New Delhi: CNN IBN’s Ashok Bagariya reported on Tuesday evening, around the same time as Congress Party President Sonia Gandhi concluded her march to seek President Pranab Mukherjee’s intervention against a “sinister campaign” to spread hatred under the BJP-led government that the government had filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court, that nailed Subramaniam Swamy’s book Terrorism in India: A Strategy of Deterrence for India’s National Security violates Section 153A.
The affidavit filed by the government on Tuesday was in response to Swamy’s petition challenging the constitutional validity of the Indian Penal Code Section 153A on the grounds that it violates free speech.
IPC 153 A: “Promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony. That the petitioner has written a book named Terrorism in India wherein he made hate speech against the community of India. The book—it’s theme, it’s language, it’s innuendos, the similes it employs and the moral of the story, if any—in order to ascertain whether the offending passages read in the context of the book as a whole fall within the mischief of section 153A,” reads the affidavit.
“The book is to be considered in all its aspects as it contains matter which ‘promotes feeling of enmity and hatred between Hindus and Muslims in India.’ Therefore, the petitioner has violated sections of IPC,” reads the affidavit.
Responding to the Modi government’s charge that his book on terrorism promotes communal hatred, Bharatiya Janata Party leader Subramanian Swamy said that he plans to speak with Home Minister Rajnath Singh about the affidavit filed against him in the Supreme Court, which, he described as mindless.“I shall also file a Reply Affidavit in the case in Supreme Court”, he said.
In an email to HuffPost India, Swamy said that the government affidavit displayed “a total lack of application of mind by the government and speaks poorly about the law officers of the government who have already brought disgrace to the BJP government by their failure in dealing with the Section 66A of Information Technology Act and in the NJAC fiasco.”
Earlier this month, BJP leader Subramanian Swamy launched Virat Hindustan Sangam, a new Hindu organisation, which, he had told HuffPost India, will be a “promoter of a renaissance in India and is aimed at the English speaking crowd.”
Swamy has been in politics for 40 years and served as Union Cabinet Minister. He is vibrant on Social Media, and has a huge following. His successful legal activism in the 2G spectrum case and other matters have helped cement his social media support base.
