As an Indian, the situation is a bit more complicated than what the article frames it as. Religion (and caste) have always been a sensitive issue, to the extent that there are multiple laws preventing people from "inciting" others (and yes, these laws are often abused by whichever government happens to be holding power, including the ones before the current government) - this is especially true for public figures like this guy here. Given that, calling this "unconstitutional" would be a bit of a stretch (abuse of power? maybe).
Further, the term "arrest" would be factually incorrect. India has a concept of detention — police can legally detain any individual on suspicion (even without a warrant/crime) upto a period of 24 hours — post which the detainee is presented to a magistrate where the detention can be legally challenged.
> a court in Kokrajhar denied him bail, ordering him to be held in custody for three days
Instead of an actual arrest this seems to be an extended detention (approved a court).
> arrest coincided with the arrival of the British prime minister
> He was taken across the country to Assam in India’s north-east
Considering these statements, instead of being arrested for his tweet, the context makes it seem more like the police felt he could be a threat given the arrival of Johnson, and they decided to preemptively detain him in a far corner of the country.
Regardless of whether I'm correct or not, it won't be the first time this has happened.
((Please ignore the typos/formatting, I typed this on a phone))
Edit: Just saw the article also mentions
> In the capital, Delhi, bulldozers have demolished the homes of Muslims accused of rioting
While this is true, it also needs to be mentioned that Delhi is not under BJP government (the ruling party).
Let me try to politely address each of your point one by one:
Its unconstitutional and abuse of power whether current government did it or previous government did it.
We can name it anything; "arrest", "detention" or a "trip to Disney". But it does not change the meaning when police takes you away.
Do you think India's law & order system is so weak that they have to arrest a lawmaker and take him to a far corner of country because of a tweet? And they made the whole country safe by arresting a lawmaker?
Its really surprising that either you don't you know that Municipal Corporation of Capital of India (Delhi) is not run by BJP government (the ruling party) or you conveniently shared false information with HN. [1]
Not only that, its the ruling party of India who is delaying the planned 2022 Delhi Municipal Corporation election because they fear their defeat.
> Its unconstitutional and abuse of power whether current government did it or previous government did it.
Agreed, I wasn't trying to make it sound okay (it isn't) — rather was just trying to point out that this has been going for a while. What others might see as "ruling party trying to establish monarchy" is simply revenge in their eyes. This will continue to happen with the next change of government as well.
> We can name it anything ... when police takes you away.
Again, I was pointing out that this might as well be a simple case of police detaining someone they feel could a threat to peace with Johnson's visit — won't be the first time either. I'm not trying to defend the government, just trying to offer another perspective to the people holding pitchforks.
> Do you think India's law & order system is so weak that they have to arrest a lawmaker and take him to a far corner of country because of a tweet?
Religion is a sensitive issue in India — really, when public figures try to incite people through social media (not talking about this incident in particular), speeches or any other medium, the only options left are to sit and watch what may turn into a riot (leading to loss of lives and destruction of property), or simply arrest the person preemptively. Is there any alternative?
And yes, people with power (which includes Modi, Owasi, and all politicians in general) often do get away with these remarks, kind-of proving how law and order is "weak".
> And they made the whole country safe by arresting a lawmaker?
Which is the point I was trying to make — this seems to be a detention, a temporary action taken as a precaution (and yes, with zero proof). The guy will most likely be sitting in jail while Johnson is in India, and be free once his detention ends.
> Its really surprising ... conveniently shared false information with HN.
Ouch, that assumption of malice. The way you worded it seems like contempt... Do we really need to be at each others throat, can't we just be two people simply discussing a topic (that just happens to be politics)?
To answer your question, I was actually unaware of the (weird?) structure for government bodies in Delhi[0]. Given how you framed your question, I guess I'm more of a buffoon than the evil-guy-trying-to-sow-misinformation...
Every day, I'm ashamed of the Modi government that has been elected twice.
Very recently, his party also won a key constituency, headed by a monk that has failed to condemn the astonishingly high number of females rapes.
If Modi were to stand for election today, he would probably win again. The majority of the people in India seem to be very fond of nationalism and its seemingly quiet transition to fascism. It's very disturbing to say the least.
> He was charged with Section 120B (criminal conspiracy), section 153(A) (promoting enmity between two communities), 295(A) (injuring or defiling place of worship with intent to insult the religion of any class), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace), and 506 (criminal intimidation). In addition to that, the police included one more charge under Section 66 of the IT Act. The most appropriate subsection in this would be Section 66A, which was struck down seven years ago by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional!
India has really vaguely worded laws that can be interpreted against any action or speech by someone. Offending sentiments, disturbing peace, inciting violence, promoting enmity or hatred, "sedition" (which is a favorite nowadays: criticize the country or a politician or praise another country's cricket team and you may be charged with sedition). There are even worse draconian laws (UAPA, Goonda Act) that allow the police to detain and imprison a person without producing them in court for a year or longer. Just claim that the person is a criminal or terrorist and they can be confined and isolated.
All these laws and charges are applied selectively. Those in power have abused and do abuse these to suppress dissent. When the people in the ruling party commit far worse offenses, they're not held to account (please search for public hate speeches where some people have talked about killing other people). When faced with protests about an inconsistent and controversial law, the Prime Minister himself said in a speech that "Those creating violence can be identified by their clothes itself" (a reference to Muslims). [2] Obviously, no action was taken against him.
