Hate speech at Dharam Sansad: SC seeks response from Uttarakhand, Delhi for ‘deliberate inaction’

Hate speeches are sullying the atmosphere in the country and need to be stopped, the Supreme Court said on Monday while hearing a plea alleging that no action was being taken by Uttarakhand and Delhi governments against such speeches.

The bench of justices DY Chandrachud and Hima Kohli has also granted four weeks’ time to the newly appointed Attorney General of India R Venkataramani to assess the affidavits filed and suggest steps to be taken.

“I would need time to take stock of what can be done. Three affidavits in response have been filed,” said AG Venkataramani. He added that there has to be no tolerance for this.

Advocate, Shadan Farasat stated that he would serve a copy of the contempt petition to the Advocate assisting the AG. Liberty was also granted to serve the petition on the concerned state governments.

Farasat, appearing on behalf of the petitioner, submitted that the police of the concerned States have not taken any action pursuant to the judgment of the Apex Court in Tehseen S. Poonawalla v. Union of India, wherein guidelines laid down regarding preventive, punitive, and remedial measures with respect to mob lynching, reported LiveLaw.

Farasat argued that the concerned Delhi and Uttarakhand police force did not abide by the guidelines issued in Tehseen Poonawalla judgment.

“This is not just hate speech, but a call for violence and extermination of a particular community. In the Uttarakhand Dharam Sansad, nine people have made speeches at the Dharam Sansad. Only two were ever arrested. Others have not even been arrested,” he said. He added, “The Sansad was allowed to be held despite complaints to the local authorities,” argued advocate Farasat, counsel for the petitioner.

Social activist and Mahatma Gandhi’s great-grandson Tushar Gandhi had moved the contempt petitions in January this year against Uttarakhand police DGP Ashok Kumar and then Delhi Police Chief Rakesh Asthana, reported India Today and claimed that the controversial speeches made in the two religious conclaves in Delhi and Uttarakhand in December 2021 were in violation of the Apex Court orders in 2017.

The court has now asked the governments of the two states to also submit an affidavit on the steps taken regarding the hate speeches. The petition has alleged that “the omission to register an FIR for grave offences on the part of the state instrumentalities is not attributable to sheer oversight/inadvertence, which can be rectified later, rather is a part of a design to let the offenders go off the hook.” – INDIA NEWS STREAM