http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/opinion/edit-page/Aseem-Trivedis-arrest-shows-how-colonial-era-sedition-laws-lend-themselves-to-abuse/articleshow/16341516.cms
*COMMENT* Aseem Trivedi's arrest shows how colonial-era sedition laws lend themselves to abuseSep 11, 2012, 12.00AM IST Normally, a cartoon makes us smile. But that's changing now, as the arrest of cartoonist Aseem Trivedi on charges of sedition has provoked angry criticism across society. The arrest contravenes the Indian citizen's right to freedom of speech and expression. Importantly, this is a right the Constitution, constructed by the founders of an independent Indian republic, guarantees. Sedition, on the other hand, is a repressive colonial law, instituted after the 1857 Revolt when the British created rules to imprison anyone causing disaffection against the government. Several Indian freedom fighters - including Lokmanya Tilak<http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/topic/Lokmanya-Tilak> and Mahatma Gandhi<http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/topic/Mahatma-Gandhi> - were jailed thereafter on sedition charges. In independent India, instead of being revoked, the sedition law has been used against a variety of dissent. The most flagrant case of abuse of sedition laws recently was when paediatrician and civil rights activist Binayak Sen <http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/topic/Binayak-Sen> was sentenced to life imprisonment, before the Supreme Court<http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/topic/Supreme-Court>released him on bail because it could find no evidence of sedition proffered by the state government <http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/topic/state-government>. Protestors at the Kudankolam nuclear plant too have been slapped with sedition charges. By deploying the same decree in diverse situations, featuring no armed rebellion against the state, independent India's politicians are clearly using the archaic colonial law as a tool of contemporary intimidation. Trivedi's case shows the same. Apparently involved with the India Against Corruption<http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/topic/India-Against-Corruption> (IAC) campaign, his worst crime has been artwork highlighting corruption. This underlines another disturbing trend - the growing targeting of cartoons by a nervous political class. Despite (or because of?) a serious economic slowdown and several social challenges, political leaders busied themselves recently with first criticizing Shankar's 64-year-old cartoon showing Ambedkar and Nehru - ironically, a fan of Shankar himself - and then establishing a committee towards weeding out such images from textbooks. The new political insecurity has recast what was considered a perfectly respectable profession - sketching cartoons - as inherently subversive. And this trend has been reinforced by archaic colonial-era laws against sedition on the statute books. It's time, therefore, to abolish such laws that circumscribe Indian citizens' democratic rights. Last year Veerappa Moily, then the Union law minister, had noted how the sedition law had become outdated in modern times. Bad laws are laws that lend themselves to abuse. As the Trivedi case shows, the sedition law is certainly one such. It deserves swift elimination from our statute books. -- Peace Is Doable -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth?hl=en-GB.
