Lord Vishnu As Shivaji Maharaj

James W. Laine’s Shivaji: Hindu King In Muslim India has now been arbitrarily banned by thegovernment of Mashrashtra in response to an attack on the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute in Pune onJanuary 5, 2004 by cadres of an organization that calls itself the ‘Sambhaji Brigade’, and the subsequentagitation by the Maratha Seva Sangh against not only Laine’s book but also against all those whose helpLaine acknowledges. This includes scholars as well as non-scholarly persons in both India and abroad who theauthor thinks deserve to be thanked in print. 

The Maratha Seva Sangh and the Sambhaji Brigade claim that certain sentences in the book have hurt not onlytheir sentiments but the sentiments of all Maharashtrians. In public meetings held later, they went on todemand that all those who helped the author of the allegedly offensive book ought to be arrested (instead ofthe seventy-two persons arrested by the police, whom the Maratha leaders wanted to be honourably dischargedfor expressing their outraged sentiments), questioned, and tried.

I write from a vantage position because, in its wisdom the government of Maharashtra perceived a threat tomy person as I was acknowledged for my help by the author himself:

"At meetings of the International Conference on Maharashtra at Heidelberg, Tempe, Mumbai, Moscow, Sydneyand Saint Paul, I was able to discuss my work with an unusually congenial group of Maharashtra specialists.For their comments, criticisms, and encouragement, I thank especially Anne Feldhaus, Meera Kosambi, JimMasselos, Irina Glushkova, A. R. Kulkarni, Rajendra Vora, Narendra Wagle, Jayant Lele, Dilip Chitre, EleanorZelliot, Lynn Zastoupil, Stewart Gordon, and Lee Schlesinger. Like most scholars in Maharashtrian studies, Iam indebted to the work of the late G. D. Sontheimer. I am grateful to Kevin Reinhart, Carl Ernst, and BruceLawrence for all they have taught me in Islamic studies and to Philip Lutgendorf, Roland Jansen, and JimBenson for helpful comments on my work. Allison Busch provided me with translations of important Hindi texts."

Shivaji: Hindu King in Islamic India,
Oxford University Press, New York, 2003 p.viii.

In the paragraph preceding this, Professor Laine has thanked V.L. Manjul, S. S. Bahulkar, Sucheta Paranjpe,Y. B. Damle, Rekha Damle, Bhaskar Chandavarkar, Meena Chandavarkar, Madhav Bhandare, in Pune and Asghar AliEngineer for his assistance in Mumbai.

All the persons from the two sets of lists above who happen to live in Pune were provided 24-hour armedsecurity from January 7 by the government of Maharashtra. I was in New Delhi on that date but thecarbine-wielding young policeman assigned to protect me reported at my home in Pune on January 7. A second manwas sent to protect me at night. From February 9, the night escort has since been withdrawn. As I write this(on February 14, 2004), I am provided day security within Pune city limits only. Beyond the city limits, I amon my own.

On January 8,  I returned from Delhi to Pune. A day later, uniformed policemen from the Yerwada PoliceStation and the Ramwadi police chowky, along with two plainclothes officers of the Special Branch paid me a‘courtesy call’ giving me all the telephone numbers I might need in case of an ‘emergency’, thoughnobody could tell me what sort of ‘emergency’ to expect. 

Neither the Police Commissioner of Pune, nor any of his bosses ever contacted me. The Chief Minister ofMaharashtra or the Home Minister of Maharashtra who had so promptly and generously taken steps to protect medid not deem it necessary to inform me from whom or from what I was being protected and why attention wasbeing directed to me in this fashion. Nobody knows to this date why the police believe that I need theirprotection, and from whom. Neither does anybody seem to know why they have not questioned or proceeded againstthe various leaders of the Maratha Seva Sangh, the Sambhaji Brigade, the Maratha Vikas Sangh and other outfitswho have been holding press conferences, public meetings, filing complaints and petitions to variousauthorities in this regard, and so forth. Their names have appeared in the press. They have been spreadingsuspicion about the people thanked by Laine and calling them his ‘collaborators’ and demanding that theybe severely punished. 

