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ABSTRACT
Since the end of the 1980s in India, groups associated with various political parties, religions, regions and castes have come to regularly attack artists and damage artworks. Straining relations between religious communities concomitant with the decline of secularism – as a practice if not as a norm – in Indian politics provides the context for such competitive and violent proclamations of ‘hurt sentiments.’ However, this paper focuses on the complementary explanations of how the rule of law has also come to not appear as a straightforward ‘solution’ to this ‘problem.’ It shows the fragility of the fundamental right of free speech and expression in India today, where the shifting legal regime is hardly an assurance against the concrete alternatives of lethal threats and violence, which have legitimized, over time, as Pratap Bhanu Mehta has argued, ‘the insidious idea that it was not the state’s job to protect freedom, but to discipline that freedom in the name of some conception of propriety’ (Mehta, 2012). To be sure, the focus of this paper is not to slam vigilant, and even, as many would argue, necessary laws and regulatory bodies, but to explore how the legal reasoning and workings might have actually come to be a rational choice for offence-takers, to develop theoretically and apply practically in their endeavours.
Disclosure statement
A slightly different version of this paper was previously published in Malvika Maheshwari, ‘Art Attacks: Violence and Offence-taking in India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2019. No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1. The range denotes the discrepancies in media’s reporting and interviews with members of Sahmat.
2. Analogous to the magnitude of its opposition, Arindum Datta described these interventions as ‘signaling a shift’ in Sahmat’s workings, underlined by a slant toward a ‘more liberally defined cultural politics’ – ’from a suspicion of mainstream culture and media to an attempt to address the mainstream.’ Sahmat opened this exhibition in Faizabad, in addition to taking it to 17 other cities across the country, including Delhi and riot-hit areas like Bombay, Surat, and Ahmedabad among others. See Datta, Sahmat, 1989–2004, 201.
3. See Muralidharan, “Against Cultural Hegemonism.”
4. The exhibition did not face any such objection in any of the 17 other cities it was exhibited in. Written by historian Romilla Thapar, the text on the panel read, ‘in this version Sita is not the wife but the sister of Rama. At the end of the exile when Rama returns to Ayodhya, Sita is made queen consort of Rama and they rule jointly for sixteen thousand years.’
5. See Rajagopal, Politics After Television, 185–6.
6. See Deshpande, Sahmat and Politics of Cultural Intervention, 1589.
7. For Sahmat to bring out these often-contradictory, little-known aspects of Rama’s stories was the most crucial aspect of mounting the exhibition, to reinforce ‘India’s cultural and religious pluralism,’ contradicting Sangh Parivar’s claims of religious homogeneity. But unfamiliarity, in general, makes acceptance difficult, just as the televised Ramayan had accustomed audiences to standardized images of Rama and Sita.
8. Beginning at the ‘stroke of midnight,’ Muktnaad was a nightlong 10-h performance by singers, musicians, dancers, and poets assembled from across the country on the banks of the river Sarayu. The preparations for the event were affected by the spread of a bitter lie: that Muktnaad was ‘a front for an attempt by Muslim fanatics to sneak into the disputed site under cover of darkness and reconstruct the Babri Masjid after blowing up the temporary Rama temple.’ Added to that, the increased police deployment in the city during the days leading up to the event because of Intelligence Bureau reports that ‘martyrdom brigades’ (shaheedi jathas) were converging on Ayodhya, only magnified the suspicious murmurs about Sahmat’s intentions. A testament to Sangh Parivar’s formidable local network, these distractions created an occasion for the governor of Uttar Pradesh (the state was under President’s Rule after the demolition of the mosque) to withhold permission for organizing Muktnaad until the final week. Even when Sahmat received the green light, local residents mostly stayed away from the event for fear of trouble due to hearsay that riots might break out again, for instance.
9. Like Chinese whispers, misinformation about Sahmat’s activities in Ayodhya thereafter emerged as reports in national newspapers where BJP leaders in New Delhi accused Congress’s Arjun Singh, as Sahmat’s ally, for ‘compelling’ the Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangathan, a system of central government-run schools, to purchase copies of the ‘offensive Rama poster’ for a sum of rupees two lakhs.
10. For example, asking Sahmat volunteers why they were ‘celebrating Pakistan day’.
11. Sangh parivar members roamed the streets that led to the riverbank, carrying lathis and knives.
12. Trustees of Safdar Hashmi Memorial Trust v. Govt. of NCT of Delhi, 2001, 852.
13. After the Speaker’s intervention, Sahmat decided to call off the exhibition, before the police seized the panels.
14. Interview, August 2008.
15. Singh projected himself as secularism’s main defender in Congress (apparently to make a bid as the future prime minister), uncovering factions within the party over this issue.
