The South Goa police (Ponda) on Tuesday filed an FIR against former Dy. Speaker and former BJP MLA Vishnu Wagh and a publisher for publishing “vulgar” content in a controversial book of poems.
Sudirsukt is a collection of poems penned by Mr. Wagh, in which a few poems have at times taken raunchy pot-shots at Goa’s influential Goud Saraswat Brahmin community and brought to the fore fault-lines in Goa’s subtle caste hierarchy.
The book is collection of poems in Konkani, which was until last week in the race for a State-owned Konkani Academy award for literature, is a stormy debate on social media platforms, particularly Facebook.
Mr. Wagh, a former editor, writer, poet, playwright and cartoonist is presently ailing and is admitted at State-owned Goa Medical College hospital.
Publisher also booked
Superintendent of Police (South Goa) Arvind Gawas confirmed the registration of FIR on Tuesday and told The Hindu that the FIR has been registered against the author Vishnu Wagh and publisher Hema Naik of Apurbai Prakashan, a local publishing house, which in 2013 released the controversial book.
“An FIR has been filed for use of vulgar language in the book. We will now investigate,” Mr. Gawas said.
The FIR has been filed under sections 293, 292 of Indian Penal Code and section 4 of Indecent Representation of Women (Prohibition) Act 1986, following a complaint by a women’s rights activist from Margao in south Goa, Auda Viegas.
Incidentally, the book, along with some more books of Mr. Wagh, were released by Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar in 2013, who also hails from the same community.
Publisher Hema Naik, a Sahitya Academy award-winner writer in Konkani said, that she was unaware of the FIR filed against her, officially.
“We will have to fight it. But as of now I have not been informed about the FIR,” Ms. Naik said.
Responding to the charges of vulgarity in the book, Ms. Naik called for a “liberal attitude towards art and literature and also a broader thinking and greater tolerance for the creative field”. She declined to comment further on the issue at this stage.
