In this episode, we take a look at the murder of a tribal woman that has refueled decades old tensions in Odisha.

We also talk about how India has been drawn into the investigation of Australia's deadliest March shooting in recent memory.

But we begin today with Karnataka's new hate speech law.

Hi, I'm Acha Sharma and you're listening to Three Things the Indian Express New show.

Last week, the Karnataka government tabled a legislation in the state Assembly aimed at tackling hate speech, titled the Karnataka Hate Speech and Hate Crimes Prevention Bill of twenty twenty five.

The bill says its objective is to curb and prevent dissemination, publication or promotion of hate speech, while also providing adequate compensation to the injured victims.

The bill also proposes tringent punishments, including imprisonment of up to ten years, and grants the government the power to block or take down online content that is deemed to be hate speech.

It is these sweeping powers, along with a much broader definition of hate speech, that have raised concerns among critics, who fear the law could be misused by the government to understand what the bill entails.

My colleague Shashankdhargev speaks to The Indian Express's legal affairs editor Apura Vishwanath.

I suppose it's fair to say that hate speech has unfortunately become part of much of our online and political discourse, and we've seen more and more of it over the past few years.

So can you tell us how the law currently tackles this issue.

So you know, we don't have one specific law that deals with hate speech because it's also a difficult thing to categorize and box in a sense, right, So what we have is a cluster of provisions in the Indian Penal Code now the Bartinia san Hitda which deal with specific aspects.

And these are the provisions that are invoked essentially to tackle hate speech.

So these sections.

Provision speech that outrage religious feelings or say damage a place of worship or trespass in public burial ground or and also what are deliberately intended to hurt the religious sentiments of an individual.

So broadly, hate speech is around religion the way we define it.

And talk about how this new bill defines hate speech, because in any law of the way you define things ends up determining how it will be used.

Right, So how is this bill defining hate speech?

So what's interesting about this Karnataka bill on hate speech is that they're looking at a more expansive definition of hate speech.

Right, so they're looking at not just religion, but cast, sex, place of birth.

Essentially, these are the same factors which are constitutionally protected as fundamental rights that there cannot be discrimination based on cast, religion, gender, sex, place of birth right.

So Kannataka's hate speech laws look to like incorporate all of this.

Say, suppose someone is dog whistling against.

A particular cast or talking about Dalits in a certain way, that also would come under hate speech.

Normally, this would be an offense punishable under the Stst's Atrocities Prevention Act.

But now additionally, if.

The Kanata Coupol is decided to take action, it would also be under this law.

But having said that, you know, the definition is not really the problem.

Or having a law with an expensive definition doesn't solve much because the issue with punishing or policing hate speech is how political forces, how the state really implements the law.

And in that regard, this is something that we've spoken about in the past as well.

If the definition of something, in this case hate speech is broad enough, then a government could categor any number of things is hateful.

For instance, content that doesn't align with its political agenda that criticizes it could then be counted as hate speech.

Yeah.

Absolutely, because especially with laws that impinge on free speech, the broader they are, the more expansive they are, the more amenable they are to being.

Used arbitrarily against a citizen.

Right.

So, and this is also a problem because the person implementing these laws at the most basic level order the first step is a police constable, so that police constable can't really decipher these overbroad definitions and see whether your speech fits in there or not.

Right.

These are people also who take cues from their political masters.

So depending on which government doesn't power, how they want to look at a particular speech, that's how it's going to be policed.

Very good case in point is how the Assam Police is looking at hate speech laws.

Right in the last say, you're the as sample is having doing a serious crackdown on instances where apparently online speech after the Pelgam incident or after operations in there, and they've made several arrests, and that is a political call that sort of has been taken that no matter where in the country we find, say a WhatsApp message or a Facebook message which is allegedly inflammatory talking about these incidents, y sam police will pick them up.

Right.

The nature of digital speech is also such that there are no geographical boundaries for online speech.

But at the same time, if there was inflammatory speech of a different kind which doesn't sit well or which sits well with the government in fact, that the government might not take action about.

Right, You've had the Supreme Court in several instances try and nudge the government.

In fact, the courts.

Had said that all dgps will be held in contempt if they don't register hate speech cases.

You take the case of Yatina Singhanan or any of these instances, right, it needed a judicial push for the police to even file firs.

So it's really about how the state decides to implement these laws rather than there being a vacuum for you know, a better definition or a better law.

And the other issue with hate speech is that you know, when we talk about intention to cause injury, disharmony, feeling of enmity or ill will, all, this can be subjective, right.

Not everyone will see something as hateful.

No, absolutely, and that is why the judicial process is really important.

There can be a case of five zero five registered against you that you outrage religious sentiments of somebody.

Take for example, the controversy ruthor pradaes recently on the Islah Muhammad posters.

Right, But eventually do these stand the test of a trial in court?

