<nettime> Israelis, Indians, filmmakers and intellectuals condemn India’s ban on The Voice of Hind Rajab

[Harsh Kapoor via nettime-l <nettime-l@lists.nettime.org>]

 Hind Rajab letter press release

Israelis, Indians, filmmakers and intellectuals condemn India’s ban on The
Voice of Hind Rajab • Embargo: Tuesday 7 April, 2.30 pm (India time), 9 am
UTC, 10 am London • Contact: jpl@epistolae.net (J.P. Loo, initial
signatory) • Full text and signatures overleaf.

In a statement published today, Israelis, Indians, filmmakers and
intellectuals condemned India’s ban on The Voice of Hind Rajab on the
pretext of safeguarding Indo–Israeli relations. J.P. Loo, initial
signatory, said: ‘The ban is an attempt to turn diplomacy into a blank
cheque for censorship. Such a precedent in this important bilateral
relationship would threaten freedom of expression not only in India, but
Israel.’

Signatories include (affiliations are for identification only and do not
imply endorsement):

Naseeruddin Shah • actor (cinema, theatre), India,
Ratna Pathak Shah • actor (cinema, theatre), India,
Anand Patwardhan • filmmaker, lifetime member of Oscar academy, India,

Michal Aviad • professor emerita, Tel Aviv University; winner, Haifa
International Film Festival,
Uri Weltmann • national field organiser, Standing Together, Israel’s
largest grassroots anti-war/occupation movement, Jenny Kananov • co-founder,
We Democracy, pro-democracy Israeli group in Britain,

Idit Nathan • internationally exhibited Israeli artist and curator,
Yair Wallach • reader in Israeli studies, head of Centre for Jewish Studies,
SOAS,

Ali Kazimi • Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Gemini Award, Harsh
Kapoor • editor, Mainstream Weekly,

Sukla Sen • founding member, Coalition for nuclear disarmament and peace,
India, Aakar Patel • former chair of board of Amnesty India; columnist,

Javed Anand • convener, Indian Muslims for Secular Democracy, John
Dayal • former
member, National Integration Council, India

Sandeep Panday • General Secretary, Socialist Party (India), Rohini Hensman
• writer, independent scholar,

Francis Kandel • commissioning editor and lead union organiser, France,
Zafarul Islam Khan • former chairman, Delhi Minorities Commission,

Kumar Prashant • president, Gandhi Peace Foundation. Yousuf Saeed • independent
filmmaker, author, and archivist, India

Jean-Michel Frodon • film critic and professor, France,
Sylvain George • filmmaker, Canada,

Lynne Segal • professor of psychology and gender studies, Birkbeck,
University of London, Agnès Devictor • professor, Université Paris 1
Panthéon–Sorbonne,

Chitra Joshi • independent historian, India,
Martin Duckworth • cinematographer, filmmaker, Canada,

Dorothy Hénaut • filmmaker, Canada,
John Greyson • filmmaker, professor, Canada,

Ranjan Palit • documentary filmmaker, cinematographer, India,
Nakul Sawhney • documentary filmmaker, India,

Sanjiv Shah • filmmaker, India, Rakesh Sharma • documentary filmmaker,
India,
Rintu Thomas • documentary filmmaker, India,

Lalit Vachani • documentary filmmaker, lecturer, Germany,

Payal Kapadia • filmmaker, India,
Ramesh Sharma • filmmaker, India,

Nishtha Jain • documentary filmmaker, India,
Ruchir Joshi • documentary filmmaker, India,

Anamika Haksar • filmmaker and theatre director, India,
Ruhi Hamid • filmmaker, Britain Mark Achbar • documentary filmmaker,
Canada,

Sophie Bisonette • filmmaker, Canada,
Thomas Waugh • professor, School of Cinema, Canada, Aditya Sarkar • associate
professor, South Asian history, Warwick,

Lynne Segal • professor, psychology and gender studies, Birkbeck,
University of London, Pritam Singh • professor emeritus, Oxford Brookes, Rashmi
Varma • professor, Warwick,
A.C. Zielinska • assistant professor, Université de Lorraine;
co-coordinator of academics’ letter to free Marwan Barghouti, Papi Sen Sri
Raman • journalist, India,
Geeta Seshu • journalist and co-editor, Free Speech Collective, India,
Shankatula Banaji, Professor of Media, Culture and Social Change, LSE, and
Manoj Nandwana • prospective Indian distributor of The Voice of Hind Rajab,
filmmaker.

Banning The Voice of Hind Rajab threatens freedom of expression in India
and Israel.

