Repacking the ‘Punch’

New Delhi: Humour has been the golden lining of India’s realpolitik for as long as one can remember. The early kings hired jesters; Mughal emperor Akbar had Birbal and, in the 19th century, quick-witted Indian writers picked up from the British bible of humour, Punch, to laugh like the white “babus”.

By the end of the 19th century, at least 70 Indian-style Punch-like papers and magazines had appeared in over a dozen 12 cities of the country.

“Humour unfortunately is now on the decline in public life. The composition of political clans has changed so dramatically that their appreciation for humour is diminishing. Public life has become very combative and politics competitive. The ability to laugh is becoming more of a rarity,” historian and anthologist Mushirul Hasan, the director of the National Archives of India, told IANS.

Hasan’s new humour compendium, “Wit and Wisdom: Pickings from the Parsee Punch” (Niyogi Books) published last month, has reproduced some of the best caricatures from the illustrated Parsee comic weekly paper published for over seven decades from 1854.

The cartoons mirror the social and political situation of Bombay and the western provinces of the country in the light of world events.

There are also academic accounts of the history of the Parsee community in India and how politics, religion, reforms, identity and foreign affairs affected their lives.

The Parsee Punch, like the London Punch, contained 20-36 pages of funny illustrations. The weekly’s name was later changed to Hindi Punch for a more pan-Indian identity and continued to be published till 1930.

The cartoons have a nationalist colour. A late 19th century Parsee Punch illustration, “A Loving Pair”, makes a political comments about a cross-cultural love.

It reads thus:

Fergusson (to a native sari-clad lady, whom he hugs) “Yes, My Dear, I shall always try to make you happy!”

Miss Poona Bai “I am so happy, so joyful for your such kind and sincere attention towards me, my dear Fergusson, that I am unable to express my feelings in words…”

(Sir James Fergusson had made an important concession for establishing a native girls’ high school at Poona.)

Another cartoon that appeared during a campaign against the British vice-regal’s and Indian gentry’s visits to Simla in the summer reads “The Gentleman Goes to Simla and the dog barks (Holkar and Barking Dog series)”. The dog in the illustration is identified as The Pioneer newspaper.

“The remarkable thing is that even though the Indian Punch writers were critical of the ruling British government and its policies, the British never proscribed any of the issues. There was a certain level of acceptance of the humour,” Hasan said.

The Parsee Punch is the second in the series of Punch anthology by Hasan.

The first volume consisted of pickings from the Awadh Punch, published from Lucknow from January 1877 to 1936.

The character sketches in the magazine were described by critics as the “precursor of the modern Indian short story”.

Tags: British bible of humour, humour, Punch

Category: India