Along with the full text (in English) of the conversation between Dr. MR Rajagopal, the pioneering palliative care specialist in India and Dr. SS Lal, renowned public health care expert.Dr Lal: Palliative care is a topic where a lot of discussions are happening in recent times. Today we are discussing this topic with a veteran in the field of palliative care, Dr MR Rajagopal, whom I personally view as one of my teachers. Dr Rajagopal has made very important interventions in the palliative care field in India.Sir, Palliative care is often highly misunderstood as a care regime. I remember a doctor getting angry when his ailing wife was advised to be given palliative care. Even the medical community is not well-aware. So, my first question is very basic . What is Palliative Care?Dr Rajagopal: We need a patient-centred approach in health care. As a medical student, I have seen many instances of patients suffering acute pain while others looked at it as a normal thing. Doctors and medical students who learn from them often prefer to turn their faces away from this pain. Now I understand that this reaction comes from a sort of helplessness. We did not know how to address this pain.Dr Lal: As a child, I have also seen many patients suffer for days and months. Has the situation changed now? We all used to see pain just as an inevitable part of life. What do you think?Dr Rajagopal: Only 4% of Indians have access to palliative care. 96% do not have access. Even the doctors who study MBBS and MD do not learn about pain relief. Palliative Care became part of our MBBS curriculum only in 2019.Dr Lal: I also have felt that we are lacking something in our approach to pain. The common attitude is that we are destined to suffer pain.Dr Rajagopal: Everybody compares other people’s pain to the pain that they have experienced sometime back in their lives. However, the other person’s pain could be more intense and we cannot know that. One might have experienced the pain of bone fracture or labour pain. Of the total palliative care needs of a society, only 30% is related to cancer. For example, Ischemic pain sometimes is far more unbearable than cancer pain. Sometimes the patient will suffer this pain for months or even years. Sometimes I feel there is this reluctance to address pain just because the solution is so simple. If expensive technology were involved, there would have been more interest for all. There is no glamour in this. This is not elite. Maybe that is the reason.Dr Lal: Even now the public is not fully aware of the scope and importance of palliative care. Who can make them more aware? Do you think domain specialisation is a necessary prerequisite?Medical Council of India has approved palliative medicine as a speciality even 7 years before it became part of MBBS curriculum. There are 10 centres in India and one in Kerala. Yet, there are only 30 palliative specialisation seats in these centres taken altogether. In a country of 1.3 billion population, we have only this many seats.Dr Rajagopal: How effective has the government intervention been in educating the public about palliative care? No such intervention has been there from the government to educate the people. A National Programme for Palliative Care was instituted in 2012. Keshav Deshraj, the then Health Principal Secretary, had taken the initiative for that. That programme has a comprehensive approach in it. However, it was not implemented effectively. The National Health Policy of 2017 focused on instituting palliative care as part of primary health care. Under it, national level and state level trainers were trained during the Covid years. Now the policy has to be implemented by state governments.Dr Lal: As you said, palliative medicine has become affordable for all. Yet, there are so many who do not have access to it. How can we fill in this gap in implementation?Dr Rajagopal: There are huge gaps in implementation. For example, palliative care was included in the primary health sector. We all applaud that. But it is not there in tertiary care. Until someone’s disease is concluded as incurable, there is no provision for pain relief for the pain, for asthma, or depression that the patient suffers from. He or she has to reach the village in their last two weeks of life to get palliative care.Isn’t that an irony? Doesn’t the care need to begin during the tertiary care days itself? Somehow, even the National Healthcare Policy is silent about tertiary sector palliative care. The World Health Organisation documents stress the need for palliative care in the primary sector. This is so because they already have palliative care in the tertiary sector. We mindlessly copied those guidelines.In Kerala, the palliative policy was adopted in 2008. There was this problem in that too. The budget came from the National Rural Health Mission. So there was no specific budget allocated for the tertiary care sector. In 2019, when the policy was revised in Kerala, tertiary care was added. Due to Covid, its implementation is now delayed. Now the steps are being taken to implement in the tertiary sector.The Kerala government has been very responsive to our demand to revamp the policy when we asked for it in 2019. Now budget allocation is required to implement the new policy. A few months before, some money was allocated to all Medical Colleges to start palliative units but the money has not reached the colleges yet as there were technical issues.Dr Lal: In Kerala, the average longevity has increased. However, Kerala’s population has a high occurrence of lifestyle diseases and we do not have sufficient systems in place to support them when they need it. The kids who are abroad or working somewhere else come back for a few weeks for end of life care of their parents and the care is limited to it.Dr Rajagopal: This is a very important issue. Ten percent of all of us including we two and the viewers of this interview will be dying from cancer. Seven percent of our population have dementia. According to India Population study 2015, 1.7 lakh aged persons were living alone. Of them, 1.43 lakh are women.Dr Lal: Our culture is also contributing to that. In any marriage, men will be older than women on an average by 5 years. Added to that, men have less longevity than women here. So, they die at least 5 years younger and the age gap between a husband’s death and wife’s death thus is, on an average, 10 years. 10 years of widowhood thus becomes guaranteed.Dr Rajagopal: As I said, out of the 1.7 lakh people who live alone, 1.43 lakh are women only. These are not the people who can afford a home nurse. In the villages, we, the palliative workers are familiar with the lives they live and the deaths they die. This is a big issue. We imported the idea of nuclear families from western countries. In the West, when they shifted to that family structure, they parallelly made systems to address the consequences; institutions such as nursing homes for the aged. We did not do that.Dr Lal: Kerala has a huge geriatric population. The number of children per family is low and those kids would go to distant places to make a living. And we blame children for not looking after their parents in old age. However, the entire family sometimes would be living off his or her income only. Isn’t this a reality?Dr Rajagopal: There is no meaning in blaming the children. Our generation created this kind of society where children are supposed to leave in search of better jobs. The average number of children per couple in Kerala is only 1.6. What happens is one couple shoulders the responsibility of looking after 4 aged persons. Don’t they have a life? Don’t they need to educate their own children? I will not blame the young generation. I have seen that most of them go that arduous extra mile to balance between their work and taking care of their parents.Dr Lal: Another aspect is that in a family, it is the primary responsibility of women to care for the ailing and the aged. I know educated and employed women who take care of both their parents and in-laws. The burden is often entirely on women.Dr Rajagopal: 90% of caregivers are women. The society here thinks that women are not supposed to live their own lives. Now the rich people have access to care homes but the poor cannot afford them. Care homes should be there and they have to be accessible to all.Dr Lal: In Kerala, 60 to 70 percent of the population depend on the private sector for their health care needs. Care in the private sector incurs a heavy cost too. Do you think this has any impact on palliative care?Dr Rajagopal: Among the audience of this interview, many would not like talking about death. Suppose somebody has the courage to talk about it and suppose we ask them, where they want to die; Is it among a number of machines, in an air conditioned ICU? Would you prefer it or would you want to die in your own bed? A large majority of those who go to private hospitals are now destined to die in intensive care units. Think what a cruel practice this is. When your life is ending, what would you want but a loving touch; I would want to say my last words to my wife, to hold the hands of my children, and to get a kiss on my cheek from my grandchildren. Instead you have tubes in all your orifices and you hear the bleeps of the machines when you die. There are many hurdles before us if we want to change this; there are legal ambiguities too. What is the responsibility of a doctor? There are many doctors who think that their responsibility is solely to prolong life in one way or the other. Medical science actually defines the role of a doctor as reducing suffering. The bio ethics unit of ICMR also says so. There is no understanding about the quality of life and death.Dr Lal: Have you noticed this exploitative practice of falsely promising magical cures to people who have reached their end of life days and extracting their last savings? There are many such instances. I think that is an unavoidable tragedy. When you stand face to face with death, the first impulse is not to accept it.Dr Rajagopal: Kubler-Ross who wrote the world famous book, ‘On Death and Dying’, has listed the different stages of grief. The first stage is denial. Then comes anger and the next is bargaining- you try to bargain with God praying that I will worship you if you let me live. The patient also bargains with his/her doctor- for example, if saved, they say they would never smoke again. Another kind of bargain is to blame it on the doctor treating that person and to approach another one- system hopping and doctor shopping. And there are many who try to exploit this situation.Dr Lal: It has been an honour to do this interview because you are a person who has dedicated his life to palliative care and as a doctor myself, I respect you as a teacher too. Before we conclude, do you want to add anything as a message to our audience?Dr Rajagopal: I would like to say this- palliative care is not just for cancer patients or for end-of-life care. It is the treatment regime to reduce suffering and pain in all kinds of ailments. As much as we understand that, the suffering of ourselves and the people who are around us gets reduced. We should also bring palliative care into the private sector.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Watch the full interview in Malayalam, <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/the-aidem-interactions-dr-mr-rajagopal/">here</a>.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">See more from MedTalk Series, <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/tag/medtalk/">Here</a>.

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Along with the full text (in English) of the conversation between Dr. MR Rajagopal, the pioneering palliative care specialist in India and Dr. SS Lal, renowned public health care expert.

Dr Lal: Palliative care is a topic where a lot of discussions are happening in recent times. Today we are discussing this topic with a veteran in the field of palliative care, Dr MR Rajagopal, whom I personally view as one of my teachers. Dr Rajagopal has made very important interventions in the palliative care field in India.

