Are we free to imagine?

Do you sometimes wonder what makes you happy, other than your dearest and loved ones? Being happy can have a powerful effect on individuals as well as on the wider nation. In an elated state, individuals and nations alike can turn negatives into positives with surprising speed.

I sometimes like to immerse myself in fiction to get relief from harsh practicalities. Movies, plays, books, paintings, or music can help us to ignore, even for a brief moment, the bitter realities of the world, or more immediately the realities of the country in which we were born, and in tough and mournful times they comfort us.

Bengalis are extremely fortunate to have had so many great writers, playwrights, filmmakers, musicians and artists. They have entertained us and accompanied our expressions of joy, happiness, sorrow or anger.

Among them are writers, poets and journalists who have been the most valuable of our aides, promoting and adding voice to our cause. Our national poet is world renowned for his rebellious works, and he suffered for them.

Writers and artists have helped us through the toughest of times to endure the devastation of wars, tyrants and oppressors, and to rebuild after natural disasters such as famine, cyclones and floods.

But now it seems we are not allowed to lose ourselves so freely into the fictional wilderness to escape unpleasant realities, as one of our popular writers has been advised (read: ordered) by the High Court to amend incorrect recollection of the past as mentioned in his recent work. Maybe the court has overlooked that it is only fiction – a mere imagination by the writer – and readers will not necessarily endorse them.

Earlier in the year the High Court intervened to prescribe how English words should be used in our radio channels.

Will it now wish to control our thoughts, imagination or expression?

Reporters Without Borders in its Press Freedom Index 2011/12 ranked us at 129 out of 179 countries studied. It summarises acrid rivalry between the government and the main opposition party as the prime obstacle to media freedom.

Freedom House, an international think tank that researches and evaluates components of freedom including media freedom, categorises us as only partly free.

The irony is that the government and the opposition probably know better, as both fought so hard against the eighties' authoritarian regime, which reacted vehemently even to mild criticism and punished furiously anyone who dared to speak even vaguely against it. Citizens resorted to BBC or VOA to get real daily news.

With the departure of that regime we thought we have started our journey toward freedom of speech.

I do not wish to patronise readers by arguing the need of freedom for creative work, except to note that it is a common understanding that creativity flourishes in a freer environment.

In addition, an open society that encourages a free flow of information can produce innovative fresh solutions to its problems –for example, media independence can foster democracy. In fact, in a truly democratic country it is a right.

Wisdom, it is said, is gained when one can see and tolerate many views and can accept limitation of one's knowledge.

I am confident that the Bengali intelligentsia which has outlived oppression and has a reputation for being resilient, unrelenting and bold will continue to survive.

The fear remains that interventions of this kind may become common, as the High Court's decisions remind me of the chillingly repressive Thought Police described in George Orwell's popular novel 1984.

Are we heading in that direction?

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Irfan Chowdhury writes from Canberra, Australia.