Roses in December

Roses in December, the autobiography of M. C. Chagla (1900-81), is one of Bhavan’s landmark publications.

Chagla distinguished himself not only as a lawyer and judge but stood out in a few other fields of public activity. Rightly, he chose to record his aspirations and achievements, ideals and convictions, thoughts and experiences, for the benefit of posterity (as he himself has said). The book turned out to be a casket of wisdom, not to speak of the racy style of writing that made it gripping.

Reading this book is like seeing personally Indian history of the past century, so vividly has M C Chagla described the events and happenings of those turbulent years. Interesting incidents have been mentioned, the joys and the sorrows, the tiffs and the anger with other leading personalities of India struggling for freedom. Chagla played a very important role during this crucial period and his agile pen has recorded all that happened in this book which has been a best seller.

Jayaprakash Narayan has written the foreword in which he has mentioned the role Chagla played during the emergency clamped by Indira Gandhi in June, 1975. The historic speech that Chagla delivered in Ahmedabad while inaugurating the All India Civil Liberties Conference in the wake of the emergency reads ‘like Magna Carta’ according to Jayaprakash Narayan. Chagla has discussed topics like Kashmir, the presidents, prime minsters and parliament of India.
Chief Justice Chagla had three abiding passions — devotion to justice between man and man and between man and the State, adherence to nationalism, involving the integrations of all communities, and love of basic human freedom. His devotion to justice made him truly a great judge. Whether he believed in ‘God or not, we are not sure. But, God believed in him, and endorsed him with the gift of grace, with nobility and intellectual humility. M. C. Chagla’s autobiography is not only the story of his life but the life of the times.

M C Chagla was a Jurist, judge, educationist, Central Cabinet Minister and Statesman. He was also the Vice Chancellor of Bombay University and also acting Governor of Bombay. He was India’s ambassador to US and High Commissioner for India in UK.