Only 4 percent of Indian Population has Access to Palliative Care

Here is an edited transcript of the interview with Philippe Humbert, French political analyst and long time India watcher, with Venkitesh Ramakrishnan, Managing Editor of The AIDEM.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Hello and welcome to The AIDEM Interactions. The AIDEM Interactions is today with an international guest. A specialist on India and Indian affairs. All the way from Paris. Philippe Humbert of Jean Jaures foundation. Welcome Philippe to The AIDEM Interactions. We know that you have been interacting with India right from the 1980s. Perhaps you know more about India than many Indians know. And you also wrote this interesting book published in 1992: The Rajiv Gandhi Years. You have had a special focus on the Congress Party because that was the ruling party at that point of time. Of course now we have a lot of things happening. The situation in India has changed. You’re coming to India after four years. After the COVID Period. So when you compare the visits made in the past and compare with the situations in the 1980s and 1990s and the New Millenia, what are the main changes you’ve seen in India?Philippe Humbert: From a political internal viewpoint I think that the situation where the Congress was a big party, things were different. Congress used to have a more diversified base.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Diversified base?Philippe Humbert: A more diversified base and it was more like a coalition of parties or segments of the population. Now I think when the BJP took over in 2014, I think, it’s acting as a big machinery. It’s a big block. A very strong machinery. And I think with a strong local organisation and Central organisation, more than when the Congress was in power.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: In your book, you talk about how the Congress built a coalition of various segments of society. We call them Castes and Communities here. But the BJP is pursuing what is called the Hindutva Philosophy. But using this the Hindutva philosophy, it has made some major inroads in terms of unifying large sections of the Hindu society. How do you look at that phenomenon?Philippe Humbert: Well I think this phenomenon is something new in India. Because it is a shift toward a society where there is a kind of monolithic view of Hinduism. It is to be noted that India is not a Hindu country, though a large majority of the population is Hindu. There is Hinduism, of course. But with a big segment of Muslim, Christian, Sikh or Jains. It’s diversified. So shifting policy towards a Hindu block is something which is a bit odd in my view. This phenomenon is related to some experience in some other countries where there is a block according to, I would not say religion or belief, just strongly based on cultural custom and habits.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: OK but, when you say that this is similar to other countries. Can you name some?Philippe Humbert: Of course, in Israel, there is this tendency. The same way, Israel is being considered as a Jewish country, one hundred percent. Which is not true because there are Arab minorities, who are citizens.So it can’t be a Jewish State even if some people would like to call it that way. It’s this kind of movement that is happening in India. Only thing is, it’s much bigger. So that’s something new according to me.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Something new and perhaps something that is taking us towards a sectarian state. A state which is kind of pushing a sectarian agenda.Philippe Humbert: Yes. I think that this view is in a way against secularism. Because secularism means that the State does not have any religious image. Secularism stands as a separation of the State, government and religion. It is what was done in France in 1905.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Of course, we all know that France is the place where the concept of Secularism originated. Interestingly, two judges of the Indian Supreme court said recently that religion and politics should not be mixed. So that is something that echoes with what you are saying. Would you like to comment on point like this ?Philippe Humbert: Secularism in France is an essential ideal. Long ago, for years, for centuries the King was supposed to represent God in France. But that has changed. So much so, that the Catholic Church of France had been struggling to have a strong influence over the state and government in many areas. But the fact is that the 1905 law, (law on separation of religion and the State) what’s called Laicite in France is still there.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: There were also demands to reform the secularism idea of France, especially in the context of the Hijab controversy and related issues that came up in the 90s and early 2000s….Philippe Humbert: Yes there are some views like that and it’s reality now but you know this law, the 1905 law, has not been changed. It has not been changed at all. Only thing is that its implementation in some areas, mainly in schools and in some public domain areas like Administration, can be in ways, a bit pragmatic, according to local circumstances. But the law has not been changed and I don’t think it will be changed.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Do you think it should not be changed?Philippe Humbert: It should not be changed. Because it is a law that provides for some basic freedom of conscience, freedom of religions, freedom of performing your religion, freedom of not to tell some people to do something. So it’s very basic. In a way it’s very simple. In principle it’s very simple. Of course, sometimes the implementation can be a bit complicated but I think it should not be changed and there is no real attempt to change the law, except some people asking for that.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: But even when you say that, one also sees that the far right in France is growing in strength from election to election and they’re getting more and more seats in Parliament, they are having a higher share of votes. So ultimately I think, perhaps, France is also heading towards an India-kind of situation.Philippe Humbert: Okay well, it’s true that the far right is increasing. There are currently about 80 to 90 MPs. Which is a big number, the biggest ever and there is a trend but we will see in the future. It is very difficult to say that in some years things will be as some people would like it to be. just imagine the situation four years ago. It was before COVID, before the Ukrainian war, and see how the world was different now. So, four years ahead, well, see. But we have to fight.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: I think across Europe migration is a major issue. And if you look at France’s history, France was a country which promoted migration especially from African countries like Tunisia. But I think there is a public sentiment against it growing in France as well. How do you account for something like that?Philippe Humbert: Yes it is true that there is migration pressure coming from the South. Mainly coming from African countries and also from countries which are involved in wars you know. Afghanistan, Syria and now Ukrainians, but it’s a very different context. It is true there is a kind of pressure. But we’ll have to build up a regime where we can welcome those people who are willing to settle down and to be integrated in and that to be done. But there is a quantum which is possible to accommodate and sometimes, on some occasion there are some situations which are difficult to tackle.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Anyway, let us come back to India. Because we have been talking about France more than India. I remember in some of your writings, when you said that the India Story, which you have been following since the middle 1980s, is about economic growth. That is something which you have consistently held. What is the kind of economic growth situation that you see in India at this point of time?Philippe Humbert: Well I think the economic growth in India for this current year is supposed to be around six percent, which is a relatively high number compared to the world. In many countries it is much less, even in China. Even so, this is a nominal number of growth. There are strong points in the Indian economy. I would say that all those IT companies like Infosys, Wipro, all the services or those related to renewable energy are doing quite well. Especially Solar energy, which was my field, saw great development in India over the last few years. Other areas that are going very well are, I think, Aeronautics. Civil aviation is also booming. And of course, the telecommunication work has totally changed. The technology is totally new now and you know that. And India is performing well in this field. But also, what is not new is that some basic problems in India are not served right. First, mass education. I think India should have a mass education project, which has been done in China. And if China is at such a high level that’s because they have performed much more in education and social amenities. I think in India you have a very high level of higher institutions, such the famous IITs and many private universities are doing exceptionally well. But still mass education is not growing at a desired rate.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Indeed, there has to be some focus on mass education. But in terms of primary and secondary education, there are States like Kerala which have done very well.Philippe Humbert: Yeah, yes. It demonstrates that it is possible. It is just a matter of will. In India you have a Centre and you have the States. Kerala is doing well. Tamil Nadu is doing pretty well also. Why are other states not doing as well? So it’s a matter of concern. The possibilities are not used by the local authorities of those States which are not dedicated enough in some cases.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Right. You talked about the growth in the aviation industry. France and India have an aviation connection, <span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;display:inline !important;float:none;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;orphans:2;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">the <a style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/exposing-the-corruption-wars-in-the-modi-regime/">Rafaele</a><span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;display:inline !important;float:none;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;orphans:2;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;"> Deal.&nbsp; How do you look at that connection?Philippe Humbert: But it’s not new. It’s not new at all. You must remember that Dassault aeroplanes have been introduced in India, in the 1950s. And many of the Pilots have been trained on planes coming from Dassault at that time. So it is a very old story. The relationship in aviation. Then it came to a new kind of aeroplane. The last one is Rafael. So I know India has selected Rafael but it is true also for civil aviation. And very recently Air India has ordered, the biggest order, in the world. Five hundred aeroplanes. Coming from about 50% Airbus and 50% Boeing. It shows that Civil aviation is booming in India. A lot of airports are being expanded.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Apart from aviation the other area that you know India and France had a huge collaboration was on solar energy. What is the future of that now?Philippe Humbert: Well I am extremely dedicated to the solar industry because I’ve been in India, like five, six years working in India itself, expanding solar plants with a French company which is a pioneer in industry. It was in 2015 and you remember the COP15 in Paris. It was where the solar alliance, the International Solar Alliance, was created with the French government and your government and now implemented in Delhi. So I am a strong believer of solar energy and generally renewable energy with wind and other sources.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: But is India doing well in the renewable energy section?Philippe Humbert: I think India is going quite well for renewable energy. To see the numbers of gigawatts which are installed at capacity is huge. So for India, it is a good move. I must say that it’s a good example of what has to be done in many countries. Solar energy and wind energy.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: India has now got the chairmanship of the G20 now. How do you think it is going to impact India’s global standing as well as especially its relationship with countries like France?Philippe Humbert: Yes, this is new. I think India is more assertive in world affairs. For a long time India was a bit idle, very shy. Not visible on the planet despite its traditions. Now I think things are different. India is much more assertive because of its weight. Maybe as number five in economic power. So you can’t hide yourself in the planet you have to fare well. G20 too is a good opportunity for that. Although, with the Ukrainian War and the rift between the so-called West and Russia-China block is making things quite difficult for India monitoring the G20. It was seen at the last meeting of the finance ministers here in Delhi. They could not sign an agreement. So the Ukrainian war makes things difficult for India to monitor the G20. I think the September meeting will be difficult also. Maybe the same will happen.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Apart from the differences in terms of the Russia-Ukraine war, the other thing that was flagged was the human rights situation in this country. And I think, you know, the Indian foreign minister kind of asserted that you cannot have a universal standard for engaging in terms of human rights. Each country has got to have its own parameters. Thinking about this point, I remember how you have asserted in the past as to how Rajiv Gandhi’s political perspectives were essentially guided by democratic values.But now you have a situation where his son and the former Congress Party president Rahul Gandhi has been divested of his parliamentary membership. So how do you look at this comparison?Philippe Humbert: Well I think this is happening also in India but also in many places. You can see that in the world now how things are done in a very pragmatic way. Just imagine this new alliance in the Middle East. Between countries like Israel and its neighbours. For example, the famous Abraham’s agreement. More and more nations are doing things in a very pragmatic way. In a way it is good but in another way it goes against the concept of universal human of Rights.Venkitesh Ramakrishanan: Thank you, Philip Humbert for your perspectives. Despite your long tradition as a secularist, and as long a tradition as a socialist, somebody who believes in social democracy, I can see that, at the end of it all, what you are seeing globally is not a very bright picture. But almost a bleak one but then let’s hope for better times and I wish you have a very good time in India as the kind of times that you used to have earlier. And we will meet in the future as well on The AIDEM Interactions. Thank you.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Watch the full interview, <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/democracy-is-being-challenged-across-the-globe/">here</a>. Read full transcript in Hindi, <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/hi-philippe-humbert-on-energy-g20-and-challenges-to-democracy/">here</a>.<hr><p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Subscribe to our channels on&nbsp;<a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.youtube.com/c/THEAIDEM">YouTube</a>&nbsp;&amp;&nbsp;<a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://chat.whatsapp.com/ELqD1D1bImgAP6MrG8jskq">WhatsApp</a>

