Why did older British obscenity laws remain influential in India?

Older British obscenity laws remained influential in India primarily because they were deeply embedded in the legal systems of former British Empire territories.1

The foundational definition of obscenity in this context was established in the 1868 British case Regina v. Hicklin. This ruling held that material was obscene if it had a tendency to "deprave and corrupt" those whose minds were open to immoral influences, regardless of the intended audience. Because this test allowed for the evaluation of isolated passages rather than a work as a whole, it provided a broad and stringent mechanism for censorship.1

While many Western nations began relaxing their obscenity laws in the 1960s to favor greater sexual permissiveness and individual privacy, countries in Asia—including India—were generally slower to liberalize these statutes. Consequently, India maintained these older British definitions and legal frameworks, which continue to shape the interpretation of obscenity within the Indian legal system.2