Changing Times For Tiny Tots (Teacher Plus, July Issue)

With inputs from Deepti Bharthur


“Surely, education has no meaning unless it helps you to understand the vast expanse of life with all its subtleties; with its extraordinary beauty, its sorrows and its joys.” – Jiddu Krishnamurti

The image of a proud little boy or girl taking off for school, excited to distraction is maybe something that only plays out on a Sarva Shiksha Abhyan advertisement. The Tabula Rasa approach to education doesn’t do for today’s generation of parents who will do anything to make sure their children get what they see as a much-needed edge to succeed in life.

With the spread of the corporate franchise preschools in urban India over the past decade, the notion of preprimary education in India has been fundamentally revamped. A fully developed curriculum, lesson plans, organised activity are all factored into the system, gearing towards preparing the child with a sound cognitive base for school.

‘Learning Readiness’ is the first of the three laws of learning developed by the renowned American educational psychologist Edward Thorndike. It is a simplistic concept that ‘individuals learn best when they are physically, mentally and emotionally ready to learn, and they do not learn well if they see no reason for learning.’ Although this concept can be applied to human learning at any stage, it is particularly significant for the 0-7 age group because any experience during this impressionable age has a long-term effect. Manju Shetty, an education consultant at Chennai says that if we initiate learning before children are ready, they may learn and perform. But by the time they come to class four when fractions are introduced, they will be saturated and lethargic. In other words, they become “schooled” in performing certain operations but do not truly “learn” in the deeper sense of the term.

The late Prof. N. Sankaran Nayar, eminent educationist and psychologist who contributed to the first authoritative nursery syllabus in Kerala back in 1963, says in his book The Concept and Practice of Preschool Education that readiness has two components – maturation and experience. While the former refers to the physical aspect (the child’s hand becoming strong enough to use a pencil), the latter refers to a background of related experiences. It is in providing the child with more experiences that preprimary education can contribute in ‘readying’ them for formal learning at primary school. Maturation on the other hand must progress at its own pace and cannot be forced.

Preprimary education has two phases in today’s Indian context – playschool and nursery (also known as kindergarten). Two years of kindergarten (German, means children’s garden) has been in vogue for some time now and it has almost become the first phase of compulsory education these days. While the notion of preschool has been around for over three decades in the country its apparent importance has increased in the recent years. Understandably, there is some confusion between the terms “preschool” and “playschool” because one refers to a phase of education while the other refers to the approach taken within education.

The huge increase in advertising for preschools and nurseries only leads to further confusion: are these spaces where children get together to play and be cared for in the absence of parents, or are they spaces where they are “readied” for formal school? Where the early preschools, slightly upgraded day care centres, were all about comfort and care, the newer ones focus on social and intellectual development - and therefore evince a greater interest in “method”.

Mr. J. Joseph, Managing Director of Sydney Montessori Schools based in Kerala, says, “I wanted to change the system of leaving children to under qualified people. Ayahs with minimal educational qualification are not equipped with the resources to provide a child during this important phase.” Joseph started Sydney with one student in a small town called Kottayam. The main challenge he faced was parents’ hesitation to pay fees of over a thousand rupees per month, especially since an older institution in the neighbourhood, run by nuns, was charging only a quarter of it. “We don’t mind spending lakhs on making our children engineers and doctors, but what is the point if we have ignored the most important phase of their lives?” he asks.

But word of mouth spread faster than he expected and within no time, Sydney became famous for the difference it was making. It now has six branches in three districts in Central Kerala. However, Joseph himself clarifies that although the school focuses on all round development of the child, character formation and finding their true potential, it does not completely follow the Montessori system as the name suggests. “There isn’t the right kind of environment for that in Kerala. It will be useful only if the child can carry on with it during primary education and upwards,” he says.

It is known that Montessori schools differ in their interpretation and practical application across the world because of the ambiguity in Maria Montessori’s work in describing the method itself; she focused more on the effects of the method. Take Anuradha Rao’s case, for instance. With the experience of running the Naval Wives Welfare Association playschool in Visakhapatanam, she started one at her house in Hyderabad after her husband’s retirement. She wanted to take it to the next level and attended a Montessori training program at Basheerbagh. “The classes went fine, but during a two week teaching practice session at a school, I saw multiple instances where the inner urges of children were being disregarded. The original Montessori style is about letting the child be. I couldn’t agree and so I quit.”

