Hate speech is any word written or spoken, signs, visible representations within the hearing or sight of a person with the intention to cause fear or alarm, or incitement to violence.” Provisions in law criminalise speeches, writings, actions, signs and representations that foment violence and spread disharmony between communities and groups.

Violation of Section 196 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) – Promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony or activities that disrupt public peace or teach people how to use violence against any group, can invoke imprisonment and a fine. For general offenses, the maximum imprisonment is three years. For offenses that occur in a place of worship or during a religious ceremony, the maximum imprisonment is five years.

Under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) –Section 153a, 153b, 153c and 505 were expected to address hate speech but were already inadequate. The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) 2023 which replaces the Indian Penal code has been criticised for making prosecution of hate speech even more difficult. The BNS ignores the 267^th Law Commission report and a slew of Supreme Court judgements asking for a nuanced effective understanding of and penal provisions against hate speech.

At times there is a confusion between free speech and hate speech. Free speech is extremely important and needs to be protected in societies that value human rights. The Camden Principles on freedom of expression and equality explore the fine balance between these two. Limitations on free speech can also be used by those in power to suppress the voices of minorities. Draconian laws such as the UAPA have been slapped on several vocal critics of the government. This is sheer abuse of power.

Offensive speech that poses a risk or threat to others has to be taken seriously if it incites discrimination, hostility or violence towards a person or group defined by their race, religion, ethnicity or other factors. It occurs through a process of ‘othering’. Hate speech has been known to incite, enable or instigate hate crimes which can be defined as overt acts of violence against persons or property (vandalism); arson; violation or deprivation of civil rights; certain “true threats; or acts of intimidation, assault or murder; or conspiracy to commit these crimes. It is a criminal offense motivated in whole or in part by an offender’s bias against a race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity, including skin colour and national origin. It is more than offensive speech or conduct and its victims can include institutions, religious organizations and government entities as well as individuals. The seriousness of hate speech has been mentioned by the UN Secretary-General, António Guterres as a precursor to atrocity crimes.

Hate speech has become the norm in election campaigns

The political leaders who indulge hate speeches are hardly prosecuted and punished. The impunity that protects perpetrators of hate speech within a democratic system is alarming. Should hate speech, openly calling for violence, vandalism, ethnic cleansing, taking up of arms etc. and directed against specific individuals and communities, especially as part of election campaigns be allowed unchecked? These hate speeches are not even infrequent and within private spaces but blaring on loudspeakers and on social media. Anonymous handles on social media congregate in huge numbers to attack, vilify and abuse individuals and communities.

Sadly, with the escalation of identity politics geared towards the elections, hate speech reaps rich dividends. We have reached a point where there is a need for a perpetual enemy to bring us together. The Muslim community in India has borne the brunt of this, although other minorities have not been exempt. This hate speech is becoming entrenched and normalised and becoming part of school and institutional behaviours and regular social media posts and WhatsApp forwards. These hate filled and discriminatory messages are accepted at face value without any kind of commitment to the truth. Illogical, irrational, baseless fake news are peddled putting communities at risk of losing lives, livelihoods and dignity. Media, the supposed 4th pillar, is in cahoots with this, with shocking conflict of interest and unabashed allegiance to the current party in power.

There have been a series of hate speeches leading up to elections particularly by the current regime.

In January 2023, a religious conclave in Haridwar saw calls for organised violence against Muslims similar to the Myanmar kind of ‘cleansing campaign’ and that any resistance by the government would be faced with ‘revolt’.

The targeting has been relentless. Muslim businesses have been targeted, there have been open calls for economic boycotts and even those engaged in trade have been viciously and horrifically attacked, lynchings of suspected cattle traders or even of consuming/transporting beef have been attacked by maniacal mobs. Vocal Muslim women on social media have been put up ‘on sale’, mosques have been vandalised and demolished. Internet is rife with the blatant anti-minority hatred that has been completely unchecked (and even to some extent enabled) by the government in power. False accusations have been thrown around without any commitment to the truth or fraternity. When called out, rhetoric and falsehoods are the norm.

Human Rights watch analysed the Prime Minister’s speech after the announcement of the Moral Code of Conduct (which forbids appealing to communal feelings for securing votes) in ……….and found Islamophobic remarks in 110 campaign speeches. “If elected to power at the Centre, Congress would distribute people’s property, land and gold among Muslims,” Mr. Modi said during his address at a Lok Sabha elections campaign meeting in Rajasthan’s Banswara district on April 21, 2024. This kind of language, as opposed to the language of non-discrimination and inclusivity, is most unbecoming of an elected representative of the State.