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Here is an edited transcript of the interview with Philippe Humbert, French political analyst and long time India watcher, with Venkitesh Ramakrishnan, Managing Editor of The AIDEM. 

The AIDEM Interactions: Philippe Humbert

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US President Joe Biden’s statement linking the October 7 Hamas strike on Israel to India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor has added a new dimension to the ongoing conflict in the Gaza region. 

The India-UAE-Europe Economic Corridor and Hydrocarbon Factor in Palestine Region

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Along with the edited transcription of the first episode of “People and Places with Bala”

How Manipur has Changed since the 1980s

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This is the full text of the 25th DS Borker Memorial Lecture delivered by Justice AP Shah at the India International Centre, New Delhi on 24 August 2023. 

The Grim Reality Behind Pomp and Rhetoric

Part two of Ravish Kumar’s speech on contemporary Indian Media.<hr>A seminar was held on October 28 at the Constitution Club in Delhi on the topic, ‘Imminent crisis and challenges for India as a constitutional nation’. This seminar was attended by poet and literary-cultural critic Ashok Bajpai, academic Aakriti Bhatia, Advocate Kabir Srivastava, Film Director Nitin Vaidya, Professor Rajkumar Jain and Journalist Ravish. The AIDEM is reproducing an edited excerpt of Ravish Kumar’s speech at the seminar.<hr>In the history of democratic India, the media has sometimes been free, sometimes not. Sometimes it has been independent and sometimes it has been slave. But its reader, its audience was never a slave. It was an autonomous entity. But now the autonomy of being a reader and viewer has also ended. Just as the journalists killed the journalist within them, in the same way the readers and viewers have killed the reader and viewer within them. Religion has been placed in its place. It is not that they do not have feelings within them, they definitely do, but in their place, they feel happy over someone’s murder. There is a new feeling of pride in talking about a permanent solution for a community. So there is a relationship between Godi media and its readers and viewers. And you scholars should study it in depth. It is not just a political connect but there is also a psychological relationship that has developed. Now they cannot read the right news. Unless they read the wrong news, they will not believe that the news they have read is correct. I have spoken many times about the need to refrain from watching Godi media. Do you think it is that easy for someone not to watch Godi media? This is like telling someone who watches reels not to watch reels. This is a habit that not everyone can get out of. You can easily go from secular to communal, but to go from communal to secular or to be human or to acquire human qualities in oneself is a very difficult process. It is not within everyone’s reach. One who is communal once, is communal for a very long time. Along with being communal, they are also murderers. If they are not a murderer, they are the supporters of murder. It is not so easy that you just tell them not to watch Godi media. What will they do? How will they survive? Now they do not know how to live without it. Unless there is a movement of citizens against Godi Media, unless people go door to door and explain, India will not get a media that is democratic and one that stands for democracy.Media, which we knew as press, has played a good role in India’s journey towards democracy. It has also played a role in adding fuel to the fire of partition. Gandhiji had once advised not to read newspapers. Many people have made divisive comments about newspapers around 1947. But many a time I have wondered as to what happened to those communal editors and journalists later on? What did they do later in journalism and after their career in journalism? How did they establish in the society? When I imagine this, I am curious to know who were the people who spread and published such communal news in 1947 which resulted in riots at many places. Many times one can see and read the irritation of Sardar Patel. So what happened to those people? Were they safe in politics? Did they become respected in the society? I do not know the answer to this. Maybe someone else has it. But in the same period Ganesh Vidyarthi, who opposed communalism, was killed in the riots. But the question still remains. There has been an element of communalism in journalism. But what is there today is different. Today communalism is journalism. You cannot imagine journalism without communalism. If you are not communal, do not hate Muslims then what do you do in Godi media? How do you spend your day?This is also a matter to think about. Can you have a place there? So today, to be a journalist, being communal, anti-Muslim is the first condition. And when you become communal, you cannot be democratic and constitutional in any way. That possibility has vanished within you. It cannot be created from any institution. And I do not use Hindu-Muslim because now everything is one-sided. So when journalism becomes communal, when people&nbsp; within the journalist fraternity start celebrating mob killings, can you teach them the lesson of our Constitution? Every kind of bad habit has entered today’s Godi media. The one good soul, the soul of the Constitution, has been thrown out of the media. Now if there is a raid on the media, then it is not a matter of concern for the media. Many anchors do not condemn it. Take the cases of Kerala’s Media One channel, which was banned for some time and now the raid on NewsClick. These actions were linked to the NIA (National Investigation Agency), but how many channels debated on it? Regarding (NewsClick journalist) Abhisar Sharma, an MP (Member of Parliament) took the name and said that he takes money from China. There is no proof anywhere. And the mainstream Godi media also debated on it. Abhisar himself is a journalist, so now the journalist also has to fight with the media to save his existence, then what will be the condition of the common citizen? We did not know that this sort of a media value would be generated by their religious and cultural values. Now it is evident that this is their imagination about a religious and cultural state or nation.So if you do journalism and you think that you want to do journalism without communalism, then you will have to fight day and night with this media too. And you can do journalism only while fighting. Still, it will call you an enemy of the country.&nbsp;Now there is no place even for journalists in this media. How many channels of Noida would have gone in support of NewsClick to the Press Club? No one would have gone. All this should have been subjects of media debate. But that is not happening now. Godi media is systematically destroying the values of media. It does not even debate on the changes that are taking place in the constitutional protection system of the law. It is abandoning these debates.The newspapers that are in existence now, the channels which are successfully running now are supposed to debate these points. And if they are not doing it, then you will have to accept that whatever opportunity there is of getting your message across is over or rather is almost dead. What is the common man doing now when he goes to protest, he makes a post, posts the same post on the Twitter handles of dozens and hundreds of journalists. No one listens to him. Earlier the media used to go to the people, now people are coming to the media and still no one is listening. In 2019, Australia’s Central Investigation Agency raided ABC News Channel and also raided a journalist’s house. In response, almost all the newspapers applied blank ink on the first page of their paper, in such a manner that the reader could not read. All the newspapers had protested and an advertisement was run on TV channels asserting that the government is trying to hide the truth from the people. Can you do it here? Do not think it is possible. So what did these journalists report? The report was about how the Australian army in Afghanistan had broken the rules of war and committed war crimes. Can you imagine such a story in today’s India? No. And Scott Morrison, who was the Prime Minister, faced a big problem. Right to Know Coalition was formed. We have Right to Information law, but how is it being implemented ?