He is the same guy who published the article "Why I can’t pay tribute to Thackeray"[1] in national news paper The Hindu.
I request OP to edit the title from 'smart judge' to 'former supreme court judge', which makes the HNers know that that articles is worthy of their time and attention.
And also I didn't understand 'Smart Judge'
And, to be clear, it has no connection with http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4800856 at all. (I suspect some may have voted it up because of confusion with the other recent India/judicial corruption/etc issue.)
A popular leader died. The city was closed down. A 21 year old woman posted on fb about people dying everyday and the vanity of closing down the city. Her friend liked it. Both of them were arrested for hate speech.
> In US terms, Judge Rehnquist just wrote to the Washington Post with a letter titled "Fuck You, You Fascists"
Am I reading this wrong?
You are reading it wrong. The posted open letter is to the Chief Minister of the state, stating that the arrest was unconstitutional and if the state doesn't take the cops to task, he will have to resort to legal means.
I don't see why it is a bad thing. I did not weigh any positives & negatives, but in India, TV needs to be properly censored. Many political parties have their own News Channels where they twist facts and make own party a hero. There is an example of Sakshi in Andhra Pradesh.
This really needs an attention. And I think by brining TV into PCI, I guess he is trying to attempt to scrub bogus self-promotion of political parties.
We have news channels in the US which twist facts and make their own party a hero as well. One thing you won't find us calling for is censorship. Censorship for "someone's own good" doesn't work in practice. Work on education instead.
We don't in the UK, because we have complicated impatiality laws (if you mention a candidate in an election, you have to mention all the others, and you can have broadcast licenses revoked for being biased - I'm simplifying, but it's a real law. Some students at my old university radio station nearly got the MW license revoked for being dismissive/rude about candidates that they didn't like, and not mentioning everyone.)
On the other hand, we have a rabidly partisan print media instead, which is now moving onto the internet (daily mail, guardian, etc).
The judge's name is Markandey Katju. I'm not sure how politics and political warfare works in India. Maybe someone who knows about that can enlighten us?
> I'm not sure how politics and political warfare works in India. Maybe someone who knows about that can enlighten us?
He is a former judge of Supreme Court(the highest court in India for the unfamiliar) and Chairman of Press Council of India. Being a former judge means he has a good understanding of legal system's letter and spirit, and being the Chairman of Press Council of India means he can rattle the cage quite easily.
The way freedom of speech and expression works here is you have it if you can enforce it. He is among the 5%(owing to his position) who can safely speak their mind without goons ransacking his house.
And his ultimatum to the CM mentions legal means. The CM(Chief Minister of a state) will have to act as he too knows very well that the ultimatum isn't vain and will most likely would be followed through. Also, the cops have a very weak case. Press is saying they have reliable information that the bigger dogs aren't happy with the way cops made the arrest.
Basically, if this guy has any intentions of actually following through(and he isn't just going to forget about it after 10 days), he has the means to make the government take action on the cops.
He is the same guy who published the article "Why I can’t pay tribute to Thackeray"[1] in national news paper The Hindu.
I request OP to edit the title from 'smart judge' to 'former supreme court judge', which makes the HNers know that that articles is worthy of their time and attention. And also I didn't understand 'Smart Judge'
[1] http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/why-i-cant-pay-tribute...