According to the HRW report, taking hate speech to the realm of hate crime, the BJP government has demolished Muslims’ homes, businesses, and places of worship “without due process” and “carried out other unlawful practices”, all of which have continued since the election.

A report by the NGO Common Cause has documented that half the police they surveyed had anti-Muslim bias making them less likely to intervene in the event of crimes against Muslims. There are several records of impunity being offered for crimes against this community, by courts and other government bodies. Ironically, laws are being passed to further vilify and target these same communities.

It is shameful to see  extrajudicial punishments being meted out to innocent Muslims, in the inhumane method of “bulldozer justice.” Since 2022 several homes have been destroyed by the authorities meant to protect citizens with flimsy reasons that no court of law would sustain. It is common knowledge that those who participated in protests or raised their voices against the government in power have been targeted by this state sponsored violence and hate crimes. The Supreme Court has stated that retaliatory demolitions are not acceptable, but even that does not seem to be a suitable deterrent, which must again concern all law abiding citizens of the country.

In May, two BJP officials made profane comments about Prophet Mohammed, leading to deadly protests across India and condemnation from Muslim-majority countries. The BJP suspended the officials but these responses are too infrequent and slow and after much damage has been done.

The US Commission on International Religious freedom has classified India as a country of particular concern and urged the US government to place sanctions on Indian officials responsible for abuse. This is indeed a shame on the country’s vibrant democratic image that has been respected across the world. It would require a lot of concerted effort to undo this damage caused to our country’s reputation.

The significant enemy concept plays well in Indian politics. It is a deviation from the real politics of governance. The policies of development should be the primary issue of the campaign agenda. Unfortunately we do not witness any such debates having serious and substantial matters in the debate. The loud spoken sensational statements in public make the news.

There are no adequate laws to deal with hate speech. The legal process will take such a long time and the consequences even if there is punishment will come only after the damage is done and the election is also over. Hence the damage control is not done at all.

The loss of argumentative Indian is an irreparable loss for the Indian system. We need to argue out things on the basis of reason, logic and scientific temper. But in reality it is religion, caste and personal history of individuals. Hence the deviation is very easy in such a context.

In the process of we and they narrative the hate speeches appeal to the minds of the masses. A deep sense of deprivation and insecurity is made part of the conversation and that can be fatal. The political campaign’s goal is very clear. It is not interested in convincing people on substantial arguments but in dividing people in the name of religion and caste.

A twisted history is part of such rhetoric in political speeches. Some historical figures are suddenly demonised and a few new historical figures are created overnight to suit the narrative that is being built up for the election run.

No doubt it is part of the larger system. It is a consequence of identity bargaining in the political sphere. Divide and rule has become the order of the day in our democratic electoral politics.

Solutions and the way forward

What are the possible solutions to these low level political gimmicks in the country that are putting our own fellow citizens at risk to their lives, property, mental health and religious freedom? The Election Commission, which has a crucial role to enable free and fair elections, has to ensure that campaigns are also above board and following basic ethical principles of non-discrimination. Selective and slow response beats the purpose of the Election Commission itself. Taking these hate speeches to court is a long drawn process and justice is often delayed endlessly. We need to explore the possibility of fast track courts during the elections specifically geared to hate speeches and hate crimes.

The voting population, including the future populations need to be educated on the right way of conducting election campaigns and the need to hold violators accountable. Those perpetuating these hate speeches only do so because they see political benefit to it. If this benefit is withdrawn by an informed and articulate voter base, it will not be able to unleash the unrestrained damage that it is currently able to.

Rajya Sabha Member Manoj Kumar Jha (RJD) has called for a law to regulate hate speech and improve information disclosure about paid content. He has called out news channels for deliberately broadcasting TRP-centric news without or contrary to officially known facts. Importantly he also suggested that such legislation be introduced with stakeholders to find a balance between censorship of harmful content and freedom of speech and expression. He also made a case for including internet education in the school curriculum to impart basic knowledge and also sensitise children about the responsible use of the internet and the risks of hate speech and abuse.

He submitted a Bill in the Rajya Sabha on 9^th December 2022 against hate crimes and hate speech directed to a person based on religion, race, caste or community, sex, gender, sexual orientation, place of birth residence, language, disability, tribe etc. and that it should be non-cognizable and non-bailable. Any person:— (a) who intentionally publishes, propagates or advocates anything or communicates to one or more persons in a manner that could reasonably be construed to demonstrate a clear intention to harm or incite harm or promote or propagate hatred, based on one or more of the following grounds: (i) religion, (ii) race, (iii) caste or community, (iv) sex, (v) gender, (vi) sexual orientation, (vii) place of birth, This includes intentionally distributing or making available electronic material which constitutes hate speech and advocate hatred that constitutes incitement to cause harm.

