SC quashes petition seeking ban on Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses

An appeal seeking a ban on Salman Rushdie's contentious book The Satanic Verses was junked by the Supreme Court today, Friday, September 26.

A bench consisting of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta heard the plea. The counsel appearing for the petitioners referred to the Delhi High Court's November 2024 order.

The high court had closed the proceedings on a petition challenging the Rajiv Gandhi government's decision to prohibit the import of The Satanic Verses in 1988, stating that because authorities failed to present the requisite notification, it must be assumed that it does not exist.

The Rajiv Gandhi government's 1988 decision to ban the import of The Satanic Verses was challenged in a petition that the high court closed, ruling that it must be assumed that the required notification does not exist because the authorities had not produced it, PTI reports.

"You are effectively challenging the judgment of the Delhi High Court," the bench observed, while dismissing the plea.

The petition was filed in the Supreme Court by counsel Chand Qureshi.

The petitioners claim to have found that vendors in Mumbai were selling the "controversial and blasphemous book" and that it was also available on a popular online purchasing website, because of the Delhi High Court order.

"The legal basis for the ban was Section 11 of the Indian Customs Act, 1962, due to which the ban was imposed. However, after the Delhi High Court revoked the ban... the blasphemous book was being sold in India for the first time in 36 years," the plea said.

In 1988, the Union Government blocked the import of the Booker Prize-winning author's The Satanic Verses for law and order issues, as Muslims around the world condemned it as blasphemous.