“Congress always enjoyed using sedition law…”: Union Home Minister Amit Shah

Amit Shah also said that various exercises are underway for inter-pillar integration.

Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Thursday said that whenever Congress was in power, it always enjoyed using sedition law against those who criticised them but whenever they were in opposition, they demanded the repeal of the said act on the pretext of it being a colonial law.

Replying to the debate in Rajya Sabha on three new criminal bills that were passed in Rajya Sabha, Amit Shah said, “I have been anti-Congress since childhood, maybe due to my ‘Sanskaars’. Even before joining this ideology, I never liked Congress but I used to observe them. Whenever they were in power, they used to implement Section 124A with fun and whenever they were out of power, they used to say 124A is a colonial law and should be repealed. But again, after coming into power, they used to impose 124A.” Amit Shah further stated that Congress, in reality, never wanted to abolish the sedition law.

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“It is under the BJP and Modi government that we have gotten rid of this sedition act forever. Our constitution allows us to speak against the government. There is no crime against it. I am happy that this law has been abolished, a law that sent Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Mahatma Gandhi, and Veer Savarkar to jail,” Amit Shah said.

The Rajya Sabha passed the three criminal bills–The Bharatiya Nyaya (Second) Sanhita, 2023; The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha (Second) Sanhita, 2023; and The Bharatiya Sakshya (Second) Bill, 2023–replacing the IPC, the CrPC and the Evidence Act. The bills were earlier passed by the Lok Sabha.

Amit Shah also said that various exercises are underway for inter-pillar integration.

“82 percent of the work on the integration of various databases has been completed before the passage of new criminal law bills. 18 percent will be completed within a year,” he said.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah also said that over 70,000 people were killed due to terrorism on account of the Congress government’s wrong policies.

The word sedition has been completely removed from the new bill.

IPC Section 124A talks about ‘against the Government’ but Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita Section 152 talks about ‘sovereignty or unity and integrity of India’.

There was no mention of ‘intent or purpose’ in the IPC, but in the new law, there is mention of ‘intent’ in the definition of treason, which provides safeguards for freedom of expression.

“For the first time in history,” Shah said, these bills were made by India and approved by the Indian Parliament for Indians.”.

The Bill will free people from a colonial mindset, as the British government considered protections against treason and treasury more important than murder or atrocities against women, said the Minister.