What's even sadder is that the Indian Supreme Court seems to have long abdicated its responsibilities to citizens, and appears to mostly favor the governments if it does hear any important cases (it seems to wake up once in a while from its hypnotized state). It's painful to say that if there were ever a sellout that most people haven't questioned, it should be on this court.
Obviously, many other countries may be in similar or worse situations. But the bar cannot, and should not, be so low in India for people to feel proud in comparison. As the largest democracy in the current times, India should be setting a much higher bar for freedoms and be a pioneer that other countries seek to emulate. That likely won't come soon, and needs generational changes.
Edit: If everyone points fingers at other countries whenever such incidents are reported in any country, we'd all soon be living in places that nobody would choose to live in.
India never had freedom of speech. Opposition newspapers are often harassed and shut down. They have a law criminalizing offending religious feelings. This is not an exaggerated paraphrase, that’s what the law says. A scientist was convicted under this law a few years ago for demonstrating that a “weeping” statue of the Virgin Mary was not actually weeping blood. The truth was offensive, so the law applied.
EDIT: I remembered inaccurately. It was a statue of the crucified Jesus, not Mary.
He was gone after not because of proving it false, but because he accused the church of purposefully lying I believe.
One could call it not much different but it isn't the exact same as being prosecuted for debunking a "miracle"
From wikipedia:
he skeptic-rationalist author Sanal Edamaruku proved that the water stemmed from a faulty sewage system, which seeped due to capillary action. However, Edamaruku also accused Latin Christian priests of regularly scamming devotees and defrauding miracles to make money, and build bigger and newer churchs or convents,[1] and mocked the Pope as "anti-science".[2] A church representative admitted Edamaruku had the "right to doubt", and Christian activists said that the backlash was not for debunking the alleged "miracle" but for the defamatory statements made live on television.[3]
Even though the allegations are indeed defamatory and slanderous in nature, they shouldn't be prosecutable period.
The only exception to be made if he divulged very specific details for scams/frauds that perpetuated by certain individuals mentioned by name, then these individuals have every right to sue him and ask for a generous compensation for the damages the defendant inflicted on their reputation and good name by making these baseless accusations.
Other than this specific case, he shouldn't face trial for these ridiculous statements no matter how incendiary or inflammatory they might be perceived by certain groups or elements of the general public.
You say "baseless accusations" and "ridiculous statements".
I have seen "Christians" do what I can only describe as scamming other people regularly, not just the megachurch guys buying private jets with "donations", but also the Catholic Church selling(!) indulgences and sometimes "monetizing" "miracles". I see how other people might feel these activities are not scams at all, but at least to me, that's how I perceive them. I cannot comment on this particular story, as I am lacking background information, and thus do not want form an opinion without knowing the facts.
Calling the pope "anti-science" isn't that much of a stretch either, from my perspective.
Defamation lawsuits are mostly filed by wealthy or influential individuals against common citizens. It is a tool to keep everyone that can’t afford decades-long legal battles obedient and shut. Laws regarding defamation do more harm than good to most people, especially vocal journalists.
There is a difference between a law in paper and its enactment. There are various laws in the constitution of india that can be conveniently represented to prosecute someone on the basis of their speech. There is significant evidence of such happenings only increasing lately
Along with several others of his works, and tons of other books, such as The deVinci Code. For various reasons such as being “poorly researched”. Here is a list of over 50 banned books:
Well, Germany censors the swastika - which has been used by eastern religions for millennia. I think democracy and free speech are different things. Absolute free speech is desired - but not all democracies implement it.
Either way, I don’t think India has ever had “free speech”. It has always been controlled speech.
The US doesn’t limit speech. Private platforms are self censoring. It has even upheld the right of citizens to burn the flag [0](reprehensible as it might be in the view of the majority).
Edit: Freedom of speech does not include the right:
To incite imminent lawless action.
Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969).
To make or distribute obscene materials.
Roth v. United States, 354 U.S. 476 (1957).
To burn draft cards as an anti-war protest.
United States v. O’Brien, 391 U.S. 367 (1968).
To permit students to print articles in a school newspaper over the objections of the school administration.
Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier, 484 U.S. 260 (1988).
Of students to make an obscene speech at a school-sponsored event.
Bethel School District #43 v. Fraser, 478 U.S. 675 (1986).
Of students to advocate illegal drug use at a school-sponsored event.
Morse v. Frederick, __ U.S. __ (2007).
That's one of the stupidest ones IMHO. Free speech absolutists harping about how great the US is in that regard forget to mention that speech is okay when it's money, insulting people for their skin colour and a bunch of other edge cases most other developed countries disagree with, but heavens forbid boobs!
US law permits restrictions on speech, but only in very specific cases for very good reasons. For example, gag orders during court proceedings are temporary limitations on speech meant to ensure a fair trial.
And obviously, any speech that is intrinsically part of another crime would be punishable (e.g. telling somebody you're from the IRS so you could steal their return).
Germany doesn’t censor the swastika. It censors Nazi propaganda. So, you’re free to draw the swastika let’s say for Diwali. But if you use it for political purposes, it isn’t allowed for obvious reasons.
