Does Censorship Ever Work?

Author(s): GEETA SESHU

Source: Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 47, No. 44 (NOVEMBER 3, 2012), pp. 19-22
Published by: Economic and Political Weekly
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/41720324
Accessed: 01-05-2020 08:58 UTC

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

Economic and Political Weekly is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend
access to Economic and Political Weekly

This content downloaded from 1.38.188.163 on Fri, 01 May 2020 08:58:24 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 COMMENTARY

onto a blog but when police visited his

Does Censorship Ever Work? home in Kanpur with an arrest warrant
in the case lodged against him, Trivedi
decided to surrender. His custody in jail
GEETA SESHU sparked off a high-decibel campaign of
protest against sedition.
Another, more recent, instance, which
Censorship,
laws (such resonated across the globe but has saw a
Censorship
Censorship India are
are routine, areIndia
routine,andastakes and
elsewhere. as are elsewhere.
the protests many the Book formsBook
protestsbans
bans in relatively less public protest in India was
taking dow
the circulation of the controversial anti-
over titles, dialogues or lyrics in films or
citing
attacks on art galleries. But the physical viole
Islamic video, "Innocence of Muslims",
all these
silencing - the murders and attacks or the m
on the video hosting website, YouT'ibe.
jailing of journalists, right-to-information While the us government has been stead-
laws guaran
activists, members of political and social fast in its refusal to block the video, cit-
of expressi
movements, writers, theatre directors ing free speech principles, the Indian
more
and playwrights, authors or artists - is matu
government quickly got the search en-
painstaking
an increasingly dangerous trend and is gine Google to block the video on
proceeding with complete impunity as YouTube in India, though it is available
with object
well. Add to this, the rising instances of and accessible elsewhere.
than the kn
online censorship - the blocking of web- In all three instances, the knee-jerk
that
sites and web pages, take down notices govern
reaction of our government in dealing
themselves
for online content, videos or blocks on with these left much to be desired, pro-
social media accounts and the cases viding little confidence that a mature
handling of such conflicts would be the
lodged under the draconian Information
Technology Act, 2000. way forward, instead of the censorship
that takes us all several steps back-
In barely a month, two separate
events in India and a third, whilewards.
not While the state gets the perfect
located in India, brought some ofexcuse the to use the fear of violence to pro-
most contentious aspects of freedom of censorship efforts, it also results
pel its
expression into sharp focus - hate in silencing debate and discussion.
speech and mischievous propaganda The on chilling effect of online censor-
online and mobile media and cartoons ship may be, at best, temporary. Both
that are allegedly offensive and insult-genuine voices of dissent and mischie-
ing to national honour. vous peddlers of hate will find ways to
counter censorship in online media. But
The first event is, of course, the wide-
is censorship the only effective way to
spread blocking of at least 309 websites,
web pages and Twitter accounts in the counter what governments think is "un-
wake of the reports that morphed images acceptable" content?
and false news of the riots in Assam had
Arbitrary
fuelled the violent demonstration in Mum- Blocking of Sites
Morphed pictures of alleged attacks on
bai on 30 August 2012. The panic and fear
of a backlash against members of the
Muslims began circulating on the inter-
north-east, transmitted mainly throughnet in mid-June 2012, mainly on social
social media networks and mobile mes- media sites like Facebook and some Arab
sages, forced a large-scale exodus of themmedia sites. These were in the context of
from Pune, Bangalore and Delhi. the long-standing conflict between the
The second was the charge of sedition Burmese and the Rohingyas. A website
and arrest of cartoonist Aseem Trivedi of the Burma Democratic Council (www.
in Mumbai in September 2012 for a se-bdcburma.org) even reproduced all the
ries of cartoons he had done and exhib-
doctored pictures alongside the original
ited at a meeting of the India Against ones to debunk the propaganda. Till
Corruption (iac) in Mumbai in Decem- mid-August, there was no reference to
ber 2011. A complaint lodged at the timethe Assam riots and the connection with
Geeta Seshu
resulted in the blocking of his website the attacks on Muslims in Kokrajhar
( g
journalist assoc
(www.cartoonsagainstcorruption.com). seemed too remote to register on the
website, The H
Trivedi managed to transfer his cartoons radar of any medium. Though trouble

