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Public Order (v Sedition) vs Freedom of Speech and Expression
Post-independence judicial rulings on the right to freedom of speech and expression have produced two contradictory lines of precedents on the restriction of “public order” under Article 19(2). The first is a “tendency-driven test” which reads public disorder as synonymous with “undermining the security of the state” and therefore sedition, while the second is a “consequence-driven test,” which separates sedition from public disorder, based on the temporal dimensions of proximity and proportionality. The underlying question at stake in either case, however, is that of determining the exercisable limits of an average Indian’s rationality within the public sphere.
The author would like to dedicate this article to the memory of late Shakti Sinha.
Article 19. Protection of certain rights regarding freedom of speech, etc—(1) All citizens shall have the right—
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