In the Handbook on Combating Gender Stereotypes, released on August 16, 2023, the Supreme Court suggested the ‘preferred alternative’; correct terms for the ‘gender-unjust terms’. The top court wants the legal community (lawyers and judges) to avoid using words such as ‘career woman, faithful or obedient wife, eve-teasing etc.’ while preparing pleas, orders and judgments, and suggested alternatives as woman, wife and street sexual harassment, respectively.
The Chief Justice wrote in the foreword that even when the use of stereotypes does not alter the outcome of a case, stereotypical language may reinforce ideas contrary to our Constitutional ethos. For example, the Code of Civil Procedure, 1908, previously referred to persons without financial means as ‘paupers’ and such suits as ‘pauper suits’.
In recognition of the fact that language conveys certain ideas about its subject and can either raise or diminish the dignity of such persons, the statute was amended and the word ‘pauper’ was replaced with the word ‘indigent person’. This amendment to the statute did not have a strictly legal purpose but was meant to recognise the humanity of the people it referred to.
The Handbook has its heart at the right place; and the effort of the Supreme Court and the CJI needs to be appreciated. However, this well-meaning effort needs to be taken forward so that it would help in eradicating prejudiced mindsets, starting with the legal system.
Many of these words get reflected in legal/court discourses because of their wide usage by law-enforcement officials in their chargesheets and other filings.
Challenges ahead
Before making our language gender sensitive, we should be aware of the difficulties in changing the human mindset as well. ‘Harijan’, meaning ‘children of God’, was a term first used by Gandhiji to refer to Dalits in 1932.
While the term’s usage became common, many, including BR Ambedkar, found it condescending. The name Harijan had become identical with the expression ‘untouchables’. Over the years, as opposition against the word grew, and with many petitions before the Supreme Court on misuse of the term, in March 2017, it ruled that the word Harijan is a word of ‘insult and abuse’. Note that it is not the word per se, but it is the usage, the context, tenor and undertones that added negative connotations to it. If indigents are referred with the same feelings and attitude as was towards paupers, calling them with a different name is not going to change the situation on the ground.
Shakespeare has been famously quoted for: “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” But it is not the words themselves but the meaning one ascribes to them that transform words.
Albert Mehrabian, in 1970, demonstrated the much talked about 7-38-55 rule by communication experts that words carry only 7 per cent of communication. Rest is tone (38 per cent) and body language (55 per cent).
Changing the attitude of people is a hard and arduous journey. Such attitudinal change has to take root at all levels, in every field. Law enforcement, legal/court level changes in usage of language and attitudinal change combined could make society level changes faster.
Such attitudinal changes should also embrace tolerance so that today’s progressive terms do not get turned into derogatory terms tomorrow. Language is a great human invention; for expression and entertainment/fun. It should not be misused for exploitation, discrimination and stereotyping. That is what all anti-discriminatory movements emphasise. The added support of the apex court will go a long way in strengthening those movements.
Baid is Professor, and Nair is Director, National Institute of Securities Markets