Free expression

Whether the Indian government cared for the hundreds of farmers who have committed suicide in central India is something we can debate about. What we cannot is the fact that its commitment to safeguarding public morality is above question. Caesar's wife, you know. The custodians of Indian morality, the venerable Information & Broadcasting Ministry, has now banned Fashion TV for two months, starting on All Fools Day. No, we are sure the government is not playing a prank on us. It does not play...

It is now the turn of the Students Islamic Organisation of India to tighten the screws on whosoever talks about sex education. The organisation does not have even 10,000 members across the country, but is big enough to be a mischief-monger. Its activists have already staged demonstrations in a number of cities/towns. Listen to (I mean, read) these quotable quotes: Sex education is teaching pornography and instigating. free sex. When the Indian Constitution declares that a person is an adult only...

Medievalism rules supreme these days. So, when Kerala minister AK Balan made an off-hand remark in the state Assembly last week that "gods are depicted in temples without clothes on," it predictably created a furore — both inside and outside the House. Balan said he was "at a loss to know as to why an issue was being made out of sex education as there was no temple without murals and sculptures depicting scenes from Vatsyayana's 'Kama Sutra' and gods are depicted without clothes on." That got...

That's what the Madhya Pradesh government tends to think when it comes to the issue of imparting sex education in schools. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in the state has stopped sex education classes for high school students after it found that illustrations in an instruction manual for teachers were "obscene". The sex education classes were part of the Adolescence Education Programme (AEP) for Class IX and above, aimed at creating AIDS awareness among students. The "objectionable"...

Some people have no sense of humour. That's fine if they keep to themselves. But not when they literally coerce the police to arrest someone whose sense of humour may not be the same as theirs. That's what has happened in Mumbai where the so-called Sikh Media and Culture Watch (SMCW) staged a demonstration and forced the police to arrest a publisher of a Sardar jokes book. The Santa and Banta Joke Book is disappearing off the shelves of shops in Mumbai, and an emboldened section of the Sikh...

Four foreign television channels have been pulled off the air in Jammu & Kashmir after extremist groups demanded cable companies stop airing "obscene" shows. Cable operators, needless to say, have complied. Two militant groups — Al-Badr Mujahedeen and Al-Madina (ever heard of them?) — on March 4 in a telephone call to a Srinagar-based news agency, Current News Service, asked cable operators to drop channels that spread obscenity. The groups did not specify which channels they were referring to...

Information & Broadcasting Minister Priyaranjan Dasmunsi made AXN go off air. Now he seems to be dish out the same treatment to Fashion TV. For once, the Congressman and his friend in the Bharatiya Janata Party, Sushma Swaraj, seem to be thinking likewise. Great minds think alike. [ Link] “I have got the highest number of complaints from schools, colleges about Fashion TV operations,” said Dasmunsi, the information and broadcasting minister. “The kind of things they show, even in school-time...

Hey, AXN is going to be back again. From its coerced hibernation. The two-month-long ban imposed on it following the telecast of the ‘World’s Sexiest Advertisements’ has been lifted 15 days. Yeah, a good 15 days before-hand. AXN Country Head Sundar Aaron told exchange4media, “We are happy that the ban has been lifted and our channel will be again watched by million of viewers.” We are very happy too. The ban was imposed in January after AXN refused to pay heed to the warnings of the Informationa...

This is what has happened in the aftermath of the Katrina-in-a-short-skirt incident. From a PTI report in the Daily News & Analysis: [ Link] Dargah Committee vice-president Sayed B Chisti said it was the duty of office-bearers of the Anjuman Committee that is accompanying the Bollywood team to ensure the maintenance of the sanctity of the shrine. The Dargah Committee will write a letter of protest to the Anjuman Committee and seek an explanation, Chisti said. Fair enough. Writing protest letters...

Katrina Kaif may have nice legs, but devotees at Khwaja Moinudeen Chishti's shrine, Ajmer, are not quite taken in by them. Many have objected to Katrina wearing western outfits inside the shrine, which did not cover her legs completely, when a large number of people were offering their prayers, IANS has reported. [ Link] Oops, distracted, were they? The silence maintained by Anjuman secretary Sayed Mohin Hussain Chisti over the issue is being objected by others. Anjuman is a representative body...