Supreme Court to pronounce verdict on Vinod Dua’s petition on June 3
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The Supreme Court is scheduled to pronounce its judgment on Thursday on a petition filed by senior journalist and Padma Shri awardee Vinod Dua to quash a sedition case registered in opposition to him in Himachal Pradesh for his YouTube telecast on the Delhi riots final yr.
Mr. Dua and his spouse are recovering from COVID-19.
A Bench led by Justice U.U. Lalit would primarily resolve whether or not Mr. Dua’s argument that authorities meets criticism with costs of sedition holds.
“There is a recent trend against the media where State governments, who do not find a particular telecast to be in sync with their political ideologies, register FIRs against persons of the media primarily to harass them and to intimidate them so that they succumb to the line of the State or else face the music at the hands of the police,” Mr. Dua had submitted within the apex court docket.
The judgment comes even because the Supreme Court, in a separate case on sedition costs levelled in opposition to two Telugu channels by the Andhra Pradesh authorities, had stated it was time to outline the boundaries of the sedition regulation.
Accused of faux information
The grievance in opposition to Mr. Dua was filed by a BJP chief. The senior journalist was accused of spreading faux information. Besides sedition, the opposite costs embrace inflicting public nuisance, printing of defamatory matter and making statements conducive to public mischief.
During the court docket listening to, senior advocate Vikas Singh had learn out excerpts from Mr. Dua’s telecast and submitted that “if this makes out to be sedition, then half the country is committing the crime”. Mr. Singh had argued that criticism of public measures or a remark on authorities motion, nevertheless strongly worded, could be inside cheap limits of free speech. Fair criticism was not sedition
The apex court docket had protected Mr. Dua from arrest in June 2020.
Mr. Dua had approached the Supreme Court after the Himachal Pradesh Police appeared at his residence on June 12 final yr and ordered him to be current on the distant Kumarsain police station — at the very least a 20-hour drive from Delhi — the very subsequent day (June 13) at 10 a.m.
Incidentally, the Himachal Pradesh Police made their presence identified to Mr. Dua shortly after the Delhi High Court stayed an FIR registered by the Delhi Police on the identical telecast.
The authorities, represented by Additional Solicitor General S.V. Raju, had submitted that even an try to disobey an order promulgated by a public servant (Section 188 IPC) or giving provocation with intent to trigger a riot (Section 153 IPC) quantities to a cognisable offence. Mr. Raju reiterated that even an try to commit these crimes would make a cognisable offence.
Mr. Raju had additionally raised the query whether or not a journalist got here below the authorized definition of a “professional”. He stated an expert was somebody who had a shopper relationship. The authorities argued {that a} journalist was like another citizen.
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