Ep. 4: The Webcomic as Political Form - Part 1
Description
This episode is the first of a two-part series on political webcomics in India. In the context of protests, arrests and judicial intimidation of citizens including artists, we take a look at how the graphic strip format is being deployed to respond to political events in India. I speak to Meher Manda and Mayukh Goswami, co-creators of Jamun Ka Ped, an Instagram-based webcomic that since the NRC-CAA protests of 2019, has been chronicling and commenting on the political and social crises raging in India under the Modi administration, including the Indian Supreme Court's verdict regarding the ownership of the mob-demolished Babri Mosque site, the abrogation of the Indian Constitution's Article 370 which ended Kashmir' autonomy, the February 2020 Delhi pogroms and most recently the farmers’ protests against the three agriculture laws [which we discussed in Artalaap’s third episode]. Today, we discuss the webcomic as a self-consciously political form, how the internet has affected traditional graphic or strip design and the hostility that Indian artists are facing from the state.
Click here to access the Image Guide+ & view the images and material being discussed in the podcast: https://sites.google.com/view/artalaap-podcast-resources/episode-4
Credits:
Producer: Tunak Teas
Design & artwork: Mohini Mukherjee
Musical arrangement: Jayant Parashar
Images: Instagram @jamun_ka_ped
Additional support: Kanishka Sharma, Amy Goldstone-Sharma, Raghav Sagar, Shalmoli Halder, Arunima Nair
Audio courtesy: Vernouillet by Blue Dot Sessions [CC BY-NC 4.0]
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