Amidst this ongoing lockdown, we might have come across quite encouraging news reports stating the drastic drop in crime rates across the country, but things can still get ugly with deadly smartphones in every hand in even the remotest part of this country.
Mob lynching is not a new affair; Indians probably being the most sentimental homo sapiens in the world, of course when they are a part of the crowd, do often tend to indulge in it. And more recently, the instances of mob-lynching have taken a new colour altogether, it’s less of cow vigilantism, communalism, honour killing or witch hunt and more of fake news and rumours with platforms like WhatsApp as their aide.
What happened in Palghar lynching, a few days ago, apparently appears to be another unfortunate event arising out of misinformation and it’s difficult to attribute any communal angle to it as of now. Rumours spread like wildfire in susceptible India and are chiefly fed on ‘fear’ of ‘naive’ Indians.
2018 saw a multitude of lynching cases originating from a rumour and spread through doctored videos, WhatsApp forwards regarding the child lifters which led to hysteria among masses, followed by innocent people being lynched. From March 2018 to July 2018, more than 22 people were killed across India on the suspicion of being child-lifters and many more by 2019.
One such hapless incident took place on July 13, 2018, in Karnataka village where 5 friends on a road trip were brutally assaulted by a crowd of 30 villagers, suspecting them of being child-lifters and this did not end here. Three of these men escaped leaving behind two of their friends. Few villagers recorded this incident and forwarded it through WhatsApp to the residents of nearby village inevitably by the time these 3 men reached the next village, those residents had already blocked the road and then dragged those three men out of the car, assaulted them, viciously killing one.
Where the policemen are expected to protect the victim, they tend to give in, opting to rescue themselves from the infuriated mob leaving helpless victims at the mercy of the mob. It appears to be a criminal omission of an act owing to the police’s legal duty to protect these victims utilizing the power conferred to them by section 129(2) of CrPC i.e, “Upon being commanded to disperse if any such assembly does not disperse, or if, without being so commanded, it conducts itself in such a manner as to show a determination not to disperse, any Executive Magistrate or police officer referred to in sub-section (1), may proceed to disperse such assembly by force, and may require the assistance of any male person, not being an officer or member of the armed forces and acting as such, for the purpose of dispersing such assembly, and, if necessary, arresting and confining the persons who form part of it, in order to disperse such assembly or that they may be punished according to law.” But regrettably, these powers are exercised only after the damage has been done.
Thus vigilantism or mob-justice continues to be an explicit challenge in the face of the Constitution of India and the rule of law. Although after hearing the case of Tehseen Poonawalla v. Union of India and Ors. which arose out of a PIL by Tehseen Poonawalla, SC laid down certain guidelines containing preventive, remedial and punitive measures with the intention to curb these vigilante crimes. But leads of reported mob-lynching cases of 2018 to 2019 depict no significant decline in the number of hate crimes. Following this judgement, stringent anti-lynching bills were passed in many state assemblies in 2019, some proposing imprisonment up to seven years and a fine up to ₹1 lakh but no step in this direction has yet been taken by the central government leaving it solely on the discretion of states to take a decision on this matter.
Interestingly, these rumours don’t get restricted to specific states but unequivocally affect all regions, be it UP or Karnataka, West Bengal or Maharashtra, implying that firstly we need a central law on this issue and secondly, awareness regarding the false information on social media on the national level is indispensable. Unable to get a grip on existing factors such as cow vigilantism, mob-justice etc, we cannot afford to add misinformation to this list of evils, further for the situation to hit the skids. Usually the most affected from these atrocities are beggars or mentally unstable homeless people who are not in a condition to fend themselves. This wildfire of rumours did not just grip India but had repercussions internationally. 2019 saw incidents where vigilante mob of more than 100 people burned two men alive in a small town in the central Mexican state of Puebla. The murder came after a false rumour spread on WhatsApp claiming “a plague of child kidnappers” had entered the country with the goal of harvesting the organs of children.
WhatsApp acknowledged this issue and rolled new updates which restricted the number of times a WhatsApp message could be forwarded. It was found that the five-forward limit slowed the spread of content by one order of magnitude. For example, if a piece of content would ordinarily take five days to reach an entire network, the limit would slow the spread to 50 days.
In a country like India, which had seen an explosion of mobile phones and internet services recently, people seem incapable of distinguishing the authenticity and venerability of information rather fall prey to falsified information. Section 505(1) of Indian Penal Code, 1860 states that the punishment for making, publishing or circulating any statement, rumour or report which may cause fear or alarm to the public, or to any section of the public. But a law is not sufficient to eradicate this egregious mob- justice practice, there is a requirement of more specific laws to address it and more stringent punitive measures against this spreading of fake news creating chaos and claiming innocent lives. Media literacy and awareness should be deployed to encounter digital illiteracy and ignorance.
This misinformation essentially targets our existing prejudices against other communities, fears and thus lends legitimacy to these fake messages. Conclusively it’s our insecurities, our intolerance which needs to be deplored before going ahead with these digital literacy and awareness programmes.
References
1. Abhishek Dey, Not just social media: What is driving India’s mass hysteria over suspicions of child lifting, SCROLL.IN ( 20th April, 2020).
2. Elyse Samuels, How misinformation on WhatsApp led to a mob killing in India, THE WASHINGTON POST (20th April, 2020).
3. Tehseen Poonawala v. Union of India and Ors, (2018)9SC C 501.
4. Daniel Funke, Susan Benkelman, Misinformation is inciting violence around the world. And tech platforms don’t seem to have a plan to stop it, POYNTER (20th April, 2020).
5. Donna Lu, WhatsApp restrictions slow the spread of fake news – but don’t stop it, NEWSCIENTIST (20th April, 2020).