Exporting culture: festival of India 1982

ABSTRACT

This article employs the concept of culture as a consumable resource in visually-mediated global markets. The Festival of India, first hosted in 1982 in Britain, was a unique state-sponsored spectacle that packaged Indian culture as a commodity for Western audiences. Indira Gandhi as Prime Minister took keen interest in the ‘visual scheme’ of India that was projected during the Festival, simultaneously conscious of her own image as she returned to power after the contentious rule of the ‘Emergency’. The article suggests that Gandhi sought to divert negative media attention on her regime by putting on display India’s ‘soft power’ in artistic and scientific fields. It further comments upon the diversity in the reception of the event by various audiences thereby challenging the notion of passivity often attributed to consumers of cultural performance. By examining how Gandhi and her advisors used culture as something ‘exportable’ to remake her image, the article seeks to place the Festival alongside similar spectacles staged in the early 1980s when Gandhi’s leadership faced a crisis of legitimacy, both at home and abroad.

KEYWORDS:

• State spectacle
• culture
• commodity
• diaspora
• Indira Gandhi

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributors

Smriti Sawkar is a doctoral candidate in History at the University of Oxford. Her research interests include the visual politics of South Asia, particularly the production and reception of state spectacles in modern India. Her doctoral project examines the role of ‘spectacular politics’ in Indira Gandhi’s final years in office, which also gave birth to new modes of middle class identity formation in pre-liberalisation India.

Notes

1 M. Sharma, ‘Chairman’s Report, CAA UK’, 29 March 1981. British Library Archives MSS Eur F215/140 (henceforth MSS Eur).

2 ‘Indian Summer’, Statesman (March 19, 1982). MSS Eur F215/232.

3 Serial no. T166A/80. Margaret Thatcher Foundation Digital Archives (henceforth MTFDA), available at https://www.margaretthatcher.org/archive/default79on.asp.

4 ‘Indo-British Relations’, Telegram number 585, 25 July 1980. MTFDA.

5 ‘Call by Mr. Swraj Paul’, 2 July 1980. PREM19/257 f6. MTFDA.

6 Ibid.

7 Ibid.

8 ‘Invitation to Mrs Gandhi to visit the United Kingdom’, 30 March 1981. PREM19/800 f193. MTFDA.

9 Tom Petzal to Editors of Sunday Times, Sunday Telegraph, Observer, and Sunday Express, 9 April 1981. MSS Eur F215/140.

10 Ibid.

11 2nd meeting of the Media Sub-Committee, 10 April 1981. MSS Eur F215/145.

12 11th meeting of the Publicity Committee of the FOI, 15 April 1982. MSS Eur F215/144.

13 Ibid.

14 Minutes of the Meeting: Publicity Committee, 2 September 1981. MSS Eur F215/140.

15 Minutes of the Meeting: Working Committee of the Arts Council, 8 December 1981 and 28 July 1981. MSS Eur F215/140.

16 ‘Proposal of book to be published in association with the FOI’, Publicity Committee. MSS Eur F215/144.

17 Ibid.

18 Ibid.

19 Ibid.

20 ‘Air-India book’ notes. MSS Eur F215/84.

21 ‘Festival of India Festival Review’ (March-October 1982). MSS Eur F215/231.

22 ‘11th meeting of the Publicity Committee of the FOI’, 15 April 1982. MSS Eur F215/144.

23 Tom Petzal to Bhikhu Parekh, 2 April 1981. MSS Eur F215/140.

24 ‘Minutes of the Meeting Festival Committee and Working Committee’, 4 June 1981. MSS Eur F215/140.

25 Ravi Jain to Tom Petzal, 13 March 1981. MSS Eur F215/140.

26 3rd Sub-Committee Meeting, Arts Council, 4 February 1981. MSS Eur F215/145.

27 ‘Who knows there is a Festival?’, The Indian Express (March 23, 1982). MSS Eur F215/232.

28 ‘UK Press focus on visit’, Statesman (March 23, 1982). MSS Eur F215/232.

29 A.J. Coles to J.E. Holmes, ‘Visit by the Prime Minister of India’, 9 February 1982, PREM19/800 f49. MTFDA.

30 ‘UK red carpet for Mrs Gandhi’, Hindustan Times (March 22, 1983). MSS Eur F215/232.

31 Quoted in ‘Who knows there is a festival?’, op. cit.

32 ‘A personal triumph for Mrs Gandhi’, Statesman (March 27, 1982). MSS Eur F215/232.

33 ‘Home Truths’, Patriot (March 26, 1982). MSS Eur F215/232.

34 J. F. Halliday to C. A. Whitmore, ‘Mrs Gandhi’s Visit’, 19 March 1982. MTFDA.

35 ‘Sikh leader condemns demonstrations’, Hindustan Times (March 24, 1982). MSS Eur F215/232.

36 Lok Sabha Debates 7th series, 6th session, 19(14), 2 September 1981, 202; and 7th session, 23(3), 23 December 1981, 179.

37 Telegram to Michael Walker, Mrs Gandhi’s visit to UK’. MSS Eur F215/2.

38 ‘UK red carpet for Mrs Gandhi’, op. cit.

39 Translated from Hindi, Lok Sabha Debates 7th series, 9th session, 30(15), 30 July 1982, 212–13.

40 Ibid.