Two incidents in a week in TN, examples of thin-skinned govts cut across states

In the latest instance, Tamil Nadu Assembly Speaker M Appavu on Thursday referred Tamil daily Dinamalar to the House privilege committee for “denigrating” Finance Minister Palanivel Thiagarajan and other MLAs in its coverage of his state Budget speech.

A report carried on March 21, Tuesday, on Dinamalar’s front page was titled ‘Scratching his head, and fumbling… the Finance Minister completed his Budget speech’. A photo accompanying the report showed Rajan reading the speech even as DMK MLAs sat next to him seemingly dozing. The daily circled the faces of the MLAs who appeared to have their eyes closed. (Some of them were at least using digital tablets to access files and procedures related to the Budget, which might have given the impression that they were sleeping). Dinamalar has not yet reacted to the Speaker’s action.

A day after the Dinamalar report, the Tamil Nadu Police, in a midnight action, arrested a 23-year-old over social media posts allegedly promoting enmity between groups and public mischief and insulting the modesty of women. Pradheep was remanded to 15-day custody.

Here again, the immediate provocation appears to have been a meme posted by the youth on the Budget. A video clip of an old Tamil film was put up by Pradheep in which two men pick “eligible” women, which he suggested would be how the government would go about selecting women homemakers for the monthly allowance of Rs 1,000 announced in the Budget. In the video shared by him, the two men were identified as Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin and Rajan.

The two incidents coincided with examples showing other thin-skinned state governments in the neighbourhood. In Karnataka, actor-activist Chetan Kumar alias Chetan Ahimsa was arrested by the Bengaluru city police on Tuesday – his second arrest in a year – for allegedly hurting religious sentiments over a tweet on Hindutva. In Kerala, ruled by the Left that is the first to accuse the Narendra Modi government of “gagging” of press freedom, a popular TV news anchor and critic of the government, Vinu V John, was booked and questioned recently.

In Tamil Nadu too, this is far from the first such action by a government. In 1987, under the M G Ramachandran-led AIADMK government, the state Assembly sentenced several journalists, including an editor of a prominent Tamil magazine, S Balasubramanian, to three months’ imprisonment for “violating the privilege of the House”. They spent three days in prison.

In 2003, when the AIADMK’s J Jayalalithaa was CM, the Speaker declared jail term for five journalists, including editors of The Hindu and DMK mouthpiece Murasoli, following several reports critical of the state government. This was stayed by the Supreme Court.

In another term in power, in 2014, Jayalalithaa filed a complaint against a news reader on a Tamil TV channel over a critical news telecast. Besides, a leading English daily editor was booked by her government for publishing a statement by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy.

During her 2001-2006 regime, Jayalalithaa in fact filed 195 criminal cases against party leaders and media. In 2012, when she was CM again, she sued Tamil magazine Nakkeeran for calling her a “beef-eater.”

M Karunanidhi’s regime was no better. In 2009, the news editor of Dinamalar was arrested after a report was published on a Kollywood actor’s prostitution allegations.

At a time when social media has blurred the line between individual opinions and institutional positions, leaders admit that governments need to develop a thicker hide and not claim offence over every slight remark. There is also the danger of leaders being gradually cut off from all voices of criticism, especially in case of long-standing rulers who often come to depend on a shrinking coterie. A former CM of a South India state says this has already come to pass, with leaders increasingly insular, amplifying their sensitivity to any criticism.

Incidentally, be it Stalin or his Kerala counterpart Pinarayi Vijayan, these are the same leaders who argued once against legal and criminal actions against slightly problematic or derogatory content when in the Opposition. For that matter, most of the stalwarts of the BJP – then known as the Jana Sangh – earned their political stripes fighting the Indira Gandhi-led Congress government’s crackdown against most institutions of the country during the Emergency.

Tamil Nadu old-timers remember well how Karunanidhi once dealt with media criticism as CM. Mediapersons in the state would often be woken up at 8 am by the then CM, either calling in to appreciate a report or expressing his disapproval.

If nothing else, it kept dialogue between two crucial pillars of the State going.