The Delhi Union of Journalists welcomes the interim relief from arrest provided by the Supreme Court to veteran editors Karan Thapar and Siddharth Varadarajan of The Wire after the filing of a second FIR against The Wire by the Assam police.
On July11, 2025 an FIR had been filed in Assam under several Sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) (S. 152,196,197, 353, 45 and 61) against The Wire for a report on the alleged downing of Indian fighter Jets by Pakistani forces during Operation Sindoor. The journalists appealed to the Supreme Court which provided them interim protection on August 12, 2025 from coercive action by Assam police. However, the Assam police immediately filed another case against Thapar and Varadarajan. The Supreme Court has today temporarily stayed any action under the second FIR as well.
Meanwhile, on August 21, 2025 the Assam police had also filed an FIR against popular journalist and YouTuber Abhisar Sharma for a video on Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma’s communal politics and the allotment of 3000 bighas of land in Assam to a company owned by the Adani group. The police have charged him under BNS S. 152 (sedition), besides S.196 (promoting enmity among different groups) and S.197 (national integration). We appeal to the Supreme Court to provide interim protection to Abhisar Sharma too.
We strongly condemn all such attempts to browbeat and harass the media into submission.
In the past when journalists and others had gone to the Supreme Court asking that the sedition S.124A of the IPC be struck down, as it was being misused against journalists, the Court had only kept it in abeyance. Sedition is back under the BNS S.156. The Wire has now challenged the Constitutional validity of this sedition Section. Journalists and all those who believe in the freedom of the press will watch this case closely in hopes that it will be struck down so it can no longer be used to arrest, imprison, browbeat and harass those who dare to speak truth to power.
