Section 124-A of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC) is commonly known as the sedition law. They also blamed both the major opposition parties – the PPP and the PML-N – for not abolishing the sedition law while they were in power despite the fact that it is mostly the politicians who have become a victim of the law. A senior government functionary revealed that the Islamabad High Court (IHC) has already regulated this provision by declaring that only the federal or provincial governments can invoke the sedition law. It is a remnant of the colonial era, when we had neither democracy nor fundamental rights." Recently, the IHC noted that it is for the parliament to weed out from the statute books those draconian offences and powers which have a colonial legacy and are inconsistent with the fundamental rights guaranteed under the Constitution.

Source: The Express Tribune October 06, 2020 19:52 UTC