J. Sai Deepak

Last updated
Jayakumar Sai Deepak
J Sai Deepak,2017 (On RSTV) (cropped).png
Deepak in 2017
Born1985 (age 38–39)
Hyderabad, India
Education Mechanical engineering
Law
Alma mater Anna University,
IIT Kharagpur
Occupation(s)Lawyer, writer, columnist
Notable workIndia that is Bharat (2021)
India, Bharat and Pakistan (2022)
Website jsaideepak.com

Jayakumar Sai Deepak (born 1985) is an Indian activist, lawyer, columnist and author. [1] As a counsel, he practices before the Supreme Court of India and the High Court of Delhi. [2] [3] In 2024, he was designated as Senior Advocate by Delhi High Court along with 70 other advocates. [4]

Contents

He writes columns for The Indian Express and The Open Magazine. He has authored two books about decoloniality in relation to India: India That Is Bharat (2021) and India, Bharat and Pakistan (2022) with two mores books to come covering the era of partition.

Education

Deepak attended St. Anthony's High School, Hyderabad. He then graduated in Mechanical Engineering from Anna University and completed law from IIT Kharagpur's Rajiv Gandhi School of Intellectual Property Law. [5]

Career

Deepak has been part of Basmati Geographical Indication litigation, as the Special Counsel for the State Govt of Madhya Pradesh, seeking inclusion of MP as part of the Basmati Geographical Indication. [6]

Deepak argued the case for the entry of women to Sabarimala Temple. He argued against the entry, stating that the Hindu deity Ayyappan observes naishtika brahmacharya ("lifelong celibacy"). [7] He was also a counsel in a petition to allow priests of any caste to be priests at Sabarimala, the priesthood at the temple has historically been open to only Malayali Brahmins. [8] The Kerala High Court ruled in favor of the traditional practices.

Deepak represented the Travancore royal family for their right to manage the estates of the Padmanabhaswamy Temple in Thiruvananthapuram. [9] The Supreme Court of India ruled in favor of the family. [10] [11]

Deepak was the counsel for Anand Ranganathan in the contempt of court case against the former for endorsing the criticism of Justice S. Muralidhar by S Gurumurthy and Vivek Agnihotri. [12] The Delhi High Court closed the proceedings against Ranganathan. [13]

Views

J. Sai Deepak with Assamese theatre actor Dulal Roy and Assamese Writer-novelist Dr. Dhrubajyoti Bora in an event during Assam Book Fair 2023, Guwahati. Dulal Roy, Sai Deepak and Dr. Dhrubajyoti Bora in Assam Book Fair 2023.jpg
J. Sai Deepak with Assamese theatre actor Dulal Roy and Assamese Writer-novelist Dr. Dhrubajyoti Bora in an event during Assam Book Fair 2023, Guwahati.

Deepak writes two blogs, one named Yukti on constitutional theory and legal philosophy; and one named The Demanding Mistress on civil, commercial and intellectual property law. An article in the latter blog was cited by the Madras High Court in its decision on the TVS Motor Company vs. Bajaj Auto Limited intellectual property dispute. [14]

Deepak is a activist.He believes that the several good qualities of the knowledge systems of ancient Hindu civilization, mixed with the good qualities of modern education systems, can be a template for modern Indian education systems, which he considers to have multiple drawbacks. [15] [16] He opposes the Dravidian movement and Periyarite thought, and claims they are Western interventions in Southern Indian societal faultlines. [17] He has written an article, where he discussed limitations imposed by the Indian Constitution against Hindu majoritarian expression. He had criticized the provisions for Hindu majority authority being subject to judicial review and being overruled if it conflicts with constitutional morality. [15]

Deepak's talks on the Karnataka hijab ban at St. Stephen's College, and on minority rights at Jamia Millia Islamia respectively, were cancelled despite receiving permission in what was termed by some journalists as the advent of cancel culture and deplatforming in India. [18] Deepak's talk on the Uniform Civil Code in Bengaluru at a Karnataka Bar Association event was faced with opposition from a group of lawyers who wanted the event to be cancelled in an attempted case of deplatforming, but it wasn't. [19]