Hate speech, particularly as an election tool, and directed across the minorities, specifically the Muslim community is rampant across the country, and only growing worse. The consequences are severe and in contrast to the democratic fibre of the country. There is a need for urgent steps to be put in place to keep the government in check. All bodies with power to intervene – whether it is the Election commission, the judiciary, the police, civil society and even the voters need to take a stance that hate speech will not be tolerated. Let us stop normalising and enabling hate speech. This, as we know from history, is only a few steps away from hate crimes, ethnic cleansing and genocide. Let us act with the urgency that the issue deserves.

The author is the Director of St. Joseph’s Law College Bengaluru. His social media handles are @JeraldSJCL Twitter/ @Jeralddsouzasj Instagram. The author is also part of a Campaign against Hate Speech.

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are the author’s personal views, and do not necessarily represent the views of Sabrangindia.

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I am someone who has been teaching postgraduate courses in post-independence history for decades. My mind goes back to the stirring speech of Feroze Gandhi (1912-1960) in the Lok Sabha on December 16, 1957 [Incidentally, December 16 is also the birthday of my daughter whom we adopted and lost at the hands of a hasty and therefore botched up juridical pronouncement, arguably succumbing to the regressive Muslim Personal Law].

The then Prime Minister, Jawahar Lal Nehru was a quintessential democrat, save some debatable blemishes. Feroze was on the treasury benches, acting more ferocious than any qualified opposition leader could have acted. As we look around today, when parts of world are moving rapidly towards electoral autocracy combined with ethnic hatred, we note with great regret that rather than strengthening and deepening our democracy, we have been eroding it significantly.

Feroze Gandhi had (1957) exposed the officials of the State Bank of India (SBI) and of Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) of India involved in (or subjected to) the scam; he was unsparing about the Finance Minister as well. The shady and corrupt transactions of Mr. Mundhra were exposed. Nehru didn’t raise the bogey of the foreign-hand in order to silence Feroze. I therefore strongly recommend — to postgraduate students taking my course—that they read the wonderfully written text of the speech that was delivered with great passion in the Lok Sabha on December 16, 1957. One remembers Feroze today, precisely because of this unwavering speech. Rajni Patel wrote in the Foreword to one famous biography, (Shashi Bhushan, 1977) of Feroze, “At a time we are once again concerned with refashioning our democratic values and revitalizing our public institutions, it is good to recapitulate the work and ideals of a pioneer” that Feroze was.

Had it been today, the Parliamentarian (Feroze Gandhi) could have been chastised as a seditious religious minority out to wreck “Bharat Mata”. Those were the days of a fledgling, proud, strong and emergent democracy; not the sham period we live through today. The then PM was not scared, not insecure and frightened to be losing his office. The regime of that time allowed the debate to take place and it was also widely reported widely in the media. Incidentally, the very same parliamentarian had fought successfully to legislate a law permitting press-coverage of Parliamentary proceedings. Contrast this with the current scenario when our Prime Minister has not had the moral courage to address a single press conference in two terms, that is the last 10 years, and this fact does not appear to disturb the electorate.

Subsequently, in August 1965, there were food riots in India, student upsurges in the Bihar and Hindi belt against corruption, inflation and unemployment. On August 9, 1965, students, employees and the opposition had gheraoed the Bihar Assembly in Patna. They had battled with the police. Herbert Heidenreich (1968), in his research-essay, The Anatomy of a Riot, notes,

“The police resorted to firing in eighteen places throughout the state as railway stations were sacked, government offices and homes of Cabinet members burned, and warehouses looted. Order was finally restored after five days; in many places only when army units were deployed. Journalists and other observers tend to attach adjectives to their descriptions of political violence in India. Thus there are ‘communal’ riots, ‘food’ riots, or ‘language’ riots”

This is how the 1967 elections came to be held against the incumbent regime. We don’t yet witness any such phenomenon in India today after the expose of the Electoral Bond Scam in 2024! Though, we live through, otherwise, an “age of mob fury”, era of lynching, an age of easy provocations and most brutal violence. One reason of course is that we have too many non-state actors, of course, in complicity with the regime, enjoying an impunity from the state, who resort to group violence. Is that why the expose of the biggest scam in the history of independent ever doesn’t provoke the nationalist commitment of the vigilante groups?

Another reason is obvious. “Mainstream newspapers” (Hindi and English and many other regional languages as also the commercial TV news channels) have gone mostly silent. At best, they are reluctantly informing us about these scandals with least possible quantum of information. The best known anchors, shrill when it comes to promoting stigma against vulnerable sections or brazenly promoting one leader and his party, have also been rendered voiceless.

