The Art Of War

The art world erupts in anger as a final year student of Maharaja Sayajirao University is jailed for painting Hindu deities in ‘provocative’ poses. Exams are disrupted and careers hang in balance as the debate rages over the limits of artistic freedom.

PICTURE SPEAK

CONTROVERSY CALL: Mohan in custody (left); Artists at a rally in his support in Mumbai

Controversy began for Mohan— a son of a carpenter in Andhra Pradesh—when four of his paintings were exhibited for an in-house examination that depicted Hindu and Christian religious icons in what can be termed as objectionable taste and context. While some of the political leaders raised slogans of protest against Mohan, saying his paintings posed a threat to public taste, others in the artistic community demanded an end to the activities of the increasingly active, self-appointed guardians of public morality.

What added fuel to the fire was the fact that the institute’s authorities were governed by the BJP Government in the state. The man who fired the first shot was Vadodara-based BJP leader Niraj Jain. He had stormed into the examination venue where the paintings were on display and demanded that they be removed. Then he entered into a heated argument with acting Dean of the Faculty Shivaji Panikkar, who backed Mohan and his paintings. The incident took an extreme turn when Jain called the police and lodged an fir against Mohan who was later arrested and sent to jail for a week for hurting religious sentiments. He is now on bail. Panikkar has been suspended by the institute’s vice-chancellor Manoj Soni, who is a government appointee, for not carrying out his orders to wind up the exhibition of erotic art works following Chandra Mohan’s arrest. “My suspension is illegal because I haven’t done anything wrong. It is an assault on artistic freedom by the saffron forces. We are not going to surrender to the moral police,” said Panikkar.

With recent cases of moral policing—the Shilpa Shetty-Richard Gere incident, the trashing of Star TV studio for inviting a Hindu-Muslim minor couple who eloped and got married—it is not surprising that the Vadodara issue was incendiary in more ways than one. Several artists and filmmakers came together in various cities to condemn the arrest and the attack on freedom of expression by the Sangh Parivar. Although the incident has witnessed protests from all corners—some for and some against—the irony is that none of the celebrities has seen the paintings, says renowned artist Anjolie Ela Menon.

LEFT FUMING

"If they are so keen on painting obscenity, why religious icons and not their own parents? They will justify blue films now." NIRAJ JAIN, BJP LEADER "It is an assault on artistic freedom by the saffron forces. We are not going to surrender to the moral police." SHIVAJI PANIKKAR, ACTING DEAN

One of the paintings by Mohan shows Christ on the cross with his hands and legs visible, and phallus hanging out, spewing semen into a commode. Another one is of Durga killing a baby, emerging from her womb, with a trident. The third painting shows Virat Swaroop of Lord Vishnu holding his own phallus, surrounded by several other penises. The fourth painting that is in the line of fire shows a Shivling surrounded by phalluses from which Mohan’s own bust emerges. Says Sandhya Bhagat, an activist of the CNI church who found his paintings objectionable, “Such perversion in the name of artistic freedom can’t be tolerated. Religious icons have to be respected.” Painter and president of the Gujarat Visual Artistes Association, Madhav Ramanuj, says, “Artists have a right to freedom of expression but within the norms laid down by the civilised society. The paintings are indeed repulsive”. Mohan, who won the Lalit Kala Akademy’s National Award last year, said, “I had no intention of hurting anyone’s sentiments.”

Just as beauty lies in the eye of the beholder, art too is open to subjective interpretation. While eminent artist Jehangir Sabawala led the protest against Chandra Mohan’s arrest in Mumbai, in Kolkata, Jogen Chaudhary led the demonstrations. In Vadodra, the condemnation of the paintings was not restricted to the Sangh Parivar alone. Says Sitanshu Yasheshchandra Mehta, an acclaimed Gujarati writer, “Artists can’t do whatever they want in the name of creativity. But outsiders too shouldn’t have entered the faculty and taken up things in their own hands.”

This is a topic that is again debatable. Jain visited the Faculty of Fine Arts on the day of the exhibition. However, the fact that Jain is no art lover, his presence only proves that he had prior information about the paintings and had gone to the institute with a definite plan in mind.

Panikkar has an enviable reputation as one of the country’s leading art historians. As the head of the Art History department, he has recently been given a grant of Rs 84 lakh by Ratan Tata. While Panikkar suffered a setback in this fiasco, 117 final year students too found themselves in a muddle. Their examinations have been disrupted. Says Shashidharan, who teaches in the faculty of painting, “The court will decide whether Mohan is wrong but the fact is he didn’t do it intentionally. However, the way it happened was definitely as assault on academic freedom.” Jain says he will withdraw the case only when Mohan and Panikkar apologise for hurting religious sentiments.

