With the media excitement around the arrest, defiance and subsequent release of Aseem Trivedi I am expecting a kind of sedition chic to hit the runways soon.

Aseem Trivedi’s freedom of expression must unquestionably be supported, whether we like his cartoons or not (I could use a little more humour and irony over the heavy self-righteousness). But what makes him a front page hero, while activists who have sustained a year-long peaceful protest in Idinthikarai against the Koodankulum nuclear plant or the jal satyagrahis standing neck-deep in water at Mandwa and now Harda in silent protest don’t call up the same level of passion from the media — and via that reportage, the public?