This is not an Indian phenomenon alone. Artists like Goya, Picasso, Andy Warhol and even Degas have all had to face the ridiculous restrictions self-styled censors of arts have imposed on them from time to time. In India, too, Souza has been at the forefront of this firing line for some time, but he gives as good as he gets. And, according to some, that is why he never made the mark that fellow-artist Husain did. But they are wrong. Art soars in a market that has successfullychallenged the status quo and arrived. No amount of censorship can stop it.

Indeed, in the art of Francis Newton (the signature in his early works), Souza seems to be doing just that at the moment on the global scene. In June 1995, there was no work of Souza's in the Sotheby's auction at New York. That October, Christie's had two works, but they remained unsold. But in 1997, we find Christie's not only put up 14 lots, of which 10 sold, five of them above the Rs 1 lakh mark. The same performance was repeated in 1998 at Christie's London auction in June, with Souza selling in eight of the nine lots put up for sale. Seven of these were above the Rs 1 lakh mark and two went above Rs 2 lakh each. Eight more works came up just two weeks after the Sotheby's auction (held soon after Christie's effort) and five of them sold, two of them at over Rs 1 lakh.

The square centimetre secured by Souza's works in 1997 was Rs 31.55, rising to Rs 51.46 at the Christie's auction of June 1998, and even higher at Rs 66.78 atthe Sotheby's auction. What is more significant is the fact that the price of Souza's works rose despite the fact that the average price secured per work was half that at the Christie's auction.

One can infer then that the price of Souza's work is on the rise. This is significant as it reflects the resurgence of an art that was a break from the academic tradition established by the colonial state at the three metropolises of Calcutta, Mumbai and Chennai. Already, the alternative hammered out by artists like Gaganendranath and Rabindranath at Santiniketan has become the most sought after trend in Indian art. Now we can expect the more radical departures from colonial calendar art to emerge and take the place of portrayals of gods and goddesses and the like, which have a certain value as icons in our society that has nothing to do with their aesthetic quality.

The rise in the price of Souza's works reflects the breakdown of both the colonial and the aesthetic as well as the revivalist one pandered to by theIndian hangers-on of the British. That is why, perhaps, they are attempting to establish their outdated and irrelevant taste in art with the help of the police and the state.

They are not likely to succeed. They can cow down individuals, but they cannot stop the evolution of popular tastes based on the experience of people and the way they want to think of life around them. To me, the rise in popularity of Souza at the very time when Husain is under attack is significant. Souza was always the most radical of the Mumbai group and the rise in popularity of his work at this time reflects a desire to save our contemporary art from the attacks of fundamentalists. It is curious how the market has parried them in a most unexpected way by putting a frontline fighter for a radical break in art in the forefront once more. Behind this process, we have the continued popularity of the Santiniketan artists, of Husain himself and of artists associated with the Bombay group, like Akbar Padamsee and Ram Kumar. There appearsnow to be a solid line of defence of Indian modernism that will not be defeated. That, at least, is what the market says.