BLASPHEMY LAWS AND RELIGIOUS SENSITIVITIES: WHETHER ALTERATION DESIRED OR NOT?

[Vol 2/ Issue 2/ Dec 2016 ISSN 2394 -9295]

ABSTRACT

Religion as defined and accepted universally, can be said as the beliefs of the people, behaviour of people, ethics followed by the people, and as the faith of the people in the supernatural powers or the supernatural being(s). But no two person existing can be expected to be alike in matters of belief, behaviour, or ethics. Every person existing have right to believe what he/she finds to be appropriate, and if his/her beliefs are different from any other person or a community of person then that cannot be considered as a crime. Blasphemy law though might have aimed to provide relief to the people but in the present scenario they have created a lot of mischief around the globe. These laws are being mishandled by some of the people in the society which has created a havoc.

The present blasphemy laws though only punish those who show insult or a feeling of disgrace towards once religion but at the same time these laws do not provide the ambit of the words „insult‟ and „disgrace‟. Due to the non-disclosure of the ambit, these laws are vague, subjective and also inconsistent laws. At the same time, they also violates some of the very basic fundamental rights of the people. The article does not aim for defunct of the blasphemy laws but for alteration in the laws so that these laws may be universally accepted and also on the same hand, these may benefit the society at large instead of creating a mayhem.

Key words: Blasphemy, India, Constitution

BLASPHEMY

An essential attribution of national freedom is the right of the people to give to themselves a Constitution of their choice- a Constitution most suited to their genius, ethos and aspiration ⁱ. One such freedom provided by the Constitution of any country is Freedom of Expression and Freedom to Religion. Blasphemy laws are not the way out for tackling the cases of freedom of expression and religious sensitivities because of multiple reasons. There have been magnitudes of cases which prove that blasphemy laws are subjective, inconsistent and absurd, and are therefore not the way for tackling the aforesaid cases.

Blasphemy is an act of insulting or showing a feeling of disgrace for gods of any religion, to a holy or religious person, sacred or religious things, towards something considered to be sacred or religious. While Blasphemy laws are a way of limiting freedom of expression, opinion and speech relating to blasphemy, some people and religions consider blasphemy as a religious crime. Blasphemy laws are also known as hate speech laws in some countries. Blasphemy laws provide remedy to those people or group of people who feel insulted by the act or words of a person against their religion. These laws work as a procedure to forbid or ban the religious insult, defamation of religion, contempt of religion or religious feelings. Many countries do not have any law existing against blasphemy or hate speech while in some countries firmly established blasphemy laws are no longer executed. The last person to be guilty for the act of blasphemy in Great Britain was in 1697ⁱⁱ while in the United States of America in 1952ⁱⁱⁱ. In some of the jurisdictions, blasphemy laws are said to be a ―Dead letter i.e. they are no longer enforceable by law but are there in the law. For example in Hong Kong, Japan, and Taiwan blasphemy laws are said to be a dead letter. Every country has their own separate blasphemy laws or hate speech laws and accordingly have their own punishment for the offenders of blasphemy. Some countries have very rigorous punishments for the act of blasphemy; for example: a Pakistani child was arrested in Islamabad by Pakistani police and can face death penalty for the act of blasphemy, who supposedly disrespected the pages of Quran by burning them^iv. Another example would be when a person advocated secular reforms between religious and state authorities in Saudi Arabia and for this he was prosecuted for insulting Islam‘ and sentenced to 10 years of jail, 10 years of travel ban, and 1,000 lashes^v. While some countries have lax punishments for blasphemy; for instance: Supreme court of India found a person guilty of insulting religious beliefs of Roman Catholics, therefore he was sentenced to pay a fine of Rs. 200/- and in default of payment of fine, to undergo simple imprisonment for one month^vi. Blasphemy laws or hate speech laws helps in protecting religious beliefs and practices from the criticism or questions of the people about one‘s own religion. For example, a person was prosecuted for publishing of a report at a conference on the topic ―is God Dead? which quoted some statements like ―We must write God off entirely and that ―[God] is beginning to stink ^vii.

From a research made in 2012 it was found that 44 countries including countries in Middle East and North Africa, America, Asia, Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa have blasphemy. According to a research, it was found that three-in-ten countries in the world had a high or very high level of government restrictions in 2012, while these countries included around 64% of the world‘s population. Pakistan‘s blasphemy laws had their origin in the country‘s colonial time, when British colonial rulers for the first time introduced penalties for insulting religious beliefs. These laws remained in effect till Pakistan‘s independence in 1947 and have increased in extremity since its independence. In America, blasphemy laws existed in eleven out of thirty five countries including Bahamas, where the

publication or even sale of blasphemous material is punishable for up to two years of imprisonment. There does not exist any federal blasphemy laws in America but several states still had anti-blasphemy laws on the books as of 2012. In sub-Saharan Africa only three of forty eight countries have blasphemy laws. They are least common in the sub-Saharan Africa as of 2012. Anti-slavery activists in Mauritania were charged and imprisoned for blasphemy after publicly burning religious texts to denounce what the activist viewed as support for slavery in Islamic commentary and jurisprudence.

