Fali Nariman's "Before Memory Fades"

Just completed reading the autobiography of one of India's most successful and well-known constitutional lawyers - Fali Nariman. I was looking forward to buying the book and reading it and when one of my friends mentioned that it was available at the High Court book vendor's stall, I immediately picked it up. I had spent my first year of practice in the Supreme Court with a senior counsel during which time I mainly observed well known senior counsels argue and would be fascinated by some of their arguments. Nariman was definitely one of the senior most counsels then and still is and so I was curious to find out how he got to where he had and to learn more about the person.

His autobiography "Before Memory Fades" however, was a bit disappointing. It starts off with his experiences in the chamber of the legendary Jamshedji Kanga and what follows is a series of witty anecdotes of life in the courts, anecdotes of some judges and other lawyers and generally of life in the Bombay Bar, of which he was a part of. While these anecdotes and one-liners are amusing, this narration reminds of how my other counsel friends and family from Bombay often talk - only of anecdotal narration of the Bar, of the judges and the quirkiness of the legal fraternity and not really about themselves and of the issues at hand. So, while this chapter was amusing, it did not give me any insight about Nariman as a young lawyer who might have had his own fears and failings and how he waded his way through the Bar.

From the chambers of Jamshedji Kanga he immediately catapults to handling important commercial matters by himself or assisting top counsels. We find Nariman then moving to Delhi as Additional Solicitor General. He writes about the emergency period and his resignation in protest of the emergency, but surprisingly while much followed this important decision of his, there is not much written about why he took such a decision. Similarly, Nariman writes about the time that he was offered judgeship in the Supreme Court, and he declined the offer. A reader would be keen to know why a counsel like Nariman refused judgeship, but we get no insight into this decision of his and why he refused.

The Bhopal case has been discussed in detail as one of the chapters in the autobiography and is largely a reproduction of the exchange of articles and letters that appeared in various journals and newspapers between Nariman, Upendra Baxi and some journalists and activists. For those who have not read these pieces elsewhere it is interesting to find them reproduced here, but if one has read them, then this chapter offered no new insights in the Bhopal case. The discussion on Bhopal, like Nariman's discussions in several other parts of the book, is about the applicable law such as tort law and criminal liability, but in an autobiography one is probably looking to find out more about the person and what he thought of when he took on the job of representing Union Carbide in a case where thousands and died thousands more injured.

The book reads like a narrative of Nariman's various achievements which are incredibly impressive but overall made the autobiography quite dry. I was looking for more - perhaps a more fuller book which gives you some insight about the person that Nariman is, a deeper insight into his family and professional life which unfortunately I did not find.