A Damocles’ Sword held over the Press

The Press and Registration of Periodicals Bill, 2023, which has now been enacted as a law, has controversial provisions which can curb freedom of the press. The bill was passed by the Rajya Sabha in August 2023 amidst an uproar by the Opposition and by the Lok Sabha in December with hardly any Opposition member present in the House. It has received the President’s assent and is awaiting framing of rules. It is at this stage that the government opened it up for consultation. The bill replaces the colonial-era Press and Registration of Books Act, 1867, which had been retained with amendments. The government has claimed that the new law would ensure ease of doing business by simplifying the rules and procedures for registration of periodicals, but it contains provisions that can be used to control them and to produce a chilling effect on press freedom. Provisions have been retained or departures made from the earlier law to give the government more power to deal with the media. 

All newspapers and periodicals containing information on current events, public news or comments on public news, except scientific publications, come under the purview of the law. It gives the Press Registrar General extraordinary powers, including the power to cancel registration. The Registrar General can transfer his power to any gazetted officer of the government, including a police officer, to enter the premises of a periodical for verification. This is intrusive action and can amount to censorship by other means. The possibility that a government official can enter the premises is an intimidatory prospect for any publication. A situation in which officials like the Registrar General will have the power to sit in judgement over the content of publications and exercise curbs on freedom of expression, which is a constitutional right, is a hang-over from the colonial era that must be removed. Under the new law, if the owner or publisher is convicted under the UAPA or for an offence related to security of the State, the registration of the publication can be cancelled suo moto. The offences have not been defined and categorised and the government will have the power to notify them. Since the UAPA is now invoked freely against critics of the government and criticism of it can be considered as endangering the security of the State, this provision is a proverbial Damocles’ Sword hanging over newspapers and periodicals and can be misused at will to harass and punish publications that are critical of the government. 

The Editors’ Guild of India has expressed concern over the “draconian” provisions of the law which gives arbitrary powers to the government. It has called it “deeply distressing” and has noted that the vagueness of some of the provisions could have “adverse implications on press freedom.” The law has caused wider concern too. Freedom of speech and expression is not just the journalists’ right but a wider right of all citizens.