&nbsp;In the media with advertisements worth lakhs of crores, you will find only one or two journalists, that too in newspapers, who use it. Journalists had to use the RTI Act the most, but they used it the least. Some things must have happened in the media in relation to RTI before 2014, but after 2014 it is as though RTI is not being used by journalists. And, even if someone does use RTI and comes up with a story it is more often than not used. In 2018, under the leadership of Boston Stroll, around three hundred newspapers in America wrote editorials for press freedom. So it is not that I am presenting Western newspapers as role models. Right now I cannot do that at all. The way they report on Israel and Gaza is very bad. But in the same reporting, representatives of the same channels are being killed in Gaza. 28-29 journalists have been killed there in this war. And these channels at least have so much decency left in them that they accept that these are their correspondents. I do not know exactly whether they are their full-time or part-time correspondents. Still they are saying that these are our reporters. And in this era, you see that the journalists who are reporting from this war zone, their own children are being killed, family members are being killed, still they are reporting. Even the doctors are not running away from there. They did not run away from the hospital. They remained there. As a matter of fact, in today’s media, those who are watching their loved ones die should be treated as heroes.There has been so much attack on India’s democracy in the last ten years. When people ask me what we should do, I say, I will tell. I will tell you such a solution that even the clothes will not get dirty. You stop paying Rs 250 to this Godi Media newspaper and news channel. Can’t you do that much work? Those against whom it is printed are also reading it because sometimes their photo is also printed in it. In today’s times, no fight can be a democratic and constitutional fight without fighting the value trap created by the Godi media. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Rahul Gandhi and I have one thing in common, all three of us are YouTubers. But there are some differences too. Rahul Gandhi probably does not say ‘Subscribe to my channel’. But the Prime Minister said ‘Subscribe to my channel’. In that matter I am senior to him because I have already been asking viewers to subscribe to my channel. And even on Twitter I am senior to the Prime Minister. I was on Twitter before him. His supporters used to make fun of me saying that I am asking for subscribers on Twitter. Fire him from his job, they used to add.This journalist is happy. I have come here after losing my job as a journalist. But when they started asking for subscribers, I said at least I have won in this matter.So you must understand why the Prime Minister had to come on YouTube? Why have Rahul Gandhi and I come on YouTube? The reasons for both are different. Even though the Prime Minister has the commercial media, as well as countless channels of Doordarshan, and Akashvani, yet he had to go to YouTube and say that you (the people) should subscribe to him. Not because the television audience has reduced. There might be some reason. Or the credibility of these anchors has gone down, so now they are not getting much recovery from them. But I think this is not a very strong reason. We should never be under the illusion that the space on YouTube is non-communal. There is more communalism there than on mainstream channels. Such content and such programs are running strongly there. So the Prime Minister is asking viewers to subscribe and start including a little bit of his content in their respective programmes. But the fact is that the media has blocked Rahul Gandhi as well as other leaders of the opposition. Whenever Rahul Gandhi holds a press conference on issues related to Adani , it is never shown in mainstream channels. There is also no debate on these issues, because when you debate, all the news published on Adani will come up in the research. So, there is no need to hold such debates. This situation has been created in front of you. When Rahul Gandhi was interviewing Satyapal Mallik, I did not like it.Indian journalism has now become such that the leader of the opposition has to become a journalist while the already established so-called journalist who is dominating the media space is killing the opposition. That is why I did not like it. I also felt that the leader who was ridiculed by the media and branded as weak, that leader, was forever embarrassing the media, an industry worth lakhs and crores, with one of his interviews. It was a sort of statement which said that when you (the media) are not there, I will also do the interviews though I am an opposition leader. It was like pointing to a vaccum in the media. And that is why it was a very sad moment when I saw this interview.On February 7, 2023, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said that these people (the opposition) should thank Enforcement Directorate (ED) because they have come on one platform because of the ED. ED brought these people on one platform.The opposition had alleged from time to time that the government was making use of the ED politically, and the Prime Minister was in a sense accepting that allegation when he said that their (the opposition’s) unity has happened because of ED. The Prime Minister also said that the trust in Modi was not born from the newspaper headlines or by the shining faces on TV. Remember, he was referring to the very people who had served him so much. And he went on to add that he has worked hard and used every moment.I want to conclude with one more statement. Elections of 2019 were going on and Rajkamal Jha and Ravish Tiwari of Indian Express were taking an interview of the Prime Minister. There is a line in that interview which I often think why a newspaper of that level did not put as the headline? Was this an editorial mistake? When we interview a big leader, we pay close attention to each and every thing he says and we choose the headline which has more news value. Did it happen in this interview? The Prime Minister had said as follows in the interview: “Whether news gets published or not is not the only thing in a democracy”. Yes, “Whether news is published or not is not the only thing in a democracy.” Namaskar.Click <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/en-journalist-ravish-kumar-speech-at-constitution-club-transcript/">here</a> to read the first part of this transcript. Watch the original video of Ravish Kumar’s Hindi speech <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jErYBjQ9S4o">here</a>.<hr>To receive updates on detailed analysis and in-depth interviews from The AIDEM, join our WhatsApp group. Click <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://chat.whatsapp.com/GLYY7P2H0Xw5eYoczxtsSa">Here</a><a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;">.</a>

