Let's take a hard look at ourselves

This is in response to Saikat Kumar Basu's letter titled “Apologise and compensate before advising” (February 22). When freedom of expression often gets designated as “sedition” in the autocracies and “democracies” of the Third World and the “anti-nationalist” gets promptly arrested or punished, how can he keep on lambasting the Western democracies? We should draw inspiration from the West so that we can appreciate the true meaning of freedom of expression, tolerance and democracy. 

Kajal Chatterjee
Kolkata-114, India