Television tells you many things even in an era of untruth, if you know what to look for. As a practised viewer and reporter, I’m lucky. I know to look past the text of Modi’s speech at the U.S. Congress and listen to the applause.The first thing that struck me is how the claps kept coming at regular intervals in exactly the same strength, as if exactly the same number of hands were clapping at the same intensity to the ministering of an invisible conductor. The sound came from the upper section of the hall in the Senate, where an occasional camera positioned at a wide angle threw a glance at pliant Indians in raptures as their leader spoke.Modi was rolling out a speech with trademark Indianisms, which is a polite way of saying that it was replete with stock phrases and homilies that brought on one round of applause after another.“Standing here, seven Junes ago…” said Modi with a dramatic flourish, “…the hesitations of history were behind us.” Whatever that’s supposed to mean, you or I may ask, not the professional clappers.Encouraged by the sounds from above to say more, Modi kept the gems flowing.“Through the long and winding road we have travelled, we have met the test of friendship.” You could almost hear the heaving Indians ushered in to the top benches of the Senate shouting ‘sixer, maar diya!’<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_5_2_fab04cdd5b.jpeg" alt="images-5 (2).jpeg"> Narendra Modi is US CongressThen, an extraordinary thing happened. Modi quoted from the Hindu scriptures in Sanskrit, as he is given to doing.“Ekam Satta, Vipra Bahudha Vadannti.”This was followed by the same ecstatic applause before he read the translation in English. It was amazing that an entire section of the U.S. Senate could now understand Sanskrit.The translation was read while the claps were in progress.“The truth is one but the wise express it in different ways,” Modi explained.Could I be imagining this? Was I a hyperactive viewer? But it happened again.<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;display:inline !important;float:none;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;orphans:2;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">“<a style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.nbcnews.com/video/watch-indian-pm-modi-s-full-address-to-congress-184163909824">Our vision is, sabka saath, sabka vikaas, sabka vishwaas, sabka prayaas</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;display:inline !important;float:none;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;orphans:2;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">” (See 20:36 mins)This time, our multilingual Senate understood Hindi before Modi could follow through with the English version.There were other observations I made, less about the semantics, more about the troubling substance of Modi’s speech. There was the spinning of the usual Hindu nationalist yarn that India has overthrown a thousand years of slavery, implying that India was unfree under Mughal and pre-Mughal medieval rulers.There was the blatant and cruel joke of the Prime Minister talking of cooperative federalism at a time when back at home, Manipur burned because of the lack of precisely the kind of federalism Modi was pontificating about and the Delhi government was protesting against the constant attempt by the Centre to snatch away autonomy from a government by an opposition party.This made me raise bigger questions of the farcical performance at hand. Where is the word democracy in this show, if a Senate in search of money and an Indian market has to kowtow to a visiting dignitary in this way. The upper stalls were reverberating with war-cry like gasping chants of `Modi-Modi’ peppered with whistles.If America calls itself the world’s oldest democracy, where does it hide itself after such a display? On the one hand, America is replete with government-funded think tanks acting as self-appointed arbiters of democracy. It creates storied telling the world where it stand on the democracy index.On the other hand, Americans are well aware of how capital can twist and distort democracy into an ugly mobocracy that can literally rip the insides of their White House to shreds. They are barely back from precisely such a precipice so they know what a megalomaniac who likes to preen in public can do. They’ve seen it. The Senate that clapped and allowed clapping has seen it.But all of us glued to our television screens watching the speech could also see Vice President Kamala Harris keep a steely stoicism as she sat directly behind the Hindu dictator, her Indian roots called into play as part of the programme.We ought to know how to read the signs. The same tropes play out whether it is the pre or post-Trump regime. Biden, Obama, Trump are all conflatable into one big business ball prepared to pay the price, any price, any act to run their local markets and keep local voters happy.While this show runs to full house, let us now call into play the last such choreographed act when Obama was at the helm. Circa 2016, Modi’s rock-star type show at New York’s Madison Square Garden. Cameras hovering over the audience rows showed people in skullcaps all sitting together. That must have taken some doing. It was another level of absurdist theatre where you would need to imagine what would have had to play out if indeed all Muslims entered Madison Square at the same time and booked seats next to one another.Google the video. Then let’s imagine what we are supposed to.Says one Muslim to another in this imaginarium: “Hey, do you know Modi is coming to town? Let’s book tickets together and oh don’t forget your skullcap. And listen, let’s get all our friends to come watch how much we love Modi and let’s show him we care by entering the hall together sitting in one place.”“Yes, let’s all do that, what a good idea.”If world politics is about which leaders are shunned and who is feted, if America sits in judgement on who is democratic and who should be in a G 8 group or the United Nations Security Council, then it has a lot to answer for. And we, the enraptured viewers have even more to think about, as we sit eyeballs and ears peeled for this display.Should we stop looking in the official places for holding up the image of liberty equality, fraternity? Where should we turn to instead to understand the true value of freedom and dissent? If the 99 percent matters, if Black Lives and Dalit Lives Matter, can we stop using vacuous references to the democracies like world’s largest and world’s oldest? Also, should we turn our gaze elsewhere for a freedom index?Can we look at how Taiwan is fighting the monolith that is China? Can we look at aboriginal movements in Australia and New Zealand? Can we ask the LGBTQi in Brazil how they bent the votes against Bolsanaro? Can we look at a post-apartheid South Africa? And the next time when someone uses hyperboles such as ‘the world’s biggest’, ‘the world’s oldest’, greatest’, ‘fastest’, and ‘fattest’, can we collectively agree that these are salesman-politicians in Teflon democracies and look away?This article was first published in The Wire. <span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;display:inline !important;float:none;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;orphans:2;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">The article can be read <a style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://thewire.in/politics/us-senate-modi-applaud-sanskrit">here</a><a style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">.</a>

