Panikkar: Suspended

May 12: Art lovers went into battle against the saffron “moral police” in BJP-ruled Gujarat today after a university suspended its fine arts dean for allowing an exhibition of Hindu deities painted in the nude.

Teachers went on mass casual leave and students held a daylong sit-in protesting the action against dean Shivaji Panikkar, bringing the Maharaja Sayajirao University in Vadodara to a standstill.

Earlier this week, VHP and BJP activists had stormed the campus and vandalised the works whose painter, postgraduate student Chandra Mohan, was arrested on Wednesday and denied bail.

The students and teachers have called a “solidarity demonstration of artists, intellectuals and cultural workers from all over India” on May 14, a former teacher of the university, Gulammohammed Sheikh, told The Telegraph. He condemned Mohan’s arrest and Panikkar’s suspension.

The controversy comes days after a notice for attachment of property was served on M.F. Husain, who’s in self-imposed exile, in a case relating to his paintings of nude goddesses and a notional Bharat Mata.

The exhibition at MS university was closed yesterday after protests from saffron outfits and some Christian groups, who were unhappy with a depiction of Jesus Christ in an “obscene posture”.

Panikkar, suspended for ignoring university authorities’ earlier orders to shut down the display, has gone into hiding, apparently fearing an attack by saffron activists.

From an undisclosed place, he described the suspension as “illegal and condemnable” and alleged that the university had acted “under tremendous pressure from Right-wing political parties”.

The students held up placards, one reading: “The BJP and VHP are not the torch-bearers of morality.” Another said: “Down with moral policing. It’s our liberty to express ourselves.”

The students and teachers want the university to publicly condemn the trespass, intimidation and vandalism. They also want a promise of more “rational and humane behaviour” in the future. A third demand is that the university should never override faculty members’ academic decisions but stand by them.

“Vice-chancellor Manoj Soni decided to suspend Panikkar from all positions for three months and a notice conveying his suspension was pasted at his residence late last night,” pro-vice-chancellor S.M. Joshi said.