On Friday, the Apex Court took exception to a Kerala-based activist uploading a video on social media of her 2 minor children painting on her semi-nude body.

A 3-Judge Supreme Court Bench, headed by Justice Arun Mishra, remarked that such acts are in bad taste & give children the wrong impression about the country’s culture.

Justice Mishra asked that “You might be an activist, but why do you do all these? What kind of nonsense is this? What impression will your kids get about the culture of the country?”

The Court was hearing an anticipatory bail by Fathima AS, who is apprehending arrest for offences under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act, 2012, & Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000, after she uploaded a video on social media of her two minor children painting on her semi-nude body in June.

The controversial video led to the registration of the case against her indulging in child pornography under the POCSO Act, 2012, & for publishing such content, which is an offence, under the IT Act, 2000.

On July 24, the High Court of Kerala had rejected her anticipatory bail plea.

Justice Mishra said that “It is an obscenity. & you are spreading it. It will leave a very bad taste".

Senior Lawyer Gopal Sankaranarayanan, who appeared on behalf of Fathima, pointed out that provisions relating to child pornography have been invoked against her & not obscenity.

He submitted that “How can it be child pornography? The children are fully clothed".

He argued that the petitioner is not someone, who will abscond, & there was no requirement of custodial interrogation.

However, the bench, dismissed the case stating the offences against the accused are prima facie made out.

Fathima, in her plea, had contended that female nudity, per se, will not constitute obscenity & children painting on their mother’s body cannot be construed as child abuse.

“The petitioner, while being semi-nude, has allowed her body to be used as a canvas for her children to paint on & there can probably be nobody, except a pervert, who would be aroused to sexual desire by seeing the nature of the work,” Lawyer Renjith Marar argued.

Her message, accompanying the uploaded edited video, illustrated that she intended to normalise the female form for her children & not allow distorted ideas about sexuality to pervade their mind, Fathima submitted.

The High Court of Kerala in its order said that “The petitioner feels that she should teach sex education to her children. For that purpose, she asks her children to paint on her semi-nude body & then uploading the same on social media. I am not in a position to agree with the petitioner that she should teach sex education to her children in this manner,” the Kerala HC had said in its order.

She also cited two Apex Court judgments in this regard to buttress her case.

The first was the 2014 judgment in Aveek Sarkar v. State of West Bengal in which the top court held that a photograph, taken by a father of his semi-nude daughter & nude son-in-law in black & white, respectively, was intended to convey an anti-apartheid message & cannot be dubbed obscene.

The second judgment referred to Bobby Art International v. Om Pal, or, what is famously known as the Bandit queen case.

In this case, the movie, Bandit Queen, which depicted the life of bandit-turned-politician late Phoolan Devi, had nude scenes.

However, the Supreme Court, held that nudity in the movie was not intended to arouse carnal desires, but should be considered in the context of the story & the situation in the movie.

The plea said that “Goddesses in Kerala are frequently depicted in idols & murals with bare breasts. When one prays at a temple, the feeling is not of sexual arousal, but one of divinity. The body painting of men is part of pulikali (a popular folk dance, where men dance with their bodies painted with tigers & leopard prints). It cannot suddenly become obscene, when the same is done on a woman".

Earlier, Fathima had courted controversy, when she attempted to enter the Sabarimala temple in 2018 after the SC had struck down a law prohibiting entry of women, aged between 10 & 50 years,

in the hilltop shrine in Kerala’s Pathanamthitta district.

She had to abandon her journey following massive protests by a mob, who had blocked her entry to the sacred shrine.

Source Link

Picture Source :