SAHMAT Dedicates Exhibition on its 35-Year-Old Journey to Sitaram Yechury’s Memory

New Delhi: The Safdar Hashmi Memorial Trust (SAHMAT) has dedicated an exhibition to the memory of Sitaram Yechury, the late general secretary of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), who passed away recently at the age of 72.  

The exhibition has been put up at Jawahar Bhawan in New Delhi to showcase the journey of SAHMAT from 1989 to 2024. 

Speaking on his association with Yechury, Sohail Hashmi of SAHMAT said he was always a “friend of SAHMAT” and contributed in the success of various events organised against communal violence and in defence of secularism and social justice.

SAHMAT, formed in 1989, gave its first call of Artist Alert, which encouraged Indian artistes to claim their democratic freedom within civil society. Hashmi while talking on the sideline of exhibition, told this writer that the campaign, Artists against Communalism, was started in 1991. As part of this campaign, SAHMAT protested against the demolition of Babri Masjid with projects that defied bans, and took exhibitions, music performances, film and street theatre across the country, including Ayodhya.

During 1999-2004, SAHMAT hosted a symposia on economic and education policies, organised a campaign against communalisation of education and expanded its publication and poster campaign. According to Hashmi, “it was a crucial time for SAHMAT when communal carnage in Gujarat happened and as a result its stepped-up public enquiry platforms to heard the voices of unheard.”

In the past 35 years, SAHMAT has worked to secure the rights of minorities, organised solidarity campaigns for artist M.F. Hussain and theatre stalwart Habib Tanvir among others, Hashmi said. It paid tributes to eminent writers, such as Premchand, Faiz, Manto, Nagarjun and Bhisham Sahni. 

Lectures were also organised on Mahatma Gandhi, Jawahar Lal Nehru and 70 years of Indian freedom.  

Hashmi said SAHMAT, by challenging government actions, the judiciary and the media over issues of constitutional rights and social dignity, “has given the artistic and intellectual community a place to critique and reshape the vocabulary of protest and resistance.”

The exhibition, in defence of India’s secular tradition, incl includes Ham Sab Ayodhya (1993), Postcards of Gandhi (1995), Ways of Resisting (2002), Forms of Activism (2014), Avaaz Do! (2016), Constitution At 70 (2020), India is not Lost (2021), Ham Sab Sahmat (2022), Moments in Collapse (2024).

Eminent personalities, such as economist Prabhat Patnaik, author Geeta Hariharan, journalist SK Pande, Newsclick editor-in-chief Prabir Purukayastha, historian Zoya Hassan, theatre director NK Sharma among others visited the exhibition so far.

The writer is a freelancer based in Delhi.