The handcuffs of illogical censorship upon social media are finally off. The collective outrage against the unconstitutional arrests of people over their posts on Facebook finally got through. Because this time the Supreme Court gave a firm rap on the knuckles to the police and politicians and told them, ‘Enough is Enough’. The court has struck down the controversial Section 66a of IT act, deeming it both unconstitutional and untenable.
Advocates of internet freedom have been alarmed at the manner in which politicians have been using Section 66a to direct the police against any dissenter. It first began in 2012 when two girls from Palghar were arrested for criticising the bandh in Mumbai in the wake of Bal Thackeray’s death. The two were released on bail on the same day of the arrest. Following a public outcry, the government suspended two policemen.
Since then there have been a string of such arrests – A Jadavpur University professor in Kolkata arrested for forwarding a cartoon featuring Mamata Banerjee, a tourism officer in Varanasi arrested for uploading “objectionable” pictures of Mulayam Singh Yadav, Akhilesh Yadav and Azam Khan on Facebook, also a shipping professional who was arrested in Goa for saying that Modi’s rule might bring about a holocaust.
The latest among these arrests was simply appalling. A class 12 student was arrested by for making a Facebook post about UP minister Azam Khan. What was outrageous about the whole affair was the smug, nonchalant manner in which Azam Khan said, “A Class XII student made comments against me on FB. Law is enforced with strictness and he has been arrested within 24 hours.” There is no consideration of the fact that the boy is probably under-aged.
The one thing common about all these cases was that they are all big politicians who were able to take advantage of the vaguely worded section 66a, which states that:
“Any person who sends, by means of a computer resource or a communication device,-
(a) any information that is grossly offensive or has menacing character; or
(b) any information which he knows to be false, but for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult, injury, criminal intimidation, enmity, hatred or ill will, persistently by making use of such computer resource or a communication device,
(c) any electronic mail or electronic mail message for the purpose of causing annoyance or inconvenience or to deceive or to mislead the addressee or recipient about the origin of such messages, shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years and with fine.”
The leeway of this Act however was denied to activist Kavita Krishnan when she found herself threatened with rape repeatedly by someone using the handle RAPIST when she was on an online chat discussing violence against women. With that the authorities made it clear that the power to wield an act like that was the prerogative only of the already powerful.
Small wonder then that the judiciary finally struck it down amidst growing unease from all quarters. Rubbishing the vaguely worded section, the Supreme Court bench ruled said, “What is grossly offensive to you, may not be grossly offensive to me and it is a vague term.” One of the judges, Nariman added, “I can give you millions of examples but take one burning issue of conversion. If I post something in support of conversion and some people, not agreeable to my view, filed a complaint against me then what will happen to me?”
Given how the loosely worded act gives so much power to the state and gives it the authority to arbitrarily deem any content offensive or a threat to security, it comes as a relief that it has finally been struck down. In fact, it is a matter of great delight that there is still hope for free speech in the country and we are not going down a Stalinesque path, or more recent in time, China.
However we are not out of the woods yet. The tremendous access to personal information that the current internet system affords to search engines and service providers and in turn, any government who wishes to lay their hand on this information, is making many activists of online free speech extremely uneasy. China is already using this access to squelch any form of dissent or free speech that is not in tune with their own policy.
Today, we share practically all our details online right from age, name, addresses, family details to even banking and financial details thanks to online transactions. It’s only a matter of time before an ambitious government or individual decides to make wrong use of it, by which time, heads will roll. So the 66a may have been struck down, but we all owe it to ourselves to keep our personal lives private.
Image Courtesy: BCCL
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