Alternative Hindu History Gets Pulped

Should free speech ever be restricted when it comes to religion?  In 1978, the ACLU defended neo-Nazi;s who wanted to march through Skoie, Ill where many Holocaust survivors lived. The government allowed the march.

In India, Penguin Publishers pulled a new book that criticizes Hinduism. Critics inside and outside India question the publisher's commitment to freedom of press.

The short clip above summarizes the issue. Penguin Books in India recently withdrew a new book about Hinduism by Wendy Doniger, an American professor,  from store shelves and destroyed them. A conservative Hindu group challenged the book as "malicious," "dirty," and "perverse," according to the New York Times.  Critics inside and outside India are challenging Penguin's decision.

Booker prize-winning author Arundhati Roy might break her ties with Penguin because of its decision. She even wrote Penguin asking why it made the decision to withdraw the books, nothing there was not even a ban or court order.

Here's a PRI interview with Wendy Doniger, the American author of "The Hindus: An Alternative History." She told the BBC that "it marks a shift, a very dismaying shift in submitting to the growing atmosphere of intolerance."