You know, the.

State has to prove that this in fact incited religious feelings and caused communal disharmony.

So many of these.

Cases don't so, which is why you look at their conviction rates, and CRB data tells you that the conviction is very low.

On the other hand, it's also.

Difficult to hate speech in a way right because, like you said, it is so subjective, because it also depends on who is making it.

Right, a college student in some part of the country putting up a WhatsApp status is not the same as a political leader dog whistling against the minorities from a political podium right in an election rally.

The nature of this speech is innately different.

The power dynamic is very different.

So how do you go about policing both of them?

At the same level, right, And this also has to be coupled by some kind.

Of an action.

For instance, is there defilement, is there an incitement to violence?

Is there a call for violence?

Right?

These things also determine whether they fall under the broader definition of hate speech.

But having said that, like most criminal laws, the process is really the punishment.

Right.

There is, say a case of hate speech filed against you, You're already been booked and arrested by the police.

As of now are IPC provisions.

Most of these sections on.

Hate speech carrier three year sentence, which, as for the Supreme Court's guidelines, if it's an offense that carries a sentence of less than seven years, you can be granted bail automatically.

So getting bail in these cases is relatively easy because of how the Supreme Courts liberally interpreted bail provisions.

But which is also why a samplice arrests people under sedition because you know, sedition is punishable with the jail term of seven years, so it makes it that much more difficult for someone to get bail.

Now, the Kannataka law goes one step further and says for so called repeat offenders, the maximum sentence is actually ten years, right, which makes getting bail impossible.

So in most of these laws, it's because the process is itself a punishment.

It doesn't matter whether they actually stand the test of a trial.

It matters what happens immediately, right.

And even besides jail terms, you know, this bill also allows the state government to remove content from online platforms if they think it falls under the broader definition of hate speech.

So could you talk a bit about that.

Yeah, that is a more immediate and a more relevant or relatable punishment in that sense, because say my Twitter posts are taken down on my Twitter handle is taken down, right, even if I'm not arrested, that is a violation of my right to free speech.

And the remedy for that is bureaucratic, often.

Involves me going to court.

So if you look at a classic citizen versus state issue, the citizen has a very very difficult recourse against the might of the state in policing this speech.

Okay, So we've talked about repeat offenders and what this bill proposes to do to them, and we've talked about the powers it gives the government to take down online content.

What are the sort of punishments does this bill propose for those who violate this law.

So the other important thing that the Kannactica bill proposes is to look at punishing organizations and institutions collectively for the so called hate crimes.

And they define institutions very loosely to say association of persons, whether registered or not.

So which means if say, an employee of an institution has made certain comments which are allegedly under the definition of hate speech, right, so the institution collectively might be responsible for it.

Of course, it has a rider which says, but if it's done despite all the checks and balances or whatever, then the person will not be punished.

But the problem is really whether you prima facie tried to stop this or not is something that will be determined and trial and before that.

What the bill does is sort of bring in this guilt by association.

Just because you spoke something that is.

Allegedly hate speech and we work together, you know, both of us can be booked under the law.

That's how the section is framed as of now.

And that's a really troubling part because in speech you can't really bring in this guilt by association because I'm not responsible for what you spoke unless you prove that I colluded with you, or I abetted you, or I was part of it in some way or the other.

So that's a big troubling part of what the Kannactica law does.

And of course they.

Do talk about repeat offenders, you know which for the mandatory minimum sentence is one year, which may extend up to seven years, but for subsequent or repeat offenders, the punishment will not be less than two years, which can extend up to ten years.

So the sentence here is not accidental.

It's by design in a way to circumvent like their sample is is doing the Supreme Court guidelines on bail.

Right, And does this also raise concerns about self censorship?

For instance, if I know that what I say could be construed as hateful under this law, then I'm less likely to say it, right, And when it comes to genuinely hateful content, that's of course a good thing.

But if it also stops me from saying other things, then it essentially curbs my freedom of expression.

Right.

No, absolutely, that is essentially what the chilling effect is.

Because something is defined so broadly, I don't know what is so called criminal territory and what is not, so you know, I might as well stay clear of it.

You speak to many people who were earlier very active on Twitter for example, right, and now with all the even say, with all the trolling and the hate that you get on Twitter, there are many who have chosen just to not tweet, right, just to not put your opinions out there.

So that is essentially what chilling effect is.

And when that policing happens not just by some trollers on Twitter, but by the state itself, it has a bigger impact.

But the other reason why this is also happening is, you know, the larger context is that there are only very few opposition rule states, and like when say, states like Assam decide to somehow take up the role of policing speech across the country on certain issues, right, and the opposition rule states are also coming from this place that we also have to respond to speech that kind of may contradict our politics or you know that we have to deal with politically in a sense.

That's why this law is, which also reflects how terrible the climate of speech is in the country right now, right, it is to show that we are also doing something about it.

