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Author	Prof Shameek Sen
Organisation/Institution	The West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata
Country	INDIA
Panel	Constitutional and Admin Law
Title	Censorship Through Misinformation Bills: Exploring the Free Speech Paradox
Abstract	It is axiomatic that when we talk about the protection of the free speech, there is an implicit underlying assumption that this protection should not be made available to certain categories of speech, like expressions of xenophobic hatred or speech that serves a singular motive of misleading people through carefully orchestrated fakery. Different jurisdictions have tried diverse regulatory mechanisms towards sanitizing such legitimate forms of free speech from the perils of misinformation and other such malaise. But this exercise has also lead to imposition of censorship in a highly subterranean manner. Across jurisdictions, it has been noticed that this gatekeeping exercise of keeping out unacceptable and abhorrent forms of speech from the ambit of protection has indirectly led to creation of a ‘speech-plus’ subset, that basically boils down to the fact that only certain forms of speech that can be considered as an “essential part of exposition of ideas” or have some “social value” are worthy of qualifying for such protection. This essentially boils down to a restatement of the much-critiqued SCOTUS position in Valentine v. Chrestensen (1942) that has since been thoroughly and substantially rejected. It is in this context that this paper wishes to do an introspective study of recent Misinformation Bills and to what extension they serve as repressive mechanisms of subterranean censorship. The core question that it seeks to address is whether in the name of dismantling echo-chambers of fakeness and xenophobia, the State is engaged in the deliberate act of creating mechanisms of otherisation of non-mainstream, unpopular and critical narratives. The paper uses two recent Indian regulatory experiments – one at the federal level and the other at the state level, and juxtapose examples from both the global north and the global south, including Asian jurisdictions like Singapore and Malaysia, to develop the conceptual framework.
Biography	Dr. Shameek Sen is a distinguished Professor at the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences (WBNUJS), Kolkata, India. He specializes in Constitutional Law, Sports Law and Media Law. Dr. Sen was part of the inaugural graduating batch of NUJS in 2005 and went on to complete his LL.M. in 2007, where he was awarded the prestigious Nani Palkivala Gold Medal for achieving the highest marks in his cohort. Following his LL.M., he joined NUJS as a faculty member and further advanced his academic credentials with his doctoral thesis titled “Free Speech and Censorship, with Special Reference to the Law of Obscenity” that delves into the complex intersections between freedom of expression and censorship laws. Dr. Sen has a prolific body of work, including books, book chapters, and articles in peer-reviewed journals. His Book titled ‘Sports Law in India: Policy, Regulation and Commercialisation’ (published by Sage Publishers) is a leading text on sports law in India. Another book titled 'Online Gaming in India: Technology, Policy and Challenges’ is the first book in India that provides a holistic insight into this fast-emerging discipline. Dr. Sen currently serves as the Director of two prestigious Research Centres - the Centre for Technology, Entertainment and Sports Law (CTESL) and the Centre for Studies in Entertainment and Media Law (CEML) at WBNUJS.