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A seminar was held on October 28 at the Constitution Club in Delhi on the topic, ‘Imminent crisis and challenges for India as a constitutional nation’. 

Time to Recapture the Autonomy of The Reader and Viewer

Renowned journalist Ravish Kumar Talks on India’s Media and the imminent crisis as a constitutional nation.<hr>A seminar was held on October 28 at the Constitution Club in Delhi on the topic, ‘Imminent crisis and challenges for India as a constitutional nation’. This seminar was attended by poet and literary-cultural critic Ashok Bajpai, academic Aakriti Bhatia, Advocate Kabir Srivastava, Film Director Nitin Vaidya, Professor Rajkumar Jain and Journalist Ravish. The AIDEM is reproducing an edited excerpt of Ravish Kumar’s speech at the seminar.<hr>Many thanks to Rama Shankar ji, Rajkumar ji, Ashok ji, Kabir ji, Aakriti ji and Nitin ji. The organiser knows the reason why I came late and why I would have to leave earlier. But it is not because of disrespect. It is not my nature either. I have come late for some reason, yet I apologise to you all. I am not in the habit of speaking without preparation. I was worried about how I would be able to speak, but now that I have come, I will have to speak.I have been writing and speaking on this media for the past ten years and during this time, examining it from inside and outside. I am also repeatedly looking at my own words with doubt and suspicion and asking how much reality is there in what I say. How close is it to reality? The magnitude of media is now left only in its name. Its work has become formless. So, now, I have to speak about what is not there.If there were some real journalists, who do good work and make genuine mistakes, we could have analysed that. Is it possible that even if you do not play cricket, you will still be called a cricketer? This cannot happen. But you can be called a media anchor without doing journalism. Whenever I talk about media, I always talk about the mainstream to which the government and the market give advertisements worth lakhs of crores of rupees. This profession is seen as an essential agency of democracy. Now this has essentially become a murderer of democracy. The challenge today is that if democracy is to be saved, constitutional values are to be saved, or the remaining democracy is to be kept alive, then democracy will have to be saved from this media. During the ten years after 2014, about which the Prime Minister said that it is not a date, it is an era of change.The thing that I do not see in my profession now are dreams. When I meet journalists working in the mainstream, there is no dream about their profession. And when there is no dream then obviously there will be no passion either. Any value of journalism cannot exist without constitutional values and democratic values. The competition or dream within them to be a journalist, to be a good journalist, all that seems to be over now. Everyone has made different kinds of excuses. Whatever outspokenness one had, that used to manifest from time to time either in an untimely manner or habitually, has turned into bleating. And I am not talking about any small industry.&nbsp;It is a very big industry. Thousands of people work in it. Thousands of people study journalism to get work. If we add all these numbers together, it becomes a decent number. Still, there seems to be no dream among them regarding journalism. Like any batsman or bowler would think that our batting or bowling should be like this, the speed of the ball should be like this, its swing should be like this. This kind of dream is not seen in people associated with this profession. And no fire in their thinking. Maybe there is something wrong with my vision. Many a time I think why these students are going to university to study journalism, when there is no journalism left? When the profession itself has ended, then what will they do after studying about that profession in the syllabus?&nbsp;Young people are worried. In our times, we still got opportunities to do something or the other. And what would these journalists talk about when they would go home or come from home to office? What kind of news about people and public would they be bringing and with which the reporter would be running to the editor and the editor would be running to take it to the reader? We all had experienced this excitement in the past.&nbsp;When we came into this profession, we used to avidly discuss with journalists of other channels about our stories. One would say that&nbsp; you missed out a particular angle in your story or that our story was factually more accurate or that you have talked to a wrong source. Someone would also say that your shot was good as your cameraman is good but the cameraman of our channel is not good. So these types of conversations used to happen. And when we talked to the cameraman, he would tell us that the sound quality of the visuals was not good. So there was a pleasure of something happening. This was a practice which we were doing continuously. Now this pleasure has ended and it has been destroyed by the media, the journalists and its owners, all put together.&nbsp;The media, which does not have dreams, or competition cannot be regarded as business, whatever else you may call it. Today, even if you want to differentiate between Godi Media’s channels on the basis of their product, you will not be able to do so. The competition among them as to whether one media is good or better than another has ended. But their business is going on. There can be long discussions on how market advertising and corporate money is being invested in this industry that spreads hatred and kills democracy.&nbsp;Earlier, the media used to make excuses when questions were raised about content that was very bad. One common excuse was that the audience is like this, then we do this for TRP, to live etc. But now Mukesh Ambani does not have such compulsion, he has a lot of money. How much money comes from TRP? 20-25 crores. If money was the reason, then Mukesh Ambani’s channel should have been the best. But their anchor sits on the same channel and says that there should be a permanent solution. So all these excuses have also ended now.&nbsp;So, what we are seeing now is a model, which has no respect for democracy and democratic debate. A media culture, which cannot assure that our democracy is safe. This is the same media which started talking about citizen journalism before 2014. It was empowering the citizens by asking questions on their behalf. It would drift from time to time but would also come back because something happened among the public that instilled or triggered a sense that a journalist had a responsibility towards the public. There were many journalists who took this responsibility whenever they found activity that required responsible reactions. It was in continuation of this that channels started covering movements from within them and many channels started building studios amidst these movements and did live recording. That is, by standing among the public, a chair was placed there and a new kind of space was being created. The reason why a journalist often went to the public was because he derived the power of his existence from such an exercise.Since 2014, the media has changed its source of power. It has eliminated the source of taking power from the public. It has started taking power from the government and has stopped asking questions to the government, it has started asking questions to the public. Your writers are being called traitors and anti-nationals by various names. In a way, they became like muscle men who were used during election time. These are the new Bahubalis (musclemen) of information. They are those wield lathis (clubs). Their job is not to give you information but to prevent the information from reaching anywhere else. They threaten the public.&nbsp;When Olympic medal winning women were protesting, they used to say that many people come to interview us but it is not visible anywhere. These interviews were not shown. And when the farmers went to protest, without knowing and without investigating, the media immediately called them terrorists. This had never happened before. Very many devious terminologies were developed to brand those who were once called Anna Data ( providers of food ).. They were called terrorists in one fell swoop. The media made it clear that now we do not want our power from the farmers, from the public. So when the media becomes anti- people and anti – opposition, expecting him to somehow follow the Constitution is a waste of one’s time. I do not expect that from them. To be anti-democratic, it was necessary for the media to exclude both the public and the opposition. It did this through its work. Therefore, 2014 is not just a date but an era of change.After this, one more thing was needed ; to throw out real information or sideline it. That work was also done very easily. So when you flip through the newspapers, you will find a large number of investigative stories or news from within the government, but you will not be able to identify and remember the name of the person who brought out such news. Especially, in the Godi media. I am talking about them and I am talking about them only. So, even when a plethora of lies was being spread and used as a weapon, media did not fight those lies, but made friendship with it. But some people did battle these lies. Who were they? People from outside; Organisations like Alt News, Boom Live. In a sense, this battle was being outsourced.&nbsp;And why was it outsourced? Because the mainstream refused to do the work of refuting fake news. Why did it carry out this act of withdrawal? Because fake news was actually government news. It was political news. So if you refute that political fake news, you will come under the government’s notice, which is the sole master of all the Godi media. So, Alt News and Boom Live took this responsibility. It has now become difficult to differentiate between the lies of the media and the government, whether they are of the government or spread by the media. But when you go to the time line of Mohammad Zubair (co-founder of AltNews), you will find amazing work. This young man does not just talk about fake news of India. He also talks about how fake news is being used in support of Israel’s narratives. The way he exposes how fake news is used is amazing. So this dream should have been of the people inside the media, but it is not. The one who announces on Twitter every 30th that I need so much money. Only one lakh has come now, please send some more. How closely this young man follows the news of ANI agency every day. Many times it catches in such a way that ANI is forced to delete the story.The owners of all the newspapers and the owners of all the channels know that the fake news, the propaganda of WhatsApp University, belongs to Saheb. Do not interfere in it, but, if possible, create some of your evening’s debate from it. So today a media is needed to fight the lies of the media. You need to stand on your own. That is why I said as to how difficult it is to speak on the media which does not exist in India. The journalists of Godi media first killed the journalist within them. It was very important that they first killed their sensibilities and their professional skills, only then they could work. Now they have come a long way.We have all been taught in journalism to remember, if nothing else, the five W’s; Who, What, When, Where, Why. Now only one W is left, What, under the guise of which the Godi Media seeks to mark its lies to be true. It has made itself devoid of information. Democracy has been made devoid of the public and the opposition. Now the public and the opposition are no longer visible on this media screen. News now has only one face, that of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Apart from this face, they have no other information. This is a new kind of information watch so that people do not realize that information is missing. In these ten years, the popularity of the Prime Minister kept increasing and decreasing in different states. But the Godi media remained consistently loyal to him. Because he has been absorbed in them. He is their editor; their news; their thoughts; their propaganda. In this media you can see the qualities of Modi, BJP, RSS, Bajrang Dal. But when the opposition comes, they call it feeble and ridicule it. It never gives space to the opposition’s questions. It will never ask questions about Adani and Pulwama. And it shows them in such a way that they are not visible, their work is not visible. It rejects whatever support they are getting. Rahul Gandhi, Aditya Thakur, Tejaswi Yadav, all these are leaders of the new generation aged around fifty or below. It will present them as clowns. It will present them as corrupt. In a country where young leaders are talked about, these young leaders will not be shown there. Rather, seventy-year-old leaders will be presented as young leaders. Will publicize their working hours, but will not question them. So, a sort of freedom from the alternative. Godi media has taken the pledge of Modi. It worships him and also makes its audience worship him.&nbsp;An anchor was asking the other day as follows:&nbsp; if the Prime Minister can work for hundred hours then why can’t the youth work for seventy hours? There is unemployment in the country, there is no work, there are low salary jobs but the anchor was preaching as to why you do not work for seventy hours. As if everyone has got work, only the youth are not interested in work and have left it. They have stopped going to office, and are sitting at home on leave. In 2019, these youth were told that frying pakoras is also a job. Now they are being told to work for seventy hours while they do not know what to do. They want to become a soldier for life. But you have made our youth a four-year- Agniveer. Why does the anchor not say that the soldiers should get full employment? But instead of such relevant questions, what kind of questions is the media sending to the society? The answer is that it does not want to talk to the public, but has to merely scold the people.With great audacity, it made the public run away by threatening them. And it is surprising how the public, which is a viewer in the evening and a reader in the morning, is tolerating this. Do they have no reason not to watch Godi media? Is there no democratic alternative left?PART TWO TO FOLLOW SOON | Watch the original video of Ravish Kumar’s Hindi speech <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://youtu.be/jErYBjQ9S4o?feature=shared">here</a>. &nbsp;<hr>To receive updates on detailed analysis and in-depth interviews from The AIDEM, join our WhatsApp group. Click <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://chat.whatsapp.com/GLYY7P2H0Xw5eYoczxtsSa">Here</a>.

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Needed, a Movement to Save Indian Democracy from the Media

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The Indian Parliament has gone through one of the worst periods in its history with the serial suspension of as many as 146 MPs in a matter of a few days. 

