India, Sept. 15 -- TV Reporter: Would you like to comment on the recent muzzling of the freedom of expression? Me: As a senior editor, it's my job to pontificate.er...I mean comment on everything under the sun. Reporter: What do you think of the sedition imbroglio? Me: What? Oh, I think it's a lost art. Given the right technique, you can achieve the results you want.
Reporter: I get your point about the art of cartooning. But should people get into trouble because of it?
Me: Look at Casanova, Don Juan, Mata Hari or Bill Clinton.
Reporter: They got into trouble over sedition?
Me: Of course. I don't think cartoons will work. What you need is a romantic environment - light music, wine, good food, perhaps candlelight. That creates the right atmosphere for seduction.
Reporter: Seduction? I was asking about sedition.
Me: Eh? Oh.
Reporter: So what do you think of sedition?
Me: I..ummm..don't mind it, if you have a bit extra to spare.
Reporter: Sedition, in case you didn't know, is saying or writing nasty things about the State.
Me: Oh that sedition. Of course you have to respect the State. Take the police - people pay them their hafta regularly, right? That's respect.
Reporter: Are you saying you agree with Hegel that the State is heaven on earth, dialectically speaking?
Me: You mean Higgins, not Hegel. Henry Higgins was the professor in My Fair Lady. He was the one who knew all about dialects.
Reporter: Hegel was all for the State. He was the guy Marx stood upon his head.
Me: Yes, Marx is quite the yoga guru. Sirsasana, he called it. He's Bengali, you know.
Reporter: He was German.
Me: That's typical disinformation spread by the Trinamool Congress. Believe me, Marx is alive and well in Kolkata.
Reporter: We have strayed far from the topic. What's your view about the insult to national symbols?
Me: Whaaat? Which idiot has dared to insult Bollywood?
Reporter: Not Bollywood, sir.
Me: Oh, somebody insulted Tendulkar?
Reporter: No, no.
Me: Then what? Butter chicken?
Reporter: Nobody has said anything against butter chicken.
Me: I get it. You mean the Victoria Memorial. Or Gateway of India?
Reporter: Those are British symbols. I mean Parliament, the flag, the rupee.
Me: See, if you have a problem with them, you could protest by sitting in the nearest river, or in the sea. It's the rage these days.
Reporter: And what do you think about disrespecting the Constitution?
Me: Somebody dared to do that? Did he have the temerity to say that half the country's kids are malnourished, 65 years after Independence?
Reporter: That's true, isn't it?
Me: So what? It's a slur on the Constitution.
Reporter: I'm afraid we've run completely out of time. Any profound parting thoughts?
Me: I had written down a quote for this interview. Here's what the great French writer Gustave Flaubert warned about the constitution: "Happiness is like smallpox: if you catch it too soon, it can completely ruin your constitution."
Manas Chakravarty is Consulting Editor, Mint
Views expressed by the author are personal
Published by HT Syndication with permission from Hindustan Times.
