Ahmedabad: Calling dissent a "safety valve" of democracy, Supreme Court judge Justice DY Chandrachud on Saturday said "blanket labelling" of dissent as anti-national or anti-democratic strikes at the "heart" of the country's commitment to protect Constitutional values and promote deliberative democracy.
Delivering a lecture here in Gujarat, Justice Chandrachud also said that use of state machinery to curb dissent instillsfear, which violates the rule of law. "The blanket labelling of dissent as anti-national or anti-democratic strikes at the heart of our commitment to protect constitutional values and the promotion of deliberative democracy," he said.
Protecting dissent is but a reminder that while a democratic elected government offers us a legitimate tool for development and social coordination, they can never claim a monopoly over the values andidentities that define our plural society, Justice Chandrachud said.
He was speaking on the topic,"The Hues That Make India: From Plurality to Pluralism," as part of the 15th Justice PD Desai Memorial Lecture organised here. "Employment of state machinery to curb dissent instills fear and creates a chilling atmosphere on free peace which violates the rule of law and distracts from the constitutional vision of pluralist society," he added.
Justice Chandrachud's comments came at a time when the passage of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the proposed National Register of Citizens (NRC) has triggered massive protests in many parts of the country.
