I N F O C H A N G E agendISSUE 22 201a1 The limits of freedom Freedom of expression is increasingly under assault — on grounds of sedition, obscenity, immorality or offending public sentiment. Should this freedom be constrained? If so, when and how? FOR PRIVATE CIRCULATION RECENT BACK ISSUES agenda agenda Enclosure of the Ethics of new medical Agricultural revival Coastal communities commons technologies © Infochange News & Features, Centre for Communication and Development Studies, 2011 Infochange Agenda is a quarterly journal published by the Centre for Communication and Development Studies, a social change resource centre focusing on the research and communication of information for change To order copies, write to: Centre for Communication and Development Studies 301, Kanchanjunga Building, Kanchan Lane, Off Law College Road, Pune 411 004 Suggested contribution: Rs 90 (1 issue); Rs 300 (4 issues); Rs 550 (8 issues) DDs/cheques to be made out to 'Centre for Communication and Development Studies' Infochange Agenda content may be cited, reproduced and reprinted for purposes of education and public dissemination with due credit to the authors, the journal and the publishers The views expressed in these articles are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily represent the standpoint of Infochange Agenda Contents Speaking freely by Dilip Simeon 2 A million tyrannies now by Maseeh Rahman 4 Sedition and the death of free speech by Siddharth Narrain 8 Freedom in security by Ajai Sahni 12 Reasonable restrictions and unreasonable speech by Lawrence Liang 15 The secret life of film censorship by Shohini Ghosh 19 When is ‘news’ better off not reported? by Jyoti Punwani 22 Cultural memory and the politics of intolerance by Mangesh Kulkarni 26 Dissent vs incitement? by Gita Sahgal 29 Freedom gagged: Public expression in Kashmir by Sualeh Keen 33 Out, dark spots: History and the state in Russia by Arup Banerji 38 Repression and resurgence in Tibet by Tenzing Sonam 41 Assaults on freedom of expression in Sri Lanka by Rohini Hensman 45 ‘Dissent is the quintessence of democracy’: High Court judgment 48 The war dogma by Javed Iqbal 54 Virtual democracy? by Ketan Tanna 57 On artistic freedom by Purushottam Agrawal 59 This issue has been guest-edited by Dilip Simeon Editors: Hutokshi Doctor, John Samuel Production and layout: Gita Vasudevan, Sameer Karmarkar Infochange team: K C Dwarkanath, Philip Varghese, Ujwala Samarth, Vijay Narvekar, Vishnu Walje 2011 ISSUE 22 1 Freedom of expression Speaking freely With citizens being charged with sedition for speaking their minds, with books and films being banned or censored, not just by the state but by chauvinist forces, with artists forced to flee the country for offending ‘public sentiment’, with historical enquiry stalled and history being rewritten, we are seeing increasing constraints on freedom of expression. When such practices become common in democratic DILIP SIMEON systems, they inaugurate the slide towards tyranny ‘With force I have subdued the brains of the proud’ — around us might re-awaken thoughts of the Inquisition. Epigraph on the grave of Cardinal Inquisitor Roberto Bellarmino (1542-1621), who presided over the The essays are substantial, and speak for themselves. The condemnation of Giordano Bruno, burnt at the stake for themes tackled by their authors have been addressed by heresy in 1600 them seriously and for a long time. They range from the debate about sedition, constraints placed upon historical THE ESSAYS CONTAINED in this issue of Infochange Agenda inquiry; the political certification of literary awards and are engagements with the question of socially accessible filmed images, to the censorship of journalists’ reports. truth. Images and spoken (or written) words are implicitly They cover experiences arising not just in India, but in social, and the matter of constraints and deliberate neighbouring countries too; and they deal with issues distortions in them is very old. In fact, a look at the world generated not only by state policy, but by mass belief as well. This is as it should be, for the political control of speech and thought is not confined within national or ideological frontiers. For instance, the state manipulation of history is not merely a Russian (or Soviet) phenomenon. It reflects the widespread attempt by governments and political ideologues to control the present via doctored accounts of the past. This is why history so often appears to be a political minefield. Here, as in related matters, the only sound option is to allow historical exploration to proceed without manipulation or intimidation, enabling truth to emerge through sustained debate and dialogue, and free access to archives. Tomaso Marcolla/www.posterfortomorrow.org Tomaso A citation from Hannah Arendt that I often use for the sheer impression it made on me, reads as follows: “Is it the essence of truth to be