Mumbai: The Maharashtra government on Friday dropped sedition charges against cartoonist Aseem Trivedi, who was arrested in September 2012. The Attorney General told the Bombay High Court that the sedition charges against Aseem were a 'knee-jerk reaction'. The AG also said that the state will draft a circular on Section 124 A and this will be presented to the Chief Justice for approval, after which it will be sent out to all police stations.
Aseem was arrested on September 8 under IPC Section 124 (sedition), Section 66 A of Information Technology Act and Section 2 of Prevention of Insults to Nation Honour Act. He was released on September 12 after the Bombay High Court granted him bail.
The freelancer has been accused of putting up banners mocking the Constitution during a rally of anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare late last year and posting the same on his website. Trivedi was arrested on the basis of a complaint filed by a member of Republican Party of India.
After coming out of the jail, Aseem had said he would continue to draw cartoons that raise issues like corruption, as people in large numbers thronged the railway station here to receive him. He said he would continue to oppose corruption through his cartoons, which he said would now spew more venom. He said it was his mission to root out corruption from the country. ...
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12:06 PM, Oct 12, 2012
Paris: A French magazine ridiculed the Prophet Mohammad on Wednesday by portraying him naked in cartoons, threatening to fuel the anger of Muslims around the world who are already incensed by a film depiction of him as a lecherous fool. The drawings in satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo risked exacerbating a crisis that has seen the storming of US and other Western embassies, the killing of the US ambassador to Libya...
09:08 PM, Sep 19, 2012
Mumbai: Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray on Wednesday came out in support of jailed cartoonist Aseem Trivedi but also gave him a sharp rap on the knuckles. While contending that the sedition charge slapped by Mumbai police on the cartoonist was a bit too much, Thackeray also pulled up Trivedi for his cartoons mocking the Indian national emblem, constitution and Parliament. In an editorial in the party mouthpiece Saamna, Thackeray...
02:07 PM, Sep 12, 2012
Mumbai: Cartoonist Aseem Trivedi was released from Arthur Road Jail on Wednesday afternoon after he accepted the conditional bail offered by the Bombay High Court. Trivedi was granted bail on a personal bond of Rs 5,000. Refusing to bow down to the pressure, Trivedi as soon as he stepped out of the Mumbai jail said, "Our fight will continue till the time the government continues to curb freedom of expression."...
01:31 PM, Sep 12, 2012
New Delhi: The latest batch of the NCERT textbooks is out, but this time, without six cartoons from four political textbooks. This comes after the Thorat committee's recommendation that 22 cartoons be removed from the textbooks. The cartoon of Ambedkar that sparked off protests in Parliament has been replaced with his photograph. RK Laxman's cartoon depicting the anti-Hindi agitation and four other cartoons that represented political developments have also been...
01:59 PM, Sep 11, 2012
Cartoonist Aseem Trivedi's arrest has the nation in outrage. Some, however, feel that the artist went a bit far when he disrespected the national emblem. ...
03:24 PM, Sep 10, 2012
Mumbai: Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray on Monday said he thought nephew Raj Thackeray would carry forward his legacy as a cartoonist. Asked why no one could inherit his legacy as a cartoonist, Thackeray said, "Who will take it forward? I thought Raja (his pet name for nephew Raj Thackeray) will carry it forward." Thackeray expressed these sentiments in the last part of his marathon interview, published in party mouthpiece...
03:04 PM, Sep 10, 2012
Mumbai: Even as Mumbai Police did a U-turn on arrested cartoonist Aseem Trivedi and decided to give up his custody, India Against Corruption (IAC) activists demanded that the charge under Indian Penal Code Section 124(A) (sedition) against him should be dropped first. Sources have told CNN-IBN that Aseem Trivedi, arrested on Saturday, has taken a moral stand that he will not seek bail unless the Maharashtra government dropped the charge...