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Television tells you many things even in an era of untruth, if you know what to look for. As a practised viewer and reporter, I’m lucky. I know to look past the text of Modi’s speech at the U.S. Congress and listen to the applause.

The Amazing Grace of the US Senate That Clapped When Modi Spoke in Sanskrit

<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;display:inline !important;float:none;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;orphans:2;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">The Seventh TK Ramachandran memorial lecture was delivered by Menaka Guruswamy, Supreme Court Lawyer, Writer and co-recipient of the coveted Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medal in Law for the year 2023.

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The Seventh TK Ramachandran memorial lecture was delivered by Menaka Guruswamy, Supreme Court Lawyer, Writer and co-recipient of the coveted Thomas Jefferson Foundation Medal in Law for the year 2023.

Dr. TK Ramachandran Memorial Lecture 2023 by Menaka Guruswamy

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This is the full text of the 25th DS Borker Memorial Lecture delivered by Justice AP Shah at the India International Centre, New Delhi on 24 August 2023. 

The Grim Reality Behind Pomp and Rhetoric

I am very happy to be here, particularly with the platform and event associated with the memory of KP Sasi, who I knew from my JNU days and again when he came back and worked in Mumbai for a while as an artist and political cartoonist. I am also glad to be here because I like your theme for the festival, which is “Rediscovering India“. It is obvious that there is a growing number of people in our country who have never discovered it (India) in the first place. These people who have never discovered India are building an entirely obnoxious construct and “rediscovering India” will mean necessarily rescuing India from what is happening around us.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:1600px;" id="attachment_26325" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26325"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg" alt="Screenshot_20240208_165051_YouTube.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg 750w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg 1000w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26325">Sainath speaking at the Panchajanyam Film Festival</figcaption></figure>Three weeks ago, the former president of the Bajrang Dal, perhaps one of the most aggressive Presidents of the organisation, Jaibhan Singh Pawaiya, told The Week magazine that the Mandir movement (Ayodhya Ram Mandir movement) is far greater and bigger than the Independence and Freedom Movement. Now, you can dismiss it as the mumblings of an idiot – which he undoubtedly is – but ten or 15 years ago, he could not have said such a thing without being challenged. Today he can do that.This was on the eve of the orgy of January 22 (when the consecration of the Ayodhya Ram Mandir was done by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.). Then, approximately ten days ago Tamil Nadu Governor Ravi declared that Gandhi’s contribution and role in the freedom struggle was insignificant. He went on to say that it was Subas Chandra Bose who did everything in the freedom struggle. Now, this is a fantastic thing of juxtaposing figures who actually dealt with each other very differently.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:678px;" id="attachment_26326" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26326"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_37_09f0646227.jpeg" alt="images-37.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_37_09f0646227.jpeg 234w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_37_09f0646227.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26326">Jaibhan Singh Pawaiya</figcaption></figure>Do you know what names Subas Chandra Bose gave to the brigades of the Indian National Army (INA),when he formed it? We all know about the Jhansi Rani Brigade. But, the other brigades of the INA were Gandhi Brigade and Nehru Brigade, named after his onetime comrades in the Congress party. By the way, in 1943 Netaji Subas Chandra Bose was making a speech on Gandhi’s birthday and do you know what he said? He said that, never in history has one individual achieved so much in one lifetime. Indeed, they (Bose, Gandhi and Nehru) had great differences. That is why they broke apart and that is why they formed different political parties. But they were of a class and a generation and a mindset that dealt with differences very very differently from the way we do today. Yes, they would ideologically fight the other completely, but they never denied the others, their role in history and their role in the struggle.<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_36_1632306369.jpeg" alt="images-36.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_36_1632306369.jpeg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_36_1632306369.