Statements about making Tamil Nadu a separate country will not amount to sedition in today’s social context, the Madras High Court has said. Instead, a person making such a comment will be viewed as having mental health issues, it observed.
Such a statement can at best cause “annoyance and therefore, in the present social milieu, the mere publication of that sentence cannot be considered as inciting hatred against the nation” or the Indian government, the bench of Justice D Bharatha Chakravarthy said in a June 29 ruling.
The observation was made while quashing a sedition case against two publishers. They had been booked under Section 124 of the Indian Penal Code in 2019. In 2022, the Supreme Court ordered proceedings and criminal prosecutions for sedition under the section to be kept in abeyance.
The publishers had moved the High Court challenging the case, which was pending before a magistrate court.
The matter pertains to a book released in 2014 by publishing house Kalagam Pathipppagam, which is run by the petitioners. The book was authored by a separate person who had died while the case was being heard.
The book allegedly stated that in 1967, one Tamizharasan had proclaimed in Coimbatore that Tamil Nadu should be a separate nation, and guerrilla warfare should be...
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