Political and Economic Notes
RULERS INVOKE ‘SEDITION’ TO STIFLE DIFFERENCE OF
OPINION AGAINST THE SYSTEM
The British colonial rulers who
intended to stabilize their rule in
India and to suppress the people’s
movements against their rule have
in 1870, divised the crime of
‘sedition’ and included it in the
criminal law.
With the help of such a section
of crime of ‘sedition’ they had
incarcerated the fighters for the
national independence like
Balagangadhara Tilak and others.
Now the heirs of those British
colonial rulers, our ‘independent’
and democratic rulers, despite the
end of the colonial rule of
oppression and suppression, have
chosen to follow in the foot-steps
of their colonial masters and treat
their opponents in such a manner.
For these ‘democratic’ rulers the
section 124 A, which speaks of
‘sedition’, came handy to stifle any
justified dissent or difference of
opinion with the establishment, of
their opponents. Though the British
government had removed and
repealed such a clause of crime of
sedition from their penal code
decades ago, the Indian rulers
have not even thought of abolishing
such a section from the penal code
of India; nor consider it necessary
to abolish such a penal code.
This section of penal code on
‘sedition’ vza 124 ‘A’ is being
liberally used by the rulers against
adivasis, dalits, poets, artists and
whistie-blowers and are being
severelly punished.
Dr. Binayak Sen who provided
health services to the adivasis
neglected by the state in
Chattisgarh was arrested under
section 124 A-sedition- and was
convicted with the life sentence. But
with the intervention of Supreme
Court he came out on a bail. A
journalist Seema Azad who
exposed the activities of Mining
20
Mafia in the state of U.P. too was
incarcerated along with her
spouse. The Tamilnadu state
government too had arrested the
activists of anti-Kudamkalam
nuclear project under this section
of ‘sedition’.
Three years back Aseem
Trivedi, an activist in the anticorruption movement of Anna
Hazare, for having tried to bringout awareness against corruption
through his cartoons posted in
social media too was arrested
under this section of 124 A for
sedition by Maharashtra state
government and jailed. Consequent
to an outcry and protest nationally
and internationally and with the
intervention of Highcourt, Trivedi
was granted with a bail.
The Bombay High Court
sensing and feeling that the section
124 A of sedition is being used
indiscriminately and mis-using it
without basing on the gravity of
crime alleged to be committed by
the accused, has ordered the
Maharashtra government to issue
a circular on the applicability of
‘sedition’- section with clarity for
foisting such cases against
offenders by the police. The good
intention of this direction of the
high-court to the government is
clearly apparent, that it intends to
restrict and avoid the mis-use of the
section on people, to stifle their
freedoms- of speech, expressionguaranteed by the constitution.
However this direction of the
court seems to have appeared ‘god
sent’ opportunity to Maharashtra
government rulers, to make the
circular further more stringent to
suppress its opponents who
dissent with their opinions and
actions, in the good faith that they
are striving to protest their
democratic rights.
So the circular made the
section more stringent, making it a
crime of sedition even a simple,
justified criticism against the
government. Any criticism