A white banner with ‘Secular India’ written in bold letters, created by dance practitioner Mandeep Raikhy during the protests carried out against the Citizenship Amendment Act in 2019, remained in the drawers of his Vasant Kunj home after the pandemic caused a halt in the protests. However, Raikhy took out the banner once more while being home-bound during the pandemic-induced lockdown in 2020.
“It made me realise that not only people but ideas such as secularism would again become parked at home and will find no space in the social and political spheres of the country,” shares the 41-year-old performance artist. Pondering over what one could do to bring these ideas back into the public sphere, Raikhy would take out time every day to use the banner and explore its relationship with his body.
Hence, came into being The Secular Project, a unique performance initiative that addresses the idea of secularism through the exploration of movements of different forms. “It was a way of looking at the intersection between protest and performance. All contemporary performances have resistance at the heart of it and I wanted to explore that,” shares Raikhy who has been performing contemporary dance pieces for almost 20 years now. After the lockdowns were lifted, the artist decided to continue the performances—he calls them explorations—but with other people.
Moves of change
As part of the initiative, Raikhy organised a road trip around India in January 2021. Taking the Project’s motto forward, he would take the banner, visit different cities, and encourage people—locals or other performers—to have a conversation on secularism while performing with the banner as a prop. “The banner, for me, gives secularism a form. It is not just something that travelled with me around the country. It was also a piece of cloth that had the ability to tie different people together with one belief,” Raikhy explains.
The performances occured at different spaces either public or studios of fellow dancers. Each exploration would also differ from city to city. “These were creative outlets and so my inspiration would always be the cityscape,” he shares. Giving the example of the exploration he conducted in front of the Vidhana Soudha in Bengaluru, he adds, “I felt it would make more of an impact if we could explore that part of the city by passing through it. So, I decided that it would make sense if different bodies were running with the banner in between.”
Taking the idea forward
Although the official road trip ended in December, 2021, Raikhy is continuing the Project by carrying the banner with him to the cities he travels to. In April, Raikhy also conducted a panel discussion titled ‘Dancing the Secular’ in Bengaluru as part of the Prakriti Foundation’s fifth edition of the Prakriti Excellence in Contemporary Dance Awards. Through the Project, he wants to concretise the concept of secularism through rituals. Raikhy concludes, “All these religious beliefs are alive only because they have rituals attached to it. In that same way, I want to keep the secular belief of the country alive.”