There is no law chamber, chartered accountant's office or income tax commissioner's office in India or Pakistan which does not have on its bookshelves 'Kanga and Palkhivala's 'The Law and Practice of Income Tax', first published in 1950 and reprinted many times since then, with several supplements.
Sir Jamshedji Kanga died just before the seventh edition was published in 1976, in the preface to which is quoted what he had written in the foreword to the first edition: "In a book which cites thousands of authorities, I may be pardoned for relying on one more in the Foreword. Justice Holmes observed, 'The riders in a race do not stop short when they reach the goal'. There is a little finishing canter before coming to a standstill.... The race is over but the work is never done while the power to work remains. It was in this spirit that I agreed to associate myself with this book. However, my task has been mainly of a supervisory and advisory character. The actual writing has been done by my co-author."
His co-author, Nani Ardeshir Palkhivala, the Indian jurist and diplomat, died in Bombay on December 11, 2002, at the age of 82. Write about him, my compatriots told me, though much has been written on him in the world's press (click on google.com). I had the privilege of meeting him thrice, but I too wished to read what a man who had been associated with him for many years had to tell me about him. So I asked my friend, Palkhivala's student, the great Indian advocate, Fali Sam Nariman. This is what he sent to me:
"The environment in which Nani grew and established his reputation was in the chamber of Sir Jamshedji Kanga - a towering legal personality. When Kanga completed sixty years of practice, Chief Justice Mohammad Currim Chagla unveiled his portrait in the Bombay High Court library describing him as the 'uncut diamond of the Bar - 'uncut' because he was so child-like, never childish.
"Nani revered and doted on his senior. It was but natural then that a good deal of Kanga's qualities would rub off on to his illustrious junior: his phenomenal memory, his innate simplicity and his high sense of values: even his forgetfulness for names. Nani would call, quite confidently, someone by a name he never possessed but he did it so guilelessly that it did not cause offence.
"I started practice in 1951 - in Kanga's chambers. It was a crowded place, with only seven tables for the seven seniors, all immensely successful. Nani was then eight years in practice, already a 'boy-wonder'; he had a table to himself but with space just enough to hold a conference with one client. When there were more than one, Nani would confer with them in his car parked outside. He could work anywhere; always brilliant, never pretentious. He worked, and walked, at break-neck speed.
" I remember one occasion when he was rushing from one court to another navigating the blind corners of the corridors of the Bombay High Court and collided with C K Daphtary, then Advocate General. Never at a loss for words, old C.K. smiled and raising his arm said: 'Get your Palkhi out of the way.' Oblivious of the humorous pun, and muttering a few apologies Nani rushed on, fast-forward.
"So 'successful' was he in the profession that when he had not yet turned fifty, the Chief Justice of India, Justice S.R. Das, invited him to become a judge of the Supreme Court of India - directly from the bar, an honour which Nani declined. If he had accepted he would have been (hopefully) Chief Justice of India for an unbroken period of fifteen years. Missed opportunities? Perhaps. But then Nani went on to become a huge success in the legal profession and in public life.
"Almost single-handedly he saved our constitution from being amended (by a majoritarian parliament) so as to take away its basic democratic features. And his name became a household word with the citizens of India. To the common man and woman who read the daily newspaper he was 'our Nani', a champion of human values, of freedom and liberty, an exponent of how best to run the government of the country.
"But so fickle is public opinion that when the same Nani embarked on a political career and stood for parliament, in a constituency in Bombay city, he was defeated - which soured his views on politics and politicians, and on adult franchise: views which he had the courage to express but which earned him the reputation of an "elitist", which he was not. When he returned to India after a brief, but successful stint, as India's ambassador to the United States, he resumed his corporate connection with Tata's. A mistake? Yes, definitely: his opinions on men and matters, always frankly expressed, would have been much better received by the people of India if he had not been associated with large industrial corporations.
"One personal quality that I always recall is Nani's genuine affection and overwhelming kindness to people around him. I have never heard him speak ill of anyone, and if someone did say something nasty about him he would not take it ill.
"Nani never did forget - that he started from the bottom, working his way up to the very top. When he began his career, he had no godfathers in the profession: phenomenal energy, hard work and a fantastic brain was all he had, and as it turned out, all he needed to have. But he always remembered the plight of the poor and the needy: his silent contribution to the welfare of hundreds of persons and causes is known to but a few: only because he was so richly endowed like Sir Jamshedji (his great leader), with that essential quality of humility, an abiding trait of those who are both good and great.
"If Nani had a fault it was that he was far too preoccupied with the concerns and chores of the moment. 'What is this life if full of care, we have no time to stand and stare? asked the poet. Nani had 'no time to stand and stare'. In fact, when he was young and burdened with briefs, he literally filled the unforgiving minute with sixty seconds worth of distance run - always in high gear, always at top speed.
"He was always on time. He was just in time for a court hearing, just in time for a board meeting, just in time for a public lecture. And he was invariably the last passenger to board a flight. In fact, not infrequently, at Bombay airport one would hear the announcement: 'Last call for Mr. Palkhivala for Flight. 182 to Delhi.' And one could see Nani rushing along to the departure gate, just in time to board his flight.
"I always admired Nani's phenomenal energy. Time was his greatest competitor - he would have outwitted time if he had the strength. But alas he lost the battle. The devouring hand of time slowed him down, and in the end outwitted him - as it will outwit each one of us.
"At eighty-two, a great lawyer - an even greater human being - has passed on, leaving behind a profusion of goodwill and fond memories."
In 1988, our chartered accountant, Afzal Munif (before he embarked on a misadventure, dabbled in dirty politics and became an MQM minister), was the president of the Chartered Accountants Institute of Pakistan. He invited Palkhivala to Pakistan to come and address gatherings in Karachi and Lahore. What Palkhivala said in his two speeches (recorded on cassettes) about peace and friendship between the peoples of Pakistan and India should be printed and circulated. It might serve to educate a few of the pundits on both sides of the divide.