WHAT OTHERS SAY

WHIPPING SENTIMENTS

Given the violence and the threats, it is perhaps not surprising that the producers of Padmavati have decided to ‘voluntarily’ defer its release. But irrespective of how this changed timetable plays out, the conduct of politicians over the past few days has been cynical and deeply unmindful of the rule of law. In February 1989, days after Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran had issued a fatwa against him for his novel The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie published an open letter to Rajiv Gandhi, then Prime Minister. He reminded the Prime Minister that his book had already been banned in India in October 1988, under the Customs Act, and that WHILE Issuing THE Curb on Its Import THE FINANCE Ministry CLARIIED that the “ban did not detract from the literary and artistic merit of Rushdie’s work”. “Thanks for the good review,” wrote Rushdie, adding that it appeared “as if your Government has become unable or unwilling to resist pressure from more or less any extremist religious grouping”. It is worth recalling that letter, as it provides a benchmark to map the race to the bottom in the current row over Padmavati. Today, as A number of CHIEF Ministers Across north INDIA rail AGAINST THE ilm and threaten to disallow its screening without requisite cuts, there Is no longer Even that perfunctory Clariication that THEIR Action HAS nothing to Do with THE Artistic merit of THE ilm. AND It Is no longer the case that the governments are unwilling to resist pressure from extremist groups such as the Karni Sena.