The kiss was harmless. However I don’t see the point of kissing at an AIDS function. After all, Shilpa is not an AIDS victim, is she?”

Of all the quotes ever quoted on the Politics of Pappi, this one, by a perspicacious Mumbai teenager, took the cake, plate and table. It does, however, beg an answer. The point, dear Miss Moderate, is that in our country, being liberal must have a point: we need to justify our broadmindedness, temper its brazen effrontery with dispassionate reason.

Perhaps that’s why our liberal views on sex education are not about sex education at all, but about saving our kids from AIDS, Abuse and Immorality. And why necking (sorry, cuddling) in public places is perfectly permissible — not, mind you, because we want intimacy but because it’s a necessary safety valve for young people who might otherwise indulge in you-know-what. In fact, the liberal line presents inexhaustible alibis for audacity, if you are patient enough to read the subtext. Take a look at some of these uncut gems from L’Affaire Shetty:

The Bourgeois Liberal: “There is nothing wrong with what Richard and Shilpa did. If she has no reason for complaint, why should we?”

Subtext: Morality is as morality does.

“We can’t even say we belong to the Dark Ages as India was quite cool in those times. Remember we’re the land of Khajuraho and the Kamasutra.”

Subtext: If our baap-dadas okayed it, why not modern

India?

“Whatever happened to the world’s largest democracy and freedom of expression?”

... contd.