So, but on an issue like free speech, an additional level really not solve the problem.

It will only do more damage to the right to freedom of speech and expression.

So then I'm thinking, what is the right way to punish hate speech?

Is it just getting people at the judicial level or at the police level to interpret these laws in the right way.

Is that the only way?

Look, it is extremely difficult to pull his speech, especially when the boundaries are almost non existent with online spaces.

Right, someone sitting in the US can insight violence in India.

That is a reality.

And it also reflects how we kind of look at speech now.

Right earlier, if it.

Was a stage in Karnataka, someone speaking in Karnataka, they would be arrested.

But now anywhere in the world and we are very interconnected and it's very difficult.

To pull his speech.

Having said that, it also flex the politics of our times.

Right, what is hate speech and what is not?

In cases where there is a serious threat to public order, right where there is an actual incitement of violence and FII has to be filed in action has to be taken.

And when that doesn't happen, citizens do have a right to knock on the doors of the court and in these cases the courts interfere, and the courts do call for registering.

And FII, but that is serious work.

Ultimately, this cannot happen if the state doesn't cooperate.

So these are not things that can just work in isolation.

That you know, hate speech will be tackled if the citizen wants it, if the court wants it, but it all.

Has to work together in that sense.

And next we shift our focus to Odisha's mulk and Gar district whether the murder of a fifty five year old tribal woman earlier this month has triggered a wave of violence that authorities say was fueled not just by the crime itself, but by decades old tensions over land and resettlement.

Not to understand these tensions, it's important to know under the Dundakar in your project, the central government had created the Multan Giri Villages for the rehabilitation of Bengali refugees who fled what was then East Pakistan for India.

So initially they wanted to settle in West Bengal, Tripura and Asam.

But when the capacity of these three states to rehabilitate the Bengales reached at a certain level and they couldn't rehabilitate.

More so Government of India started looking for some alternate areas.

This is the Indian expresses to read Bishoi who reports on the state for the paper.

So in that way they identified this dunder careeran a reason which is a vast land comprising some parts of Orisa and Madhepades.

Now these are under Chattisgar and some parts of Andropades.

So the proposal was moved, survey was done and ultimately they identified around thirty thousand square miles of land in nourishan Chattisgard as an appropriate lend to resettle and rehabilitate the Bengali migrants who came from East Pakistan and present day Bangladesh.

And so the Maltangiri villages known as m these were among the planned settlements created under the.

Scheme basically to Pramorisa and to present Chatisgad and soil mades those who identified to settle this Bengali refugees.

So in that scenario, these Malkanigri villages were created basically.

And over time, the state driven demographic transformation altered local land relations and economic hierarchies.

Well as I said the detension between these refugee Bengali settlers and the tribals that was always there because there's several regions, but the prime region is basically the dispute over the land and Malkanigiri is a tribal dominated area.

Tribals were living.

There's a pull of forests and all that.

But after the government launched this undercurrenty project and resettled the Bengalese there there's a kind of insecurity among the tribals that started as soon as the project was launched.

And the tension was always there because the Bengali people alleged that the settlers they encrossed upon their land, they legally took over the land, taking benefit of their lack of resources and education.

So in larger case, that was the trigger why this violence escalated in Malkang recently.

And so to understand how this recent murder case has refueled these tensions, we speak to Suggit in this segment, who starts by telling us how it all began.

In the fast week up December, maybe on fourth December, to be very frecised.

The police a day after missing complaint was launched about missing of a fifty five year choir tribal women.

So a day later, on fourth December to be precise, the police recovered the body from a river Wen but the body was headless, so from the cloths and other ornaments, the family members identified that this was the same women who was a missing complaint was lost by their family members and this was happened on fourth December on Thursday.

But on seventh Sunday evening, the younger among the tribals was came out after police detained one person from the nearby Malcanngary village that is MB twenty six.

They detained a forty four year old person from that village.

After that, on Sunday, around one thousand tribals, they'd armed with their traditional weapons, they enter into this twenty six village and they started vandalizing the shops, setting houses on fire and vandalizing other structures.

That continued even on Monday in presence of lease.

In fact, and what's interesting is that the administration ordered internet suspension for a week.

So why was that.

The administration because of the violence that continued even in Monday, as a precautionary measure and to avoid further escalation of the issue.

The administration at the first place, they imposed probity order on Sunday evening only, and a day later the internet wain was also imposed that was in force around for a week just to ensure that no false information was circulated to that to further escalate this violence.

Right, and as you mentioned earlier that landownership disputes are often contentious here and this is also being seen as the motive.

Behind the murder.

So why is it that land ownership is such a.

Flashpoint in this region even decades after formal settlement and citizenship of Bengali refugees.

