Ramesh: Privy Council ruling on sedition law important

FORMER attorney general Ramesh Lawrence Maharaj, SC, says the Privy Council's ruling on TT's colonial-age sedition laws is significant and enhances the freedom of expression and the freedom of the press.

He also said the decision contained important guidance on how sedition cases should be prosecuted.

"If anyone is prosecuted, the prosecution cannot get off the ground without proving that a speech incites violence."

Maharaj was on the losing side of Thursday's decision by TT's apex court, which held that the Sedition Act was "saved law," as sedition laws were part of TT's laws before the 1962 Constitution went into effect, and was not unconstitutional or incompatible with section 1 of the Constitution.

The former attorney general represented the Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha's (SDMS) challenge of the constitutionality of the pre-independence legislation.

The case was first filed in 2019 by the late Satnarayan “Sat” Maharaj – secretary general of the SDMS – and taken over by his son when he died in November 2019.

Although Sat Maharaj was not charged with an offence, he claimed it was likely to happen after police executed search warrants on the group’s radio and TV stations, taking away recordings of the April 15, 2019, television programme Maha Sabha Strikes Back.