All that a democracy is is a form of government where people elect some part of the legislature and the executive. If the electorate wants censorship, then the electorate will get censorship. If the electorate doesn't care much either way about censorship, but the people they elect do, then they will get censorship.
1) Censorship of "offensive" content (for some definition of "offensive"), applied equally to all people.
2) Censorship of political opponents, either overtly (as in Russia) or under the guise of censoring "offensive" content.
A democracy can theoretically sustain itself while engaging in censorship of type 1. A democracy that has chosen to engage in censorship of type 2 is on its way to becoming an authoritarian regime, even if that censorship has public support in the short term. Eventually, the opposition is slowly but surely silenced altogether, and you end up with single-party authoritarian rule. Your vote doesn't matter if no one is allowed to campaign against the status quo.
Further, I would argue that it is very difficult to prevent type 1 censorship from turning into type 2 censorship, because the party in power is always incentivized to use any tools they have to stay in power. It is more sustainable for a democracy to take a firm stance against censorship of any form than to try to walk that line.
Very well said, I think. I would add that (1) and (2) overlap, as well. For example, speech railing against sharia might be classified as offensive to Muslims. But it becomes a political issue if a party or candidate supports a policy of allowing some limited form of sharia to have official status.
> A democracy that has chosen to engage in censorship of type 2 is on its way to becoming an authoritarian regime, even if that censorship has public support in the short term.
Depends on who the political opponents are. There's a vast gulf between single-party rule, and a oligopoly of parties that censor their opponents, but not eachother. The former is seen in a place like Russia, the latter is what we have seen for decades in many Western countries. (See: The Red Scare as a great example of this.)
> I would argue that it is very difficult to prevent type 1 censorship from turning into type 2 censorship, because the party in power is always incentivized to use any tools they have to stay in power.
It's actually easy, what you need is a strong bureaucracy that maintains social norms, due to its inertia. As long as we can all shake hands and agree to treat, say, commies as a common enemy, but treat eachother as gentlemen, that sort of status quo can be maintained indefinitely.
That bureaucratic inertia is what will protect you from despotism, not the letter of the law.
Good point. What I mean by “not a democracy” is not democratic in a meaningful, functional sense. So if people can vote, but they’re not allowed to share political opinions freely, and specifically if the government decides what you’re allowed to say, then the voting becomes meaningless—or at least, less meaningful. My vote is not informed by what I know about the candidates or various political issues if I’m only allowed to read what the party in power allows me to read.
Also pure democracies don't really exist. for example the US is a democratic republic and the bill of rights has (until recently) stopped a lot of companies, people, and state governments from running over the rights of an individual to speak their mind (or religion or whatever) without fearing reprisal from the government. I'm afraid with the far right SCOTUS that we have currently though those individual rights are likely to be taken away to allow more police actions in our country as republicans increasingly push to remove hard won civil, racial, and gender equality rights.
There's liberal and illiberal democracy, and I think for the majority of people here when democracy is mentioned, the former is the one that comes to mind not the latter.
> They have a law criminalizing offending religious feelings.
Happens in the first world too! 2018: "In Europe, Speech Is an Alienable Right: [the European Court of Human Rights] upheld an Austrian woman’s conviction for disparaging the Prophet Muhammad."
I know it does. It’s a matter of degree. How bad does the threat to free expression have to be before a society is not a functional democracy? It’s a judgement call.
Although I know what you meant by 1st world (e.g. Western Europe / N. America), I found it funny because technically Austria isn’t in the first world and never has been. Since it never aligned itself with the US, Austria was considered a 3rd world country just like Ireland, Finland, Sweden, Hungry and Mexico.
India ranks 142nd on the World Press Freedom Index for 2021 [1] out of 180 countries tracked by Reporters sans frontières (RSF), a very embarrassing ranking for the world's most populous or largest democracy.
I remember stories of people beaten up for not standing for the anthem in the cinema, one of them was disabled wheelchair user. So I guess it is like that for a while especially after the Hindutvas got into power.
Indira wasn't a saint but Modi is evil personified.
Emergency was invoked and was soon revoked. If you are careful, you can see India is now again under Emergency since 2015. And things are getting worse. The difference between 1975 and 2015 is that earlier it was declared openly but in present case it wasn't declared, rather it was systemically implemented by developing a hate mongering Hindutva brigade. Press freedom was gone for may be one year during 1975. But now? It is gone for good 5 years. In 1975, no particular community was targeted. Now? Every muslim is at risk. Heck, even Hindus who are anti-Modi are at risks. During 1975, journalists were able to protest against Indira Gandhi. And now? You'd be put in jail for whatever reason. No journlist can dare to oppose Modi.
India is in worse condition now than it was in 1975.
RSS is the ideological parent of currently ruling political party (BJP). The second head and most powerful figure in RSS history was Golwalkar and he openly praised Hitler for 'fighting for his culture'.
If we start to get a lot of comments here, pay attention. You'll likely see confirmation of recent trends in India. I suspect we're already seeing that, even with the few comments that have been posted so far.
Majority of Indians IT professionals or majority who has attended college in India are upper caste folks, the main supporters of current ruling party. So the trend is not surprising.
