22.5'' x 15'' - charcoal on paper

“Assam calls for a human response. Over 400,000 Bodos and Muslims uprooted, terrified and running for their lives in under 10 days.”
 - Farah Naqvi, The Hindu, (6, August 2012)

“India is yet to recognize the nature of targeted violence in law or uphold the inviolable rights of those uprooted in each such episode." This is how Farah Naqvi began her article in The Hindu, an English daily.

As the magnitude of the human tragedy in Assam unfolds, where is our healing touch? Where are the appeals for funds that newspapers routinely issue? Where are the big humanitarian aid agencies? This is possibly the single largest conflict-induced human displacement to take place in India over such a short period of time since partition - over 400,000 Bodos and Muslims uprooted, terrified, and running for their lives in under 10 days. In this hyper-connected age, news travels fast, graphically, and into our drawing rooms, yet we appear unmoved.

When the Gujarat carnage took place in 2002, scattering over 200,000 people to the winds, hardly anyone came forward, not even the State. This was in sharp, painful contrast to the generous corporate support, and eager aid agencies that rushed to help victims of the terrible Gujarat earthquake the previous year.