A cartoonist is overwhelmed by the audience’ response

January 25, 2005
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(News Feature)

Baral (left) with one of his works of art. Photo courtesy: Bikas Rauniyar/Kantipur

Ace cartoonist, Durga Baral, popularly known as ‘Batsyayan,’ says he is overwhelmed by the response of one of his audience to award him a cash prize of Rs. 5,000 for his cartoon published in Kantipur—the largest circulating daily.

“Perhaps this is the first such incident when a reader has awarded cash prize to a cartoonist. But more than money, it is the admiration that has left me overwhelmed,” Baral, who lives in the scenic western town of Pokhara, told Nepalnews over phone.

On Sunday (Jan. 16), the leading Nepali language daily published a cartoon by Batsyayan (Durga Baral), in which ruling coalition leader and general secretary of the CPN (UML), Madhav Nepal could be seen congratulating himself for protesting the price hike as well as for announcing steep hike in the prices of petroleum products. In the background was the portrait of former prime minister and late UML leader, Manmohan Adhikary (see: picture)

Cartoon by Batsyayan published in Kantipur daily.
The same day, a reader of Kantipur daily was so overwhelmed by the cartoon that he announced a cash award of Rs five thousand to Baral. In a letter to the daily, managing director of Kanjirowa Overseas Pvt. Ltd., Sher Bahadur Shahi, said he had decided to offer the award as the cartoon had “reflected the ‘dual character’ of the UML leader towards the impact of price hike in petroleum products upon common people.”

Interestingly, Shahi said he was a UML supporter and had contested for the House of Representatives from the mid-western district of Jajarkot in 1999 on behalf of the CPN (ML) after the vertical split in the CPN (UML).

The CPN (ML) later merged in the parent party while one of its leaders, C. P. Mainali, still leads what was once the breakaway faction.

So, what makes Baral’s cartoons so distinct from rest of the crowd? “It is because he has a rare capacity of depicting burning political and social issues of the day in a way that can be comprehended even by a layman,” says Narayan Wagle, editor of Kantipur daily. He, however, said Baral’s political cartoons were more popular among the readers than his other creations.

Baral, too, says that there is abundance of political issues for him to work on while he often faces dearth of socio-economic issues. He, however, said it was because of continuous love and encouragement from the readers that he has been able to continue for so long in the area of creating cartoons.

A cartoon by `Batsyayan’ published in The Kathmandu Post on Sunday, Jan. 23 05.
Baral started drawing cartoons way back in 1965 for ‘Naya Sandesh’ weekly—a popular tabloid edited by Ramesh Nath Pandey. Pandey later switched over to politics and was a cabinet minister in the royal-appointed Lokendra Bahadur Chand government.

In the eighties, Baral started contributing to a weekly paper, Prangan, published from Pokhara. As people started showing increasing interests towards political cartoons in the latter days of the partyless Panchayat regime, Baral started contributing to a series of weeklies published from Kathmandu including Interestingly, it was the government’s mouthpiece, Gorkhapatra—the oldest newspaper in the country—that made history by publishing cartoon on the first page of a broadsheet newspaper that too in a bigger space.

It was only after Baral started working for Kantipur daily in the mid-nineties that his works started getting popular response. “Thanks to the readers’ continuous encouragement, I am still in this profession,” he said.

Away from the hustle and bustle of Kathmandu, the 65–year-old artist enjoys creating his works of art at his house at Pokhara sub-metropolis ward no. 3 at Nadipur near the Mahendra bridge. “Of course, I could have kept myself more up-to-date had I lived in Kathmandu. But, there is no disturbance here and I feel at peace while engaged in my works (in Pokhara). And, it certainly helps in the quality of my creation,” he added. Besides producing cartoons, Baral also draws paintings—the subject of his passion. He organised a solo painting exhibition at the Siddhartha Art Gallery in Kathmandu last year. His subjects obviously were aberrations in the society and quest for peace, among others.

When asked how has been the response to his political cartoons from the politicians themselves, Baral says sometimes political workers express some dissatisfaction to the way he depicts their leaders. “But, politicians more or less seem restrained. In fact, people in the public spheres must be ready to face criticisms,” he added.