authored with the acclaimed writer and feminist publisher, Ritu Menon, who's also my co-author, Ritu and I have co-authored three books. Your book, I think, is far more than a personal memoir as I read it. It offers a compelling window into India's social, political and constitutional transformation over the last few decades. And what I found most striking is that at its heart, it is the story of the Indian Constitution, not merely as a legal text, but as a moral compass, an instrument of resistance that you underline throughout and the foundation of India's experiment, India's democratic experiment. And interestingly, the cases that define your career from Mary Roy's struggle for inheritance rights and Rupan Deol Bajaj's pursuit of justice against sexual harassment to Olga Teller's Sabri Mala and, of course, above all, the constitutional challenges to the Citizenship Amendment Act. Almost all of these cases have become milestones in India's constitutional history. I was wondering whether you could share some personal recollections with Mary Roy herself and your relationship with her. what was she like as a client? And what do you remember most vividly about her when you were doing her case Okay Zoya it equally an honor for me to be talking to you and just a word to explain why I decided to do this conversation, which is really not a memoir, it's a conversation with Ritu. I too have known her for the last 30 years. And so it wasn't an abrupt conversation. It was picking up on conversations which have occurred over the last 20 years with her. So it made it possible to happen. Secondly, I really didn't want to talk about my personal life, but Ritu insisted that we as feminists believe that the personal is political and that I must talk about my early years and which is what made me do it. Now, to answer your question, you see, Mary Roy's case was also a defining case in both in constitutional history and in my history. So I must tell you that Mary was actually introduced to me by a non-lawyer, by a very close friend of mine who knew Mary as an educationalist. Because this friend of mine was herself the principal of a school in in Bombay and she was in communication with Mary as an educationalist who had established the Corpus Christi school and Mary's school was also an experiment in I would say unconventional education for children of that age group and as you know the school was extremely popular So my connect with Mary was more through this friend as an educationalist rather than a client. Now, however, coming to her relationship with me as a client, of course, in her case and in the case of many of the women I've represented, I do not like the use of the word client. For example, Geeta Hariyar and Rao Vandana. They all became friends. Yes, I have always said that I have been as much influenced by the women I've represented as maybe they by me. That's very lovely. Absolutely. I'm very clear in my mind about that. So dealing with Mary, personal recollections, I would say at two different levels. One is at the personal level, the other is at the legal level. Now at the legal level she was very persistent. She was never the type to give up. For her, the judgment of the Supreme Court was not the end of her struggle, it was the beginning. And let me tell you she told me very clearly that the judgment actually led to a huge backlash against her within the church within the Syrian Christian church And she told me that priests from pulpits were advised remember this is a wealthy community the Syrian Christian community, coffee estates, huge coffee estates. And by the way Mary too was fighting for agricultural land which was appropriated her brother who was then a Rhodes Scholar as you know but someone she fought through her life for her rights so she told me that priests from pulpits were propagating to their flock now that the judgment has come there's nothing we can do about it please make your wills because we we would like to educate you that you can disinherit your daughters by will. So these are the kind of challenges that she faced. And every time she faced a challenge, she would come back to me and challenge me in turn. She would say, now what are you going to do about this? And the other very inspiring thing about her was she wasn't really fighting only for herself. Now that's important. Very important, Zoya. There were two other women and they had much smaller plots of land, but they had plots of land. And they faced the identical problem of, I don't mean fighting for an amorphous community. I'm saying she was fighting for real life and blood women. And for a much larger issue. Yes, because she knew that the issue went beyond her. and these were women who were in day-to-day contact with her and so she fought their cases. That made the case very interesting then because of its wider implications. Absolutely, she was very aware of that. You know the title is really very very interesting the title of your memoir The Constitution is My It's such a deeply evocative title and perhaps we can start with that. Now there are two things. One, did writing this memoir change the way you understand your own journey? And looking back now, I mean the memoir has been published a few months back, when you look back at it, are there any issues or constitutional questions that you now wish you had explored more fully in the memoir. I mean, and also I think it would be very interesting if you could tell us some striking anecdotes or moments in the court, which have in a way influenced your thinking and your work as a lawyer. Okay.
