Chastising The Chaste

Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul said the allegations against the 93-year-old painter who lives in self-imposed exile in London are baseless, adding that “A painter at 90 deserves to be sitting in his home and painting his canvas.”

“A painter has his own perspective of looking at things and it cannot be the basis of initiating criminal proceedings against him,” Kaul said in his 74-page judgment. “In India, new puritanism is being carried out in the name of cultural purity and a host of ignorant people are vandalizing art and pushing us towards a pre-renaissance era.”

Husain’s painting, “Bharatmata,” depicting a nude woman symbolizing mother India was deemed offensive by some Hindu groups. However, Kaul noted: “Ancient art has never been devoid of eroticism where sex worship and graphical representation of the union between man and woman has been a recurring feature.” Kaul said, “Art is never chaste – where it is chaste, it is not art.”