The burgeoning protests over the rape and murder of the young doctor at the state-run RG Kar Medical College and Hospital have exposed a schism in Bengal’s culture brigade, which can beat any brigade except perhaps North Korea in being aligned to the party in power.

On Tuesday morning, veteran playwright Chandan Sen returned the Dinabandhu Mitra Puraskar, one of Bengal’s three awards for theatre, that he had received in 2017.

He was reportedly hurt with the comments by TV funnyman-turned Trinamul MLA Kanchan Mullick, who had asked if the artistes shouting justice for RG Kar would return their awards to the government. Mullick later apologised but the damage was done.

On Tuesday evening, National Award-winning actress Sudipta Chakraborty said she would return the Special Film Award she had received in 2013 from the state government.

Theatre personality Suman Mukhopadhyay was not surprised at the caustic remark by first-time Trinamul lawmaker Mullick.

“When an artiste gets comfortably close to the ruling class, he or she loses the power to protest,” Mukhopadhyay told The Telegraph Online. “This is what my play ‘Mephisto’ was all about. Those from the field of theatre and films who have become MPs and MLAs or have received some hefty perks, high positions… how can they make a turnaround now? Artistes are supposed to be with the people.”

Suman Mukhopadhyay File picture

Like many things in Bengal, the special awards in theatre named after Dinabandhu Mitra (for playwrighting), Girish Ghosh (for direction) and Shambhu Mitra (for acting) were instituted during the CPM’s rule. Critics say it was, like many other things, a Soviet hangover.

After Mamata Banerjee took over, members of the culture clan – who were once close to the CPM, specially the late chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee who liked watching East European films at Nandan – defected in hordes to the Trinamul. Many of them like the late Soumitra Chatterjee and Tarun Majumdar were ideological fellow-travellers of the Left.

Possibly that is what takes Bengal closer to North Korea than to America, where artistes are almost expected to be anti-establishment. Barack Obama wrote that Bob Dylan “didn't want to take a picture with me… That's how you want Bob Dylan, right? You don't want him to be all cheesin' and grinnin' with you. You want him to be a little skeptical about the whole enterprise….”

The list of artistes against Donald Trump gets longer every day. But then, they don’t depend on the government.

Less than 10-months after coming to power, Mamata Banerjee who kept the information & cultural affairs portfolio with herself like her predecessor Bhattacharjee had increased the department’s budget allocation by 125 per cent.

The I&CA department’s budget of Rs 110 crore (from the revised estimate of Rs. 48.60crores in the 2011-12 fiscal) was to be spent on awards for drama and music, acquisition and modernising of film studios, fairs and film festivals.

The largesse was not wasted; the culture brigade have since the 2011 Poriborton stood firmly with Mamata and the Trinamul.

Many from the film and television industries were handpicked by Mamata to contest on the party symbol for the Lok Sabha and Assembly polls. If that did not work, a Rajya Sabha seat was available.

“The Left, when in power, could only give awards. The bureaucratic structure of the Communist Party made it difficult for them to field people from outside the party fold though exceptions were there like athlete Jyotirmoyee Sikdar,” said a political commentator. “Under Didi, the gifts are many.”

For example, theatre personality Bratya Basu has been a minister in the Mamata Banerjee government for three terms now. In 2019 he was conferred the Dinabandhu Mitra award, considered the highest in the field of theatre.

There is also the (probably apocryphal) story that an actress who had split with her partner, who was firmly saddled with the ruling party, had run to Didi for solace and returned home with a seat in Parliament.

Biplab Bandyopadhyay (L) and Chandan Sen File picture

Even in this atmosphere, there are those who have stepped out, marched on the city streets and been on night-long vigils against what is undoubtedly one of the most shocking crimes committed in Calcutta in recent times.

Three of them are Aparna Sen, Swastika Mukherjee and Sohini Sarkar.

Others with far lesser credibility in their craft have been openly issuing threats to fellow-artistes. And the silence of some, like actor-turned-MLA Raj Chakraborty, has been deafening.

Theatre activist Biplab Bandyopadhyay, who also returned his Natya Akademi award on Tuesday, spent the day working out the process to return the award money that was deposited into his account.

“I could not attend the ceremony as I was busy with my professional commitment. I never received the memento or plaque from the Akademi,” Bandyopadhyay said.

Kaushik Sen, a recipient of the Bengal government’s Girish Puraskar in 2022, was present along with his family at Jadavpur’s 8B bus stand on Monday night at a protest-concert over the RG Kar rape-murder. His wife, Reshmi Sen, had received the best actress award from the Natya Akademi along with Bandyopadhyay.

Kaushik Sen File picture

“When I was given the award on the dais, nobody from the Trinamul said that I could not protest,” Sen said. “When the Left Front government was in power, twice I received the best actor award. During the protests over Nandigram, which I was a part of, nobody had said I should return the awards. I respect the decisions [of Sen and Bandyopadhyay], but I don’t agree with it. The awards are a recognition from the theatre fraternity not any party or the government.

“Truth be told, the Trinamul does not care about theatre,” Sen said. “None of their leaders watch or are interested or even understand theatre. Mamata Banerjee does not even attend the award ceremonies. That part is handled by Bratya Basu, Indranil Sen, Joy Goswami and Deb Shankar Haldar,” said Sen. “The year I received the Girish Puraskar, Basu, Sen and Haldar were present, not the chief minister.”

Sen said he was committed to the protests on the RG Kar rape and murder but the protests had to be on the streets.

“Returning awards will be self-indulgence,” he said.

Questions have been raised why Sen and Bandyopadhyay decided to accept the awards in 2017 and 2023 after incidents like the rape at Park Street, the rape and murder in Kamduni, the many corruption charges against the ruling party leaders and the events at Sandeshkhali had happened.

“If I did not speak then, it does not mean I can’t speak now,” said Bandyopadhyay.

The schism in the culture brigade has not gone unnoticed by the Trinamul. Kunal Ghosh has on X admonished the Bengali film fraternity for not condemning what he called an anti-Bengal propaganda films.

You know there is a wind blowing when the culture clock turns, is a not so old Bengali proverb. How strong, how long, only the wind knows.