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined">What was I doing on January 22nd when the Prime Minister was playing high priest to Hindutva and in fact making the Shankaracharyas jealous, many of whom wanted to know what right he (Modi) had to be doing what he did in Ayodhya on that day. On that day, the television channels were full of Modi. Lord Modi kneeling down and Lord Modi prostrating, Lord Modi rolling over etc. I kept looking for the Ram Lalla (Lord Ram in a child image), but Modi was clearly more visible on channels than Lord Ram.It was told that the day marked a celebration of the return lord Ram from exile. But the fact is Ram Lalla was not kicked out of Ayodhya by Babar or Islam which did not exist at that time. Ram was thrown out of Ayodhya by his flesh and blood. He was kicked out by his father and his stepmother. Now,what that has to do with Babar or what that has to do with Islam is beyond me. But, you can write your own history now.The differences you are seeing on these subjects and on these issues is not the difference between different interpretations of history. It is a difference between those who see history as a process, history as an evidence based discipline and those to whom evidence is irrelevant and faith triumphs over everything else. Evidence is irrelevant in this school of thought.I covered Ayodhya as a journalist when I was working in Blitz. I covered the Ram Janmabhoomi movement from between mid 1980s to a little after 1993, the period when the demolition of the Babri Masjid took place in December 1992 and the riots took place in different parts of the country, including in Mumbai. It was also the time when the great security scam rocked Dalal Street. On the one side you had Ram Janmabhoomi and on the other side the Scam Janmabhoomi, as we put it in the Blitz paper.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:863px;" id="attachment_18474" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-18474"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/ddff_daa66be03b.jpg" alt="ddff.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_ddff_daa66be03b.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_ddff_daa66be03b.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_ddff_daa66be03b.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-18474">Karsewaks on top of Babri Masjid minutes before it was demolished by them on the 6th Dec 1992 in Ayodhya. Credit- T. NARAYAN</figcaption></figure>I have visited Ayodhya several times and if you go to the Ayodhya- Faizabad region there is not one but thousands of temples in that region. Almost half of these temples claim that Ram was born at the place their temple stood. They would give you the spot marked X as the birthplace of Ram, but they could not tell you when the Lord was born, because once you start trying to put a date to it you run into all kinds of problems. So, there are temples where Ram shot his first Arrow and there are temples where Ram, you know, maybe ate an apple or whatever. That is there are temples for every moment of the Lord’s life, but there is no temple which tells you when he was born. You claim to know the exact spot and the location (of the Lord’s birth) and you built a huge thing on it.On that day, our organisation, the People’s Archive of Rural India (PARI), we carried Rabindranath <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/tag/rabindranath-tagore/">Tagore’s</a> 124 year old poem, which is titled “There is no space for God in your temple”. In that poem Tagore writes of a great king who built a gigantic temple of gold, which was almost piercing the sky. There was effusive enthusiasm when it was inaugurated, but after a while nobody was going there. At the same time, the courtiers reported to the king that people are going and listening to some old sadhu who was sitting under the branches of a tree.So, the king took his courtiers and went to the sadhu and he asked him,”Oh Holy One, why are you sitting here in the open when you have got my temple over there and you can preach from there.“ And the sadhu said “there is no space for God in that Temple“. The king gets very angry and says, look, it is pure gold, it is piercing the sky, I built such a thing and you are saying my temple is empty? The sadhu replied: “I didn’t say your temple was empty. It is filled and crowded with your arrogance and pride. The arrogance and pride of a King. That is what is there in your temple.”Governor Ravi and the former Bajrang Dal president are able to say the kind of things they said and get away with it, because of the dangerously near complete erasure of our history. Erasure of our history is visible from the way the official government website displays things. Please compare what you saw on January 22 with how the country celebrated August 15 and January 26. Is there any comparison? Did the commemoration of one of the greatest Freedom struggles humanity has seen get that kind of attention? You did not see that on August 15 and you did not see anything of it on January 26 Republic day but you saw the most incredible celebration on January 22. This again has to do with the erasure of history.