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US academic angry after book pulped in India

American scholar Wendy Doniger said she was “angry and disappointed” that all copies of her latest book on Hinduism will be pulped in India after a legal row that has ignited fears about free speech

The Jakarta Post
India
Thu, February 13, 2014

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US academic angry after book pulped in India

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merican scholar Wendy Doniger said she was '€œangry anddisappointed'€ that all copies of her latest book on Hinduism will be pulped inIndia after a legal row that has ignited fears about free speech.

Her publisher Penguin agreed on Monday to withdraw the 2009 book '€œThe Hindus: An Alternative History'€ to settle a court battle with an activist group which took offence to the depiction of the religion.

'€œI was of course angry and disappointed to see this happen and I am deeply troubled by what it foretells for free speech in India in the present, and steadily worsening, political climate,'€ she wrote in an email statement sent to AFP on Tuesday.

Doniger, 74, wrote in her statement that as a '€œpublisher'€™s daughter, I particularly wince at the knowledge that the existing books (unless they are bought out quickly by people intrigued by all the brouhaha) will be pulped.'€

The Shiksha Bachao Andolan Committee, a group of Hindu academics, filed civil and criminal suits in a New Delhi court claiming the book contained factual errors and parts of it misrepresented Hindu mythology.

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