As a precursor to the release of Nandita Das’ film on Manto, we hosted the film’s cast members Nawazuddin Siddiqui and Rasika Dugal for a conversation on free speech with literary historian Rakhshanda Jalil and Nazia Erum, author of Mothering a Muslim. They spoke about the provocative writer’s life and writings as depicted in the film, in the context of our current socio-political environment where freedom of speech and expression seem to be increasingly at risk.