Freedom of expression is a fundamental right that shall be practised by every individual. Freedom of expression is protected by article 19 of UDHR (Universal Declaration of Human Right) and ICCPR (International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights). UDHR and ICCPR are some of the milestone documents in the history of human rights. These documents are drafted by representatives of different legal and cultural backgrounds from all nations of world while they contain common standards of achievement for all the people and all nations. ―According to the Universal Declaration of Human Right, freedom of expression is the right of every individual to hold opinion without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers .

Freedom of religion is another right guaranteed by article 18 of UDHR (Universal Declaration of Human Right) and ICCPR (International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights). According to the Universal Declaration of Human Right, ―Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practise, worship, and observance .

These fundamental rights are protected by International Human rights instruments. A blasphemy law in practise prohibits the freedom of expression when it comes to the offering of criticism, asking of questions, making an expression of mockery or contempt or ridicule or sarcasm, in any way relating to any religion. A person was found guilty because his newspaper published James Kirkup‘s poem ―The Love that Dares to Speak its Name , which supposedly vilified Christ and his life^viii. A blasphemy law criminalizes these expressions of mockery or contempt, asking of questions and therefore offend against the fundamental rights guaranteed by International human rights framework. Every religious institution or religious group or any religious person should be open to hearing of some reasonable criticism against their religion just like the other existing groups in the society. Religion is an imagination which defers from person to person and group to group so if a person or a group have their own kind of imagination which goes against the imagination of another person or group then it ain‘t a crime. A person shall not be guilty just for having a different kind of imagination or thoughts for a religion and there is no fundamental right which guarantees not to be offended in one‘s religious feelings or that not to put up any question against the religious feelings of a person. For example:

some Christians may find it ―blasphemous to say that Jesus was merely an ordinary human being while on the other hand some Muslims may find it ―blasphemous to consider that Jesus was Nazareth

―the son of god .

Both the religions have their own kind of imagination therefore neither of them can be said to be guilty of blasphemy until and unless they are proved wrong. But according to the current blasphemy law or hate speech laws, both religions have committed blasphemy and therefore such laws are not justifiable. Moreover if a person believes in a religion eternally and truthfully, then he/she need not prove it to someone else in the society just for the sake of making them believe in his or her religion. As an example, a women was forced to hide after an angry mob rushed into Farooqi Girls‘ High School in the city of Lahore just because she wrote something derogatory references to the Muslim Prophet Mohammad in a piece of homework^ix. Criticism of a religion means insult of the religion but in prohibiting the insult of a religion means prohibiting all types of enquiry and evaluation in relating to religion. But if we prohibit criticism we extremely violate the freedom of speech of the vilifier. Only if a person believes that his religion is genuine then he/she need not shield his or her religion from criticism or insult of the other people and also shielding a religion is not a social good. We can also assume that some criticism also helps the religious philosopher improve theism. While criticism also helps in removing or moulting the unlawful practices carried out in the name of religion. For example: sati practise that took place in India for a long period of time. While even if any action is meant to be taken then it should be only taken against those criticisms which are proved inaccurate and are supported with some reasonable evidences. While those criticisms which are proved to be correct should be heard for sake of correcting the flaws in the religious feelings of the religious communities. A person shall not be punished just for the sake that he passed any comment about the religion or he put up a question on the religious feeling of a person.

With the violation of freedom of expression, blasphemy laws also violates Right to equality which is another fundamental right guaranteed by International Human Rights Instruments. Right to equality refers to equality in the eyes of law, discarding any unfairness on grounds of caste, race, religion, place of birth, and sex. Equality before law means that state cannot refuse to provide equality before the law and equal defence of the law to any person within the territories of India. So when we charge a person for blasphemy then we violate his right to equality because we don‘t give him equality in law as these laws are subjective and inconsistent laws. When a person is charged for an offence of blasphemy then his right to equality gets violated because like the other people of the society the person accused of blasphemy is not allowed to express his views in the society.

Another issue that can be brought forward is that existing blasphemy laws and hate speech laws at the bottom are unpleasant laws i.e. these laws are vague, subjective and inconsistent laws. Blasphemy

laws are very vague in nature i.e. they can be interpreted in many ways. For example: a person who calls for the reform or revocation of blasphemy laws, have sometimes been accused for act of blasphemy. Another such example was, a girl was accused for posting a comment on Facebook against Bal Thackeray‘s funeral and also her friend was accused for liking the comment^x. In Gujarat, a person was arrested because of his Facebook post aggravated Muslims to go on riots^xi. Many people also use these laws for achieving their political goals. Some of the countries have poor blasphemy laws while some countries have very extreme blasphemy laws. There is no balance in constitution of these laws, every country have a different way to interpret these laws. Another example in concern of the matter is that, a woman was arrested by the police just because she distributed pamphlets declaring herself as a prophet^xii. All these examples proves that these laws apart from being too vague are also illusory which makes them unreliable in the eyes law and that is the main reason that these laws are so much prone to be abused by people for their own benefits. Whereas United States Commission on International Religious Freedom(USCIRF) has found that blasphemy charges often are based on false accusations and used for political purposes (as mentioned above), and aggravates discrimination, violence and most importantly religious intolerance. In 2014, a Muslim human right attorney was assassinated for defending someone accused for blasphemy^xiii. In some of the blasphemy or hate speech cases, the accusation is entirely malicious, based on rumours or planted evidences.