Parliament Attack and Surveillance Raj

I am very happy to be here, particularly with the platform and event associated with the memory of KP Sasi, who I knew from my JNU days and again when he came back and worked in Mumbai for a while as an artist and political cartoonist. I am also glad to be here because I like your theme for the festival, which is “Rediscovering India“. It is obvious that there is a growing number of people in our country who have never discovered it (India) in the first place. These people who have never discovered India are building an entirely obnoxious construct and “rediscovering India” will mean necessarily rescuing India from what is happening around us.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:1600px;" id="attachment_26325" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26325"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg" alt="Screenshot_20240208_165051_YouTube.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg 750w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_Screenshot_20240208_165051_You_Tube_9e95be4826.jpg 1000w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26325">Sainath speaking at the Panchajanyam Film Festival</figcaption></figure>Three weeks ago, the former president of the Bajrang Dal, perhaps one of the most aggressive Presidents of the organisation, Jaibhan Singh Pawaiya, told The Week magazine that the Mandir movement (Ayodhya Ram Mandir movement) is far greater and bigger than the Independence and Freedom Movement. Now, you can dismiss it as the mumblings of an idiot – which he undoubtedly is – but ten or 15 years ago, he could not have said such a thing without being challenged. Today he can do that.This was on the eve of the orgy of January 22 (when the consecration of the Ayodhya Ram Mandir was done by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.). Then, approximately ten days ago Tamil Nadu Governor Ravi declared that Gandhi’s contribution and role in the freedom struggle was insignificant. He went on to say that it was Subas Chandra Bose who did everything in the freedom struggle. Now, this is a fantastic thing of juxtaposing figures who actually dealt with each other very differently.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:678px;" id="attachment_26326" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26326"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_37_09f0646227.jpeg" alt="images-37.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_37_09f0646227.jpeg 234w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_37_09f0646227.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26326">Jaibhan Singh Pawaiya</figcaption></figure>Do you know what names Subas Chandra Bose gave to the brigades of the Indian National Army (INA),when he formed it? We all know about the Jhansi Rani Brigade. But, the other brigades of the INA were Gandhi Brigade and Nehru Brigade, named after his onetime comrades in the Congress party. By the way, in 1943 Netaji Subas Chandra Bose was making a speech on Gandhi’s birthday and do you know what he said? He said that, never in history has one individual achieved so much in one lifetime. Indeed, they (Bose, Gandhi and Nehru) had great differences. That is why they broke apart and that is why they formed different political parties. But they were of a class and a generation and a mindset that dealt with differences very very differently from the way we do today. Yes, they would ideologically fight the other completely, but they never denied the others, their role in history and their role in the struggle.<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_36_1632306369.jpeg" alt="images-36.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_36_1632306369.jpeg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_36_1632306369.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined">What was I doing on January 22nd when the Prime Minister was playing high priest to Hindutva and in fact making the Shankaracharyas jealous, many of whom wanted to know what right he (Modi) had to be doing what he did in Ayodhya on that day. On that day, the television channels were full of Modi. Lord Modi kneeling down and Lord Modi prostrating, Lord Modi rolling over etc. I kept looking for the Ram Lalla (Lord Ram in a child image), but Modi was clearly more visible on channels than Lord Ram.It was told that the day marked a celebration of the return lord Ram from exile. But the fact is Ram Lalla was not kicked out of Ayodhya by Babar or Islam which did not exist at that time. Ram was thrown out of Ayodhya by his flesh and blood. He was kicked out by his father and his stepmother. Now,what that has to do with Babar or what that has to do with Islam is beyond me. But, you can write your own history now.The differences you are seeing on these subjects and on these issues is not the difference between different interpretations of history. It is a difference between those who see history as a process, history as an evidence based discipline and those to whom evidence is irrelevant and faith triumphs over everything else. Evidence is irrelevant in this school of thought.I covered Ayodhya as a journalist when I was working in Blitz. I covered the Ram Janmabhoomi movement from between mid 1980s to a little after 1993, the period when the demolition of the Babri Masjid took place in December 1992 and the riots took place in different parts of the country, including in Mumbai. It was also the time when the great security scam rocked Dalal Street. On the one side you had Ram Janmabhoomi and on the other side the Scam Janmabhoomi, as we put it in the Blitz paper.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:863px;" id="attachment_18474" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-18474"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/ddff_daa66be03b.jpg" alt="ddff.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_ddff_daa66be03b.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_ddff_daa66be03b.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_ddff_daa66be03b.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-18474">Karsewaks on top of Babri Masjid minutes before it was demolished by them on the 6th Dec 1992 in Ayodhya. Credit- T. NARAYAN</figcaption></figure>I have visited Ayodhya several times and if you go to the Ayodhya- Faizabad region there is not one but thousands of temples in that region. Almost half of these temples claim that Ram was born at the place their temple stood. They would give you the spot marked X as the birthplace of Ram, but they could not tell you when the Lord was born, because once you start trying to put a date to it you run into all kinds of problems. So, there are temples where Ram shot his first Arrow and there are temples where Ram, you know, maybe ate an apple or whatever. That is there are temples for every moment of the Lord’s life, but there is no temple which tells you when he was born. You claim to know the exact spot and the location (of the Lord’s birth) and you built a huge thing on it.On that day, our organisation, the People’s Archive of Rural India (PARI), we carried Rabindranath <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/tag/rabindranath-tagore/">Tagore’s</a> 124 year old poem, which is titled “There is no space for God in your temple”. In that poem Tagore writes of a great king who built a gigantic temple of gold, which was almost piercing the sky. There was effusive enthusiasm when it was inaugurated, but after a while nobody was going there. At the same time, the courtiers reported to the king that people are going and listening to some old sadhu who was sitting under the branches of a tree.So, the king took his courtiers and went to the sadhu and he asked him,”Oh Holy One, why are you sitting here in the open when you have got my temple over there and you can preach from there.“ And the sadhu said “there is no space for God in that Temple“. The king gets very angry and says, look, it is pure gold, it is piercing the sky, I built such a thing and you are saying my temple is empty? The sadhu replied: “I didn’t say your temple was empty. It is filled and crowded with your arrogance and pride. The arrogance and pride of a King. That is what is there in your temple.”Governor Ravi and the former Bajrang Dal president are able to say the kind of things they said and get away with it, because of the dangerously near complete erasure of our history. Erasure of our history is visible from the way the official government website displays things. Please compare what you saw on January 22 with how the country celebrated August 15 and January 26. Is there any comparison? Did the commemoration of one of the greatest Freedom struggles humanity has seen get that kind of attention? You did not see that on August 15 and you did not see anything of it on January 26 Republic day but you saw the most incredible celebration on January 22. This again has to do with the erasure of history.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:1200px;" id="attachment_26212" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26212"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg" alt="mod-iat-ayodhya.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg 750w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_mod_iat_ayodhya_3d935eec11.jpeg 1000w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26212">Narendra Modi at Ayodhya</figcaption></figure>The extraordinary thing about the present regime is not merely the erasure of the past. They are even erasing the present. Look how after losing millions of people in Covid -19 we are now claiming to be the nation that managed Covid best in the world. There is a section in the official website of the government, which claims to be a celebration of 75 years of Independence. However, this website does not contain a single picture, a single photograph, a single video, a single illustration, a single story on or a quote by a living freedom fighter. There are many still alive in different parts of the country, including in Kerala, but still they don’t figure in the website at all.I am told that after “The Last Heroes“ (Sainath’s book “ Last Heroes; the Foot Soldiers of Indian Freedom” Penguin 2022) came out they have taken two or three characters from my book and included them, but they have been careful to include those characters who have died. But not a single living freedom fighter was included. Now, I am not saying there are no photos on the website. There are hundreds of photographs and you all know whose photographs would be there. Yes, the very same photograph that appeared on every single Covid-19 vaccine certificate. The same photograph, if we are unfortunate in April- May this year, which will appear on every bus ticket in this country.<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_38_8ff71eb5b0.jpeg" alt="images-38.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_38_8ff71eb5b0.jpeg 234w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_38_8ff71eb5b0.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined">Generations have grown up without knowing what British colonialism did to countries and people around the world. Incidentally, every year there is new emerging research on what that colonialism did. But that research is not happening in Indian universities. In 2022 November Jason Hickel of London and Dylan Sullivan of Melbourne brought out an astonishing paper. You know all of us during Covid-19, we learned this word “ excess deaths “. What does this “ excess deaths” mean? Excess deaths mean if a society has a normal number of deaths each year – let us say a big nation has 10 million deaths a year normally, but one year it has 15 million, then the excess deaths are 5 million. You all read this phrase during the Covid-19 period.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:647px;" id="attachment_26322" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26322"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_34_c9dc9b59d8.jpeg" alt="images-34.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_34_c9dc9b59d8.jpeg 213w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_34_c9dc9b59d8.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26322">Jason Hickel</figcaption></figure>Does anyone have a sense of what were excess deaths during British rule? Remember those days you were a bigger country. You were India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, parts of Burma and parts of Nepal. What these two researchers – Hickel and Sullivan – have done is take data of 40 years – from 1880 to 1920 – and tabulate excess deaths. Why did they take 1880 as the starting year? Because the India’s first census was in 1871 and so from 1880 to 1921 you have comparable data. And what did they find? Can you guess the number of excess deaths in just 40 years of British imperialism? There is a high estimate, there is a low estimate and a middle estimate.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:492px;" id="attachment_26323" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26323"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_35_9d50f655c0.jpeg" alt="images-35.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_35_9d50f655c0.jpeg 123w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_35_9d50f655c0.jpeg 395w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26323">Dylan Sullivan</figcaption></figure>But the general agreement or consensus is that 100 million excess deaths took place in that period. The high estimate is 168 million excess deaths. Can you count how many that is per second? Now, tell me if just one percent of that had occurred in a European country you would be screaming genocide. But it was treated as worthless Brown lives.(To be continued in Part 2)

Sainath-8th-feb-24-b.jpg

This is the first part of the edited transcript of renowned writer and journalist P. Sainath’s inaugural speech at the Panchajanyam film festival at Chittoor, Palakkad, Kerala. The event took place on February 4, 2024. (For Video, Click Here)