The anti-Emergency campaign and the run up to the 1977 elections are too well known to be re-counted here in detail. Ironically, some of the anti-Emergency crusaders of the 1970s have turned into the practitioners of undeclared Emergency today.

The 1989 elections were held on the back of a campaign against the Bofors Scandal (1987). The then Finance Minister, V P Singh,  resigned from government and led the oppositional coalition to victory and formed a short-lived government, supported by both the left and right. Over decades, VP Singh’s allegations have turned out to be either exaggerated or baseless. There were other mistakes too, that Rajiv Gandhi had committed. He had surrendered “to the forces of prejudice, illiberalism and fundamentalism” in the case of Shahbano Judgment of 23 April 1985, which was upturned through a parliamentary legislation in 1986. This immensely contributed to the rise of majoritarian forces, candidly confessed even by its chief villains, the Muslim clergy, who also nationalized the local dispute of Ayodhya. (See Abulhasan Ali Miyan Nadvi’s Urdu memoir, Karwaan-e-Zindagi. 1988, vol. 3, chapter 4). Rajiv Gandhi, however, had enough grace to have later confessed to the journalist Vir Sanghvi (A Rude Life, 2021) “I was young. I made mistakes”. V P Singh-Arun Nehru combine targeted Rajiv Gandhi like anything. Their partner-in-crime, so to say, was the English daily Indian Express (IE). This is a newspaper, which has today given space to several right wing ideologues and official spokespersons. Ajaz Ashraf writes (Mid Day, April 3, 2023),

“Since May 2014, when the BJP swept into power, its members have altogether written 640 opinion pieces over approximately 3,000 days. This means a piece from the RSS-BJP stable was being published in one of the three newspapers every fifth day. Of the 640 pieces, IE accounted for 337, HT 97 and TOI 206. IE’s figures are high partly because its archive is the best among the three. Its opinion pages are vibrant—proprietors and editors fear a backlash only when they speak out against the government.

I found that 399 of the 640 pieces, or 62.34 per cent, mention Prime Minister Narendra Modi or his government at least once. In one piece, RSS leader Ram Madhav mentions Modi 20 times, in another 18 times. Former President Ram Nath Kovind referred to Modi 22 times in just one piece written, thankfully, after he demitted office. Union Minister Bhupender Yadav did so 21 times in an article. Most BJP spokespersons possess a sycophantic inclination to needlessly repeat Modi’s name in their pieces.

Guess they owe it to Modi for turning them into writers. Since May 2014, Madhav has written 101 pieces for IE, 25 for HT and six for TOI. The IE index of authors shows he began writing only in May 2014. Former Vice-President Venkaiah Naidu has written 68 pieces across the three newspapers, Bhupender Yadav 34, MP Dr Rakesh Sinha 31 for IE, for which former minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has penned 22. Spokesperson Anil Baluni has 26 bylines for IE and his colleague Shehzad Poonawalla 20 for TOI.

The 2014 elections were held in the background of the “India Against Corruption” (IAC) campaign of 2011, led by a non-descript “non-ideological” old man Anna Hazare and thereafter, Arvind Kejriwal. Soon, it became pretty clear that majoritarian right wing forces were surreptitiously supporting and sustaining the anti-corruption movement. Very few academics and public intellectuals had the foresight to warn us against such a dangerous anti-ideological movement of the majoritarian forces. By the 2014 elections, India underwent a change almost beyond recognition. What India and the regime stands for today, repudiates almost everything that the freedom movement and the Constitution envisions and commits itself to.

In most of the milestone moments of the electoral history of independent India, the “progressive” forces (Socialists and parts of the Leftists) have aligned with the right wing majoritarian forces. With every of such moment, the majoritarian forces gained greater political strength, social base and institutional penetrations. By now, they have become the hegemons, aided by crony capital and the state institutions at the service of their partisan politics to hound and harass the opposition with. Rahul Gandhi is almost a lone crusader to be going into the masses through his Yatras amidst acute resource-crunch and state-hounding.

As yet there is no biography of Rahul Gandhi. Though, there are not less than two, unflattering, accounts (viz., Sugata Srinivasaraju’s, Strange Burdens and Dayashankar Mishra’s Hindi book) cataloguing the viciously hostile political atmosphere in which he is operating.

Besides the anti-Muslim communal hatred, what else is/are the factor(s) which could possibly explain why we don’t we see a popular outrage on the ground against the Electoral Bond Scam which financially not only cripples but also asphyxiates the opposition to death? This is no longer a concern of a specific oppositional political party alone. It is a question of democracy itself. Why 85% of Indians wish to have autocratic regime?