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:1200px;" id="attachment_26212" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26212"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg" alt="mod-iat-ayodhya.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg 750w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg 1000w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26212">Narendra Modi at Ayodhya</figcaption></figure>The extraordinary thing about the present regime is not merely the erasure of the past. They are even erasing the present. Look how after losing millions of people in Covid -19 we are now claiming to be the nation that managed Covid best in the world. There is a section in the official website of the government, which claims to be a celebration of 75 years of Independence. However, this website does not contain a single picture, a single photograph, a single video, a single illustration, a single story on or a quote by a living freedom fighter. There are many still alive in different parts of the country, including in Kerala, but still they don’t figure in the website at all.I am told that after “The Last Heroes“ (Sainath’s book “ Last Heroes; the Foot Soldiers of Indian Freedom” Penguin 2022) came out they have taken two or three characters from my book and included them, but they have been careful to include those characters who have died. But not a single living freedom fighter was included. Now, I am not saying there are no photos on the website. There are hundreds of photographs and you all know whose photographs would be there. Yes, the very same photograph that appeared on every single Covid-19 vaccine certificate. The same photograph, if we are unfortunate in April- May this year, which will appear on every bus ticket in this country.<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_38_8ff71eb5b0.jpeg" alt="images-38.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_38_8ff71eb5b0.jpeg 234w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_38_8ff71eb5b0.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined">Generations have grown up without knowing what British colonialism did to countries and people around the world. Incidentally, every year there is new emerging research on what that colonialism did. But that research is not happening in Indian universities. In 2022 November Jason Hickel of London and Dylan Sullivan of Melbourne brought out an astonishing paper. You know all of us during Covid-19, we learned this word “ excess deaths “. What does this “ excess deaths” mean? Excess deaths mean if a society has a normal number of deaths each year – let us say a big nation has 10 million deaths a year normally, but one year it has 15 million, then the excess deaths are 5 million. You all read this phrase during the Covid-19 period.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:647px;" id="attachment_26322" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26322"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_34_c9dc9b59d8.jpeg" alt="images-34.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_34_c9dc9b59d8.jpeg 213w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_34_c9dc9b59d8.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26322">Jason Hickel</figcaption></figure>Does anyone have a sense of what were excess deaths during British rule? Remember those days you were a bigger country. You were India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, parts of Burma and parts of Nepal. What these two researchers – Hickel and Sullivan – have done is take data of 40 years – from 1880 to 1920 – and tabulate excess deaths. Why did they take 1880 as the starting year? Because the India’s first census was in 1871 and so from 1880 to 1921 you have comparable data. And what did they find? Can you guess the number of excess deaths in just 40 years of British imperialism? There is a high estimate, there is a low estimate and a middle estimate.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:492px;" id="attachment_26323" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26323"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_35_9d50f655c0.jpeg" alt="images-35.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_35_9d50f655c0.jpeg 123w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_35_9d50f655c0.jpeg 395w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26323">Dylan Sullivan</figcaption></figure>But the general agreement or consensus is that 100 million excess deaths took place in that period. The high estimate is 168 million excess deaths. Can you count how many that is per second? Now, tell me if just one percent of that had occurred in a European country you would be screaming genocide. But it was treated as worthless Brown lives.(To be continued in Part 2)

