World Law Forum Conference on SLAPP
ABOUT
The notion and term Strategic Lawsuits against Public Participation (‘SLAPP’) emerged from the United States (‘US’) and was coined by Canan and Pring, two academics from the University of Denver in the 1980s. A SLAPP commonly involves the instigation of malicious, meritless and costly lawsuits by a powerful corporation, government or event the press with the sole intention to intimidate and silent activists, whistleblowers and academics respectively who publicly express their opposition or concerns over social issues. In addition, SLAPPs are often filed in the name of defamation and is a tactic routinely used against journalists and the media in hopes of censoring and prevent the spreading of their views and preserve the status quo. This inevitably interferes with the general public’s freedom of speech and expression and becomes in practice as a way to safeguard the interest of the affluent and ensuring the continuation of the vicious cycle where the rich gets richer, more powerful and more mainstream; and the poor gets poorer and their views more marginalised. The interrelationship between money, public opinion and power can once again be observed through the increased employment of strategic lawsuits around the world and particularly India to discourage public participation.
Coinciding with the World Law Forum Global Launch will be a Conference focusing on SLAPP, a phenomena which has been on the rise in India in the recent years.
Speakers
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Aniruddha BahalEditor-in-Chief, Cobra Post -
Anoo BhuyanJournalist, The Wire -
Apar GuptaFounder, Internet Freedom Foundation -
Ashish DixitCounsel, Supreme Court of India -
Dilip CherianConsulting Partner, Perfect Relations -
Ghazala WahabExecutive Editor, Force -
Molina AsthanaVice President, Law Institute of Victoria; Principal Solicitor, Swarup Asthana LawyersMolina is a commercial lawyer with her own practice and is currently the Vice President of the Law Institute of Victoria. She is a Commissioner for the AFL South East Commission, a director on the board of Gymnastics Victoria and a member of the Football Federation of Victoria Tribunal. She is the founder of the organisation Multicultural Women in Sport which aims to empower migrant women from multicultural backgrounds through sport. She has also been a Cricket Australia Ambassador, Commonwealth Games Ambassador and Jean Hailes Women’s Health Week Ambassador.
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Paranjoy Guha ThakurtaSenior Journalist -
Raghav ChadhaNational Spokesperson, Aam Aadmi Party -
Rajshree ChandraA/Professor, University of Delhi -
Ram JethmalaniSenior Advocate & Member of Parliament (Apologies) -
Shaili ChopraFounder at SheThePeople.TV -
Sidharth VardarajanFounder, The Wire (Apologies) -
Vakasha SachdevAssociate Editor (Legal), The Quint -
Veera MahuliResearch Fellow, Charkha, Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy