PANAJI: Chief Justice of India S A Bobde on Saturday hailed Goa’s uniform civil code and said the state already has what the framers of the Constitution envisaged for the whole of India. “I’ve had the great privilege of administering justice under that code,” Bobde said at the inauguration of a new high court building at Porvorim.
“It applies in marriage and succession, governing all Goans irrespective of religious affiliation. I have heard a lot of academics talk about the uniform civil code. I would request all those intellectuals to simply come here and watch the administration of justice to know what it turns out to be,” he said.
Bobde, who often sat in Goa during his tenure as a Bombay HC judge, said that something unique to this bench is the variety of cases.
“In India, if there’s any bench which gives you the variety of experiences and challenges as the Supreme Court, it is only the Constitution bench at Goa. When you sit on a Constitution bench in Goa, You can expect to hear a land acquisition case, a Section 302 murder appeal, a public interest litigation, a question under administrative law, income tax, sales tax and excise law.”
Talking about Goa’s Liberation, he said although Goa was liberated later than the rest of the country, the most distinct thing about it was that it was “completely bloodless”.
“No shots were fired, no corpses carried away. When Liberation took place, a few incidents did occur, but basically it was not a conflict between the two armies, which is very different from Liberati-on in other places like Hyderabad,” he said.