HC relief for Vaiko in sedition case

Justice PD Audikesavalu granted the relief on the appeal Vaiko moved challenging his conviction and imprisonment ordered by the special court for MPs and MLAs cases here on July 5.

Justice Audikesavalu also refused to impose a condition restraining Vaiko from making such speeches against the sovereignty of the State as sought by public prosecutor A Natarajan. Instead, the judge asked Vaiko’s counsel G Devadoss to advise him to be responsible while making public speeches pending disposal of the appeal.

The special court had found him guilty under Section 124A (Sedition) of the IPC for his speech on July 15, 2009, while releasing Naan Kutram Saatugiren, the Tamil version of his English book I accuse, on the Sri Lankan issue. Special judge J Shanthi had conceded to the prosecution submission that Vaiko’s speech made in support of the banned LTTE in 2009 was against the Indian government, attracting the offence of sedition. After pronouncing the judgement, the judge suspended the sentence for a month to enable Vaiko to appeal against the conviction in the High Court.

In his plea, Vaiko submitted that a decisive ingredient for establishing the offence of sedition was to bring hatred or contempt to the government established by law in India. In this case, there was not even a suggestion that he did anything against the Centre or the State governments. For that matter, the charges framed against him did not contain any averment that he did anything against the government, he contended.

Noting that the trial court had convicted and sentenced him based only on presumption, Vaiko assailed the verdict terming it perverse, as the reliance were made on the facts which are not proved by any evidence or even by material produced before the court, “but based on the personal view of the trial judge”. “The words I spoke must be judged objectively and from standards reasonable to strong minded, firm and courageous men and not those of weak and vacillating minds. Otherwise, the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression will be in jeopardy and will remain only in paper,” Vaiko said.

On July 11, Vaiko and six others were elected unopposed in the biennial elections to Rajya Sabha from Tamil Nadu.