In 2003, the government of West Bengal (India) banned the book Dwikhandita ("Split in Two") by Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasrin. The state's Home Secretary, Amit Kiran Deb, said that if the book were not banned, “it could ignite communal tension." (Background article.) Yesterday's issue of The Statesman reports that the ban has been reviewed and reversed by a three-judge Special Bench of Calcutta High Court. The court held that the ban would only be justified under the law if the book violated Indian Penal Code, Sec. 295A that provides: "Whoever, with deliberate and malicious intention of outraging the religious feelings of any class of citizens ..., by words, either spoken or written, or by signs or by visible representations or otherwise, insults or attempts to insult the religion or the religious beliefs of that class, shall be punished with imprisonment... or with fine, or with both."
The court says that the book criticizes Bangladesh for becoming a theocratic state, and was not specifically intended to insult Islam. Another report on the court's decision in the Calcutta Telegraph says that the court directed the government to return the books it had seized to the book's publisher. However, after the decision was handed down, the Jamiat-e-Ulama-e-Hind (Council of Muslim Theologians) declared at a rally in Calcutta that the author would not be allowed to enter any district in Bengal. "She has tarnished Islam in her book and must be punished," said its general secretary, Siddikullah Choudhury.
