IN 1994, Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev was interviewed in Moscow by the well known journalist, the late Dev Murarka, on behalf of the India International Centre (IIC). This interview was published in The Russian Enigma (Rethinking Russia), a thematic volume of the IIC Quarterly, the journal of the India International Centre. It was also perhaps his first interview to an Indian journal – that Gorbachev, the architect of glasnost and undoubtedly one of the most important political figures of the 20th century, chose to share his views on the spectacular dissolution of the USSR with the Quarterly speaks for itself. This spirit of glasnost and openness is reflected in the Quarterly, which has, over the last 40 years, evolved into a special forum for liberal and enlightened discourse in the English language, and continues to be a platform across most disciplines for some of the world’s most eminent writers, scholars, statesmen, thinkers and activists.

To appreciate the position that the Quarterly occupies and its contribution to the worlds of both intellect and publishing, it is necessary to go back in time to the genesis of the India International Centre, and its charter. Conceived in 1959 as a ‘bridge’ for cultures and communities all over the world, in the words of its Founder-President C.D. Deshmukh, the Centre was designed to be a place ‘where various currents of intellectual, political and economic thought could meet freely’. Almost immediately, the Centre grew to occupy a special position in the capital, developing as a ‘vital and creative force for a broad spectrum of cultural and intellectual activities’.

The Centre’s Memorandum of Association visualized ‘the publication of newsletters, research papers and books, and of a journal for the exposition of cultural patterns and values prevailing in different parts of the world’. Its earliest publishing programme was in the form of pamphlets of a selection of the significant talks and lectures held there. It was immediately apparent that this intellectual wealth was a rich lode that could be mined, and in 1963, it was decided to bring out a quarterly journal, provisionally titled International Understanding, to make these lectures available to members of the Centre.

In 1964, Conspectus (as it then came to be) was conceived and its first number, a slim volume published in February 1965, carried a stimulating miscellany of articles, book reviews and a photo essay, all of which would, essentially, set the template for the journal in its various avatars through the following decades to the present day. Contributors to Conspectus’ earliest numbers included diplomats John T. Reid and Clovis Maksoud, author Nirad C. Chaudhuri, academics Ali A. Mazrui and E.A.T. Johnson, and poet Octavio Paz, among others, on subjects as diverse as the sterility of post-Independence Indian literature, the controversy between the judiciary and the legislature, the problems of the coexistence of communism and capitalism, and on a nuclear policy for India. Gordon Cullen’s exciting sketches of what Delhi ought to look like in the years to come, ‘The Ninth Delhi’, formed its first ‘art pages’. However, in 1967, after two-and-a-half years of regular publication, despite these thought provoking contributions, Conspectus was discontinued on the recommendation of the board, perhaps for financial reasons.

 

A few years later, in 1974, it was decided to revive the journal, but in a slightly different garb. Now titled the IIC Quarterly, it was envisioned as ‘a vehicle for the expression of interesting and provocative ideas on a variety of subjects’. While its content depended largely on lectures and seminars held at the Centre itself, it was intended to approach the intelligentsia to contribute specially commissioned articles on a range of subjects in order to make it more broad-based and inclusive. Views and contributions would be sought from across the ideological spectrum to foster and maintain a non-partisan platform that would encourage both the writer and reader to question and revisit assumptions. The journal was not designed to be, in any sense, a house magazine, limited to being a mere record of the Centre’s proceedings, but rather a concerted attempt to keep abreast of the times by connecting with an international community of intellectuals who would, in turn, endeavour to contribute to the process of informed debate.

 

As we live in an age of great turmoil and transition, it is impossible to keep abreast of so much information. Consequently, this new version of the journal – its circulation restricted to the Centre’s members-subscribers – was envisioned as an interdisciplinary format that would offer to the reader a selection of the best ideas. Not a professional or a technical journal, it would address, in one way or another, various issues of governance relating to civic and international affairs, ethics and society, education, law, the environment, indigenous knowledge systems, literature, films and the arts, among others. The articles were to be scholarly, analytical and thoroughly researched without being overly academic, and not restricted to a particular discipline or time frame.

