No legislative vacuum with regard to hate speech, notes SC

• The Supreme Court made it clear that it will not step into the role of a lawmaker on the issue of hate speech.

• A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta noted that hate speech is already covered under existing provisions, and therefore, there is no legislative vacuum that requires judicial intervention.

• Hate speech has not been defined in any law in India.

• The Supreme Court delivered its verdict on a batch of petitions, including those seeking a direction to the Centre to examine the existing legal framework governing hate speech and rumour-mongering, and to take necessary steps to effectively address and regulate it by way of a legislation.

• The existing statutory framework contains adequate provisions to address acts that promote enmity, hatred, or disturb public order.

• Hate speech is “fundamentally antithetical” to the constitutional value of fraternity and strikes at the moral fabric of our republic, the SC bench underlined.

• The mere occurrence of incidents of hate speech cannot lead to the conclusion that the law is silent on the subject. 

• More often than not, the difficulty lies in the effective enforcement and application of the existing statutory framework. 

• The court, in exercise of its constitutional jurisdiction, cannot create or expand criminal offences or prescribe punishments in the absence of legislative sanction. Any such exercise would transgress the settled doctrine of separation of powers and encroach upon the legislative domain, the judges noted.

What is hate speech?

• There is no international legal definition of hate speech. The term hate speech is understood as any kind of communication in speech, writing or behaviour that attacks or uses pejorative or discriminatory language with reference to a person or a group on the basis of who they are, in other words, based on their religion, ethnicity, nationality, race, colour, descent, gender or other identity factor. This generates intolerance and hatred and, in certain contexts, can be demeaning and divisive. 

• Hate speech incites violence and undermines social cohesion and tolerance. 

• Incitement is a very dangerous form of speech, because it explicitly and deliberately aims at triggering discrimination, hostility and violence, which may also lead to or include terrorism or atrocity crimes. 

• Hate speech not only affects the specific individuals and groups targeted, but societies at large.

• The escalation from hate speech to violence has played a significant role in the most horrific and tragic crimes of the modern age, from the antisemitism driving the Holocaust, to the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. 

• The Internet and social media have turbocharged hate speech, enabling it to spread like wildfire across borders. 

• If left unchecked, hate speech can even harm peace and development, as it lays the ground for conflicts and tensions and wide scale human rights violations.