SHREYA SINGHAL V. UNION OF INDIA- (Case Commentary)

 

Statutes & Provisions Involved

·        The IT Act, 2000 (Section 66A, 69A, 79)

·        The Constitution of India (Article 19(1)(a) and 19(2) )

INTRODUCTION          

Two girls were arrested by the Mumbai Police in 2012 namely , Shaheen Dhada and Rinu Srinivasan, for posting a censure remark in Facebook against the bandh imposed within the wake of Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray’s death. The women were later released by the police but the apprehension of them was widely criticized across the country. it had been voiced by many activists that the police has exploited its power by invoking Section 66A of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (hereinafter mentioned as ‘IT Act’), which prescribes the punishment for sending obnoxious texts or messages through communication services and curtailed the elemental right of speech & expression enshrined under Article 19(1)(a) of the Indian Constitution. The offence mentioned under Section 66A of the IT Act comes under the purview of cognizable offences, which allows cops to arrest and investigate a case without a warrant. Hence, the results of this was that a lot of uncanny arrests of the people were made by police throughout the country for publishing any opinion or view which the government termed as ‘obnoxious content’ but it had been mostly demurring politics.

After that, within the year 2013, the Union Government recommended a provision to arrest an individual under Section 66A of the IT Act. The Central government stated in its advisory that no individual shall be apprehended by the police without prior authorization of the superior officer, who isn't below the rank of military officer of Police. Henceforth, there have been numerous petitions filed by the people across the country to strike down the unconstitutional provisions of the IT Act. The Apex Court of India clubbed those petitions into one PIL and therefore the case came to be referred to as Shreya Singhal v. Union of India.

BACKGROUND

The petitioner filed  public interest litigation under Article 32 of the Indian Constitution, seeking the Supreme Court of India to declare Section 66A, 69A and 79 of the IT Act as ultra-vires to the Constitution of India. It had been asserted within the petition that the wordings of those provisions are wide and ambiguous. The petitioner further affirmed that the target of those provisions are inclined towards its reckless exploitation and thus falls out of the purview of Article 14, 19(1)(a) and 21 of the Indian Constitution. There are terminologies like menacing, offensive, annoyance, inconvenience, obstruction, danger, and insult which aren't explained in any act.  Thus, it makes it more susceptible to unwanted abuse. Keeping aside from it, the classification made between the citizens and netizens of the country was also termed as arbitrary and contrary to the supply of free speech inscribed under Article 19(1) (a) of the Indian Constitution. It had been asserted that the excellence gives an authority to the cops to apprehend netizens for his or her remarks which may even be made by the overall citizens of the country. Thus, such classification violates the elemental right to equality penned down under Article 14 of the Indian Constitution.

The freedom to speech and expression is guaranteed by the Preamble of the Indian Constitution and is deemed to be of utmost importance in a democratic country. The elemental right of free speech and expression is additionally embedded under Article 19 of the Indian Constitution which provides liberty to each citizen of this country to carry opinions and views. This was further affirmed within the landmark case of Maneka Gandhi v. Union of India. During this case, the Apex Court of India held that there are no territorial restrictions on the freedom to precise & hold opinions and it's equally applicable in foreign territories also. Then, within the case of Romesh Thappar v. State of Madras, the Apex Court of India further interpreted the scope of Article 19 and rightly pronounced that the elemental right of speech and expression also encompasses freedom of media to precise views and opinions also. In fact, the freedom to carry opinions by the media houses is taken into account to be of supreme importance among all the liberties provided by the Indian Constitution because it's necessary for the right functioning of democratic institutions. An equivalent was pronounced within the case of Bennett Coleman vs. Union of India. However, the extent of Article 19 was still opined to have certain ambiguities in it, which hadn’t been vanished. The rising issue of endless transmission of false and malicious one-sided information by the members of the society was a major example of it. As a result, the Apex Court of India took cognizance of this escalating problem and put an end thereto within the case of Union of India v. Association for Democratic Reforms and Anr. During this case, it had been held that the prejudiced transmission of data, red herrings and non-information results in a misinformed nation which may be a threat to democracy. At last, within the case of S. Khushboo vs. Kanniamal and Anr, the fate of Article 19 was decided because the Supreme Court of India asserted that the freedom to speech and expression is conditional but it's very vital in nature as we are required in touch unpopular views and opinions of the society. Therefore, it is often ascertained that the elemental right of free speech and expression signifies a free flow of opinions and perceived as an important right to sustain a collective life. In other words, one can say that tradition of social discourse, by and enormous, is of great communal significance.

The parlance used in Section 66A of the IT Act are deemed to be very ambiguous and loose in nature. It's so vague that it's very hard to place up a charge on an accused under this section distinctly. The chief authority is additionally unable to grasp the idea for bifurcating a specific speech or expression falling under the purview of this provision. For this reason, it's tend to be argued that what could be obnoxious to at least one individual won't be to the opposite and this makes the supply constitutionally vague in its entirety. A legislation having ambiguities in its effective interpretation is said to be void under the system of India. An equivalent has been affirmed within the case of Kartar Singh v. State of Punjab. During this case, the court of law affirmed that an enactment must be proclaimed to be void for having ambiguous characteristics in its prohibitory application.  Therefore, the elemental doctrine in our jurisprudence system asserts that a law which regulates people within the society should provide a just and rational notice of their conduct being unlawful or lawful. within the case of Connally v. General Construction Co., the court of law held that an enactment which either authorizes or forbids to try a specific act or omission during a language which is so ambiguous in its nature that a private or ordinary intellect must essentially presume its interpretation and gets perplex by its application, infringes the element of due process of law. Hence, the Apex Court of India accepted the submissions of petitioner within the instant case and settled on the anomaly of the section 66A.

There are certain cases during which the court of law is unpleased with the constitutionality of a law. Section 66A of the Information Technology Act, 2000 is legislated during a language which is susceptible to be misused by the authorities, and it contains an arbitrary restriction on the right of ”freedom of speech and expression” which is in conflict with the Article 19(2) of the Indian Constitution. As stated under Article 13(1) of the Indian Constitution, any existing law inconsistent with Part III of the Constitution is merely null and void to the fraction of its discrepancy and not further.

CONCLUSION

In the historical case of Romesh Thappar v. State of Madras, the question concerning the constitutional validity of Section 9(1A) of the Madras Maintenance of Public Order Act, 1949 came before the court of law.

In the Shreya Singhal’s case, the petitioner had affirmed that those offences which are ambiguous, irrational and discriminatory in nature tend to violate the Article 14 of the Indian Constitution and leads to the prejudiced application of the law. additionally thereto, it had been asserted by the petitioner that section 66A of the IT Act doesn’t conform to the essentialities of dual test. There's no intelligible differentia present between the general public transmission of messages through live speech and therefore the internet. Therefore, it's arbitrary to make a replacement class of offenders on the idea of it. It had been also affirmed that Section 66A of the IT Act sanctions people with maximum 3 years of imprisonment, which is contrary to the offence of defamation having 2 years of maximum sentence prescribed in it. Along side this, the offence of defamation falls under the purview of non-cognizable offence whereas an offence under Section 66 is cognizable. The Supreme Court disagreed with the submission of the petitioner and affirmed that there's an intelligible differentia present between the general public transmission of messages through live speech and therefore the internet. It had been stated by the court of law that the transmission of obnoxious texts through the web is cost-effective and fewer time consuming as compared to measure speech. Therefore, such messages get available to the broader public during a brief span of your time and make an opportunity of expediting public disorder. Hence, the petitioner who filed the PIL under Article 14 got failed before the Apex Court of law.

-Anadi Chitranshi

Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University.