Decolonial comics in a sceptic time: a colloquy with Vidyun Sabhaney

In this interview, Rounak Gupta and Partha Bhattacharjee speak with Vidyun Sabhaney, a comics artist, editor, curator, illustrator, and practitioner. They discuss her art practices, her editorial work in both volumes of First Hand Vol. 1 and 2, her individual comics works such as ‘Broken Lines’, ‘The Spoke in Wheel’, and ‘Double Speak’, her collaborative projects with other artists—Food & Farming: A Journey Through India in Comics, Orijit Sen and Harsho Mohan Chattoraj, and her role as a comics publisher for Captain Bijli Comics. The interview also explores the challenges that independent publishers encounter in India, the role of international presses in shaping India’s post-millennial comics scene, censorship in Indian comics, the economy, and the politics of comics in contemporary India and the global context. While the primary objective of the interview is to understand how an artist shapes their oeuvre, we also seek to decipher the role of comics activism or artivism in India, with a special focus on ignored social and political issues.