Re: Supreme Court: Khushboo free to opine on pre-marital sex

April 30, 2010

India is full of silly people. That might have been dismissed as India's special

misfortune if they had not been taken seriously.

Their presence looms so large that those with respectable IQs cannot express

their opinions without being forced to contend with them at some point in their

lives.

The Tamil actress, Khushboo, suddenly achieved national fame by having remarked

in the course of a talk on AIDS awareness that women who have sex before

marriage should protect themselves from sexually transmitted diseases and from

pregnancy.

Silly people, together with other silly people motivated by business competition

— Ms Khushboo was an anchor on a television channel — immediately kicked up a

rumpus, claiming that she had defamed Tamil women. Then they went to court. The

Supreme Court has at last quashed 22 cases filed against the actress in 2005.

That the silliest people should have a say is certainly part of democratic

culture, just as the free expression of opinion is also a very significant part

of the same culture — as long as it does not incite one group against another.

That is one of the arguments given by the court in quashing the cases, but the

question is, why should the court have to say this at all?

The substance of the cases against Ms Khushboo, bringing charges of

licentiousness, evil influence and opposition to that strange creature called

`Indian culture', did not seem to deserve the courts' attention.

This is not the first time that the higher judiciary has had to say that there

is nothing wrong with live-in relationships or sex between consenting adults.

And that people are meant to have different opinions.

Where does law come into all this? With its enormous backlog of cases, the

justice system is strained to its utmost. The court's time is precious; the

court itself should screen out cases that waste it.

Or get them over with in a couple of days. Instead, it has taken years to quash

these cases, which is all the more amazing because there is virtually nothing to

be said except a few platitudes.

The court takes on many issues that should be the responsibility of the

administration, such as the environment or the distribution of food. There it

might be argued that the administration is not doing its job, so the court has

stepped in. But that is not the situation in Ms Khushboo's case.

Giving silliness so much importance would merely encourage the rest of India to

be sillier

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