I could not imagine myself as a prostitute

It then occurred to her. Why not present before the world something which is very much a part of India but is never highlighted because the world still relates to India through its snake charmers, poverty and medieval temples. And thus came up the idea to shoot people belonging to that section of society “to which I belong and to which I can relate too”.

The photographs were clicked in thorough consultation with the subjects. Sometimes an entire family argument would generate over what and who would make a better frame. There are families of Calcutta, Delhi and Mumbai, some Dayanita’s friends and acquaintances, others commissioned (Rs 25,000 for a Delhi shoot) by people who no longer had the time or patience for a portrait done by an artist. Dayanita speaks to her subjects through her lens and brings out through a private moment an entire character of the city to which these families belong. So, while families in Delhi are set against the background of their relatively new prosperity and wealth, those of Bengal and Mumbai have their past inheritance with a liberal dose of colonial influence staring from their backs.

The photographs are a glimpse of the other India. But more than that, the exhibition is an acceptance of the fact that photography has now come to be accepted as an art form in India. While Dayanita was winning over critics abroad, lensmen Raghu Rai and Prabuddha Das Gupta made sure that photography was seen as a genre as creative as any other art stream.