Laws that carry harsh criminal penalties are justified because they protect citizens from harm and ensure that perpetrators are held accountable for the injury they  cause. It is precisely because they empower the state to take away the rights to life and liberty enshrined in Article 21 of the Constitution that they must be framed and deployed with the utmost care and address genuine harm. The Uttarakhand Freedom of Religion Act (UFRA), passed in 2018 by the BJP state government — its penal provisions were made harsher last year — fails to meet these criteria. As an........

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