Judges attend the inaugural session of the programme at Judicial Academy in Ranchi. Pix: Ashok Karan

Ranchi, Nov. 19: What would you tell an octogenarian who’s not ready to reach a compromise with his brother over a property dispute for the past 17 years? Read him lines from the Bhagvad Gita and bring him to the negotiating table, maybe?

Strange as it may sound, but judges at a Delhi court had done just that when an 84-year-old man was locked in a legal tangle over a Rs 50-crore house in the national capital. Their father had drafted a will allotting equal shares for the two brothers, but the man, who had stayed in one half of the house as a tenant, claimed both the parts — one as a tenant and the other in tune with the will.

All this and many such instances were thrown up during the concluding day of the three-day training session of 12 district judges, who were armed with different tools of mediation. Donning the hat of the teachers were M.L. Mehta and Sudhir Jain, judicial officers who have been trained in the US and are manning the mediation centre in Delhi.

The judges will now move on to the other side of the table and run a mock drill of their lessons tomorrow, where over 50 cases involving matrimonial, property, labour, motor vehicles accident cases at the Ranchi civil court have been shortlisted. A mediation centre is expected to be set up in Ranchi early next year.

Besides spiritual healing, a judge should also be a diplomat and journalist moulded into one. Telco, for instance, Mehta and Jain said, had dismissed a worker who was later awarded a compensation of Rs 5 lakh by the industrial tribunal. The worker, however, insisted on a written apology, to which the management put its foot down. The mediator, then, softened both the parties and made the worker accept a “neutral” apology signed by the MD.

Justice M.Y. Eqbal of Jharkhand High Court also joining the interactive session and said a judge has to find out the reasons behind the deadlock in such cases.

The success of the tool, the judge said, depends to a great extent on the presiding officer. If he applies his mind to the nature of the dispute, he would be in an appropriate position to convince the warring parties and steer their ways to a settlement, he added.

Mehta recalled another case where a girl from an affluent family married a clerk. Their mismatched financial backgrounds spurred a quibble where the husband would blame the wife of lavishness. It was after the mediator poked his nose in the civil war and persuaded them to reach a compromise that they went on to live happily ever after.