While Mohan’s arrest may have been an extreme reaction and his release on bail is welcomed even by his critics, the debate at the national level is far from over. The art world, which supports Mohan and his paintings, is not willing to yield an inch. “When it comes to vulgarity, Hindi films are worse,” says Menon, adding, “Why single out fine arts?” Says Gujarat’s best-known art critic Esther David, “It’s an assault on the soul of creativity and academic freedom. Nudity is a part of the syllabus of fine arts.” Renowned painter Ghulam Mohammed Shaikh too condemned the assault and blamed the university authorities for allowing outsiders to interfere in the examination process. What is lost in the din of battle is that the damage to the reputation of a great institution has already been done.

GUEST COLUMN: BY ANJOLIE ELA MENON

“Why this Victorian Prudery?” Not having seen the actual image, I can’t comment on it. But it appears to be politically pre-meditated. I declare that I am not a pseudo-secularist. I am a born-and-bred secularist. I know no other way. In my immediate family there are Muslims, Bahais, Sikhs, Catholics, Protestants, Hindus and Brahmos. Also, there is a Druid and some agnostics. I chose the path of Hinduism at the age of 14 as I was inspired by the teachings of Vivekananda and Ramakrishna. I also profess to be apolitical. I am grieved that the lumpen elements of the neo (pseudo) religious right are dumping my faith to its lowest common denominator. Today, religiousness and spirituality are being replaced by religiosity. Hinduism was non-congregational, and left diverse paths for different individuals. It is essentially a religion for an individual, steeped in profound philosophy. It is not a religion for prudes. Our imagery and sacred texts have been replete with erotic references but that very eroticism was a metaphor for a man’s union with the divine. Our iconography has celebrated the body from time immemorial with total acceptance of the unclothed. In a recent debate on television, someone averred that there was no nudity in Indian iconography as the deities were “clothed in air”. What a beautiful concept! So why this sudden objection to contemporary artists who are using nudity as a symbol in art? When did the devi cease to be clad in air? Why have we now embraced an imported Victorian prudery? I was at the Ardh Kumbh earlier this year, where I witnessed a thousand Naga sadhus leaping and running towards the edge of the water in an early, misty morning. Women and children walked past these naked sadhus and conversed with them. Nobody flinched. Great Jain statues stand in all their glorious nudity receiving abhishekams of milk from their devotees. The image of the unclothed Chinnamasta Kali, standing on a copulating couple is worshipped throughout Bengal. There’s a lot in acceptance. When we see these deities, there is an innocent acceptance which depicts the greatness of our country and culture. Perhaps, it is this same docile acceptance that prevails when the thin line between eroticism and pornography is breached on a daily basis as hideously suggestive gyrations loaded with sexual innuendo are watched by half a billion people, including kids, on silver screen. The current brouhaha over the Vadodara incident is only one of a series. Not having seen the actual image, I decline to comment on it. However, against the backdrop of Gujarat’s abysmal human rights record, one was apprehensive about the outcome. What I object to is the fact that it appears to be politically pre-meditated. It was clearly not a spontaneous response of a person whose sentiments were hurt. It was a well-planned onslaught which was followed by a now familiar sequence. In such an attack, an informer or spy first puts a word to the political party. The party then seizes an opportunity to create an incident and sends out its uneducated goons to do the needful. In this case, they arrived with a posse of quiescent policemen who were obviously lackeys of the Sangh Parivar. In an incident earlier, where the mob pulled out bits of Jatin Das’ white beard, mistaking him for Husain, it neither knew Husain nor his paintings. I asked the audiences who came on television, “Which of you has seen the painting that is offending?” Not one hand went up. So it was the notion of being offended, not offense that created the storm. And this idea or notion was deliberately disseminated and fanned by political parties to cash in on the sensitivities of uninformed people. Was Pravin Togadia arrested for circulating a carefully-produced all-colour pamphlet against Husain that could clearly have led to communal hatred and violence? Cowards are often bullies. Shamefully, two of the most vulnerable citizens have been attacked—one is a 92-year old man and the other is a young student whose family is so poor that they cannoteven defend him. In contrast to the cowardly attack is the extreme courage shown by dean Shivaji Panikkar. He supported his student in the face of grave threats and the betrayal by his own vice-chancellor. He remains suspended but will go down in history as a guru with broad shoulders—a teacher of stature. The great gift of Republic of India to the creative community was freedom of expression. This has led to immense flowering of arts. We will fight tooth and nail to preserve this gift. There is a groundswell of protest growing exponentially throughout the country. We will not submit to the diktat of the neo-Taliban, the self-appointed moral police. The writer is one of India’s leading contemporary artists.

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