02:25 PM, Sep 10, 2012
Mumbai: After country-wide outrage and severe criticism for the arrest of cartoonist Aseem Trivedi, Mumbai Police decided to give up his custody on Monday. Trivedi was sent to police custody till September 16 on Sunday. Trivedi's friend and India Against Corruption (IAC) member Mayank Gandhi met Trivedi on Monday and was told by the police officers that they would give up his custody soon. Earlier, Maharashtra Home Minister RR Patil...
01:15 PM, Sep 10, 2012
While the Press Council has called the charges against the cartoonist ridiculous, Maharashtra Home Minister RR Patil has said that police custody was not needed. ...
11:23 AM, Sep 10, 2012
Justice Markandey Katju has slammed the charges against cartoonist Aseem Trivedi as "non-sense, stupid" and said that the policemen who arrested him must be put behind bars for violation of fundamental rights. ...
11:01 AM, Sep 10, 2012
New Delhi: The arrest of cartoonist and India Against Corruption activist Aseem Trivedi on charges of sedition has sparked outrage. Aseem has been sent to police custody for a week for allegedly posting 'ugly and obscene' content on his web portal. Aseem's family and other anti-corruption activists are standing by him claiming there was nothing unpatriotic about his cartoons."Why should the government arrest our son, a cartoonist when there are...
07:40 AM, Sep 10, 2012
New Delhi: Justice Markandey Katju, Press Council of India chairman, on Sunday defended Aseem Trivedi, who was arrested for allegedly posting seditious content on his web portal, saying the cartoonist has done nothing illegal. "My opinion is that the cartoonist did nothing illegal. In a democracy many things are said, some truthful and others false," Katju said in a statement. Trivedi was arrested yesterday and produced in a Mumbai court...
07:30 AM, Sep 10, 2012
Mumbai: Yet another cartoonist has become the victim of the ongoing policing by political parties. Cartoonist Aseem Trivedi was on Sunday arrested for allegedly posting "ugly and obscene" content on his web portal. Trivedi was arrested in Mumbai and produced in a Bandra court later in the day following which he was sent to police custody till September 16. He was charged with sedition under Section 124 A of the...
01:36 PM, Sep 09, 2012
Kolkata: The West Bengal Human Rights Commission (WBHRC) on Monday found the state police guilty of harassing Jadavpur University professor Ambikesh Mahapatra and his neighbour Subrata Sengupta. Both were arrested by the West Bengal police for allegedly circulating e-mails of a controversial picture collage of Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Union Railways Minister Mukul Roy in April. The three-member WBHRC panel recommended the West Bengal government to pay a compensation...
05:22 PM, Aug 13, 2012
New Delhi: NCERT on Monday held "exhaustive" deliberations with the textbook development committee on political science on the issue of removal of certain cartoons and objectionable content from CBSE textbooks, a final decision on which is expected on Tuesday. The meeting comes amid indications that the controversial cartoons on BR Ambedkar and the one relating to anti-Hindi agitation in Tamil Nadu could be removed. "There were exhaustive deliberations and a...
03:29 AM, Jul 31, 2012
New Delhi: The controversy over cartoons in text books threatens to escalate. After a committee set up by the HRD Ministry recommended the removal of 43 cartoons, which included those of Indira Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, from the NCERT textbooks of classes 9-12, the chief of the national council has said that there is no logic behind axing them. The NCERT chief says that it is illogical to remove the...
07:33 AM, Jul 07, 2012
The NCERT panel has recommended the removal or modification of 36 of the 176 cartoons in textbooks for classes 9-12. ...
10:47 AM, Jul 03, 2012
The residents of Dholakpur are a resilient lot. They regularly brave demons, robbers, evil wrestlers and various other calamities, big and small. They have a timid, but benevolent king in Raja Indraverma and a beautiful princess in Indumati. And of course, they have Bheem because of whom they emerge unscathed from various assaults. Bheem is the nine-year-old protagonist of Pogo TV's wildly successful animated show Chhota Bheem that runs for...
10:21 AM, Jun 28, 2012
