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Kunal Kamra-Arnab Goswami episode and Sharjeel Imam’s arrest have shown up Indian liberals’ doublespeak.

It is easy to support Kunal Kamra because the state action against him is so arbitrary and ridiculous, without any semblance of legal grounding, that it takes no courage to oppose it. But Sharjeel Imam’s is the real test case of liberalism. If someone needs to be arrested for inciting violence, it’s BJP MP Anurag Thakur, whose exhortation to supporters at a rally to chant ‘shoot the traitors’ was succeeded by the firing at Delhi’s Jamia Nagar; and not Sharjeel Imam, whose comments had no material effect whatsoever.

When comedian Kunal Kamra was banned from travelling by four airlines, one of them state-owned, there was an enormous outpouring of support from India’s liberal circles. Even politicians joined in. CPM general secretary Sitaram Yechury deplored the “clear stifling of democratic rights, civil liberties and freedom of expression”. Congress’ Rahul Gandhi condemned the Narendra Modi government’s attempt to “silence a critic”. Yet, the slapping of draconian sedition charge under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) on Sharjeel Imam was met with jarring silence.

The liberals’ hesitation to defend Sharjeel is based on three reasons, all of which are not just groundless but a betrayal of every liberal principle.

Also read: Why call gunman mentally unstable, he’s a terrorist — Jamia students after brazen shooting

Silent approval

First, some liberals silently approve of the charge of sedition, with a few even egging the state to take action. They believe threatening to block roads going to Assam is enough to merit the sedition charge. However, as Justice Markandey Katju wrote, “inflammatory speech is also protected by the Freedom of Speech guaranteed by Article 19(1)(a) of the Indian Constitution — unless it incites or produces imminent lawless action.”

Justice Katju pointed out that Sharjeel’s speech does not “incite or produce imminent lawless action”, which is the key part of the Brandenburg test. This test, originally formulated by the US Supreme Court in ‘Brandenburg vs Ohio’, has been cited in two different judgments by the Supreme Court of India and is thus part of the Indian law on sedition. That the filing of the anti-terror law UAPA charge on a rabble-rousing student is patently ridiculous does not even need to be pointed out. By staying quiet, Indian liberals become complicit in the state’s abuse of draconian laws.

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FoE on our terms

Second, Indian liberals, it seems, only stand up for the freedom of speech that they agree with. “Goebbels was in favour of free speech he liked. So was Stalin. If you’re really in favor of free speech, then you’re in favor of freedom of speech for precisely the views you despise. Otherwise, you’re not in favor of free speech,” Chomsky wrote.

It doesn’t matter whether you disagree with Sharjeel Imam’s comments, or his ideology. The issue at hand is whether you are willing to defend an individual who is being viciously persecuted by the state for her words.

Principles are only tested when they have to be applied in the defence of someone you find disagreeable. If you are defending Kunal Kamra and shunning Sharjeel Imam because you like the former and dislike the latter, then you are merely standing up for your buddies or favourite celebrity, not for the Indian Constitution. It isn’t enough to shrug your shoulders and say that the courts will decide. Even if he is eventually acquitted of the charges, he stands to lose many years of his life.

The process, as they say in India, is the punishment. And if he is not vigorously defended now, the pall of guilt will forever hang around Sharjeel Imam’s head, even if he is later acquitted. Former Delhi University professor SAR Geelani was acquitted in the 2001 Parliament attack case as early as 2002, but his arrest under the now-defunct Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA) meant that he could never shake off the terrorist tag until his demise recently.

Also read: Sharjeel Imam, the IIT graduate in JNU who called out Left’s ‘Islamophobia’

It’s ‘strategic’

Third, the more conscientious Indian liberals offer the strategic importance of maintaining a silence. Defending Sharjeel Imam, they argue, risks the fight against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s authoritarianism. In the battle to win public perception, Sharjeel is a losing fight. By sacrificing Sharjeel, they can help salvage the image of Shaheen Bagh, and the wider anti-government struggle.

But what is Shaheen Bagh if not for ensuring constitutional protections of vulnerable citizens, particularly India’s Muslims? Sacrificing Sharjeel means accepting that every Muslim person is one bad statement away from having his or her life destroyed. And make no mistake, Sharjeel’s Muslim identity is the primary factor behind him being treated like a terrorist.

The optics of five state police ‘hunting him down’, the detention of his family members – all are meant to portray him as a dreaded terrorist. The convenient leaks citing Delhi Police accusing him of being “highly radicalised” and wanting to make India an “Islamic state” follow the same neat Islamophobic script that is used to demonise the protesters at Shaheen Bagh.

Also read: Two reasons that can keep CAA-NRC protests from evolving into a larger anti-Modi movement

Not ‘one of our own’

It is not a question of supporting ‘extremists’ of the other side. Sharjeel Imam’s views on the state, methods of resistance, and even on M.K. Gandhi, are no more radical than Arundhati Roy. Or the views of many similar ‘upper’ caste Hindu radical intellectuals, who would be promptly and unambiguously defended by the liberal establishment that would see them as ‘one of our own’. A Muslim student from Bihar, though, is conveniently dispensable.

All these three reasons (or excuses to be precise) far from absolving liberals, show up the shallowness of their principles, and the hollowness of their convictions. At a time when Muslims are at the forefront of fighting for the idea of a secular, democratic India, laying down their lives in the process, the least that can be expected of the liberal intelligentsia is to defend them with their words.

You don’t have to defend their views, just defend them from unjust prosecution. And not just those Muslims who tick the boxes of the ‘good Muslim’ in the liberal imagination.

The author is a research scholar in political science at the University of Delhi. Views are personal.

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