Do we need a Big Brother in theatres?

The word ‘imbecile’ means a person who is foolish or dull-witted. It is obviously a charge that is relative because it cannot be quantified or calculated. Nor can we be certain about the number of such cretins populating a particular country. So it is really surprising that the denizens occupying seats of power in our esteemed and mighty Ministry of Communications have accorded all of us the common status of dimwits and idiots, requiring spoon-feeding and monitoring at least as far as watching films is concerned.

Otherwise how on earth can they explain the need to blip every expletive and cuss word, skip any scene with even a hint of physical intimacy at whim and insert cancer warnings and anti-smoking adverts while a movie is in progress in theatres and on television? To add insult to injury, these trailers are so stilted, unimaginative and poorly executed that they elicit a cringe and many a time, even force you to turn away.

While watching an English film (about a botched up bank robbery) on television the other day, I was so frustrated by the random censoring of sentences that the entire conspiracy eluded me and the essence of the plot was quite lost. The usually short English films have actually become shorter in length due to this arbitrary gagging and we are led gingerly, not unlike horses with a halter, around the periphery of such heathen information, in the (mostly futile) hope of keeping us chaste and pure. According to these self-righteous and powerful mandarins waving the red flag and wielding razor-sharp scissors, the ordinary citizen knows not what is good for him and needs a jury to make sure he doesn’t veer from the correct moral path. So are other, more judicious folks going to decide and permit the extent to which we can be morally corrupted? Finer nuances of a plot may be missed, dialogues may sound disjointed and the film can jump from one frame to another safer one, arbitrarily, all in the name of keeping our minds pure and unspoiled.

I had a good mind to cut off my Tata Sky connection and try downloading films on the numerous illegal websites until I realised that these too have now been blocked by the smug bigwigs at the ministry.

So I am left with little choice but to either watch the numerous downright vacuous and regressive family soap operas where the woman is either an all suffering saint or a cruel, overly made-up vamp or the pitiful reality shows where innocent children are made old before their time, dolled up artificially and coached to compete with and outdo each other rather than rightfully enjoy their childhood in playgrounds.

Or, horrors of horrors, I may be forced to suffer the antics of Radhe Ma as she gyrates vulgarly and most unbecomingly to bhajans that sound suspiciously similar to Hindi film songs while people (men mostly) stand around in raptures, their faces flush with gratitude and looks of benign faith.

One by one as the numerous godmen and god women in India fold their tents and scout around for alternative professions, can we expect the Censor Board to at least temper its zeal and maybe reconsider its utility too?

THE SHORT ENGLISH FILMS HAVE BECOME SHORTER DUE TO THE ARBITRARY GAGGING