Just as we had been providing up hope, there are indicators that the defence of person liberty is not a lost lead to.
The thought that India was getting ruled by foreigners who had no ‘right’ to rule India or deprive Indians of their liberty came incredibly late to India, if you think about that, in America, the Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776.
Over a hundred years later, the thought of Independence — of a sovereign Indian state — germinated in India. At the Calcutta Congress in 1906, Dadabhai Naoroji sought Swaraj, but it was for restricted self-government. In 1916, Bal Gangadhar Tilak and Annie Besant began the ‘Home Rule’ movement and demanded the status of a ‘dominion’ below the British Empire. It was only at the Lahore Congress in 1929 that the Congress Working Committee adopted the declaration on Purna Swaraj or comprehensive independence.
On attaining independence, India borrowed heavily from tips that had been in vogue in France and the United States, in certain the war cry of the French Revolution, “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity”, and the statement from the US Declaration of Independence “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”. The crucial word is Liberty.
Assault on Liberty
Never ahead of in the history of independent India have the powers of the State been mobilised so ruthlessly to suppress just about every voice of dissent or protest or defiance. During the Emergency (1975-77), the target was the political opposition. Now, the target is just about every voice of dissent — be it political, social, cultural, artistic or academic. The farmers at Singhu and Tikri are protesting against the farm laws, not against the BJP as a political party but they are targeted by the investigating agencies. There are voices of protest against crimes perpetrated on Dalits, against discrimination, against value rise, against denial of details, against polluters, against the corrupt, against police excesses, against monopolies, against cronyism, against denial of workers’ rights, against ruinous financial policies and so on. Every voice of dissent or protest is regarded as opposition to the BJP government and is sought to be suppressed.
Ms Disha Ravi was supporting the farmers’ protests, by all accounts she was not a political partisan, but she was portrayed as an enemy of the state. Before her, there was a journalist, Mr Siddique Kappan, who set out to create a story on the victim of rape and murder in Hathras he was portrayed as a conspirator to overthrow the established government. Students and ladies protesting the Citizenship (Amendment) Act had been portrayed as the tukde tukde gang attempting to break up the sovereignty and integrity of India. Ms Nodeep Kaur supported workers fighting for their rights and she was jailed on charges of rioting and try to murder. A joke that was not uttered attracted the charge of outraging religious feelings and Munawar Faruqui, a comedian, was place in jail. The assault on just about every aspect of liberty is comprehensive and manifest.
Passive Spectators
The court — specially the reduced judiciary — was a passive spectator, routinely upholding arrests and mindlessly sending individuals to police custody or judicial custody. The settled law of the nation was not followed. In State of Rajasthan vs Balchand, Justice Krishna Iyer had declared that “The basic rule may perhaps be tersely put as bail, not jail….” In Manubhai Ratilal Patel, the Supreme Court had underlined the duty of the Magistrate to
“… apply his mind whether there is a warrant for police remand or justification for judicial remand or there is no need for any remand at all”. Despite these rulings, courts merrily send individuals to jail.
The saga of below-remand and below-trial prisoners is an outrageous violation of liberty. Once in just about every month or two, the prisoner will have a date in court. Invariably, one of the following will occur: the Investigating Officer will be absent or the Prosecutor will be absent or the Prosecution Witness will not turn up or the health-related report will not be prepared or the Judge did not have time or the Judge will be on leave. The prisoner will return to jail with one more ‘date’ and fading hope. It is not a lot improved in the larger courts: thousands of bail applications are pending in the High Courts and the Supreme Court and are hardly ever disposed of in one hearing. I have identified that the key explanation is the stubborn opposition of the investigating agency (police, CBI, ED, NIA, and so forth) to just about every application for bail.
Reassuring Verdicts
An Arnab Goswami has its lessons. The Supreme Court (Justice D Y Chandrachud) reminded us that “Deprivation of liberty even for a single day is one day too many.” I am delighted that quite a few more judges are no longer tolerating the bull-headed opposition of the investigating agency and are weighing in favour of liberty. In Varavara Rao, the High Court of Bombay granted the 82-year old poet bail on health-related grounds. In Disha Ravi, Judge Rana underlined the essence of democracy: “Difference of opinion, disagreement, divergence, dissent or for that matter even disapprobation are recognized legitimate tools to infuse objectivity in state policies.”
As courts uphold liberty, I really feel as if a second struggle for independence has begun, and these languishing in jails could be capable to breathe the air of liberty.