Deepak has participated in multiple debates, the prominent ones being with Saurabh Kirpal on same sex marriage; [20] with S. Y. Quraishi and Manish Tewari on the Uniform Civil Code; [21] with Shashi Tharoor on decoloniality; [22] and with AG Krishna Menon and Sanjay Nirupam on nationalism. [23] Deepak is also a frequent orator, having spoken at multiple universities, as well as at literature and cultural festivals. [24]

Publications

Books

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bharat Ratna</span> Indias highest civilian award

The Bharat Ratna is the highest civilian award of the Republic of India. Instituted on 2 January 1954, the award is conferred in recognition of "exceptional service/performance of the highest order", without distinction of race, occupation, position or gender. The award was originally limited to achievements in the arts, literature, science, and public services, but the Government of India expanded the criteria to include "any field of human endeavor" in December 2011. The recommendations for the award are made by the Prime Minister to the President. The recipients receive a Sanad (certificate) signed by the President and a peepal leaf-shaped medallion. Bharat Ratna recipients rank seventh in the Indian order of precedence.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Supreme Court of India</span> Highest court of jurisdiction in India

The Supreme Court of India is the supreme judicial authority and the highest court of the Republic of India. It is the final court of appeal for all civil and criminal cases in India. It also has the power of judicial review. The Supreme Court, which consists of the chief justice of India and a maximum of fellow 33 judges, has extensive powers in the form of original, appellate and advisory jurisdictions.

The chief instrument through which judicial activism has flourished in India is public interest litigation (PIL) or social action litigation (SAL). It refers to litigation undertaken to secure public interest and demonstrates the availability of justice to socially-disadvantaged parties and was introduced by Justice P. N. Bhagwati and Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer. It is a relaxation on the traditional rule of locus standi. Before 1980s the judiciary and the Supreme Court of India entertained litigation only from parties affected directly or indirectly by the defendant. It heard and decided cases only under its original and appellate jurisdictions. However, the Supreme Court began permitting cases on the grounds of public interest litigation, which means that even people who are not directly involved in the case may bring matters of public interest to the court. It is the court's privilege to entertain the application for the PIL.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sabarimala Temple</span> Hindu temple in Kerala, India

The Sabarimala Sree Dharma Sastha Temple is a Hindu temple dedicated to the god Ayyappan, who is also known as Dharma Shasta and is the son of the deities Shiva and Mohini.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Padmanabhaswamy Temple</span> Temple dedicated to Vishnu in Thiruvananthapuram

The Padmanabhaswamy Temple is a Hindu temple dedicated to Vishnu in Thiruvananthapuram, the capital of the state of Kerala, India. It is one of the 108 Divya Desams which are considered the sacred abodes of Vishnu in the Sri Vaishnava tradition. The name of the city of 'Thiruvananthapuram' in Malayalam and Tamil translates to "The City of Ananta". The temple is built in an intricate fusion of the Kerala style and the Dravidian style of architecture, featuring high walls, and a 16th-century gopuram. While as per some traditions the Ananthapura Temple in Kumbla in Kasaragod district in Kerala is considered as the original spiritual seat of the deity ("Mulasthanam"), architecturally to some extent, the temple is a replica of the Adikesava Perumal Temple in Thiruvattar in Kanyakumari district in Tamil Nadu. It is widely considered the world's richest temple.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Subramanian Swamy</span> Indian politician

Subramanian Swamy is an Indian politician, economist and statistician. Before joining politics, he was a professor of Mathematical Economics at the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. He is known for his Hindu nationalist views. Swamy was a member of the Planning Commission of India and was a Cabinet Minister in the Chandra Shekhar government. Between 1994 and 1996, Swamy was Chairman of the Commission on Labour Standards and International Trade under former Prime Minister P. V. Narasimha Rao. Swamy was a long-time member of the Janata Party, serving as its president until 2013 when he joined the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He has written on foreign affairs of India dealing largely with China, Pakistan and Israel. He was nominated to Rajya Sabha on 26 April 2016 for a six-year term, ending on 24 April 2022.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dhananjaya Y. Chandrachud</span> Chief Justice of India from 2022 to 2024