The Waldorf method developed by the Australian philosopher Rudolph Steiner has also gained niche popularity in Indian schools recently. Based on a more humanistic pedagogy, the Waldorf style is different from mainstream teaching methods. Manju, who also has 13 years of experience as a kindergarten teacher at Shloka Waldorf School in Hyderabad says, “We use the playway method. Our play materials and even the classroom ambience is the same in all countries. But we follow what is called the rhythm of the child – which starts with their heartbeat,” she says.

At Euro Kids, a leading preschool chain in India, a combination of playway method and Montessori style is put to use. Asha Swaminathan, Academic Coordinator for the Kerala Territory, says: “Our philosophy is based on this idiom - I hear, I forget; I see, I remember; I do, I understand. So instead of just saying A for Apple, we bring an apple to the class, make them smell, touch, peel, cut and eat. All senses are at work that way.”

However, preschool institutions are not all about fun and play. Teachers often encounter challenges while working with children from dysfunctional, unhappy homes or with a history of abuse. Manju speaks of a senior kindergarten student in her charge who was grappling with an incident of attempted molestation at a park. “Fortunately, nothing happened. But the child became so clamped. I requested the parents to give her one more year in kindergarten. They are so grateful for that one year now. She has forgotten it (the episode) completely.”

Joseph remembers having a four year old who was so tactfully sexually abused by her uncle that she developed a sexual interest. The parents had not communicated this, but her behaviour with older boys upped the teachers’ antennae. The parents, however, later confessed that they sent her to Sydney just so that she could get over it.

Parents are a problem!

Anuradha, who runs a non formal playschool (just three hours everyday), says she has had parents who were worried about their children not knowing the alphabet and numbers 1-20 while other kids did.

Manju confesses that the biggest challenge in her career has been dealing with parents, not children. “They should understand that children are like our five fingers, all are different but each one is indispensable. There is no point in comparing them.” But she herself says that ‘the parents who trouble you a lot are the genuine ones.’ That is precisely why Waldorf gives parents the opportunity to participate in the class for a day and watch their kid learn.

Euro Kids arranges a parent orientation program at the outset itself to avoid such ‘a conflict of interest.’ “We make it clear to parents what we will be doing and what the expectations from them are. They are equal contributors in their child’s development,” says Asha.

Joseph and his wife Jasmine have had a tough time dealing with indifferent parents. The attitude is that ‘we pay you and you are supposed to do this.’ There have been cases when the kids are bathed and sent home and they return the next morning without even brushing. Some parents even touch teachers the wrong way while handing over the child. Some come drunk to school to drop children. And most of them are completely averse to feedback as well.

But there are also parents like Jyothi Rao, whose daughter has gone to Anuradha’s school as well as Euro Kids in Kukatpally, Hyderabad. She can list the learning of her child in each place with the changes in her behaviour; such is the level of involvement!

An important factor to keep in mind here is that the nursery school is not a substitute but an extension of the home. Neither home nor school can take care of all needs and they cannot function in isolation as well. A coordinated approach working at an individual plane (parent visiting school and teacher visiting home) and a collective plane (parent teacher meetings to discuss common problems) is required. Of course, basic manners are not negotiable.

Teachers don’t just teach...

In many of these institutions, teachers have the freedom and responsibility to choose the school activities based on children’s interest and pace. They ‘prepare an environment’, as Maria Montessori puts it, where children do not have to be forced with either the carrot or the stick to learn.

Equating teaching with discipline gets a strict negative nod. Regimentation is a serious hazard to mental and emotional health of children at this age; what they need is a free permissive atmosphere where free activity is not only tolerated but encouraged. As Swami Vivekananda ardently advocates, teachers should help them manifest the perfection they already have in them.

The Waldorf system calls their teachers ‘facilitators.’ “We talk very little unlike in other schools. If a child asks why the sky is blue, we don’t give a readymade answer. We ask back, ah, why is it blue? This will make him observe and experience by himself that the sky changes colour as the day progresses,” Manju explains. At Sydney, teachers are given special training to understand that it is a re-rooting process for children, their first exposure to a world outside home, which calls for a lot of care. One teacher is assigned to each kid during the time of joining and it is her duty to see that the child is comfortable being away from parents and home.

