I know that you must be thinking that this man has come again to lecture you on sedition in these dark times.
You must be wondering what is the relevance of sedition in today’s crisis.
In this episode of TheDeshBhakt, I will tell you how sedition is directly related to today’s crisis and its consequences.
Before we get into all that, please subscribe to our channel and press the bell icon.
Sedition law was first drafted by the British in 1837 and then re-introduced in 1870.
It was first used against freedom fighter Bal Gangadhar Tilak in 1897.
Do you know during which epidemic the British used sedition law against Tilak?
“Corona  Corona”
Not Corona, but Plague.
There was a similar bacterial infection spread across the country in those days.
Tilak was not happy with the way British were handling the epidemic and he wrote some articles in his newspaper “Kesari” against the Brits.
Naturally, the Brits didn’t appreciate the questions raised by Tilak and they charged him in the Sedition case.
So does this mean that freedom fighter Bal Gangadhar Tilak was anti-national?
He certainly was but only for the British rule as the questions he was raising were causing troubles to their reputation.
As it is believed commonly, History repeats itself.
Today, the country is again battling against a pandemic; doctors are being asked not to be revolutionaries and not demand Personal Protective Equipment.
In another case, an FIR was filed against ‘The Wire’ editor, Siddharth Vardarajan for his article on UP CM attending the ceremony that happened at the Ram Janambhoomi during the lock down.
Also, the government is discouraging any investigative reporting and questioning over the number of diseased and how the authorities are handling the situation.
Government wants us to only say and write what is suitable to them.
Basically, no matter who the authorities are, sedition has been used as a political tool by everyone who is in power.
Sedition is simply an excuse to cripple dissent and questions that are being raised against the Government.
In colonial rule, it was used against many freedom fighters including Mahatma Gandhi.
After independence, there have been vehement debates over the law.
In the end though, the lawmakers agreed to keep sedition in our constitution.
Jawahar Lal Nehru called this law obnoxious and objectionable in 1951
.Although, he also did not do anything to remove it.
Even after independence, we continued using the law according to the whims and fancies of the government.
Here we can say that Nehru was reasonably at fault.
British themselves have revoked this law from their constitution in 2010.
Yet it is constantly being used by the Indian authorities indecisively.
We have continuously protested the use of foreign goods and products in India but not sedition.
We have heard the word sedition a lot and also about those on whom it was used but what exactly is sedition?
Sedition literally means ‘Rajdroh’.
According to the Indian Penal Code, if a person with his spoken, written words or signs or visual representation expresses hatred, contempt or disaffection against the government then it will come under sedition.
If the person is found guilty of his crime then he can even be penalized with life imprisonment.
In India, even murderers are not punished so severely but mere words can make your life end in jail.
Initially, the law was incorporated as a response to the rising Wahabi movement.
Between the 1830's and 1860's, the Wahabi movement was the most troublesome movement against the British.
Later, the law was amended to cripple the voices of freedom fighters such as Tilak.
Consequently, sedition was left as an open ended law with various interpretations.
Hence, it has been misused constantly by all the Governments.
As we keep on forwarding WhatsApp movement without checking them twice, the Government has also been charging any voice of dissent with sedition without even thinking once.
Whether it is the Congress government or the BJP government, everyone is guilty of using sedition at their disposal.
Even then in this country, calling out to shoot those whom the government believes are “traitors” is not sedition but casually hailing other countries is !
You may ask that if there are so many loopholes in this law then why didn’t the courts do anything about it.
Our judiciary system is full of loopholes itself, what can we expect from it?
This has not been the case forever though.
In many previous judgements on sedition, Courts ruled that casually chanting slogans would not account to sedition until it does not incite violence or social disorder in the country.
While giving the Kedarnath judgement, the courts said that there is a need to provide some parameters on the unrestricted use of sedition by the government as it may result in encroachment of personal liberty.
Well, the government cares about personal liberty just as much as the finance minister cares about the economy.
Courts have constantly expressed their discomfort with the irrational use of sedition by the Indian government.
