Indira Jaising: ‘Now is the time to reclaim the Constitution’

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In 2009, Indira Jaising became the first woman to be appointed the Additional Solicitor General of India. | Photo Credit: The Hindu

For over five decades, Indira Jaising has been at the forefront of some of the country’s landmark legal battles on gender inequality, state violence, and institutional apathy. In her memoir The Constitution Is My Home (HarperCollins India), co-authored with the feminist publisher Ritu Menon, the senior advocate blends personal history with the story of a nation striving to uphold its constitutional ideals.

But the book is more than a chronicle of the professional journey of a legal luminary. It is also a deeply personal account of growing up in a family displaced by Partition, revealing how a lifelong search for belonging came to shape her understanding of identity and justice. In doing so, Jaising lays bare the intimate relationship between the personal and the political, weaving together the story of a life in law with that of a nation still striving to realise the constitutional promises upon which the republic was founded. In an interview at her office in New Delhi, the octogenarian reflects on the many challenges confronting the judiciary and why she believes the country must repeatedly return to the Constitution in moments of crisis. Edited excerpts:

A: I was conscious that no book between two covers can ever fully capture a life, and that made me initially hesitant to write a memoir. At the same time, I found myself increasingly troubled by the loss of institutional memory within the legal profession. Cases were being decided without reference to earlier precedents on the very same issues. That disturbed me because it seemed to me that the memory of the court itself was gradually fading.

What finally prompted me to write the memoir was that more and more young women began approaching me and saying, “You are the reason I chose to study law.” I found that difficult to understand because, as far as I am concerned, I have simply done what I do