Hate speech and law: Narsinghanand and Akbaruddin not exceptions but the rule

Out on bail, Yati Narsinghanand has spewed even more poison against Muslims, while Akbaruddin Owaisi brags about the very speech for which he was jailed

In the days before social media caught everything live and relayed it almost as it was happening, a government could protect a rabble-rouser by claiming that it didn't have evidence of their offence. This happened in Mumbai in 1984, when an anti-Muslim speech by Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray culminated in widespread riots.

Then CM Vasantdada Patil considered a regional Congress strongman, shrugged off demands for Thackeray's prosecution by saying he couldn't get hold of the recorded speech. It hardly seemed to matter to the CM that hundreds of Mumbaikars had heard the Sena chief's vitriol at his rally held in the heart of the city, on Chowpatty beach, and that its most sensational parts had been reported on page one.

The 1984 riots claimed 258 lives in Mumbai, Kalyan, Thane and Bhiwandi. Of course, Thackeray was never prosecuted for the speech.

Almost three decades later, in the age of social media, another rabble-rouser actually spent 40 days in jail after his hate speeches went viral. But that turned out to be the full sum of his punishment. Despite both his December 2012 speeches being available on YouTube, the police only produced truncated versions in court. So, though the Central Forensic Science Laboratory certified that the voice was indeed that of Akbaruddin Owaisi, the AIMIM MLA from Chandrayangutta (Hyderabad) was acquitted for lack of evidence.

Also Read — The curious case of hate speeches and Delhi Police

Even while acquitting him, Special Court Judge K Jaya Kumar advised him not to give such "provocative" speeches in future, keeping "national integrity in mind". There could have been no clearer indicator of the court's findings of his culpability. But what could the court do given the quality of recordings submitted by the police?

Deposing in front of the Srikrishna Commission investigating Mumbai's 1992-93 riots, senior police inspectors would, without a trace of embarrassment, justify not arresting Hindu assailants named by Muslim victims by saying they couldn't find them, even though their own records showed that the former had attended the "peace committee" meetings held in the police station. One inspector even said he hadn't known which IPC sections to apply to the Shiv Sena leaders who raised inflammatory slogans at a "victory" rally celebrating the demolition of the Babri Masjid.

Where there's a will, there's a way, is a saying made for our police. When they want to, they can go through the entire data of an accused's computer to pinpoint particular emails, as the Gujarat police did after charging 124 Muslims in Surat in December 2001 under the UAPA for aiding terrorist activities. All of them were acquitted last year; the emails were ruled to be of no evidentiary value.

But to find a complete recording of two speeches that were viewed lakhs of times on YouTube in the space of a month proved too much for the Telangana police in the Akbaruddin Owaisi case.

Apart from their own (un)willingness to produce the required evidence, the other factor that would have forced them to do so may also have been missing: Specific instructions from the government. Why would Telangana CM K Chandrashekar Rao want to spoil his "friendly" relationship with the Asaduddin Owaisi-headed AIMIM?

In fact, it was just such a breakdown in relations between the Owaisis and the Congress government in (then undivided) Andhra Pradesh in 2012 that resulted in the prosecution of Akbaruddin Owaisi. Till then, the AIMIM floor leader in the Assembly had three cases under section 153A (promoting communal enmity), and one each under 295 and 295A (defiling a place of worship and deliberately outraging religious feelings respectively), registered against him, with no progress being made in any of them.

Also Read — Uttar Pradesh cops arrest seer who threatened to rape Muslim women

Today, technology allows us to watch venomous outbursts against entire communities without being present on the spot and spread these outbursts within seconds across the world. Yet, technology can't help us get those who commit these offences booked under the law. For that, we remain dependent on governments, who alone can sanction prosecution for hate speech. Recall the sustained outrage on social media before the Uttarakhand government arrested habitual hate-monger Yati Narsinghanand, chief organiser of the Haridwar Dharm Sansad held in December. Out on bail, he's spewed even more poison against Muslims.

Is it surprising then that Akbaruddin Owaisi could brag about the very speech for which he was jailed? In his December 2012 Nirmal speech, he had made the by now infamous challenge: "If the police were removed for 15 minutes, we could finish 100 crore Hindus." In 2019, while still an accused, he boasted that the RSS had not yet recovered from his "15 minutes speech". Three years later, he's been acquitted.

(Jyoti Punwani is a journalist)

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author’s own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of DH.

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