“THIS is an international conspiracy to defame India,” raged one minister in parliament last week, upset by a foreign film about a rape in Delhi. Another, Rajnath Singh (the home minister), claimed that he would somehow order Britain’s state broadcaster, the BBC, not to show it. Pressed by the opposition, the government prevented the film from being shown on national television—guaranteeing it a large audience online.

Thin-skinned Indian politicians often claim that a “foreign hand” is plotting against the country and besmirching its good name. When outside researchers point to worryingly high levels of air pollution, open defecation or bad public hygiene, for example, nationalists call such observations malign or defamatory.

A fuss in the past few days over the BBC documentary is typical. It retold the terrible story of the gang rape and murder of Jyoti Singh, a medical student, in 2012. Controversially, it aired interviews from jail with one of her unrepentant killers, who blamed his victim for her own murder. “It takes two hands to clap,” he said. An attention-seeking defence lawyer described how he would kill his own daughter in public if she “dishonoured” him.

Such comments make Indian men look repressive and thuggish. In fact in the film, and elsewhere, many voices (men included) speak sensibly about the wider causes of women’s ill-treatment. “These men are ours,” says the author of a judicial commission on rape in India. His point is that Indians are perfectly capable of confronting abusive attitudes: denial helps nobody.

To his credit, the prime minister, Narendra Modi, has done more than most to discuss social problems. Since becoming prime minister last year he has called rape a national “shame”; he has talked about the “mental illness” of ill-treating girls; he has called for a minimum level of representation of women in parliament (a third); and has said bluntly that sex-selective abortion “needs to stop.” Female foeticide remains prevalent, reflecting a cultural preference for boys.

The government might also welcome a wider debate because it has a decent case to make. Maternal mortality has fallen by almost half since 2000. Female literacy rates have risen (see table). Even the increase in the numbers of rape cases reported to the police might indicate greater willingness to report it, as well as (or rather than) rising incidence. Of course, too few women have jobs or bank accounts; murders happen over dowry and “honour”; fathers and husbands wield most control overall. Nonetheless, a national debate should be possible on fixing social ills.