The physical attack on Taslima Nasreen in Hyderabad made me think about the deteriorating tolerance amongst Indians for the expression of others. Or is it so...? Let me consider a small list of recent incidents :
- Andhra MLAs, 20 MIM(Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen)activists manhandle Taslima Nasreen.
- Neeraj Jain of VHP (Vishwa Hindu Parishad), barged into the fine arts department of Vadodara's Maharaja Sayajirao University, vandalised paintings that weren't even up for public exhibition but meant for internal assessment.
- M F Husain's gallery in Ahmedabad was vandalised by the VHP and Bajrang Dal, part of a chain of events that forced one of India's greatest living artists to live abroad in exile.
- Information and broadcasting ministry issues periodic bans on TV channels like AXN and FTV.
Can you spot one common thing in all the above incidents which I've picked at random at different points in time? Each of these news item is attached to some political faction. We don't see any news either in television or the dailies where the general public has initiated a protest against some form of art. This is truly encouraging.
We know that all (no exceptions here) political parties and extremists group live on and wait for such opportunities to gain popularity. The sincerity of these protests are understood by us without any specific mention. Truly, these are entertainment and mere entertainment to me a momentary highlight on these groups and we forget them soon.
On the other side, I have seen that these incidents has benefited the victims on a long term. Salmaan Rushdie, Taslima Nasreen, MF Hussein, Mallika Sherawat and FTV just to quote a few would have been less popular without such incidents in their career.
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