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Political cartooning gained strength during the Second World War when
cartoonists, starting from David Low, found an abundance of material during
the political turmoil in England and the other countries involved in war.
Cartoons were also used as propaganda by the warring nations. For examples,
John Bull or Kaiser Bill became metonymies when they represent nations;
emblems such as the British Lion or the German Eagle were portrayed to
represent nations.

Punch, a British weekly magazine of humour and satire, made cartoons popular
in England and its progenies, in India. Partha Mitter writes in his book, Art and
Nationalism in Colonial India, 1850-1922: Occidental Orientations,

However, no single humorous publication made a deeper impression in colonial India than
the English magazine, Punch. A riotous procession of its offspring greets us in the second
half of the 19th century; The Delhi Sketch Book, The Indian Charivari, The Oudh Punch, The
Delhi Punch, The Punjab Punch, Urdu Punch, Gujrati Punch, The Hindu Punch, The Parsi
Punch and a version of Punch from Madras in the South.

The English educated class of Indians, though a minority, became addicted to

this sort of new, humerous drawing. Later on Cartoons started appearing in
Indian owned newspapers and magazines. When the period of significant
political movements in the subcontinent began, cartoons also became political
in nature. Demands for social reform, self –rule and freedom to discuss national
affairs on the public platform began to be voiced. Government imposed laws
like The Vernacular Press Act of 1878 helped only in giving vitality and
legitimacy to the cause and stirring up national consciousness. The Indian
political cartoonist during the pre-independence era worked under restricted
conditions. R. K. Laxman1 says,

As the national struggle began to gain momentum, the cartoonist ventured to draw the
paunchy, thick-set John Bull to represent the colonial ruler. But still the cartoons were more
in line with propaganda posters than with significant satirical comments. They portrayed
flaming patriotism and lampooned the alien ruler, but in a vague and impersonal way within a
safe limit set by the system.

Political cartooning in India flourished after independence and many cartoonists

enjoyed the powers stamped under the new constitutional provision of ‘free

press’. New Delhi, the capital and hub of all the political activities of the nation

sheltered a lot of celebrated cartoonists like K. Shankar Pillai, O.V. Vijayan,

Abu Abraham, Rajendra Puri etc. R.K. Laxman, another great cartoonist was

centered in Bombay. A vast, multicultural nation like India with its share of

poverty, politics and corruption worked as an infinite source for the budding

cartoonists. Changing governments and historical incidents like the Emergency

and the wars with neighbouring countries created enough material for criticizing

and lampooning. Politics based on vote bank and caste strengthened during this

period and the emergence of a new middle class under new economic policies

also prompted cartoonists to aim a new target. R.K. Laxman created a cartoon

character called ‘The Common Man’ as symbol of common people of India.

O.V. Vijayan also created two characters in his cartoons – a father and a son - as

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Freedom to Cartoon, Freedom to Speak (a speech given) by R.K. Laxman
representing a poverty stricken low class of India, often wondering about the

incomprehensive policies taken by leaders roaming in the political power

sources. Cartoons became more and more popular and as important as

editorials.

Cartoons, in a third world country like India, are highly different from cartoons

produced in developed nations because the problems or challenges a cartoonist

has to face in a third world country seems to be more complex than that of a

developed nation. In the post-colonial history of India, in my opinion, political

cartoons create a different medium of translating history. M.H. Spielmann, the

historian of Punch, had no doubt about the importance of cartoons to historians.

He wrote in 1906,

‘The Cartoon of the Week’ is the week’s chief idea, situation, or event, is truthfully

representative of the best prevailing feeling of the nation, of its soundest common sense and

of its most deliberate judgment – a judgment… seriously formed, albeit humorously set down

and portrayed. I follows therefore that the Punch cartoon is not to be considered merely as a

comic or satirical comment on the main occurrence or situation of the week, but as

contemporary history for the use and information of future generations cast into amusing

form for the entertainment of the present. Current national opinion frequently becomes

modified, and history may qualify – it may even radically alter – the view of the day; but the

record of how public matters struck a people, an imperial people, at the instant of their
happening, is surely not less interesting to the future student of history, of psychology, and of

sociology, than the most official record of the world’s progress.

Cartoons are one of the most typical products of the mass and popular culture.

A certain kind of significance is attached to the mass media and often to

cartoons. All kinds of power are associated with them, including the

conditioning and/or corruption of individuals and the control of minds. Several

studies have shown that cartoons offer a rich source for studying the

contemporary cultural and social trends, attitudes, and practices of a given

society. Even though cartoons need not be humerous, several studies associate it

with humour being portrayed through a different medium because humour is

invariably connected to a socially and geographically delimited frame. Joseph

Boskin, an American scholar, has argued that humour is simultaneously a form

of social control and a device for cultural release, which due to its structure,

enables individuals and social groups to use it as an aggressive as well as a

defensive device. Cartoons have been employed frequently and effectively as an

aid in building up resistance to the policies of politicians and as a weapon of

propaganda, generally in ridicule.

Cartoons form an opinion as they deal with domestic politics, social themes, and

foreign affairs. Political cartoons are more specific – they depend on the
viewer’s recognition of the characters, subjects and events depicted. The use of

stereotypes is also part of it. The symbols and images of the cartoon are crucial

to its interpretation. Unlike social cartoons which were a critique of customs,

manners, and laws, political cartoons were usually produced to emphasize

differences and increase the political temperature. In my research I intend to do

a careful study of political cartoons from a cultural and political point of view to

bring out an unread history of the construct of nation. R.K. Laxman’s ‘Common

Man’ as the mute symbol of an average middle aged, middle class Indian and

O.V. Vijayan’s nameless ‘Father and Son’ as the emotionless spectators who

has access even in the narrowest corridors of the country’s political theatre are

representations of a history unseen and untold.