Many of them migrated to West and continue to do the same caste things even in silicon valley. Google the Cisco caste discrimination incident.
I doubt it. On an average around 70% of seats are reserved (affirmative action) for lower caste students. The difference of admission cutoffs is like day and night. I wouldn't be surprise that people from upper caste don't feel particularly well, for being lawfully, indefinite discrimination.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservation_in_India
The Wikipedia link is correct, but you are only seeing one side.
Getting into engineering schools requires coaching, which majority can't afford. Second, surviving there requires additional skills that state board educated Dalits and lower castes don't have.
You can Google for the number of Dalits and lower castes really getting admitted or finishing the course.
It's only less pronounced for American IT professionals defending the US reputation as y'all have more of a contrarían streak. I think if anything Americans online are more prone to criticize their own country than other places specifically because we have decent freedom of speech.
... for now. The right wing SCOTUS is likely to begin upholding racist, sexist, and political decisions as okay in republicans states, they (the 5 far right members) have made no qualms about putting out feelers for such cases in the past, we are just beginning to see how bad it's going to get with challenges to Roe v. Wade (soon to be completely upended), voters rights, and various other cases in the pipeline
Freedom & freedom of speech aren't equivalent ideas, and most of us Indians do not correctly identify the subtle difference. Hence speech and opinions come under vicious attack instead of productive participation.
India sees journalism taking camps (since the era of Mrs. Indira Gandhi' premiership). There are national newspapers & media channels who very overtly align with the political parties. Speaking your mind out comes with its own consequences.
Sure even the freest of speech is not free of consequences, but this seems to be a case of the state punishing a specific person for his speech. Partisan media is one thing but this seems to be something entirely different
Let me tell you my anecdotal experience. Modi came in power in 2014 and till than I was BJP (Modi's party) supporter.
Then I began to see how dangerous Modi is to society as a whole. In short, he is modern, complex sophisticated version of Nazi ideology. He carefully raised an army of hindu rightwing members who are bigots, intolerant and full of hate. He doesn't belive in democracy, freedom of speech, human rights, tolerance, diversity, press freedom and stuffs like that. Anyway...
Earlier I (and every other Modi opponent I know) would openly criticize him on various SM platofrms or whatsapp groups. Now we just stay silent. We now dont even talk anything against him even in familiar circles. Why? Because we are afraid. You may get beaten. You may be arrested. You may be shunned.
I live in an apartment in Delhi and there is a whatsapp group for that apartment where we share and discuss apartment related issues. Some Modi supporters often post highly inflammble propagandist anti muslims post on regular basis. One guy politely objected to it. He was immediatly declared anti-hindu and anti India. He was removed from the group. He was 'politely' told that he should be careful in future. The friendly neighbors have turned foes.
Even I was cornered and declared anti-national many times (luckily by people who were otherwise friendly to me.) This is happening all around in India. If you aren't Modi supporter, just keep your mouth shut.
And PM of India also does a regular monologue which is broadcasted across all govt news channels, radio stations, translated to multiple languages, sent through mobile app of govt/pm. They even spam you on your emails if you ever used your email to deal with govt services.
And yet he is so coward that he always avoid interviews, except for may be 2-3 interviews (read PR stunts) which were conducted by sycophants like Rajat Sharma who has dedicated his life to Modi.
Other than that, he never faced any open interview in his 8 years tenure as a PM of biggest democracy.
No, it hasn't been a backslide, it has been always like this.
While media in the west will pick certain stories, you can find such events all across the political spectrum.
A much lauded and young people supported newcomer party used the police against the members of the party in power at the national level as soon as they came to power in a state and got hold of the police there.
It is sad but when courts won't act in time, this abuse of law will keep happening.
Absolute freedom of speech is a US Bill of Rights thing, and we backslide when it comes to political or sexual speech, e.g. with political Islam in the 21st century; Communism/Socialism/Anarchism in the early 20th century; and constantly when it comes to anything sexual, especially information about birth control, anything gay, anything involving miscegenation, or anything else that embarrasses a judge or gives him an erection.
The difference between the US and other places is that these things are usually reverted after a few decades by appeal to a clearly written first amendment. The most dangerous assault on US freedom of speech has been copyright, which has become an pretense to monitor all communications since sending information about birth control or sending porn through the mail ceased to be a public priority.
Vaguely defined "hate speech" is creeping up on becoming a reason for government censorship through the backdoor of "hate crime." "Hate crimes" are proved by proving a regular old crime was committed, then poring through the history of the person who committed the crime looking for "hate speech." "Hate speech" could certainly eventually expand to be indistinguishable from lèse majesté. A certain type of mind can see criticism of the President as a "hate crime."
The current Modi government is held to a much higher standard than the previous congress dynasty.
Freedom of speech is much worse in non BJP states like Tamil Nadu.
There is a huge cabal of bureaucracy, media, academia, judiciary and foreign institutions that profited handsomely under the corruption ecosystem built by the congress.
They are infuriated by the people's choice of a more honest and a non-dynast like Modi.
Until 2014, BJP was the only democratic party in India which wasn't run by a authoritarian person. Current BJP is now the most authoritarian party where Modi-Shah call the shots. Can you name even a single person who is critical of Modi and still is in BJP? Who opposed ANY decision of Modi government?