Another issue is that many countries, which practice blasphemy or hate speech laws especially those with strict blasphemy laws, tend to face problems of religious persecution and mob violence. Religious persecution is the treatment of individual or group of individuals as a response to their religious beliefs, religious practices or lack of religious beliefs in an individual or group of individuals. Religious persecution is just the opposite of freedom to religion and therefore is another reason that violates the freedom to religion. Religious persecution has resulted in extreme level of violence in many countries. Religious persecutions have taken place since the ancient period and in different contexts. Until the 18^th century, some groups of people were nearly universally persecuted for their views about religion, such as Atheists, Jews, and Zoroastrians^xiv. While mob violence refers to disturbance of peace by several persons, assembled and acting with a common intent in executing a lawful or unlawful enterprise in a violent and turbulent manner. Mob violence, riot, rout, unlawful assembly all are related offences but differ from each other. But when we talk legally, mob violence is practically synonymous with riots. For example, the burning of Christian‘s properties and murder of Christians by mobs of Muslim men in Pakistan, such as this incident which took place in 2009 that left

6 people dead, which usually follow unlikely, malicious, unsourced rumours that someone has desecrated the Koran.

With the above mentioned argument, it can be clearly shown that blasphemy laws or hate speech laws are not the way out for tackling the cases of Freedom of Expression and Religious Sensitivities. Even if we follow blasphemy laws, then atleast three basic fundamental rights will be violated and that are freedom to expression, freedom to equality, and freedom to religion itself, which in turn impairs the other rights of the individual or group of individuals of the society. One may also even find contradiction when it is said that blasphemy laws are meant to protect a religion as they obstruct a person freedom to religion. There are so many religions in existence, the people following any of these religions need to understand and tolerate the feelings of others following the same religion or any other religion. As Voltaire one said, ―I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it . It‘s better to criminalise those offenders of law who take the laws in their own hand and punish the people who commit the offence of blasphemy. The criminal procedure code should be applied to these people instead of those who commit blasphemy. The ambit of these blasphemy laws is wide and at same point also very vague. Many people use these blasphemy laws in a direction which is not mentioned in these laws itself such as a high profile case that took place in which a Christian woman was sentenced to death for the offence of blasphemy in 2010. The incident took place in 2009 where the woman was harvesting berries with a group of Muslim women, and was then accused by them for drinking from the same water bowl as them. Those Muslim women went to a local cleric and alleged that the Christian woman has blasphemed against Islam^xv. Also the former governor of Punjab (Salman Taseer) and the Federal Minister for Minorities (Shahbaz Bhatti) were assassinated as they stood for the Christian woman. By this case we can clearly say that blasphemy laws are not clear in their use as we saw in the above mentioned case that a woman was just charged for blasphemy because she drank water from the same bowl which was used by the Muslim women to have water. Therefore we can say that blasphemy laws are not the way out. Some alternative laws for blasphemy should be introduced. There utilization and misutilization should be clearly specified with the. There ambit should not be as vague as compared to the current blasphemy laws. The new laws should be clear, specific, and consistent with how the today‘s world understand and perceive religion. If a suggestion was to be made then, the blasphemy laws should be so revised that they are accepted and appreciated globally. As Charles de Montesquieu has rightly said, ―In the state of nature, all men are born equal but they cannot continue in this equality. Society makes them lose it, and they recover it only by the protection of the law ^xvi. Hence, the blasphemy laws should seek to provide equality to individuals before religions instead of becoming a means for causing hardship to individuals.

REFERENCES:

1 The Constitution of India

ii Thomas Aikenhead

iii Joseph Burstyn, Inc. v. Wilson, 343 U.S. 495 (1952)

iv Katie Hunt and Nasir Habib

v Raif Badwai Saudi Arabia

vi The state of Mysore v. Henry Rodrigues AND Anr.

vii Merrett, Christopher Edmond (1994). A Culture of Censorship: Secrecy and Intellectual Repression in South Africa.

viii Brett Humphreys: The Laws That Dared to Lay the Blame

ix Lahore‟s „blasphemy‟ teacher in hiding

x http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/two-girls-held-for-fb-post-over-thackeray- funeral/article4111814.ece

xihttp://deshgujarat.com/2014/09/27/internet-banned-in-vadodara-for-three-days/ xii“Pakistani Woman arrested for declaring herself a Prophet”

xiiiRashid Rehman case

xiv Hinnells, John R. (1996).Zoroastrians in Britain: the Ratanbai Katrak lectures, University of oxford 1985.

xv Asia Bibi‟s case

xvi Montesquieu, The Spirit of Laws, Bk. VI, Ch.