Justice Mukhopadhya, Chief Justice of the Gujarat High Court, Mr. Suresh Shelat, Senior Advocate and Chairman of today’s meeting, Mr.Kamal Trivedi, Advocate General, Gujarat, who is also the member of theTrust, Mr. Bhaskar Tanna, Senior Advocate, Nirupam Nanavaty, my friend Dushyant Dave, Justice M.B. Shah, former Judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Nanavati, former Judge of the Supreme Court, Justice C.K. Thakkar, former Judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Trivedi, my colleague in the Bombay High Court, Justice Mehta, former Judge of the Gujarat High Court, the Sitting Judges of the Gujarat High Court, Senior Advocates practicing in the Gujarat High Court, ladies and gentlemen and students in particular.
Let me make one correction in the beginning. The Advocate General in his speech mentioned that I was working in Gagrat & Company, that’s not correct. I would like to make one clarification there. First of all, before I introduce the great man Justice P.D. Desai, I would like to share that I am a believer in God and I owe to God, to my family and to certain people in life including P.D. Desai. I started my career and I want to inform the students, particularly coming from poor family, that don’t be disheartened. This country is a great country. If it can give opportunity to a person who started his career as a peon, as a Class-IV employee, in a small Trust office, I am quite sure, in this land of opportunity, you can make it. I was working in a small Parsi Trust office. They had huge lands in Bombay, they were the clients of Gagrat & Company. It is in the evening and on Saturday, Sunday I used to work in Gagrat & Company just to go through the references, books, conveyances and there all of a sudden Mr. Gagrat saw me, one day he called me. He inquired who was I, how I came to Gagrat & Company and he stood by me till the end. He promised me that the day I joined the profession he will give me the brief and mind you I had no family background as far as law is concerned. Suddenly the man comes, he offers me an opportunity in life and that’s how I joined the profession. The same thing happened, I was in practice, Justice P.D. Desai came to Bombay I think from Calcutta as the former Chief Justice. Something happened, he called me in his Chamber, I was introduced to him by Justice S.C. Pratap and my name got cleared. I did not know Justice P.D. Desai prior in point of time. The point which I am making is have faith in God, have faith in destiny and you will contribute by the hard work towards what the God wills. This is my introduction.