When Didi growls and Commies meow

(Originally published here at The Sunday Guardian)

At a time when university professors are getting arrested for forwarding cartoons aboutMamtadi, writer Anant Singh and artist Abhijeet Kini should be afraid, be very afraid indeed. In their graphic novel, Chairman Meow and the Protectors of the Proletariat, the protagonists are a bunch of vigilante anthropomorphic animals; die-hard Communist guerrillas out to protect the people from the raging imperialist Chief Minister – a pug dog referred to only as Didi.

The guerrillas are a hilarious bunch led by the redoubtable Chairman Meow, lovingly rendered by Kini as a plump, ochre-coloured cat. Then there's the explosives expert duck called Leftwing. ("I gave up my wing for the Revolution, Chairman. That's why they call me Leftwing!") There's Red Panda (R. Panda – a quintessential Bong name) the propaganda officer and Wiper, the snake who has well, wiped out notable enemies of the Revolution like Top Dog, Cash Cow and Capitalist Pig.

Author Anant Singh clearly revels in drawing from filmi tropes, mostly Bollywood, although there's a panel, which shows an angry Didi thumping her desk a la Hitler inInglourious Basterds. Abhijit Kini's no-holds-barred caricaturist's style does full justice to what is an uproarious parody of Bengal politics. However, it's the attention to detail and the little jokes peeking out from every panel that really grab your attention. The Bengali McDonald with the giant 'M' has a clownfish (Maachh in Bangla) instead of Ronald. The campaign poster for Didi features the slogan Kaka Kutir Kukkur, ('My Uncle's pet dog' in Bangla) a spoof on the Trinamul Congress slogan Maa Matir Manush.

The book was released at the Delhi Comic-Con in February this year, by Pop Culture Publishing, which has also given us other recent indie titles like Widhwa Ma Andhi Behen and Munkeeman. Writer Anant Singh says, "The only real pop culture that we have here in India are the Bollywood films that most of us have grown up watching. Their influence is what drives our books, like the titular filmi crime-fighting duo in Widhwa Ma." This is in sharp contrast to the wealth of iconic comic book superheroes that are part and parcel of Western pop culture.

Speaking about Chairman Meow, Singh says, "The five years that I spent at IIT Kharagpur had a deep impact on me. The policies of the previous Communist regime weren't consistent with actual communism, while Mamta Banerjee's clamping down on dissent is a typically commie diktat. Banerjee's electoral victory was just the hook for the story, which took off from that point."

Whether you're into politics or not, Chairman Meow is a highly recommended read; and as Singh mentioned, there are plans for a sequel, Chairman Meow and The Red Dragonwhere our fearless guerrillas travel to China, that ultimate red bastion.