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This is the first part of the edited transcript of renowned writer and journalist P. Sainath’s inaugural speech at the Panchajanyam film festival at Chittoor, Palakkad, Kerala. The event took place on February 4, 2024. (For Video, Click Here)

Modi Regime Erases History and the Present Too

<div class="post-featured-image" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px 0px 50px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">&nbsp;</div><div class="post-body clearfix single-blog-header single-blog-inner blog-single-block blog-details-content" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;"><div class="entry-content clearfix" style="box-sizing:border-box;counter-reset:footnotes 0;margin:0px;padding:0px;">Renowned lawyer and social activist Prashant Bhushan points out to the all round institutional collapse in India under the Narendra Modi regime in this Keynote speech delivered at the seminar titled “Reclaiming the Republic” held at the Sahithya Academy Auditorium in Thrissur on March 9, 2024.Bhushan underscored that all institutions of democracy have been under attack over the last ten years, but the assaults on the judiciary and media have become increasingly vicious over the last five years. The seminar was organised by the Thrissur Literary Forum. Watch the full speech here.</div></div>

Judges Blackmailed, Dossiers Made on Them

<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Renowned writer and journalist P Sainath presents an extensive narration of Indian history and underscores the importance of remembering a country’s past truthfully and drawing the correct lessons from such remembrance. He points out that rampant and aggressive attempts are on from the Narendra Modi regime to erase heroic chapters from India’s freedom struggle in order to manipulate the narratives of the present. “A country that does not know its past does not know where it is going too”. He points out in this inaugural speech made at the Panchajanyam Film Festival at Chittoor, Palakkad on 4 February 2024.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">&nbsp;<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">“സ്വന്തം ഭൂതകാലത്തെ പറ്റി ഒന്നുമറിയാത്ത ഒരു രാജ്യത്തിന് അത് നാളെ എങ്ങോട്ടാണ് പോകുന്നത് എന്നും അറിയില്ല” – ഇന്ത്യൻ ചരിത്രത്തിൻ്റെ ഒരു സമഗ്ര പരിപ്രേക്ഷ്യം അവതരിപ്പിച്ചുകൊണ്ടാണ് പ്രശസ്ത പത്രപ്രവർത്തകനും എഴുത്തുകാരനുമായ പി സായ്നാഥ് ചിറ്റൂർ പാഞ്ചജന്യം ഫിലിം സൊസൈറ്റിയുടെ ചലച്ചിത്രോത്സവം ഫെബ്രുവരി നാലിന് ഉദ്ഘാടനം ചെയ്തത്. സ്വന്തം ഭൂതകാലത്തെ സത്യസന്ധമായി ഓർത്തുകൊണ്ടും അതിൽ നിന്ന് ശരിയായ പാഠങ്ങൾ പഠിച്ചും മാത്രമേ ഏത് രാജ്യത്തിനും ജനതയ്ക്കും മുന്നോട്ടുപോകാൻ ആവൂ എന്ന് സായ്നാഥ് ചൂണ്ടിക്കാട്ടി. നരേന്ദ്ര മോദിയുടെ ഭരണം നടക്കുന്ന സമകാലിക ഇന്ത്യയിൽ നമ്മുടെ സ്വാതന്ത്രസമര ചരിത്രത്തെ വികൃതമാക്കാനും വികലമായി അവതരിപ്പിക്കാനുമുള്ള ഭ്രാന്തവും സംഘടിതവുമായ ശ്രമങ്ങൾ നടന്നുകൊണ്ടിരിക്കുകയാണ് എന്നും സായ്നാഥ് പറഞ്ഞു. പ്രസംഗത്തിന്റെ പൂർണ്ണരൂപം ഇവിടെ കാണാം.

