Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay has issued a public clarification after facing criticism online over its alleged association with an event titled 'South Asian Capitalism'.
The backlash came after a flyer promoting the event carried caricatures resembling top leaders from India’s ruling party, sparking outrage on social media.
The event is scheduled to be held at the Institute for South Asia Studies, University of California (UC) Berkeley, on Friday, September 12. The flyer named IIT Bombay as one of the organisers, alongside UC Berkeley and the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, as per a report by Indian Express.
In a statement posted on its official X handle on September 10, Wednesday night, IIT Bombay denied any role in designing or approving the flyer and announced steps to address the issue.
“A post on x.com regarding a flyer of a workshop on South Asian Capitalism was brought to the attention of the Institute authorities. This workshop is to be held at University of Berkeley in partnership with UC Berkeley and University of Massachusetts-Amherst for young scholars. IIT Bombay has a project related to the New Political Economic Initiative. However, we were totally unaware about the published flyer. Upon hearing about this post, we issued immediate instructions to the organisers to take down the flyer from all social media platforms and remove IIT Bombay’s name from everything to do with this event,” the institute said.
It further added, “The details of the programme have been removed from the website of New Political Economy Initiative with immediate effect. No one from IIT Bombay is attending the conference. The Institute was not at all consulted about the flyer. We are deeply shocked and upset by its content. The Institute will cease to associate with these faculty members from UC Berkeley and University of Massachusetts-Amherst going forward. Further investigation into the matter will be conducted.”
The flyer in question, titled Pyramid of Capitalist India, depicts a pyramid with five layers. The top shows caricatures of business tycoons with the statement “we rule you,” followed by caricatures resembling ruling party leaders with the statement “we fool you.”
The next row shows security personnel with the line “we shoot at you,” while the bottom two layers depict the middle class and the working class with captions reading “we work for all” and “we feed all.”
The workshop, co-sponsored by UC Berkeley and the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, aims to explore how “capitalist accumulation is socially structured across South Asia.”
