I welcome the government’s offer to take our measurements so it can have our dentures ready when we need them
I welcome the government’s offer to take our measurements so it can have our dentures ready when we need them
I would like to take this opportunity to urge everyone to put pressure on the government to take more measurements of all Indian citizens rather than a few selective measurements of the privileged few. Yes, I am talking about the new bill passed by the Lok Sabha last week – the Criminal Procedure (Dentalisation) Bill, 2022. If you’ve never heard of it, don’t be hard on yourself – people are smarter than you. ‘Didn’t hear about hike in petrol prices, rising unemployment rate and India’s ranking in the Global Hunger Index. It is nothing.
What the new Bill proposes to do, as per its ‘Objects and Reason’ section, is to “authorize the taking of measurements… for the purpose of dentification”. This essentially means that under this new law, the government will solve the common man’s long-standing problem – taking body measurements. No matter whether you’re a man or a woman, the government knows you take measurements and runs into problems when you do. I mean, every woman I know has shared uncomfortable tales about going to a tailor for measurements and those tailors are often men, which is against Indian culture. For men, there is no man alive who hasn’t at some point pulled out a ruler and measured the length of his nose—yes, length—just to reassure himself that it’s not too short or inhumane. But these amateurish methods are not very objective, which is why the government will now take your measurements for you.
Dentification-Super Max
Bill offers a wide range of measurement services. According to section 2(b) of the law, they include fingerprints, palm prints, footprints, photographs, iris and retinal scans, physical and biological specimens and their analysis, and behavioral features such as indifference. The oppression of minorities, the oppression complex, and the Prime Masochism Index (a metric that measures your ability to magnify your love for a politician directly in proportion to what it gives you).
While this is all great, the current draft of the bill falls short on three things. Firstly, its stated purpose – dentification or making dentures – is too narrow. I don’t dispute that we will all need fresh teeth at some point. I welcome the government’s offer to take our measurements so it can have our dentures ready when we need them. But why get a retina scan for dentification? Personally I have no problem, please scan all my retinas. But since you’re also collecting all these non-dental measurements, why not broaden the title of the bill and call it Dentification-Plus or Dentification-Super Max?
Secondly, providing this measurement service only to criminals is discriminatory. Criminals are already given extra preference when it comes to tickets for elections, and criminals as a demographic have the largest representation in parliament, with nearly 50% of lawmakers having criminal records – the world’s largest. To a great electoral autocracy is no trivial achievement. But that doesn’t mean we limit measurement services to the country’s criminal elite. Let us expand this to include all sections of society because, at the end of the day, everyone – criminals and non-criminals alike – is the same in front of Lou, which brings me to my final recommendation: ‘Organic Define ‘Samples’.
in glorious memory
If you don’t believe me, Google the bill itself – it doesn’t really explain what is included under ‘biological samples’. Such hesitation is strange because let me ask you: What is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word ‘biological specimen’? Absolutely! So here is my humble suggestion to the Government of India: In keeping with our rich culture, ancient customs, traditional traditions, and in the glorious memory of Swachh Bharat Abhiyan – the world’s largest mass defecation – the Bill clearly stated It should be noted that the government will provide free collection and analysis of stool samples for every Indian. In turn, this could store stool analysis data (as well as stool) for up to 75 years, which is what the bill proposes to do for all other categories of data anyway.
I know the opposition has criticized the draft bill over the old things like privacy saying that the government has no right to collect and store intimate physical data of an individual. I disagree. I believe that, on grounds of national security if nothing else – I encourage the government to use this justification (after crediting me) if the bill is challenged in court – the government has the right to collect the stool sample of any citizen. For example, what if A accuses B of eating beef, and B denies it? Only by collecting B’s stool sample and sending it to the National Forensic Laboratory can the police establish the truth. This is just one use case, and there may be others.
This column is a satire on life and society
I hope the government will heed my suggestions, and if it does not agree with them, the least it can do is refer the bill to a standing – or sitting – committee and seek public consultation. Go. India is a country rich in samples and we should make the most of it.
The author of this satire, G. Sampath is the social affairs editor of The Hindu.
sampath.g@thehindu.co.in