I am really puzzled about this “indifference” of the people towards the expose of the electoral Bond Scam (corruption). I ask myself, are we no longer thinking humans? Have we, as a nation, become machines controlled by our vicious political leaders? Has the governing party semitized the majority like some religions, where we refuse to evaluate our faith (our politics) with reason? We remain faithful followers of our preferred political party and leader round the clock all the time when, in a vibrant democracy, we are expected to be voters of a specific party only for the polling day, and for the rest, become vigilant and critical citizens. Or, have we, all or most of us, turned into card-holding cadres? We react to the political party we have voted for, in a manner as if we are afraid of committing a heresy against our faith, that is, the wrong acts of the political party of our choice? Why have we become a prisoner, a fanatic supporter of messianic, cult politics, hence a retrogressive, backward looking nation?

After all, way back in November 1937 (The Modern Review, Calcutta), a pseudonym Chanakya, had written against this attitude which “potentially paves the path to Caesarism and dictatorship”. We later got to know that he was none other than Nehru writing against himself. It was his way of training Indians against cult worship. This phenomenon of cult politics was a sad truth for provincial politics in the latter half of the last century, when caste-based, corrupt, nepotist, dynastic parties have had turned into a faith-like creed or sect, in the name of social justice. By the second decade of the current century we magnified this tendency to an alarming level? Why are we in love with electoral autocracy, authoritarianism? Why are we endorsing institutional meltdown? Have we become a psychopathic case? Are we suffering from the Stockholm Syndrome-having fallen in love with our oppressors and tormentors?

The present phenomenon cannot be explained away by just faith-based hatred of one group of citizens against another! True, minority conservatism and communalism has contributed immensely to the strengthening of the majoritarian forces, particularly in the 1980s. True also that the liberal-left forces have often supported (or gone silent on) minority regressivism. This resulted into their gradual but inevitable erosion of the credibility of the liberal-left. So much so that today, increasingly larger number of Muslim narrative-making groups, influencers, columnists and academics are falling into the lap of the dispensation to extract small favours such as vice chancellorship of a few selected “Muslim” institutions. This is amply demonstrated by Felix Pal (2020). Quite a few of these Muslim “notables” do have antecedence of affiliation with the Muslim Right Wing as well as having extracted favour from the ruling Congress (in the pre-NaMo era).

Nonetheless, there is certainly more to the majoritarian resurgence in India (and beyond) in the recent times, in a phase of late-capital crisis and crony capitalism. Identity politics and competitive communalisms constitute only a part of the current crisis in India. Today, in the social media, saffron narratives are most prevalent. Anti-communal narrative- making stuff is less visible than the pro-establishment propaganda. “Neoliberal psychopolitics is a technology of domination that stabilizes and perpetuates the prevailing system by means of psychological programming and steering”, says, Byung-Chul Han, in his 2017 booklet, Psychopolitics: Neoliberalism and New Technologies of Power. But how to get out of this is not something coming out as lucidly from this philosopher, Han. Have we, as a collective, been turned into “unintelligent”, or “stupid” or “idiot”? We are into the era of mass stupidity? If so, what is the possible answer, being offered by Han? He says,

“The idiot is a modern-day heretic. Etymologically, heresy means ‘choice’. Thus, the heretic is one who commands free choice: the courage to deviate from orthodoxy. As a heretic, the idiot represents a figure of resistance opposing the violence of consensus. The idiot preserves the magic of the outsider. Today, in light of increasingly coercive conformism, it is more urgent than ever to heighten heretical consciousness”.

In my very limited understanding, Rahul Gandhi, much maligned as the so called Pappu, and everyone engaged in the epic resistance, can be said to be pursuing the noble act and mission of raising the heretical consciousness of the masses who have sadly been turned into unquestioning faithful (bhakts) of the semitized and oppressive political establishment. May this tribe of “idiots” rise in this era of despondency and desperation! We need larger number of “idiots” to take away the elements of bhakti from us and to shake us to realize how badly we are being looted by a handful of the capitalists. These crony capitalists have snatched away employment from our educated and skilled youth. This band of select two dozen or so capitalists are busy destroying all the wealth of the nation including minerals, water, forests, environment, the very essence of being humans. Has allegience to them overtaken all the state institutions.

Related:

As the date for the general assembly election approaches, hate crimes in India continue

Conduct independent inquiry into Arun Goel, Election Commissioner’s resignation, don’t allow elections until inquiry public: Open letter to President Murmu

ECI must announce elections only after SBI provides details of corporate purchase of electoral bonds: Ex-Civil servants

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