Text of the Inaugural Speech of Hon'ble Mr Justice Imtiyaz Murtaza* at the National Seminar on Growth with Justice on April 10, 2016

Growth and Justice are the two fundamental necessities of the human society. The impetus for growth is an insatiable instinct of the human race and perhaps the most fundamental drive which distinguishes it from all other known forms of life. The desire to grow has been the fuel for the engine which has brought us to this stage of developmental supremacy over all other living creatures From the primitive nomads not much different from chimpanzees, we have grown to a stage where we are capable of listening to the birth-cries of a black hole far, far away in the fathomless universe which took place million years ago.  

In this journey however, we have reached to a juncture, where we all must address a few fundamental questions. And the most basic of these questions will be - whether our growth can be called a healthy growth? A very common lay-man analogy will perhaps clarify the seriousness of the question. If we see a pot- bellied young child gaining weight very fast, but not growing the limbs and other organs proportionately, and who is in a habit of messing up and soiling his own living room, destroying the furniture and breaking the window panes, will we say that the child is healthy? No, never! Without any medical examination, even the most ordinary onlooker will tell that the poor child has become unhealthy physically and mentally.

Some recent reports disturbingly tell that the gains of the human race have now becoming comparable to the plight of that sick child.

There have been reports and claims, and of course which can be observed even by a common person, that the distribution of resources is becoming very heavily lopsided. It has been reported that 50% of the world resources are being owned and controlled by only 1% of the population while the other 99% of the population is making itself content with the remaining 50% of the resources only. There are also reports that, not an ordinary doomsayer or a clergy, but a scientist of the stature of Prof. Stephen Hawking has prophesied that the planet earth is going to be destroyed within a couple of centuries! Brother Masood Rezvi has dwelt upon the subject passionately in his recent book “ Tightening Noose of Poverty ” published by the LEAD Trust.

The situation clearly calls upon for an immediate attention on distributive justice. The law-framers, the judiciary, the academia, the technocrats, the urban planners and developers, the rural experts,  the media, the bureaucracy, and of all, we the people; must seriously work towards a reliable standard of Growth with Justice. Distributive justice has to be ensured on legal front, economic front, sociological front, educational front and technological front etc, for a long term survival, development and well-being of the human species.

This seminar is a joint effort by the LEAD Trust, Unity Degree College and Justice Murtaza Husain Educational Welfare Trust in this regard. I congratulate the organizers, the Trustees, the Principal and faculty members of Unity Degree College for collecting an impressive galaxy of experts, thinkers, academicians and practitioners  in different relevant fields to brainstorm on the subject and wish that this effort will not end with this seminar but will continue for the times to come. I am sure this humble effort will go as a mile-stone in the annals of the history of growth with justice.


                                               
∗
 Former Senior Judge, Honourable High Court of Judicature at Allahabad (Lucknow Bench), Chairman Unity Technical Institute Society and Unity Degree College, Chairman Justice Murtaza Husain Educational Charitable Trust and Patron LEAD Trust.