Restorative Justice Roots in Indian Popular Culture and Gandhian Philosophy.

Source: (2005) VOMA Connections. Winter 2005-2006(22):11-12.

My engagement with the concept of
restorative justice has entailed on occasions
a sense of déjà vu and renewing
of acquaintance with a friend long
forgotten. At times it is the “aha!”
feeling, the lifting of the veil that reveals
a concealment I did not know
existed. This paradoxical state is not a
surprise because I come from a land
about which “if you say one thing, the
opposite is also true.” This aphorism
probably emerged because the young
nation-state of India is one of the oldest
civilizations. Indian culture is multicultural,
multireligious, and multilingual,
a reservoir of multiple traditions.
In India, there is also a practical quotidian
existence of tradition(s) and
modernity (see Ramanujan, 1989). (excerpt)