Ramji Lal Modi vs The State Of U.P

Rewritten Version Notice: This is a rewritten version of the original judgment.

Court: supreme-court

Case Number: Petition No. 252 of 1956

Decision Date: 5 April, 1957

Coram: Syed Jaffer Imam, S.K. Das, P. Govinda Menon, A.K. Sarkar, Sudhi Ranjan Das

In the matter titled Ramji Lal Modi versus The State of Uttar Pradesh, the Supreme Court of India delivered its judgment on 5 April 1957. The case was heard before a bench consisting of Justice Syed Jaffer Imam, Justice S.K. Das, Justice P. Govinda Menon and Justice A.K. Sarkar. The official citation of the decision appears as 1957 AIR 620 and 1957 SCR 860, and the issue concerned the legislative provision making insult to religion an offence, namely section 295A of the Indian Penal Code (Act XLV of 1860). The petitioner, Ramji Lal Modi, challenged the constitutional validity of that provision and also sought to have his conviction under the same section set aside. The central question was whether section 295A infringed the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression guaranteed by Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution and, if so, whether it could nevertheless be justified as a reasonable restriction in the interests of public order under Article 19(2). The petition also raised the related constitutional guarantees of freedom of religion under Articles 25 and 26. The headnote of the judgment summarises that the Court examined whether the impugned section constituted an unreasonable restriction on speech and concluded that it fell within the protective ambit of Article 19(2), thereby upholding its constitutionality.

The Court explained that the phrase “in the interests of” inserted by the amendment to Article 19(2) broadened the scope of permissible restrictions, allowing legislation that, while not explicitly aimed at preserving public order, could be sustained if the prohibited conduct tended to provoke public disorder. Referring to the earlier decision in Debi Soron v. The State of Bihar, AIR (1954) Pat 254, the Court rejected the notion that an offence of insult to religion could be divorced from concerns of public order, observing that Articles 25 and 26 themselves subject religious freedom to the requirement of public order. The Court further held that, based on the language and elements of section 295A, the restriction could not be employed for purposes beyond those permitted by the Constitution. Earlier cases such as Romesh Thappar v. The State of Madras (1950) SCR 594, Brij Bushan v. The State of Delhi (1950) SCR 605 and Chintaman Rao v. The State of Madhya Pradesh (1950) SCR 759 were deemed inapplicable. Consequently, the Court affirmed that section 295A of the Indian Penal Code was a valid law falling within the exception provided by Article 19(2) and could not be struck down as unconstitutional.

The petition was presented under Article 32 of the Constitution of India seeking a declaration that Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code is beyond the power of the legislature and therefore unconstitutional, and also requesting a writ of certiorari to set aside the petitioner’s conviction under that provision together with any ancillary reliefs. The factual backdrop is limited in scope. The petitioner served as editor, printer and publisher of a monthly periodical titled Gaurakshak, a magazine devoted to the cause of cow protection. In the months of July or August 1954, a Hindi daily newspaper called Amrit Patrika, published from Allahabad, printed an article or a cartoon featuring a donkey, an act that triggered an agitation among the Muslims of Uttar Pradesh. The editor, printer and publisher of Amrit Patrika were prosecuted by the State, but the Allahabad High Court eventually acquitted them. Subsequently, in the issue of Gaurakshak corresponding to Kartik Samvat 2009, which aligns with November 1952, the petitioner’s magazine published an article. On 12 December 1952 the State Government ordered the petitioner’s prosecution on the basis of that article. Consequently, on 8 June 1953 a complaint was lodged before the Court of the District Magistrate, Kanpur, by the Senior Superintendent of Police, Kanpur, alleging offences under Sections 153A and 295A of the Indian Penal Code. The Magistrate, by order dated 5 August 1953, formally charged the petitioner under both sections and committed the case to the Sessions Court of Kanpur for trial. The petitioner entered a plea of not guilty. The learned Sessions Judge, in a judgment dated 16 November 1953, acquitted the petitioner of the charge under Section 153A but convicted him under Section 295A, imposing a sentence of eighteen months’ rigorous imprisonment and a fine of rupees 2,000; failure to pay the fine would attract an additional four months’ rigorous imprisonment. The petitioner appealed to the Allahabad High Court. The single judge of that court, by judgment dated 25 October 1956, held that the article had been published with a deliberate and malicious intention to outrage the religious feelings of Muslims and affirmed the petitioner’s guilt under Section 295A, although the judge reduced the imprisonment term to twelve months and the fine to rupees 250. An application for a certificate of appeal to this Court under Articles 132 and 134 was rejected by the High Court on 30 October 1956, prompting the petitioner to seek special leave to appeal the High Court’s judgment dated 25 October 1956. On 5 December 1956 the petitioner filed the present petition under Article 32 for the reliefs outlined above, and simultaneously applied in this Court for a stay of the sentence imposed on him. Both the application for a stay and the petition for special leave were dismissed by this Court on 18 December 1956.