Economic & Political weekly »*avj November 3, 2012 vol xlvii no 44 19

This content downloaded from 1.38.188.163 on Fri, 01 May 2020 08:58:24 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
COMMENTARY

Bangalore. But regrettably, instead of And of course, the main question: did
began on 19 August, print media in India
stemming
reported the riots only after the Guwa- the panic, its action focusedthe blocks work?
hati-bound Rajdhani Express was at-
on the blocking of a range of sites, using
tacked on 24 July. provisions of the infamous Information The Case against Aseem Trivedi
However, electronic media - the na-
Technology (it) Act, 2000. In November 2011, barely two months
tional television channels or local chan- But even this was executed in an arbi- after the 24-year-old cartoonist from
trary manner and with complete lack of Kanpur launched his website he was told
nels - clearly neglected the issue. The
CNN-iBN editor Rajdeep Sardesai, whotransparency. The Bangalore-based Cen-by friends that the site could not be ac-
tre for Internet and Society, on its web- cessed. After an exchange of emails with
later defended the lack of coverage cit-
site, put up a list of websites, web pages,the web host Big Rock, Trivedi was told
ing the "tyranny of distance", added that
Kokrajhar was 150 kms from Guwahati Twitter accounts and Facebook pages that the site was blocked following a
and no national news channel had an that were ordered to be blocked. complaint lodged against his cartoons.
outdoor broadcasting van in the largest Pakistani blogger, Faraz Ahmed, No information was then forthcoming
city in Assam! blogged about the propaganda in the Ex- on the complainant, the nature of the
The internet has been a major aggre-press Tribune newspaper.1 In a detailedcomplaint or the charges against him.
gator of information in recent times, inrebuttal to the propaganda, he published Trivedi, who was inspired by the anti-
several instances, the only source of in-the morphed pictures alongside the realcorruption campaign launched by Anna
formation on issues print or electronicpictures, providing damning evidence of Hazare and others, was told that the
media either ignore or downplay. Werethe manner in which the altered photo- website was blocked under various sec-
the Assam riots any different? In thisgraphs were misused. In turn, New Delhi-tions of the it Act. Till then, he had little
case, not really. Instead, social network-based filmmaker Yousuf Saeed, who or no idea about the Act and its provi-
ing sites responded to the essentiallywrote about the issue in the site Kafila,sions. He then started a campaign called
humanitarian crisis of the flood of refu-referring to Ahmed's blog, pointed out"saveyourvoice" against the Act. In Au-
gees into relief camps by counting thethat Facebook posts on the propaganda, gust 2012, after police from the cyber
refugees by their religious identities,was a major fuel for the violent demon- crime cell in Mumbai visited his home in
mourned an article on 28 July 2012, instration in Mumbai. Kanpur to execute an arrest warrant in
the well-known website on Muslim But in its order to block a number of his name, Trivedi came to Mumbai and
sites on 18 August, the Indian govern- gave himself up for arrest. He was charged
issues, Twocircles (www.twocircles.net).
ment's department of telecommunica- with sedition under Section 124A of the
The social networking sites, of course,
did much more than count the dead. tions, also blocked the web pages that Indian Penal Code (ipc), with dishon-
They also became the site for an unprec- published photos Ahmed had used to ouring the national flag under Section 2
edented level of propaganda, where bolster his argument against the propa-of the Prevention of Insults to National
morphed pictures of all manner of disas- ganda! Twitter accounts of two journal-Honour Act of 1971 and with transmit-
ters like victims in an earthquake, a self-ists who are critical of the government, ting offensive messages in an electronic
immolation attempt by a Tibetan and including a journalist well-known for communication under Section 66-a of
even protests were given false captions his right-wing proclivity, were alsothe it Act.
and circulated widely as victims of thesought to be blocked though no effort The arrest sparked a huge debate and
riots in Assam. was made to communicate to them as to protests - both at the national and inter-
Leave alone the fact that they made a which tweets were objectionable andnational level - on the absurdity of using
travesty of the real suffering and plightwhy. Sites like Twocircles and pages that sedition against the cartoonist and
of the riot-affected, the pictures wereactually pointed out the propagandaforced the Maharashtra government to
picked up by Muslim groups in Mumbai were also blocked. announce that a senior police officer
who staged a demonstration on 11 August. Sustained protests over internet cen- would investigate whether the charge of
Speakers attacked the media for neglect- sorship and endless television studio de-sedition was applicable at all against the
ing the riot-affected and in the violence bates for several days thereafter (the is- cartoonist. The issue also resulted in
that followed, media people were targeted sue generating more heat than the cov-more vocal protests on the continued use
and beaten, their cameras snatched and erage of the riots in Assam) followed theof a colonial era laws like the one on se-
smashed. The police, caught unawares government's actions. The governmentdition and the need to repeal them. The
by the size of the mobilisation of has clarified that it was not in favour ofUK had removed laws on sedition in 2010
Muslim youth, also became target of censorship, online or otherwise. But the after a decade long struggle and Australia
their ire. status of the blocked sites is still unclear.had followed suit the next year.
In typical ostrich fashion, the govern- Is there any review of the content that The charge of sedition itself is being
ment woke up only after the propagandawas hurriedly blocked? Has the block used with alarming regularity against
resulted in the targeting of members ofbeen accompanied by any investigation all manner of dissent in the last few
the north-east and led to the large-scale about the content? Are the blocks to beyears - from the recent instances of vil-
exodus of them from cities like Pune andlifted at all or is it permanent? lagers protesting the nuclear power
20 November 3, 2012 vol XLVii NO 44 Bid Economic & Political weekly