Rediscovering India in the Times of Manipulation of History

<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/FT_Rftr_770x470_1851b4c4c4.jpg" alt="FTRftr-770x470.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_FT_Rftr_770x470_1851b4c4c4.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_FT_Rftr_770x470_1851b4c4c4.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_FT_Rftr_770x470_1851b4c4c4.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Making his first speech in the 18th Lok Sabha, Samajwadi Party (SP) President Akhilesh Yadav literally tore into the BJP, exposing the tall claims of the ruling party and its leadership, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Yadav’s engaging intervention was during the debate on the motion of thanks on the President’s address to the Lok Sabha.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Watch his full speech below:<div class="raw-html-embed"><iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/QP2QUTYgwB8" title="Akhilesh Yadav's Remarks | Motion of Thanks on the President's Address in #18thloksabha" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen=""></iframe></div>

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BJP-Modi’s "Jumlas" Continue to Harm People: Akhilesh Yadav

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Tamil (ta)

English (en)

Hindi (hi)

Telugu (te)

Kannada (kn)

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Dancing To Her Tune

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An Unwritten National Autobiography

<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_1_6258d15665.jpeg" alt="images-1.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_1_6258d15665.jpeg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_1_6258d15665.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><div class="post-body clearfix single-blog-header single-blog-inner blog-single-block blog-details-content" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;"><div class="entry-content clearfix" style="box-sizing:border-box;counter-reset:footnotes 0;margin:0px;padding:0px;">People who read literature in India knew him, MT Vasudevan Nair. Language was no hurdle for his works to reach out beyond the state borders of Kerala. While Malayali diaspora took a handful of nostalgia along to the places they went, a little bit of MT was also in that.Today, the big business of literature finds translators to translate anything that moves. All tetrapods of literature are given awards that stink of corporate imperialistic nexus. But MT belonged to a different era when blood recognised blood, genius recognised genius. He got translated not once but several times.Basheer, Takazhi and MT were the triumvirate that could transcend the borders and stand tall among the Indian modernist literature. Yes, MT’s literature also had a fair amount of auto-fiction but he hoodwinked it with the magic of text. He was a persuasive minimalist both in writing and in person.An unsmiling MT could generate generations of readers who could smile through tears. MT wrote about a collapsing social structure that divested the old feudal class with their ill-gotten properties. But their social capital remained intact and could exert a lot of influence among the readers by becoming the surrogate emotional ethos of a transition time of Kerala’s socio-political history.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:1196px;" id="attachment_31084" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31084"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg" alt="mt-1024x575.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg 750w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg 1000w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-31084">MT during his Interview with Sabha TV (Watch <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:0.4s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NttnjeaVqn0">Here</a>)</figcaption></figure>When society evolved into a different being altogether, MT turned to the treasure trove of myths and itihasas to eke out allegories that explained the pain of loss, of class, roots and love. His literature spat on the face of bigotry, whether it was religious or familial. He was so stoically poised in his literature that none could have challenged him and expelled him from the world of literature.MT’s literature spoke of love and separation as vehemently as he wrote about the changing social complexions. But he was not sentimental. There was something in his writing that touched some chord in every reader. Before initiating themselves into Ambedkarite politics, the Dalit ideologues also, in their torturous nights of youth, pined for MT’s characters.Those who call the modernists, Dad Vibes, have really lost the sight of the forest while focusing on shrubs and thicket. MT was a forest that moved, as in the great tragedies. He remained a serious writer while the post modernists fell in the trap of publishers and wrote lightning stories and became laughing stokes.MT remains, so is the MT critique. That’s the beauty of a great writer’s life and of course, death.</div></div>

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MT: A Forest that Moved

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An ‘Overture’ Stringing The Pope, Yesudas and the ‘Songster Chaplain’

