*Vandalism is quite a refined art in our land*. Witness the speed with which *a few members of the loony fringe* attacked an exhibition of the nation's leading artist. Apparently, a dozen men assembled, stormed into the enclosure, smashed glass frames and tore off pictures all in a matter of minutes. The police, naturally, was nowhere on the scene.
The question really is whether they ever wanted to be there at all. For, t*he state has exhibited a peculiar attitude to this noted painter.* Indeed, *state dithering or simply equivocation on the issue of ending the exile of the said gentleman is another refined art*. On the one hand, he is held up as an early master, one who broke the barriers for Indian art, even feted. Yet, not a murmur is heard about when attacks on his exhibitions will be stopped. Indeed, *for all talk of our pluralistic tolerance, we have even exported violence against his exhibitions abroad. In the meantime, we conveniently make things ambiguous by excluding the man's work from an ongoing art summit.* This forced an activist group to set up the parallel art summit in response to the exclusion. Things merely came full circle with the lack of police protection leading to vandalism. The same case perfectly underlines our relative sense of freedom of speech and notions of exile. A writer from a neighbouring country is allowed entry, hounded out, and finally let back in, with the central establishment tying itself up in knots over the issue. But our own legendary painter is forced out without any move to restrain those hounding him. *This seems to point to the great time-tested tradition of our political and bureaucratic classes, their preferred method of administration: doing nothing.* The entire governmental juggernaut can, when it wants, excel in demonstrating the virtues of inaction. Que sera sera. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth?hl=en-GB -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