This content downloaded from 1.38.188.163 on Fri, 01 May 2020 08:58:24 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
plants in Koodankulam to writers like Constitution of India do not explicitly
Coming so soon after the protests over
Arundati Roy for her views on the sepa- mention hate, restricting anything that
the Assam riots, the propaganda, the vio-
ratist movement in Kashmir, Binayak lent demonstration that left two dead could affect public order or incitement to
Sen and scores of adivasis in Chhattis- and the exodus of north-east people, it an offence. However, Indian laws, espe-
garh, civic activist Piyush Sethia in
was clear the Indian government was cially provisions in the ipc, the Preven-
Salem, Tamil Nadu and even veteran not going to take any chances when tion of Atrocities Act, 1989 or the infa-
civil liberties activist like E Rati Rao for news broke out over the anti-Islam film. mous it Act, 2000 (amended in 2008)
a journal of the People's Union for CivilIndia was among the first countries to have a wide range of content that is ob-
Liberties that is actually defunct! get Google, owners of YouTube, to block jectionable and invite punitive action.
The debate on the second chargethe film from its India servers. Other Here is a quick list:
countries
against the cartoonist - that of insulting where Yotíñibe blocked the film • ipc: Section 153-A promoting enmity
national honour2 - did occupy some
included Egypt, Pakistan, Bangladesh,between different groups or doing acts
Saudi Arabia, Malaysia and Indonesia. prejudicial to maintenance of harmony;
space in the media. Apart from television
studio debates, there were comments onThe violent protests over the film, as wellSection 295-A deliberate or malicious in-
blogs and on social networking sites likeas the us government's defence of it cit-tent to insult to another's religion; Sec-
Facebook and Twitter. Many felt that,ing free speech, sparked numerous pro- tion 505 public mischief through rumour
tests across several countries and at least
even if the cartoons were explicit and di- or statement intending to cause fear or
50 lives were lost in the process, includ- alarm or incite any class or community
rect instead of being humorous, subtle or
satirical, they did not constitute seditiousing that of the us ambassador to Libya. against another.
content. Whether national honour was Yet, the executive chairman of Google, • The Prevention of Atrocities Act on of-
damaged as a result was entirely subjec-Eric Schmidt, told journalists in a meet- fences against members of scheduled
tive and left to individual perception.ing in South Korea that the film still re- castes and tribes: Section 3 (i)(x) about
mained accessible in several countries
Unfortunately, the third charge - that intentional insult or intimidation);
of sending offensive messages through because it met YouTube's criteria for ac-• The it Act, 2000: Guidelines for inter-
electronic communication - did not getceptable content. The answer to "bad"
mediaries under Section 79 - "blasphe-
as much attention. There has been a lot speech, Schmidt said, was more speech,
mous, hateful or racially, ethnically ob-
of discussion over other aspects of the it not a ban on speech altogether.3 jectionable" content.
