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Why India at 75 is ready for a sedition-less future https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/why-india-at-75-is-ready-for-a-sedition-less-future-7430939/ Upendra Baxi writes: Section 124-A needs to be wholly judicially repealed at the bar of the fundamental human right to free speech..

Kedar Nath (1962) did not go this far but the SC held that it was “reasonably clear” that the IPC punishes only “such activities as would be intended, or have a tendency, to create disorder or disturbance of public peace by resort to violence”. Put differently, “disloyalty to a government established by law is not the same thing as commenting in strong terms upon the measures or acts of the government, or its agencies”...Already, some law luminaries have found new stirrings of hope in the Supreme Court, while some others have insisted that we must not void the section but rather, as the learned attorney general observed, find constitutional ways and practical means to prevent the abuse and misuse of law.

The policy question is simple: Is the mighty sovereign Indian Republic so vulnerable to public and media criticism as to require the continuation of a colonial and repressive law? Directing the Government of India Press, on the pain of sanction, not to publish the voided sections of the law, or provisions which are read down, may be a necessary first step, but the real problem is to make political executive and law enforcement officials take most seriously the judicial directions reading down the criminal statutes...Any creation of “public disorder” or “disturbance of public tranquility” is already upheld as a reasonable restriction in other draconian collective security laws in the State’s arsenal, though even these would not justify uses of criminal law outside its stated purposes.

Democratic legality thrives on the axiom that powers given by the law must be exercised for the purpose for which it is given and for no other.

Democracy, Dissent & Draconian Laws : UAPA & Sedition  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2hiy3OU78Y 

In UAPA Cases The Process Itself The Punishment, It Stares Us In The Face In The Death Of Father Stan Swamy Without Trial: Justice Aftab Alam Mehal J https://www.livelaw.in/top-stories/uapa-cases-the-process-itself-the-punishment-stares--death-of-father-stan-swamy-justice-aftab-alam-178112

"Right To Question Govt Is The Essence Of Democracy, Sedition Law Should Be Shown The Door As Soon As Possible": Justice Deepak Gupta https://www.livelaw.in/top-stories/sedition-law-justice-deepak-gupta-section-124a-right-to-question-govt-178090

In comment:

Manoj Jain: Majority section is suffering illegal incarceration due to non punishment of Judicial Magistrates for failure to comply with direction contained in Arnesh Kumar.

Sedition Has No Room in Modern Democracies, Time for The Law to Be Repealed https://thewire.in/rights/sedition-law-democracy-rights-repeal-misuse 
The law has been misused and abused several times even though convictions are extremely rare.

Individuals charged with sedition have to live without their passport, are barred from government jobs and must produce themselves in court at all times as and when required – if they have got bail, that is. The legal costs, the time involved, the effort and the stress for the accused are enormous. The charges have rarely stuck in most cases, but the process itself becomes the punishment. It is so difficult to fight a legal system, even if the system is not biased. And if it is?

In a 2018 Consultation Paper on Sedition, the 21st Law Commission said:

“Democracy is not another name of majoritarianism, on the contrary, it is a system to include every voice, where thought of every person is counted, irrespective of the number of the people backing that idea. In a democracy, it is natural that there will be different and conflicting interpretations of a given account of an event. Not only viewpoints which constitute the majority are to be considered, but at the same time, dissenting and critical opinions should also be acknowledged. Free speech is protected because it is necessary to achieve some greater, often ultimate, social good. In the unforgettable words of Charles Bradlaugh: Better a thousand fold abuse of free speech than denial of free speech. The abuse dies in a day but the denial slays the life of the people and entombs the hopes of the race.”

Free India has used a series of laws to control the personal freedom of those who have spoken against the policies of the state. Perhaps the most significant today are the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) and the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act (AFSPA), both of which use the basic argument of division, of “we versus them”. But the colonial provision of S124A is perhaps the worst – it can make a loyal Indian anti-national by the stroke of a dishonest policeman’s pen in an FIR. It is a law that Macaulay himself did not want in his IPC. It is time that, in independent India, that law goes. Abhijit Sengupta is a former secretary, Government of India.