The dissident lens

A historian offers an immersive experience in tracing the history of protest at FTII, Pune

John-Ghatak-Tarkovsky: Citizens, Filmmakers, Hackers

Author: Ashish Rajadhyaksha

Publisher: Sher-Gil Sundaram Arts Foundation and Tulika Books

Price: Rs 1,500

Pages: 336

Film historian Ashish Rajadhyaksha’s new book John-Ghatak-Tarkovsky: Citizens, Filmmakers, Hackers traces the history of protest at the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII), Pune, using the student strike in June 2015 as a starting point for his scho­larly enquiry. In addition to the immediate triggers for discontent, the author also investigates the subversive potential of cinema to analyse, question and threaten the authority of the state.
 

It is published as a collaboration between the Sher-Gil Sundaram Arts Foundation and Tulika Books. The Cen­t­re for the Study of Culture and Society supported the research.

Following an introduction written by Rajadhyaksha and the foreword by filmmaker Saeed Akhtar Mirza, this book has nine chapters. Each chapter title is poetic and political: The Cam­pus in Expanded Cinema; Reinven­ting the Regisseur; Collective Acts and Lumpen Students; Celluloid Spectres; Freedom and Dread; The Macabre Spectacle; The Hollow Centre; Grotesque Bodies; The Totalitarian Pleasure Garden.

To refresh our memory of what happened in 2015, before Covid-19 drastically changed the nature of teaching and learning, Rajadhyaksha writes, “Mainly, they (the students) were protesting the nomination of se­veral individuals to the Institute’s Go­v­erning Council whose only quali­f­ic­ation to govern India’s premier film school seemed to be their direct affi­l­i­ation with the ruling Bharatiya Jana­ta Party and its allied formations.”

Gajendra Chauhan, known for playing Yudhishthira in B R Chopra’s television epic Mahabharata before he joined the BJP and worked as their national convener for culture, was named chairman of FTII’s Governing Council. Other nominees were Nare­n­dra Pathak, president of the Maha­rashtra wing of Akhil Bharatiya Vid­yarthi Parishad; Shailesh Gupta, who directed the film Shapath Modi Ki; and filmmaker Anagha Ghaisas of Ram Mandir: Adalat aur Aastha and Shri Narendra Modi: Gatha Asamanya Netrutva Ki fame.

Why was this unacceptable to the students at FTII? How did they mob­ilise against political interference? What made them find common cause with students prot­esting at Jadavpur University, Jawaharlal Nehru University, and University of Hyderabad?

The book explores these questions through inter­views with those stu­dents and with FTII alum­ni who took part in the pro­t­es­ts directly or from a dist­ance. The book also draws upon sour­ces such as news rep­or­ts, video footage, blogs, soc­ial media posts, minutes of meetings, po­s­­ters, official docu­m­ents, and records from the FTII Stu­dents’ Association’s email account.

It offers an im­mersive reading exp­erience best charact­erised as polyphonic and post-modern. Rajadhya­ksha’s text is acco­mpanied by scr­een grabs from stu­d­ent diploma films, cam­paign posters, maps, photographs of off­icial commun­i­ca­tion locked away in files, and QR codes that can be scan­ned to read, watch and listen to various kinds of so­u­rce material. Clearly, it deser­ves thoughtful engagement.

In fact, the title of the book comes from a prot­est banner with the lines “John, Ghatak, Tarko­v­sky/ We Shall Fight/ We Shall Win” inscribed on it. It refers to filmmakers John Abra­ham (not to be confused with the actor), Ritwik Gha­tak, and Andrei Tar­kovsky. Mirza calls them “icono­c­lasts…from the past who were free spirits, and they could not be regu­lated”. No wonder that they are role models for protesting students.

Beyond “the fight for academic aut­o­nomy that directly took on Ind­ia’s central government” in the form of a strike that went on for 139 days in 2015, Rajadhyaksha is interested in telling a bigger story about “cine­phobia” and “cinepolitics” informed by techno­lo­gical, political, economic and legal de­velopments. According to him, the changes at FTII cannot be understood without looking at the practice of censorship during British rule and in independent India, de­ba­tes around indecency and immo­r­al­ity, the Emergency, liberalisation, the arrival of satellite television, globali­sation, digitisation, crackdown on intellectuals and activists, sedition laws, and privatisation of education.

Rajadhyaksha is neither a voyeur nor an aloof observer. His sol­idarity with the prot­esting students comes across clearly. He foregrounds their voices, and presents material that is critical of the establishment. It might, therefore, be called a biased acco­unt. To the author’s credit, he does not try to hide his politics. He names the networks and collectives that he has been part of, and describes the organ­ic process through which this book came together. He unambiguously calls it “a personal account”.

Is the FTII meant to be a place that imparts technical and vocational training or shapes aes­t­h­etic and poli­tical sensi­bilities? How does its rela­tionship with the Minis­try of Inform­ation and Broadcasting influence its priorities in terms of curriculum, pedagogy and allocation of funds? What pressures do stu­dents have to work with when they are constan­tly reminded that their education is subsidised through taxpayer mo­ney? What anxieties do teachers face when they are subjected to surveil­lance and are on short-term contracts?

The book grapples with these ques­tions in depth, and will hopefully ins­p­ire younger scholars to undertake stu­d­ies of other educational institu­t­i­ons in India in a rigorous manner. After all, the crackdown on freedom of speech and expression, or any kind of political interference, is not limited to the FTII. What kind of learning can take place in environments that are filled with fear, where questioning is shut down and dissent is routinely crushed?