Modi Regime Erases History and the Present Too

<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/Sainath_part_2_1_770x470_b6a5fb52cb.jpg" alt="Sainath-part-2-1-770x470.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_Sainath_part_2_1_770x470_b6a5fb52cb.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_Sainath_part_2_1_770x470_b6a5fb52cb.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_Sainath_part_2_1_770x470_b6a5fb52cb.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><em style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">This is the second part of the edited transcript of renowned writer and journalist P. Sainath’s inaugural speech at the Panchajanyam film festival at Chittoor, Palakkad, Kerala. The event took place on February 4, 2024. (For Video, Click <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:all 0.4s ease 0s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://theaidem.com/p-sainath-speaking-at-the-panchajanyam-film-festival-in-palakkad/"><em style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Here</a><em style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">)&nbsp;We are seeing genocide and are unable to condemn it. We are seeing genocide in Palestine. We are seeing genocide televised live. Yet, it doesn’t move us to action.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">One of the things that I am proud of, and I want to tell you about rediscovering remembrance. Remembrance is resistance, and there is no resistance without remembrance. One of the things that I first remember most proudly about my country is the first passport that I owned, in the first half of the eighties. And, it said: “All countries except the Republic of South Africa and Israel.”<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Do you know that Indian passports had a ban on South Africa even before we became independent. A poor country emerging from famine, from hundreds of millions of deaths, South Africa was boycotted by all countries. That country lost 5% of its external trade because we had a huge trade surplus with it. And, we did that on morality. Ours was a moral position. We may not have been a great nuclear power, but we were a great moral power. Mahatma Gandhi in the 1930s was already condemning what was happening in Palestine. Every single Indian national leader worth his salt was condemning what was happening in Palestine because they knew what British imperialism did.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);display:block;font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;height:auto;letter-spacing:normal;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;vertical-align:middle;white-space:normal;widows:2;width:600px;word-spacing:0px;" id="attachment_26394" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26394"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/6222_cd293dec1b.jpg" alt="6222.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_6222_cd293dec1b.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_6222_cd293dec1b.jpg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26394">Gandhi arriving in Britain in 1931</figcaption></figure><p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">I have been to over 45 colleges and universities in the last more than one-and-a-half years with my book “The Last Heroes – Foot Soldiers of Indian Freedom” based on the life story of living freedom fighters. Incidentally, it is also published in Malayalam. You know, when you have completely erased history to this extent, Naturam Godse resurfaces as a freedom fighter, as a hero. Savarkar resurfaces as a hero.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">Now, I will tell you two things, one about myself and the other about Savarkar. I was not trained as a journalist. I was trained as a historian, and my guide was K.N. Panikkar. My teachers were Romila Thaper, K.N. Panikkar, Bipan Chandra, S. Bhattacharya, and S. Gopal. I dropped out of my M.Phil and P.hD and went into journalism. Now, let me share my understanding of Mr. Savarkar. You know, Vinayak Damodar Savakar was a genuine revolutionary till 1911. Let us not indulge in the erasure of the past. He was a genuine bonafide revolutionary till 1911. That is when he was thrown into the Andamans, and all his revolutionary zeal vanished.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);display:block;font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;height:auto;letter-spacing:normal;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;vertical-align:middle;white-space:normal;widows:2;width:800px;word-spacing:0px;" id="attachment_17626" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-17626"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/savarkar_e7fc110e15.jpg" alt="savarkar.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_savarkar_e7fc110e15.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_savarkar_e7fc110e15.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_savarkar_e7fc110e15.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-17626">Vinayak Damodar Savakar</figcaption></figure><p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">There were hundreds of others who were sent to the Andamans, but he was the only one who wrote seven begging mercy petitions to the British Raj, saying: “Spare me. I will be your advocate.” There were others who wrote letters seeking remission of sentence in various prisons in India, but the Andaman prisoners did not write mercy petitions except Savarkar. Leaders of the old Ghadar party in Punjab would write letters from prisons. Gurmit Singh, founder of the Desh Bhagat Yadgar Hall in Jalandhar, would write letters citing domestic issues, and within a week of being released on compassionate grounds he was bombing the British barracks in Hoshiarpur railway station. These were your revolutionaries, and none of them offered to collaborate with the British.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);display:block;font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;height:auto;letter-spacing:normal;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;vertical-align:middle;white-space:normal;widows:2;width:850px;word-spacing:0px;" id="attachment_26395" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26395"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/Work_party_of_Andaman_Island_Penal_Colony_prisoners_being_fed_by_the_sea_shore_circa_5248d56209.jpg" alt="Work-party-of-Andaman-Island-Penal-Colony-prisoners-being-fed-by-the-sea-shore-circa.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_Work_party_of_Andaman_Island_Penal_Colony_prisoners_being_fed_by_the_sea_shore_circa_5248d56209.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_Work_party_of_Andaman_Island_Penal_Colony_prisoners_being_fed_by_the_sea_shore_circa_5248d56209.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_Work_party_of_Andaman_Island_Penal_Colony_prisoners_being_fed_by_the_sea_shore_circa_5248d56209.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26395">Andaman Island Penal Colony/ Photo from collection presented to India Record Office by Sir Richard C. Temple in 1922.</figcaption></figure><p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">I suggest you read Mr. Savarkar’s letters. A.G. Noorani’s seminal book contains five of the seven petitions. They are in the National Archives. The point is that after spending time writing Mercy petitions to the British, he was released. He was confined to Ratnagiri district. He was not under house arrest, but he could not leave the district. In 1926, a book titled “The Life of Barrister Savarkar” was released. The book was written by the pseudonym Chitra Gupta (Chitra Gupta was, as per mythology, the scribe and book-keeper of Lord Yama). In the 18th and 19th centuries, a lot of people used the pseudonym ‘Chitra Gupta’ because it had some authority. The book was a terrible hagiography. It was, in fact, such a eulogy of Savarkar that it gives hagiography a bad name. The book was proscribed in 1926 by the British, but it was published again in 1942 and a discussion of sorts about the book began in some quarters.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">The discussion again was over who Chitra Gupta was. The book was published once again in 1986, and the publisher proudly revealed that Chitra Gupta was none other than Savarkar himself. Interestingly, the source for this information was none other than Savarkar’s younger brother. So, Savarkar had written his autobiography and presented it to the world as a biography. I went back and read it again, and I had to conclude that Mr. Savarkar had a very high opinion of Mr. Savarkar. I wanted to tell you that remembrance is necessary. For a nation that does not know where it came from and has no clue about where it is going.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">You don’t know about the freedom struggle if you don’t know about the incredible fights of the freedom struggle. How many people in this country sacrificed for 190 years, and history tells us about how it all began in 1857, ninety years before the first shot was fired in the North.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);display:block;font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;height:auto;letter-spacing:normal;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;vertical-align:middle;white-space:normal;widows:2;width:800px;word-spacing:0px;" id="attachment_26396" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-26396"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_45_8815fd2b16.jpeg" alt="images-45.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_45_8815fd2b16.jpeg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_45_8815fd2b16.jpeg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_images_45_8815fd2b16.jpeg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-26396">Battle of Plassey (Artists Rendition)</figcaption></figure><p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">It started with the Battle of Plassey, and the Adivasis and Dalits of the Jungle Mahal region resisting the British for 40 years in what was wrongly known as the Chuar rebellion. In the eighties and nineties, 60 years before a single shot was fired in the North (India), Tipu Sultan, Veerapandiya Kattabomman, and the Maruda brothers led a struggle. The Marud Brothers and Kattabomman actually came closest to bringing down the East India Company totally. This is your history. Please know it and remember it. It was not happening in Uttar Pradesh or Bihar.<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">&nbsp;<p style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(39, 39, 39);font-family:Manjari;font-size:18px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;line-height:1.7;margin:0px 0px 15px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;">To be continued in Part 3.

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This is the second part of the edited transcript of renowned writer and journalist P. Sainath’s inaugural speech at the Panchajanyam film festival at Chittoor, Palakkad, Kerala. The event took place on February 4, 2024. (For Video, Click Here)

Remembering History is Important: One should Know that Savarkar Wrote his own Biography to Glorify Himself

Malayalam (ml)

Tamil (ta)

English (en)

Hindi (hi)

Telugu (te)

Kannada (kn)

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Dancing To Her Tune

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An Unwritten National Autobiography

<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/images_1_6258d15665.jpeg" alt="images-1.jpeg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_images_1_6258d15665.jpeg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_images_1_6258d15665.jpeg 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><div class="post-body clearfix single-blog-header single-blog-inner blog-single-block blog-details-content" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;"><div class="entry-content clearfix" style="box-sizing:border-box;counter-reset:footnotes 0;margin:0px;padding:0px;">People who read literature in India knew him, MT Vasudevan Nair. Language was no hurdle for his works to reach out beyond the state borders of Kerala. While Malayali diaspora took a handful of nostalgia along to the places they went, a little bit of MT was also in that.Today, the big business of literature finds translators to translate anything that moves. All tetrapods of literature are given awards that stink of corporate imperialistic nexus. But MT belonged to a different era when blood recognised blood, genius recognised genius. He got translated not once but several times.Basheer, Takazhi and MT were the triumvirate that could transcend the borders and stand tall among the Indian modernist literature. Yes, MT’s literature also had a fair amount of auto-fiction but he hoodwinked it with the magic of text. He was a persuasive minimalist both in writing and in person.An unsmiling MT could generate generations of readers who could smile through tears. MT wrote about a collapsing social structure that divested the old feudal class with their ill-gotten properties. But their social capital remained intact and could exert a lot of influence among the readers by becoming the surrogate emotional ethos of a transition time of Kerala’s socio-political history.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:1196px;" id="attachment_31084" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31084"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg" alt="mt-1024x575.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg 750w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_mt_1024x575_251dd09907.jpg 1000w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-31084">MT during his Interview with Sabha TV (Watch <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:0.4s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NttnjeaVqn0">Here</a>)</figcaption></figure>When society evolved into a different being altogether, MT turned to the treasure trove of myths and itihasas to eke out allegories that explained the pain of loss, of class, roots and love. His literature spat on the face of bigotry, whether it was religious or familial. He was so stoically poised in his literature that none could have challenged him and expelled him from the world of literature.MT’s literature spoke of love and separation as vehemently as he wrote about the changing social complexions. But he was not sentimental. There was something in his writing that touched some chord in every reader. Before initiating themselves into Ambedkarite politics, the Dalit ideologues also, in their torturous nights of youth, pined for MT’s characters.Those who call the modernists, Dad Vibes, have really lost the sight of the forest while focusing on shrubs and thicket. MT was a forest that moved, as in the great tragedies. He remained a serious writer while the post modernists fell in the trap of publishers and wrote lightning stories and became laughing stokes.MT remains, so is the MT critique. That’s the beauty of a great writer’s life and of course, death.</div></div>

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MT: A Forest that Moved

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An ‘Overture’ Stringing The Pope, Yesudas and the ‘Songster Chaplain’

