Letter to the Readers, Mainstream, Mar 29, 2025

A public performance of an acclaimed stand up comedian in India was attacked recently in Mumbai by a mob of supporters of the ruling state govt, he is now facing defamation charges framed by the state police [1], around the same time a Palestinian man a co-director of an Oscar winning documentary was nearly lynched by Israeli settlers & then detained in the West Bank [2]; and elsewhere a comedian was arrested in Russia for supposedly mocking war invalids [3]. Tough in different locations, all three are routine, deemed thought crimes that pose a risk. World Economic Forum