On October 4, a senior judge at the Thailand’s Yala provincial court, Khanakorn Pianchana, pulled out a pistol and shot himself at the end of a hearing. He was rushed to hospital where he underwent surgery for injuries said not to be life-threatening. A spokesman of the Office of the Judiciary said the judge had apparently acted out of stress from personal issues.
Meanwhile, a 25-page statement the judge purportedly posted on Facebook on the same day before he shot himself. However, the document was not visible on Facebook later, media reported. The document stated the case he was hearing concerned national security and was related to secret association, conspiracy and gun-law offences.
The document allegedly described disagreements among senior judges over the case ruling, in which Mr Khanakorn reportedly decided to acquit all five defendants. Messages reading “Return the ruling to the judges” and “Return justice to the people” were repeated three times in the document. Only for differing with other judges on a judgement it is most unusual for the dissenting judge to feel so strongly as to give his life. Because it is no wrong to disagree with other judges and deliver his own version of the judgement. His judgement will not be operative, but his conscience will remain clean.
The judges are conscience of the people although they are not supposed to be elected by the people. Yet they rely on public faith for functions as judges.
The responsibility of doing justice has to be a matter of great challenge and courage. That is the reason the judges lead a lonely life not to be influenced by what they may have heard from public sources. The case is to be decided exclusively on facts of evidence and his understanding of the law. He may be right or may be wrong but he should be able say to himself that he acted on his own impartially and as dictated by his conscience. The conscience is the accountability of the judges.
It is important that a judge must all time be aware of the public trust that he had done justice. A judge always be reminded the importance of public faith in him for doing justice.
A judge has to hold the scale of justice even between the rule of law and liberty of the individual as guaranteed by the highest law, i.e. the Constitution.
We do not know about the whole situation in which judge Khanakorn of Thailand found himself in differing with other judges to agree on a verdict of guilty. But this is known that the case was concerning gun law offences. The judge must have felt that the innocent persons were being punished by a wrong judgement and suffer the consequences individually and socially. It is possible, as suggested by the local media, that he was under stress for other reasons.
Whatever be the truth about the merit of the case, what cannot be denied is the truth for true justice. To do justice is a public duty and he may have rightly thought that finding of the other judges holding the five accused guilty was not justice. So he considered it best to leave his judgement of not guilty in the court of the people. His own judgement will not prevail over the judgement of the majority judges. It is possible his conscience strongly rejected the finding of the majority of the judges.
Whatever be the truth about the merit of the case, what cannot be denied is the truth for true justice. To do justice is a public duty and he may have rightly thought that finding of the other judges holding the five accused guilty was not justice. So he considered it best to leave his judgement of not guilty in the court of the people. His own judgement will not prevail over the judgement of the majority judges. It is possible his conscience strongly rejected the finding of the majority of the judges.
Thailand is not particularly a difficult country for judges to be under fearful pressure from the above. We do not rule out that he had other problems to make his life difficult. But his idea that justice needs courage and it is a shameful defeat if justice is denied for external considerations.
In our justice system the judges are functioning under great pressure. This fact is too well-known to remain indifferent. The political parties are not believers of independence for the judiciary. The government thinks the police power is all the more important for governance.
Justice for the people is not the concept for appreciation by the persons in power. But it is also true that the people here are too helpless and living in fear. Our lawyers are as political activists belong to different parties and divided and no strength for the independence of the judiciary.
So our circumstances are not favourable for easy justice. Here fear works in such a way that the judges are not expected to show courage for justice. There are even few judges who are happy to be obliging for reasons political or otherwise. This is sad.
The fact is our great judges have shown great courage in the past. But at present the greatest weakness of the judiciary is that our political parties do not believe in democracy or the rule of law. The idea of independent judiciary is not in their thoughts. They think that the judiciary is a hindrance for their development politics.
We have political leaders who are more power hungry than nation builders. They will not appreciate that without justice system no civilised and safe living is possible. The judiciary is weak in our country but the government is also not strong on its own, being heavily dependent on police power.
The government now in disarray because the constitutional institutions for good governance are being ignored in favour of bureaucratic centralisation of power. We shall urge the lawyers to be a force of justice and not party activists of those who do not believe in free and fair justice.
