In Defence Of BAB And His Cartoons

In 1975, the emissaries of Sheikh Abdullah and Indira Gandhi signed an agreement. It was more of a heavily bargained permission request for the latter's re-entry into active electoral politics in Jammu and Kashmir. For years Abdullah had been fighting for the resolution of the Kashmir issue under his Plebiscite Front. But after the accord, Abdullah gave up on all that and was soon in the seat of power.

Many in Kashmir felt that Abdullah had reversed the very political stance he had been advocating until then and suffered long incarceration for. The sentiment was most accurately captured by Bashir Ahmad Bashir, a political cartoonist of Srinagar Times, a local Urdu daily. His cartoon showed the exchange between Indira and Sheikh, between India and Kashmir, as a transaction of loss for Kashmiris. In it, Sheikh is presenting his head (a grin on his face) detached from his acquiescent body to Indira whose arms are in motion, a cap-a crown, a taj-in her hands, being placed on Abdullah's bodiless head. The message was clear: Sheikh Abdullah handed over his head to Indira Gandhi and India, for taj, for power. Or, for crown and power, Abdullah gave up his head.

This was the first-ever political cartoon in the journalistic history of Kashmir, and it quickly captured the imagination of the Valley. Since then, Bashir has become a household name. While the Srinagar Times is not widely read now, people across Kashmir wait eagerly to see what he will draw next, looking for cartoons signed with letters BAB, his initials through which he became known to his readers.

Over the years, he has made cartoons on almost every political development in Kashmir. When militancy was raging in Kashmir, he made cartoons about the militants, at times lampooning them. His caricature of National Conference leaders Dr. Farooq Abdullah and Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, former Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and the PDP president Mehbooba Mufti are a class apart. Even after the abrogation of Article 370, he continued to make cartoons, less about Lt Governor Manoj Sinha and more about Farooq Abdullah.

However, over his long and distinguished career, BAB has also found a share of critics, most prominent among them the National Conference these days. The party, it seems, holds a special grudge against him that he submitted meekly before the Lt Governor-led government and didn’t draw any cartoon against Lt Governor and his government but continued to caricature Abdullahs and other mainstream parties.

It is true that not much has been written about Sinha and his government over the years, but this does not mean that one should avoid writing about the Abdullahs or the National Conference, or for that matter any other Kashmiri politician.  Lt Governor Sinha is not fighting elections in Kashmir; he does not belong to Kashmir. He is an outsider, and, like Governor N.N. Vohra--one of the longest-serving and most respected governors--he will eventually demit office and leave, and be forgotten.

Omar Abdullah is not a governor; he is a popular chief minister with 42 seats in the assembly. The National Conference is a party that is spread over Jammu, Kashmir, and Ladakh. People know NC and its leaders. And they must understand if a journalist, or a cartoonist self-censors in order to survive considering the situation at hand.

In a situation where Farooq Abdullah, Omar Abdullah, and Mehbooba Mufti were under arrest, and journalists were being raided, expecting BAB to make cartoons about those who put them behind bars on allegations that were collective humiliation of people. Isn’t that asking too much? There was silence all around. Even the political parties were silent. Why to point out only BAB?

Soon after abrogation of Article 370, BAB showed courage through his work. In June 2020, when most political leaders of Kashmir were in detention and the region seemed to be under a veil of silence.

In the US, the protest movement that erupted in the aftermath of the killing of George Floyd inspired new discussions on police brutality. BAB quickly found a way for both Kashmir and the US to reference each other in his cartoon. It depicted a policeman kneeling on the neck of a Kashmiri, bound and lying on the ground, with the figure of democracy crying, "I cannot breathe," Floyd's now iconic last words.

But after the government tightened its control over the media, BAB too fell silent. Those were the times when local newspapers were writing editorials on Cambodian Elections and they still do it rather than writing about local issues. Why should BAB take all the blame? The NC expects revolutionary acts from cartoonists but BAB is not Che Guevara. And Che is long dead.

On October 8, 2024 while discussing the "special status" resolution passed by the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly and the Governor's address, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah told the Assembly that the National Conference (NC) resolution had given a voice to many people who had previously maintained silence.

He made a pointed, sarcastic comment aimed at journalists who had criticised the NC resolution, calling it "meek." He suggested these were the same voices that had been mute for the past five years-whose pens had stopped writing, whose keyboards had gathered dust, and who had seemingly forgotten social media. Suddenly, he said, these critics had regained their voice. "For five years, I don’t know why they didn’t speak up," Omar said. "It’s a positive thing to see them now feeling free. Democracy allows for freedom of speech."

The sarcasm is fine, but the NC, now it is running the government, should seek information about why journalists fell silent. The party either doesn’t know or hasn’t bothered to understand what happened these years. The reason keyboards of many reporters have gathered rust is that many journalists' laptops are still in custody. Sarcasm is good, but the least the NC government can do is to ensure these laptops “are released from custody.” 

The National Conference should not construe every critical article as an existential threat. Newspaper articles do not pose any existential threat. Remember Donald Trump has won US presidential elections despite fierce opposition from legacy media. The NC's over reactive spokespersons should not berate and ridicule journalists for writing or BAB’s cartoons. Instead, they should restore the glory of the press. The least the government can do is restore the Kashmir Press Club to its original and pristine form, in its rightful place, and invite BAB to re-inaugurate it. One would look forward to the next day's cartoon by BAB.