Facebook fury and fatwa trouble force all-Kashmiri girl band to quit

In yet another case where social media has played an important role in deciding fates and outcomes, an all-Kashmiri girl band, Pragaash, has decided to call it quits and stop singing.

Apart from the pressures faced from the religious communities who issued a fatwa on grounds of singing being un-Islamic, several hurting sentiments echoed on Facebook added fuel to the fire.

India has recently witnessed several such incidents where vocal opinions on Facebook, Twitter etc have triggered communities to react both negatively and positively. This has led to open debates on whether the Section 66A of the IT Act should be reviewed and government being forced to take action both against the offenders and for the victims.

In fact, the Union Information & Broadcasting Minister, Manish Tiwari has indicated recently that "Freedom of expression must include the right to offend" when asked whether India was turning intolerant to freedom of speech and expression.

In the Pragaash band case, "A case under Section 66 A of the IT Act and Section 506 IPC (Criminal Intimidation) has been registered in Rajbagh police station with regard to the hate messages posted on the Facebook page of the ‘Pragaash' band," a police spokesman said, according to media reports.