Editors Guild of India & Right to Free Speech UPSC NOTE

 Editors Guild of India & Right to Free Speech

• Chief Justice of India (CJI) said the Editors Guild of India (EGI) may be right or wrong in its report about “partisan media coverage” of the Manipur violence, but it has a right to free speech to put forth its views in print.

• The complaints, which led to the registration of FIRs against senior journalists, the members and president of the EGI, did not contain even a “whisper of the offences alleged against them”, the Chief Justice said.

Section 153A of the IPC

Section 153A of the Indian Penal Code

• Section 153A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) penalises “promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony”. 

• This is punishable with imprisonment up to three years, with a fine, or both.

Safeguards against misuse:

• Sections 153A and 153B require prior sanction from the government for initiating prosecution. 

• But this is required before the trial begins, and not at the stage of preliminary investigation.

Supreme Court’s guidelines:

• No automatic arrest for sentence of fewer than seven years:

• To curb indiscriminate arrests, the Supreme Court laid down a set of guidelines in its 2014 ruling in Arnesh Kumar v State of Bihar. 

• As per the guidelines, for offences that carry a sentence of fewer than seven years, the police cannot automatically arrest an accused before investigation.

• In a 2021 ruling, the SC said that the state will have to prove intent for securing a conviction under Section 153A.

Section 200 IPC

Section 200 IPC

• Using as true such declaration knowing it to be false. 

• Whoever corruptly uses or attempts to use as true any such decla­ration, knowing the same to be false in any material point, shall be punished in the same manner as if he gave false evidence.

• In simple words, Section 200 of the Indian Penal Code states that if someone knowingly uses a false declaration as true, with corrupt intentions, they will be punished as if they had given false evidence.