If you think Gandhi dynasty was corrupt then why Modi wasn't able to put them in jail? Why didn't he press any charges against them? Again, if you believe Gandhis were corrupt then you should also believe Modi got innocents murdered. He committed genocide and there is no bigger crime than genocide.
I opposed Congress when it was in power without any fear. Initially I opposed Modi too but not anymore. Why? Because I'm scared for my life. That is the difference between Congress and BJP.
Question is, if Modi is culprit, why he is not in jail. Congress was in power for atleast 5 years or so, post Godhara. That's how the country is. There is no rule of law and for sure there was never rule of law for politicians). If you have lived in India, you would know there is no difference in Modi or Congress or anyone else. Politicians are gangsters. Modi has done what congress did early. Congress consolidated Muslim votes at the expense of Hindu sentiments, and Modi has done exactly opposite. He has consolidated Hindu votes at the expanse of Muslim sentiments. They are all same.
I wonder how was it possible (I mean where the courage stems from) that supposedly minority group can burn alive hundreds of pilgrims without thinking of consequences. How did kashmiri muslims assumed that there'll be no repercussions of kicking out Hindus from Jammu (oh they didn't leave due to minor inconvenience). The resentment wasn't build in a day(I believe Congress was ruling India in 1990). What did congress government do? Nothing. So to conclude, congress and BJP are equivalent.
Fundamentally they are same but their depth of crimes aren't same. Congress did appease minorities but it never was like 'let us kill all muslims'. Fundamentally and ideologically, congress is neither anti hindu or anti muslim. However BJP/RSS has always been ideologically against muslims. It is in their blood. It is the party of religious bigots. If you read the history of RSS, you'll find RSS was established not to fight british but to fight muslims.
There has always been riots in India. But 2 incidents - 1984 sikh massacre and 2002 gujarat genocide stand out. Why? Because these two were STATE SPONSORED. That is big point here. However, unlike BJP, Congress wasn't arch-enemy of Sikhs. After 1984, congress didn't do anything to hurt sikhs. They even kind of apologized for that. But BJP? It has always been anti-muslims (although Vajpayee wasn't pro violence) and under Modi regime, covert genocide of muslims is going on strongly.
As for Godhra, it wasn't merely against Hindus. It was against the right-wing hindu extremists who demolished Babri masjids. Subtle but important difference. Being Hindu is one thing. Being anti-muslim Hindu extremist is another.
And what happened to culprits of Godhra incident? They all are in jails. What happened to 2002 culprits? They are running the country and they have upped the game of muslim genocide. And that is why we are even having discussion here.
The extent of crimes of BJP and congress aren't same. They both are ugly but BJP is evil personified.
I am Hindu and all my family members and friends are staunch BJP supporters. And yet as Modi opponent, I feel scared. A hindu is scared of criticising Modi. That has never been the case during Congress. Even in 1975, people were able to oppose Indira Gandhi but that is unimaginable now.
And I am saying this as someone who has been hardcore member of RSS for all my life. I am now 44 yr old and I started to drift away from RSS/BJP since Modi came into scene.
Appeasement is bad policy either you appease to Hindus extremist or Muslim extremists. Please don't undersell the BS of Hindu or regional extremism in India. In Mumbai, political powers hate and beatup north Indians. So please don't project the picture, that the glimpses of akhand bharatvarsh are pretty.
Who the fuck are you (or BJP/RSS goons) to decide who is Hindu and who is not? While we are at it, I call people like you nazi. You are what people call right wing Hindu extremists. You are 'useful idiot' for murderer Modi. Your idols are openly saying that every Hindu should rape muslim women. And yet you have the gumption of calling me anti-Hindu. What a sick people you are.
Those RSS thugs didn't even participate in India freedom struggle. So why are they even concerned with partition or freedom?
If I am not a Hindu and hence should move to Pakistan, then you idiots are shedding tears for Pakistani Hindus?
You actually proved me right when I asserted in other comments that anybody who is anti-Modi is declared anti hindu/anti India and is unsafe in India.
Please do not post flamewar comments, especially not nationalistic or religious flamewar comments, regardless of how badly another account is behaving. This only makes everything worse. We need you (and everyone here) to follow the site guidelines even when other commenters are breaking them.
Modi is an oppressive ruler who was originally jailed for beating a cow farmer in broad daylight. I'm glad The Guardian is finally paying attention to oppression outside of the Western sphere.
The genocide of Indian Muslims has begun. The economic cornering process has begun already and there are large scale riots incited by armed extremists who go for processions in Muslim communities and play loud music which have abusive lyrics towards Muslims. They are dancing with weapons in their hands.
This is extremely common now and is a daily occurrence. There will be lots of deaths and even larger scale violence on Muslims in the coming years. It has to be stopped. The ones who are supporting this violence has to be held accountable.
While I understand the emotion but anyone who believes that 200 million Muslims in a country are a target for genocide, is being unfair. Situation isn’t as straightforward.
You're the first person to bring the US culture war into this conversation. Every other time the US has come up, it's either to note the exceptionally strong legal protections we have or to bring up the relatively limited legal restrictions we do have (EDIT: all in the context of this story about India).
Actually, it was the American left (Tipper Gore and friends) who led the censorship movement of the 80s and early 90s. I am in my late 40s and I was quite liberal in my youth and I don't remember any censorship from the right.
