Transcript of an Audio Interview with Professor Salima
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Transcript of an audio interview with Professor Salima Hashmi (SH) conducted by AAA project researcher Samina Iqbal (SI) on 24 May 2017 at Hashmi’s residence in Lahore, Pakistan. 24 May 2017, Part 1 SI: So Mrs Hashmi, we'll start our third part of the interview and if we just reiterate a few of the things that we discussed in Part 2. So, you were in England from 1965 to… SH: 1966 to 1969; just a few words about that. This was, of course, a very, very turbulent time worldwide. It was the height of the Vietnam War. It was the height of the anti-Vietnam war protests. And Shoaib and I were very much part of those in England. It was a time of Paris, May 1968; we had just been there in April. It was a time of Rudi Dutschke. It was a time of the reaction against; I suppose the working class reaction, against what they saw as a growth of unbridled neo imperialism. And in Pakistan, it was the time when the decade of development of Ayub Khan led to great protests against the military regime. So all in all this was a period in which one could sense something was happening because we were very much in the throes of…we brought out a magazine called The Pakistan Left Review. And that's where I wrote my first piece on Pakistani art. SI: That was in England? SH: Yes, in London. And it was, of course, a bare bones thing but we would meet with other Pakistanis very regularly and that is where we first really sensed that feeling of being marginalised which came to us from the East Pakistanis. And while we would argue that we felt that being marginalised was what was most the average Pakistani felt—whether it was West or East—but you could sense that there was a mood for separatism already. SI: Between…? SH: Between East and West. We were very friendly with a couple of very well know East Pakistani intellectuals who later actually played a big role in the movement for Bangladesh. But this was a period where we understood their feelings and the anger that was there; their sense of being controlled and exploited by the elite and the army in West Pakistan. SI: So this is all very interesting happening in London. It's not like you were in Pakistan experiencing this. You were like in this… SH: We were there. This was a time when Tariq Ali became a well-known leader. This was the time when we were; I suppose that the first interview we got was from Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto at that time for The Pakistan Left Review. So you felt the sense that there were great political changes in the offing. I say this because when we came back in 1969…I had my baby…that was the time when I started teaching at NCA. So, on a personal level, it was more dormant. But on a national level what was happening was I'd taken students from NCA to Iran and to Afghanistan. We went on a long trip. And we didn't realise what was happening in the East wing of the country. SI: So you're saying that it was more prominent while you were living in London. SH: Yes, we were closer to it, because here you were very cut off. There was only one news channel, which was PTV, and Yahya Khan had come into power. That was while we were still in London. And the news was controlled and that was that. So we were not really aware of the extent of the opposition in East Pakistan. And it was after the 1971 elections— 1970 elections—when the People's Party swept to power over here and the Awami League swept to power over there, that you realised that there was going to be change. 1971 saw army action in Bangladesh—what was then East Pakistan. You saw the defeat of the Pakistani army. It was I think a very sobering moment to see the General handing over his sword to the Indian Army Chief. And there was deep depression naturally. Then there was the attempt in Pindi to hand over to another army general, which was then subverted actually by younger army officers who just said enough. Which was then, how Zulifiqar Ali Bhutto was invited to form the government. What did it mean for a place like NCA? Well, during the time when this turmoil was going on and then straight after with the fall of Dhaka we did these huge paintings which were pasted on to billboards in Lahore. We went to Packages and we got these big rolls of paper from there and the students under the tutelage of Ahmed Khan, they made these very large works which were really supposed to be morale boosting for the people. And what little I remember of them, they were like eulogising the peasants', the students', and the workers' of Pakistan. They were all put up one night on very big billboards. Of course, they were not the size or the number of billboards you have today but they were strategic points in Lahore. So they were pasted on at night. The boys took ladders and so the next morning the people woke up and…And I remember we used to have a Volkswagen so I had put up a band at the back of it saying: ye mulk awam ka hai, kissi fauji jurnail ka nahin (this country belongs to the people, not to an army general). And we were given like looks, like, how are they doing this? But the mood was like that. There was great anger against the betrayal of the people. SI: If I can interrupt you for a second, can you talk a little bit more about what kind of posters were these? Are these all visuals or are they slogans? SH: No, no, they were all visuals but with one slogan. SI: Okay and the slogan was? SH: The slogans were different. I think one was jairha waye ohi khaye (The one who works gets to eat). They were very socialistic slogans. I wish I could remember then now. I'm sure some of the students who painted them would probably remember. People like Mahboob Ali, the designer and printmaker; he was very much in the forefront. They were third year students then. So then at the same time, with the coming of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto's government, one felt that NCA also was poised to change. And this was really because there was a move to bring the college under the Punjab University to affiliate it. We as teachers felt a great reaction and so did the students. And we had a Teachers' Association and I was I think the Secretary. I went to see Hanif Ramay who was the Chief Minister of Punjab. We took a delegation. He, being an artist, couldn't understand why we were getting so het up about not wanting to go into Punjab University. We said ‘we don't want to go there for political reasons. So he said ‘Anna Molka Ahmed tau aap ki ammi ki dost hain (Anna Molka Ahmed is your mother's friend).’ So I said her philosophy and our philosophy is radically different. And then it was I think almost sheer chance because Hafeez Pirzada who was the Federal Minister of Education happened to be on the same train as Javed Najam who was coming from Karachi. And on the way, Javed Najam gave him this long lecture on the National College of Arts and its potential to be something very important for a popular government. So by the time the train arrived in Lahore, Hafeez Pirzada was sold on taking this college into the Federal government. And so then I think he sent for Shakir Ali, or whatever, the next thing we knew was that an ordinance was being promulgated and it was going to be shifted from Punjab into the Federal government with its own board of governors with the minister as the chairperson of the board. I think, probably no, it was secretary of ministry. SI: So I'm sorry, I'm just going to interrupt you again. So Javed Najam was the… SH: He was just a teacher in architecture. SI: He was a teacher, okay. SH: Yes, my old class fellow and who was teaching at NCA at the time. So he came, he got very enthused by our enthusiasm…Pirzada…and said ‘you know the sky is the limit. You'll do national projects and everything that you do; your output should be geared towards’…So the students in the thesis I remember, the Graphic Design thesis, everybody took up a different social problem. Somebody did a thesis on universal education; somebody else did it on the dignity of labour; there were all these sorts of…and they really did very magnificent work. Ahmed Khan was actually leading that whole sort of 'move.' And pretty soon we found that actually they'd started giving national projects. Like, they gave a project and I think it was, if I'm not mistaken it was funded by UNESCO. It was to design schools for the whole of Pakistan. So a study was conducted; a report was prepared. Groups of students…they’d divided up the whole country and each province was selected, each geographical region, which was geographically and climatically different from others, was selected.