A month after the sedition law was suspended, a group of over 100 former bureaucrats on June 12 said deleting IPC section 124A while retaining criminalisation of "unlawful activities" under the UAPA will give a "substantial political advantage" to the Union government and the party in power at the national level.
The group, which claimed to have no political affiliation, suggested the Supreme Court should examine Article 19 under the "basic structure of the Constitution" principle with reference to all existing laws and provisions that put curbs on "freedom of speech and expression".
The Supreme Court on May 11 put on hold the colonial-era penal law on sedition till an "appropriate" government forum re-examines it, and directed the Centre and the states to not register any fresh FIR invoking the offence.
