Undressing the dress code

A friend who had just read about the dress code issue in court involving SC Israel Khan thundered, “Now everybody only fighting stupid petty issues.” He sounded as exasperated as the suggestion, “Should the country look forward to Bobo Shanti turbans and Rastafarian robes lending colour to the barristers’ bench, alongside the fez, skull cap and gowns now seen only on celebrity Muslim accused?”

Really, what is it that makes Bobo Shanti turbans and Rastafarian robes unacceptable to lend their “colours to the barristers’ bench?” Or how do “the fez, skull cap and gowns now seen only on celebrity Muslim accused” become invalidated? In fact, the jacket and tie—which are acceptable to the court—are worn by many more people who are accused than those dressed in fez. As a matter of fact, this reasoning has unreasonably placed traditional wear of people in the docks. We have, in the same way, unthinkingly come to label all western wear as “clothes” while non-western clothes are called “costumes.” Our language unconsciously betrays our prejudice.

Such prejudice against ethnic wear is as disconcerting as Chief Magistrate Mc Nicholls, who had ordered Khan to change his Nehru jacket before he could proceed to discharge his duties in the courts. The Code of Ethics, Legal Profession Act (1986) No 40 is, however, instructive in its openess. “An attorney-at-law appearing before the court shall at all times be attired in such a manner as prescribed or agreed by the proper authorities and as befits the dignity of the Court.” A practical direction issued by former Chief Justice Clinton Bernard on December 8, 1986 declared, “The male practitioner should wear a pair of sober trousers and a black jacket.” No tie is mentioned.

While the Nehru dress is not cut exactly to the rule of the code, it is certainly no less dignified and admissible. In fact, the tri-colour suit and tie Khan subsequently wore that was acceptable was certainly more flamboyant than the Nehru suit, which takes its name from India’s first Prime Minister, who popularised it in the west. It has also been worn by African and Chinese leaders in their parliaments, where laws are enacted. But then some say that the law is—to use more admissible language—quite an interesting animal. In fact some of the laws we quote in our T&T are made by people wearing the Nehru jacket itself.

The Nehru jacket is originally a sherwaani, which was worn in the courts of Hindu and Muslim rulers. What changed the status of the sherwaani was colonial rule, which determined that nothing but the jacket, trousers and tie were fit for the court for practitioners of law. The irony is that the shift in the code of dress for the court itself perpetrated an injustice through the colonial court systems.

Further, the argument that the Nehru jacket, Bobo Shanti turbans and Rastafarian robes are ethnic wear and therefore not acceptable also asks a question. What is the jacket but an ethnic wear enforced on the world? Its acceptance was never because it could better inform or secure justice. It was not established by democracy or in freedom but by force of one of the most unfortunate events in human history.

That is why I admire Khan’s deference to the Chief Magistrate: “I complied out of respect for the Chief Magistrate.” Khan’s deference itself should help us peer deeply in the poignant request he poses, “Leave me with a little remnant of my heritage.”

Is that an unfair plea in the courts of justice?

I think a bigger issue than the inquest itself has inadvertently found itself in the court of the nation’s conscience. And it was driven into the legal arena through an energy no less in value than law and justice.

I do not suggest that Chief Magistrate Mc Nicholls is hostile. Khan himself makes this clear. But the casual way traditional wear of citizens was dismissed both in court and by an editorial confess how really deep the neo-colonial hegemony is entrenched. The discrimination is meted out unconsciously. It is not surprising therefore, that while the majority of religious groups, media, opinion leaders, political heads and a former chairman of the awards committee have agreed that the Trinity Cross should be replaced we are crippled. Now it is in court.

It is the same handicap that makes the administration at the Sugarcane Feed Centre in Raghunanan Road refuse to allow Divali activities inside one of its buildings. The administration had no hesitation, however, in allowing the Christmas celebration and even provided funds and allowed alcohol on the premises. (By the way, is alcohol allowed on Government premises?) That’s cool in the sacred season of goodwill, I guess.

The real issue is that that we have swept important things under the carpet, hoping they would go away. Worse, we have been hoping that the processing of the product called “Trini” would have been made easier if these “petty things” would have vanished. One feels Eric Williams was helplessly kaaraying in the political gayelle to ward off the mounting challenges of the foundling democracy. So he chanted a famous mantra, “No Mother India and no Mother Africa.” But the issues would not disappear but wear us to the bone.

Khan is just an instrument for the still unanswered first question of nationhood, whether in the Sugar Feed Centre or Independence Day Awards event or before the magistrate: white, red or black?

The prosecution rests.