Bishops say no bad movies for all you kids!!

So the breaking news is that the Information & Broadcasting Ministry has decided to put a temporary stay on the release of the film "The Da Vinci Code". I just saw CNN-IBN interviewing a certain Donald Dsouza who is hotshot in the Catholic Bishop Council in India. Of course it goes without saying that he made a complete fool out of himself with his arguments :-) According to him (and probably others in the "council") in a country where we do not have much of a Christian population such a film should not be shown as it will spread a wrong view of the religion. In Christian countries everybody is already a Christian so they are better informed to make the right decision..etc etc. When asked that the book wasn't objected to then why the film, the response was that films have more effect on public opinion...okay granted..but how that justifies a ban is still not clear to me :-) All in all a completely incoherent, inconsistent argument. About 200 Catholic groups have complained to the government. So this looks very much an organized and co-ordinated activity intended to flush down freedom of speech into the gutter. I hope this time sanity will prevail and if it is taken to the courts I hope our "Supreme" court will act as named. However if this results in a ban I won't be surprised..it will just one to the shameful list comprising of Satanic verses, Lajja, Me Nathuram Godse Boltoy and many more. Another funny thing is that the film will be reviewed by the I&B minister and the Catholic council members. Bloody hell if they are objecting to it why don't they just close their eyes on the movie and go back to their worship and strengthen their weak faith :-)

PS: It pains me to write the obvious but it has to be done for it is only the spoken/written word that is heard/read and countless such tiny voices make up a collective social opinion. To stay silent would be to weaken my own side.

Yet another addition to the Francis Sujai naming contest

"Francis S Arokiaraj" is the latest permutation by which Francis will be known in IBM's official records :-).
Update: And his son is named Jason Fleming Francis wherein "Fleming" is the arbitrary pick :-)

Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick A Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick Tick

A tiny speck on what I hear is an illustrous career?? This song "If you come today", starring the late Rajkumar, is a real real gem..a must watch. The pronunciation of "desires" is one of the high points of the singer's talent and the dance steps during the "tick tick tick tick" melody seem to indicate that the Rajkumar was of the firm opinion that no matter what the tempo of the song he would dance at his own relaxed pace :-)

The Firefox bus :-)

Too cool! Not somewhere in the Americas or Europe...but in our very own Karanataka:-) Click image to see more photos.

Thanks to this guy "Kalyan" for the images and to a colleague Girish for forwarding the link.