More Bans Please!

I read that FTV had been banned for 2-months, starting April-1. Apprently, AXN had been banned some months ago, but had managed to apologize their way out of it, what a cheap, slimy trick!

My respect for the I&B Ministry, which was already high, has gone some notches further up - can you imagine the pressure the staff must be under - so many channels to monitor 24×7…. FTV for instance has been banned for some racy show transmitted around midnight! I hope the concerned people managed to get some rest, and then did not forget to claim overtime for the time they put in monitoring the channel.

I’m also disappointed - they’ve banned just FTV, and that too for a paltry 2-months! In my view, they ought to ban at least 3-dozen other channels starting with Star, Zee, DD, Cartoon Network & all the music channels. The prime-time soap-operas (to which I’m exposed relentlessly through the hoardings that fill every available gap between buildings) all denigrate women terribly - they seem to be all home-makers and home-breakers! And as far as popular music is concerned, the lyrics and the compositions are offensive enough to merit being banned… and then the videos that are made - what can I say, except that they’re all uniformly pneumatic. Just hot-air all over! And the kiddie channels seem to have more ads than incredibly violent programming content involving lots of colored helmets with body-suits. Whatever happened to Ramayan & Mahabharat, either of which could empty out the streets at the appointed hour?

In my humble and highly considered opinion, the government ought to ban all private television channels. The good old days of DD-I with its religious, cultural & agricultural programming marked the golden age of Indian television - and we can still return to it. Why should the youngsters of today not benefit from the seminal wisdom of Hum Log? Can Simi Girebaal hold a candle to Tabassum? Bring them back and throw out these corrupting imposters - particularly the subversive news channels! And have you seen the clothes that Mandira Booby…. sorry, thats Mandira Bedi, sports? She should have been banned years ago!

And just to be safe, lets ban Internet access as well, or better yet ban computers - no computers, no Internet…. or as it is put magnificently in our local idiom - if no bamboo, then where will the flute come from!!

Once this is done, I’d like to ban magazines. At the very least, they should not be allowed to have any images whatsoever! Likewise with newspapers!!

I’ll be back with more things to ban over the coming days, hope the I&B Ministry takes up the above recommendations in the mean time - does anyone know someone in the I&BM who I could forward my views to?