The Court noted that the petition filed under Article 32 of the Constitution was now before it for adjudication. It appeared that the petitioner had surrendered to the authorities and was serving the term of imprisonment imposed on him. Counsel appearing on behalf of the petitioner advanced the argument that Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code was beyond the legislative competence and therefore void, because it infringed upon the petitioner’s constitutional guarantee of freedom of speech and expression under Article 19 (1)(a). The counsel contended that the provision could not be sustained as a law imposing reasonable restrictions on the exercise of the right conferred by Article 19 (1)(a), as required by Clause (2) of the same article. According to the counsel, the only ground in Clause (2) that the State could invoke to justify the validity of the impugned provision was the interest of public order. He further explained that a statute which interferes with the freedom of speech and expression and prescribes a punishment for its breach may be characterised as being “in the interests of public order” only when the likelihood of public disorder is expressly made an element of the offence and when the prevention of such disorder is a proximate, not a remote, consideration. The counsel emphasized that merely insulting the religion or religious beliefs of a particular class of citizens does not, in every instance, give rise to public disorder, even though it might do so in certain circumstances.

Consequently, the counsel argued that where a law, as Section 295A does, seeks to authorise restrictions on the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression in language so broad that it encompasses both restrictions permissible under the Constitution and those that are not, the Court should refuse to uphold the provision even to the extent that it might be applied within constitutionally permissible limits, because the provision is not severable. He maintained that as long as there exists a possibility that the provision could be employed for purposes not sanctioned by the Constitution, the entire provision must be declared unconstitutional and void. The counsel referred to the authorities in Romesh Thappar v. State of Madras (1950) SCR 594 and Brij Bushan v. State of Delhi (1950) SCR 605. In the Romesh Thappar case, the Governor of Madras, acting under the powers conferred by Section 9 (1‑A) of the Madras Maintenance of Public Order Act, 1949, was satisfied that for the purpose of securing public safety and maintaining public order it was necessary to prohibit the entry into, circulation, sale or distribution in the State of Madras of the English weekly newspaper “Cross Roads”, published at Bombay. Section 9 (1‑A) was enacted with the objective of securing public safety and maintaining public order, and the term “public order” was described as having a wide connotation.

In this case the Court explained that the term “public order” was meant to describe the state of calm that existed among the members of a political community as a result of the internal regulations enforced by the Government that they had created. The phrase “public safety” used in the statutory provision was treated as part of the broader notion of “public order.” The Court noted that clause (2) of Article 19, as it existed at that time, protected a law dealing, among other things, with a matter that could undermine the security of the State or tend to overthrow it. The Court observed that while a breach of public safety or public order might sometimes threaten the security of the State, many breaches of those concepts would not have such an effect. Consequently, a law that restricts the freedom of speech and expression in order to prevent a breach of public safety or public order that does not threaten the security of the State or aim to overthrow it cannot be said to fall within the protection of clause (2) of Article 19. Section 9(1‑A) was challenged because it covered both categories of activity and could not be severed; therefore the whole section was held to be invalid. In Brij Bushan’s case the Court examined the validity of section 7(1)(c) of the East Punjab Public Safety Act, 1949, as extended to the Province of Delhi. That provision permitted a provincial authority, if satisfied that action was necessary to prevent or combat any activity prejudicial to public safety or the maintenance of public order, to issue a written order to a printer, publisher or editor requiring prior scrutiny of any matter on a particular subject before publication. The Court, with Justice Fazl Ali dissenting, held that because the provision authorized restrictions on the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression guaranteed by Article 19(1)(a) for the purpose of preventing activities prejudicial to public safety and order, it did not constitute a law solely relating to a matter that undermined the security of or tended to overthrow the State within the meaning of clause (2) of Article 19 as then framed. Applying the principles laid down in Romesh Thappar’s case, the Court declared the provision void. The Court also relied on Chintaman Rao v. The State of Madhya Pradesh, emphasizing that when statutory language is sufficiently wide to permit restrictions on a fundamental right both within and beyond constitutionally permissible limits, and the possibility of the law being used for purposes not sanctioned by the Constitution cannot be excluded, the statute must be held entirely void. After deciding Romesh Thappar and Brij Bushan, clause (2) of Article 19 was subsequently amended.

