'Liberties, Once Lost, Are Not Easily Regained': Senior Advocate Sanjay Hegde

The new criminal laws and codes that now have the President's assent wear a new cover--in Hindi--but 80-90% of these laws and codes are the same as before. So it's difficult to say they decolonise the legal procedures and laws themselves. NewsClick speaks with Sanjay Hegde, Senior Advocate at the Supreme Court of India, who says many of the offences are so vaguely worded that they can hardly be called fair, just and reasonable under the Constitution. They will cause litigation, they criminalise what should never have been criminal, and put people and society at the mercy of the police. According to the well-known senior lawyer, they reflect a regime obsessed with grand gestures. In the process, the police have got sweeping powers to arrest and detain, but no incentive to investigate cases.