A Theoretical Analysis of the Law on Sedition in India

Authors

  • Narayanan Aishwarya Third Year, B.A. LL.B.(Hons.), National Academy of Legal Studies and Research, Hyderabad

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.12728/culj.6.5

Abstract

The law on sedition in India has been employed as a tool of harassment to curb free speech. This has resulted in widespread demands to repeal the provisions regarding sedition as it is seen as an archaic law that was meant to serve the colonial interests. In this paper, the researcher explores the law on sedition under section 124A of the Indian Penal Code, 1860. The researcher seeks to propose an amendment to section 124A, by devising Austin’s Speech Acts Theory, Sorial’s exposition based on Austin’s theory and by accommodating the prevalent judicial interpretation into the existing provision.

Author Biography

Narayanan Aishwarya, Third Year, B.A. LL.B.(Hons.), National Academy of Legal Studies and Research, Hyderabad

Third Year, B.A. LL.B.(Hons.)

References

C. Sathyamala, Binayak Sen: Refining Health Care in an Unjust Society, 4(3) INDIAN J. MED. ETH. 104, 104-105 (2007), (Dr.Binayak Sen, the General Secretary of P.U.C.L., was arrested in May 2007 for allegedly acting as a courier for a jailed Maoist leader in Chhattisgarh).

Press Trust of India, Sedition Case Registered Against Arundhati Roy, Geelani, NDTV, Nov. 29, 2010, http://www.ndtv.com/ article/ india/ sedition-case-registered-against-arundhati-roy-geelani-69431, (Arundhati Roy and Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani were arrested for allegedly making anti-India speeches at a conference on “Azadi – the Only Way” in 2010).

Special Correspondent, Mumbai Police Arrest Cartoonist, Slap Sedition, Cybercrime Charges On Him, THE HINDU, Sept. 10, 2012, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/mumbai-police-arrest-cartoonist-slap-sedition-cybercrime-charges-on-him/article3877809.ece, (Aseem Trivedi was arrested for making and publishing seditious cartoons as part of the India against Corruption movement in 2012).

Dean Nelson, Indian Kashmiri Cricket Fans to be Charged for Cheering Pakistan, Mar. 25, 2014, THE TELEGRAPH, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/10678163/Indian-Kashmiri-cricket-fans-to-be-charged-for-cheering-Pakistan.html, (A group of Kashmiri students was arrested in Meerut for cheering for Pakistan in a televised Asia Cup cricket match in May 2014).

Siddharth Narrain, ‘Disaffection’ and the Law: The Chilling Effect of Sedition Laws in India, 46(8) ECON. POLIT. WKLY 33, 33-37 (Feb. 19, 2011), available at http://jmi.ac.in/upload/menuupload/16_ccmg_epwsedition.pdf.

RATANLAL & DHIRAJLAL, THE INDIAN PENAL CODE 534 (Justice Y.V. Chardrachud & V.R. Manohar eds., 31st ed. 2006).

Id.

CENTRE FOR THE STUDY OF SOCIAL EXCLUSION AND INCLUSIVE POLICY, NATIONAL LAW SCHOOL OF INDIA UNIVERSITY, & ALTERNATIVE LAW FORUM, SEDITION LAWS & THE DEATH OF FREE SPEECH IN INDIA 9 (Chandan Gowda ed, 1st ed. 2011), available at https://www.nls.ac.in/resources/csseip/Files/SeditionLaws_cover_Final.pdf.

Narrain, supra note 5 at 33.

(It is interesting to note that the provision relating to sedition has been placed in Chapter VI rather than Chapter VIII of the IPC which deals with Offences against Public Tranquillity. This clearly indicates that the section is intended to criminalize mere words regardless of any consequent action. Disturbance to public order is implicitly not intended to be included as a necessary ingredient of the section. However, this view has been altered by the Supreme Court as discussed later).

PEN. CODE § 124 A.

RATANLAL, supra note 6 at 356.

Id at 356.

ALTERNATIVE LAW FORUM, BANGALORE, supra note 8 at 10-14.

Id at 14 (Mahatma Gandhi, during his famous sedition trial of 1922).

