Punjab govt to set up panel to check vulgarity in songs, says Navjot Sidhu
CHANDIGARH: Punjab’s cultural affairs minister Navjot Singh Sidhu on Saturday announced that the state government has decided to constitute a Punjab Sabhyachaar (culture) Commission to check vulgarity in Punjabi songs.
The commission will also have the power to monitor social media content, he said, claiming that Punjab is the first state in the country to have such a setup.
At a press conference for the announcement, Sidhu said that chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh will be the chairman of the commission and the cultural affairs minister (Sidhu) will be the vice-chairman.
Punjab arts council chairperson and poet Surjit Patar has been tasked with preparing a blueprint on the membership structure and norms in two weeks, said Sidhu. Patar claimed the members will be an “apolitical group of intellectuals”.
The commission will have the power to register FIRS against those who violate the code of conduct to be put in place soon, Sidhu said adding, “an FIR will be the last resort. The commission will first urge writers and singers not to promote songs that are harmful to the psyche of society and our coming generations.”
Patar, asserting the need for the commission, said, “The situation has become such that you cannot watch songs in your house with your children or parents. How Punjabi songs impact our society is for all to see. Despite wide-ranging criticism of singers and writers who are promoting such songs, the trend has not diminished. We have to stop it somewhere, if want to save our culture.”
Notably, the state police too had initiated efforts to urge singers to stay away from such songs, but not much has been heard about them so far.
At present, the national-level censor board does not cover music albums, though complaints can be made to authorities, including private firms such as Google that owns video-sharing portal Youtube, on a case-bycase basis. As 2019 approaches, political parties such as the Trinamool Congress (TMC) and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) have stepped up efforts to forge a wider pact to keep the BJP out of power. West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee was in Delhi last week and met a range of political actors; she now intends to travel to state capitals. This comes in the backdrop of the BJP appearing slightly more vulnerable than it has so far in its term. It lost the Uttar Pradesh Lok Sabha bypolls to the combine of the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP); it also suffered setbacks in the Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh by-elections. Regional political forces suddenly see a chance of re-emerging as important players in national politics . But this is not the first time they have sought to play a A hung parliament emerged from the 1996 elections in which the Congress government of PV Narasimha Rao was defeated. The BJP became the largest party in Parliament with 161 MPS and formed a government under the leadership of Atal Bihari Vajpayee but it only lasted 13 days. Regional and Left leaders came together and offered the leadership to former prime minister VP Singh, who declined it. They turned to veteran West Bengal chief minister Jyoti Basu, but the CPI(M) decided that it would not participate in the government and declined the pivotal role in national politics. In 1996, a group of regional parties and the Left formed a United Front (UF) government. That formation too came about with the explicit objective of keeping the BJP out of power. The Congress supported the coalition from outside. This time too, regional party leaders such as Mamata have indicated that the Congress should be ready to support such an initiative.
The Congress, while expressing its openness to alliances, kept open the question of leadership of such a coalition in its political resolution at the party plenary. In a recent interview, Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Sitaram Yechury indicated that the country may see a 1996 type situation in 2019. So what happened back then? offer, a decision Basu would later describe as a “historic blunder.” They then decided to prop up HD Deve Gowda as the Prime Minister. Deve Gowda’s party, Janata Dal, only had 46 MPS.
The Left Front and Congress lent their support, but the Deve Gowda government couldn’t last beyond a year after the then Congress president Sitaram Kesri decided to pull the plug and insisted on a change in the Prime Ministership. The UF constituents, after cancelling each other out, picked IK Gujral . Gujral was seen as a non-threatening fig- ure since he did not have a mass base of his own.
The government, however, did not complete its full term due to internal squabbling and because of differences with Congress. The Jain Commission Report on Rajiv Gandhi’s assassination hinted that the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), a UF component, had a role to play in it.
The Congress insisted on the DMK’S removal from the coalition while Gujral decided to stick with the party. India went to the polls once again in 1998, and this time the BJP came to power.
The situation has become such that you cannot watch songs in your house with your children or parents. ...have to stop this