Free expression

Now human rights bodies have to intervene in temple matters. The Kerala State Human Rights Commission has asked the Travancore Devaswom Board to allow male employees at Lord Ayyappa temple to wear underwear while counting currency notes and coins offered by devotees. All these days, the staff at the hill shrine of Sabarimala had to strip themselves of all clothing, except their dhotis, before entering the counting chamber. The temple authorities enforced this practice after they found that money...

Indo-Asian News Service (IANS) has reactions from people in the Hindi film industry on the Mallika dress issue. I am reproducing them all in full. [ Link] Shilpa Shetty: "I'm just happy that the obscenity case against my dress in Tamil Nadu is quashed. I won.” Malaika Arora: "I think Mallika has become a favourite punching-bag in the press. Leave the girl alone. It's ridiculous. Maybe the moral police in the South should take a closer look at their own films for obscenity.” Rahul Khanna: "I feel...

The Delhi High Court has dismissed criminal proceedings against MF Husain, overruling the charges of obscenity against his paintings. The cases against him were filed in Indore, Rajkot and Pandharpur. Some details from NDTV (May 8): It was his Nude paintings of Hindu gods and goddesses as well as Bharat Mata that created a furor resulting in several threats from right wing Hindu groups like VHP, Shiv Sena, Bajrangdal and the Hindu Jan Jagriti Samiti. Three other cases are still pending against...

Mallika Sherawat is once again in the news, and of course, in trouble. This time she has received a notice from the Chennai Police for a skimpy and translucent dress she wore at a show in the city recently. The one gunning for Sherawat is the Hindu Makkal Katchi (HMK). Now, don't you dare take umbrage at HMK's outrage, for you will get it back in turn. They are quite a hypersensitive lot. [ Link] HMK activist S R Kaniraj has lodged a complaint with the Periyamet police station in Chennai, saying...

West Bengal Sports Minister Subash Chakravarty is leading for the ban on cheerleaders in West Bengal and has even sought the intervention of Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharyya. Three ministers—Kshiti Goswami, Nandgopal Bhattacharya and Pratim Chatterjee—are also lending support to the demand. [ Link] The Navi Mumbai police seems to have learnt some lessons from fashion shows: “We have been told that any instance of wardrobe malfunctioning will be severely dealt with and hot pants and...

Just when there is talk of the Indian Premier League (IPL) making Indian sporting history, the Maharashtra government has decided you can't keep cheering on. The state government has asked IPL team franchisees to apply for permits before cheerleaders can be allowed to perform in Mumbai. The move came as a response to politicians who alleged the cheerleaders were “vulgar”. See what the moral cops had to say: “They will first have to take our permission. We will allow them on the condition that...

There's some more relief for Shilpa Shetty. The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court has quashed criminal cases against Shetty and Reema Sen. The two were accused of having conniving with a Tamil eveninger to publish their obscene pictures. Well, some people get the weirdest of ideas. Justice S Nagamuthu felt the materials available on record did not make out ''any case'' against them. Little wonder. Some details from the NDTV story of April 23. [ Link] Allowing the proceedings to continue...

Film actor Akshay Kumar has landed in trouble on grounds of obscenity for letting his wife Twinkle Khanna unbutton his jeans at the Lakme Fashion Week in Mumbai a few days back. From the Indian Express: [ Link] Advocate Virendra Kumar filed the case in the court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Rajesh Kumar against the star couple's performance during the promotional catwalk for a particular brand of jeans at a show. The court after recording the complainant's statement, has scheduled...

The Supreme Court has suspended legal proceedings against Richard Gere, who faced obscenity charges for publicly kissing Bollyood star Shilpa Shetty last year. Gere made headlines when he arched over and kissed Shilpa Shetty, winner of the British reality television show "Celebrity Big Brother", several times on the cheek at an anti-AIDS show in New Delhi. Reuters says Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan and Justice RV Raveendran stayed the arrest warrants against Gere and granted permission for him...

The Supreme Court on Tuesday ordered the lifting of bans on the screening of "Jodhaa Akbar", a film about the romance between a Mughal emperor and a Hindu princess that had angered the Rajput community, says a Reuters report. [ Link] Several states banned the film on the grounds that its screening would incite violence after Rajputs protested and even attacked movie halls screening it. The makers of the film moved the Supreme Court, saying the bans were illegal and had led to huge revenue losses...