Harsh Mander: If JNU union leader is tried for sedition, I too should be charged with the same crime The former IAS officer recounts his public statements expressing doubt about the death sentence for Afzal Guru.

IAS babus at it again.

Mr. Mander should not worry, his time will also come to be tried for sedition as he so forcefully wants for his utterings.

He wrote while Afzal Guru was hanged “The hanging of Afzal Guru on 9 February, 2013 raises a thicket of debates – ethical, legal and political – about justice, law, democracy, capital punishment, and a strong state. What is the quality of true justice? Is it enough for it to be lawful, fair and dispassionate, or must it also be tempered with mercy?”

He should have left his AC Offices, and spent some time with the Security Forces, for once in his service to understand the cost of terrorism to this nation and its people, then probably he would not have talked about mercy for Afzal Guru..Mercy as I understand. Is for those who commit a heinous crime without understanding what they do, or sometimes really extreme injustice has  been experienced by them. 

Those who attack the Integrity of a Nation, put in jeopardy the well being of its people, carry out subversive activities, with firearms or with their pens or verbal onslaughts, being fully aware of what they are doing, are the enemies of this nation what ever facades they put up while committing these crimes. 
There should be no thought of mercy for such people. Which the upholders of the law have rightly upheld.

When Mr Mander talks of mercy, I wonder which level of Utopia he functions from.

Sedition relates to the uttering of the seditious words, the publication of seditious libels, and conspiracies to do an act for the furtherance of a seditious intention, whether by words spoken or written, or by conduct.

Coming to JNU. I am no intellectual but I understand sedition as an intention to bring into hatred or contempt, or to excite disaffection against, the Government and the constitution of India by law established, or either House of Parliament, or the administration of Justice.
To raise discontent or disaffection among Indian Nationals, or to promote feelings of ill will and Hostility between different classes of such subjects. 

Mr Mander was also a part of that shameful rally and spoke out there about the government preventing students from their free right to dream and dissent, because throughout history and across the planet, the journey of creating a more just and humane world has begun always with the dreams and also the challenges and disagreements of its young people.

I do agree that the Constitution protects the right to have anti-national and unpatriotic beliefs and opinions, and propagate them peacefully. How ever it is oftentimes forgotten that, these rights are subject to laws that impose “reasonable restrictions…in the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, decency or morality or in relation to contempt of court, defamation or incitement to an offence.”


I feel the act of the students and there leaders, plus

acceptance by intellectuals by branding subversive
and anti national activities, as liberty of free thinking
and free speech was an act of corrupting  students in social intelligence in which students are being easily tricked and manipulated into  ill-advised course of action, morals and understanding about the nation and what its people stand for.

Anyone supporting these people by thought, deed and influencing the students in their formative years and the masses, is not free thinking, but out right subversion though they may have worn a jacket of Free thinking. I also am of the view that such people should be treated by the same yardstick of subversion.

Its time I think Babus got down from their pseudo Moral horses and come to face the reality of this Nation..

An extract from Mr Mander's writings: You can see the subversion and misquoting here regarding who raised anti Nationalist and Treasonous slogans
 "if there were SOME Kashmiri students who did 
raise slogans expressing disaffection against India 
and in support of independence for Kashmir," 

This is bull shit and Mr. Mander knows it.

There is ample evidence and videos available as to  what happened at JNU, this babu has a different  agenda to follow, I do not know who has instigated  him to it. Though I must admit that this babus is using his tricks learnt as an IAS administrator to some  effect. He did fool politicians during his tenure but those tricks of an old horse will not work here where treason is on the anvil.

Extract:

However, it is important to add that even if there were SOME Kashmiri students who did raise slogans expressing disaffection against India and in support of independence for Kashmir, the fitting response to this would only have been open public debate in which students and teachers heard their views and challenged these, not to charge these students with the grave colonial crime of sedition that could result in their imprisonment for up to 10 years. Universities are places where young people must feel free to challenge the received wisdom of the times they live in. Their minds and hearts must be freed of the fetters of fear and the obligation to conform to powerful or dominant opinion. It is in universities that students the world over have fought colonialism, unjust wars, tyranny, hate and unequal social orders. Governments and indeed majority opinion may be pitted powerfully against their views, but a democracy requires the stout defense of their right to profess and debate these ideas, even by those who are opposed to these ideas. Universities in a democracy cannot be allowed to become places where the institution’s leadership allows police to walk in and arrest students at will, and where dissent by students or indeed teachers is demonized and criminalized.

It is for these reasons that I declared that if Kanhaiya Kumar is charged with sedition, I demand that I be tried for the same crime. And I know that I am not alone in this demand.

Harsh Mander IAS Babu: If JNU union leader is tried for sedition, I too should be charged with the same crime