To The President of India

Dear Rashtrapatiji,

The Sangh Parivar and its allies have, as part of their majoritarian
mode, devised a form of cultural nationalism that we find abhorrent.
They are looking for targets to terrorize the people of India. M.F.
Husain has been thus targetted because he is a Muslim and because he
symbolically serves their purpose best. Husain is not only India's
most eminent artist, he has been honoured by previous governments
(among other honours, membership of the Rajya Sabha). He is a loved
figure in the streets of India like no other artist, and his
popularity can be maligned to maximum effect.

Husain's work, which has earned him so much acclaim in this nation's
post-independence decades, is precisely what is now being arbitrarily
attacked. That this is being done by known communalists, whether these
be political leaders or their own lumpen outfits, should make everyone
instantly wary of their intentions. Statements such as " If Husain can
enter Hindustan, Why can't we enter his house ?" made by Bal Thackeray
of the Shiv Sena, and the justification by Khushabhau Thackeray, the
new President of the Bharatiya Janta Party, of the attack on Husain's
home on Doordarshan, on Sunday the 17th, are inflammatory. They
criminally manufacture fear rather as crude bombs are manufactured and
placed anywhere to create instant havoc.

It is Husain's ability to command the imagination of the public by his
modernist imagery, as also his personal charisma and grace that is
under attack. All the attributes of creativity are being tested on the
basis of a so-called iconographic orthodoxy, but even that is a
dubious exercise. Far from making images of Hindu gods and goddesses
as an act of provocation, he has exhibited publicly his love of this
very culture to which he belongs, and that produces the most
exuberant, uninhibited and protean -- not to speak of the boldly nude
and erotic-- representations of mythology to be seen anywhere in the
world. It offended no one from our culture in the ancient and colonial
period; it offended no one for exactly these 50 years of independence
that we are celebrating. The offense and abuse signals a dangerous
move towards an entirely instrumentalised and recognisably fascist use
of culture.

An attack on creativity, of which this is an instance, is a precursor
to an attempt to regiment society, which needs to be frustrated. We appeal to you to ensure the safeguarding of the secular character of our polity and its institutions.

Geeta Kapur Art Critic, New Delhi
Ram Rahman Photographer, New Delhi
Anjolie Ela Menon Artist, New Delhi
GulamMd. Sheikh Artist, Baroda
Sohail Hashmi Sahmat, New Delhi
Arun Vadehra Gallery Director, New Delhi
Prabhat Patnaik Economist, New Delhi
Santo Dutta Art Critic, New Delhi