India is debating whether S Durga or Nude can mount a film festival or whether Padmavati will release on its release date. Pakistan is debating whether its Censor Board listens more to the conservative mullahs than needed as Mahira Khan's much-awaited Verna is banned.

Verna comes from the director of ‘Khuda Kay Liye’, the acclaimed Shoaib Mansoor. Padmavati from Sanjay Leela Bhansali. Opposition comes from a small minority that is vocal and often violent. Over the last few months, India is witnessing a kind of reality that can put the worst form of theatre of the absurd to shame. Take a look at any news source today. Any time of the day. You will find headlines screaming out how Sanjay Leela Bhansali's film Padmavati is demeaning the glorious heritage of Rajput women. People are taking to the streets to burn effigies of the director and his lead actress Deepika Padukone, while defending the shame and honour of a Rajput queen who may or may not have existed in real life. But who will teach history or reality  to our armies of fanatics?

So when Shri Rajput Karni Sena's wolves howled their disapproval against Padmavati, other wolves joined in. Soon, Sanjay Leela Bhansali was being thrashed and the film sets were being torched. And now, with a few weeks to the release of Padmavati, the entire country seems to have erupted in protests against this fictional account of the 1303 siege of Chittorgarh by Turk emperor Alauddin Khilji.