Dhananjaya Yeshwant Chandrachud is an Indian jurist, who served as the 50th Chief Justice of India from 9 November 2022 to 10 November 2024. He was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of India in May 2016. He has also previously served as the chief justice of the Allahabad High Court from 2013 to 2016 and as a judge of the Bombay High Court from 2000 to 2013. He also served as the ex-officio Patron-in-Chief of the National Legal Services Authority and the de facto Chancellor of the National Law School of India University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vinod Rai</span> Former Indian bureaucrat

Vinod Rai is a former IAS officer who served as the 11th Comptroller and Auditor General of India. He assumed office on 7 January 2008 till 22 May 2013. He is the current chairman of UN Panel of External Auditors and Honorary Advisor to the Indian Railways and a member of the Railway Kaya Kalp Council.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shakti Anand</span> Indian television actor

Shakti Anand is an Indian television actor. He appeared in various television shows like Tenali Rama, Saara Akaash, Sambhav Asambhav and Ek Ladki Anjaani Si. The actor also hosted the first season of the crime reality show Crime Patrol in 2004.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rohinton Fali Nariman</span> Indian judge (born 1956)

Rohinton Fali Nariman is a former judge of the Supreme Court of India. Before being elevated as a judge, he practised as a senior counsel at the Supreme Court. He was appointed the Solicitor General of India on 23 July 2011. He also served as a member of the Bar Council of India. He was designated as a Senior Counsel by Chief Justice Manepalli Narayana Rao Venkatachaliah in 1993 at the early age of 37.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dipak Misra</span> 45th Chief Justice of India

Dipak Misra is an Indian jurist who served as the 45th Chief Justice of India from 28 August 2017 till 2 October 2018. He is also former Chief Justice of the Patna High Court and Delhi High Court. He is the nephew of Justice Ranganath Misra, who was the 21st Chief Justice from 1990 to 1991.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Uday Umesh Lalit</span> 49th Chief Justice of India

Uday Umesh Lalit is an Indian lawyer and former Supreme Court Judge, who served as the 49th Chief Justice of India. Previously, he has served as a judge of Supreme Court of India. Prior to his elevation as a judge of the supreme court, he practised as a senior advocate at the Supreme Court. Justice Lalit is one of the eleven senior counsels who have been directly elevated to the Supreme Court. He is currently ‘Distinguished Visiting Professor’ at Ashank Desai Centre for Policy Studies, Indian Institute of Technology, Bombay and Distinguished Visiting Professor at West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences.

Rahul Easwar is an Indian public policy commentator, philosophy author, advocate and activist from Kerala.

The Ready To Wait campaign is a social movement initiated in September 2016 by a group of female devotees of Hindu deity Ayyappan, as a response to a petition filed in the Supreme Court by women's groups to demand the right to enter the Sabarimala temple, located in the southern Indian state of Kerala, which traditionally restricts entry of women of reproductive age. The campaigners of "Ready To Wait" asserted their willingness to respect the traditions regarding entry to the Sabarimala temple. It started as a social media campaign with the hashtag #ReadyToWait and soon gained momentum as Hindu women from all over the country took to social media to show their support.

Deepak Verma is an Indian jurist and a former Judge of the Supreme Court of India. His career in the Indian judiciary includes serving as the Chief Justice of the Rajasthan High Court, acting Chief Justice of the High Court of Karnataka, and holding the position of a judge in the High Court of Madhya Pradesh. After retiring from the Supreme Court, Justice Verma has become known for his work as an international arbitrator and mediator, and he has acted as an expert on matters of Indian law in several high profile cases before foreign courts and international tribunals including the Enrica Lexie incident and the multi-billion dollar Vijay Mallya case. He has also assumed the role of a sports ombudsman in India. Additionally, he has chaired significant High-Powered Judicial Committees appointed by the High Court and the Supreme Court of India. He also serves as the chairperson and member of the advisory board of several distinguished non-profits, educational institutions and universities in India.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Entry of women to Sabarimala</span> Dispute involving a temple in Kerala, India

