FT Hai Hai: Rise of the subsidised revolutionary

My views on the FTII affair, amplified over social media while this issue was yet in infancy, are scripted in more detail and cast in celluloid here.

Ek Ruka Hua Faisla

There are now only two stated positions on the issue of protests by some students of FTII, one being that the choice of the chairperson is not acceptable on account of his mediocre profile in the film industry and the other that appointments have been and will remain the prerogative of the government that runs and subsidises the institution. The controversy, if there is indeed one at all, has been assisted by occasional burps of disappointment or disparagement depending on the calibre of the person in question, mostly filmi characters initially but later those of the leftist ilk, and now political johnny-come-latelys like the Right Honourable Rahul Gandhi.

Bhumika

The role of an assortment of people with very little skin in the game is noteworthy. So what began essentially as a comic regurgitation of disapprovals by filmi hacks and frat brats of the industry, is now a battle cry of panicking leftists who are aghast at the loss of yet another red bastion to the malefic forces of the right. The funniest bits were when people who have not a sinew of serious talent between them start pontificating on who should lead an institution supposed to be the crucible of nurturing flaming talent. I have heard that Rishi Kapoor, the Chintoo of method acting, and Salman Khan, the black buck of the acting fraternity, have already spoken. Since the venerable Shyam Benegal has been disregarded, we are now waiting for some other genius from Bollywood to add value.

Ardh Satya

The claim of the striking students, that this is a popular insurrection by a majority of students is frail and survives on an emotional half-truth. The facts are offended. The official strength of FTII at any point of time should be approximately 250 students. But over a 100 more are on campus. An inquiry by the I&B ministry suggests that as many as 40 former students who passed out over the years continue to squat in the FTII campus. Former faculty members differ. They say this number could be as high as two hundred and includes students who had joined the institute more than eight years back. They point out that it will be very difficult to count the number of occupants as there are rooms where some students stay illegally and there are areas of the boy’s hostels where administrators just don’t go. Not too coincidentally, squatters are actively leading or supporting the strike.

Mandi

Truth is, the very people who claim to hold aloft its flag have run the FTII aground. The institute has degenerated into a bazaar of vested interests. The environment in the institute has deteriorated dramatically over the last few decades. Former students and faculty lament at the total anarchy. Hostels have become overcrowded with squatters, sometimes four to a room; faculty and administrative staff are routinely abused and threatened and one has recently even had to file a police complaint. One would think there was some serious underlying methodical churn these revolutionaries were seeking which would induce serious revision in the way the institute has been run for such a long time. But no, we only hear an obdurate wailing for the reversal of the chairperson’s appointment, post haste and sans hearing.

Dil To Pagal Hai

There is a method to the madness. The strikers are pretending to aim at the appointment of popular TV artiste Gajendra Chauhan as the chairperson of FTII, but their purpose is aimed at controlling an institution which while losing its lustre over many decades of ineffective leadership is still crucial to their ends, as we will see in the next few paragraphs. But they are on a weak wicket here. Appointments are not popularity contests or electoral options. The FTII is a place where students with a flair or interest in films and television industry come to skill themselves in the art, craft and science of it. By virtue of the fact that the institute exists before the student finds admission, students do not get to choose the Chairperson. The demand is not only atrocious; it is infantile.

Sabse Bada Rupaiya

The math too, is compelling. The government of India doles out Rs 12 lakh per student per annum in subsidising the students at FTII. This is in stark and rather embarrassing contrast to the Rs 5 lakh for IIM and Rs 3.4 lakh for IIT it outlays for students of these stellar institutes. Just for the record, a cost review by the I&B ministry found that the extent of recovery through fees, hostel rent and other expenses as a percentage of expenditure in academic activities in FTII has dropped from 25 per cent in 2006-2007 to 11 per cent in 2010-2011. Many don’t even pay what they have to. Naturally, the knives are out and a number of prominent voices are expressing disgust at the government investing taxpayer funds into a non-essential activity, however much the purveyors of art complain.

Uski Roti

It is clear that the students who chose to come to FTII out of limited opportunities and who are keen to finish study and set out on careers are deeply impacted by this impasse. In a sardonic twist of fate, those who want to make a living from cinema and television are being held to ransom by those whose bread is buttered around staying back and stalling. It is now routinely accepted that many students are taking up part employment while in FTII even though it is against the rules. There is a clear division of success in courses too, and while technicians are much in demand and often get off to flying starts in the industry, the acting and directorial courses are a pointedly poor return on investment with a number of them out of work and struggling. Stands to reason that this creative fraternity is at the forefront of leading the standoff.

Kissa Kursi Ka

It has always been the prerogative of governments to appoint people to posts – and they tend to appoint people who they know, are comfortable with and can be trusted to deliver to objectives. At the end of every such tenure, the government sits in judgement of whether the incumbent achieved these objectives or not. Students, particularly who have been subsidised by taxpayer money don’t dictate that policy. Policy dictates their admissions, ratings and whether they deserve subsidies or not. The strikers know they have been nakedly disingenuous. Their attempt to rope in the Congress was a desperate gambit, a political poison pill. And it has spoilt their case further.

Hum Aapke Hain Kaun

The director of FTII, not the chairperson, is the one who executes all the decisions on campus. He meets the students on a daily basis and lives on campus. The chairman needs to come to campus only on occasion. Anything concerning the running of the institute is the director’s domain. Besides, a board of advisors constitutes the consensual running of the institute. By focussing on the chairperson and raising not a quibble over the director’s posting – the last incumbent’s qualifications state that he was a guitarist in a band – the strikers are exposing their pre-set ideological relationships and predatory instincts.

Manthan

The unintended fallout of this entire episode is that it has kicked off a debate on whether it is the business of government to be subsidising esoteric initiatives. It stands to reason that any empirical opposition to government support for education will never succeed but the use of taxpayer funds to build a cadre of popular film directors and artistes will always be suspect in the grander plan. After all, the question is valid: Isn’t this money better spent on a hospital or a school that provides basic education for survival or succour from disease. Curiously, the champions of FTII and its legacy have succeeded in achieving the opposite of what they claim; a question mark on the very existence, and relevance of FTII.

Kalyug Or Meghe Dhaka Tara

Finally, the FTII is pretty much sick. It has lost its sheen. It is no longer the bastion of creative output it once was and which produced some celebrated artistes, actors, directors, and technicians. Today’s FTII is no patch on what it’s hallowed past has been. This sort of freeloader insurgency has punctuated the lost years of the FTII where no convocation has taken place in 17 years since 1997, when the chief guest, veteran actor Dilip Kumar, was booed and hooted. FTII has had 39 strikes in the 55 years of its existence, which illustrates the sate of the institution. Rife with indiscipline, where the studious eke out a course year with a prayer on their lips while the others use the campus as a commodious theatre for their gallivanting ways at taxpayers' expense. It is ironical, if not downright comical, that people who have produced nothing, directed nothing and have nothing against their name as yet are sitting in judgement over a chairperson’s body of work.

Garam Hawa

The exhortations by well meaning folks that the government should talk to students are misplaced. If we compromise the process now, we will rue the day forever. Just as an example, even as we discuss this, a university student group in Puducherry has decided that the vice-chancellor is not fit for the august premiership of their institution. Some teachers have joined them. And there begins a spool of subsidised activism that is much like a dog biting its own tail. There is no need to falter on the principle. Kids don’t get to choose their principal. FTII is not an election booth. Get on with it, remove the subsidies, partially-privatise and improve the institution, focus on the students who want an education and ignore the strikers: their position is just a lot of, well, "garam hawa". [With apologies to MS Sathyu]