A drop in Varanasi turning into a flood in Bengal? The colour of waterchanging from saffron to red, saffron for cultural paranoia and red forcultural patronage? Art that died on a trident resurrecting on a hammer?Well, Deepa Mehta's Water is no longer a metaphor for widowed Indiancivilisation (O what a theme!) but a drenched reality of Indian politics.It was such a despicable spectacle: hyper-Hindus of Varanasi stopping theshooting of a film in the name of Hinduism and Hindustan. They were reallyover-reacting, bringing bad name to their cause Indian culture. Rather,they succeeded in exposing their own cultural insecurity. Their misplacedrage also gave birth to a martyr, who in reality is a pretty averagefilmmaker in search of market-friendly oriental kitsch. But Mehta shouldhave the freedom to make whatever film she likes, even if you don't likeit.That freedom was denied in Uttar Pradesh. Shame. That freedom is beingprovided in West Bengal. Great. Really, it was very honourable of ComradeJyoti Basu to put the Hooghly at Mehta's feet. And Mehta is happy ifSatyajit Ray can make a Varanasi out of Calcutta for his Aparajito, whycan't Deepa Mehta? Though it is an altogether different matter that even amillion Calcuttas can't bring Mehta anywhere closer to Ray. But, politicallyspeaking, has Water brought Comrade Basu closer to culture or art?There is a little bit of problem here. Culture and communism, of which Basuhappens to be an enduring lea-der, are incompatible. Like the culture policeof Vara- nasi, the communists of history were very effective in defining anddefending culture. They were better. De-epa Mehta has at least the freedomto talk about her fre-edom, to protest, to shift the locale from onevandalised river to another venerable river. And she is alive. That was notthe case with writers and filmmakers in the motherland of communism. Duringthe Gory Age of Communism, culture written or culture staged had to conformto culture as defined by the Party. Punishment to blasphemy wasbanishment.Imagination was the enemy of the state, it was a counter-revolutionaryfaculty that went against progress. Still, both literature and cinema areindebted to communism. Tyrannised imagination took refuge in metaphor, andmetaphor conned the censor. Look at Jyoti Basu, isn't he a Marxist whoendorses the metaphor?Or, is this Indian communist the redeemer of communism? No, the Indiancommunist is still the keeper of the legacy. There was no confession, norepentance, only justification. The Indian communist has internalised allthose Stalinist horror chambers, though India has denied him a mandate totranslate them politically.There may not be any Soviet Union today, geographically speaking.Intellectually, it is still the solar system of the Indian communist. ABasu-protected Deepa on the Hooghly can't compensate for the Indiancommunist's endorsement of the cultural crimes of communism. His ideologicallegacy is as culturally intolerant as the ideology of the hydrophobicsaffronite. So, sorry, Comrade Basu, the rite of purification requires morethan a dip in Water.
