Penguin Books have been forced to withdraw all copies of a book called “The Hindus: an Alternative History” by an American academic, Wendy Doniger. Doniger talked about the importance of women, sexuality and the very poor of India who exist at the bottom of the caste system of India. This inflamed the good ‘ole boys of the Vishva Hindu Parishad, an extreme conservative Hindu group that polices everything said about Hindus, regularly forcing educational authorities to remove “objectionable” passages from school textbooks and excluding certain books from university libraries. The nearest analogy seems to be the Catholic Inquisition and the merry book-burning that went along with enforcing the faith.

Unfortunately, religious extremism is in this case muddled up with politics, because the Hindu nationalist party, the BJP, might well form the next government of India, and although they officially disagree with censorship, the fact is that a religion-based political organisation is vying for power and could use it to terrorize non-Hindus.

So much harm is still being done in the name of religion. Epicurus believed that the Greek gods quarreled and made love on top of mount Olympus and took no interest in human lives. This charming picture was a not-so-subtle way of saying there were no gods to bother with. India could do with an Epicurus, it seems.