Catch 22 1/2

Go west
Even though a majority of the arts are conceived and presented as entertainment for the sake of overriding commercial purposes, a lot of it remains political and social. Both directly and otherwise. Especially modern/post-modern art-forms.

With modern popular art, the medium is the message. Especially art-forms that are mostly made by and for by young men and women. Historically, they are imbedded with the whole concept of youthful rebellion, no matter how naïve they may sometimes seem.
It is a rebellion against moral dogma, social conservatism and political intrigue. At least this is how it began during and after World War: II, until it evolved into a full grown artistic and literary reflection of what became to be known as the “New Left” in the sixties.

Of course, nothing politically revolutionary was as such achieved. However, the overall consequence of matter like existentialism, Beat literature, youth cinema and the sixties’ counter-culture did (by the dawning of the seventies), usher in a social revolution. But not the sort of a political revolution as originally perceived and worked for by the New Left.

Instead the revolution came in as an anarchic model of liberalism, which when co-opted by the growing brand pushing corporate economics of the West in the seventies, rapidly shot across the world as the new socio-economic and political fad.

Brown sugar
Shades of this swinging liberalism reached the sub-continent as well. By the early ‘70s it not only arrived in the shape of fashion, but by this time both India and Pakistan too had openly embraced Keynesian economics and Social Democracy, even though they were no more than loud allusions to the spirit of the Social welfare state.

Like in the West, this affected the popular art-forms reigning the urban cultural scenes in both the countries as well. For example, the content of the films and its music in these two countries, though remaining largely romantic, did turn to look at social and political issues a lot more closely and directly than ever. And in Pakistan, television as well, even though state owned, marched boldly with plays depicting the finer points of Socialism.

The new Socialist-liberal fad hovered over society, politics and the arts as fashion and a loud slogan, because the undercurrent in this respect was more about a budding reaction against this loud liberalism.

The evidence of this allusion and as well as the undercurrent was apparent in the modern arts. Because for example, in India, even though Amitabh Bachchan’s angry-young-man epics all revolved around the time’s trend of pro-proletariat Socialist themes, the directors of these films never failed to make sure to place a portrait of the then Indian PM, Indira Gandhi, sometimes even in scenes shot in a broken hut in a shanty town!

Gandhi’s ruling Congress Party made a lot of Socialist noises, her favorite son Sanjay Gandhi (a powerful Minister), never hid his contempt for Socialism and his desire to open up the Indian economy to attract private investment.

And even though Socialist themes were the order of the day, Bollywood cleverly made sure never to highlight the efforts in this respect of society as a whole, instead concentrating on the struggle and triumph of a lone hero. The idea was not to inspire a revolution, but instead to project a loner mouthing off heroic Socialist rhetoric. Socialism as perceived and preached by Congress (I)!

Pakistan was no different. Films and the famous PTV drama, though increasingly wanting to address and push ahead the Socialist-liberal fad, was however cautious not to play it like a romanticized call to a mass level revolution. So to balance things in this respect, Pakistani films and plays posed the new liberalism as something to be questioned (albeit philosophically) with a Sufist version of Islam ( for example, Ashfaq Ahmed’s Aik Mohabbat Soh Afsaney), or (in the films), to be mocked with the inherent conservatism of the petty-bourgeoisie. A majority of the film-makers came from this class.

This was done to project and paint the Bhutto regime’s “Socialism” as something closer to Islamic aspirations as opposed to the abstract fashions of the time’s liberal fads. Ironically though, these apparently apolitical tactics actually ended up contributing the symbolism that was instrumental in the making and emergence of the anti-Bhutto/liberal “Nizam-e-Mustapha” movement in the late seventies!

For example, all that self-righteous mocking of liberal fads and fashions in the period’s films in which the whole concept of a liberated woman, a trendy man, or a guitar wielding hippie were projected as pastimes of immoral, drunk rich brats, left quite a mark on the so-called common man. These gaudy exaggerations were actually taken as ample truths.

So just when the government thought that it had a good chance of keeping in check petty-bourgeoisie inflammations against Bhutto’s “Socialism” and the liberal fad by the apolitical usage of reactionary petty-bourgeoisie symbolism in popular cinema, it had another thing coming. Because in 1976 when parties opposed to the Bhutto regime raised their slogan of “Islami nizam” and “Sharia” they increasingly used almost the same distorted symbolism to excite the so-called common man.

In the West, if the liberal revolution managed to last till, say, 1979, in Pakistan, it was all over by 1976. Brought down not really by the emergence of neo-conservative economics (like in the West), but by an “Islamic movement” frighteningly constructed by reactionary petty-bourgeoisie conservatism and mentality; the sort seen and used by the country’s popular cinema to actually safeguard Bhutto’s populist liberalism from reactionary accusations of being “unIslamic” and “obscene.” The plan had clearly backfired. Zia had gained politically from what was initiated as a simple cultural safeguard to soften the edgier sides of the time’s Socialist-liberal trends.

