Author Arundhati Roy to be prosecuted in India for 2010 speech

Prolific writer Arundhati Roy, the only non-expatriate Booker prize winning author of The God of Small Things, is one of the most high-profile critics of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and a voice for the voiceless in her country.

Amidst the dire situation of press freedom in India, the author may face prosecution for a speech she delivered in 2010 about Kashmir, as per media reports. A top-official in New Delhi, VK Saxena, has given approval for the case to proceed before the courts. According to Saxena’s directive, Roy and her co-defendants were allegedly advocating for the secession of Kashmir from India at a public function and that is enough evidence for a legal case.

Under the Modi Government, sedition laws are often used to curb the freedom of expression and journalism, raising a question over the so-called biggest democracy’s principles. Added to that are PSA laws exclusive to Jammu and Kashmir which allow detention of individuals “preventively” for up to two years, without a trial or warrant. In IOK, a number of journalists have been held in detention.

The revocation of Article 370 ensuring the special status of Kashmir on August 6, 2019, has caused voices like Roy to become more loud. “In Kashmir when we wake up and say, ‘Good Morning’ what we really mean is ‘Good Mourning,'” exclaimed one of the characters from her novel, The Ministry of Utmost Happiness. Her house was besieged when the speech became public and the complaint that lodged against her has now proceeded after 13 years.

Roy, now 61, has always been fearless in her expression and is known for her work as a journalist, activist and a novelist. Her work is a scribbled protest whereas her speeches and the articles she reads in conferences is vocal dissent in the face of oppressors. In one of her famous speeches, she voices out the basic facts of Kashmir’s reality that “it is not an integral part of India and even the Indian Government has accepted this years back in the UN.” Her latest book Azadi Freedom, Fascism, Fiction is an honest account of the situation of minorities, Dalits and activists in India.