India Charges Novelist Arundhati Roy Over a 2010 Speech https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/11/world/asia/arundhati-roy-kashmir.html the government had approved charges against Ms. Roy and the Kashmiri law professor Sheikh Showkat Hussain, a move required for certain crimes in India. The two have been charged under several sections of Indian law, including offenses related to provocative speech and the promotion of enmity between different groups... The lieutenant governor of the Delhi region said the government had considered filing a more serious charge of sedition against Ms. Roy and Mr. Hussain in the case, which sprang from a complaint filed in October 2010 by a right-wing Kashmiri Hindu activist against speakers at a conference on Kashmir....
(In view of https://www.boomlive.in/law/supreme-court-sedition-law-section-124a-23033 Supreme Court Constitution Bench To Examine Validity Of Sedition Law By - Ritika Jain | 12 Sept 2023 the Supreme Court referred the batch of pleas challenging the validity of the sedition law to a Constitution Bench of “at least five judges”. Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud said the bench would also decide if the top court’s 1962 verdict upholding the sedition law required reconsideration.
The Kedarnath Singh judgment was decided on a narrow understanding of fundamental rights that were prevalent at the time, the top court said. Sedition was examined only in the context of free speech, the bench further observed. Since then, several judgments have been passed which say Articles 14 (right against discrimination), 19 (free speech), and 21 (right to life) must operate in harmony, it added.
The action against a Booker Prize winner was the latest in a growing crackdown on free expression by the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.