In this case, the Court observed that the Constitution had been amended so that clause (2), as amended, protected a law to the extent that such law imposed reasonable restrictions on the exercise of the right guaranteed by sub‑clause (a) of clause (1) of article 19. The protection applied when the restriction was made “in the interests of” the security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, decency or morality, or in relation to contempt of court, defamation or incitement to an offence. The Court then framed the issue for consideration: whether the provision that was being challenged could properly be described as a law imposing reasonable restrictions on the fundamental right to freedom of speech and expression in the interests of public order. The Court noted that the wording in the amended clause used the phrase “in the interests of” rather than the earlier expression “for the maintenance of”. Referring to an earlier decision in Debi Soron v. State of Bihar, the Court explained that the expression “in the interests of” gave a very wide scope to the protection. Consequently, a law need not be drafted with the sole purpose of directly maintaining public order; it could still be said to have been enacted in the interests of public order. The Court further observed that section 295A of the Indian Penal Code was placed in Chapter XV, which deals with offences relating to religion, and not in Chapter VIII, which deals with offences against public tranquillity. From this placement, some had argued that offences relating to religion bore no relation to the maintenance of public order or tranquillity, and therefore a law creating a religious offence could not claim the protection of article 19(2). The Court rejected that argument by pointing to articles 25 and 26 of the Constitution, which guarantee freedom of religion but expressly subject that freedom to restrictions in the interests of public order, morality and health. Thus, it could not be asserted that freedom of religion had no impact on public order, nor that a law creating a religious offence could never be said to have been enacted in the interests of public order. The Court noted that those two articles themselves contemplated that restrictions might be imposed on the rights they secured in the interests of public order. Finally, counsel for the respondent altered his line of attack, contending that insults to the religion or religious beliefs of a class of citizens might sometimes lead to public disorder, but in many other instances they would not. Accordingly, a law that made insult to religion an offence would cover both kinds of insults—those that could provoke public disorder and those that would not.

In this case, the Court observed that the statute, to the extent that it addresses the first category of insults, can be said to have been enacted in the interests of public order as contemplated by clause (2) of Article 19. However, the Court noted that the portion of the statute that deals with the second category of insults does not fall within that clause. The petitioner’s argument concluded that because there is a possibility that the law could be applied for purposes not authorized by the Constitution, the whole law ought to be declared unconstitutional and void. The Court said that it could not accept this argument based on the wording of the impugned provision. The Court first explained that clause (2) of Article 19 protects a law that imposes reasonable restrictions on the exercise of the right to freedom of speech and expression “in the interests of” public order, a phrase that is broader than the narrower phrase “for maintenance of” public order. Accordingly, if certain conduct has a tendency to cause public disorder, a law that penalises such conduct as an offence must be regarded as imposing a reasonable restriction “in the interests of” public order, even though in some instances the conduct may not actually result in a breach of public order. Next, the Court turned to Section 295A. It held that Section 295A does not criminalise every act of insult or every attempt to insult the religion or religious beliefs of a class of citizens. Instead, it criminalises only those acts of insult, or those forms of attempted insult, that are carried out with a deliberate and malicious intention to outrage the religious feelings of that class. Insults that are made unwittingly, carelessly, or without any deliberate or malicious intent to outrage religious feelings are excluded from the scope of the section. In other words, the provision punishes only the aggravated form of insult to religion that is motivated by a deliberate and malicious purpose to outrage religious feelings. The Court observed that the very purpose of this aggravated form of insult is to disrupt public order, and therefore the provision that penalises such conduct falls squarely within the protection of clause (2) of Article 19 as a reasonable restriction on the freedom of speech and expression guaranteed by Article 19(1)(a). Considering the elements of the offence created by the impugned provision, the Court opined that there is no possibility that the law could be used for purposes not sanctioned by the Constitution. In other words, the language of the provision is not sufficiently broad to encompass restrictions beyond the constitutionally permissible limits on the fundamental right guaranteed by Article 19(1)(s). Consequently, the question of severability does not arise, and the authorities cited by the petitioner’s counsel are not applicable to the present case. For these reasons, the Court concluded that the impugned provision is fully protected by clause (2) of Article 19.

In this matter, the Court observed that the relief sought by the applicant was governed by the limitation provisions contained in Article 19 of the Constitution. Having examined the submission that the impugned provision fell outside the protective scope of Article 19, the Court concluded that the provision was, in fact, covered by the constitutional provision and therefore subject to the reasonable‑restriction test articulated in Article 19(2). On that basis, the Court held that the applicant’s petition could not succeed because the statutory restriction was constitutionally valid. Accordingly, the Court ordered that the application be dismissed. The dismissal of the application was entered as a final order, reflecting the Court’s determination that the challenge was barred by the constitutional framework established under Article 19.