July 19, 1999

A chairman unused to administering and a wilful official sling it out at the cost of institution.

By S Kalidas

The Sangeet Natak Akademi (SNA), the national academy for the performing arts, has never lacked in drama. However, the happenings there over the past couple of weeks bordered on sheer midsummer farce. A controversy has flared up after the summary termination of the contractual service of SNA secretary Sharbari Mukherji by the chairman, Bhupen Hazarika, on June 23. Mukherji has now filed a writ petition against the SNA and Hazarika in the Delhi High Court. Needless to say that this has brought to a halt all the work in this apex cultural body and become a hot topic of conversation in the art world.

For those unaware of the affairs of this autonomous government-funded body, the allegory of the Indra sabha (the court of Lord Indra) replete with the mandatory apsaras (celestial dancers) might not be out of place. Only here, Indra (SNA chairperson) is appointed by the President of India, ostensibly on the recommendation of the Department of Culture (DoC) though in practice the present and the previous chairmen have held office literally and solely "at the pleasure of the President", with the DoC candidates totally bypassed. Adorning the durbar-e-aam or general council are some 60-odd members representing the various states, Union territories and the disciplines of music, dance and drama. However, the effective functioning authority vests in the durbar-e-khaas, the executive board, comprising Hazarika, Mukherji, Shyamanand Jalan, Ram Gopal Bajaj, Helen Giri, Sharayu Kalekar, Shanno Khurana, Pratibha Prahalad, Sonal Mansingh, S. Satyamoorthy, Sanjay Narain, B.P Singh, S. Rajaram, Dulal Roy, Shanta Serbjit Singh, Ratan Thiyam, Chitra Visweswaran, Himangshu Sekhar Das and Balwant Thakur.

A highly respected film and folk musician and a Dada Saheb Phalke awardee, Hazarika is a multifaceted personality and works for the SNA in a purely honorary capacity. If anything, the time and attention demanded by the complex and wide-ranging mandate of the institution must be cutting into his busy work schedule. And not having much experience with government institutions, he is probably unused to administering a body like the SNA. Under normal circumstances, he is not expected to do so too. That function rests with the secretary who is the chief executive.

Hazarika has to tread a wary path in trying to balance the interests of various factions within the SNA, filled as it is with many eminent artists with their individual perceptions, demands and agendas. At the same time he has to not only act fairly but also seem to do so. Given his age and health these may be proving to be a heavy burden. And if the present events are any pointer, having weathered this strain over the past seven months his nerves are perhaps starting to fray.

Mukherji, on the other hand, is a quintessential bureaucrat. Having risen from the ranks of the Akademi over the decades, she was possibly stodgy in her work and complacent about her security as an employee. After all Hazarika was the second chairman she was serving under as secretary. Never a great personal favourite with her colleagues, she was also now the target of both their envy and their ambitions. There must have been too the unarticulated expectations of some powerful artists in SNA which she was supposed to fathom and fulfil. Not an enviable task, to say the least. Add to this the cocky indifference towards authority she is accused of.

The two were simply not temperamentally suited to work together. The bickering started within weeks of Hazarika's nomination as chairman in December last year. In a blistering letter dated February 18 he accused Mukherji of having insulted him by instructing her office to make him fill out a TA/DA form before reimbursing his airfare. Repeatedly invoking the authority of the President of India almost as if it were a divine writ, he wrote, "Since my arrival I have come across several accusations and complaints against you made to me by Human Resource Minister Murli Manohar Joshi, members of the executive board and general council and SNA staff." He went on to add, "President K.R. Narayanan, HRM M.M. Joshi and the secretary, culture, Mr Iyyer have given me full authority to make all necessary changes for the progress and improvement of the SNA. Henceforth I want you to execute my orders and not take any decisions on your own without my written consent ..."

Anyone in Mukherji's place should have gauged the way the wind was blowing, but given her sang froid she decided that a verbal explanation rather than a written reply would do to set things right between her and her boss. Meanwhile, a collusion of interests within the SNA and beyond played on Hazarika's sense of hurt and kept the antipathy alive. Past deeds were vaguely referred to and pecuniary impropriety implied, especially in the context of a music documentation joint project in which the other partner was a French ethnomusicologist, Xavier Bellenger.

Off the record, it is alleged that Mukherji compromised the interests of the Akademi by allowing Virgin Classics to bring out a CD-ROM of the music recorded during this project. Called Music of the Ganges, the cd-rom traces the music found on the banks of the Ganges from Gangotri to Ganga Sagar in West Bengal. What fuelled the suspicion of foul play is the fact that she made three private trips to Paris, including one for the release function of the contentious CD-ROM. It is learnt that an informal and secret inquiry committee was formed to go into the matter but its findings were never shared with the board. Nor was Mukherji given a chance to clarify.

Mukherji was again holidaying in Paris when Hazarika called an emergency meeting of the executive board in Delhi on June 23 and without recording any specific charges persuaded the 14 members present to consent to terminate her service as secretary with immediate effect. The rather perfunctory office order does not specify whether she reverts to her original post of deputy secretary or not. While the minutes of this meeting record that the decision to sack Mukherji was unanimous, at least one member, Sharayu Kalekar, has written to the HRD minister putting on record her grave objections to the minutes. At the same time, while not wanting to be drawn into the controversy, Sonal Mansingh says, "We were faced with a distasteful but necessary task. We had to chose between the institution and the person."

Mukherji has since returned and has sued the SNA for mala fide dismissal. The DoC meanwhile is not willing to intervene, preferring to leave the autonomous SNA to sort its matters out itself. Having just got over the messy and sordid saga of the Lalit Kala Akademi (academy for the plastic arts) last month, it understandably needs a breather before facing the storm raging in the SNA.

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