Saturday, January 21, 2012

Silly Writers

This is from Jaipur Literary Festival. According to Qaumi Awaz (and other media outlets):

Authors Hari Kunzru and Amitava Kumar used their session at the festival to read from "Satanic Verses", giving clear indications that the festival was organized to create ill will within India.
This is indeed silly. The aforementioned book was banned because of certain reason. This reason was not hurt Muslim sentiments. By reading passages from the banned book the said authors might be making a statement, as these type of people live by making statements, but they also violated the law of the land. Any willful violator of law should be ready to face the legal process. They way democracy is for the people every institution of democracy is supposed to be for the people. To sabotage it goes against the grain of the system. There is nothing ingenuous or inspiring in this activity. A desire to hurt the sentiments of a twenty crore strong minority is certainly there. And that makes it all the more silly. The institution of literature is a voluntary one - the state does not decide that Mr A and Mr B shall be the writers. Writers and authors who do not represent the interests of the people betray a sacred trust and that is third silliness in this episode.