The New York Times has issued an apology for an editorial cartoon in its international edition that critics claim mocks India’s Mars Mission by showing a man in a traditional dhoti and turban who is leading a cow on a leash and knocking on the door of the “Elite Space Club”, while inside two bespectacled men in bow ties look perplexed by the sound.
The cartoon was published online on September 28 after India’s Mangalyaan probe began orbiting Mars at a cost of $74 million (4.5 billion rupees), which BBC News reported was “one of the cheapest interplanetary space missions ever.”
The space craft was launched on November 5 by the Indian Space Research Organisation, and began orbiting the red planet on September 24, joining four other US and European missions circling Mars and giving India a success in its first-ever Mars mission, something neither the US or Russia could accomplish.
Critics quickly complained the cartoon was racist and went too far.
Similar complaints followed several days later when the Boston Herald published a cartoon showing a White House intruder in President Barack Obama’s bathtub asking him if he’d tried watermelon flavoured toothpaste.
The Herald and its editorial cartoonist apologised within hours in that situation. The Times apology comes about a week after the first complaints on social media and a debate about who was being ridiculed in the space-mission cartoon. Was it the people of India? Or was it the fat cats who make up the “Elite Space Club”?
Andrew Rosenthal, editorial page editor for The New York Times, apologised via Facebook on Sunday: “A large number of readers have complained about a recent editorial cartoon in The International New York Times, about India’s foray into space exploration. The intent of the cartoonist, Heng Kim Song, was to highlight how space exploration is no longer the exclusive domain of rich, Western countries. Mr. Heng, who is based in Singapore, uses images and text – often in a provocative way – to make observations about international affairs. We apologize to readers who were offended by the choice of images in this cartoon. Mr. Heng was in no way trying to impugn India, its government or its citizens. We appreciate that readers have shared their feedback, which we welcome.”