<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/1_cc9df0fe47.png" alt="വലതുപക്ഷവുമായുള്ള-സംവാദത്തിൻ്റെ-വ്യർത്ഥത-1.png" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_1_cc9df0fe47.png 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_1_cc9df0fe47.png 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><div class="post-body clearfix single-blog-header single-blog-inner blog-single-block blog-details-content" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;"><div class="entry-content clearfix" style="box-sizing:border-box;counter-reset:footnotes 0;margin:0px;padding:0px;">When old age shall this generation waste,Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woeThan ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st,“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is allYe know on earth, and all ye need to know.” (John Keats, Ode on a Grecian Urn)<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/6_904b2e9f2a.jpg" alt="6.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_6_904b2e9f2a.jpg 147w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_6_904b2e9f2a.jpg 470w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined">Siddharth Tagore, Founder Director of Delhi’s <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:0.4s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/artkonsultindia/photos">Art Konsult</a> Gallery is no more. He cannot be contained in such a cold statement, so matter of fact like death itself. Besides the gallery, he founded magazines such as Art and Deal, Travel and Deal and many other publications. Even when he knew that he wouldn’t make any profit out of the publications, he invested money in them because he knew art wouldn’t survive without the literature surrounding it.&nbsp;Yet another venture of Tagore’s was an auction house, namely Art Bull. The name was perfect for a bullish art market of the 2000s. But the glitch was this: Siddharth Tagore was not bullish. Nor was he bearish. He was cherubic, complete with a benign smile on his face and a burning cigarette between his fingers. Whenever I came out after having a meeting with him, I would ask myself, was he cut for this business?&nbsp;Tagore could have been a poet and dreamer like his internationally renowned namesake of yesteryears.. After the pandemic period I met Tagore after a gap of four years at the Visual Art Gallery, India Habitat Centre where Art Konsult had organized a group exhibition. After the inaugural function, I shook hands with him and I realized that his hands had lost the firm grip though the warmth remained. “I have not been keeping well,” he told me.&nbsp;<div class="gallery galleryid-31051 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-full" style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:30px -8.96875px 0px;padding:0px;" id="gallery-1"><figure class="gallery-item" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;display:inline-block;height:auto;margin:0px 0px 1rem;max-width:33.33%;padding:0px 8.96875px 17.9531px;text-align:center;vertical-align:top;width:262.609px;"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/c_768x993_a7cec9742c.jpg" alt="c-768x993.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_c_768x993_a7cec9742c.jpg 121w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_c_768x993_a7cec9742c.jpg 387w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_c_768x993_a7cec9742c.jpg 580w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"></figure><figure class="gallery-item" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;display:inline-block;height:auto;margin:0px 0px 1rem;max-width:33.33%;padding:0px 8.96875px 17.9531px;text-align:center;vertical-align:top;width:262.609px;"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/b_768x985_3f8fb449e6.jpg" alt="b-768x985.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_b_768x985_3f8fb449e6.jpg 122w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_b_768x985_3f8fb449e6.jpg 390w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_b_768x985_3f8fb449e6.jpg 585w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"></figure><figure class="gallery-item" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;display:inline-block;height:auto;margin:0px 0px 1rem;max-width:33.33%;padding:0px 8.96875px 17.9531px;text-align:center;vertical-align:top;width:262.609px;"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/a_7888f94e4b.jpg" alt="a.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_a_7888f94e4b.jpg 121w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_a_7888f94e4b.jpg 385w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_a_7888f94e4b.jpg 577w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"></figure></div>Then on another occasion, at the same gallery, I met him again, this time without the crowd. He preferred to wear a pair of fading blue jeans and white shirt, a reminder of those romantic 1970s when every youth in West Bengal dreamt of poetry, love and revolution. Jeans and Shirt were the uniform of love and revolution. I think, when Tagore came to Delhi as a young man, he carried those qualities along, plus his sense of dressing. Lovers in those days smoked rather constantly and drank Old Monk Rum.&nbsp;On that day when I met him, Tagore told me that he had quit smoking, which was news to me. I couldn’t have imagined the man without a cigarette between his fingers or at least a packet of cigarettes to fuss with. I understood the gravity of the situation.&nbsp;Then again, we met when Praveen Upadhyay of the Progressive Gallery at Laddo Sarai organized a talk session with art professionals that included Tagore, Prayag Shukla, Vinod Bharadwaj and myself. Tagore was supposed to talk about the art market. When the mike was handed over to him, he fussed with it for a while and said that he always wanted to make it big by promoting young artists, but somehow, he never made huge business.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:689px;" id="attachment_31054" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31054"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/7_768x511_149563fe01.jpg" alt="7-768x511.