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“Right to free speech” is very rare in the world. Though the world is acquiring a democratic system with each passing day but the essence of democracy i.e. “Right to free speech “is still missing. “Right to free speech” is a fundamental right by democracy in which everyone is free to express his own school of thought and clamor his dissent in any matter with a mighty voice without fear of any stringency. “Right to free speech” is a pillar of democracy that improves the system by highlighting underlying issues but this right is rarely granted to citizens.
Article 19 of the constitution of Pakistan says that everyone is free to hold opinions, and to express them, and right to speech. But throughout the history of Pakistan, this article has also remained unfulfilled. Freedom of speech is manipulated as words like “Rebellion, infidelity, miscreation, and uprising.”
We might have not experienced it earlier or we may have forgotten the violation of this article but past 15 months have, especially, corroborated it. People are picked up from their homes and are brutalled. Those who show resistance to that brutality are threatened with profonating sanctity and dignity of their home. People are enforcedly disappeared and killed extrajudicially. And all this is because they dare to speak against tyranny. They vociferously speak about issues and the barbarity of state and powerful elite. They make them lessonary examples by such horrendous use of power.
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Even if the individual brutality doesn’t help in curbing the spread of the use of speech then digital manipulation is used and people are deprived of internet and social media connectivities mostly by saying “Shark na lines disturb krdi hai “ (Sharks have destroyed the internet lines) Now what type of shark is it who just appears to destroy internet lines when flocks want to raise their voices to higher forums. A few innovations have also been made by digitalising the method of shark like “web management system” and “ Overuse of unauthorized VPN”.
People are barred from gathering. Those who dare to speak against wrong decisions of coart are trialed with accusations of contempt of coart. Ladies are dragged and battered because they were clamoring for the rights of them and the return of their disappeared loved ones. And many more efforts have also been made to snatch the freedom of speech from the citizens. Have those horrific atrocities frightened the people? Has the state succeeded? The answer to all these lies in just one word i.e. No. Those atrocities and brutalities are being retaliated with force and extremism.
A teacher of mine used to say that press the balloon until it doesn’t explode. There is always a threshold if achieved will surely generate current. An Austrian philosopher Karl Max Popper in his book, Open Society and its Enemies said that a highly tolerant society becomes more vulnerable to the inevitable domination of intolerant forces. According to him, intolerant domination must be retaliated with intolerant forces.
I have observed that freedom of speech cannot be plundered completely but it can be reduced only. A partially heinous fear can be loomed over citizens but for a longer extent, it is not possible. The more the powerful elite tries to suppress the voices of people, the more they rise in one form or another. The more a person is vilified for raising their voice, more he attains heroship, and both present and past are evidence of it. So it is their ignorance of them that this infringement will be accepted hushingly.
History is filled with such examples when people bore the brutal torchers but didn’t displace from their position. They never compromised on infringement of their basic right.
This is my blog for #hl-exclusive and #hl-w133e3.