Euro Kids employs a ‘reporting and inspection system’ to deal with the problem of widespread franchisees. Each school has to call the territory Academic Coordinator every day and give a report. Additionally, monthly inspections are arranged. Coordinators across the country meet once in four months to discuss feedback from teachers across the board and to amend the curriculum accordingly.

Getting the right applicants is a challenge faced by all these schools. Most schools consider good English communication skills and graduation a must and mothers are preferred. But an attitude problem among educated people in teaching at preprimary level is the biggest deterrent. ‘I did not do my post graduation to teach at a nursery’ is a statement that is often heard. What many teachers do not realize is that this is the place where he or she can make maximum difference to a child’s life.

Of course, the attitude problem has a lot to do with the poor salary scale of playschool and kindergarten teachers. At Sydney, every teacher gets a basic salary of Rs.5000 plus performance based bonus. Joseph says he knows many schools that are run with teachers who have just passed plus two and have undergone nursery teaching training and are paid as low as Rs.1000. Sister Nirmal, Principal of St. Lukes Nursery School, Gandhinagar says that all three teachers in her school have only completed these courses.

While enhanced pay scales will go a long way in attracting a better talent pool, a genuine interest in teaching young children is important for those who wish to make a career in it. Asha once had a post graduate who had come for the post of Counsellor, but the vacancy was for teaching. “She was averse to the idea, but I requested her to be with us for a month and see how things go. She loves her job today.” If that’s not enough, she vouches for it herself – “I have 100% job satisfaction.”

The early years of a child’s life must be handled with care and consideration - in terms of providing the right physical and emotional environment, and in terms of having the right kind of people around the child. While a warm and nurturing home may be the best place for a child to take early lessons for life, the space provided by a preschool can offer a valuable addition to those lessons—through peer interaction and play, which is after all, a child’s work.

MRP – The Meaning And The Myth

Shopping for house supplies has never been such a ‘surprising experience’ before as it is in current times. Some super markets sell sunflower oil at half the amount of MRP and some celebrate ‘our price’ of 49.99 for a detergent packet worth Rs.50! The irony is that most of us, when at the local kirana shop or a street vendor shop, also will not mind if the shopkeeper asks for an extra rupee or two on MRP. ‘Poor fellow,’ we think.

Maximum Retail Price is by no means an unfamiliar term; even to a consumer who is just about average in awareness. But does that mean that all consumers understand what those words mean?

Of course, it is the maximum amount that a retailer should charge us for a packaged commodity. What most of us do not know is that we almost always pay much more than the cost of the product and a respectable margin put together, even when paying just the MRP.

So where is the glitch? From a layman’s point of view, it is because the manufacturer has the right to decide the price of his/her product. Government does not interfere in this process, and it is up to the consumer whether to buy a product at a particular price. This is why the fancy ‘Hang Out’ packs of Lays available mostly in theatres and malls cost Rs.15, but gives you almost the same quantity as a Rs.10 pack. Manufacturers simply customise the packaging for malls and put a higher price tag.

However, Prof. Vamsi Vakulabharanam from Department of Economics at University Hyderabad says: “As long as there is a competitive structure and private enterprising, it is alright if manufacturers set the price. It is actually the market which is mediating between the consumers and them. The market acts as a disciplining institution whereby prices are brought down to a minimum and hence there is no need for government intervention.”

May be, we should rewind a little bit to understand how this fancy price tag brouhaha came about. Until December 1990, Indian manufacturers had two options while printing prices on packaged commodities: Retail Price (local taxes extra) and Maximum Retail Price (inclusive of all taxes). However, when consumers flooded courts with complaints alleging that retailers were going haywire in charging the ‘local taxes,’ the Ministry of Civil Supplies and its executive wing - Department of Legal Metrology - decided to pull the plug. They amended the Standards of Weights and Measures Act 1976 making it mandatory for manufacturers to print the MRP that is inclusive of all taxes. If you still see packages with ‘Local Taxes Extra’ printed, they are indeed illegal.

Unfortunately, things are still not hunky dory. Local charges still vary from place to place. Since the manufacturer cannot mark the price of a commodity differentially, they build in the highest required margin into their products. This means that retailers, in places where local taxes are less, can either choose to make consumers pay the printed price or work with a lower profit margin and pass the benefit of lower local taxes by selling at prices lower than the printed price. This is one of the reasons why a lot of commodities are sold at prices less than MRP. Another, of course, is that the manufacturers themselves mark up the MRP considerably and ‘do consumers a favour’ by selling it at sometimes even half the price! This is a very common trend with many oil brands these days.