In the 1960s/1970s the left had complete free speech on campuses. It was perfectly acceptable to be a Maoist. Real leftists like Chomsky have never been de-platformed.
I'm curious to know what the right effectively suppressed in 1980-2010, which is the time frame you mention. Those were pretty free decades.
I do not recall censorship. Also, the current "left" is not really left outside of cultural wedge issues. They are elitists and academics with useless degrees protecting their income streams and they despise the actual working class.
In the 1960/70s (when my parents were in college), it was perfectly acceptable to throw a milkshake at a fellow black student with literally no consequence. It was necessary for black male students to walk with black female students because of harassment. I know this because it was literally what my parents had to deal with.
So "complete" free speech is a resoundingly absurd idea, in no way were they protected and able to speak freely. As I mentioned above, the suppression (true, I wouldn't say censorship) resulted in a sort of de-facto very unfree speech.
There is governmental censorship and private censorship. People complaining about censorship in the US are complaining about private censorship. I also don't think anybody in the US is saying that the censorship we have here is worse than censorship experience experienced by others. Censorship in India doesn't really impact the average person in the US but the private censorship in the US does.
Bad stuff happening to people thousands of miles away doesn't seem to impact the average person in the US. I don't see any impact to the average person in the US based on that comment.
Guardian is not 'The west'.
It's a News organization. It is neither a representative or an official mouthpiece for 'The west'.
Guardian is not finger pointing as well, It's doing it's job, which is reporting the events.
And the criticism is absolutely valid.
This deflection and tangential remarks are not suitable for Hacker News.
When the west starts point fingers at India for - free speech, human rights, co2 emissions or for that matter oil imports from Russia.
There is still a colonial mindset at the institutional level where they believe they can just pass arbitrary unfounded judgments and the world has no choice but to accept it.
The Guardian points fingers at the West on the issues of free speech, human rights, CO2 emissions and oil imports from Russia (and pretty much every other oil exporting nation) on a daily basis. The idea that it reserves its criticism for places like India is comically ignorant of the Guardian's editorial stance...
(And the prevailing institutional bias at the highest level of government is the other way: it's "we'd probably make more of a fuss about these incidents and allegations if Modi didn't seem such a pro-business, pro-West kinda guy". The UK government's latest obsession is a trade deal with India, after all)
Your own arbitrary unfounded judgements of other countries are all over this thread. Sorry, your culture isn't the only one that gets to have an opinion on others.
Or the more logical explanation is that you're maybe a bit oversensitive to criticism just like the Indian government which proves the point made by The Guardian in exposing these abuses and holding people in power accountable for their policies.
Oh my. Chinese source citing a “Russian Security Council Deputy Secretary” who “told Russian media” a thing. Incompetent trolls might press your claim better.
> The Global Times (simplified Chinese: 环球时报; traditional Chinese: 環球時報; pinyin: Huánqiú Shíbào) is a daily tabloid newspaper under the auspices of the Chinese Communist Party's flagship newspaper, the People's Daily, commenting on international issues from a nationalistic perspective.[1][2][3][4] The publication has been labelled as "China's Fox News" by some scholars and writers for its propagandistic slant and the monetization of nationalism.
When the Wikipedia entry for your source starts with that, you might want to check the credibility of it before treating it as gospel.
UK is half way to Sharia?!
It's not true, but even it is, why has that got to do with the criticism?
There are continuous calls in India for genocide of Muslims, publicly.
Past two weeks, religious processions have been undertaken by Hindu extremist orgs in front of mosques with swords and Guns, mocking Muslims.
And PM of the Nation has been silent, with no calls whatsoever for peace.
It's not 'funny' to criticize PM of Nation to do his duty to people of the nation.
And it's not funny that Guardian is reporting it.
People living in India know how terrifying the situation has become due to these repeated calls for Violence against Muslims
If you have not noticed there was rioting in Sweden, attacks on Easter parade in Spain, and multiple counts of riots and attacks on Hindu processions in India.
Perhaps it is a correlation between hunger and anger, or perhaps the more regular congregation is convenient opportunity for riots.
So riots in Sweden and Spain makes Sharia halfway in UK?!
More Hindus kill Hindus in India. Relative to people belonging to other religions, More Hindus attack other Hindus in India. Where is your outrage against those Hindus here?
And stick to the topic at hand rather than inflammatory tangential remarks. This is not the place for that
The same is true of Muslim extremists. In general there has been an uptick in India with regards to religious extremists. Please don't try to make it sound as if only one group is making these things happen.
But one side has the support of the government. That same government is passing laws against Muslims. Maybe that’s the reason why they are getting riled up?
Didn't expect to see whataboutism and Islamophobia on this site but I guess I should have low expectations from those supporting Modi and his fascist regime.
The current PM called muslim women 'letter boxes'. You've clearly never been to the UK. I'm sure if you had a basic familiarity, you'd rest comfortably in the knowledge that the state there is just as disgustingly bigoted as you are.
> On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
> Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic.
This story is surely closer to politics than to intellectual curiosity?
[parent]
> Making such a remark is equivalent of calling someone here a nazi etc. Hardly newsworthy
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[answer]
> Indeed and better reasoning explained here over guardian [...]
