A court in India has lifted a decades-old import ban on Salman Rushdie's novel 'The Satanic Verses,' as the government cannot locate the original ruling. India was among the first nations to ban the book in 1988 due to its depiction of Islam and portrayal of Prophet Muhammad, which many Muslims deemed blasphemous, leading to protests and death threats against the British-Indian author.
The ban became the focus of a 2019 petition filed against the Central Board of Indirect Taxes & Customs (CBIC) in the Delhi High Court. Petitioner Sandipan Khan challenged the constitutional validity of the CBIC's 1998 notification, which banned the import of the novel under India's 1962 Customs Act, citing its alleged blasphemous content. Khan argued that the ban infringed on constitutional rights to freedom of speech and expression, and sought permission to import the novel.
Khan requested a copy of the notification, but was informed that the document could not be found, according to legal documents. The CBIC repeatedly sought extensions from the Delhi High Court between May 2019 and May 2024 to locate the document, ultimately stating that 'the notification was untraceable, and therefore, could not be produced.'
In the final hearing this week, the Delhi High Court ruled that it had 'no other option except to presume that no such notification exists.' The ruling stated that 'the petitioner will, therefore, be entitled to take all actions in respect of the said book as available in law,' issued on 5 November. This decision allows people in India to import 'The Satanic Verses,' according to Indian media reports. Rushdie recently announced he is writing a new work of fiction, a set of three novellas, his first publications since surviving a knife attack in New York in 2022.
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