Interestingly, there are some opinions on the Internet that dig out the loopholes in the law that governs MRP. According to S K Ananda Thirtha, a member of the Mysore Grahakara Parishat, there are several Supreme Court orders which say that ‘Rules’ cannot extend the boundaries of the ‘Act’ under which they have been made (eg. Bharathidasan University v/s All India Council for Technical Education, (2001) 8 SCC 767). As of now, the Standards of Weights and Measures Act 1976 only mandates that MRP be printed on the package. However, the ‘Rules’ part of this Act (Standards of Weights and Measures – Packaged Commodities - Rules 1977) crosses the boundaries of the Act by stipulating that price charged cannot exceed the printed MRP. According to Thirtha, therefore, this part of the Rules is invalid making not printing MRP punishable, but not selling above MRP.

Then, is MRP just a fiction? Well, may be not. It appears that most consumer courts, probably unaware of the Supreme Court decisions, keep rewarding compensation against merchants who sell packaged commodities in excess of MRP. Thirtha believes that this is a case of a badly drafted law and its incorrect interpretation providing justice. In short, two wrongs making a right! Of course, the right way is to rectify the law.

However, even the Legal Metrology Bill 2008 which replaced the Standards of Weights and Measures Act 1976 does not contain any provision prohibiting of charging a price higher than the printed price.

So are restaurateurs using this loophole while charging more than MRP on bottled water and cool drinks? No! Another Supreme Court order (State of Himachal Pradesh v/s Associated Hotels of India, AIR 1972 SC 1131), which clarified that MRP is applicable only to retail sales (goods sold in shops), is the ‘culprit’ of food lovers. It is permissible to charge extra in hotels, restaurants and aeroplanes because what they are offering is a service. The ambience and the cooling level at which the drink is offered become part of that service and justifies the prerogative to charge what they want.

On the other hand, home delivery service cannot be interpreted on the same lines. In a case filed by Ankit Jain, who was charged Rs.35 for a 500ml Coke bottle (MRP Rs.15) that he had bought with burgers from Nirula’s in New Delhi, the apex consumer court held that home delivery service cannot be construed as a sale in restaurant where added services are offered.

So the next time you get you pizza delivered, check what you have been charged for the accompanying drink. While India’s law fraternity takes its time to rectify its Acts and Rules and what not, we should bask in the glory of their ignorance and demand for MRP, at least!

Individual Rights, Cultural Terrorism And Media Ethics - The Mangalore Question

India with its ‘post-colonial’ tag and the baggage that comes along with it has never had it easy. As a country, we have had to fight the moral dilemma of choosing between an indigenous culture that embodies multiple facets and a remnant western culture still being infused through what is called ‘cultural imperialism.’ We never got rid of the obsession with anything remotely connected with the West; not once during the sixty two years of independence. At the same time, we cannot let go what we boast about as Indian culture. It is a funny case of confusion and identity crisis.

This dichotomy often manifests in many forms in our day-to-day life which we hardly notice. But when some events are re-presented as larger than life through our mainstream media, they generate discussion and debate.

The whole of India watched in horror when news channels across the country (English and regional) aired the scenes of violence from a pub in Mangalore. Young men and women who came to chill out were being beaten up by the activists of an outfit called Sri Rama Sena for contaminating the Indian culture by drinking and smoking. The incident attracted supreme media attention and the focus was women’s rights to socialise freely. Women’s organisations across the country took up the issue and condemned it on the same grounds. One lady formed ‘a consortium of liberal, pub-going women’ on the Internet inviting women to join her cause to send ‘pink chaddies’ to the Sri Rama Sena head Pramod Muthalik on Valentines’ Day and protest against the Mangalore incident.

The politics of power

It is impossible to miss where this drama was staged – in Karnataka, a BJP ruled state. The BJP, ever torn between its love for Hindu culture and its desire for a modern image, was embarrassed. With the BJP in power in Karnataka, Muthalik knew the publicity value of his show. Had he enacted his theatre elsewhere, like the Shiv Sena which raided pubs years ago in Mumbai and Pune under the ‘secular’ Congress rule, it would have been far less noisy.