Sabarimala is a temple dedicated to Shasta, in Pathanamthitta District, Kerala, India. Women and girls of reproductive age have traditionally not been permitted to worship there, as Shasta is a celibate deity. The Kerala high court provided a legal justification for this tradition, and since 1991 onwards, women and girls were legally forbidden to enter the temple.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">T. G. Mohandas</span> Indian writer social critic

T. G. Mohandas is an Indian engineer, lawyer, social critic, writer, journalist and television presenter from Kerala. Mohandas was the state convener of Bharatiya Janata Party's Intellectual Cell and the General Secretary in 1997 of Bharateeya Vichara Kendram and its vice-president in 2006 and served also as General Manager of Ayodhya Printers, a company owned by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).

S. Muralidhar is an Indian lawyer and a former Judge. He was the Chief Justice of Orissa High Court and a Judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court and Delhi High Court. He has been designated as a Senior Advocate by the Supreme Court of India and presently pracising before the Supreme Court of India.

Bindu Ammini is an Indian lawyer and lecturer at Government Law College, Kozhikode, and a Dalit activist. She is one of the two first women between the age of 10 and 50 to enter the Sabarimala Temple after a Supreme Court of India decision allowed women of reproductive age to enter the temple.

Pawan Reley is an Advocate-on-Record in the Supreme Court of India. He is also an author known for advocating on the case rights of manual scavengers and sewer cleaners over the past nine years.Pawan along with former Justice J.R Midha has edited the Ninth Edition of B.V. Vishwanatha Aiyar’s Commentary on the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908. As co-editors. Reley is also a TEDx speaker. He was honoured by 5 Union Minister including Satish Chandra Dubey and Hema Malini at Vigyan Bhavan in Delhi.

