A Delhi court recently said that criminal defamation laws hurt free speech. Now, the Supreme Court should take another look at these laws.
Politics in India is one of the most intense in the world. But strangely, politicians often act like they can’t handle criticism. They regularly file criminal defamation cases when someone says something they don’t like. A Delhi court recently dismissed one such case filed by BJP leader Rajeev Chandrasekhar against Congress leader Shashi Tharoor. The court pointed out that if every speech is treated as defamation, then the right to free speech would mean nothing.
To be clear, this isn’t about saying it’s okay to ruin someone’s reputation. But there should be a fair way to handle such complaints. Instead of criminal charges, there should be civil penalties, like fines.
The problem is that courts don’t always follow the same logic. In 2023, Rahul Gandhi was convicted by a Surat court for a comment he made four years earlier. He was sentenced to two years in jail, which led to him losing his position in Parliament. The Supreme Court later paused the ruling, allowing him to return. As a top politician, Rahul Gandhi could fight back. But ordinary people don’t have that power.
Imagine a woman being accused of defamation just for speaking up about harassment. Or a cartoonist getting into trouble for drawing something critical of the government. Even if they aren’t found guilty, just being dragged through the legal process is punishment enough. This fear stops people from expressing their opinions freely, and it even threatens press freedom. When people are afraid to speak out, democracy itself is in danger.
India’s new criminal laws, which replaced the old British-era ones, didn’t fix this problem. The new laws still make defamation a crime and keep the same harsh rules. They define defamation in a way that is too broad—it can be anything from “hurting someone’s feelings” to “making them look bad.” This allows politicians to use these laws as weapons, even when they are victims of it themselves. But for ordinary people, these laws are just a tool for bullying and silencing them.
The Supreme Court should fix this unfair system. Free speech is too important to be left at the mercy of sensitive politicians.
Disclaimer
Views expressed above are the author’s own.
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