On February 7, in NDTV’s 24X7 programme anchored by Rajdeep Sardesai (The Big Fight) the issue ofcensorship was debated by the Shiv Sena M.P. Sanjay Nirupam, the Nationalist Congress Party’s youth wingleader Jitendra Avhad, and the editor of the Marathi daily newspaper Loksatta --Kumar Ketkar. The liveaudience with which the three interacted included invited members of the Sambhaji Brigade as well as membersof the Raza Academy , the Muslim organization that had offered an award of Rs. 1 lakh to anyone who wouldblacken the face of Salman Rushdie on his recent visit to Mumbai. 

During this debate, a clip from an earlier recorded interview with me in Pune was shown to the participantsand the anchor, Mr. Sardesai referred to it while asking questions. Mr. Avhad, who brandished what he vouched,was a copy of Laine’s book (though it looked unlike a book), called me his (Laine’s) ‘collaborator’ onthis nationally telecast debate. This is of course absurd and untrue and I could demand an apology or eventhreaten to sue Mr. Avhad for spreading this canard and further endanger my life since I have to live amongfanatics claiming to have ‘hurt sentiments’. 

But if the Mumbai and the Maharashtra  police can let the Raza Academy, the Shiv Sena, the MarathaSeva Sangh, the Sambhaji Brigade and others have their freedom of speech in instigating potentialdisturbances, my complaint will not cut any ice with them.

How the Maratha Seva Sangh and the Sambhaji Brigade operate can be seen from the remarkable incident thatoccurred in the city of Pune on March 16, 2001 -- long before Laine’s book provided them with a high-profileexcuse. 

Shrikant Pradhan, an artist in Pune, had painted a portrait of Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj in the traditionof Indian miniatures. This painting was inspired by the Sanskrit work Shivabharat composed in the 17th centuryby Paramananda. Pradhan had announced that he would exhibit this work on March 16, 2001 between 4 p.m. and 8p.m. at the Bharat Itihassamshohdak Mandal’s hall. Pradhan was helped with historical reference material byNinad Bedekar, a local writer on historical subjects. 

At the time of the exhibition, a Maratha Seva Sangh activists’ group led by Shantaram Kunjir made violentdemonstrations at the venue demanding that Pradhan’s painting be confiscated and destroyed as they believedthat the painting, which depicted a four-armed Shivaji, distorted the hero’s image by seeking to deify him.The exhibition did not take place under the circumstances. 

But the significant part of the incident was the curious action taken by the officer-in-charge at theVishrambaug Police Station in Pune who gave a written notice to Pradhan, the artist, and Bedekar, hisconsultant, in Marathi under the Criminal Procedure Code( Cr. P. C.) No. 149 which translates as follows:

"Notice under Cr. P. C. 149  

"You are being warned through this notice that you have painted a picture of Chatrapati Shri ShivajiMaharaj depicting him with four arms---holding a ‘dandpatta’ in one hand, a sword in the second, a lotusin the third, and a raised lance in the fourth; moreover, you have shown Hanuman and Bhavani Mata holdingeight weapons in a corner of the painting. The Akhil Bharatiya Maratha Mahasangh, Pune City and DistrictBranch have fiercely demonstrated in protest against the exhibition and the possibility of any untowardconsequences cannot be ruled out, should you exhibit the said painting.  

"You are therefore being advised by this notice not to exhibit the controversial painting and to takecare that no law and order problem arises.