References

  1. ↑ Kunnummal, Ashraf (2023-08-22). "Islamic Liberation Theology and Decolonial Studies: The Case of Hindutva Extractivism". Religions. 14 (9). MDPI AG: 1080. doi: 10.3390/rel14091080 . ISSN   2077-1444. Of the Hindutva propagandists who deploy decolonial studies, J. Sai Deepak is the only one who has written substantively on it.
  2. ↑ "Lord Ayyappa at Sabarimala too has rights under Article 21, SC told". Indo-Asian News Service. 26 July 2018. ProQuest   2076261680.
  3. ↑ "Sabarimala case: Deity living person, has right to privacy, women devotees to SC". Indian Express. Mumbai. 27 July 2018. ProQuest   2076507987.
  4. ↑ "J. Sai Deepak Among 71 Advocates Designated Senior Advocate By Delhi High Court, Supreme Court Conferrs Designation On Newly Appointed ASG". Verdictum. 2024-11-30. Retrieved 2024-12-03.
  5. ↑ Iyer, Lakshmi (6 August 2018). "Small talk: The Deity's Advocate". Mumbai Mirror. ProQuest   2083283397.
  6. ↑ "The State Government Of Madhya Pradesh vs Union Of India & Ors on 25 April, 2019".
  7. ↑ "Written Submissions to the Supreme Court of India in the Sabarimala Temple Entry Case" (PDF). February 2019.
  8. ↑ "Written Submissions in the Vishnunarayan vs State of Kerala case" (PDF). 22 February 2023.
  9. ↑ "Written Submissions to the Supreme Court of India in the Padmanabhaswamy Temple Administration Case" (PDF). April 2019.
  10. ↑ Vishwanath, Apurva (2020-07-13). "Explained: Padmanabhaswamy temple case, and what the verdict means for the Travancore royal family". The Indian Express. Retrieved 2023-10-04.
  11. ↑ "Sri Marthanda Varma vs State of Kerala" (PDF). Supreme Court of India. 13 July 2020.
  12. ↑ "'Am a free speech absolutist': Author Anand Ranganathan in contempt case". Indo-Asian News Service. 24 May 2023. ProQuest   2817965951.
  13. ↑ Thapliyal, Nupur (2024-01-03). "Delhi High Court Closes Proceedings Against Anand Ranganathan In Criminal Contempt Case For Tweets Against Justice S Muralidhar". www.livelaw.in. Retrieved 2024-02-03.
  14. ↑ Madras High Court (18 May 2009). "M/S TVS Motor Company Limited vs M/S Bajaj Auto Limited on 18 May, 2009". indiankanoon.org.
  15. 1 2 Sijoria, Siddharth (28 June 2023). "J Sai Deepak is wrong: Indian democracy is not Hindu will". The Indian Express .
  16. ↑ Sen, Raj Shekhar (24 July 2023). "Isolation, conservatism and buzzwords: What drives the lucrative market for right-wing influencers". newslaundry .
  17. ↑ T. Mayura Priyan (2023-10-08). "Sanatana Dharma and the Dravidian Movement: A response to J. Sai Deepak — 2 – The Leaflet". theleaflet.in. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
  18. ↑ Kumar, Utpal (2022-02-28). "The issue with St. Stephen's College isn't just confined to cancel culture; its very DNA is a problem". Firstpost. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
  19. ↑ Shukla, Suchita (2023-09-01). "Karnataka Bar Council Ignores Demand By Lawyers' Organisation To Cancel Sai Deepak's Talk On UCC, Event Witnesses Huge Crowd". www.verdictum.in. Retrieved 2024-02-12.
  20. ↑ Menon, Vandana (2023-07-20). "Can Parliament be trusted with LGBTQ rights? Star lawyers Sai Deepak, Saurabh Kirpal debate". ThePrint. Retrieved 2024-02-14.
  21. ↑ Bureau, The Hindu (2023-08-06). "Debate without draft Uniform Civil Code is a non-issue, says ex-CEC S.Y. Quraishi". The Hindu. ISSN   0971-751X . Retrieved 2024-02-14.{{cite news}}: |last= has generic name (help)
  22. ↑ Kabilan, Kannalmozhi (2021-09-11). "The reality of the nationalism debate". The New Indian Express. Retrieved 2024-02-14.
  23. ↑ "Decolonising India: Is Bharat trying to reinvent itself?". India Today. Retrieved 2024-02-14.
  24. ↑ "Those in power must be held accountable". Star of Mysore. 2022-12-18. Retrieved 2024-02-14.
  25. ↑ Sen, Anandaroop (2023-05-04). "J Sai Deepak's India that is Bharat: Coloniality, Civilisation, Constitution . Bloomsbury 2021". Social Dynamics. 49 (2): 376–385. doi: 10.1080/02533952.2023.2236899 . ISSN   0253-3952.
  26. ↑ Valluvan, Sivamohan; Kapoor, Nisha (June 2023). "Sociology after the postcolonial: Response to Julian Go's 'thinking against empire'". The British Journal of Sociology. 74 (3): 310–323. doi:10.1111/1468-4446.12995. ISSN   0007-1315.
  27. ↑ Dann, Philipp (2023-12-22). "Southern turn, Northern implications: rethinking the meaning of colonial legacies for Comparative Constitutional Studies". Comparative Constitutional Studies. 1 (2): 174–196. doi:10.4337/ccs.2023.0016. ISSN   2752-9665.
  28. ↑ Yadav, Yogendra (2022-05-06). "India needs to challenge colonialism in its own language. But solution isn't Hindu worldview". ThePrint. Retrieved 2024-03-03.
  29. ↑ Kumar, Utpal (2022-09-06). "How India, a victim of conflicting colonialities, is coming out of slumber to reboot its tampered mind". Firstpost. Retrieved 2023-06-12.
  30. ↑ Yadav, Yogendra (2022-05-06). "India needs to challenge colonialism in its own language. But solution isn't Hindu worldview". ThePrint. Retrieved 2023-06-12.
  31. ↑ "Re-Discovering Bharat". Star of Mysore. 16 December 2022. ProQuest   2754825320.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.