Portrait Artist Forum - View Single Post

Tarique Beg · 01-30-2002, 02:01 PM

Cynthia

I checked out Arul's site. It seems he was in Delhi around the same time I was there. From 1971 to 1980. Actually, our family was somewhat well known in New Delhi, because my dad was a Supreme Court judge there, who went on to become the Chief Justice of India in 1978. There was much controversy in New Delhi at that time, since Mrs. Gandhi appointed my dad over another senior judge who only had a month left for retirement. In 1978 when, our president Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed (who Arul painted) expired, my dad, being the fourth citizen of India, was summoned to the Parliament as a standby, in case something happened to the Vice President, who temporarily took over the president's office - the order of precedence is Prime Minister, President, Vice President, and Chief Justice.

We have a mixture of British Parliamentary and US Presidential democracy. The Indian President is the head of the armed forces, but otherwise is a figure head for the most part. The Prime Minister holds governing power. My dad, then swore in the next president of India, Gyani Zail Singh in 1978. So, for a while in those days we were in the news off and on, but not in a big way, because the Judiciary is expected to excercise a certain objective sobriety and isolate itself from political leanings and the general commotion that sometimes goes on in the House of Commons where some neophyte ministers settle differences by throwing slippers and shoes at one another.

Arul it seems also painted Mrs. Gandhi and other officials whom we occasionally met at official gatherings and have therefore known our family. So, it must have been in those days that he heard of us. Although I don't remember his name in The Delhi College Of Art (actually the best painters never went to Art School), I do once remember visiting a painter who had done an outstanding full length portrait of Nehru (Mrs. Gandhi's father). But again that artist was middle aged then which would make him in his seventies today.

My Dad (1913 - 1989)

01-30-2002, 02:01 PM	#24
Tarique Beg Juried Member Joined: Oct 2001 Location: Morgan Hill, CA Posts: 38	Cynthia I checked out Arul's site. It seems he was in Delhi around the same time I was there. From 1971 to 1980. Actually, our family was somewhat well known in New Delhi, because my dad was a Supreme Court judge there, who went on to become the Chief Justice of India in 1978. There was much controversy in New Delhi at that time, since Mrs. Gandhi appointed my dad over another senior judge who only had a month left for retirement. In 1978 when, our president Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed (who Arul painted) expired, my dad, being the fourth citizen of India, was summoned to the Parliament as a standby, in case something happened to the Vice President, who temporarily took over the president's office - the order of precedence is Prime Minister, President, Vice President, and Chief Justice. We have a mixture of British Parliamentary and US Presidential democracy. The Indian President is the head of the armed forces, but otherwise is a figure head for the most part. The Prime Minister holds governing power. My dad, then swore in the next president of India, Gyani Zail Singh in 1978. So, for a while in those days we were in the news off and on, but not in a big way, because the Judiciary is expected to excercise a certain objective sobriety and isolate itself from political leanings and the general commotion that sometimes goes on in the House of Commons where some neophyte ministers settle differences by throwing slippers and shoes at one another. Arul it seems also painted Mrs. Gandhi and other officials whom we occasionally met at official gatherings and have therefore known our family. So, it must have been in those days that he heard of us. Although I don't remember his name in The Delhi College Of Art (actually the best painters never went to Art School), I do once remember visiting a painter who had done an outstanding full length portrait of Nehru (Mrs. Gandhi's father). But again that artist was middle aged then which would make him in his seventies today. My Dad (1913 - 1989)