16. Lok Sabha Debates, 1993, 7580–86.
17. Rajya Sabha Debates, 403, 18–22.
18. Liang, “Sense and Censorbility,” 28–34.
19. Mehta, “The Crooked Lives of Free Speech,” Open Magazine, January 30, 2015.
20. See Holmes, Passions and Constraint.
21. Jain, Taking and Making Offence, 200.
22. Rao, Violence and Humanity: Or, Vulnerability as Political Subjectivity, Social Research 607–32.
23. Bilgrami and Cole, Who’s Afraid of Academic Freedom, Introduction, xi.
24. Mehta, “Our Scissorland,” Indian Express (New Delhi), January19, 2012.
25. See Nair, “Beyond the ‘communal’ 1920s,” 317–40.
26. See Dhavan, Publish and Be Damned, 11.
27. Ahmed, “Blasphemy, the Indian Penal Code,” 173.
28. Kapur, “Secular Artist, Citizen Artist,” 422–39.
29. Objectives spelt out at the time of the creation of the National Akademies of Art (Lalit Kala, Sangeet Natak, and Sahitya Akademi) in the 1950s.
30. Kapur, “Secular Artist, Citizen Artist,” 424.
31. Ibid., 425.
32. Laclau explains this as procedures that produce equality by creating equivalence between unlike persons, discourses, forms of speech, etc..
33. See Becker, Art Worlds, 14.
34. State at the instance of S.H.J. Kanga v. Akbar Padamsee; 249 of 1954.
35. The two quotes are from interviews conducted with two members: one each from the Bajrang Dal and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, August–September 2008.
36. Becker, Art Worlds, 177.
37. Rajya Sabha Debates, March 1955.
38. Anand Chintamani Dighe v State of Maharashtra, 2002 (1) BomCR 57.
39. K. A. Abbas v. The Union of India, 1971 AIR 481.
40. T. Kannan v. M/S. Liberty Creations Ltd. Madras High Court, 2007.
41. Raj Kapoor and Ors v. State and Others, 1980 AIR 258.
42. Rao, Violence and Humanity: Or, Vulnerability as Political Subjectivity, Social Research, 11.
43. See note above 41. 258.
44. M. F. Husain v. Raj Kumar Pandey, Delhi High Court, 2008.
45. Berger, Ways of Seeing, 2008.
46. Narrain, “Censorship and the Law,” 49–52.
47. Entry 3 in the State list II reads ‘theaters and dramatic performances; cinemas subject to provision of entry 60 of list I; sports, entertainment and amusements.’
48. Lok Sabha Debates, April-May 1958. However, this remains a common practice in many states, which continues until this day; corroborated through interviews with numerous theatre artists.
49. Pre-censorship for cinema is governed by the Cinematograph Act 1952 under which it is stated that a ‘film shall not be certified for public exhibition, if, in the opinion of the authority competent to grant the certificate, the film or any part of it is against the interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India, the security of the States, friendly relations with foreign States, public order, decency or morality or involves defamation or contempt of court or is likely to incite the commission of any offence.’ In Khwaja Ahmad Abbas vs Union of India (1968) Supreme Court upheld the ‘necessity’ of prior restraint since a ‘combination of act and speech, sight and sound in semi darkness of the theatre with elimination of all distracting ideas have a strong impact on the minds of the viewers and can affect emotions.’
50. Interviews conducted with former members of the CBFC board, New Delhi and Mumbai, August 2008 and March 2009, respectively.
51. CBFC has generally been maligned for its extra sensitivity to concerns of ‘decency and morality,’ along with religion. Most recently it circulated a list of 25 ‘objectionable words’ that included: ‘bastard,’ ‘screw,’ ‘masturbating,’ which would not be allowed in any category of the certificate. Lawrence Liang noted of this decision: ‘one of the hallmarks of absurdity – especially as manifested by government policies-is its ability to confuse our reactions, provoking umbrage when it ought to provoke raucous laughter.’ Liang, ‘Thanks to CBFC, we need to come up with better abuses today,’ www.dailyo.in; 15 February 2015, accessed on 20 February 2015.
52. Quoted in Sethi et al. “Who’s afraid of censorship!” India Today, January 7, 2014.
53. Noorani, “The Constitution and Censorship of Plays,” 31–33.
54. Bald, Literature Suppressed on Religious Grounds, ix.
55. Latour and Weibel, “Introduction,” Iconoclash: Beyond Image Wars in Science, Religion and Art, 2004.
56. Mehta, Passion and Constraint, 313.
57. Mehta, “Freedom’s our defense,” Indian Express (New Delhi), March 4, 2010.
58. Holmes, Passions and Constraint, 19.
59. Hansen, Violence in Urban India, 144.