Radhabinod Pal
| Radha-Binod Pal | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
27 January 1886 Kushtia District,Bengal Presidency, British India (now in Bangladesh) |
| Died | 10 January 1967 (aged 80) |
| Occupation | Jurist |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Alma mater | Presidency College, Calcutta (now Kolkata) and the Law College of the University of Calcutta |
| Children | Shanti Rani, Asha Rani, Leela Rani, Bela Rani, Nilima, Roma Rani, Renu Kana, Lakshmi Rani, Smriti Kana, Prasanta Kumar, Pradyot Kumar, Pronab Kumar, Pratip Bijoy and Pratul Kumar. |
Radhabinod Pal (27 January 1886 – 10 January 1967) was an Indian jurist, who was a member of the United Nations' International Law Commission from 1952 to 1966. He was the only South Asian person appointed to the International Military Tribunal for the Far East's trials of Japanese war crimes committed during the Second World War. Among all the judges of the tribunal, he was the only one who submitted a judgment which insisted all defendants were not guilty. The Yasukuni Shrine and the Kyoto Ryozen Gokoku Shrine have monuments specially dedicated to Judge Pal.
Radhabinod Pal was born in 1886 in the small village of Salimpur, Kushtia District, now a part of Bangladesh.
He studied mathematics and constitutional law at Presidency College, Calcutta (now Kolkata), and the Law College of the University of Calcutta.
Pal was a major contributor to the formulation of the Indian Income Tax Act of 1922. The British Government of India appointed Pal as a legal advisor in 1927. He worked as professor at the Law College of the University of Calcutta from 1923 till 1936. Pal became a judge of the Calcutta High Court in 1941 and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Calcutta in 1944.
He was asked to represent India as a member of the tribunal of judges officiating at the Tokyo Trials in 1946. In deliberations with judges from 10 other countries, Pal was highly critical of the prosecution's use of the legal concept of conspiracy in the context of pre-war decisions by Japanese officials. He also maintained that the tribunal should not retrospectively apply the new concept of Class A war crimes – waging aggressive (also known as crimes against peace) – and crimes against humanity (that had already been used ex post facto at the Nuremberg Trials). Hence Pal dissented from the tribunal's verdicts of guilt in the cases of defendants charged with Class A war crimes. His reasoning also influenced the judges representing the Netherlands and France, and all three of these judges issued dissenting opinions. However, under the rules of the tribunal, all verdicts and sentences were decided by a majority of the presiding judges.
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