At a book launch that turned into a quiet thunderclap of truth, Supreme Court Justice BV Nagarathna shattered the notion that women are tiptoeing into male-dominated arenas. “This isn’t an invasion,” she said. “It’s a return.”
Speaking at the unveiling of Women Laws from the Womb to the Tomb: Rights and Remedies, penned by Senior Advocate Mahalakshmi Pavani, Justice Nagarathna made it clear: the rise of women in courtrooms, boardrooms, and legislative halls is not a novelty. It’s restitution.
She took aim at the quiet condescension baked into everyday language—how we say women are “entering” the judiciary or “making their way” into leadership—as if those doors were never meant to open for them. “These phrases,” she said, “carry the scent of exclusion. They suggest that women are guests in institutions they helped build.”
Justice Nagarathna rejected the myth of male default. Intelligence, authority, and leadership, she asserted, are not male inheritances. They are human capacities.
“Every woman who steps into a chamber of power,” she said, “isn’t breaking into someone else’s world. She’s walking back into her own.”
Calling for urgency in implementing the 33% reservation for women in Parliament and State legislatures under the 128th Amendment, she called the pending rollout a long overdue tribute to centuries of quiet, relentless struggle.
“This is not anti-men. It’s pro-justice,” she declared.
But she didn’t stop at applause lines. Justice Nagarathna also called for judicial vigilance, especially in the face of growing concerns over the misuse of legal provisions like Section 498A. The judge’s task, she said, is to look past weaponized litigation and protect the heart of justice.
She urged a comprehensive legal sweep, calling on the Law Commission to audit and identify outdated laws that still place women at a disadvantage—and recommend their erasure.
Mahalakshmi Pavani, whose book sparked this vital conversation, described it not as a manual but a lifeline—a companion for every woman navigating a maze of rights few are ever taught to read.
“This isn’t just about law,” Pavani said. “It’s about giving women the vocabulary to defend their futures.”
Justice Hima Kohli, who officially launched the book, noted that the law’s complexity often locks women out of their own protections. Pavani’s book, she said, “translates rights into reality.”
With chapters spanning issues like reproductive autonomy, sexual violence, and bride trafficking, the book is designed for the everyday woman—for the dreamer, the fighter, the survivor.
Justice KV Viswanathan, also present, saluted the work as a much-needed reminder that when women reclaim lost ground, the world shifts—for the better.
From Parliament halls to court corridors, a new chorus is rising: women aren’t stepping in. They’re stepping up—to reclaim what was never truly lost, just long denied.
