Sen can be accused of sedition only if there's direct incitement: Jethmalani

BILASPUR: Civil rights activist Dr Binayak Sen found a new lawyer to defend him in the Chhattisgarh high court — Ram Jethmalani — a month after he was sentenced to life by a Raipur sessions court.
The lawyer and an eight-member delegation of European Union arrived at the Raipur airport on Sunday night to slogans of "go back" by a hostile crowd that included activists of Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarathi Parishad, the student wing of BJP.
Jethmalani is the party’s Rajya Sabha MP."This constitutes interference in the judicial process and causing public prejudice to my client," argued Jethmalani in the HC at Bilaspur on Monday afternoon.
He pointed out that even the SC had granted Binayak Sen bail when he was being tried for the more serious charge of waging a war against the state, a charge under which he now stands acquitted.
"Grant of bail is a rule, denial is an exception," contended Jethmalani, also pointing out Binayak Sen’s record of good conduct. He referred to the judgment in Kedarnath versus State of Bihar, 1962, in which the SC ruled that sedition is committed only when there is a direct incitement to violence or an attempt to lead to public disorder.
"Disloyalty to the government is not the same as disapprobation,” argued Jethmalani. "We all criticise the government for corruption".
He further argued, "The letters are innocuous and have nothing to do with sedition", referring to the three letters allegedly found on Kolkata businessman Piyush Guha. The police claimed that Guha had confessed the letters had been written by jailed Maoist ideologue Narayan Sanyal, who gave them to Binayak Sen during their meetings in the jail. "This (Guha’s purported statement) is wholly inadmissible as evidence," said Jethmalani. "It is a surmise or hearsay".
He argued that any charges must be backed up by particulars of time, place and manner in which the offence was committed. "Before you charge a person with sedition, you have to tell the manner (in which sedition was carried out).. What did you (Binayak Sen) say or what did you do (that amounted to sedition)," he said.
On December 24, award winning doctor and vice president of People’s Union of Civil Liberties, Dr Binayak Sen had been sentenced to life term, along with Guha and Sanyal, after Raipur sessions court pronounced them guilty of participating in a criminal conspiracy to commit sedition.