Reddy defends Salwa Judum ruling, questions Shah's 14-year delay in criticism

Justice B Sudershan Reddy sat for an interview this week with the weight of fourteen years of judicial criticism suddenly pressing down on him. The Opposition's Vice-Presidential candidate—a retired Supreme Court judge—found himself defending a decision he made in 2011, one that had largely receded from public view until Home Minister Amit Shah resurrected it last Friday with a pointed accusation: that Reddy's judgment disbanding the Salwa Judum militia in Chhattisgarh had handed new life to Naxal terrorism, that the violence might have ended by 2020 had the ruling never come down. Shah repeated the charge on Monday. By then, BJP colleague Ravi Shankar Prasad had joined in, suggesting the verdict reflected Reddy's "inclination towards Maoism."

Reddy's response was measured but firm. He did not dispute the state's right to fight violence—he emphasized it. What he disputed was the method. "The State has every right to fight such a menace of violence," he said. "The judgment merely said, 'Don't outsource it.'" The distinction matters. Reddy was not telling the government to stand idle while Maoists killed. He was saying the constitutional duty to wield force, to protect citizens, to maintain order—that duty belongs to the sovereign state alone. Not to militia groups. Not to vigilantes armed and trained for a few weeks and then sent into the field.

The Salwa Judum had recruited men with minimal education—some had only completed fifth grade—given them weapons, and called them Special Police Officers. These barely-trained recruits then fought Maoists in the forests of Chhattisgarh, and both sides killed each other. Reddy's concern was not abstract. It was rooted in a basic principle: the state holds the monopoly on legitimate force. That principle stretches back centuries in political theory. It cannot be outsourced to civilians, no matter how urgent the threat.

When asked why he seemed surprised by Shah's timing, Reddy did not hide his bewilderment. "The mighty Home Minister, the most powerful Home Minister of this country, is raising this issue after 14 years," he said. "And it never occurred to him when they were fighting this menace that this judgment was the root cause or was coming in their way." The implication was clear: if the ruling had truly been the obstacle Shah now claimed, why had the government not challenged it sooner? Why wait until Reddy became a political candidate to suddenly resurrect the complaint?

The Vice-Presidential race itself is the backdrop to this eruption. Reddy is running against the arithmetic. The ruling coalition controls the Electoral College—the members of Parliament who cast votes. By conventional count, he has no path to victory. Yet he is appealing to MPs to vote on merit, to exercise conscience, to cross party lines. He knows the Constitution designed the Vice-Presidential election as a secret ballot precisely to allow such independence. He is betting that some MPs, when alone in the voting booth, will choose differently than their party leadership expects.

Reddy's ideology, he said, is the Constitution itself. When asked if his commitment to social justice amounted to Leftism, he did not flinch. "My ideology is allegiance to the idea of equality, liberty, fraternity, the dignity of the individual, and justice," he said. "In that order." He was quoting the Preamble. He was saying: this is not my invention. This is what the founding document demands.

On other fronts—the 130th Amendment Bill, the Collegium system for judicial appointments, the disruptions in Parliament—Reddy spoke as someone who has spent decades inside the system and sees it fraying. The Collegium needs more transparency. The appointment process needs wider consultation. Parliament needs less confrontation, more genuine debate. These are not radical positions. They are the observations of someone watching institutions strain under pressure.

What remains unresolved is whether any of this will matter. Reddy will meet or appeal to MPs from parties that have not backed him. He will make his case on merit. But the numbers are stacked, and he knows it. The question is whether enough MPs will decide that merit, or conscience, or the Constitution itself, outweighs party discipline. That vote will come soon. Until then, Reddy waits—a judge who spent his career interpreting the law, now asking the country to interpret him fairly.