COMEDY, FREE SPEECH, AND THE LAW

The quality of the content offered by influencers of our time might often be questionable. Yet, it is one thing to acknowledge this issue, and quite another to call for a law to 'set it right'

- KALEESWARAM RAJ

T'S the prerogative of the legislature to make laws or not. Law is not a solution for every unethical act in human conduct, which would need a social or cultural diagnosis and appropriate remedies. For example, one is not punished for ingratitude, for it is only a moral wrong and not a penal offence. If a person tells a lie to their spouse, unless it contains penal ingredients, they are not punished. Bad Samaritans cannot be prosecuted for being bad. Such instances of moral wrongs are numerous in human life.

When it comes to freedom of speech and expression, legislation is a more serious business. Free speech is a constitutional guarantee under Article 19(1)(a). This can only be subjected to reasonable restrictions as indicated in Article 19(2) of the Constitution. Whether a law restrictive of free speech is reasonable or not is for the constitutional court to decide. Given the scheme of things, the court asking other branches of the state to enact restrictive legislation is bound to be inherently problematic. It negates Montesquieu's age-old idea of the separation of powers.

The Supreme Court called for a law on digital content when YouTuber Ranveer Allahbadia challenged the multiple cases against him in different parts of the country. The court's demand for restrictive laws renders the constitutional scheme under Article 19 nugatory, as this writer has previously noted in an earlier piece (TNIE, March 12, 2025).