India News and Travel Times Provides India-centric and other News and Features

The arrest of cartoonist Aseem Trivedi on charges of sedition for allegedly insulting national symbols has sparked protests. Protesters gathered outside the police station here where Trivedi was held and raised slogans against the Centre and police. Trivedi's friends and supporters also complained that they were not being allowed to see the cartoonist, since his arrest late on Saturday night. Speaking to mediapersons outside the police station, close aide of Anna Hazare, Mayank Gandhi said that the sedition law, under which Trivedi had been charged, was formulated by the British and termed his arrest unjustified. “This sedition law has been drafted by the British at that time to pressurize the Indians who were fighting against injustice and for freedom and independence. How can you use that same law against some innocent young boy who has made a cartoon to say exactly what we have been saying? I am sure all the press and so many people are saying that this country is being raped. So he just makes a visual depiction and you call it sedition, I think it is completely unjustified,” Gandhi said. Recipient of this year's acclaimed 'Courage in Editorial Cartooning Award', Trivedi remained defiant and raised slogans against the government as he emerged out of the court. Trivedi is facing charges of sedition for allegedly insulting national symbols in his sketches during the three-day fast of veteran social activist and anti-graft crusader Anna Hazare at Mumbai in December 2011. While participating in Hazare's three-day fast at the Bandra-Kurla complex, Aseem Trivedi had sketched the cartoon of 'Mother India' dressed in a tri-colour sari, while a politician and a bureaucrat pin her down and urge 'the beast of corruption' to assault her. The cartoon was titled 'Gang Rape of Mother India'. In the second cartoon the four lions in the national emblem was replaced with foxes and the engraved motto 'Satyameva Jayate' was replaced with 'Brashtameva Jayate'. The final cartoon portrayed the Parliament as a national toilet.

Protest against cartoonist Aseem Trivedi’s arrest