India the ban-capital of the democratic world

My desire to read University of Chicago scholar Wendy Doniger's book, The Hindus: An Alternative History, has been aroused.

Why? Because it's now banned in India.

Penguin India recently caved in to the demands of a Hindu Right Wing activist, Dinanath Batra that all copies of the book be destroyed because it allegedly misrepresents Hinduism from a deeply salacious point of view.

To allay fears that India is going the way of Hindu fascism, Batra said that he is not against alternative perspectives, it's just that there should be "guidelines" for expressing dissent. The octogenarian RSS is not aware, as so many of the old, semi-literate fogies of Indian politics and the Indian religious establishment are, that alternative and dissent mean flagration of "guidelines". 

Whether or not Hinduism has the DNA of real "dirty" sex embedded in it or not is moot; what's lamentable, as activist Arundhati Roy observes, is the fact that free speech has been censored in a country that prides itself on being the world's most populous democracy.

The censorship of the book comes in the heels of earlier censorships of books with religious and cultural content, like Joseph Lelyveld's The Great Soul, a biography of Gandhi. Gujarat Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, who is poised to be India's next Premier, personally campaigned for a banning of the book because it had allegedly portrayed Gandhi as a "homosexual". Modi had also asked for a national ban of the book.

Two other books that have been banned in India are: Jitendra Bhargava's The Descent of Air India, and Tamal Bandophadyay's Sahara, The Untold Story.

Bhargava's book doesn't have any religious content, but it takes to task the dealings and the abuse of power of former aviation minister Praful Patel. Patel is accused of ruining the once-significant national carrier Air India.

Neither of these books have been banned, but both Patel and Subrata Roy, founder of Sahara Pariwar, the unscrupulous Indian conglomerate with holdings in every business imaginable, have slapped defamation suits worth crores of rupees in Indian courts. The defendants don't want to fight their battles in Indian courts when the plaintiffs are powerful and can bribe their way around the judiciary.

A timely reminder that freedom of speech is restricted in India and that citizens are not free to speak inconvenient truths or express opinions that unsettle the powers.