Backstabber’s delight
Too much liberalism caused a conservative backlash? Not entirely true this. In the West’s context the so-called backlash emerged as a consequence of the left-of-center Social Democracy and economics failing to handle the economic crises brought on by the massive Oil Crisis of the mid-seventies. A failing that was also used to explain the United State’s thrashing in Vietnam and a failing attacked as being the cause of the period’s “decadent art” and cultural trends.

In India and Pakistan it was this economics being used as a mere slogan and half-baked implementation.

And even on a cultural level, this ideology was distorted and pragmatically toned down because both the governments feared that it may evolve into a full blown Socialist revolution if portrayed anything else other than a chant of a superlative romantic hero, who though a “protector of the poor,” remained confined to the propagation of the state and government’s diluted version of Socialism. Because after all, both in India and Pakistan, the Socialist-liberal trend of the seventies were spearheaded by political elite groups whose economic and political were still attached to the very people they were targeting.

Zia only brought out into the open what was already brewing as a volatile undercurrent.

Take for instance a popular 1975 Pakistani film, Society Girl. The plot was quite like the plot of various local films of the period. A “modern,” urban woman (Sangeeta), whose independent streak and liking for western attire is explained as immoral posturing and decadence brought on by having a filthy rich father and a conniving mother. The guy (Ghulam Mhoyyodin), who wants to marry her is shown as a simple, obedient and loving young man (even though his preference for those long side-burns and flowing bellbottoms are of course never commented upon), is constantly insulted by the woman, but when he gets her to see the emotional and psychological scars she had received by the uncouth ways of her “high society” and modern lifestyle, she repents by suddenly slipping into a moderate shalwar-kameez and talk of God.

Usually one would expect such simplistic petty-bourgeois nonsense either playing in the censor-heavy cinemas or PTV during the peak years of the Zia regime. And a lot of it did, but by then what was played as soap operatic fantasy in the seventies, had boiled over as a wrongly perceived truth when Zia took over. For example, it was in the early eighties that a belief such as an independent woman in modern western attire is basically chaloo, and surviving as a hip call girl, started to take root. A belief that today has been imbedded deeply in the social psyche of the country, so much so, that ironically, today many Pakistanis are more prone to staring at women in western attire (or even shalwar kameez), than they were twenty years ago! I see the unconsciously embedded belief mentioned above as at least one of the culprits.

Of course, the continuation of such symbolism and ideas on national television and even making its way into the construction of the country’s social and cultural policies during the Zia regime, further complicated matters. This time such petty-bourgeois conservatism was not only being used to appease reservations certain sections of the society might have had against the seventies liberal trends, but now they were actually being aired in policy making political circles, mainstream television plays and sometimes by the head of the state as well. For instance, and as already mentioned in an earlier feature by this scribe on these very pages, the following was actually uttered by General Zia-ul-Haq in one of his first televised addresses: “Main jaanta hoon ab log TV kyoon nahi daiktey … sab chriyaan jo urr gain!” (“I know why people have stopped watching television … all the birds have flown!).

Surprisingly, in India, the so-called backlash against the seventies political and social ethos also arrived in the late seventies, but could not last into the eighties as it did in the West and Pakistan. Indira Gandhi after loosing popularity and the elections in 1977, returned with a bang in 1980 almost on the same political, social and economic platform she had come with the help of in 1971. But of course, the world was a lot different now. For example, even though Bollywood continued to churn out lone Socialist hero romances well into the eighties, more and more of them started to seem like gapping self-parodies with more “masala” than matter. The sudden fall from grace and popularity of Amitabh Bachan during this time is a telling example. He would have to reinvent himself totally to make his way back a decade later.

But since the Cold War was still on, culturally the whole idea of left-intellectualism was still a potent force; maybe by the eighties, this was the only thing remaining within the withering left to tackle the rampaging advent of neo-conservative politics and economics.

As Communist and Socialist parties in the west started their gradual move towards the right-of-center leanings (moves that will eventually give birth to phenomenon like the “New Labor” and the “New Democrats” in the nineties), the liberal-left in India and Pakistan moved across matter like “alternative” and “underground” art to make a last stand.

In the underbelly of mainstream Bollywood, a strong “art film” scene emerged, trying to make sense of leftist ideals in a fast changing world, as in Pakistan, a vibrant theatre and folk music scene emerged to challenge the sociology and politics being imposed by the Zia regime.

But just as the late eighties appeared to have been a time of vanquished neo-conservative forces, the truth was, the times actually came in as hurried announcements and declaration about the final blow being dealt to conventional Social Democracy and the Socialist movements patronized by the former Soviet Union. An era had ended. And eventually, so did the Cold War.

Starting over
The late eighties were interesting times. Because as champions of the conventional right rose to claim the defeat of the conventional left, the truth was, many from the conventional right went down as well. Rightist dictatorships across Asia and South America went down with as much noise and fanfare as did Stalinist regimes in East Europe and the former Soviet Union.

