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Debate on Intolerance: Why it took 27 years to identify a mistake asks Rushdie
Debate on Intolerance intensifies to a different angle with questions being raised on the past policies of government regarding the same subject.
New Delhi, Nov 29 : The recent self admission made by former Finance Minister P Chidambaram regarding the incorrect decision to ban the book Satanic Verses of notable writer Salman Rushdie is further going to draw impetus about the debate on intolerance. Speaking at the Times lit fest in New Delhi, Chidambaram expressed in clear terms that he has no qualms in accepting the mistake that was made almost three decades back.
Rushdie took to twitter following the development and made his views public questioning how many years before it would require to correct the mistake. Chidambaram who was then the home minister under the Rajiv Gandhi Government during the period between 1986 – 1989. Congress Leader, Sandeep Dikshit also expressed his view on the subject saying that he aught to have corrected the mistake back then than now.
The controversial book which got published back in 1987 received a lot of ire from Islamic radicals including hardliner Iranian President Ayotollah Khameni calling for the killing of the author issuing a Fatwa in his name forcing the leader into abstention and seeking asylum in various western countries.(ALSO READ : Narendra Modi government is promoting Brahmanism, says Arundhati Roy)
Recent debate on intolerance has been raised on successive occasions pretty much regularly by the opposition and awards returned as a mark of protest by individuals achieving distinguished accolades like the National awards. While many have suggested in recent times that returning of awards is the most likely option of protest, it is extremely unfortunate that incidents in the past had a potrayal of intolerances too. Writers and many notable literary authors,artists,film actors have also voice their opinions on incidents like Dadri, the irony is questions based on such signs of intolerance was never questioned in the past. The rise in topic of intolerance also saw a spike only in 2015 and not even 2014 when the NDA government got voted into power.
Adding to that aspect, many believe that the awards returned now as a mark of protest to this government were all conferred by the UPA and Congress led governments since that is the government which led for so many years since 1947.
Graphics credit: Neeraj Kathale, India.com
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