LS polls: Artists face wall writing blues as digital age catches on
Siliguri: Wall writings usher in any election, especially in the state of Bengal. With elections, the walls turn into canvas for political parties with graffities, caricatures, each trying to outdo the other. Artists who rely greatly on wall writings for their livelihood, used to wait eagerly for elections. However, with passing days, the number of wall writings is gradually decreasing.
According to the artists, this is owing to stringent model code of conduct and people not allowing their walls to be written on. Social media and digital technology has also caused a major dent to the art of wall writing with digital flex and banners in vogue. “Earlier, I used to work all night and return home with money in my pockets but the situation has changed now. Many people do not allow us to draw on their walls, so political parties have switched to digital flexes and banners. Therefore, the demand for wall writing is steadily decreasing,” said Ajay Dutta, a wall writer. Ahead of Lok Sabha elections, all political parties are busy campaigning. This year too, many parties have started their campaign by writing on the walls.
The number is however less compared to other years. In the early days, it was seen that along with political party symbols, different poems on political parties were written on the walls, which played a key role in the campaign. It helped people remember the names of candidates and party symbols. On an average an artist gets Rs 300 if he paints the whole wall with the candidate’s name, symbols and other details. If any artist only draws the party symbol, he gets Rs 150 per wall. About 500 such artists work in Siliguri city. They claim that the number of walls have reduced by 70 per cent and so has their work. Under these circumstances, it becomes difficult for the artists to survive.
Sanjay Paul, another artist, said: “As we are wall writers, we cannot do any other work. We used to write on walls all year round for different companies. However, election time was the golden period for us. We used to earn a large amount of money during that time.” According to artist Kishore Basu, so far, they have only drawn walls for Trinamool Congress (TMC) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). No other party has called them yet. “The way things are heading, we cannot continue with this profession in the future. The trend of wall writing will disappear in the coming days,” Basu added.
