A top Indian official has allowed the prosecution of celebrated Indian author Arundhati Roy, who faces charges under anti-terror laws for a “provocative” speech made in 2010.
The 62-year-old Booker Prize-winning novelist has been an outspoken critic of the Narendra Modi administration for its controversial policies and laws targeting minorities. as well as more broadly on social injustice in India.
The charges relate to an event in Delhi in 2010 on Kashmir where Roy and a former professor of international law from Kashmir, Sheikh Showkat Hussain, spoke under a banner reading “Azadi (Independence) – the only way”.
Roy is reported to have argued that the Kashmir region, which is claimed in its entirety by both India and Pakistan and partly administered by each, had never been an “integral part of India”.
Permission to prosecute Roy was granted by the most senior official in the Delhi capital territory, VK Saxena, a politician from Mr Modi’s ruling BJP who currently serves as the lieutenant governor.
Read more at https://www.independent.co.uk/asia/india/arundhati-roy-uapa-terror-law-kashmir-speech-b2563177.html
