Where is the informed perspective? Where is the analysis? Where is the whole picture? Where is the constructive criticism? Where is the empathy... these were the questions that came to mind, as I sifted through enough `reports' to fill a box file. Clearly, the heat generated by `celebrity voices', at the Samantar meet, had left very little room for even the stray voice of reason. Publication after publication seemed to have recorded `celebrity' opinions, or should I say, accusations -- often in the same rabid tones -- without really verifying the facts.

For instance, it would be interesting to actually investigate whether a certain director of Hindi theatre has, in fact, shot off 25 letters (as he claims to have, and as has been duly recorded by an afternoon paper) to Vijaya Mehta.As someone who is aware of Vijaya Mehta's almost obsessive need for filing virtually every scrap of paper that enters her office, I'm willing to put across a wager that it may just be possible to cut that figure down to its actual size.

Further, as someone who has `learnt the ropes', so to speak, by watching `Bai' work from between the shadows in the aisles, I can certainly afford to state that she is as accessible to the media and to theatre persons and other artistes, as she is to those working with her. Sure, she has a hectic schedule and would appreciate a request for her time. Just like any of us.As for the NCPA and its programming lows... well, it just needs one quick look at the monthly diary of the programme officer to discover that the NCPA, despite certain attendant problems, is possibly the only institution in the country that puts out nearly 40 programmes -- including theatre, music and dance performances, alongside cinema screenings, various awareness workshops and the informal CHAURAHAprogrammes -- each month. Not to mention the fact that, from time to time, it serves as the venue for several film and theatre festivals.

Last Thursday, on the invitation of this paper, I actually met with Vijaya Mehta. Again, contrary to circulating rumours, she was not only accessible but also willing to dialogue, to answer any and every question. In fact, she had even drafted a personal statement in Marathi. Seated in her spacious cabin she appeared, as Vijaya Mehta has always appeared: calm, composed and dignified.

Recording her systematic response to the volley of charges flung at her as Executive Director of the NCPA, I realised, yet again, that certainly there is truth in the fact that media-fuelled controversies involving `personalities' -- where people feed off each other's ignorances -- do have a tendency to snowball right onto the hairline that splits clarification from courtmartial and character analysis from character assassination.

In the wake of the entire NCPA controversy it may beuseful for us, on either side -- in the media and the art world -- to realise the worth of viewing our `beliefs' against the background/context of the conditions in which heads of premier art institutions, like the NCPA or the NGMA, are forced to function. Many of which are -- whether or not we choose to ignore the facts fairly steeped in bureaucracy, besides being sorely in need of funds and adequately trained arts personnel.

As editor of an arts magazine I have often discussed, with arts professionals in various capacities and posts, the question: `What ails our art institutions?' Not a single one of them has any direct solutions. However, every one of them would accede to the fact that arts administration and arts resource management are areas of fundamental importance today. Areas that require immediate attention if our arts institutions are expected to effectively carry out allotted functions. It may therefore also be necessary to view corporate patronage, as the NCPA has done, for its inherent worth.As is the case anywhere in the world.

But for that, we, as an art fraternity, would need to rise above personal differences, parochial sentiments and a `Me for Myself' approach to the arts. As Dr Vishakha Desai, Director, Asia Society, New York, once put it, ``Mumbai as a city has immense resources and energies. We just have to get around to getting people to come together to do something constructive and creative in a consolidated way.''

Perhaps Vijaya Mehta, doyenne of the arts, could (at some point in time) herself initiate a dialogue on the subject? That, for one, would certainly show up her critics in true light.

(Anupa Mehta was the founding editor of The Art News Magazine of India. She now runs a company that offers art management services.)