SWARAJ exhibition at India Habitat Centre traces India’s political history

At the Visual Arts Gallery at India Habitat Centre, images of student protests from the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s sit alongside film posters, archival material and reminders of the freedom struggle.

*SWARAJ: India’s Political History*, presented by the Tuli Research Centre for Indian Studies, follows the country’s political imagination from colonial rule through the freedom movement and the making of a new nation. Its cinema section includes Chetan Anand’s *Haqeeqat*, set against the Indo-China war, and films featuring Dilip Kumar and Manoj Kumar.

Curator Neville Tuli described swaraj as more than a political idea. “Freedom [is] also an inner process – the ability to question oneself, laugh at oneself, look inward and still retain faith in oneself,” he said.

Sukhpreet Kahlon of the research centre said the conflicts, forms and protagonists represented in the historical material have changed over time, while the images retain echoes of contemporary public life. The exhibition is on view at India Habitat Centre’s Visual Arts Gallery.