Are you trying to answer from alternate account @amreeksohata, to hustle traffic? Making a comment & replying it as an legitimate answer looks bit confusing & suspicious otherwise.
Where is “here”? In the US, for example, defamation is a tort, not a criminal offense. And calling the president or any other public figure a “Nazi” would be totally safe.
Every newspaper is narrowly selective about what it writes about. Clearly the Guardian has chosen to write about free speech issues within the UK, regularly, putting the lie to what zozbot234 implied.
In the UK, yes. But my point was, recent incidents of suppression of free speech through law enforcement agencies by other parties in India haven't made it to Guardian coverage like this has. So they are selective about what they choose to write.
Guardian is as infallible as any other media organisation run by humans who have their own biases.
This actually has less details than the Guardian article. It just recites the government's argument. It doesn't seem that he incited violence but rather accused Modi of doing so.
The tweet baselessly accused Modi of worshiping the terrorist who killed Mohandas Gandhi. That would be highly offensive to many Indians, and easily construed as "fighting words" and inciting violence.
We know this especially well because earlier fringe attempts to "rehabilitate" the perp have caused widespread offense in India; also as far as can be ascertained, Modi has not given any support whatsoever to these extremist fringe efforts. So any such claim is complete misinformation as well as trying to stoke offense.
Without knowing much of how Indian law is spelled out, this would be very clearly permitted language in every other liberal democracy. The narrow exceptions for "fighting words" need to be very explicit physical threats. Insults, even lies, are well within the realm of protected speech. Protection against causing offense is exactly what free speech rules are written for. Americans say absolutely awful things about our presidents whether or not they're true and none have ever been punished for expressing an opinion no matter how odious.
Modi and the BJP may not literally worship an assassin, but they absolutely do support violent confrontation against Muslims. The kind of thing that is not only offensive and "fighting words" but a very real existential threat against a minority of Indian citizens. Yet they don't receive punishment because they have the protection of the government. It makes it seem very obvious that this prosecution is just government oppression.
In every liberal democracy. India is not one of those. They have elections, but those are necessary, not sufficient conditions for a meaningful state of democracy to exist.
Sure, it's been mired in the "flawed democracy" category for a long time. I'm explicitly not commenting on the actual legal justification of this action because I don't know anything about how their law is written. I think the point of this article is very much to grade India on an absolute international scale of behavior. They fancy themselves as the "world's largest democracy" and things like this put a huge asterisk on their use of that kind of title. Permitting dissent would be a big signal that they're still committed to being a part of the liberal order, but they went the other direction. Same with their tepid reaction to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
The Organization Modi belongs to:RSS and the political party he leads:BJP, both of them have pictures of Godse on their office walls. They garland his pictures, they celebrate the day Gandhi was assassinated and they believe Godse did the right thing by shooting Gandhi.
There was nothing baseless about the tweet.
Either u are intentionally trying to mislead the audience here, or you do not know enough about RSS/BJP's politics and Ideology. In the latter case, perhaps do not accuse others of 'baseless accusations'
Adding to your point, people have been arrested for similarly offensive tweets in the U.K. too. Yet I have not seen much concern for free speech rights in the Grauniad. Why is India being singled out here? It looks like old colonial attitudes resurfacing again, where exotic colonial dependents are always stereotyped as "backward".
I am bring lazy but I can cite at least 200 cases (from recent past) where Modi regime (mis)used government agencies to harass its critics/opponents/muslims and timing of each misuse was impeccable. As a case study, just see the use of ED in last 12 months alone. There is a remarkable pattern. Some person/org become critical of Modi and in next few days, he is arrested/detained/raided.
Of course Modi regime maintained that agencies were working independently and without any political motives. And naive people like you agree.
> there is not even a single bit of tech relevance in this story
This story first came to my attention through a fellow LP in a VC fund currently deploying in India. If this is part of a broader pattern, it's relevant to anyone with or considering exposure to India, personally, financially or professionally.
With what we have seen in China, I hardly think it matters whatever happens in India with relation to freedoms as long as the economy booms. Investors will pour money for returns.
But I had a question about this. Do VCs looking for data and analysis of a country largely rely on foreign press or read an assortment of local media as well?
> People speaking opposing viewpoints are silenced in China as well, no?
One, different systems. Two, when Xi took out senior members of his opposition, it absolutely prompted concern abroad. There was no ensuing rioting or breakdown in the rule of law, so calm minds prevailed. This is a rando lawmaker being taken out for tweeting, not a rival power centre; it looks petty and stupid.
Frankly, the whataboutism in response to this article, on this thread, make it sound more like Russia or Turkey than China or the U.K. If the people aren’t in touch with reality, the government will be stupid.
Another commenter already said this below, and someone else already replied with this guideline:
> On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
Boris Johnson arrived in India. Rabble-rousers know that the world's media attention will follow; and they use this opportunity to garner some of the spotlight. It's just a shameless ploy to get their names out.
Such is democracy, I guess.
And the Guardian doesn't help by adding flame bait such as this:
"In the capital, Delhi, bulldozers have demolished the homes of Muslims accused of rioting."
Illegal construction, encroachment on public land will sometimes get this response. Of course, due to vote bank politics, this may not always happen; but it does.
