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My Friend Sancho
My first book, My Friend Sancho, was published in May 2009, and went on to become the biggest selling debut novel released that year in India. It is a contemporary love story set in Mumbai, and had earlier been longlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize 2008. To learn more about the book, click here.
If you're interested, do join the Facebook group for My Friend Sancho
Click here for more about my publisher, Hachette India.
My posts on India Uncut about My Friend Sancho can be found here.
Recent entries
Check out this piece by Shikha Dalmia on the role that market forces play in perpetuating the caste system.…
Our right-wing lunatics are so funny sometimes that it’s hard to hate them. Balbir Punj has a bizarre (but…
Having resumed blogging, it was natural for me to head over to the ToI site for the potential double…
The Hindustan Times reports that two Karnataka ministers were caught watching pornographic videos “when the house was in session.”…
This personal essay by me appears in the winter edition of Forbes Life India. I feel the ground sway…
20 July, 2009
Criminalizing Zardari Jokes
It would seem that in Pakistan, there is nothing you need to watch out for more than making a joke about President Asif Ali Zardari by SMS (Short Messaging Service).
If you mistakenly, or just for fun, share with a friend one of the hundreds of derisory jokes about the leader floating around electronically, you could get a 14-year prison sentence.
Pakistan’s interior minister Rehman Malik announced last week that the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has been tasked to trace SMS (or text messages) and e-mails that “slander the political leadership of the country” under the vague Cyber Crimes Act. In addition to facing up to 14 years in the jail, violators could have their property seized, Malik said, adding that the government would seek Interpol assistance in deporting foreign offenders.
I think whatever the jail sentence announced for each accused person, Zardari himself should be made to serve 10 percent of it.
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I particularly like this Zardari joke from the report above:
Robber: Give me all your money!
Zardari: Don’t you know who I am? I am Asif Ali Zardari!
Robber: Okay. Give me all my money!
Oops, wait, I’d better watch it, or there’ll be an Interpol notice out on me for having a Zardari joke on my blog. Maybe Pakistan will suggest a Lakhvi for Varma swap. We’ll give you the terrorist mastermind, they could say, if you hand over the blogger who dared to joke about our esteemed president.
(Link via separate emails from Mihir Modi and Luv.)
Posted by Amit Varma in