With just one mad act, Muthalik turned many, including a minister at the Centre, into full-scale lunatics. It would be irrelevant to ask if Renuka Chowdhury would have supported a ‘pub bharo andolan’ to take on Muthalik, had this happened in a Congress ruled state. The Union Minister for Women and Child Development, who has never ever uttered a word on the continuing rapes and paedophile crimes in UPA -ruled states, has got agitated and warned the Karnataka government.

The rights of individuals

The most important outcry post-Mangalore is against ‘moral policing.’ Young men and women do not want anybody to dictate to them what they should do and what they should not. Forget young men and women, no adult with a thinking mind would want ultimatums on what he/she should do for the weekend. This right to freedom of thought and expression is a constitutional right. Some people say that society is more important than an individual. Well, easier said than done because society comprises of individuals. No society constituting repressed individuals has ever had ‘order’ that these people envisage.

However, it is necessary that we look at the other side of the coin as well. There is an observation that connects individual right claim and the present economic crisis. It says that the current Indian discourse on individual and human rights apes the West, and many in the West now seem to realise that continuously undermining the moral and social order has led to the present economic crisis.

In the United States, the contract-based model undermined families and led to low or no household savings, high personal debt, credit card based living, outsourcing of household functions, and the like. The erosion in relation-based lifestyle soon imposed a huge social security burden on the state because the family mechanism that supported the unemployed, infirm and the aged became dysfunctional forcing the state to step in to aid them.

Apparently, all individual- centric economies are deep in debt; but family-oriented nations like Japan, China, India and generally Asian nations, account for over three-fourths of global savings. This idea that unbridled human rights and unrestrained personal freedom have led to social and cultural degeneration, and that it is possibly the cause of the present economic crisis is extremely interesting.

Terrorism in the name of culture

Most hooligans, who justify the violation of human right of freedom of choice, do so, on the basis of culture. It is depressing that these ruffians operate in the name of Rama and Shiva causing disrepute to genuine Hindu organisations and more importantly, Hinduism.

Here are some arguments that appeared in reports related to the incident:

‘To drink alcohol or indulge in carnal pleasure is not sin, but its abstinence bring great rewards says our Dharmasastras. [Manu Smriti 5.56]’

‘Renunciation is the national ideal of India, ratified Swami Vivekananda.’

The custodians of the so-called Indian culture have taken it upon themselves to uphold these thoughts and indulge in violence to avoid cultural erosion. Whether Indian culture tells one to kill lives and break bones is doubtful. It is also strange how other factors that go into this ‘erosion’ are not ever considered. India, as an economy, liberalised itself in the last decade of the twentieth century opening floodgates of opportunities for the West and their culture to pour in. McDonaldisation, Cocacolanisation or whatever ‘isations’ followed. All of these were acceptable because there was huge money involved. Many cultural custodians benefited from them. When there is no shame in accepting an English education system and multinational corporations, why ridicule the individual choices which form just a subset of many governmental choices and have been deemed legitimate by the existing legal system?

Also, in the Indian tradition, women have been overwhelmingly burdened with the duty of being the embodiment of culture that needs to be preserved. It is extremely anachronistic in this age of equal opportunities.

The question of media ethics

The argument about media’s irresponsibility in dealing with this issue stems mainly from the fact that this was a staged act. Media personnel were at the venue, much before the unfortunate incident happened. It was almost a ‘Lights, camera, action’ episode. It is disturbing that not one of them chose to inform the Police about this grave law and order situation. Had they done that, the chaos that occurred could have been averted, of course at the cost of ‘a colourful scoop of violence against youth.’

Another aspect worth noticing is that the attack that happened against a group of young women and men swiftly transformed into one against women only in the subsequent media reports. Everybody took up the cause of women’s rights raising questions about their individual right to freedom. It is dubious how the men in the picture faded away. Was it done because talking about violence against women is fashionable; or because that is what the violent outfit targeted anyway – just that men came in the way?

If the latter option is the answer, we have a serious problem at hand. Even while condemning what happened, media is abetting such insane organisations’ cause of propagating the argument that the baggage of morality has to be borne only by women. The men of our country have been visiting bars regularly all through the history of our country. That never has been a problem. However, when women started going to places of socialisation openly, probably in the last two decades, there is hue and cry over it. Some say that ‘women have the additionally responsibility endowed by nature to usher in new life into this world. Drinking and smoking are unhealthy habits for women as they would not be able to perform this task ably without a healthy body.’ It sounds as if healthy men are not required for reproduction. The institutionalisation of such biased ideologies will lead to permanent damages from which recuperation might not be possible. Media should be the last agency to let that happen, let alone be a part in the heinous process.

