Looking for the exit door? Govt may be willing to dump FTII chairman Gajendra Chauhan

From the way things are going in the Film and Television Institution of India, it would seem there’s no end to the deadlock between the government and the students who are agitating against the appointment of actor Gajendra Chauhan as FTII chairperson. However, according to a report, the government may just be willing to relent on the matter.

An Indian Express report  says that the government is looking for an “honourable exit” from the chaos at the institute and admits it could be a “tightrope walk” after the arrest of five students added further fuel to the fire.

“Some solution has to be arrived at without it appearing to be a climbdown for the government,” said an unnamed official from the Information and Broadcasting Ministry, in the report.

It seems the government is now apparently willing to relent and bring in a ’new face’ in place of Chauhan, but it just doesn’t want to do so immediately. However, the government has also said that students cannot protest an appointment simply because a candidate has links with Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (BJP’s student wing) or RSS, regardless of their other qualifications.

The report comes even as a three-member panel appointed by the government visits FTII to understand the sequence of events that led to the arrest of five students late on Tuesday night. Newly-appointed FTII director Prashant Pathrabe had accused  students of torture and illegal confinement on Monday night, which led to him filing an FIR against them.

“Initially for a couple of hours, I refused to call police,” said Pathrabe. “But even after 4-5 hours, they didn’t give in. I had no choice but to call the police…When the police came in, there was a scuffle and in it, they broke furniture. The office has been sealed. I really wonder by what yardstick you can call such people ‘students’.”

At the moment, there are videos circulating of Pathrabe while he was gheraoed by the students. Some show him in conversation, while others show him hassled. While the student’s actions are quite clearly intended to intimidate, Pathrabe’s accusations of the students having “tortured” him seem exaggerated.

While the current flare-up  may have been prompted by Pathrabe’s decision to follow the ministry’s directive to complete an assessment of the 2008 graduate films, it seemed like the government had found the protesting students’ Achilles heel when Pathrabe complained of extreme harassment. However, despite videos of unruly students in Pathrabe’s office, the director’s decision to bring the police into the institute and visuals of students being arrested in a midnight raid also haven’t done the the government any favours.

The government has good reason to be keen on resolving the issue since it’s in danger of becoming a political lightning rod now that everyone from Rahul Gandhi to Arvind Kejriwal have entered the fray and backed FTII’s students. By the same token, however, giving in now would amount to a political surrender of sorts and the government would want to avoid this at all cost. This might explain why the government is looking for an ‘honourable exit’.

Veteran filmmaker Shyam Benegal in an insightful interview to the Indian Express said that the students had erred when they turned to various political parties for support. The veteran filmmaker – who pointed out he was gheraoed all night by FTII students when he was serving as Director – suggested that the students and the government sit across the table and work out some form of a compromise.

The ideal solution to the immediate FTII crisis would be Gajendra Chauhan, Anagha Ghaisas, Narendra Pathak and Rahul Solapurkar having the wisdom to resign and walk away in the face of these. Unfortunately, the man best known for playing Yudhishtra has shown no signs of doing so and neither have Ghaisas, Pathak and Solapurkar whose nomination for FTII Society pushed other Society members to tender their resignation.

Softening its initial stance, the government is clearly showing some signs of wanting to find some sort of middle path. FTII students have repeatedly said that all they want is a dialogue. However, what is evident from the reports of conversations between the government and the FTII students , it’s become an ego battle.

While the students have had the sympathy of many, now that the government has made it clear that it’s willing to compromise, the ball may just have wandered into the protesters’ court.