Police action in Mumbai with regard to the arrest of two girls for venting their feelings in Facebook posts about the city virtually shutting down in the wake of the death of Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray is a knee-jerk reaction that was far too excessive.
To use provisions of the Information Technology Act to tackle what was in effect an innocent comment on the way of life in a metropolis was harsh and unnecessary.
At a time when the law is doing its best to catch up with the complications of the Internet, too many users of social networking sites are seen getting into trouble over the posting of comments. While the laws of libel must surely apply to people who use microblogging sites like Twitter without quite understanding the implications of intruding into other people’s rights, penalising youngsters for a general social comment just goes to show how sensitive politicians and political parties are getting.
Freedom of speech is a noble principle that must be nourished in democracies so long as it does not impinge on other people by maligning them in a medium that is divided by only a thin line from public discourse. The UK has shown how to deal with the increasing malicious use of the social media without taking away the right to freedom of speech. Where we seem to go wrong is to see official India react in only those situations that impinge on politicians. We suffer only because we live under a crushing VIP culture that shows no tolerance.