Public enemy

ON STAGE

If every line hurts someone, there will be no lines to stage.

It is happening again! In fact, now it is happening with disturbing regularity. There is this mysterious “public” whose sentiments get hurt at the drop of a hat! Its members seem omnipresent, lurking around everywhere to get hurt. It could be by filmmaker Deepa Mehta trying to show the plight of widows in Varanasi, by pictures of goddesses painted by the venerated M F Husain, at a scholar writing a book on Shivaji, at a student in an art college presenting his paintings in an exam — the list can go on.

One is moved at this extremely sensitive public, which otherwise does not mind beating up and burning people, now braving its lives to protect the interests of all Hindus. And every time this public burns some paintings or vandalises or stops a work of art from being shown, Hinduism emerges stronger. It is trial by fire — isn’t it!

Now the public is hurt not just by works of art but by artists merely opening their mouths in public. Jaya Bachchan is not allowed to say that she will speak in Hindi, which is the language she grew up with, nor is Shah Rukh Khan allowed to state that he belongs to Delhi. How ungrateful of them — truly! Would these Mumbaikars ever speak in Marathi in Delhi or claim that they belong to Mumbai? Never! So please do not open your mouth lest you hurt someone.

The world would indeed be a more peaceful place with no artists talking about their lives, histories, language, et cetera. In fact, it would be so much better if no one talked at all. Except, of course, those who have taken it upon themselves to prevent the truth from being expressed — because that hurts them! But they can hurt anyone, threaten anyone, and there is no law that can prevent them from doing so. No law so far has deterred them from vandalism, from making inflammatory speeches, from threatening and killing people. Long live democracy!

I have, in any case, stopped directing plays several years ago. With every line that I read of a play for staging, I knew that there was someone out there ready to get hurt. So I would censor it myself — I would alter the line, then remove some words from it, then finally delete it and go ahead. But then you had the next line to deal with. Same dilemma and same result: delete. So, as one went along, there were no lines left to stage.

Now playwrights have stopped writing plays, at least for me. It seems like the end of the road for me. Unless, of course, I take on “getting hurt” as a profession. My vague feeling is that it might not be such a bad option after all. I am sure I can earn money from the artist who does not want me to “get hurt” by his work. Alternatively, I could also earn from those who want me to get hurt by someone’s work.

So now, I extend an open invitation to all interested parties to join this profession called “cash for hurt”. This is safe because it is our constitutional right to get hurt!

On a serious note, however much we might fight for freedom of expression, and whatever stand we might take on it, clearly the parameters today for this are vastly different from what they were around 15 years ago. Today, art can no longer be about protest, about truth, about conflicts, because artists are forced into self-censorship in a big way, and it is sad when this means censoring the truth if one does not want controversy. And even that is not enough.