14th June 2023 (7 Topics)
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Where anyone can be accused of Sedition
Context:
The 279th Law Commission Report laid down the grounds for retaining sedition in the current books of laws.
Recommendations of Law Commission
- Incorporating the meaning of sedition: The first is that Section 124A of the IPC should be amended to incorporate the meaning of sedition which was laid down by the Supreme Court in Kedar Nath Singh v. State of Bihar in 1962.
- Increasing sentence: The second is that the minimum sentence be increased from three to seven years.
- FIR after preliminary enquiry: The third is that First Information Reports (FIR) in sedition cases should be registered only after a police officer makes a “preliminary enquiry.”
Issues
- No fundamental change: The definition of sedition as the crime of inciting hatred, contempt, and disaffection against the government won't be significantly changed by the proposed revision.
- Police power: The Commission's proposal will cover a wide range of actions because the criteria by which the police must now evaluate the act is "mere inclination to violence," when no evidence of violence or even a genuine danger of violence is required.
- Ignored global precedent: The Commission ignored developments in other nations that invalidated sedition statutes, claiming that the "ground realities" in those nations vary from those in the United States.
A Colonial law
- Suppression of Subjects: Sedition is a colonial law because it creates a relationship of suppression between the political rulers and subjects, one that precludes accountability and a right to question.
- Greater discretion: It seems obvious that the intention is to leave it up to the local police officer to determine, for example, whether or not someone holding a sign is "inclined" to encourage violence without actually being a threat.
- Social stigma: the person accused of sedition will have to undergo the social stigma of being labelled a ‘traitor’ even before a trial is concluded, face a pre-trial system that favours incarceration over bail.
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