Congress MP Priyanka Gandhi's son Rehan R Vadra has said that Delhi's Bikaner House forced him to remove pictures of the protests from his photo exhibition.
Rehan refused to remove these photographs from the exhibition, although now only partial photographs from his collection are being displayed.
Priyanka Gandhi has raised questions on the top leadership of the government and has said that she will stand by her son. At the same time, Congress has accused of imposing censorship on art.
Bikaner House issued a statement saying that it was requested to remove the photographs of the exhibition which were not found to be in accordance with their rules.
Rehaan Vadra, son of Priyanka Gandhi and Robert Vadra, is a photographer. An exhibition of his photographs titled 'No Idea is Final' is being held at Bikaner House which was scheduled to start from Wednesday evening.
Rehan Vadra said that at 3.30 pm on Wednesday he was told that if he did not remove the photographs by 5 pm, his photo exhibition would be cancelled.
Rehan Vadra had included photographs of the Gen Z Protest in Delhi in his exhibition.
Rehan Vadra made a post about this on Instagram and said that among the pictures which were asked to be removed, two pictures were also pictures with the national flag of India.
After this controversy came to light, Priyanka Gandhi made a post on Instagram sharing pictures of the exhibition.
In it, she wrote, "When a powerful person becomes afraid of someone else's expression, he doesn't realize it, but he has already lost the power he was trying to protect. You stand up for the truth and beautiful things find their way to you. I am proud of you and always will be."
Regarding removing the pictures, Rehan had posted on Instagram on Wednesday saying, "The management of Bikaner House forced me to remove most of the art works in my exhibition. My exhibition "No Idea is Final" is going to start today (Wednesday) at 7 pm."
"These pictures depicted the youth protests in Delhi. Apparently, he found these pictures "objectionable". He also directed me to remove two pictures of the tricolor. I have refused. I will not remove the picture of the Indian flag."
"For now the exhibition will continue partially, but I will find another location and display the entire collection of photographs from the protests there," he said.
On this entire controversy, Bikaner House said in a statement, "Bikaner House is a public cultural institution, dedicated to the promotion of art and culture. The exhibitions organized here and the activities related to them are required to be in accordance with the policy of the Bikaner House Management Society.
"Some photographs displayed under Rehan Vadra's exhibition "No Idea is Final" at Bikaner House were found not to be in accordance with the policy of Bikaner House Management Society. Therefore a request was made to remove them.
Photographs which are in accordance with the Society's policy have been continued in the exhibition."
Congress has reacted sharply to this incident and targeted the government.
Congress MP Pawan Kheda posted on Twitter alleging that even the tricolor is safe from censorship. He wrote, "Perhaps the problem is not in art, but in the government."
Sharing pictures of the empty space in the exhibition, he wrote, "A few hours before the start of Rehan Vadra's art exhibition 'No Idea is Final', the Bikaner House administration got 74 of his artworks removed. This was almost half of the exhibition."
“These were removed as ‘political’. Only the protests were recorded in these photographs. Not a single one of these pictures was derogatory or inflammatory. So what was so objectionable about it?"
"Among the photographs that Rehan had to fight to keep in the exhibition was an image of the Indian flag. Instead of art on the rest of the walls, only bare iron nails were left, which were shining in the light of the spotlight. It was a horrific symbol of censorship. Imagine a government that is so afraid of ideas that it does not tolerate not only protests, but pictures of protests and even the tricolor."
Former Rajasthan Chief Minister and senior Congress leader Ashok Gehlot said that more than 70 photographs of Rehan Vadra were removed from the protest.
He wrote on X, “Bikaner House is the property of Rajasthan Government. This means that the artistic expression of a young artist was suppressed under the rule of the BJP government, which is highly condemnable. Many of the photographs in the exhibition featured Delhi's youth movements."
"Rehan Vadra was asked to remove two pictures of the tricolor, but he flatly refused. His determination is commendable. He has shown that there can be no compromise in the matter of respect for the tricolor."
Gehlot termed the removal of photographs as 'suppressing the voice of artists' and called it a 'direct attack on democracy'. He said, "This is a clear example of censorship. The BJP government should answer why the pictures showing the truth were removed."
Activist Gurmehar Kaur said that just hours before the exhibition was to open, most of the photographs were forced to be removed.
He wrote on
Youth Congress, the youth organization of Congress, has said that it will organize an open photo exhibition on the streets of Lutyens' Delhi.
