December 16, 2025 07:26 pm (IST)
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Most of the parties welcome scrapping of sec 66A; Petitioners ecstatic
New Delhi, Mar 24(UNI) The government and most of the major political parties welcomed the Supreme Court verdict scrapping the Section 66 of the Information Technology Act 2000 that allowed arrests for offensive contents online.
Hailing the court verdict, Information and Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said,
"Those who are in power must be liberal, India is a free country. The government of India welcomes the Supreme Court judgment."
"The government was willing to come up with additional stringent guidelines to prevent misuse of Section 66(A)," said Mr Prasad. But the amendments, if at all needed, will be arrived at "objectively" after "widest consultation", he said..
The current government of India is different from previous governments, the minister said. "We had instructed the Additional Solicitor General of India on guidelines to prevent misuse of Section 66A."
The petitioners, who moved the court against the section had contended that it was vague and resulted in the misuse of the law by police.
Congress spokesman Manish Tewari said he Supreme Court has done the “right and appropriate thing” by striking down the provision.
"The Supreme court has arrived at an appropriate decision. Section 66A has put too much of arbitrary power in law enforcing agencies and not withstanding the safeguard we attempted to build into it," he said.
“It became an instrument of oppression. It had put too much of power in the hands of law enforcement authorities to persecute and hound people who maybe innocuously or intentionally indulged in dissent,” he said.
“Mere law enforcement or knee-jerk reactions, as was the implementation of Section 66A, cannot be a solution to curb freedom of speech and expression,” he added.
Former home minister P Chidambaram too welcomed the verdict:"I welcome the judgement of the Supreme Court holding that Section 66A of the IT Act is unconstitutional. "The section was poorly drafted and was vulnerable. It was capable of being misused and, in fact, it was misused," he said.
The Left parties and Aam Aadmi Party accused both BJP and Congress of taking the "same anti-democratic position" on the issue in the court.
NDA constituent Shiv Sena, however, demanded that there should be a debate on the issue and steps were needed to stop misuse of social media.
Janata Dal (United) leader Sharad Yadav also said, "I respect the verdict of the Supreme Court. But it is a wrong decision. The way vulgar and abusive language is being used (in social media), it is not freedom."
Freedom means to have a debate....Does it mean freedom to hurl stones and abuses. "This is a very good Act. I completely disagree with the Supreme Court's verdict," he said.
But Shreya Singhal, the young law student who was the first among those who challenged section 66A said she was "ecstatic" as the verdict upheld the freedom of speech and expression.
"I am ecstatic. It was grossly offensive to our rights, our freedom of speech and expression and today the Supreme Court has upheld that," she told NDTV moments after the court scrapped the law.
The apex court held that the section is unconstitutional and violates the rights of citizens.
"Nobody should have fear of putting up something because of the fear of going to prison. The court has upheld the rights of all citizens today," Singhal, whose mother is a Supreme Court lawyer and grandmother was a judge, said.
She was 21 when she filed a petition in 2012, after two young women were arrested for posting comments critical of the total shutdown in Mumbai after the death of Bal Thackeray, the Shiv Sena chief.
Shreya told NDTV that her family encouraged her. "I am also a law student so through my studies also I knew that you can approach the Supreme Court directly," she said, aware that she has achieved, even before becoming a lawyer, what many veterans in the profession haven't.
"It is being misused by BJP governments, Congress governments... all over the country. Even when the Congress was in power, it was being misused. Governments have their own political agenda; a law has to be for the people," she said.
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