We are, variously, Israelis, Indians, filmmakers, journalists, academics
and activists. We write in support of pluralism, democracy and freedom of
expression in India and in Israel—for both Jews and Palestinians. And we
condemn the Central Board of Film Certification’s invocation of
Indo-Israeli relations to justify its banning of The Voice of Hind Rajab.

The ban continues a worrying pattern of Indian censorship of Palestinian
and progressive Israeli voices. In January, Einat Weizman and an Israeli
theatre troupe were denied visas for the International Theatre Festival of
Kerala. And in December last year, the Union government censored
pro-Palestinian
films at the International Film Festival of Kerala, including All that’s
left of you and Once upon a time in Gaza. We wish to make three points
about the implications of the ban for freedom of expression, not only in
India but also in Israel.

First, the ban is a plainly unlawful attack on freedom of expression,
protected by Article 19 of the Constitution of India. In Ramlila Maidan
incident, the Supreme Court held that freedom of speech can be restricted
only under Article 19(2): such restrictions must be ‘reasonable’, i.e.
‘free of arbitrariness,...have a direct nexus to the object, and...be
proportionate to the right restricted as well as the requirement of the
society’. The Board’s reasoning that certification might ‘break up’
Indo–Israeli relations fails all three tests. It is arbitrary: the Board
felt no need to ban e.g. 120 Bahadur or The Bengal Files, even though they
were at least as likely to damage foreign relations. It has no ‘direct
nexus’ to a relationship principally based on economic, defence and
strategic ties. And it is difficult to see how denial of certification of
films could be a proportionate means to any foreign policy ‘requirement
of...society’ that it could plausibly achieve.

Second, self-censorship is a vicious cycle. It encourages others to expect
similar self-censorship in future. Israel would likely not even have
thought to concern itself with film certification in India before these
incidents. Now the Indian authorities have shown themselves willing to
censor films in foreign powers’ interests. Although most self-censorship is
individual, the same logic of anticipatory obedience applies to state–state
interactions. Conversely, both states and individuals that display a
principled commitment to freedom of expression ultimately protect their own
interests at the same time. Others understand the opportunity cost of
seeking to cross their red lines vis à vis free speech, and so are less
likely to make such demands in the first place.

Third, the ban endangers freedom of expression not only in India but in
Israel. Governments that censor material inconvenient to other governments
will generally have similar expectations. Both the Israeli public and
government attach great importance to bilateral relations with India. The
Indian authorities have shown that their idea of friendship is appeasement
of the government of the day, to the point of censoring films bringing to
light their most appalling crimes. Such attitudes would undermine freedom
of expression in Israel, which is already under threat, most notably in
police attacks on Palestinian citizens of Israel and anti-war voices. On 7
March this year, police violently attacked anti-war protesters in Tel Aviv
and Haifa. Last November, police armed with rifles raided the national
assembly of Standing Together, Israel’s largest grassroots movement of
Palestinians and Jews fighting war and the occupation. And that same month,
the government defended a ban on a planned protest by Sudanese activists
outside the embassy of the UAE on the grounds that the protest might ‘harm
foreign relations’. We reject this norm of bilateral relations, not only
between India

and Israel, but as a matter of principle. It serves no useful purpose in
promoting international cooperation or friendship. The only interests it
serves are those of reactionary governments. When they individually cannot
justify censorship on its own merits to their own peoples, they nebulously
appeal to the equally contrived and capricious sensitivities (imagined or
real) of friendly states (or their governments).

David Borenstein, the co-director of Mr Nobody Against Putin, said in his
Academy award acceptance speech that his documentary was ‘about how you
lose your country...through countless small little acts of complicity’.
Last year, another winner of the Best Documentary award, No Other Land, was
the object of de facto censorship by Israeli distributors. And when public
attention is seduced by the easy satisfaction of social media, censorship
of dissident voices is particularly pernicious. Both India and Israel have
the misfortune to be in the international vanguard of democratic
backsliding. Governments in this vanguard have learned to skilfully
cooperate to silence dissenting voices in their own countries. We hope by
this letter to promote another kind of international solidarity—between
peoples, in support of freedom, justice, and equality.

