The 84th Akhila Bharata Kannada Sahitya Sammelan, scheduled to be held in Dharwad from January 4 to 6, 2019, will discuss issues related to ‘Sedition in India’.
According to sources in the Kannada Sahitya Parishat (KSP), which is organising the annual Kannada event, there will be a session that will dwell on the need to amend the archaic Sedition Act, under Section 124 A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), introduced by the British government in 1870. Under this session, state and intolerance; and the importance of the Uniform Civil Code, will also be discussed.
The inclusion of this session has triggered a debate in the backdrop of the recent arrests of five social activists, under the provisions of the sedition law, and dubbed as urban naxals.
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When contacted, Manu Baligar, president of the KSP, said that this particular session is one among 40 at the three-day event to be chaired by Jnanpith recipient Chandrashekar Kambar. “A committee, headed by noted literary critic and scholar C.N. Ramachandran, selected the sessions and speakers. “The parishat will not interfere in the committee’s decision, and experts on the issue, regardless of their political ideologies, will speak and present papers,” he told
The annual event, according to him, has a tradition of discussing contemporary social, political and economic issues that impact the people. Issues including the Mahadayi, Cauvery, Krishna, problems being faced by people in the border areas of Karnataka, State of government Kannada schools that are on the verge of closure, will be discussed. Around one lakh people a day are expected to attend, he said.
Recounting the resolution passed protesting attack on freedom of expression in the 49th Akhila Bharata Kannada Sahitya Sammelan, chaired by noted writer S.V. Ranganna held at Shivamogga in 1976, Dr. Baligar sought to know why those objecting to a session on sedition law was not looking at a session on attempts of the Karnataka government to close Kannada-medium schools.
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Refuting the allegation that the session on sedition is to embarrass the NDA government at the Centre and to please the JD(S)-Congress coalition government in Karnataka, he said, “I don’t dream of this kind of idea. It is highly ridiculous and I am pained by it.”