Even the most meticulous students of history will struggle to remember the names of DK Baisantry or Baldeo Sahai, both officers at Press Information Bureau, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting in 1975. They are footnotes in history that changed the course of a nation. However, their innocuous signatures could effectively throttle any voice raised against the government of that time. Two such instances are on public display in a comprehensive exhibition of cartoons commemorating the birth centenary of the stalwart cartoonist Attupurathu Mathew Abraham (1924-2002) at Kolkata’s Gallery Rasa, primarily curated from the private collection of his daughters, Ayisha and Janaki Abraham.
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