In discussions of press censorship in the Indian context, two periods garner the most academic and public attention: first, the colonial; second, that of the internal Emergency declared by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi for 21 months between 25 June 1975 and 21 March 1977. In both periods censorship was seen as the natural accompaniment to authoritarian rule as well as its most visible, even symptomatic feature. This chapter looks at an era sandwiched between—and eclipsed by—these two. The decade after Independence and after the adoption of the Indian Constitution in 1950 was one in which the legal framework of the democratic nation state was laid down and tested. The First Amendment (FA) to the Indian Constitution in 1951 included, among other things, changes in Article 19, which dealt with the freedom of expression and the limits that the state could impose on this freedom. The FA debate revolved around the content and meaning of the big questions of the age: the circumference of freedom, the ramifications of democracy, and the rights of the individual versus state and society. For the generation of Indians living in a time of transition from colonial to self-rule, the issue of state-imposed limits on the freedom of expression was a prickly one. It is therefore not surprising that the parliamentary debate spilled over to the pages of newspapers, and journalists and readers alike participated in what was then—and is today—‘… too important a matter to be left alone to the press to defend’.

The First Amendment in Context

Debates over the future of free speech in India outlived the term of the Constituent Assembly (December 1946–January 1950) and intersected with debates about other kinds of liberties. The FA was preceded by the passage of a controversial legislation in February 1950, the Preventive Detention Act (PDA), which provided central and state governments the authority to detain people on grounds very similar to those listed in the FA clauses pertaining to the press. That is, prejudicing the defence and security of India, friendly relations with foreign states, the maintenance of public order, and the maintenance of supplies and services were all actions that could result in preventive detention.