Next is the classic debate of the urban versus the rural; the elite versus the marginalised. Why is it that the urban elites get a lion’s share in airtime as well as newsprint? The Mangalore incident was of importance, and had to be reported. Nobody disagrees with that. But the amount of coverage it got was beyond proportion of its news value. What is news value anyway? Whose value for news are we talking about? There are thousands of women who fight a battle everyday for a dignified living. Who will tell their stories? Who has the time to report and to read these subaltern stories? These are pertinent questions that are lingering around media ethics, unanswered.

Discussions and debates go on. But the reality remains. The Mangalore incident can happen again in our country; probably in another location, to different people. But it can happen. Our mainstream media will still act like hawks hovering for a piece of meat. Let us try and remember that a lesson not learnt in time, is a lesson lost forever. Before it is too late, we should realise our strengths and weaknesses as a culture and reach a consensus on what is the right path for us. Otherwise, the identity of a confused caricature will get jinxed and get stuck to us.

Women’s Right To Freedom Of Expression - The Khushboo Question

Right to freedom of expression is a constitutional right guaranteed to every citizen of India. However, it is doubtful if this is understood in its full capacity by all sections of our society. Also, if gender plays a role when it comes to the luxury of exercising this right is worth looking into. Tamil superstar Khushboo underwent quite some trouble in 2005 when she decided to exercise her right to freedom of expression on a very sensitive topic – premarital sex. A deeper dive into this chapter will possibly unravel many double standards of the Indian civil society and media.

In October 2005, the respected news magazine India Today published a survey in which a lot of college students confessed to having premarital sex. For its Tamil language edition, India Today asked Khushboo about her reaction to the survey. Khushboo, who lived together with her future husband for two years before marrying him, opined that “pre-marital sex is okay provided safety measures are followed to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases.” She also said that “no educated man would expect his wife to be a virgin at the time of wedding.”

One would think that the comments were innocuous enough, particularly when juxtaposed against the survey which would have shattered the comfortable myths Indians grow up with. One would further think that the advice about safe sex is relevant in the context that India has one of the fastest- growing HIV patient populations in the world, with Tamil Nadu leading the way. In fact, the first AIDS patient in India was identified in Tamil Nadu.

The initial reactions to Khushboo’s remarks did not give a clue about what was to follow. Sun TV carried a report on her remarks and the news of a small demonstration against her for having maligned Tamil women. The demonstration apparently also demanded an unconditional apology to all Tamil women.

But soon, the protests snowballed into something wholly different. Her remarks unleashed a veritable storm, with the Dalit Panthers of India (DPI) and the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK) orchestrating a campaign against her, which comprised filing false cases in courts throughout Tamil Nadu, burning her effigies, and a demand that she should leave the state and return to Maharashtra. Some of them went on to allege that Khushboo made the remarks on pre-marital sex to justify her own life's experiences and that she had no right to talk of the chastity of Tamil women. Moral policing moulded itself in various forms and came out as statements like ‘it is not correct to advocate free sex,’ ‘marriages are based purely on trust,’ ‘it is important to protect the institution of marriage,’ and the like. Media – both national and local- was crammed with Khushboo and her remarks.

It is interesting that the cases filed against Khushboo were all under criminal law. In the US, a private citizen can only file a civil case against an individual. He could prefer a criminal complaint against another person, but the district attorney’s office will have to decide if there is a prima facie case and launch criminal proceedings. Here, every Tom, Dick and Harry was filing criminal complaints. A total of twenty eight complaints were filed in various district courts nearly simultaneously. Judges, who have no hesitation in postponing even murder cases against politically-connected persons, responded with unusual alacrity, issuing summons. At least in a few instances, these summons conflicted with each other, requiring Khushboo’s appearance hundreds of miles away on the same day.

Khushboo tearfully apologized on Television for having hurt the sentiments of her people. Though the demand for apology was met with this, the lawsuits proceeded.

