NEW DELHI: Chief Minister MK Stalin on Wednesday condemned the slapping of sedition charges against eminent journalists and said that a democracy cannot survive if asking questions is treated as treason.

Expressing solidarity with journalists Siddharth Varadarajan and Karan Thapar of news website The Wire, who were booked under sedition provisions in the BJP-ruled Assam, Stalin said, "I strongly condemn the action of the police in issuing summons to the senior journalists.

"The summons has been issued despite the Supreme Court granting protection in a related matter only days earlier. No copy of the FIR and no particulars of the case have been furnished, leaving only the threat of arrest."

Calling out the misuse of Section 152 of the BNS as a substitute for the repealed sedition law to suppress independent journalism, Stalin said, "A democracy cannot survive if asking questions is treated as treason."