A list of controversial subjects Indians shouldn’t write about if they want to avoid giving offence (and going to jail)
1) Dr Ambedkar, Mamata Banerjee, Bal Thackeray
2) Dead politicians
3) Living politicians
4) Mahatma Gandhi
5) And his sex life
6) Rama, Sita, Ramayanas, Ramanujan
7) Just kidding. You can write about Ramanujan.
8) Hindu gods and goddesses
9) The Prophet and Islam
10) Any other gods, goddesses, temples, mosques, gurdwaras, churches, systems of belief, places of faith past and present, religious rituals, scriptures, priests, followers etc.
11) Duh. Religion.
12) Sex is fine, especially if it involves starlets, but not if it involves 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10 and 11.
13) Savita Bhabhi. (All other Bhabhis are exempt.)
14) Maoists
15) Maoists masquerading as college girls
16) Anything about 1 to 15 on the Internet
17) Under the IT Rules, do not post anything on the Internet that might encourage terrorism, drugs, satire, political discussion, religious discussion, criticism of corporations, criticism of the Indian government, criticism in general. Spam and Shahrukh Khan jokes are fine.
18) If you intend to be disparaging about the IT Rules, do not write about it on the Internet, because the IT Rules make disparagement and certain kinds of criticism on the Internet illegal, even though they are legal forms of free speech. To clarify, you may disparage the IT Rules, which are about the Internet, anywhere except on the Internet. This is what literary theorists call “very meta”.
19) Since it is probably dangerous to write about sex, religion, politics, and the Internet, what can you write about? I suggest mangoes. This year’s crop is especially fine, and worthy of your attention.
User’s guide to Indian free speech
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16 responses to “User’s guide to Indian free speech”
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Salman Rushdie?
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LOOOL
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Its not surprising that the list will be endless. Here's the root cause of the problem:Flawed freedom of speech law in our Indian constitution
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Mangoes are OK as long as you are writing about more than two of'em.
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This basically covers my entire body of published and/or forthcoming work.
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Shivaji and Sachin Tendulkar for neo liberals 🙂
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Sonia Gandhi? Rahul Gandhi?
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Weirdly, a lot of people do seem to be writing about mangoes. I guess this explains why.
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Rest In Eternal Peace ! – Article 19 of The Constitution of India. Redefined as "Thine Onerous Duties Far Outweigh Rights, if any" !!
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….Freedom of Speech…? There's an Orwellian spectre of the "Thought Police" at play here ?!
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That was sooo Funny….. Thanks for bring a smile…. Kudos
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In my opinion, freedom of writing, or in a more wholesome way, "creative freedom" is a blunt excuse for so called progressive writers who sell people's sentiment for their own materialistic well-being. First of all, nobody is creative. We all do copy pasting thing. We copy things from our circumstances, from nature (internal and external both) and weave it in our own way. The selection of words, sentence structure, style, pun etc. all are also thrust upon us, gradually in our up bringing. So, I personally don't like this statement creative writer. What we create? we create nothing. We only mold certain things in our own ways. Second, we can write anything we want unless we hurt other sentiments. Sentiment is not mere a word, but the greatest manifestation of our ego, and somehow we always feel happy to hurt others, so that it actually massage our own ego. The list is comprehensive but I think we can write about anything in this list albeit we minus our personal egotistical pleasure from it.
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hee hee hee, *hi5* but ab to aam har season mein milega naa? 😛
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Wait a minute!! Mango? no no no, ganesha->mango->murgan->cheat ? No ?
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what about 'aam' aadmi.. can we write about it? 😀
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Nice blog. I appreciate this.
nilanjana s roy 
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