One of the most important things to understand in today?s world with its advances in information technology is that while choices increase, there is a singular lack of perspectives. This is understandable in the context of a world dominated by monopoly capital. Multiple perspectives and their articulation are uneconomic for consumerism, which relies on mass consumption of standardised products whose basis is neither their being better nor more competitive, rather, that they are the only things available in a market controlled by a handful of monopolists.

?Sufi Dance?, Oil-on-canvas painting by Arpana Caur

The fault does not lie with the market as is assumed by many. It is merely an important and a space for transactions of different sorts to take place. It could be a space for barter, as many border areas between primitive tribes served as, an area where exchanges between equals took place. It could be a market facilitated by currency, with only the profit motive allowing for an increasing control by accumulators over both competitive producers, who are either destroyed in competition or integrated in takeovers, and, the consumer whose choices in the original competitive market are succussively reduced till he has only the choice of buying what is made available for sale.

The market of a command socialist economy is similar, with the difference that production and prices are geared to the fulfilment of needs, not to profiting from the consumer.

The consumer, under conditions of monopoly capitalism, increasingly becomes a slave from being an illusory king under competitive capitalism. Consumption without effective choice as to what to consume, becomes a bondage that is no less unhealthy for human beings and for a creative life as force-feeding is for the geese whose lives are to be extracted to make pate de foie gras.

That is why I disagree sharply with those who attack the market and not its manipulators. It is like those people who fail to distinguish between an electricity generator and the ?electric chairs.? Neither the world market nor the process of globalisation that brings people closer to each other is something we should run away from.

Only we must ensure that the benefits of the revolution in information technology and transportation should belong to the mass of people of the world and not just a handful. In this process, just as markets and movement of goods are being freed, the consumer must also be freed from the command control of the monopolists in the market.

This can be done by informing the consumer of the choices that are available. Indeed, the media and the internet go a long way in helping to facilitate this process. But then, information is not enough. It must be backed up by freedom of access.

The profit motive is the main obstacle to this. For example, one is constantly reading about the way in which Chinese production will flood the market. But it is not doing because retailors are themselves bonded to monopolists and prefer to fleece the customer rather than offer him the best at the price.

The art market is similar. The monopolists in it would love to restrict all sales to a handful of big names. Even smaller galleries prefer to promote just a coterie of artists who hang around them. But a number of galleries are sticking their necks out and make Indian art competitive by organising mega-shows with catalogues. Among these, one could mention the catalogues of the ?Harvest 2001? show of Arushi Arts and ?The Joy of Life? of Art Alive, both in New Delhi.

Both accessed and promoted close to a hundred artists each. And the successful sales that followed reflect the consumer?s gratitude at being offered a wider choice.

What is more, buyers chose very judiciously. Art collector Anil Chandra acquired a Durga Kainthola series.

The social activist Suman Sahay now owns one of Arpana Caur?s best works, gourmet restaurant owner Ritu Dalmia bought a work of Paresh Roy who is the artist cook of Biman Das, the principal of the Kolkata College of Art. Other artists whose work is not seen in the limelight but who sold almost immediately were Gauri Pant, Debabrata De, Gauri Vemula and Ratnapali Kant.