'Police Sensitisation Required': Supreme Court Calls For Enduring Solution To Hate Speeches

The Supreme Court on Friday issued a call to action to stakeholders to find an enduring solution to the problem of hate speech. Highlighting that the difficulty lay in implementing and executing the law on hate speech, Justice Sanjiv Khanna suggested appropriately sensitising the police forces to ensure that victims of hate speech could access meaningful remedies without having to come to the court. He said:"Why don't you all sit down together and find a solution? One difficulty is...The definition of 'hate speech' is fairly complex...and how to understand 'hate speech' within the parameters of free speech. We have enough definitions in several judgments. That's one issue. But the main problem is not the definition, but the implementation and execution aspects. You will have to think about that. The police forces needed to be sensitised in order for these matters to be resolved." These observations were made today during a hearing of a plea against the rallies and protest marches organised by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Bajrang Dal in various parts across the Delhi national capital region (NCR) in the wake of the communal violence in Haryana’s Nuh and Gurugram. Although the division bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and SVN Bhatti adjourned the hearing, there was a brief exchange in the courtroom, during which the court urged the parties to adopt a constructive approach and find out a solution. However, after clarifying that he was not in any way condoning instances of hate speech by any community or person, Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta argued that the petitioners prematurely approached the top court without pursuing remedies available under the law. He said:"The law has been clarified in Tehseen Poonawalla. No one can justify hate speech by Community A or Community B. I am also not doing that. If there is any violation of law, the remedy would be to file an FIR. If an FIR is not registered, you have to approach a competent court. Now, the practice that has developed is...two practices actually. They come to the Supreme Court in contempt petitions, seeking directions from the Supreme Court. Now, a step ahead...before any organisation or any person organises a function, they are coming to this court seeking an advanced ruling so as to ensure no offence is committed.""There's a little problem," Justice Khanna interjected, "The law on hate speech is complex. As far as execution or implementation is concerned...everyone cannot be coming to the court."SG Mehta chimed in, "They are!"Justice Khanna, in response, emphasised the lack of sensitisation among the police forces. "The police forces needed to be sensitised in order for these matters to be resolved. On that, we would require your assistance. Secondly, it is not in anyone's interest that there exist such social tensions."The law officer agreed, "It is not in the interest of the country, not just communities." But, he continued, the difficulty is that petitioners approaching the Supreme Court were 'selective' to subserve ulterior motives. "This petitioner, staying in Delhi, hailing from Kerala, files petitions only for Maharashtra...Only for one community.""We are not going into that," Justice Khanna said."This is not adversarial litigation. The thing is, it is not just hate speech. These are almost calls for genocide," Senior Advocate CU Singh, appearing for the petitioner, interjected at this point."What I will do is, I have some similar speeches. I will share the videos with my learned friend. Let him amend the petition." the solicitor-general countered, before adding:"There are some lawyers who give me clips. The speeches in these clips demolish the very vital fabric of our country which is secularism. I will ask these lawyers to share the videos with Mr.(Nizam) Pasha(petitioner's lawyer) so that he can place them before this court. Selected people come to this court, with selected prayers."Advocate Nizam Pasha replied:"The reason why we have to approach the court again and again is because when the police refuses to register first information reports, there is a procedure in law. But when the same people meanwhile are making hate speeches again and again. And you see the consequences. Speeches asking one community to leave a state or an area...""Exactly, I will share such videos with Mr Pasha," the solicitor-general shot back, "I want to see your bona fide. I am making this clear.""One thing is to look at the past. One thing is to look at the future," Justice Khanna said, urging all parties to adopt a constructive approach, but Solicitor-General Mehta protested, saying, "Past events are necessary to decide the future. I will take this court through these events.""We will have to find a solution to this," Justice Khanna firmly said. He explained that there needed to be a solution that would allow victims of hate speech to access justice without having to come to the court:"There has to be some way in which we deal with this problem....

'Police Sensitisation Required': Supreme Court Calls For Enduring Solution To Hate Speeches

Awstika Das

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