This is an interesting column in today Sunday Times, considering the M'tra government is going nuts and it wont take long before the entire country chooses to go that way.

COLONISING MINDS

The cunning moves of a nanny state

Pritish Nandy

Last evening, I walked into the Jehangir Art Gallery, Mumbai’s most popular cultural space for citizens to get their weekly art fix. Sprawled across their three galleries was a show by one Sanjeev Khandekar with Vaishali Narkar called Tits, Clits & Elephant Dick. There were paintings, sculptures, installations and the gallery was crowded with men, women, children—yes children—admiring the erotic images. There were large sculptures of naked men with erect phallus. There were naked women as well, full breasted and lustful. Brochures of the show were being freely distributed. There was a long poem by the artist called In Search of the Best F*** of His Life, in both Marathi and English, peppered with four letter words you may not like me to repeat here.
Frankly, it was no great show. The art was puerile. The poems were worse. But I was delighted to see a local artist trying to break through the nonsensical moral code that enslaves today’s middle class mindset where everyone wants to censor everything. A code best personified by people like Pramod Navalkar who have held this city ransom to an anachronistic and hypocritical moral order first imposed on us by invading Mughals and then perpetuated by the East India Company. The purpose was the same to colonise our minds.
And, funnily, they succeeded.
Take the example of Vishal Bharadwaj’s amazing film, Omkara. Most people are discussing it with outrage. No, not because Othello kills the beautiful Desdemona—Kareena Kapoor looking her prettiest after Chameli—but because the film is full of expletives in the native dialect of Western UP. I hear horror stories about critics who watched the film with their ears plugged and young girls who slunk out of the hall, embarrassed by the profanities. The fact is that a producer has been brave enough to make such a film and mainstream actors like Ajay Devgan, Saif, Kareena and Vivek risked such roles, instead of doing the usual rubbish that most top actors are condemned to do.
But what amazed me most was that kids were strolling in and out of the Jehangir show, tits, clits, dicks, et al, while Omkara—an outstanding work of cinema—was restricted to adult viewers. No genitals were on display in the film. Just a few expletives that every child hears on the streets every day and the film is banned from universal viewing, which, incidentally, also means no TV channel can carry it, despite it being a truly world class film, a home-grown take on Shakespeare, while an exhibition of erotic art can be seen by anyone.
This is what happens when the state interferes in matters of culture. The stupidest decisions are taken by the stupidest of people. There is no logic, no consistency, no vision. The state is puritanical towards one art and liberal towards another. The legendary Ara spent all his life painting only big-busted naked women and flower vases.
Souza’s nudes were grotesque and perverse. Bhupen Khakkar openly painted sodomy. The much maligned M F Husain’s nudes are comparatively timid. But all of them are recognised as the great masters of Indian art and get top dollars in auctions worldwide. No one complains. No one complains when novels are published which describe sexual acts in graphic detail. No law stops bookstores from selling them or allowing young children to browse through them. In fact, that’s how I first learnt about sex. From Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer. This morning I picked up another classic, Deepak Chopra’s Kamasutra which was displayed at Crossword. Again, lots of people were browsing through the book.
So why are we so anal about sex in movies and songs? Why has the I&B ministry once again issued a directive that no songs, no trailers, no movies, no remixes can be shown on TV without a ‘U’ certificate from the censors? Why can we read anything we want, watch anything we want in an art gallery but have restricted viewing in theatres and ‘U’ certified content on TV? Is there any sense in such a policy? Is it the contention of the I&B ministry that art and literature deserve more artistic licence than cinema or TV content? What else could provoke such an idiotic law?
Cinema is the most powerful and influential art form of our time. It is no less than literature and painting. If Ara, Souza, Khakkar and Husain do not need censor certificates, if Picasso does not need a censor certificate, if the great novelists of our time do not need censor certificates, why do we need censor certificates for movies and TV content? In the age of 3-TV homes, do we want everyone to perforce watch Mickey Mouse? Is that the level of intellect we want to inculcate in our viewers? Do the people of India have no right to make an informed, intelligent, adult choice? If we want our art, our culture, our cinema, our theatre to grow and mature, we must allow free choice to our audiences. In the theatres. On the TV set. That’s what the remote is for. That’s what the child lock is for. You cannot chain art and culture to obsolete notions of morality. There’s nothing called vulgarity in art. There’s only good art and bad art. Good art enriches our lives. Bad art is forgotten. It does not have the power to corrupt. It never did. When good and bad art coexist, we acquire taste, values, knowledge and understanding.
A law that bans any work of art, literature, cinema, theatre is vile and vulgar. But what’s as bad is the censorship imposed by nanny states. Our broadcasting laws, bad as they are, will get worse when the new Broadcasting Bill comes in. So, if you value your rights, stand up and protest against censorship. For controlling obscenity is an excuse. The real objective is to control information, and thereby control minds.