powerless and of power to be deceitful? And what reality does truth possess, if it is powerless in the public realm?” To my mind, this meditation lies at the heart of the question of freedom of speech and expression. Censorship and propaganda are mirror images of each other. Censorship is a passive form of propaganda and propaganda an active form of censorship (readers wishing to examine this proposition could read George Orwell’s essay on euphemism, for which a link is provided below). There are other questions, about the responsibility of the state and of citizens. Where may we draw the line between freedom of speech, hate speech and the incitement to murder? How ought the media to treat the reportage of hate-inspired acts, and the reproduction of images likely to inflame people’s feelings? How do we deal with deceit and deliberate misinformation? These questions also relate 2011 to the violent conflict that surrounds us. If truth is the first ISSUE 22 2 Introduction casualty of war, it follows that a condition of perpetual me. There is a lot more that could be said on the theme of warfare (‘hot’ or ‘cold’, involving internal or external free public expression, but I’m confident that readers will enemies) implies an all-round assault on truth. Modern find a great deal here to pursue their interests further. My warfare is characterised by ideological manipulation, on the heartfelt thanks are due to the contributors, and regards to assumption that public opinion is part of the battleground. all readers of Infochange Agenda. The media lends itself to the political realm as a means of mobilising sentiment. Ideologies tend to mix reason with faith; and their adoption by the mass media strengthens Some useful links on censorship and intellectual freedom the belief that truth is a purely relative thing, “a mobile • Index on Censorship, current edition: The Net Effect: As digital army of metaphors”. Media aside, a crass manifestation technology transforms the culture of activism and access to of commercialised venom is available for travellers to the information — from revolution in Egypt to reporting on the Wagah border, where assembled crowds from India and secret services in Russia, Index on Censorship assesses the ways Pakistan hurl patriotic slogans at each other every evening — and means of using new media to get the word out, and asks if egged on by tour operators making a fast buck (incidentally, the United States is Internet freedom’s best friend. http://www. this was not the case some 20 years ago, when I visited the indexoncensorship.org/category/current-edition/ border along with some friends. There was a friendly and convivial atmosphere then). • Pakistan’s blasphemy law is a tool for persecution and reflects the grip of religious extremism. http://www.indexoncensorship. org/2011/03/speak-no-evil-the-grip-of-religious-extremism-on- Must we resign ourselves to the belief that truth is just a pakistans-political-culture/ line of vision, one perspective among many, that everything is an interpretation? Has truth been abolished by politics? • The controversy regarding the NDA government’s alleged attempt I believe not. There are indeed many interpretations of to tamper with Mahatma Gandhi’s Collected Works. http://www. things and events, but in order to interpret anything, we gandhiserve.org/cwmg/cwmg_controversy.html must assume there is an object to interpret in the first place. To hold that all truth is class truth; or that everything • Extract from George Orwell on Politics and the English Language, worth knowing is already evident, in accordance with 1946: “In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British some established tradition; or in line with the interests rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the Nation, the Community or some such permanently of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only unquestionable entity, is to set the stage for an obliteration by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and of language. The tendency to replace meaningful which do not square with the professed aims of the political conversation by polemic and sentimental brow-beating is parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, apparent in the political domain, where cliches and holy question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenceless villages cows are regularly fielded in order to manufacture animus are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the rather than clarity. In such a situation, speech becomes countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with equivalent to silence, because no one hears anyone. We incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with cannot hope to engage with the crucial issues of our time no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or if we continue to treat the pursuit of truth with such rectification of frontiers.