Act, including the rules that prescribe A report from the well-known journal-• Codes for print and broadcast media,
due diligence for intermediaries, the ists' organisation, Reporters Sans Fron-
cable television, cinema and advertising
provisions for intercepting, monitoring tières (rsf), expressed concern at thespecify that expressions of hate are un-
acceptable.
and blocking of content or the privacy blocking of the video and the obvious self-
and security aspects. censorship. The "geo-located" censorship In practice, despite numerous exam-
But it is the vast potential inherent in by Google could set a dangerous prece-
ples of the utterances of leaders of politi-
Section 66a and other related sections
dent but "eliminating online content in cal parties and vigilante groups that
cases such as this is rendered almost im-spewed hatred, it has been difficult, al-
for curbing any manner of dissent or
free expression in this section which possible because videos spread even moremost impossible, to actually prosecute
law-enforcing agencies have woken up by what is known as the 'Streisand Effecť
any offender for hate speech that result-
to in recent times. Apart from Trivedi, ed in violence. Police investigations are
and through the use of censorship circum-
the hapless Kolkata professor Ambikeshvention tools", the report said. faulty and political will is clearly weak,
Mohapatra and retired engineer SubrataSo, if videos that are potentially sensi-
whether it is the cases filed against Shiv
Sengupta, both members of a housing Sena leader Bal Thackeray in Mumbai or
tive do circulate anyway on the internet,
society in Kolkata, were booked under should one allow them because it is im- Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi.
Section 66a of the it Act. possible to curb them? Or should we be The case against the Shiv Sena lead-
Punishment under Section 66a of the cracking down more strictly on the peo- er's communal writings in the Marathi
it Act is up to three years and the offence ple who circulate these videos? mouthpiece of the party, Saamna in the
is non-bailable. The net of what can be wake of the Babri Masjid demolition and
"offensive" is also cast so wide that it Prosecuting Hate Content the riots in Mumbai, tenaciously pur-
can snare anything that allegedly caus-
Unfortunately, cracking down on hate sued by the late J B D'Souza and editor
es annoyance, inconvenience, danger,has never been easy, even before the ad- Dilip Thakore, did not bear fruit as the
vent of the internet. Fraught with politi- special leave petition seeking Thack-
obstruction, insult, injury, criminal in-
cal ramifications, cases lodged against eray's prosecution was turned down by
timidation, enmity, hatred, or ill will!
political leaders who used threatening the Supreme Court in 1995.
Intermediaries, who are expected to ex-
ercise due diligence to ensure them- or inflammatory language hardly ever In May this year, Samajwadi Party
ended in their conviction.
selves a safe harbour from prosecution, leader Abu Azmi was sentenced to two
are quick to take down content that at- Reasonable restrictions for freedom of years in jail for making provocative
tract complaints. speech and expression (Article 19) in the statements in a rally in 2000 in Mumbai.

