Gauhati HC Issues Notice to Assam CM Over Hate Speech Claims

The Gauhati High Court on Thursday issued notices to Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma after hearing multiple petitions seeking action against him for alleged hate speeches targeting Muslims, whom the Chief Minister has referred to as the 'miya' community. Miya is a pejorative term used in Assam to describe Bengali-speaking or Bengali-origin Muslims. The Chief Minister has said the word means 'illegal immigrants'. A Division Bench, led by Chief Justice Ashutosh Kumar and Justice Arun Dev Choudhury, directed that notices be served on the Chief Minister, as well as the Central and the Assam governments. The next hearing was scheduled for April 21. The petitions include the Congress party, historian Hiren Gohain, and the Communist Party of India (Marxist), who had initially approached the Supreme Court, which advised them to go to the high court. Advocates Abhishek Manu Singhvi, Chander Uday Singh, and Meenakshi Arora argued that Sarma’s statements appeared to show a 'fissiparous tendency' and described provocative and threatening rhetoric against Muslims. They pointed to a video (now deleted) shared on X showing the Chief Minister symbolically shooting at people wearing skull caps and told the court about his reported plans to manipulate the voters’ list, an alleged threat to restrict voting rights, and a call for an economic boycott of the community. They contended that such rhetoric reflected a habitual pattern of incitement and was not in keeping with his duties as the head of the State. The case also drew attention to calls for a possible special law on hate crimes, a topic the Supreme Court told the Attorney General to look into, signaling broader legal debates about hate speech in the region.

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