The Criminal Laws (Rajasthan Amendment) Bill 2017 tabled in the Assembly on Monday by the Rajasthan government is so shocking in its brazenness to curb freedom of speech and block citizens from challenging corruption that it is being publicly opposed by some even in the ruling BJP. Narpat Singh Rajvi and Ghanshyam Tiwari, BJP MLAs, have joined the opposition Congress in their condemnation of the impugned Ordinance as “strangling of democracy” and a reminder of the “draconian and unconstitutional” moves to trample citizen rights during the Emergency. The purported intent behind the Ordinance is to facilitate better governance by protecting serving and former judges, magistrates and public servants from frivolous allegations by disallowing investigation without prior sanction for six months. Even worse, it prescribes two years’ imprisonment for anyone in the media for publishing and printing the name, address, photograph or family details of the public servant against whom corruption charges are sought to have been brought.

While the spectre of policy paralysis that followed in the wake of corruption scandals in UPA II with top bureaucrats being jailed for scams, particularly in the telecom and coal ministries, is understandably a reference, the Rajasthan Ordinance is an entirely misplaced and superfluous corrective measure. It is misplaced because policy paralysis in UPA II was the result not of bureaucratic ambivalence but a weak and indecisive political leadership. It is superfluous because the law already provides for protection to public servants by making it mandatory for a court to take cognisance of an offence only after getting prior sanction of the government. The higher judiciary too is already protected as no complaint against a judge of a high court or the Supreme Court can be made without the permission of the Chief Justice of the relevant high court or the Chief Justice of India. A magistrate similarly cannot be proceeded against without the investigating agency taking permission from the Chief Justice of the State High Court.

The significant part is that the Ordinance prevents not prosecution but even an investigation into a charge against a public servant. How is a charge that an offence was committed to be proved if investigation itself is blocked? The Rajasthan government needs to be reminded that all previous efforts to block investigation into corruption have been summarily dismissed by the apex court. A journalist enjoys no special privilege when exposing a corruption scandal. There are laws for civil and criminal defamation and contempt of court that apply to any frivolous media report. To threaten two years’ imprisonment for the offence of attempting to expose corruption in high places amounts to pre-censorship . The State government ought to withdraw the Ordinance unless it wants to face the embarrassment of it being struck down by the courts.

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