FIRST AMENDMENT PROJECT PART-2

CASE 1 : Romesh Thapar v. State of Madras

Facts of the case –
The petitioner was CROSS ROADS (English journal) – editor , printer and
Publisher.

Cross Roads was printed and published in Bombay and was considered a left
leaning journal, very critical of a number of the policies of the Nehruvian
government.

The Madras government had declared the communist parties illegal.

The Government of Madras, in exercise of their powers under section 9(1-A) of the
Madras Maintenance of Public Order Act, 1949 claimed to issue an order No.
MS.1333 dated 1st March 1950, within which/by which they forced on people a
ban upon the entry and circulation of the journal in that State. Romesh Thapar
approached the (most powerful/better than anyone or anything else) with a (taking
a court case to a higher court for review) that his freedom of speech and expression
(promised that something will definitely happen or that something will definitely
work as described) under Article 19(1)(a) was violated by this ban.
Section 9(1-A) authorised the (related to a local area) Government "for the purpose
of securing the public safety or the maintenance of public order, to prohibit or
control the entry into or the circulation, sale or distribution in the Area of
control/area of land of Madras or any part of that/of it of any document or class of
document

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QUESTION -
1. Whether Sec. 9 (1-a) of the Madras Maintenance of Public Order Act was saved
by Art. 19(2) ?
2. Art. 19(2) did not contain the phrase ‘public safety’ or ‘public order’, the
question was whether it could fall under the language of Art. 19(2) and be
considered a "law relating to any matter which undermines the security of or tends
to overthrow the State"
*serenity : state of being calm or tranquil
Government argued that the expression "public safety" in the Act, which is a
statute relating to law and order, means the security of the Province, and, therefore,
"the security of the State" within the meaning of article 19(2) as "the State" has
been defined in article 12 as including, among other things, the Government and
the Legislature of each of the erstwhile Provinces.

Decision -
The court stated that the ban would prima facie** constitute a clear violation of the
fundamental right of freedom of speech and expression unless it could be shown
that the restriction was saved by the exceptions provided by Art. 19(2) of the
Constitution .
"unless a law restricting freedom of speech and expression is directed solely
against the undermining of the security of the State or the overthrow of it, such law
cannot fall within the reservation under clause (2) of article 19, although the
restrictions which it seeks to impose may have been conceived generally in the
interests of public order.
It follows that section 9(1-A) which authorises imposition of restrictions for the
wider purpose of securing public safety or the maintenance of public order falls
outside the scope of authorised restrictions under clause (2), and is therefore void
and unconstitutional.
* AIR 1950 SC 124
** Prima facie

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CASE - 2. Brij Bhushan v. State of Bihar :
FACTS OF THE CASE :
Chief Commissioner of Delhi passed an order under section 7(1)(c) of the East
Punjab Public Safety Act, 1949 against an English weekly of Delhi called the
Organizer.

The commissioner had issued the order against the organizer for printing
inflammatory materials with respect to the partition. As per the order, the editor of
the Organizer had to submit for scrutiny, before publication, all communal matter
and news and views about Pakistan including photographs and cartoons other than
those derived from official sources or supplied by the news agencies, viz., Press
Trust of India, United Press of India and United Press of America.

The Question arose:

Whether this order of pre-censorship could be held to be constitutionally valid.

Decision :
This decision was delivered on the same day as the Romesh Thapar case and the
majority in this case referred to their decision in Thapar’s case and concurred with
the findings in the Thapar case.

The key factor in both the decision was the fact that the phrase ‘public order’ was
not included in Art. 19(2) and that the courts interpreted restrictions on freedom of
speech and expression as being legitimate only if they pertained to "undermining
the security of the state or overthrowing the state". Mere criticism of the
government could not be considered as speech which could be restricted for the
purposes of Art. 19(2).

2. Friendly relation with foreign states :

If the freedom of speech and expression tends to risk the friendly relation of India
with other state then state may impose reasonable restriction on it .

By the Constitution first amendment act 1951 this was added.

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HYPOTHESIS
The following suggestions can be made with regard to reasonable restrictions
under Indian constitution in this connection :

.- Freedom of press may be inserted as a specific basic right under

Article 19 of the Constitution of India.

- Limits/guidelines of freedom of press should be clearly set aside.

- Information must be available at a low-priced cost within specified, definite

and reasonable time-limits.

- Free press should not violate right to privacy of an individual.

- Free press must be law enforcing and (serving to stop something bad before it
happens) of crime.

- Rule of law must be followed by the free press.

- Influence through free press upon the (related to judges and the court system)
should not be exercised

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CONCLUSION
In (system or country where leaders are chosen by votes), the Government cannot
function unless the people are well informed and free to participate in public issues
by having the widest choice of other choice solutions of the problems that come
up.
Articles and news are published in the press from time to time to expose the
weaknesses of the governments. The daily newspaper and the daily news on
electronic media are practically the only material which most people read and
watch.
The people can, therefore, be given the full scope for thought and discussion on
public matter, if only the newspapers and electronic media are freely allowed to
represent different points of views, including those of the (fighting force/bad
feelings), without any control from the Government.
'Hence we can figure out that Freedom of press is necessary for proper democratic
functioning but at the same time it is extremely important too to have reasonable
restriction on these freedom .

REFRENCES
 Romesh Thapar v. State of Madras : AIR 1950 SC 12
 Brij Bhushan v. State of Bihar
 Babulal Parate v. State of Mharashtra : ( 1961) 3 SCR 423