Why Legal Aid is Important
[Music]
hello
when i was in school i was used to
participating in a lot of competitions
be it essay writing
education painting sports you name it
and i was there not that i was good at
each and every
uh competition but i made a point to
participate in every
every competition when i was 10 or 11
years old i realized a lot of students
around me
started talking about making a career in
the competitions they were good at
students who were good at sports started
talking about being a sports person
students who were good at dancing
started talking about being an artist
i wondered i’m good at public speaking
i’m good at writing
what career i can make out of it but
one thing i was very sure about that i
wanted to do something what i was
talking about
and the primary reason for that was the
topics that i was talking about or which
were given to me
was very inclined towards social
causes and that’s the primary reason why
i had this
instinct of doing something good for the
society
interestingly we never had a debate
competition in our school
and my name was enrolled in an
inter-school debate competition
i was told about it only an hour before
i had no idea of what a debate is
i started preparing myself but i had
very little time
for a kid to go in front of 50 odd
audience
and to talk about something who has no
who has no idea about it
was very difficult but yet i prepared
myself
while my partner was speaking i jotted
down the arguments in my head
and while he stopped i thought i spoke
about it
by the end of the competition it so
happened that we won it
and i realized that this particular
strategy of mine
really worked very well i got interested
in these competitions
and i started participating in more and
more debate competitions
and that is when i realized that being a
lawyer
is something i am made for i studied
hard
and i got into a law school now this is
what happens in law school
you’re very motivated you’re very
passionate you get into the school
and then you realize that there are a
lot of other students
who are as passionate as you are now
this is the thing
about law students we love rules we are
like sheldon coopers in our own way
yes so i started studying and then i
realized that there are a lot of
committees in my college
to other to each and everyone’s passion
in some of the other sense
be it research writing magazine
committee cultural committee
legal aid etc etc now i had this
knack of doing something good for the
society from the talent or the
interest that i have and that is when i
decided
to be a part of the legal aid committee
now the
purpose of legal committee is to help
those
who are fighting the legal battles but
do not have enough resources for it
maybe they’re economically backward
physically differently able
or their minorities and facing some of
the
other social problems i was helping
these people i was trying to file as
much as pro bono lawyers i can
and i was kind of spreading awareness
among them
but there was one particular incident
that happened with me
which changed my entire perspective of a
legal aid committee
one day it so happened that i was
sitting in a canteen with my friend
and having a cup of tea the cup slipped
from the waiter’s hand
and the words he uttered were my
boss will cut this from my salary
that is when i realized that
people who are seeking for legal
services are of course
illegal are the kind of people legal aid
should help
but there are an awful lot of people out
there
who do not know that something wrong is
happening to them
what about them if you are hungry and if
you tell someone that you want food
they will give it to you but if someone
doesn’t know that you’re hungry
how are they supposed to give you food
so addressing the problem
is the key solution for uh eliminating
that problem from the society now this
is not the only reason why people are
afraid from going to
courts or filing their complaint there
is a lot of shame attached
to the fact that someone is going to a
police station
if you file an affair if you go and go
into the police station
for any given reason there will be a lot
of name calling
and uh a lot of problems that will
that you have to face in the society so
people will prefer
staying at home suffering but not going
to the police station
because that means double the suffer
according to them
be it the shame be lack of awareness
we all know that the justice system in
india takes
a lot of years there are a lot of
pending cases of course
there are some convicts or some
criminals who get punished after 30 40
years
people also wonder that so much of
weight
is it worth of getting justice is
getting justice after so much of your
actually called as justice this is the
primary reason
why people start thinking about the
alternatives
they can use to satisfy their
anger their rage which is uh caused
because of injustice that is done to
them
it is a very sad part of a reality
if we talk about legal aid and give
giving services to people
economically or paying for their court
fees it is one part of the problem
but if we do not address the people who
hesitate
reaching the court who has it expressing
their problems
then only i will say the half
portion of the problem is solved and not
the first half
that is one part which legal aid
committees or legal aid clinics
throughout the country should look at
that is addressing the problems people
are so
tired at the end of the day with their
work with their professional life
better daily wage earner or a middle
class person
that they do not have effort they do not
have enough energy
to take the effort to go to the court
and fight for the justice
each day every day can someone afford
giving up their daily wage salary and
coming to the court even if someone else
is paying for their court fee
no he will obviously choose going to
work and earning for his family
men will address all these issues and
solve this and also help people who
approach the court of law
it is then there will be a balance or i
would say it is then
that we will start working towards 100
percent
helping or aiding people who are facing
problem
in getting justice access of justice is
not just about court fees
access of justice is also making people
realize
that they need the access to justice and
this is what my dear friends
is what i think the aid that we require
before taking legal services
or helping people in accessing
the code