In Bangladesh, it's now illegal to have the national anthem as a ringtone
If you're in Bangladesh and you have the national anthem as your ringtone, you better change it quick: On Monday, the country's Supreme Court banned the use of the song for any commercial purpose.
Upholding a 2010 high court ruling, the Supreme Court stated that "the national anthem can't be used as a business tool." "Amar Shonar Bangla," or "My Golden Bengal," is based on the first 10 lines of a 1905 song by Nobel Prize winner Rabindranath Tagore, and became the anthem in 1972. Bangladesh has one of the fastest growing telecom markets in the region, Reuters reports, with 124 million cell phone users — hopefully they can all find an appropriate ringtone that doesn't break the law.
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Catherine Garcia is night editor for TheWeek.com. Her writing and reporting has appeared in Entertainment Weekly and EW.com, The New York Times, The Book of Jezebel, and other publications. A Southern California native, Catherine is a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
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