Explained: What's The Current Sedition Law In India

The colonial-era law of sedition was scrutinised, and pending trials, proceedings and appeals indicted with it were held in abeyance by the Supreme Court. This followed after Attorney General Venugopal told the Supreme Court that the government wanted to review the sedition law.

Earlier, in the Kedar Nath Singh case (1962), the supreme court upheld the constitutionality of the law with certain restrictions on its scope to prevent misuse.

What is sedition and section 124A?

The Indian Penal code predates the Constitution of India. Sedition was inserted in the IPC in 1870 by the Britishers to curb political dissent.

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Today, section 124A of the IPC defines sedition as: ¡°Whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards the Government established by law in India shall be punished with imprisonment for life to which fine may be added, or with imprisonment which may extend to three years, to which fine may be added, or with fine¡±.

Merriam-Webster defines sedition as ¡°incitement of resistance to or insurrection against lawful authority¡±. Historically, sedition cases were used to counter political dissent expressed against the British crown during the freedom struggle. Freedom fighters like Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Mahatma Gandhi were charged under this colonial-era law. In recent times, MP Navneet Rana and her husband had been charged under section 124A when they declared to recite the hanuman chalisa in Maharashtra CM¡¯s house.

Gandhi called the law, ¡°The prince among the political sections of the IPC designed to suppress the liberty of the citizen¡±.

What is the controversy surrounding this law?

Sedition since its inception has been a controversial inclusion which during the colonial era was used as a tool by the British government to silence criticism of the government. After independence, while drafting the constitution, the constituent assembly carefully assessed and discarded the word ¡®sedition¡¯ from the constitution of India, and soon after, the first amendment re-introduced the law with a greater scope during Nehru¡¯s term even though the PM himself shared sentiments against the law.

An impartial judiciary is the cornerstone of any court. Since the constitution is interpreted by the court, disparities might make a way in jurisprudence and these disparities may be used in conjunction with other notions like incitement or even slander. Governments across the world have used sedition to curb political dissent but the idea of liberal democracy and sedition laws being antithetical to democratic values have reflected in these democracies leading to scrapping of seditious provisions.

Some examples of section 124A being used in recent times: 22 cases were filed against journalists relate to the coverage of the Hathrasg ang rape incident, several dozen cases were filed against key-figure protesters protesting against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), there was even a sedition case filed against three Kashmiri students in Agra for allegedly celebrating Pakistan¡¯s victory over India in T20 match on social media.

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According to the National Crime Records Bureau, the number of cases filed under section 124A of the IPC increased by 160 percent between 2016 and 2019, while the conviction rate fell from 33.3 percent to 3.3 percent during the same period.

This shows that the State has been abusing this provision by filing frivolous or unsubstantiated lawsuits.

The current union government had a strong stand on its positive position on sedition law but recently their stand has reversed given that the union government volunteered to review the sedition law. The changes, if any, brought out after the review might be a relief for the press given their prevalent hardships and nuances in being careful not to step over the line of constructive criticism of the government without being labeled seditious.

References

¡°Explained: Sedition, Defamation, AFSPA laws that Congress wants to repeal or amend.¡± 2019. The Indian Express.

¡°Section Details.¡± n.d. India Code: Section Details. Accessed May 23, 2022.

¡°The Sedition Law: Time to erase the blot on Indian democracy.¡± 2022. ORF.

Vishwanath, Apurva. 2022. ¡°What is the Sedition Law - Section 124A of IPC?¡± The Indian Express.

Yadav, Avinash K., Vikram Singh, Rintu M. Biju, Venkateshwar Rao, Shashank Pandey, and Shreya Garg. 2021. ¡°Decoding the history of Sedition law in India.¡± TheLeaflet.