Does democratic India need more draconian laws than the ones under the British rule?

By Prabhakar Sinha*
Democratic India has far more draconian laws than the India under the British imperial rule. In fact, the Rowlatt Act whose opposition led to the massacre of more than a thousand men, women and children at the Jallianwala Bag is very mild and liberal compared to the Prevention of Terrorism Act, (POTA), 2002, Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA), 1985, Maintenance of Internal Security Act (MISA), 1971, Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), 1967, Armed Forces (Special Powers) Acts (AFSPA), 1958, and numerous other laws enacted by the Union and the State governments after Independence.
Under the Rowlatt Act thousands could not have been arrested indiscriminately as is done under the dreaded draconian laws enacted in the Republic of India. When a democratic government needs draconian laws, it means that it has ceased to be a government for the people and is engaged in serving a handful at the cost of the multitude leading to the need of an arsenal of draconian laws to suppress the protesting masses.
Would the people create such a situation for a government which serves them well as to warrant enactment of draconian laws for their own suppression? Such a course would be illogical and irrational. If there is a need for ruthless laws in our country, there has to be a reason.
The fact is that successive governments after Independence have been shamelessly violating the letter and spirit of the constitution and betraying the people to serve the rich causing anger and resentment. To take only a few examples, the constitution enjoins the State to 'minimise the inequalities in income' and 'eliminate the inequality of status, opportunity and facility' but the rulers have been maximising them.
The constitution enjoins the State to prevent concentration of wealth and the means of production into a few hands, but the rulers have been doing the opposite and have created a class of the rich and super rich. The constitution mandates the State to utilise the resources of the nation for the community, but the same is being gifted to the handful of the rich to make them richer.
The rich fund all the political parties and finance their leaders, and they all return the favour by employing the power of the State and resources of the nation to serve the interest of their benefactors at the cost of the people. They have reduced our democracy to a plutocracy (the rule of the rich) with the facade of democracy.
It is this plutocracy, which impels the government of the day to fill its arsenal with draconian laws to suppress the masses clamouring for the fulfilment of the dream which the politicians have sold them.
The people are helpless in forcing the government to implement the provisions in the constitution (mentioned above) because they have been made non-justiciable i.e. the courts cannot direct the State to implement them. All the provisions dealing with the welfare of the people have been placed in Part IV of the Constitution, which are non-justiciable.
Thus the people have been made helpless spectators of the usurpation of their rights and their future while the usurpers have been vesting themselves with ferocious laws to suppress them if they raise their voice against their betrayal.
Ours is a government of the people and by the people because it is elected by the people, but is not a government for the people because it serves a handful instead of the general public. It offers bouquet to its paymasters and lathis, bullets and prison to the rest. The draconian laws are needed to shut us in the prisons and ask us to shut up.
---
*Former national president, People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL). Source: PUCL Bulletin, March 2019

Comments

Plastic burning in homes threatens food, water and air across Global South: Study

By Jag Jivan In a groundbreaking study spanning 26 countries across the Global South , researchers have uncovered the widespread and concerning practice of households burning plastic waste as a fuel for cooking, heating, and other domestic needs. The research, published in Nature Communications , reveals that this hazardous method of managing both waste and energy poverty is driven by systemic failures in municipal services and the unaffordability of clean alternatives, posing severe risks to human health and the environment.

From protest to proof: Why civil society must rethink environmental resistance

By Shankar Sharma* As concerned environmentalists and informed citizens, many of us share deep unease about the way environmental governance in our country is being managed—or mismanaged. Our complaints range across sectors and regions, and most of them are legitimate. Yet a hard question confronts us: are complaints, by themselves, effective? Experience suggests they are not.

From colonial mercantilism to Hindutva: New book on the making of power in Gujarat

By Rajiv Shah Professor Ghanshyam Shah ’s latest book, “ Caste-Class Hegemony and State Power: A Study of Gujarat Politics ”, published by Routledge , is penned by one of Gujarat ’s most respected chroniclers, drawing on decades of fieldwork in the state. It seeks to dissect how caste and class factors overlap to perpetuate the hegemony of upper strata in an ostensibly democratic polity. The book probes the dominance of two main political parties in Gujarat—the Indian National Congress and the BJP—arguing that both have sustained capitalist growth while reinforcing Brahmanic hierarchies.