Even in the theocratic Iran, movements and trends emerged to wrest some power away from the hard line clergy and put it in the hands of moderates and reformists. And eventually this trend would also undo the hold “Thatcherism” and “Reganeconomics” had over the United States and Britain, with the gradual raise of the “New Labor” and the more moderate Democratic Party. This change was captured and celebrated with early post-eighties’ film and music trends in these countries (“Alternative rock,” “grunge,” “Indie-pop,” Tarantino, Oliver Stone, Guy Ritchie, etc.).

These trends did work as revitalizes for many of these countries’ cultural pursuits.

In Pakistan, even though its spiraling cinema industry failed to recover from the beating it got from the Zia regime’s destructive censor policies, its TV plays attempted a passionate renaissance by replacing the heavily censored feel-good Hasina Moin soaps and Ashfaq Ahmed’s tiring born-again Islamist tirades with “progressive” turnarounds; a lot of them portraying the democratic struggle against the Zia regime (Saira Kazmi’s Tapish and Syed Nadeem’s Neelay Haath). Not surprisingly, Amjad Islam Amjad’s glorification of the feudal lord (Waris, Samandar), too went out of vogue, especially with the electoral raise of urban middle-class politics and economics in Sindh (MQM) and the Punjab (PML(N)).

However, as the new era and decade soldiered in a little deeper, the new order finally started to reveal its true identity. Because by 1996 the trend emerging could now be clearly seen as something of a middle-ground between the old left and the old right, but mostly made up of a liberal and “democratic” interpretation of matter such as corporate capitalism, free market enterprise, multi-party democracy and/or sociology, economics and politics according to a fast developing middle-classes.

Couple these with the reality of the United States now emerging as the lone superpower, these new trends started creating their own extremes. Interestingly, this time around, hardly any radical move was made from the left, apart from perhaps some potent literature and music emerging against the new corporate capitalism and what started to be called as “globalization” (Naomi Klein’s No Logo and Radiohead’s OK Computer).

Asia seemed to have become the new order’s central economic playground, as the region’s new regimes started shedding off their mixed-economies in favor of new economic trends and adopting the ear’s new mantras about democracy, globalization and market economics. It was this that, for example, herald in the right-wing Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) over Congress (I) in India, and the PML(N) in Pakistan. Both encouraged their respective country’s electronic media to educate the populace about the “superior ways of market economics.” Also, it was during the emergence of the BJP and the PML(N) in the mid and late nineties, which also saw the consolidation of the electronic media boom in these two countries. And interestingly, films and tele-plays/soaps, now shifted their stories and characters from shanty towns, factories and the streets and put them in comfortable middle-class and upper-class environments Dil Wallay Dhulaneeya Ley Jain Gay, Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham, Mohabbatain).

Heroes were no more lone guns mouthing off dramatized Socialist jargon, but rather hip dudes with Rambo muscles, soft hearts and concerned more about the new dance moves rather than the struggling proletariats or the starving peasants. And even when film makers did decided to move the action away from luxurious drawing rooms fitted with freshly leased furniture and household goods, the focus was put on the lives of gangs and mafias whose ultimate aim, of course, was also to get their hands on the instruments, brands, trends and products that the new middle-classes were now rampantly leasing (Satya, Company, Vaastav).

However, these themes in popular cinema and television were not exactly reflecting a stunning post-Cold-War liberal revolution in these countries. Because just as (in the seventies), religion was used by regimes in India and Pakistan in popular art to soften the more radical aspects of the Socialist-liberal trends of the era, both the BJP and PML(N) fused all their talk of market economics, privatetization and democracy with a more political usage of religion. This was not all that new regarding Pakistan, especially after the Zia dictatorship’s eleven-year display in this context, but it most certainly was something novel regarding India.

Though done to continue appealing to the classes that were not rubbed off well by the new economic and social trends, the fusion turned dangerous when it started to be seen as a vital ideology by the petty-bourgeoisie and the middle-classes to secure their newly gained economic prosperity.

The results were surreal: Educated middle-classes voting for the BJP in spite of the party’s early Hindu-fundamentalist agenda and slogans; and the Pakistani middle-classes and the petty-bourgeoisie voting for the PML(N) in spite of its blatant tactics smacking of reactionary Ziaist maneuvers.

On a social level, the results of this fusion were even more surreal: The same educated middle-classes in both countries, who had shown support for the new market economics, started growing another convenient side to their belief: Religious faith based on loud exhibitionism.

Television plays pushed forward the image of apolitical (but highly patriotic) heroes and heroines, who drifted between being hip liberals and conservative faithfuls in a matter of a single scene!

So is it any wonder that the late nineties (in Pakistan), saw the rise of a special breed of drawing room preachers who jettisoned from one middle/upper-middle-class household to the other and listened to hoards of young men and women? And this fusion is still the name of the game in both the countries, in spite of President Pervez Musharraf’s “Enlightened Moderation” and in spite of the electoral thrashing the BJP got from the classes that did not benefit from the parties’ fusion of Hindu fundamentalism and market economics.