Following its earliest format, book reviews formed a niche; poetry and literary writing also soon made an appearance. The visual element, considered an important aspect of the Quarterly right from its inception, was initially represented by the photo feature; gradually, drawings and illustrations – most specially commissioned to illustrate the articles – were added. More photographs began to be used, and, occasionally, cartoons on social issues. The photo essay, as either a stand-alone body of work selected for its purely aesthetic value or one that complements and illustrates the central theme of a special issue, has over the years become one of its major defining elements with portfolios by Henri Cartier-Bresson, M.F. Husain, Richard Bartholomew, Pablo Bartholomew and Dayanita Singh, among others.

In 1983, the Quarterly published an interview with David Horsburgh, noted educationist and Indophile – adding an element that became a hallmark. The scores of interviews since published in every conceivable field – with author V.S. Naipaul, poet Kathleen Raine, mountaineer Edmund Hillary, His Holiness Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, lawyer Albie Sachs, linguist Noam Chomsky, artist S.H. Raza, economist Anita Bose Pfaff, and activist Suad Amiry, to name a few – continue to remain significant even today because they deal with perennial values on issues that take us beyond the everyday. To quote a former editor of the Quarterly: ‘Perhaps these might best be described as dialogues, as in-depth discussions, moving from personal insight to political commentary.’

 

A publishing history spanning more than four decades that includes hundreds of articles, photographs, interviews, poems, book reviews, drawings and illustrations, makes it impossible to highlight more than a representative sample. Currently, the Quarterly is published as three volumes: two a miscellany of articles on an eclectic range of subjects calculated to appeal to a broad-based readership, and the third, a double (thematic) volume on a specially chosen subject of contemporary relevance, which (from 1990 onwards) is also brought out as a book in collaboration with a leading publisher. Many of these thematic issues have gone on to become collectors’ items.

The earliest volumes dedicated to a single theme were Indian Popular Cinema: Myth, Meaning and Metaphor and India’s Population: Problems and Prospects, both published in 1981. When New Delhi hosted the prestigious IX Asian Games in 1982, the Quarterly published Sports: Through the Looking Glass. India: Forty Years (1987), brought together personalities and opinions reflecting the Indian context of the modern experience, an exploration from varying points of vantage of some salient areas involving decisions, both individual and collective.

 

To commemorate Calcutta’s tercentenary in 1990, the Quarterly compiled a collection of essays, historical photographs of the 1940s and ’50s, and drawings by Pulak Biswas and Mickey Patel, in the form of a monograph that attempted to adopt a different approach. The Calcutta Psyche went on to become the first title in the book co-publishing venture, establishing a tradition that continues to the present day. This engagement with contemporary debates of consequence has resulted in the thematic issue of the year being sought after and partnered by a commercial publisher.

Other co-publications have been a trilogy on three major problem areas that have haunted India over the years: The Great Divide: India and Pakistan (2008-2009), India China: Neighbours Strangers (2009-2010) and A Tangled Web: Jammu and Kashmir (2010-2011). India 60 (2006-2007), a critical overview of the country, was brought out to mark six decades post-Independence. In line with its tradition of reflection and stocktaking, and involving writers from both India and abroad, it covers a wide range of political, economic, educational, sociological and cultural issues. Its book version went on to feature in India Today’s top 20 non-fiction titles.

 

In 2015, the Quarterly’s theme volume, Thirty Years of SAARC: Society, Culture and Development (2014-2015) was published to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the establishment of SAARC. Contributors from all eight SAARC countries – Eric Gonsalves, Beena Sarwar, Aishath Velezine, Nihal Rodrigo, Kanak Mani Dixit, among others – assessed SAARC’s trajectory thus far, writing on economic, social and political issues, including discussions on human rights and trafficking, gender empowerment, literature and civil society initiatives. Two other noteworthy co-publishing ventures that have presciently commented on the times we live in are Interrogating Women’s Leadership and Empowerment (2012-2013) and Living with Religious Diversity (2013-2014).