Naseeruddin Shah • actor, theatre and cinema, India
Ratna Pathak Shah • actor, theatre and cinema, India

Michal Aviad • filmmaker; professor emerita, Tel Aviv University
Anand Patwardhan • filmmaker, India
Yair Wallach • reader in Israel studies, head of Centre for Jewish Studies,
SOAS

Uri Weltmann • national field organiser, Standing Together, Israel
Ilan Ziv • documentary filmmaker, Tamouzmedia, USA

Jenny Kananov • co-founder, We Democracy, Britain/Israel
Idit Nathan • artist, curator, researcher, British–Israeli

Akeel Bilgrami • professor of philosophy, Columbia
Payal Kapadia • filmmaker, India
Ali Kazimi • filmmaker; professor, York University, Canada

Lynne Segal • professor, Birkbeck, University of London
Mark Achbar • documentary filmmaker, Canada

J.P. Loo • initial signatory, member, national steering group UK Friends of
Standing Together, Ritwik Agrawal • philosopher, University of Arizona

Martín Alonso Zarza • philosopher, Spain

Javed Anand • convener, Indian Muslims for Secular Democracy
Arash Azizi • columnist, The Atlantic; fellow, Yale

Shankutula Banaji • Professor of Media, Culture and Social Change, LSE Debanjan
Banerjee • Kolkota Dwaipayan Banerjee • documentary filmmaker, India

Kasturi Basu • documentary filmmaker, India Fatima Z Bendahmane • Paris
Sunanda Bhatt • documentary filmmaker, India Sophie Bisonette • filmmaker,
Canada

Natalie Bleicher • Britain
Richard Bull • Kibbutz Ketura
Sanjana Choudhary • researcher
Anne Marie Codur • researcher, Boston University
Ron Cohen • Tel Aviv
Ranabir Das • cinematographer, filmmaker, India
Agnès Devictor • professor, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne
Arundhati Dhuru • convener, National alliance of people’s movements
Holly Dressel • author, Canada
Martin Duckworth • cinematographer, filmmaker, Canada
Bina Sarkar Elias • editor, poet, publisher, art curator, India

Jean-Michel Frodon • film critic; professor, France
Sylvain George • filmmaker, Canada
John Greyson • filmmaker, professor, Canada Anamika Haksar • filmmaker and
theatre director, India

Ruhi Hamid • filmmaker, Britain
Andy Heintz • freelance journalist, USA Marieme Hélie Lucas • sociologist;
founder, Women living under Muslim laws, Algeria Dorothy Hénaut • filmmaker,
Canada
Rohini Hensman • writer, independent scholar Albert Herszkowicz • Memorial
98, Paris Natalie Högström • Stockholm
Miriam Ish-Horowicz • London
Nishtha Jain • documentary filmmaker, India Chitra Joshi • independent
historian, India Ruchir Joshi • documentary filmmaker, India Francis Kandel
• commissioning editor, trade unionist, France
Harsh Kapoor • editor, Mainstream Weekly, India
Jasr Kawkby • member, national steering group of UK Friends of Standing
Together
Zafarul Islam Khan • former chairman, Delhi Minorities Commission
Pankaj Rishi Kumar • documentary filmmaker, India
Imogen Lambert • academic, London
Robert Lang • Kensington Communications, Canada
Jonathan Miller • film distributor, USA
Leah Mitchell • historian, Princeton
Adele Moss • Oxford
Manoj Nandwana • filmmaker; prospective Indian distributor, The Voice of
Hind Rajab Markus Nornes • filmmaker, professor, USA Lennaart van
Oldenborgh • filmmaker, Britain Bedabrata Pain • filmmaker, scientist,
USA Ranjan
Palit • cinematographer, documentary filmmaker, India
Sandeep Panday • general secretary, Socialist Party (India)
Aakar Patel • columnist; former chair, Amnesty India

Pranav Pingle • filmmaker, curator, India Kumar Prashant • president,
Gandhi Peace Foundation, India
Papri Sen Sri Raman • journalist

Daniel Randall • author; trade unionist; member, steering group, UK Friends
of Standing Together
Jan Rofekamp • documentary consultant, Greece
Yousuf Saeed • filmmaker, author, archivist Aditya Sarkar • assistant
professor, Warwick Nakul Sawhney • documentary filmmaker, India
Sukla Sen • Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament and Peace
Geeta Seshu • journalist; co-editor, Free Speech Collective, India
Ruhaan Shah • doctorant, Cambridge
Sanjiv Shah • filmmaker, India
Theo Sharkey • researcher, Campaign against transnational repression
Rakesh Sharma • documentary filmmaker, India
Ramesh Sharma • filmmaker, India
Pritam Singh • professor emeritus, Oxford Brookes
Lior Suchoy • researcher, Imperial
Carrie Supple • London Friends of Standing Together
Rintu Thomas • documentary filmmaker, India S.P. Udayakumar • Convener,
People’s movement against nuclear energy, India
Lalit Vachani • documentary filmmaker, lecturer, Germany
Rashmi Varma • professor, Warwick
Tirza Waisel • London Friends of Standing Together
Thomas Waugh • professor, School of Cinema, Canada
A.C. Zielinska • assistant professor, Université de Lorraine
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