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_7_768x511_149563fe01.jpg 235w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_7_768x511_149563fe01.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_7_768x511_149563fe01.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-31054">Siddharth speaking to the media at Art Konsult</figcaption></figure>Then I remembered Tagore telling the same during the market boom years that lasted in India for around ten years starting from 2005 to 2015. In 2008, the world market had collapsed, but the Indian art market using its cunning and reserve withstood the pressures and dragged the impending failure for a few more years only to revive itself by the beginning of the third decade of the new millennium.&nbsp;Had Tagore acquired a penchant for failure despite his resilience in running a gallery, publications and an auction house for over three and a half decades ? Did he enjoy calling himself a failure in the art market? Was he romantically involved with the idea of failure even when he kept others who were with him in the business, floating? I don’t know for sure. But Tagore remained grounded and rooted; he tried his best to keep himself away from the nefarious market practices.&nbsp;There were a few people who stood with Tagore in his highs and lows (lows that lasted for not some months but for years together), never deserting him, following his orders. Prashant Seal and Rajula Bisht are two people I remember. These two people have been so close to his heart and even after his twin daughters joining him in the business, both Seal and Bisht never lost their position as the confidantes of Tagore. He loved them like family.&nbsp;I met Siddharth Tagore in 1995. He had started Art Konsult in Hauz Khas Village. Meena Tagore (now Meena Varma) was with him then. Late Vijayan Kannanpally was the editor of Art and Deal. With the growth of art scene, Tagore’s gallery also grew in stature. Art Konsult was one of the few A listed galleries in the city. Tagore took it to South Delhi’s art district, Laddo Sarai during the boom years and later relocated it to Hauz Khas again.&nbsp;<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:562px;" id="attachment_31055" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31055"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/0_768x512_88eabd3bbc.jpg" alt="0-768x512.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_0_768x512_88eabd3bbc.jpg 234w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_0_768x512_88eabd3bbc.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_0_768x512_88eabd3bbc.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-31055">Siddharth Tagore with art critic and curator Jyoti A Kathpalia at the Art Konsult, New Delhi</figcaption></figure>It was in his Laddo Sarai phase that I joined him as the Editor of Art and Deal. It was the same when he decided to start Art Bull and Travel and Deal. I brought out around ten issues of Art and Deal between 2010 and 2013, with a gap in 2012 when I joined the United Art Logistics to establish the United Art Fair. Tagore literally lent me to the other organization with a promise that I could walk into the editor’s office at any time that I wanted. And I did go back.&nbsp;As a part of Tagore’s team, he gave me full freedom to edit the magazine and curate exhibitions. I curated a few shows and introduced a few new artists of which some are very reckonable names in today’s art scene. The exhibition ‘Merging/Submerging’ was a showcasing of contemporary photography art and ‘R.A.P.E’ (Rare Acts of Political Engagement), an all-woman show responding to the brutal murder of Nirbhaya in Delhi. This exhibition was a super hit and was discussed in all the print and television media. Art Bull did do a couple of exhibitions and auctions. I did not take much interest in it though Tagore hoped that his auction house could change the scenario and also break certain monopolies. Tagore also initiated an Art History Lecture series which I conducted on his behalf.&nbsp;Siddharth Tagore remained true to his calling. With a kind of detachment, he sponsored exhibitions that he knew well, would not bring any business. He was an avid collector of folk and tribal art and together with Meena Varma, he initiated an organization called ‘Art of the Earth’ for promoting the folk and tribal art of India, much before the ‘folkploitation’ of today’s art market became rampant. Tagore helped whoever came to him with a request for an exhibition or an immediate financial relief. &nbsp;<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:640px;" id="attachment_31053" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31053"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg" alt="3-e1734762508660-669x1024.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg 102w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg 327w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg 490w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg 653w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-31053">Siddharth Tagore signing the <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:0.4s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://amzn.in/d/4TijcgO">book</a> “Ganika- In the visual culture of the 19th-20th Century India” at the Art Konsult</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg" alt="4-560x1024.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg 85w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg 273w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg 410w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg 547w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined">When artists in Calcutta packed their wares and set out for Delhi, they knew Siddharth Tagore was there if nothing else worked (perhaps he was their primary destination), along with cigarettes and Old Monk Rum. He never discouraged the people who came to him with a clear intention to exploit. He was not cautious about relationships that brought him a fair amount of heartburn. As I said elsewhere, Tagore was a poet in his heart, with a heart ready to bleed for love and art.</div></div>

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