Tipping the balance

Getting kids to read about the Indian Constitution is no mean task. And when the first lady of the high ranks of India's legal system, Leila Seth, decides to tell children a story, one sits up and listens in.

That she had a three-month old child in her arms when she became the first woman to top the London Bar exams is enough to have me starting an imaginary Mexican wave in a huge stadium, in admiration for her. But Leila Seth has many such milestones tucked away behind that disarming grandmotherly smile and grace.

If you thought lawyers and judges were all knotted up in complex legalese and were beyond understanding, you should have seen her disprove that with panache at the launch of her book “We, the Children of India - The Preamble to our Constitution” recently at Crossword, Bangalore. Leila Seth was the first woman judge of the Delhi High Court and the first woman Chief Justice of a state High Court in India. She will soon turn 80.

Targeted at children aged seven to 11, Leila Seth says she chose to work on the Preamble because it's a visionary statement. “Only if you have a vision, will you follow it,” as she explains. Children usually start civics as a subject in school at 12 and find it boring. “But the earlier they learn, the more it becomes a part of their daily living,” she says. In recent times, however, the NCERT text books show a big improvement and so there's no need for books on a similar line for the older age group, she feels.

Full report here Hindu

Maharashtra is right tosquash 'Shivaji'

The recent judgement of Supreme Court to end a ban on James Laine’s book on Shivaji has received belligerent reactions from political parties in Maharashtra, ruling party and opposition alike. The Maharashtra government banned the book in 2004 following an attack on the Bhandarkar Institute of Oriental Research where the author conducted his research for the book.

In Maharashtra, Shivaji is the symbol of Maratha pride and has a similar status as George Washington has in the U.S. or Subhash Chandra Bose has in Bengal. A number of major establishments in the state - airport, railway station, roads, schools, colleges — have either been named after him or were rechristened with his name. Owing to this revered position, any remarks which diverge from the age-old opinions about his life are deemed sacrilegious.

Full report here WSJ blogs

Shrinking Heroes

Once again we have a display of the insecurities of the Maratha people. Even after having their own state for fifty years, the leaders of the Marathi speaking people are out agitating against one page of a book written by a foreign scholar on their hero Shivaji.

On a previous occasion too, these agitators had already destroyed a jewel of Maharashtrian, indeed, Indian scholarship when they burned down the Bhandarkar Institute’s Library in Pune. This sort of self abuse continues. Now, even the Congress has joined in the demands that despite the Supreme Court judgment, the book be not sold in Maharashtra. The idea that the Constitution guarantees the right of free speech and within that, access to books which are not banned, is beyond the intelligence of Congress chief ministers nowadays. What matters are vote banks and knee-jerk populism.

Full report here Indian Express 

Maharashtra seeks law on defamatory books

After facing embarrassment in James Laine book case, the Maharashtra government has demanded that the Centre must a frame a law that will enable states to ban books that defame any person, dead or alive, who is revered by the people.

The Supreme Court lifted the ban on Laine's book Shivaji: Hindu King in Islamic India on Friday. Sources in the State's Law and Judiciary Department said the state's case had weakened because it did not have any basis like that applied in banning books of authors like Salman Rushdie. Opposition parties have been protesting what they call the state government's failure.

RR Patil, who was instrumental in banning Laine's two books, demanded a stringent law.

Full report here Hindustan Times