(What is often ignored is the fact that the right is not absolute and is subject to the limitations contained in Article 19(2) which allows the State to impose reasonable restrictions on the freedom of speech in certain situations).

Kedar Nath Singh v. State of Bihar, 1962 S.C.R. Supl. (2) 769.

ALTERNATIVE LAW FORUM, supra note 8 at 15-18 (Similar views were expressed by the framers of the Constitution in the Constituent Assembly).

Madhu Limaye v. S.D.M., Monghyr & Ors. (1970) 3 S.C.C. 746; Balwant Singh v. State of Punjab, (2005) 3 S.C.C. 214; Bilal Ahmed Kaloo v. State of A.P., (1997) 7 S.C.C. 431, Kedar Nath Singh v. State of Bihar, 1962 S.C.R. Supl. (2) 769, Romesh Thapar v. State of Madras, A.I.R. 1950 S.C. 124, Brij Bhushan & Anr v. State of Delhi, A.I.R. 1950 S.C. 129.

ALTERNATIVE LAW FORUM, supra note 8 at 12 (Sedition Trial of Bal Gangadhar Tilak in 1908).

Romesh Thapar, A.I.R. 1950 S.C. 124.

(It must be noted that at this time Article 19(2) included only ‘security of state’ and not ‘public order’ as a ground to justify restriction of speech. In order to rectify this, the First Amendment to the Constitution was enacted in 1951 to include ‘public order’ as one of the grounds for restricting the freedom of speech under Article 19(2)).

Kedar Nath Singh, 1962 S.C.R. Supl. (2) 769.

Madhu Limaye v. S.D.M., Monghyr & Ors. (1970) 3 S.C.C. 746; Balwant Singh v. State of Punjab, (2005) 3 S.C.C. 214; Bilal Ahmed Kaloo v. State of A.P., (1997) 7 S.C.C. 431.

Nazir Khan v. State of Delhi, (2003) 8 S.C.C. 461.

ALTERNATIVE LAW FORUM, supra note 8 at 29.

Rudyard Kipling, Surgeons and the Soul inA WORD OF BOOKS available at https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/k/kipling/rudyard/words/chapter23.html (last visited Dec. 22, 2014).

(Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau each propounded a different version of the Social Contract Theory; however, in each case the essence of the theory is the formation of a State which would be superior to the citizens – irrespective of whether it is in the form of a leviathan, a representative government or sovereign).

J. L. AUSTIN, HOW TO DO THINGS WITH WORDS (Harvard University Press, 1st ed., 1962).

Sarah Sorial, Can Saying Something Make it So? The Nature of Seditious Harm 29 LAW & PHILOSOPHY 273-305 (2010).

Truth Values, Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy available at http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/truth-values/#1 (last visited Feb. 14, 2015).

Kevin Halion, Deconstruction and Speech Act Theory: A Defence of the Distinction between Normal and Parasitic Speech Acts, E-ANGLAIS, available at http://www.e-anglais.com/thesis.html (last visited Jan. 7, 2015).

Id.

Halion, supra note 32.

Halion, supra note 32.

Halion, supra note 32.

Yoshitake Masaki, Critique of J.L. Austin’s Speech Act Theory: Decentralization of the Speaker-Centred Meaning in Communication, 2 KYUSHU COMMUNICATION STUDIES 30, 27-43 (2004).

Id at 30.

Halion, ¬supra note 32.

Id.

Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy, Speech Acts, (Jul. 03, 2007) http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/speech-acts/.

R. Langton, Speech Acts and Unspeakable Acts, 22 PHILOSOPHY AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS 305, 293-330 (1993).

Sorial, supra note 30 at 290.

Ishani Maitra and Mary Kate McGowan, The Limits of Free Speech: Pornography and the Question of Coverage, 13(1) LEGAL THEORY 45, 41-68 (2007).

Id.

Sorial, supra note 30 at 298.

Sorial, supra note 30 at 276.

Downloads

Published

2021-08-13

How to Cite

Aishwarya, N. (2021). A Theoretical Analysis of the Law on Sedition in India. Christ University Law Journal, 4(1), 87-101. https://doi.org/10.12728/culj.6.5