As I said, this land dispute was all always there because this after the Dundacarno project was launched, the tribals were very insecure and even today they alleged that these Bengali settlers taking benefit because the tribals are not very educated and they lake resources and they remained four But many of these Bengali settlers they owned a good wealth in that reason and settled there with their family members.

So that is a point.

And this the tribals people always allied that the refugee settlers they took over their land by fraudulent means and they encroach upon the government land and later they took it to their position.

So this lend dispute and lake up access to resource cent and equinit marginalization.

Basically, these are the issues that was the flashpoint between the tensions between the tribals and the Bengali settlers in Malcangary.

And previously also there were deadly violences occurred in that region.

So before Doncarno project was launched in nineteen fifty eight, there was no such land structure, but the Mulkangar region was always recited by the tribals, so they thought the land was there right.

And you also highlight that similar tensions have erupted earlier as well, like in two thousand and one, So talk a bit about that.

In two thousand and one October and November, there were deadly violences occurred between these Bengali settlers and the tribals when over eight thousand Bengali settlers they gathered and they protested outside the Raiger Block headquarter in Navumpu District that was also part of this Dundagarran region and then it was under the undivided Koraput Distate when the Bengali were settled they protested outside Traiger Block headquarter office demanding that their land should be returned to them, which were allegedly taken over by the Bengali settlers, and the protests became violent after the Bengali settlers they set on fire the block office and they indulged in vandalism, so police resorted to firing.

Two tribals were killed in that incident and this protest continued for around a month and in November again because of violence, police set to restort to firing.

In that incident, three more tribals were killed.

And sort how has the Odisha government responded to these tensions.

Well after the incident.

This incident didn't blow up out of properson because of the timely intervention, we have to say because the police, the administration imposed prohibit orders and they imposed the internet shut down immediately.

Then central and police personnel were deployed who continue to guard the area till today because people started returning to their home in MB twenty six and as tension still continues to prevent so internet ben has been revoked but deployment is still there and administration held peace meetings with the head of communities from both the side tribals and Bengales who the administration claimed that they agreed for fees to restore peace in that reason and as the land dispute is the reason, the administration said that they all also try to resolve this issue.

In the meantime, two ministers from these state government Deputy Chief Minister KB sing them and one more minister, they visited that region and they submitted a report to the Chief Minister.

And what we learned that they've also mentioned in the report that the lend dispute was the reason and government need to take some concrete steps to resolve this land dispute issue between the tribals and Bengali settlers.

And so what would these concrete steps look like do we.

Know, well, we would not be able to say what concrete steps, but what the experts say that they need to be a fresh survey land survey so that the areas can be demarketed properly land belonged to the tribal.

They need to be told these are the land and land owned by the Bengali settlers that the land survey versically because land dispute is the the salation from the expert and senior officials when we spoke out of curiosity, they said that a fresh survey need to be done to demarket Gilland and that could be the way for addicts.

And in the end we take a look at how an Indian individual has been linked to one of Australia's worst mass shootings in recent history.

The attack in question took place at Bondai Beach in Sydney during Chanaka by the Sea, a Hanukah celebration organized by the Jewish community.

During the roughly ten minute assault, two gunmen open fired on people attending the event, killing fifteen people, including a rabbi, a Holocaust survivor and a ten year old girl.

These two shooters were identified as fifty year old Sajar Dakram and his son, twenty four year old Navi Dakram.

Now, two days after the Mars shooting, Australian authorities confus that Sajad actually had links to Hyderabad.

Telingana police said that he was originally from Hyderabad and migrated to Australia in November nineteen ninety eight after completing a Bachelor of Commerce degree.

He had limited contact with his family in India over the past twenty seven years and visited the country six times after migrating.

As reported by the Indian Expresses, Nikola Henry, Telangana, Directed General of Polis B shivdhar Radi, said the factors that led to Serju Dahkram's radicalization had no connection with India.

He said the individual had lived in Australia for over two decades and that there was no evidence of links to extremist activity in India.

Investigations have revealed that the father and son traveled to the Philippines for most of November before the attack.

Philippine immigration officials said Serjad Akram entered the country on first of November on an Indian passport, while naw Dakram traveled on an Australian passport, and the two returned to Sydney on the twenty eighth of November.

Henry highlights that Philippine authority said the pair declared the city of Davao as their destination, though the military said it could not confirm whether they received any form of training during their stay.

Officials noted that extremist networks have operated in parts of Southern Philippines in the past, though their influence has reduced significantly in recent years.

Australian Federal Police said early indications pointed to a terrorist attack inspired by the Islamic State.

Police said a vehicle link to the younger shooter contained improvised explosive devices and homemade flags associated with the organization.

Video circulating online showed Navi Dakrum peaching in suburban Sydney prior to the attack.

You were listening to Three Things by The Indian Express.

Today's show was edited and mixed by Suriesh Pavar and produced by Shihang Bargov and me Ichasharma.

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