Advocate K.L.N.V. Veeranjaneyulu filed a petition in Supreme Court to ban a book named “Samajika Smugglurlu Komatollu” written by a Dalit writer and activist Professor Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd. The petitioner focused on a particular chapter ‘Post-Hindu India’ called ‘Hindutva Mukt’ Bharat and the book as a whole talked and criticized about the cast system prevailing in India.
The Supreme Court bench of Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, Justices A.M. Khanwilkar and D.Y. Chandrachud out rightly rejected the petition stating that a book just can’t be banned because someone has an ambitious motive. Any request to ban a book should be scrutinized thoroughly because when an author writes a book, he exercises his fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression under the Indian constitution. If it is to be banned, it would be explicitly curtailing the author’s right to speak out ideas freely and express thoughts adequately and hence, should never be viewed lightly.
Further, the court found in inappropriate to ban the books under Article 32 of the Constitution.
The bench in its two page judgment placed the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression at the apex and stated that it’s not up to the Supreme Court to ban something which is a free expression of someone’s thoughts and feelings about the environment he lives in.
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