Action against The Wire: Abuse of authority throttles the voice of criticism

The Uttar Pradesh government’s action against Siddharth Varadarajan, the founding editor of web portal The Wire, has shown how the political authority arrogates the legal power to itself to supress the voices that criticise the ruling dispensations.

There are two major unconstitutional and anti-people atrocities within this ‘action’ of UP Police in registering FIR against the editor. First, it does not want to tolerate any criticism from journalists like Varadarajan. Second, the absolute abuse of authority by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, his media advisor, and the police which is supposed to register an FIR independently, without coming under instructions of the political bosses.

On March 31, The Wire wrote, “While sharing the article on Twitter, Varadarajan had mistakenly claimed, ‘On the day the Tablighi Jamaat event was held, Adityanath insisted a large Ram Navami fair planned for Ayodhya from March 25 to April 2 would proceed as usual and that Lord Ram would protect devotees from the coronavirus’.”

The next day, as a clarification, the journalist tweeted, “I should clarify that it was Acharya Paramhans, Hindutva stalwart and head of the official Ayodhya temple trust, who said Ram would protect devotees from coronavirus, and not Adityanath, though he allowed a public event on 25/3 in defiance of the lockdown and took part himself.”

A correction was made to the article and a corrigendum was also added at the end of the story.

However, the Faizabad Kotwali police station viewed it as a cognizable crime. The unfortunate misquote has proved very costly for the editor, as the police filed an FIR invoking a string of penal provisions.

They include Section 188 which penalises disobedience of any order of a public servant, Section 54 of the Disaster Management Act, for a false alarm or warning as to disaster or its severity or magnitude, Section 505(2) of the IPC (creation or promotion of enmity, hatred or ill will between classes, Section 67 of the IT Act (transmission of obscene material) and Section 66(D) of the IT Act (cheat by impersonation using computer source).

This was followed by threats. On April 1, the Chief Minister’s media advisor Mrityuanjay Kumar shared Varadarajan’s post on social media and asked the editor to delete the tweet. He also posted copies of the FIR filed against the editor.

The FIR also mentioned his remark questioning Yogi Adityanath’s participation in a religious ceremony at the Ram Janmabhoomi site in Ayodhya during the nationwide lockdown to contain the spread of coronavirus.

Now, the editor is charged, though not charge-sheeted as ‘accused,’ and his wife was served a notice for appearance under Section 40(A) of the Criminal Procedure Code, which is a precursor to ‘arrest.’

The Supreme Court held in several cases that an accused should be given a notice of appearance before getting arrested. The police officer should bear the identity tag of his name, along with the warrant of arrest, if not responded to notice of appearance. These are part of right to ‘information’ about the reasons, charges, arresting authorities.

Whether it is Chief Minister or any other person, calling for huge congregations with religious fervour amounts to defiance of instructions of public authorities, protocol of lockdown, and breach of law, which should invoke the penal provisions like Section 188 of IPC. Surprisingly, both Hindus and Muslims are giving calls for collective prayers and celebrations expressing complete bharosa over Ram & Allah that coronavirus would not hit them.

The Chief Minister, Ministers, and Legislators take oath of office in the name of God or Conscience, and almost all BJP elected representatives do take oath in the name of God. They ‘do swear in the name of God/solemnly affirm that he/she would bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution of India as by law established, faithfully and conscientiously discharge the duties as …”.

If they breach the Constitution by not conscientiously discharging their duties, not bearing true faith and allegiance to Constitution of India, what will law do to them? Law is in their own hands. But if they violate the swearing in the name of God, how is God expected to punish them?

(M Sridhar Acharyulu is a former Central Information Commissioner and Dean of Law in Bennett University)

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