Could anyone provide an Art Director please?

Just like the famous monologue in the play ‘NataSamrat’, ‘Ghar deta kuni ghar…’ (Could anyone provide a home?), now it is the turn of the Directorate of Art and the Department of Higher and Technical Education to say ‘Could anyone provide an Art Director?’. What was sown by the corrupt officers of the Higher and Technical Education Department in the last thirty-five years has now sprouted. Satish Naik, the editor of ‘Chinha’, will be writing a special series reviewing the numerous scandals in the Directorate of Art, every Monday to Friday for a month starting September 1st . Here is the first part of the series.

In Tatyasaheb Shirwadkar’s play Natasamrat, there is a monologue by Ganpatrao Belwalkar. “Could anyone provide a home… this storm wants a home…”. Now after so many years I don’t remember all the words in that monologue. But Dr Shriram Lagoo used to present the monologue with such power that even after almost forty-forty-five years today, it does not fade out of memory.

I remembered that monologue three days ago due to a phone call from some friends. Everyone on the call was of the opinion that the Government of Maharashtra is in desperate need of a good Art Director. The shortlisting has begun. We are suggesting some names. But you can also suggest better names than us, that’s why we are requesting you. Now there is no way of knowing who made such a request. But some officials in the Maharashtra government must have raised this issue with them. Otherwise why such a request should be made after so many years. But I didn’t ask them. Or did not even investigate deeply.

I had a fair idea that such a situation would come upon them sometime. I have been giving warnings through my writing many times in the last thirty years in this regard. But no one paid attention to it then.

Prof Baburao Sadwelkar retired in 1986. (In one of my previous articles, I had written Sadwelkar’s retirement year as 1985, however Sadwelkar’s daughter-in-law Minu Sadwelkar sent a message on Facebook to show that it was 1986. Thanks to her for pointing out that mistake. But that mistake was only inadvertent. I am aware that I am not doing any historical writing or even research writing. When I do that, I will definitely write the exact dates. So while reading my writing I would like to suggest that the readers always be aware that it is written from experience or memory. And this time span was long too, almost fifty long years. So also, such mistakes are bound to happen with advancing age. Also, please note that I am not justifying such mistakes.)

From 1986 to 1989, Prof Shantinath Arwade managed the administration very meticulously. Prof. Arwade managed the work without crossing the line drawn by his predecessors Adarkar, Dhond, Satwalekar, and Sadwelkar. After that, each candidate who was appointed as Art Director by the Higher and Technical Education Department of the Government of Maharashtra, did the job of discrediting the Art Directorate and ultimately disfiguring the painting tradition of Maharashtra. In particular, the Maharashtra Public Service Commission, who appointed either immature or people with criminal tendencies to the post of Art Director, took pleasure in taking revenge on the government by discrediting the post of Art Director as much as possible.

Many of these scandals made by Art Directors came to light over time. But so far the government has not taken any action against any of them, which may be either out of indifference or out of fear. An in-charge Art Director was responsible to make the Chief Minister of Maharashtra to apologise in the Legislative Assembly. But no action was taken against him either. Because all of them were busy filling their own pockets. So who will take action and against whom?

A Deputy Art Director even submitted a fake caste certificate and ran his one man rule at the Art Directorate. During his tenure, the Art Directorate was virtually decimated, but even after his caste certificate was found to be fake, he was suspended on the last day of his tenure. Needless to say, this whole thing happened during the Congress and NCP era. (If curious readers want to read more in this context, ‘Chinha’ has also made it easy for him. In this regard, ‘Chinha’ published a 350-page issue of ‘Kalabazaar’ in the year 2008. Most of the content in that issue seems fresh even today. Chinha has made this issue available on its website. Please click on the following link and read the issue for free.)

https://chinha.in/2008_edition

This action also proved to be just for namesake as the worthless Deputy Art Director got back his withheld retirement pay in just a few months. His superiors in the Directorate of Art and the Department of Higher and Technical Education gave it to him because as the saying goes, ‘Hamam me sab nange.’ (Everyone is naked in the common bath)

If such a serious crime has been committed and even after it has been proven, if no action has been taken against the criminal, then only a fool would expect that any action will be taken against other criminals by the Department of Higher and Technical Education! Newspapers picked up one case after another by publishing numerous news stories from the JJ campus. Be it the case of Gaitonde’s saw-cut paintings or the burning of 150 paintings of former students in the collection of J School of Art, which are worth billions of rupees today, or be it the forgery of gold medals awarded to farmers by the Maharashtra government, countless cases have come to light but no action has been taken by the shameless administration. As a result, the administration that was run very well during the reigns of Adarkar, Dhond, Sadwelkar, Satwalekar, Arwade literally collapsed and reached the abyss.

And today, such a time has come that the Directorate of Art is requesting, “Could you provide an Art Director?”

Read what actually happened and how it happened in the next part.

Satish Naik

Editor, ‘Chinha Art News’