Q. Why is the sedition law objectionable and why is the Party opposed to it when there are secessionist forces active in the country?

 Rajkumar, Chandigarh

THE sedition clause in the Indian Penal Code is contained in Section 124A. This clause was introduced by the British colonial government in the IPC to suppress people who were opposed to British rule. Sedition means inciting people against the authority of the State or the monarch. This notorious clause was used rampantly by the British against freedom fighters. Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Gandhiji and many others were sentenced on charges of sedition and given long years of imprisonment. That is why Gandhiji had called the sedition law “the prince among the political sections of the Indian Penal Code designed to suppress the liberty of the citizens”.

However, after independence the Indian State retained the sedition clause in the IPC with minor amendments to replace “His Majesty’s government” with that of the Indian government. This was done despite the fact that Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru had stated during a parliament debate in 1951 that “As far as I am concerned, that particular section is highly objectionable and obnoxious and it should have no place in any body of laws that we might pass”.

It is shameful that despite the notorious record of this colonial law, the same clause has been retained in the Indian Penal Code and used against thousands of people in the decades since independence. Neither the Congress rulers nor other successive governments have sought to remove this obnoxious clause from the law.

Section 124A is a draconian clause which 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 attempt to excite disaffection towards the government established by law”.

It has to be noted that the clause speaks about disaffection towards the “government” and not the “State”. By this any criticism or protest against the government can be termed as sedition. Thus this clause is anti-democratic and goes against the tenets of democracy and the freedom of speech.

There has been glaring misuse of this clause on many occasions. Five years ago Dr Binayak Sen, a medical doctor, who served the poor in Chattisgarh was sentenced to life imprisonment on the charge of sedition by a district court. He finally got bail in the Supreme Court which held that no evidence of sedition has been proved. The Supreme Court had actually ruled in 1962 that the crime of sedition requires evidence of incitement of violence.

But the police and the governments have continued to misuse the sedition clause by applying it to all those who express political dissent or make public criticism of the government and those holding public office. In the recent period, cartoonists, students, political and social activists have been slapped with sedition charges and sent to jail. Among them are Asim Trivedi a cartoonist in Mumbai who circulated cartoons against corruption and was arrested on charges of sedition. In Tamilnadu, thousands of people where charged with sedition for participating in the protests against the Koodamkulam nuclear plant. 67 Kashmiri students studying in a private university in Meerut were charged with sedition in 2014 on the accusation that they were cheering the victory of the Pakistani cricket team over India. In Thiruvananthapuram, the same year, six young people were arrested for refusing to stand up when the national anthem was played in a cinema hall there. They were charged with sedition along with other clauses under the law.

After the advent of the Modi government, opposition and dissenting voices are branded as “anti-national” and therefore seditious. The most glaring misuse was seen when Kanhaiya Kumar, the president of the JNUSU and other students were charged with sedition and arrested. Even those who support the JNU student leaders and oppose their arrest are being booked under sedition charges as was done in the case of Sitaram Yechury and other opposition leaders under the direction of a Magistrate’s court in Hyderabad.

As long as the sedition clause is there in the IPC, the police and the lower judiciary will utilise it to persecute a range of people engaged in opposition activities. The clause itself provides the basis for such draconian action. That is why the CPI(M) has been demanding the scrapping of the sedition clause in the IPC. There are other provisions in the law to deal with secessionist activities.