Acknowledgements My greatest debt is to Homai Vyarawalla for inspiration, patience and reposing trust in me. Without her generous sharing and warm hospitality over two long years this book would not have been completed. I hope that in some measure it makes up for the many disruptions that the project has caused in her otherwise tranquil life. I thank Dr. Shernaz Cama for making this book possible. I am also grateful to the Parzor Foundation and the UNESCO-Parzor project for funding my research. This publication was funded by a grant from the Ministry of Culture, Government of India to whom I am extremely thankful. I first started to work on Homai Vyarawalla in 1998, as part of a study on women photographers in India, that was funded by India Foundation for the Arts, Bangalore. Thanks are also due to Bipin Shah, Paulomi Shah and Janki Sutaria at Mapin, Ahmedabad.
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There are others upon whom I have depended for intellectual and emotional support. Shohini Ghosh, my colleague and friend for all seasons, for a first critical reading, for taking over some of my responsibilities with teaching, and for being supportive in all kinds of ways. My other ‘family’, Ranjani Mazumdar, Shikha Jhingan and Sabina Kidwai, for suggestions and many helpful chats around the book. Alan Ross-Guy, for pushing me to meet Homai in the summer of 2000. I would never have managed to complete this book without my mother, Shashi Gadihoke, taking over completely on the home front. I also gained immensely from Sunday morning chats with my father Vice Admiral (Retd.) S.M. Gadihoke P.V.S.M. and ‘mamaji’ (Satpal Behl), who also read parts of the manuscript and helped fill in the gaps of an era that was unfamiliar to me. My deep gratitude to Sarita Handa, for being friend and mentor through good times and bad. In Baroda, I would like to thank Mrs. Vyarawalla's friend and neighbour Jayshree Mishra for her warmth and helpfulness. To Nandini Manjrekar, Naina, Chitrangada Mitra and Shankar Mitra, my deepest gratitude, for making Baroda more pleasurable and hospitable. The genesis of the book lies in Three Women and a Camera (1998), a documentary I made on three women photographers including Homai Vyarawalla. I owe a debt of gratitude to the other two protagonists of the film, Dayanita Singh and Sheba Chhachi, for their support to the project.
The research for this book was aided by work at the libraries of Teen Murti and the Press Information Bureau. Homai’s interviews over the past seven years were transcribed by Payal Radhawa, Ghazala Amin, Ambarean Al Qadar, Shakeb Ahmad, Rabiya Jairam and Khadeeja Arif. I am grateful to Madan Mehta at Mahattas studios for printing Homai’s negatives. I also owe thanks to Kailash Dilwali, Aditya Arya, Shyam Benegal, Ivy Lerner-Frank, Kitty Tawakley, Tanika Sarkar, Joy Michael, Bhaskar Ghosh, Narayani Gupta, Usha Bhagat, Lt. General (Retd.) Adi Sethna, Padma Bhushan, P.V.S.M., A.V.S.M., Khorshed Sethna, Iffat Fatima, and Homai’s contemporaries T. Mathra and N. Thiagarajan for clarifying so many small details that a book is made up of. The manuscript has greatly benefited from the inputs of Shernaz Cama, who also edited the book. Needless to say, I am grateful to photographer Satish Sharma for doggedly pursuing a trail and persuading Homai Vyarawalla to emerge from her life of anonymity in 1989. When I started to work on this book, I wrote to Homai’s friends all over the world, all of whom responded. I am particularly grateful to Omana Jacob and Sima Bose for all their helpful dispatches. I am deeply touched by the interest shown in the book by Lorna Clift in Punchbowl, Sydney and for sending me the correspondence between Homai and her late father Hugh McInnes, who I know would have loved to read this book. Thanks are also due to Mr. R.P. Perera and Ambreen Ali-Shah at UNESCO, New Delhi; Hemant Mehta, Dushyant Mehta, Abhilasha Kumari, Ras Behari Das, Yaaminey Mubayi, Niloufer Shroff, Jehangir Cama, Jameela Verghese, Kapila Vatsyayan, Ashok Dilwali, Kety and Keki Pavri, Merzban Khajotia, Rumy Mistry, C.S. Lakshmi, Yogesh Nigam and Vinod Kaul. I am grateful to my workplace, the A.J.K. Mass Communication Research Centre, at Jamia University and to its Director Dr. Iftekhar Ahmad for giving me short periods of leave to write this book. I was greatly encouraged in this project by my former Director and friend, the late Dr. Habeeb Kidwai. I will miss his gentle presence when this book is released. This book took two years to complete because of the commitments of a full-time teaching job. My home became my haven during this time, where I would lock myself away and work. My final debt, by no means small, is to the family of cats who solemnly and silently watched over me as I wrote this manuscript. Sabeena Gadihoke July 2nd, 2005
