Supreme Court Agrees To Hear PIL Seeking Action Against Haridwar Dharm Sansad Anti-Muslim Hate Speeches
LIVELAW NEWS NETWORK https://www.livelaw.in/top-stories/supreme-court-agrees-to-hear-pil-seeking-action-against-haridwar-dharm-sansad-anti-muslim-hate-speeches-189129 10 Jan 2022
The petitioners argue that the speeches would pass the 'spark in a powder keg' test as the Supreme Court had held in Ragarajan v. P. Jagjeevan Ram and Ors. (1989) 2 SCC 574 - "...The anticipated danger should not be remote, conjectural or far fetched. It should have proximate and direct nexus with the expression. The expression of thought should be intrinsically dangerous to the public interest. In other words, the expression should be inseparably locked up with the action contemplated like the equivalent of a "spark in a powder keg"."
Genocide: The Convention on Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide to which Indian is a signatory. Article I of the Convention reads "The Contracting Parties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish."
Role of Police: The Petitioners emphasised that the guidelines laid down by the Apex Court in Tehseen Poonawalla (supra) are also not followed by the State functionaries - "42. We may emphatically note that it is axiomatic that it is the duty of the State to ensure that the machinery of law and order functions efficiently and effectively in maintaining peace so as to preserve our quintessentially secular ethos and pluralistic social fabric in a democratic set-up governed by rule of law. In times of chaos and anarchy, the State has to act positively and responsibly to safeguard and secure the constitutional promises to its citizens. The horrendous acts of mobocracy cannot be permitted to inundate the law of the land. Earnest action and concrete steps have to be taken to protect the citizens from the recurrent pattern of violence which cannot be allowed to become "the new normal"."
Guidelines: guidelines set out in Tehseen Poonawalla (supra) to be followed by the police authorities, which include -
The appointment of a designated nodal officer, not below the rank of Superintendent of Police for taking measures to prevent prejudice-motivated crimes like mob violence and lynching.
If an incident of lynching or mob violence comes to the notice of the local police, the jurisdictional police station shall immediately lodge and FIR, without any undue delay, under the relevant provisions of law.
It shall be the duty of the Station House Officer, in whose police station such FIR is registered, to forthwith intimate the Nodal Officer in the district who shall, in turn, ensure that there is no further harassment of the family members of the victim(s).
Investigation in such offences shall be personally monitored by the Nodal Officer who shall be duty bound to ensure that the investigation is carried out effectively and the charge- sheet in such cases is filed within the statutory period from the date of registration of the FIR or arrest of the accused, as the case may be.
There should be a scheme to compensate victims of such prejudice-motivated violence.
Article 7 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and 20(2) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Article 20(2) specifically condemns hate speech as under -
"Any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence shall be prohibited by law."