This is a guest post by NIYATI SHARMA AND SNIGDHA KUMAR

The latest in a line of institutions to fall victim to the BJP government’s campaign against “cultural pollution” is The Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (NMML). The agenda is loud and clear – anything which ‘pollutes’ the current government’s preferred way of life and thinking will be done away with. Bans such as the recent ones on porn and meat are the most obvious instruments at the disposal of the government to achieve this goal. The more effective interventions, however, are not those which instantly deny people their choices and freedoms. Presented instead as minor improvements and renovations, interventions in art, history and academic institutions allow the government to introduce subtle long term changes – changes with the capacity to access and alter our very being.

Given the enormity of these interventions in the long run then, it is particularly curious how the clear recent attempts to take over academic institutions such as the ICHR, FTII and now NMML have managed to raise only a few eyebrows while the bans on porn (and meat to an extent) have met with much protest and were subsequently lifted. Perhaps this is because such spaces appear to be remote islands inhabited only by those interested in history, film and/or academic research. Only such an impression can explain the rather meek public debate and outcry that these clearly targeted changes have generated.

Continue reading Another One Bites the Dust: “Cultural Pollution” and the Nehru Memorial Museum & Library: Niyati Sharma and Snigdha Kumar →