A carver from Kanker

“I make it a point never to ask them about their past, or talk about what is happening right now, but only contemplate about the future,” says Ajay Mandavi, 47, when we meet at the 17th annual Bharat Rang Mahotsav theatre festival of the National School of Drama, Delhi. Describing his experience of teaching wood-carving at Kanker district jail in North Bastar, Chhattisgarh, the soft-spoken educator had delivered a lecture at the festival session ‘Marginal in the Market of Theatre’.

A proud Gond, he has seen firsthand his home district metamorphose from an underdeveloped but peaceful region into one that is wracked by untold violence. “When I was growing up, we could go anywhere, come back at any time, there was no checking, nothing,” says Mandavi. “It was only after the ’90s that it became what it is now... you can’t step out after dark and more than 10 people can never come together without permission even if it’s for a wedding or any social event.”

Describing himself as a ‘god-gifted artist’, he says he has been working on wood and producing art for as long as he can remember. It was in 2010 that he got an opportunity to teach his skills and simultaneously relinquish his day job in the state’s revenue department. The Collector had summoned Mandavi and his friend after hearing about their innovative idea for a brick kiln. “He asked us to use our skills to teach inmates in the jail. The Collector believed that would be a great route for them to change,” he says. He took along his toolbox and headed to the jail the very next day for his first class with 14 students, all of them undertrials accused of having Maoist links. Today he has more than 350 students, including many with a livelihood they owe to him. “They really took to it. The Gond are great learners and it didn’t take them more than a few weeks to produce good art. A few of them now make a living from wooden calligraphy and have, in turn, taught others in their village.”

He is now preparing for his next big project — a training centre near Anthagad, about 90km from Kanker. “The problem with Bastar is that if you are supporting the police, the Maoists kill you and if you support the Maoists, the police kill you. The tribal people are sandwiched with no way out,” he says, adding fervently, “Art can change, and change for the better.”

His wish is that the state government should buy the artworks made by the inmates and display these in its offices, thereby encouraging them to produce more and make a living out of it. “That way they won’t be forced to take up arms for one side or the other.”