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From
Tehelka Magazine, Vol 9, Issue 38, Dated 22 Sept 2012 |
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Sovereignty in India has historically been seen as belonging not to the people but to the State
A cartoonist’s arrest has put the spotlight on archaic laws governing national emblems. |
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By Ashok Malik
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Ashok Malik |
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LIKE CHANDRASEKHAR AZAD, Aseem Trivedi, the cartoonist arrested recently in Mumbai, too has family origins in central Uttar Pradesh’s Unnao district. The purpose of recounting that piece of trivia is not to compare the revolutionary hero of the 1920s to Trivedi. The two are very different individuals, and any comparison would be odious. However, one intriguing question does link them: was Azad’s relationship with and threat to the British Indian State exactly the same as Trivedi’s relationship with and threat to the Indian State? The answer is plainly “no”. If that be the case, how does one explain that a charge of sedition — the same legal clause that the Raj may well have deployed against Azad and other freedom fighters — has been used by authorities in Maharashtra to arrest Trivedi?
What is Trivedi’s crime? At the height of the India Against Corruption activism of 2011, he made some cartoons that depicted Parliament and the Ashokan lions — India’s national emblem — in poor light. The cartoons were over-the-top and aesthetically a bit off. Nevertheless, did they amount to sedition and incitement to violence and overthrow of the Indian State? Such questions have been asked previously as well. In 2010, writer Arundhati Roy gave an impassioned speech in New Delhi. She criticised India’s Kashmir policy and pretty much advocated secession. The content and timing of her speech — Jammu & Kashmir had just come out of a summer of violence and unrest — disappointed and angered many. However, matters became problematic when there were calls to try Roy for sedition. Even those who opposed Roy’s views found it difficult to stomach that a free-speaking citizen could be charged with sedition, a decidedly loaded, blockbuster expression that has been manipulated by governments through history to harass political opponents.
It is worth recalling what P Chidambaram, home minister then, had said about the proposal to charge Roy with sedition. “Not taking action is also an action,” he had said, when asked why Delhi Police had not invoked the sedition law, “Section 124(A) of the IPC is for deterrence and punishment. The spirit of the law and true interpretation of law is that unless there is direct incitement to violence, the State must show tolerance and forbearance. Delhi Police is acting in accordance with the letter and spirit of the law.” One wonders why the government in Maharashtra didn’t exercise such prudence.
OTHER THAN the disturbing and anachronistic use of sedition, the overdone “protection” offered to national emblems also merits discussion. In the same week in which Trivedi was arrested for redrawing the Ashokan lions (and replacing the animals with foxes he felt better represented politicians and ministers), Indian television audiences saw live telecast and re-runs of the Democrat and Republican election conventions in the United States. In typical American style, these were all-purpose jamborees, with delegates and supporters turning up in hats and shoes depicting the Stars and Stripes. It is important to note that such exhibition and use of the national flag was regarded as an articulation of American patriotism. It was not even remotely construed as debasement.
There is a lesson here for India, where sovereignty has historically been seen as belonging not to the people but to the State. As a result, symbols of the republic — the flag, pictures of Parliament, India Gate and so on — don’t so much embellish the celebration of popular culture and patriotic feeling as end up being appropriated by the State. In 2005, an under-secretary in the home ministry sent a letter to the Board of Control for Cricket in India demanding that Sachin Tendulkar remove the tricolour sticker from his helmet. Apparently, this was in violation of the Flag Code of India. As a bureaucrat painstakingly explained at the time, if a fast bowler hit Tendulkar’s helmet, it would amount to an insult to the flag and to India. Thankfully, this gobbledygook logic was soon shown up and the Flag Code was subsequently amended. Even so, as Trivedi’s bizarre case shows us, the Indian State — and the Congress-NCP government in Maharashtra — can still be remarkably obtuse. That makes it all the more imperative to redeem India from the Indian State.
Ashok Malik is Contributing Editor, Tehelka.
ashok@tehelka.com
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