Radio jockeys, mind your Ps and Qs. You never know who’s listening. As of this week, the government has declared war on “double meaning” and “vulgarity” on the airwaves. It started with Samajwadi Party MP Jaya Bachchan pointing out that the language used by RJs on private FM channels was “really objectionable”, “very bad”, “not palatable”. She also took exception to MPs being mimicked and lampooned — RJs clearly lack proper reverence for the chair-flinging and pepper-spraying so essential to the business of Parliament. But I&B Minister Prakash Javadekar rushed in with clarifications: MPs would heroically submit themselves to mimicry, but language or humour of a riper nature could attract the attention of the electronic media monitoring centre.
The government should think twice before it turns itself into Orwellian parody, though that would be rich material for humour of all kinds. It could also take the the advice of the Supreme Court, which recently told certain petitioners, “Don’t be so sensitive to these things”. The court was hearing a plea to stay the release of the new Aamir Khan starrer, PK. The petitioners had felt that the movie posters, featuring a nude Aamir Khan with a strategically placed boom box, hurt religious sentiments and promoted obscenity. “If you don’t like then don’t watch the movie,” the court said. Words of wisdom in a cultural climate where, too often lately, the first impulse has been to slash and ban. Vulgarity is most often a matter of personal taste and sensitivity. An individual who finds a film or a broadcast offensive has the choice to tune out; it is not a decision that can be taken for her by a fussy nanny state.
Besides, wasn’t the prime minister just lamenting the lack of humour in Parliament? An overzealous media had cramped the MPs’ style, he felt. Look who’s watching whom now.
