As a college student, I’d live out the month by humble means just to save up for a gig I wanted to go to. Hyderabad at the time was a fantastic venue that constantly hosted international artists, and electronic music had really come into being as part of the culture in the city. So watching it change from parties that ended at sunrise to clubs being shut down at 1 AM was dispiriting. 

On the other hand, any visarjans (the immersion of idols in a water body as a closing ceremony of festivals) that I've attended had no limitations or complaints despite them being a larger and louder public spectacle. Even the cops that were there were only present as security, not to cease the program. It was then I started to wonder about how the rules for public gatherings were different based on where they fit in the cultural map of India. Despite having a history of violence, conspiracies, displacement and several other interlinked social evils, organized religion had the upper hand over rave culture. Dance music was just a deviant ‘Western’ lifestyle that had no merit. So the issue of noise pollution, disturbance, or volume was never the problem but the content and intention of the sound was. There was politics involved in something as benevolent as music. 

Delhi-based sound artist, DJ & music producer Anandit Sachdev dissects these ‘politics of sound’ in his paper, The Anatomy and Political Currency of Sound Systems. Commissioned by CTM Festival, an art and music festival in Berlin for their 2024 theme ‘Sustain’. The research paper dives into the use and misuse of sound systems in propagating hyper-nationalist ideologies in India. Anandit started his journey as a DJ in Berlin where he played with various artist collectives over the course of two years. He also started Antariksh Records after moving back home, a label featuring genre-agnostic music from the subcontinent.

Anandit started looking into how local sound systems operate in the social landscape. Employed for weddings, parties, and particularly religious festivals, he noted how the demand for these sound systems forms a sort of ‘sonic ritual’ with religious undertones. This set the precedent for the central theme of the paper, which explains how sound systems play a role in pushing religious and nationalist agendas in the country. 

We’ve all witnessed environments in rallies that are led by blaring communal songs, whether it’s for the promotion of a political party or a religious festival. The artist explains, through his paper, how the technologies of sound, and the mechanisms behind its production and reproduction are weaponized to establish a dominion in the public space. 

Anandit dissects how the language and lyricism in communal songs (detailed in Kunal Purohit’s investigative book about right-wing music culture) incites anti-minority emotion among the listeners by playing into the trope of a set narrative. The insights from Dhananjai Sinha & Pranoy Kanojia documentary, 'A Sound Democracy', which is cited in the paper, further unveil how by using sounds like the conch, war drums and bells, religious artists evoke the ‘warrior’ in devotees, nudging them further into action against the assumed enemy of the state which happens to be, for them, a specific minority community. Anandit also expounds on the power of sound itself in mobilizing the crowds, “The engagement and relationship of oneself with a sound system is that of corporeality. Sound systems have the ability to exude power by their literal ability to move air. This puts the corporeal directly in relationship with the sonic and the spatial. How our bodies move in space and how we embody sound become important questions to ask.”

In other words, music resonates through the emotional response we have to it. A part of this resonance is credited to the archetype a song is written about: we become the lover when we listen to Hozier or the tortured loner to a System Of A Down track. So when a certain patriotic song about warriors taking up arms against the enemy is played in a crowd that already has strong feelings about making India a homogenous nation, it’s a recipe for disaster; also something that fascist forces are counting on. Anandit’s paper focuses on understanding this insidious use of sound as an oppressive instrument. 

He shares, “For me, sound, in this context, is a tool used to ritualize an ambient form of violence. Simply put, using sound as a tactic of intimidation can help in creating ambient forms of violence in the built environment. This coupled with the ritualistic in turn gives the whole affair a certain kind of legitimacy – one which is bestowed upon it often by its religious associations.”

So, the question rather is this: how big of a role does sonic violence and intimidation play as a precursor or a prelude to physical forms of violence? There have already been instances where such ambient violence has turned physical, tipping over the thresholds that separate them. How sensitive are we/ do we have to be to the nuances of how the sonic can turn into a form of violence? How far will it be explored before we truly start thinking of sound in such ways?

In his paper Anandit also refers to inattention as a tool of perception nor non-perception, so to speak, against this ‘ambient violence’. Women understand this inattention all too well through the premise of bodies and space, more particularly, the politics of gender in public spaces. The entitlement with which men occupy a public space, with a self-imposed status and privilege, also requires a similar indifference. Women are often subjected to an ill-intentioned, unwanted stare, a lewd gesture or an invasion of personal boundaries in a public space. More often than not we’re compelled to ignore it or we risk our safety if we do speak up. This intrusive imposition of power that turns the air thick with a palpable tension also exists sonically when anthems of a majority group are blasted in a country that already has a history of marginalizing the minority. Inattention then, according to Anandit’s paper, becomes the final measure in maintaining some semblance of peace. This may be the norm but it doesn't make it any less unfortunate, I think, that the responsibility of avoiding violence always falls on the oppressed. 

However, the corrupting agendas of sound and sound systems are only as powerful as the people they impact. As the artist puts it, “The language a sound system speaks, whether it be of inclusion or exclusion, makes these sound systems largely deterministic of the kind of ideologies they propagate and the kind of solidarity they amass.” 

The paper contrasts the propagandist intention of the Right with Jamaican sound system subcultures that stand for dissent and resistance against fascism. Reggae culture has been brewing in India for a few decades now, with selectors like Delhi Sultanate & Begum X of Bass Foundation Roots sound system in Delhi, Dakta Dub of Monkey sound system in Hyderabad,  the 10,000 Lions Sound System in Goa and more. Reggae, born from the core Rastafari ideologies of anti-slavery, anti-colonial and anti-imperialist beliefs, is a form of resistance against dominant culture and oppression, advocating for the reclamation of power from the state back to the people. Anandit’s paper also sheds light on how the subculture, in India, counters the groupthink forces by empowering free thought and individual narratives against the machine of hegemony. 

Showcasing the two sides of a coin: power and its subversion; oppression & liberation; fascist & democratic ideals, The Anatomy and Political Currency of Sound Systems unearths the inner workings of sound and sound systems as an apparatus in the sociocultural fabric of the country. 

It’s also a look into how a practice that is often overlooked as harmless can have political connotations and implications. An enlightening exploration into the power dynamics of communal conflict, Anandit's paper brings the modality of sound to the foreground in the discourse around culture and the co-existence of communities. Even though the battle against fascism is a tough one to win, especially in a country like India where dissent is labelled as anti-national, understanding how social practices are used for its propagation is still an important defense against the psychological manipulations of the oppressor. 

Better the devil you know than the one you dismiss as the norm.

Follow Anandit here and read his paper here.

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