With an amendment passed in the legislature on Friday to the Maharashtra Police Act to ban dance performances in hotels, bars and restaurants, the DF government has spurned critics who had called the ban move a few years ago in 2005 ‘unfair and autocratic’.

 

The changed law bans dancers in even the star-grade hotels, hospitality centers which had been spared by the 2005 amendment in the law that closed the doors on dance bars in the state.

 

While the assembly was passing the bill, R R Patil informed the opinion of the advocate general and some senior lawyers in Delhi had been sought before coming up with the amendment.

 

"Each one has supported the bill," Patil said. "There are no deviations from the government stand of a total ban." The home minister said now there would be no legal glitch and the changed law would stand in court.

 

Ironically, the law as amended in 2005 had been quashed by the Supreme Court as it found that allowing dancers in big hotels but not in smaller bars was discriminatory.

 

"This decision has been made to avoid the discrimination between the ordinary dance bars and dance bars in three- to five-star hotels which the SC had objected to," a senior Congress minister said.

 

The law will not influence family parties in pubs, discos and hotels, and orchestras. In the council, Ashish Shelar of the BJP asked if the law would apply to cheerleaders in cricket and Patil said the issue would have to be examined.

 

A minimum of three months imprisonment and a fine of at least Rs 1 lakh were approved for breach of the law.

 

There is still the likelihood of a legal dispute to the amended Act; a critical point the courts had raised was artistes' right to perform and women's right to livelihood