Maldives policy on censorship

Does censorship have implications for intellectual development?

In Maldives people have practiced self-censorship for a long time. People have been, in general, very cautious about what was expressed, especially in the written form. However, this situation is changing and has been on a roll for a few years now. This is evident in the number of newspapers and magazines that has been added in the last few years. And with the advances happening on the Internet with the likes of blogs, writing has reached a new height.

A few years back it would have been difficult, if not impossible to find any written material criticising government policies. But now, this is a common practice. True, the common folk show signs of intimidation when handling anti-government material.

My point here is to say that self-censorship has been in place for a long time and it is practiced by writers themselves, publishers, and also the readers. This situation still prevails with people who do not have access to the internet. And at the next level there is censorship imposed by governing authorities.

But is there a point in censorship? Censored or not, people will read and access what they want; if not openly then, in secrecy.

A few weeks back, the issue of censorship in Maldives emerged up with the book on apostasy co-authored by Dr. Saeed. This was published in 2004 and it has taken over 3 long years for the religious authority in Maldives to say that this book cannot be allowed to be freely circulated and read; that the book carries inappropriate information.

This incidence alone has shown what the information culture of Maldives is about. It is controlled and it is reactionary. A proactive community would have sought out the book sooner since we do not have too many scholarly books published in Maldives or abroad by Maldivian scholars. In an ideal scenario, the National Library of Maldives should have purchased it for their national collection at least within the first year of its publication.

And if, it was a book on religion, which it is - based on the policy on religious books being censored and approved by the religious authority, it should have been passed on to the mathee majlis (or the relevant body) and they would have either approved or disapproved of the book and this whole process should have, in an ideal world, taken the most of 4 months. And this whole process would have happened back in 2005, or 2006 at the least.

But as things happen in Maldives, the book has been out there for quite sometime, and all of a sudden someone contests for a job that many people are eyeing and there had to be some dirt pulled up against this contender. This dirt finding process brought up a book which is on a religious topic and all of a sudden this book comes in to the picture.

The book attracted the attention of everyone and something had to be done to this book. And I suppose mathee majlis did the most sensible thing (for them) that can be done under the circumstances.

Now the book is officially banned. This would mean that the National Library will not hold it in the national collection; which I personally think is very unfortunate as it is a national treasure for the simple reason that it was written by a Maldivian.

People should have the freedom to read whatever they want. I personally believe it should be the individual’s freedom to decide if the content is right or wrong. But of course, it is the responsibility of the concerned authorities to “educate” the public on what is right and wrong.

The most disturbing aspect of all this is that a good piece of writing is banned and from the looks of it nobody is concerned about it – that is other than the few blog entries that was written about it.

The general public is not concerned since, for them a book is a book and is not important as people don’t have time to read books and/or don’t have the money to spend on books. The reading body of Maldives is not too concerned either, because the chapter in question is available online. The Ministry of Information or the National Library does not seem to be concerned either.

Some questions that need clarification are:
Where does free flow of information fit in with this kind of censorship?
What does the censorship policy serve really?
How well defined is this censorship policy?
Is it relevant to the current online environment?
Does this control of what can be read and what cannot be read border on individual human rights?
Doesn’t this sort of censorship restrict intellectual output and lead to intellectual stagnation by the learned?