'Gap between rich- poor still enormous': Justice Dhulia disagrees with SC's majority view on privately-owned properties

New Delhi: Supreme Court judge Justice Sudhanshu Dhulia on Tuesday disagreed with a majority view that not all privately owned resources are “material resources of the community", which he felt limits the hands of the legislature to a non-exhaustive list of factors to determine which resources can be considered as “material resources”.

Perhaps in some ways situations have changed, but what has not changed, however, is the inequality, he said.

"There is today a political equality and there is also an equality in law, yet the social and economic inequalities continue as cautioned by Dr Ambedkar in his speech in the constituent Assembly on November 25, 1949," he said.

"The inequality in income and wealth and the growing gap between the rich and the poor is still enormous. It will therefore not be prudent to abandon the principles on which Articles 38 and 39 are based and on which stands the three-judge bench opinion in Ranganatha Reddy and the unanimous verdict in Sanjeev Coke," he added.

Justice Dhulia said the broad and inclusive meaning given to the expression “material resources of the community” by Justice Krishna Iyer and Justice O Chinnappa Reddy in Ranganatha Reddy and Sanjeev Coke respectively has lost none of its relevance, or jurisprudential value, nor has it lost the audience which appreciates these values.

"The Krishna Iyer Doctrine, or for that matter the O Chinnappa Reddy Doctrine, is familiar to all who have anything to do with law or life. It is based on strong humanist principles of fairness and equity. It is a doctrine which has illuminated our path in dark times. The long body of their judgment is not just a reflection of their perspicacious intellect but more importantly of their empathy for the people, as human being was at the centre of their judicial philosophy," he said.

In the words of Justice Krishna Iyer himself : “The courts too have a constituency – the nation – and a manifesto – the Constitution,” he pointed out.

Examining the question whether private properties or privately-owned resources are included in the phrase “material resources of the community”, given in Article 39(b) of the Constitution, Justice Dhulia said there should be no confusion that the expression “material resources of the community” used in Article 39(b) includes privately-owned resources.

"This has been the consistent view of this court. It could not have been otherwise. To my mind a reference to material resources in Article 39(b) without privately-owned resources being a part of it, does not even make any sense. It is only when we include privately-owned resources, as a part of the 'material resources of the community' that the purpose of Articles 38 and 39 is fully realised. It is only then that the socialist and democratic principles incorporated in our Constitution get their true meaning," he wrote in his separate judgment.

Justice Dhulia pointed out a constitutional provision acquires its meaning only after it is interpreted by a constitutional court.

He opined the meaning which must be given to “material resources of the community” is what has been given to it in Ranganatha Reddy judgment by the three judges and what has been followed in the Constitution Bench decision in Sanjeev Coke.

"To my mind, this has been the correct interpretation of the phrase 'material resources of the community'," he said.