The most recent co-publication is Education at the Crossroads (2015-2016), contemporaneous with the long-awaited National Education Policy, 2016. Engaging with the state of Indian education at all levels, it takes cognizance of disparities in incomes and social status and the heterogeneity of culture, religion and language.

 

Currently, as the West reels under the onslaught of technology, print media, in particular, has been severely impacted. Notwithstanding the advantage of newer technologies for printing and the Internet, which has evolved over the years, greatly increasing the speed of production and availability of information, newspapers and magazines are closing down at an alarming rate – retrenchment is rampant. Iconic magazines like Newsweek have now gone online; the shrinking of advertising space, and the downward spiral of subscriptions and readers has been catastrophic. Michael Stephens from the Columbia Journalism Review states: ‘Editors and news directors today fret about the Internet, as their predecessors worried about radio and TV.’ In an analysis of this situation, Reid Goldsborough observes, ‘The relative cost of doing all this is so low that it’s toppling multibillion dollar old-media institutions and threatening the printed world itself.’ Moreover, an increasing preference for online/digital technologies and reading apps like Kindle is gradually eroding the inclination towards the printed word. Clearly, Indian publishing is going to face this onslaught very soon, if it has not already. Where, then, does the IIC Quarterly – non-academic, yet erudite – feature in this constantly evolving electronic information age?

 

Notwithstanding this pessimistic scenario, the Quarterly continues to be published and its very presence, indeed relevance, over 40 years must be attributed to both readers as well as contributors. Primarily conceived and published for the IIC’s members – its circulation once entirely confined to member-subscribers, and still limited substantially by institutional policy on subscriptions – newer generations of audiences and publics across disciplines, who are non-members, are able to access the journal, as both readers and authors.

Despite the compulsion of publishing in peer-reviewed journals, a significant number of authors continue to write for this niche, non-commercial publication. Equally, the honorarium paid to contributors is extremely modest and could hardly be said to be the motivation. It would appear that despite these perceived disadvantages, authors seem to take these spaces seriously, and the journal’s stature is, in turn, elevated by such contributors. The average Quarterly reader – knowledgeable and intellectually curious – is richly rewarded by its eclectic content. In recent years, the use of their electronic spaces, such as blogs and websites, to disseminate the authors’ contributions has exponentially multiplied the journal’s reach.

Unfortunately, even as greater access continues to generate interest, even appreciation, it does not translate into any significant increase in subscriptions – possibly a reflection of the shift in communication technologies mentioned earlier, as also an institutional policy that has so far not been in favour of any online presence, except on JSTOR, a pay-and-use e-platform for journals and books.

The Quarterly is not a commercial publication with any particular bias – political or economic or cultural – and nor has it ever associated itself with any specific ideological movement. The intent is to provide a sane, liberal space for contested issues, possibly why its essays reflect a wide disparity of views. It is also this liberal stance that has made it increasingly attractive over the years as a platform of choice, particularly for young and up-coming writers, across disciplines. While being published in peer-reviewed journals is a career imperative and the norm for young academics and authors today, a gratifying number still contribute to the Quarterly by choice.

 

The engagement with national concerns directs it towards contemporary issues, questions and policy planning – and the challenge has been to present them in a manner that is neither purely academic, nor purely journalistic. Its very nature allows it to follow its own agenda and permits for meticulous planning, assessment, analysis and contemplation. It is also one of the very few publications today that does not carry any advertisements and is, therefore, unaffected by external attempts to dilute its editorial independence.

The search for meaningful material across a wide range of concerns often leads interested readers into exploring multiple outlets. Writers too have a wider range of forums to express and share their thoughts. Attracting and sustaining a pool of quality contributors and readers is thus not easy. The fact that over the years the Quarterly has been able to attract some of the best of both is testimony to its intellectual and aesthetic standards.