The pea under the mattress

"The important thing is not winning, but taking part." So goes the timeless satirical barb at the (fictitious) Arms Merchants Club, derisively equating the members' collective penchant for war games with the slogan of the Olympic Games. This cartoon, created by the maestro Abu Abraham back in 1982, is as potent today as it was then. Indeed, in looking over Abu's illustrated record of the second half of the 20th century, it becomes clear how little has changed – in Southasia and beyond.

Attupurathu Mathew Abraham ('Abu') was born in Tiruvalla, Kerala, on 11 June 1924. He began his career as a reporter at the Bombay Chronicle and the Bombay Sentinel, and later in Delhi worked as a staff cartoonist and caricaturist at the satirical English-language journal Shankar's Weekly. In July 1953, he moved to London, to receive immediate acclaim from widely respected publications in the UK (see accompanying article, 'Abu in London'). Abu Abraham returned to India in 1969 to work in Delhi as a political cartoonist at the Indian Express (1969-81), where he earned a reputation as one of the most hard-hitting cartoonists anywhere in the modern era. The accompanying selection of his work focuses on the turbulent, formative years from 1966 to 1988.