Economic superpower’s social failure? Inequality, malnutrition and crisis of India's democracy

By Vikas Meshram India may be celebrated as one of the world’s fastest-growing economies, but a closer look at who benefits from that growth tells a starkly different story. The recently released World Inequality Report 2026 lays bare a country sharply divided by wealth, privilege and power. According to the report, nearly 65 percent of India’s total wealth is owned by the richest 10 percent of its population, while the bottom half of the country controls barely 6.4 percent. The top one percent—around 14 million people—holds more than 40 percent, the highest concentration since 1961. Meanwhile, the female labour force participation rate is a dismal 15.7 percent.

Urgent need to study cause of large number of natural deaths in Gulf countries

By Venkatesh Nayak* According to data tabled in Parliament in April 2018, there are 87.76 lakh (8.77 million) Indians in six Gulf countries, namely Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). While replying to an Unstarred Question (#6091) raised in the Lok Sabha, the Union Minister of State for External Affairs said, during the first half of this financial year alone (between April-September 2018), blue-collared Indian workers in these countries had remitted USD 33.47 Billion back home. Not much is known about the human cost of such earnings which swell up the country’s forex reserves quietly. My recent RTI intervention and research of proceedings in Parliament has revealed that between 2012 and mid-2018 more than 24,570 Indian Workers died in these Gulf countries. This works out to an average of more than 10 deaths per day. For every US$ 1 Billion they remitted to India during the same period there were at least 117 deaths of Indian Workers in Gulf ...

Kolkata event marks 100 years since first Communist conference in India

By Harsh Thakor* A public assembly was held in Kolkata on December 24, 2025, to mark the centenary of the First Communist Conference in India , originally convened in Kanpur from December 26 to 28, 1925. The programme was organised by CPI (ML) New Democracy at Subodh Mallik Square on Lenin Sarani. According to the organisers, around 2,000 people attended the assembly.

Celebrating 125 yr old legacy of healthcare work of missionaries

Vilas Shende, director, Mure Memorial Hospital By Moin Qazi* Central India has been one of the most fertile belts for several unique experiments undertaken by missionaries in the field of education and healthcare. The result is a network of several well-known schools, colleges and hospitals that have woven themselves into the social landscape of the region. They have also become a byword for quality and affordable services delivered to all sections of the society. These institutions are characterised by committed and compassionate staff driven by the selfless pursuit of improving the well-being of society. This is the reason why the region has nursed and nurtured so many eminent people who occupy high positions in varied fields across the country as well as beyond. One of the fruits of this legacy is a more than century old iconic hospital that nestles in the heart of Nagpur city. Named as Mure Memorial Hospital after a British warrior who lost his life in a war while defending his cou...

The architect of Congolese liberation: The life and legacy of Patrice Lumumba

By Harsh Thakor* Patrice Émery Lumumba remains a central figure in the history of African decolonization, serving as the first Prime Minister of the independent Republic of the Congo. Born on July 2, 1925, Lumumba emerged as a radical anti-colonial leader who sought to unify a nation fractured by decades of Belgian rule. His tenure, however, lasted less than seven months before his dismissal and subsequent assassination on January 17, 1961.

Epic war against caste system is constitutional responsibility of elected government

Edited by well-known Gujarat Dalit rights leader Martin Macwan, the book, “Bhed-Bharat: An Account of Injustice and Atrocities on Dalits and Adivasis (2014-18)” (available in English and Gujarati*) is a selection of news articles on Dalits and Adivasis (2014-2018) published by Dalit Shakti Prakashan, Ahmedabad. Preface to the book, in which Macwan seeks to answer key questions on why the book is needed today: *** The thought of compiling a book on atrocities on Dalits and thus present an overall Indian picture had occurred to me a long time ago. Absence of such a comprehensive picture is a major reason for a weak social and political consciousness among Dalits as well as non-Dalits. But gradually the idea took a different form. I found that lay readers don’t understand numbers and don’t like to read well-researched articles. The best way to reach out to them was storytelling. As I started writing in Gujarati and sharing the idea of the book with my friends, it occurred to me that while...

Search This Blog