The Bizarre World Of Facebook

Facebook is not just a replica of reality, but also a mythical land where some true stories are so bizarre, that you often wonder if it is some poorly scripted piece of fiction. Of late though, the recent confessions pages have been creating most of the stir on FB, but there is enough fodder for those looking for some reality-TV style tales out in the open. Here are some of the classic cases of virtual insanity that India has seen via the social networking service.

E-Commerce Gone Too Far?
You can buy everything from groceries, vegetables, gadgets, to footwear online. But how about human beings? By the likes of it, that is possible too. Well, almost. Recently,police arrested a man in Ludhiana for selling off his grandson to a Delhi-based businessman for Rs 8 lakhs. The deal had been allegedly made via Facebook with a local hospital helper, for the child who was born to the accused's daughter on 9th April. Although the cops are yet to ascertain where indeed the deal was put through from the social networking website. If true though, the police will frame additional charges under the Information Technology Act as well. Well, these days, you can buy anything online, I guess. What next then? Mail-order brides and grooms? Oh wait, matrimony sites already exists!

Watch What You Say
Pulling up people for spreading hurtful and racist content on social networks isn’t new either. But when Facebook likes start attracting sedition charges, it changes the meaning of the term 'free speech'. While the Palghar incident brought to light several issues that plagued the IT Act, incidents like these don’t seem to slow down at any rate. Recently, a Kashmir-based all-girl band faced not just the ire of the Grand Mufti, which issued a fatwa against them, announcing that singing is un-Islamic (!), but also faced the wrath of FB goons following which they disbanded. While the band "Pragaash" (meaning light) is getting a lot of backing from netizens from around the world, it just goes to show that voicing your opinion on the internet in our country is not always a good thing. But then again, it does get you some free publicity.

Sometimes, The Fault Lies Within
While we've all been bashing up the government about framing a weak IT Act, some of the perpetrators actually got the jail time they deserved. In two separate incidents in Jaipur and Chandigarh, two well-educated young men saw themselves on the wrong side of law after they defamed their colleagues' walls, merely out of spite. Not a nice way to vent out your anger, especially when there have been reports of several people losing their jobs, just because they didnt know where to rant and how to rant, when online . Indian laws may be flimsy, but are not always ineffective.

Rebels Without A Cause, Or Purpose
But the most bizarre (or borderline childish) of them all was when an Aurangabad based couple separated because of a Facebook update — or rather the lack of it. The first incident of its kind to be reported in India, a 28-year old woman filed for divorce, as her husband did not change his Facebook relationship status from Single to Married. Well, whether the husband continues to rot in hell, or if the petty wife got her way is something we'd never know, but they sure caused a revolution in the country! But for those wanting to use this as an excuse to dump their bitter halves, you should know, it's our ministers who've warmed up to technology, not the judiciary. So for now, this is not something that will give you a solid ground for divorce. So don't waste your energy snooping on your partner's profile.

Commedy Of Errors
Not all incidents involving FB puts users at fault — the social networking service was at the receiving end of a lot of anger from an Assamese community which was banned just because their last name is similar to a Hindi-language expletive. The comedy of errors saw some red-faced with anger, and others with laughter. After all, we don't really get to pick out last names, now do we?