The politics involved in the whole issue cannot be missed. The actress had earlier demanded an apology from a film director Thankar Bachchan, for his remark that “actresses who act for money are like prostitutes.” Many conventional political parties (friends of the director as well) could not tolerate the audacity of a woman to make such ‘noise.’ Groups which waited for a chance to even out scores used this situation heavily.

A few enlightened citizens like Suhasini (film actor) came to Khushboo’s rescue raising the legitimate issue of freedom of expression. Not so surprisingly, she also faced vehement criticism for ‘bringing shame to Tamil people.’ Fortunately, there were some others also who argued that they will defend Khushboo’s right to speak her mind even though they did not agree with her opinion. The leader of the Dalit Panthers found himself isolated when he appeared on NDTV and claimed that the protesters did not act at his or his party’s instigation.

However, protests virtually held Khushboo hostage for a month at her home in Chennai. The groups that politicized the issue went on organizing protests and throwing footwear and eggs even when she tried to appear before the Magistrate. To add to the confusion, at least four criminal complaints were filed against India Today for publishing the sex survey and the starlet’s remarks.

Here, we see a clear case of intimidation and trying to deny freedom of speech which is guaranteed by our constitution. It is worth noting that political groups protest only when women threaten what they imagine to be sexual decorum. If it were a man who had said this, the media would have had a field day covering major sections of the society and asking every other person his opinion about Indian women and their rights over their bodies! A woman making a comment on a subject is far more than a taboo.

A pertinent question here is what the masses (especially women) would do if they have to give a vent to their views. In light of Khushboo’s experience, the safest option would probably be to crib about it in the safety of one’s living room, have a happy dinner, and sleep!

Indian civil society should understand that women of this century are more matured and sure about themselves, their sexuality than their counterparts from 1990s. It is high time that the Indian man stood up and tried to accept the fact that women and sexuality have come of age and pre-marital sex might be a reality, more than they think of it as a westernized concept.

As a nation, we should stop being cowards. We should condemn our famous mentality to hide away from things that we feel are against the ‘traditional picture.’ Why the double standards? Many television serials show men having a wife and multiple mistresses. Why don't protestors target such themes? There is never protest against such themes because the one indulging in free sex is a man. Nobody agitates against the filthy language, the sexual innuendos and double meaning in the lyrics used in movies. Khushboo was the chosen one, undoubtedly because she was a soft target.

Politicians and the beholders of the destiny of the nation think that 33% reservation for women in the Parliament is enough to make the fairer sex feel safe. But don’t they forget that the constitution has given the power of free speech to all the citizens of the nation. This right should endow men and women alike the courage to say that, “hey, I don’t think I agree to being nudged when I am walking on the roads” or talk freely about their views on pre-marital sex, religion, contraceptives and much more. The day has to come when freedom of speech is not just a clause in the constitution.

It is regrettable that media all over India chose to sensationalise the Khushboo issue rather than point out the politically motivated tactics of the self-styled champions of Tamil culture. Some media took it out of context and irresponsibly ran stories that were provocative and untrue. The very first report that instigated the whole issue came up on Sun TV expressing ‘shock’ over Khushboo’s remarks. It was a well strategised blow to undermine her popularity through a gameshow ‘Jackpot’ that airs on Jaya TV, archrival of Sun TV. Such cheap and irresponsible actions by some sections of the media who defend their actions as ‘lost in translation!’ cannot be forgiven. There should be a minimum level of ethics in media etiquette.

If a debate is not generated to discuss such issues, we stand a high risk of disintegrating our democracy in the coming years. A country where fifty percent of the population does not have a voice in the mainstream media or public domain as a whole, cannot hope to achieve anything substantial.

The Khushboo story came to a close only when The Supreme Court suspended trial in as many as 23 criminal cases against her. A bench of Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan, Justice R.V. Raveendran and Justice M.K. Sharma stayed the trial and issued notices against pro-Tamil outfits for outraging public morality against her.

It is depressing that one has to move the High Court or the Supreme Court to obtain justice. One can be subjected to harassment through criminal complaints that can only be fought through expenditure of considerable amounts of money and time. What we need immediately is a reform of the criminal law so that free speech – for men and women - is not subject to prosecution even by the state let alone by individuals.

Coupled with that, we also need to inculcate a strong sense of responsibility and accountability in our media to ensure that they facilitate democratic processes and not impede them. Ethics should not be limited to speeches; let us put some into practice as well.