new delhi in a landmark verdict the supreme court on tuesday fortified the right to freedom of speech and liberty by striking down as unconstitutional section 66a of information technology act which police had used indiscriminately to arrest persons for posting criticism of government and political leaders section 66a is so widely cast that virtually any opinion on any subject would be covered by it as any serious opinion dissenting with the mores of the day would be caught within its net such is the reach of the section and if it is to withstand the test of constitutionality the chilling effect on free speech would be total the court said justices j chelameswar and rf nariman said the law was ambiguously worded prone to misuse and therefore stretches far beyond the reasonable restrictions criterion laid down under article 19 2 of the constitution they brushed aside the governments promise not to misuse the law saying that what is unconstitutional should not be on the statute book at all as a result of the verdict which brings the law in line with the times where internetbased social media is used by citizens to air their views freely all cases slapped till date against citizens under section 66a of the act will be closed and police cannot arrest anyone under this section in future however the cases may continue if the police had invoked other sections of ipc along with 66a against the arrested person in fact despite the sc judgment citizens still need to be careful in posting comments in websites and social network sites as provisions similar to section 66a exist in indian penal codes sections 153 and 505 but the judgment from a bench of justices chelameswar and nariman could act as a deterrent against arrest heralding a redletter day for the internet users and social network site frequenters the bench said section 66a was vaguely worded making it prone to misuse police referring to as many as 20 judgments of the us supreme court the bench also said restriction on free speech by section 66a brought into force by the upa government in 2009 by amending the it act and defended in the apex court by the nda government far exceeded reasonable restrictions provided under article 192 of the constitution writing the 123page judgment for the bench justice nariman said section 66a purports to authorize the imposition of restrictions on the fundamental right contained in article 191a guaranteeing right to freedom of speech and expression in language wide enough to cover restriction both within and without limits of constitutionally permissible legislative action the court also struck down section 118 of kerala police act which was on the lines similar to section 66a justice nariman said it cannot be over emphasized that when it comes to democracy liberty of thought and expression is a cardinal value that is of paramount significance under our constitutional scheme the sc refused to buy nda governments assurance that it would exercise restraint