Freedom of speech and expression is critical to the very existence of the idea of democracy and India’s Constitution is very clear on it. Some restrictions were subsequently introduced by the government of India’s first Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, on the plea that “the citizen’s right to freedom of speech and expression guaranteed by Article 19(1)(a) has been held by some courts to be so comprehensive as not to render a person culpable even if he advocates murder and other crimes of violence” and that “in other countries with written constitutions, freedom of speech and of the press is not regarded as debarring the state from punishing or preventing abuse of this freedom”. Seventy-four years later, the Supreme Court of India has now felt that there must be “regulatory measures” against the abuse of the right in such a way that the use of “filthy language” and “vulgarity” did not pass off as humour in programmes streamed online. There must be a way to ensure that the programmes adhere to “well known moral standards” of Indian society while it keeps off the idea of censorship of the fundamental right to speech and expression. This may be the first time the court, a guardian of the fundamental rights, has suggested to the government to come up with measures which could end up curtailing them. The court may have been sharing the concern a section of society has for the uncontrolled freedom people enjoy when it comes for expressing themselves which breaks the conventional idea of humour or is in bad taste even. There has been a hue and cry in the southern state of Kerala where youngsters have been held for committing grievous crimes including murder, and the blame was laid at the door of a genre of movies which fetes violence as they have got a good following of late in the state. The criticism is so serious that the chief minister told the state Assembly that the government will initiate a discussion with filmmakers on the topic. All this shows that there is a felt need of steps to ensure that the freedom of speech and expression does not undo the good that is expected of it. However, there is a risk, too, that when the government wades into the area, it will be the proverbial bull in a china shop. Pertinently, another bench of the Supreme Court has pulled up the Gujarat police on the same day for unthinkingly registering a first information report against a Congress Member of Parliament on the basis of a poem which essentially espouses the cause of non-violence. But the police had charged him with promoting enmity among people of different faiths. The suggestion was that the government was unmindful of the fundamental right to expression of the citizen when it booked the MP. However, as things stand, while courts have generally promoted the idea of self-regulation when it comes to this right, they are now compelled to call the attention of the government in power to frequent instances of its abuse, too. The government, while pondering over these prospective measures, must keep in mind the sanctity democracies attach to this right, and the court must ensure that whatever it suggests passes constitutional muster. It is the job of the apex court to assure that its invitation to the government to formulate these regulations for social media users and content producers do not end up like the blessing Lord Shiva gave Bhasmasura and burn the intended beneficiary who is the citizen.
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