Stop people: spare the disputed Mamata Banerjee cartoon

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The cartoon controversy of  West Bengal Chief minister  has  created a new focus point for cyber law researchers like me. Why wouldn’t an individual express his political ideologies through cartoons? Why would the government gag this right?  Most supporters of liberal free speech guarantee protested the  Chief  Minister’s angry protests when a professor of a reputed university had reportedly spread the cartoon through someone else’s email id. When the lady noted the issue and the man behind this was indicted by the police, he apologetically accepted his first mistake, sending message from someone else’s email id. But he failed to understand the mistake which created such a big controversy, i.e spreading a supposedly offensive cartoon about Mamata Banerjee’s administrative skill and  human resource managerial skill. The cartoon was made after the then minister Trivedi was dropped by Banerjee because of some internal tip offs between the two. It apparently depicts parts of a  conversation between the two characters of a famous detective series film made by the legendary film maker Satyajit Ray for children. The cartoon picture which was widely circulated in the Facebook, showed Mamata’s face cut and pasted along with other two ministers, where one of the individuals tells “ei sei dustu lok”, meaning this is the bad man, and mamata says “dustu lok vanish”, meaning bad man vanish. She apparently speaks similar words like the villain in the noted children’s film where the person pushes another one to death and clarifies to the child protagonist that he has made him ‘vanished’(see Professor arrested for poking fun at Mamata. HT Correspondent, Hindustan Times

Kolkata, April 13, 2012. http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/WestBengal/Professor-arrested-for-poking-fun-at-Mamata/Article1-839847.aspx) .

What irked mamata were using her picture for conveying this ‘bad’ image, and also using the speech which according to her, conveyed the same meaning to the audience as the film characters did.... murdering the man in question  and removing him  from her path. According to the reports that posted her feelings for the issue, she had felt it was a cyber crime because it involved morphing of the pictures and it was insulting and injurious to her as well as her political party’s image(See Cartoon row: Mamata loses cool, storms out of live TV session, May 18, 2012. published in http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/cartoon-row-mamata-loses-cool-storms-out-of-live-tv-session-212905). Both of these crimes are recognised by the Indian Information Technology Act; the first under section 66 of the Act, which states that “If any person, dishonestly, or fraudulently, does any act referred to in section 43, he shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to two three years or with fine which may extend to five lakh rupees or with both,”( To be more detailed about this, section 43 also includes unauthorised access to computer documents and altering the document for misuse of the same, among some other types of typical computer related crimes); the second under section 66A which prescribes punishment for sending grossly offensive messages or which have menacing character, or which is false, injurious, insulting etc. Well, that is her defence, and when she expressed her defence, a battery of intellectuals and common people burst out in protest saying this is nothing but gagging the freedom of speech and expression which is, according to me, is the most coveted right enshrined in the Indian constitution. Well, that is the people’s defence. People of India have not forgotten the emergency period that was created by erstwhile prime minister Indira Gandhi in the 1970’s,  when extremely strict regulations were brought in regarding journalism and also regular right to speech. This time, the protest was stronger because Mamata herself  belongs to that generation which grew up learning what should not be done with this almost sacred right.

But still then, I stand on the opposite platform. I feel there should be a limit line in activities which keep the soul of democracy alive, namely criticising the ruling party’s decision. However, there is one ‘myth’ that anti cartoon row people believed and  I would like to break. My defence line may look very thin,  but I stand strong on that.The incidence may not have involved “morphing” of the pictures of the individuals in the true meaning of morphing. The pictures were used as it is, however, they were accompanied by set of conversations which were framed and with visual indication lines  as to from whom they are originating. Well, ask me what is morphing and how affected people feel for it, for in my capacity as a cyber victim counseller, I get to see hundreds of such pictures of women especially, and I know their pain.  

But  my defence stands on the main  ground:  usage of  the logo of a government department,i.e the Indian railways for the purpose of such cartoons, which may derogate the actual purpose of  putting up the logo in the original government website. It must be understood that the cartoons were not meant to derogate a government establishment, but criticising people in it. Unauthorised usage of government emblems for trade, business, calling and professional practices is prohibited under section 3 of The Emblems And Names (Prevention Of Improper Use) Act, 1950. If the wordings of this section are pulled broadly, probably this very cartoon row would establish another milestone in Indian legal research field; for not to forget a small observation by a wise parliamentarian Sharifuddin  Shariq, who pointed out that cartoonists are given this chance to paint the politicians “wrong”(see “We ourselves have given the chance to cartoonists”, published in The Hindu on May, 14,2012, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article3419130.ece), which turns my attention to another question...can cartoonists fall under this law ?

People, it is wise to be a part of the largest democracy wisely. But do remember, you cannot wrongly ride over the law of the land to insult the core values of democracy.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012), “Stop people: spare the disputed Mamata Banerjee cartoon”, 19^hMay,2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”