"(Signed with an official stamp)
"Assistant Police Supervisor
"VISHRAMBAUG POLICE STATION
"PUNE
16/3/2001"  

Later in the evening after this happened, a completely shaken Shrikant Pradhan contacted me to tell meabout the incident. He had already shown me his miniature painting (as a practising painter and occasional artcritic, I am in regular touch with other artists in Pune; and being elderly as well as open and accessible, Iam ready to discuss their work with them). The very next day, a patron of the arts in Pune, Surabhi Nag hadinvited me to deliver a lecture to a group of artists in Pune under the aegis of the Nag Foundation that sheheads. The theme of the lecture was ‘The Visual Arts Environment in Pune’. I requested Shrikant Pradhan toattend my lecture where I decided to highlight his being bullied by the Maratha organization, and his beingbrowbeaten by the police as well. 

My lecture the next afternoon was attended by over a hundred people and more than one half of the audienceconsisted of practising artists of Pune. I narrated the case of Pradhan to them and criticised what I calledthe ‘Talibanisation’ of Maharashtra and the oppressive, undemocratic role played by the police who,instead of taking cognisance of the threat to law and order by the violent demonstrators, threatened theartist of consequences if he exhibited his work. The audience spontaneously signed a letter of protest afterthe lecture. A reporter of Pune’s leading Marathi newspaper Sakal published a report of my lectureand the letter of protest on March 18, 2001. 

The same morning, I received a number of phone calls by a person not willing to identify himself. The callswere received by my son, my wife, and me. The caller simply threatened me by saying, "You have to live inPune and in Maharashtra. We’ll settle scores with you sooner or later."  I thought of sharinginformation about this threat with the citizens of Pune and of Maharashtra, so I informed the same reporterof  Sakal about the threats. On March 19, 2001 Sakal reported the threats received byme. 

About three weeks of silence followed this. Then, on April 9, 2001 the Marathi weekly SaptahikChitralekha carried an article by Dnyanesh Maharao (the same weekly and the same writer attacked Laine’sbook in December 2003 that seems likely to have resulted in the blackening of Professor Bahulkar’s face byShiv Sainiks in Pune and the attack on the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute in January by the ""SambhajiBrigade’).

On the very day that Maharao’s article was published in Saptahik Chitralekha, the Secretary of theMaratha Seva Sangh, Thane wrote a letter to the Editor of that weekly lauding Maharao’s piece for ‘representingthe sentiments of the common man of Maharashtra’ about the various controversies on Shivaji’s date ofbirth, his deification, his biography, and his depiction by artists. Signed by Balakrishna Parab of theMaratha Seva Sangh, Thane a copy of this letter was mailed to Shrikant Pradhan and also to me. 

It is not a coincidence that the same names appear in the controversy created around James W. Laine’sbook. Shantaram Kunjir was one of the speakers at a number of meetings held in Pune not only to demand actionagainst the book and its author but against all people acknowledged or thanked by him. The Maratha Seva Sanghwas in the forefront of the agitation. Dnyanesh Maharao wrote a series of articles in Saptahik Chitralekhacreating ill-will among its readers whether they had access to the book or not, and whether they knew whatrole, if any, the people thanked by Laine played in the contents and the writing of the book. Since it is somepolice officer who decides whom to warn under Cr.P.C.149 and whom to let go, even when there is a pattern inthe behaviour -- of those who claim to suffer from ‘hurt sentiments’ and those who hold up their cause inthe tabloid press -- that suggests these are engineered incidents, the government may pretend it has nofurther constitutional responsibility in matters such as these. 

Where even celebrities such as the painter M.F. Hussain have to suffer at the hands of Bajrang Dal andVishwa Hindu Parishad and their works are damaged and their exhibitions wrecked, who will listen if a ShrikantPradhan complained or narrated his woes?

The pluralism of Indian civilization, the syncretistic Hindu tradition, and the secular democraticConstitution of the Republic of India are under attack by extra-constitutional mobs mobilised by politicalparties across the board. This is the new populist culture rising in India and it carries the deadly virus offascism.

Dilip Chitre is Honorary Editor New Quest - a quarterly journalof participative inquiry into society and culture - and this piece appears in New Quest Number 155(January-March 2004) focussing on "the rise of neo-Fascism in India".