A truly original voice that attends India’s biggest literary festival (Jaipur Literature Festival for the uninitiated), the Twitter account, @JLFInsider is taking a break this year. Many of us have come to enjoy the JLFInsider’s hot takes on literary (and not so literary) sessions — uncensored, hilarious and spontaneous — over the years.
While last year they had signed off promising to come back, this year a more somber message awaited fans.
“Due to a variety of reasons including the current political climate in India, we have decided to give this year’s JLF a miss.
Snark during times like these just feels out of place. We’ll (hopefully) be back next year.”
The Jaipur Literature Festival has posed somewhat of a moral quandary to several writers and attendees. The longest running controversy about JLF now is the title sponsor of the festival, Zee. Several writers have over the years boycotted the festival because of Zee News’ anti minority rhetoric. Zee was also at the forefront of the fabricated news that the words ‘bharat ke tukde tukde’ were said in JNU by Kanhaiya Kumar and friends.
Historian Ram Guha, for instance, has said that he will boycott the festival until Zee sponsors it. Lawyer and writer Gautam Bhatia too has spoken about the need to boycott JLF as long as Zee sponsors it.
Due to a variety of reasons including the current political climate in India, we have decided to give this year’s JLF a miss.
Snark during times like these just feels out of place. We’ll (hopefully) be back next year.— JLF Insider (@JLFInsider) January 23, 2020
The Insider handle that posts “Crowdsourced live tweets from the Jaipur Literature Festival where you can hear some of the brightest minds on the planet, and Suhel Seth,” though did attend the festival last year, and Zee was the sponsor then too. So that alone can’t be the reason. Protests that have erupted across the country, and the sentiment of fear that looms over the impending CAA, NRC and NPR, seem like the primary reason they felt the need to take a break.
Featured image: Huffington Post