Economic & Political weekly Œ253 November 3, 2012 vol xlvii no 44 21

This content downloaded from 1.38.188.163 on Fri, 01 May 2020 08:58:24 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Azmi has challenged his conviction in a
higher court, alleging that the verdict
smacked of political vendetta.
But cases are still underway against
Maharashtra Navnirman Sena leader Raj
Thackeray for the violence against can-
didates appearing for the railway re-
unwittingly transmit content that canwrote,6 banning the video was not the
potentially cause conflict? solution and that the policing of opin-
In two separate efforts in the wake ofions on any matter, including religious
the Assam riots propaganda and the ex-ones, would result in clamping down on
odus of north-east residents from Ban- all other expression of opinions.
galore and Pune, the tougher route of
interaction and dialogue helped break notes

cruitment board examinations in 2008 down the fear, mistrust and panic be- 1 "S
and Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Pra- tween Muslims and the members of the Mus
2012.

veen Togadia (who was also blocked fornorth-east. An iftar was organised in2 Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act,
online hate by the Indian government inBangalore between members of the two 1971, amended in 2005, Section 2 : INSULT TO
INDIAN NATIONAL FLAG AND CONSTITU-
this current action) for hate speech when communities. Over a thousand people
TION OF INDIA Whoever in any public place
violence broke out after a speech he attended and vowed to ensure that no
or in any other place within public view burns,
made at a rally in Kerala in May 2011. violence broke out here, says an account mutilates, defaces, defiles, disfigures, destroys,
tramples upon or otherwise shows disrespect
Janata Dal leader Subramaniam Swamyby legal researcher and activist Law-
to or brings into contempt (whether by words,
sought anticipatory bail fearing arrestrence Liang.4 either spoken or written, or by acts) the Indian
after his article in an English language In the face of an unprecedented level National Flag or the Constitution of India or
any part thereof, shall be punished with im-
newspaper drew widespread criticismof censorship of the anti-Islamic video
prisonment for a term which may extend to
for spreading hate. Swamy obtained bailacross the world, the online media is still three years, or with fine, or with both.
after he gave the Delhi High Courtthe site of a growing number of voices3http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/
an undertaking that he would refrainfrom within the Muslim community de- internet/googles-executive-chairman-eric-
schmidt-defends-hosting-of-anti-islam-film/
from writing inflammatory articles andcrying both the attempts to denigrate articleshow/i65720i8.cms
would respect the reasonable restric-their religion and the censorship that fol- 4 http://kafila.org/2012/08/18/iftar-party-f0r-
tions under Article 19. lowed. The mainstream media attempts members-of-the-north-east-community-host-
ed-at-nilasandra/
to blow the protests of Muslim groups5 See www.anindianmuslim.com; http://blog.
Dialogue, Not Censorship against the video out of proportion.5 thehoot.org/the-tweetorists/
While there are strong arguments for These saner voices also suggested that6 http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/shahla-khan-
salter/inn0cence-0f-muslims_b_i890i07.html,
the prosecution of political leaders whoone should ignore attempts to offend
http://www.viewpointonline.net/freedom-to-
advocate hate and violence, is there an-instead of falling prey to propaganda criticize-religion-is-a-touchstone-of-free-ex-
other approach to deal with hate mes-and hate. As writer Sahla Khan Salter pression.html

sages, abusive and insulting posts, "cy-

berbullying" and content that may be
considered as offensive to others? Economic&PoliticalwEEKLY
Today, the cybercrime cells of various
law-enforcing agencies in Mumbai, EPW 5-Year CD-ROM 2004-08 on a Single Disk
Pune and Delhi are working overtime to
The digital versions of Economic and Political Weekly for 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008
locate the urls (universal resource loca-
are now available on a single disk. The CD-ROM contains the complete text of 261 issues
tors - web addresses) of people who al- published from 2004 to 2008 and comes equipped with a powerful search, tools to help organise
legedly forwarded or uploaded the research and utilities to make your browsing, experience productive.The contents of the CD-ROM
morphed propaganda pictures of the are organised as in the print edition, with articles laid out in individual sections in each issue.
Assam riot victims. But, so far, while
With its easy-to-use features, the CD-ROM will be a convenient resource for social scientists,
several arrests are reported to have
researchers and executives in government and non-government organisations, social and political
been made and police have zeroed in on
activists, students, corporate and public sector executives and journalists.
a few people who allegedly sent smss
Price for 5 year CD-ROM (in INDIA)
arid uploaded the morphed pictures,
Individuals - Rs 1500
it is anybody's guess whether they
Institutions - Rs 2500
will be held responsible as originators
of the content. To order the CD-ROM send a bank draft payable at Mumbai in favour of Economic and Political

Other questions remain. Were they Weekly. The CD can also be purchased on-line using a credit card through a secure payment

aware of the implications of their act? gateway at epw.in

Did they intend to cause conflict and in-
stigate violence? Were they hapless par-
ticipants? Is it possible, for instance, to
put into place an intensive awareness
programme for ordinary users of the
Any queries please email: circulation@epw.in
Circulation Manager,
Economic and Political Weekly
320-321, A to Z Industrial Estate, Ganpatrao Kadam Marg, Lower Parel,
Mumbai 400 013, India

internet and of mobile media who may

22 November 3, 2012 vol XLVii no 44 E33SS Economic & Political WEEKLY

This content downloaded from 1.38.188.163 on Fri, 01 May 2020 08:58:24 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms