And may we add, it is evidently entirely besides the point that the targetaudience for what has now been renamed Austin Powers 2 is more than aware of the connotation of the four-letter word that has conjured for the censors such nightmarish visions of dissolute mayhem in our ancient land. This is no endorsement for yet another surprise English hit, it is instead an expression of bemusement over a propensity to miss the wood for the trees. There are absolutely rational reasons for regulating the fare being dished out to unsuspecting viewers, for ensuring that the responsibilities that are a corollary to the freedom of expression are respected. But certainly there are no excuses for the regulatory authority to spend its tenure absorbed in a crash course in sexual innuendo only to pass strictures based on this hurriedly gleaned knowledge, to turn a blind eye to the more undesirable messages that form the subtext of much of the entertainment provided at cinema houses. Messages that are never explicitly stated but evoked by the narratives, the characterisation and the suggestivechoreography. Messages that perpetuate old prejudices and reactionary social practices and evolve fresh ones.

The board, however, seems oblivious to the dim yet critical line between letter and spirit. The very fact that in the controversy at hand it is not concerned with innuendo, just with four-letter words, is disturbing. Parekh's words in the S-word episode are worth repeating. "Well, we did find out what the word meant," she declared. "But should you make such a word common, especially as there is so much filth around?" An everyday example may be instructive. A conservative Indian woman who saw Elizabeth enquired what on earth was there that the Censor Board could have sought to excise. She clearly has not read the details of the Kapur-Parekh quibble which has forcefully introduced a new word in the public vocabulary, a word which would otherwise have been missed by most of the viewers. There's a lesson in there somewhere.