In fact, in Balwant Singh Vs State of Punjab case, the courts ruled that merely shouting ‘Khalistan Zindabad’ is not sedition as it didn’t lead to violence directly.
Even then, writing letter to the Prime Minister against the rising mob lynching is considered sedition today.
 
Performing play against the Citizenship Amendment Act is sedition but not inciting speech by politicians such as Kapil Mishra.
Courts have said clearly that until and unless the speech or written words do not lead to violence or agitation in the country, it would not amount to sedition.
But the government doesn’t understand this clear fact.
See, if there is a law which literally says that any dissatisfaction expressed with the government is sedition then it was bound to get misused.
It has been used in India as it is some public property.
As it is not written anywhere in public toilets that littering is prohibited, it is not written in the Constitution that use of sedition to withhold freedom of speech is prohibited.
For example, 10,000 farmers were charged with sedition in a village of Jharkhand for demanding their land rights provided in the Constitution.
In Karnataka, mother of a student and the Principal of the school were charged with sedition for performing an anti-CAA play.
The Karnataka Police was found questioning the kids.
Kids who don’t even know the meaning of sedition were interrogated for it, this is literally a joke in Indian democracy.
If you think that it is only the BJP government that misuses sedition then you don’t know the Congress party enough.
In 2016, Bengaluru police reportedly charged Amnesty India with sedition when the Congress party was in power in Karnataka.
Later it was found that you can only charge individuals with sedition and not the entire organisation.
Before that in 2012, sedition was allegedly used against protesters in the Kudankulam nuclear power plant case.
Then there is the case of a folk singer being charged with sedition for writing songs against Jayalalitha in 2016.
And the recent case of sedition being used against 49 celebrities who were demanding action against the increasing mob lynching in India.
It feels as if sedition has become inevitable to those raising voice against the government.
There are many cases in which sedition is being used irrespective of whether the speech led to social disorder or not.
In Delhi, there was one case where sedition was used against some activists who were demanding action against Kapil Mishra’s speech which led to a pogrom in North-east Delhi.
Had this clause been available to me as a child for siblings who complained a lot, my childhood could have been merrier.
You must have understood by now that the government loves using sedition and as Mr Piyush Goyal has said, “Don’t get into the math’s.”
Since we are already considered anti-national, we will get into the math and will talk about numbers.
According to the NCRB, there were about 35 cases registered under sedition in 2016 while in 2018, this number rose to 70.
The most surprising part here was that at least NCRB released the data.
What was even more surprising was the low conviction rate in these cases.
In the past 5 years, trial has been completed in only 43 cases of all and only in 4 of these cases the judgement led to conviction.
The conviction rate in 2016 was 16.7%; it was 33.3% in 2017 while only 15.4% in 2018- the lowest in the past five-years.
On the brighter side, we should be happy that these many cases have actually managed to get a closure in our ruptured judiciary.
With the rising cases of sedition being used against social activists and anybody who is asking questions, I believe my number is coming soon.
Now, let’s talk about how sedition is linked to the current pandemic.
About 120 years ago, Tilak had raised uncomfortable questions for the British rulers.
Today, we should also be raising these important questions to our government which the reporters are not asking.
Lockdown was an appropriate decision but what’s next?
What about essential goods and services?
What about the economic bailout?
What about the past “achievements”?
What about the medical facilities and protection to doctors?
What about the falling GDP growth, jobs and migrant workers?
It is possible that asking these basic and common questions will also come under sedition tomorrow.
So it is very important for all of us to read about sedition and understand how the government is misusing it to restrict our freedom of speech.
So today if you’re cursing the government for increasing inflation, tomorrow you might also be declared anti-national under sedition.
Be safe and keep raising your voice because we might win the battle against this virus but the fight against sedition shall continue.
We could have made the episode on sedition whenever, but it is important in the present scenario when our freedom of speech is in even more danger because of an health emergency.
But even in this emergency, we should underst and our rights and keep on questioning the government.
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