HYDERABAD: The BRS has demanded the chairman and members of the Select Committee on the Telangana Hate Speech and Hate Crimes (Prevention) Bill, 2026, to withdraw the proposed Bill.
In response to the views, objections and suggestions sought on the Bill, the BRS, through its general secretary and legal cell in-charge Soma Bharat Kumar, submitted its views.
The BRS said that if the Bill is not withdrawn, it must be fundamentally redrafted along the safeguards listed in Part 7 and Part 8, and should be put through genuine public consultation and hearings before it is reported to the House.
The BRS feels that the Bill in its present form carries a grave risk of being used against lawful criticism, the free press and the Opposition. “The Bill should be withdrawn.
The country already has a dedicated body of law against hate speech: Sections 196, 197, 299, 302 and 353 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS), the Information Technology Act, 2000 and the Supreme Court’s directions in Tehseen Poonawalla (2018). The documented gap is one of enforcement, not of statute,” the party said.
The Bill infringes Article 14 (arbitrary and vague classification and powers), Article 19(1)(a) and 19(1)(c) (speech, press and association, beyond Article 19(2)) and Article 21 (personal liberty and fair procedure). Presidential assent under Article 254(2) cannot cure a violation of Part III, it further said.
Parliament enacted the BNS, BNSS and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 after prolonged consultation and scrutiny by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Home Affairs.
A state law that rewrites the same field, while reproducing the defects for which the Supreme Court struck down Section 66A of the IT Act and read down other speech offences, undoes the settled position without removing the basis of the judicial verdict, it added.
The BRS further said that Telangana’s social media and independent media are today actively scrutinising government performance. A law of this breadth, enforced by the executive, will have a chilling effect on that scrutiny, which is the lifeblood of a democracy, it said.
“The BRS condemns hate speech and hate crime in every form and supports firm action against anyone who incites violence or targets people for who they are. But the answer to hate cannot be a law that blurs the line between hatred and dissent.
The Bill, in its present form, is vague, overbroad and disproportionate; it hands the executive powers of arrest, preventive detention and take-down without judicial oversight; and it defeats the notice to safeguard of Section 35 of the BNSS through a 10-year ceiling; it infringes Articles 14, 19 and 21; it duplicates the new Central criminal codes framed after thorough deliberation; and it invites the very misuse that the Supreme Court warned of in Shreya Singhal. We therefore urge the Committee to recommend that the Bill be withdrawn, and in the alternative that it be reconsidered in the light of the safeguards above, after proper consultation,” it added.
