What if there was something you want to tell others, but no one would listen. What if you felt misrepresented, but have no opportunity to explain yourself. What if you were kept silent and want eagerly to voice out, but simply cannot. In rural India, where people are unable to express their concerns due to poverty, widespread illiteracy, and mainstream media that is, if accessible, disinterested in rural populations, a new medium is creating a movement for communication: grassroots comics.
Ashoka Fellow Sharad Sharma has been introducing the concept of using comics across India through which millions of Indians can raise their voices on issues of concern. With a natural interest in cartooning, Sharma started work on cartoon wall posters as a tool to spread awareness and today is teaching communities how to create comics.
Because grassroots comics are made by the common people, it reflects local concerns. Comics in Jharkhand highlight migration, tribal rights, witch-hunting, alcoholism, and corruption. In Madhya Pradesh, they relate to displacement, illiteracy, and debt caused by social rituals. Whatever the case, people are desperate to be heard with some making wall posters from early morning to late at night.
The posters generate plenty of discussion and have featured landlords, police, local politicians as the subject of ridicule. Some have been ripped up and removed, and people have taken steps to protect them. Others were the reason for positive change.
In 2002, Sharma established the non-profit organization World Comics India to spread the concept of grassroots comics through workshops in India and worldwide. The organization hosts annual events that bring together artists and comics. To date, there are approximately 500 workshops held with most of them in remote and conflict areas in South Asia. The movement is growing worldwide, with NGO activists and individuals from Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Brazil, Lebanon, and the UK using grassroots comics. Perhaps this is a sign that a pen, paper, some humour, and an issue people hold at heart are all that is needed for social change.