Dev 360: Dissent & democracy A real debate needed
Are citizens and dissenters two separate groups of people? If the police can hold press conferences accusing well-known human rights campaigners, share documents and letters purportedly to establish links between the arrested persons and Maoist organisations, even as the Supreme Court is seized of the matter, how can ordinary people dare to speak truth to power? Consider the case of the assistant professor in Bihar who was brutally thrashed by a group of people over sharing a Facebook post critical of Atal Behari Vajpayee after the former PM’s death last month. It’s difficult to say how these cases will end, but there’s no doubt that cumulatively they are having a chilling effect on ordinary people who may want to speak out. Tamil folk singer Kovan has been arrested twice — most recently for singing a song satirising the Prime Minister and the BJP, and also in October 2015 on charges of sedition, attempt to create enmity between social groups etc when he had taken on the Tamil Nadu government, then led by the late Jayalalithaa.
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