> Illegal construction, encroachment on public land will sometimes get this response.
Illegal construction is rampant in india. Please contextualize the act of bulldozing with the riots that happened. Let's not be blind to the clear use of power and authority to specifically root out people of a certain cast.
The level of politics being played out in India is nearing to the intellect of a badly scripted bollywood movie and people are turning the other way or even worse making excuses for it.
And bulldozing happens in non Muslim areas as well. Sometimes even middle class homes illegally built.
Just as cities in the US clear homeless encampments.
"who destroyed government or private property during a protest, strike or riot, and that if necessary, the property of the accused would be seized and auctioned to recover the money" — Narottam Mishra, Home Minister
If you’re a Muslim living in an illegally-built home and you were _accused_ of being involved in riots, they will bulldoze your life.
The extremists argue that this is well-deserved. Even if you agree with that, why should an entire family living under a shared home suffer for the actions of one person? They’re not just forcing “rioters” to be homeless, they are ruining the lives of uninvolved people. Where will all of the displaced kids go? What would you tell them when they riot because of what was done to them?
Rioters and protesters come from oppressed and impoverished communities. Nobody speaks for them. The media speaks for the rich and powerful politicians. It’s weird how the actual victims are portrayed as the wrongdoers here.
Sure, again, context matters. A lot of Delhi, and probably a lot more of Mumbai is just illegal construction, if you were to apply the law squarely, a large part of the cities would be rubble.
You're (perhaps rather knowingly) ignoring the nuance here.
Agreed but this is not unique to the current federal government at all. Whoever is in power at the state or national level has used this power for their benefit.
Case in point, office of a prominent Indian actor was broken by a state government which is the political rival of the government at national level, even after a high court order preventing them from doing so.
I seriously don't want to engage with whataboutry, but I'm going to reply to you with the tiniest hope that you might be willing to listen to reason.
So first, i agree with you that power structures have always taken advantage of their position to shutdown their opposition.
The reason that this has become significant enough in India for someone to take note and take action, is because of the blatant and frequent application of authority in this manner and that too targeted towards a specific community. The scale is enormous and is not showing any signs of decreasing.
If you really want to discuss with civility, don't start with an accusation. I agreed with the commenter that there is definitely political motive to these demolitions and it is definitely not right to not follow procedure even if these are illegal. My point is against this belief that this is something recent. It has been always like this, no matter who is in power. It might have increased or decreased; that I don't know without stats. I am old enough to have seen media being used to create narratives like WMD in Iraq to know not to go forward with the narrative pushing in media.
> The reason that this has become significant enough
> The scale is enormous and is not showing any signs of decreasing.
There is also a narrative in media that these communal incidents have increased recently. When I looked at data on this the last time in 2020, the crime record data pointed to much higher rates of communal violence in 80s and 90s than 2010s, so I will not be sure if it has increased or is it just fanned more in media.
I am also aware it can very well be that cases are being registered less that's why the stats seem lower.
> that too targeted towards a specific community
This is something I am concerned about though. There seems to be definitely increase in overt bigotry.
> Why would you compare violence from 1980's to 2020? You realise thats a gap of 40 years?
I said 90s too which is a gap of 20 years. I skipped 00s because I don't recall the data completely now, but I will check.
> In terms of trends in the 20th century, there's been a clear noticeable jump after the current government came in, which is what should matter.
00s had clearly more terror incidents in India than 10s. There were several major metros and big cities hit with blasts every year. So, one form of communal violence has definitely gone down. Even early half of 10s had much more of these than the latter half. There is a whole Wiki article that lists these incidents, you can have a look at that.
This is a very ingenuous take, trying to shield the wrong doings by Current Gov.
First, Illegal encroachments were not bulldozed. People had valid documents proving the legitimacy of their houses.
Also, the Supreme Court ordered for the demolitions to stop, but the houses and shops of people were still razed to ground.
The Rabble rousers were people who were undertaking religious processions with swords and guns raised in front of mosques, mocking and troubling Muslims. They even hoisted saffron flags over the mosques.
Rabble rousers are those who are continuously giving calls for genocide of Muslims in Dharm sansads, publicly.
And PM of India has stayed mum all through out.
What Guardian said is absolutely right. It's not flame-bait.
Such is Democracy, I guess.
Further, the term "arrest" would be factually incorrect. India has a concept of detention — police can legally detain any individual on suspicion (even without a warrant/crime) upto a period of 24 hours — post which the detainee is presented to a magistrate where the detention can be legally challenged.
> a court in Kokrajhar denied him bail, ordering him to be held in custody for three days
Instead of an actual arrest this seems to be an extended detention (approved a court).
> arrest coincided with the arrival of the British prime minister
> He was taken across the country to Assam in India’s north-east
Considering these statements, instead of being arrested for his tweet, the context makes it seem more like the police felt he could be a threat given the arrival of Johnson, and they decided to preemptively detain him in a far corner of the country.
Regardless of whether I'm correct or not, it won't be the first time this has happened.
((Please ignore the typos/formatting, I typed this on a phone))
Edit: Just saw the article also mentions
> In the capital, Delhi, bulldozers have demolished the homes of Muslims accused of rioting
While this is true, it also needs to be mentioned that Delhi is not under BJP government (the ruling party).