<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/1_cc9df0fe47.png" alt="വലതുപക്ഷവുമായുള്ള-സംവാദത്തിൻ്റെ-വ്യർത്ഥത-1.png" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_1_cc9df0fe47.png 245w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_1_cc9df0fe47.png 500w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><div class="post-body clearfix single-blog-header single-blog-inner blog-single-block blog-details-content" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width:0px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(85, 85, 85);font-family:Manjari;font-size:17px;font-style:normal;font-variant-caps:normal;font-variant-ligatures:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;margin:0px;orphans:2;padding:0px;text-align:left;text-decoration-color:initial;text-decoration-style:initial;text-decoration-thickness:initial;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;widows:2;word-spacing:0px;"><div class="entry-content clearfix" style="box-sizing:border-box;counter-reset:footnotes 0;margin:0px;padding:0px;">When old age shall this generation waste,Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woeThan ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st,“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is allYe know on earth, and all ye need to know.” (John Keats, Ode on a Grecian Urn)<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/6_904b2e9f2a.jpg" alt="6.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_6_904b2e9f2a.jpg 147w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_6_904b2e9f2a.jpg 470w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined">Siddharth Tagore, Founder Director of Delhi’s <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:0.4s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.facebook.com/artkonsultindia/photos">Art Konsult</a> Gallery is no more. He cannot be contained in such a cold statement, so matter of fact like death itself. Besides the gallery, he founded magazines such as Art and Deal, Travel and Deal and many other publications. Even when he knew that he wouldn’t make any profit out of the publications, he invested money in them because he knew art wouldn’t survive without the literature surrounding it.&nbsp;Yet another venture of Tagore’s was an auction house, namely Art Bull. The name was perfect for a bullish art market of the 2000s. But the glitch was this: Siddharth Tagore was not bullish. Nor was he bearish. He was cherubic, complete with a benign smile on his face and a burning cigarette between his fingers. Whenever I came out after having a meeting with him, I would ask myself, was he cut for this business?&nbsp;Tagore could have been a poet and dreamer like his internationally renowned namesake of yesteryears.. After the pandemic period I met Tagore after a gap of four years at the Visual Art Gallery, India Habitat Centre where Art Konsult had organized a group exhibition. After the inaugural function, I shook hands with him and I realized that his hands had lost the firm grip though the warmth remained. “I have not been keeping well,” he told me.&nbsp;<div class="gallery galleryid-31051 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-full" style="box-sizing:border-box;margin:30px -8.96875px 0px;padding:0px;" id="gallery-1"><figure class="gallery-item" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;display:inline-block;height:auto;margin:0px 0px 1rem;max-width:33.33%;padding:0px 8.96875px 17.9531px;text-align:center;vertical-align:top;width:262.609px;"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/c_768x993_a7cec9742c.jpg" alt="c-768x993.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_c_768x993_a7cec9742c.jpg 121w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_c_768x993_a7cec9742c.jpg 387w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_c_768x993_a7cec9742c.jpg 580w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"></figure><figure class="gallery-item" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;display:inline-block;height:auto;margin:0px 0px 1rem;max-width:33.33%;padding:0px 8.96875px 17.9531px;text-align:center;vertical-align:top;width:262.609px;"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/b_768x985_3f8fb449e6.jpg" alt="b-768x985.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_b_768x985_3f8fb449e6.jpg 122w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_b_768x985_3f8fb449e6.jpg 390w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_b_768x985_3f8fb449e6.jpg 585w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"></figure><figure class="gallery-item" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;display:inline-block;height:auto;margin:0px 0px 1rem;max-width:33.33%;padding:0px 8.96875px 17.9531px;text-align:center;vertical-align:top;width:262.609px;"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/a_7888f94e4b.jpg" alt="a.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_a_7888f94e4b.jpg 121w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_a_7888f94e4b.jpg 385w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_a_7888f94e4b.jpg 577w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"></figure></div>Then on another occasion, at the same gallery, I met him again, this time without the crowd. He preferred to wear a pair of fading blue jeans and white shirt, a reminder of those romantic 1970s when every youth in West Bengal dreamt of poetry, love and revolution. Jeans and Shirt were the uniform of love and revolution. I think, when Tagore came to Delhi as a young man, he carried those qualities along, plus his sense of dressing. Lovers in those days smoked rather constantly and drank Old Monk Rum.&nbsp;On that day when I met him, Tagore told me that he had quit smoking, which was news to me. I couldn’t have imagined the man without a cigarette between his fingers or at least a packet of cigarettes to fuss with. I understood the gravity of the situation.&nbsp;Then again, we met when Praveen Upadhyay of the Progressive Gallery at Laddo Sarai organized a talk session with art professionals that included Tagore, Prayag Shukla, Vinod Bharadwaj and myself. Tagore was supposed to talk about the art market. When the mike was handed over to him, he fussed with it for a while and said that he always wanted to make it big by promoting young artists, but somehow, he never made huge business.<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:689px;" id="attachment_31054" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31054"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/7_768x511_149563fe01.jpg" alt="7-768x511.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_7_768x511_149563fe01.jpg 235w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_7_768x511_149563fe01.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_7_768x511_149563fe01.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-31054">Siddharth speaking to the media at Art Konsult</figcaption></figure>Then I remembered Tagore telling the same during the market boom years that lasted in India for around ten years starting from 2005 to 2015. In 2008, the world market had collapsed, but the Indian art market using its cunning and reserve withstood the pressures and dragged the impending failure for a few more years only to revive itself by the beginning of the third decade of the new millennium.&nbsp;Had Tagore acquired a penchant for failure despite his resilience in running a gallery, publications and an auction house for over three and a half decades ? Did he enjoy calling himself a failure in the art market? Was he romantically involved with the idea of failure even when he kept others who were with him in the business, floating? I don’t know for sure. But Tagore remained grounded and rooted; he tried his best to keep himself away from the nefarious market practices.&nbsp;There were a few people who stood with Tagore in his highs and lows (lows that lasted for not some months but for years together), never deserting him, following his orders. Prashant Seal and Rajula Bisht are two people I remember. These two people have been so close to his heart and even after his twin daughters joining him in the business, both Seal and Bisht never lost their position as the confidantes of Tagore. He loved them like family.&nbsp;I met Siddharth Tagore in 1995. He had started Art Konsult in Hauz Khas Village. Meena Tagore (now Meena Varma) was with him then. Late Vijayan Kannanpally was the editor of Art and Deal. With the growth of art scene, Tagore’s gallery also grew in stature. Art Konsult was one of the few A listed galleries in the city. Tagore took it to South Delhi’s art district, Laddo Sarai during the boom years and later relocated it to Hauz Khas again.&nbsp;<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:562px;" id="attachment_31055" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31055"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/0_768x512_88eabd3bbc.jpg" alt="0-768x512.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_0_768x512_88eabd3bbc.jpg 234w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_0_768x512_88eabd3bbc.jpg 500w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_0_768x512_88eabd3bbc.jpg 750w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-31055">Siddharth Tagore with art critic and curator Jyoti A Kathpalia at the Art Konsult, New Delhi</figcaption></figure>It was in his Laddo Sarai phase that I joined him as the Editor of Art and Deal. It was the same when he decided to start Art Bull and Travel and Deal. I brought out around ten issues of Art and Deal between 2010 and 2013, with a gap in 2012 when I joined the United Art Logistics to establish the United Art Fair. Tagore literally lent me to the other organization with a promise that I could walk into the editor’s office at any time that I wanted. And I did go back.&nbsp;As a part of Tagore’s team, he gave me full freedom to edit the magazine and curate exhibitions. I curated a few shows and introduced a few new artists of which some are very reckonable names in today’s art scene. The exhibition ‘Merging/Submerging’ was a showcasing of contemporary photography art and ‘R.A.P.E’ (Rare Acts of Political Engagement), an all-woman show responding to the brutal murder of Nirbhaya in Delhi. This exhibition was a super hit and was discussed in all the print and television media. Art Bull did do a couple of exhibitions and auctions. I did not take much interest in it though Tagore hoped that his auction house could change the scenario and also break certain monopolies. Tagore also initiated an Art History Lecture series which I conducted on his behalf.&nbsp;Siddharth Tagore remained true to his calling. With a kind of detachment, he sponsored exhibitions that he knew well, would not bring any business. He was an avid collector of folk and tribal art and together with Meena Varma, he initiated an organization called ‘Art of the Earth’ for promoting the folk and tribal art of India, much before the ‘folkploitation’ of today’s art market became rampant. Tagore helped whoever came to him with a request for an exhibition or an immediate financial relief. &nbsp;<figure class="wp-caption aligncenter" style="border-width:0px;box-sizing:border-box;clear:both;display:block;height:auto;margin:15px auto;max-width:100%;padding:0px;vertical-align:middle;width:640px;" id="attachment_31053" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-31053"><img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg" alt="3-e1734762508660-669x1024.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg 102w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg 327w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg 490w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_3_e1734762508660_669x1024_7c977a7959.jpg 653w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined"><figcaption class="wp-caption-text" style="box-sizing:border-box;display:block;font-size:15px;line-height:20px;margin:0px;padding:12px 0px 0px;text-align:center;" id="caption-attachment-31053">Siddharth Tagore signing the <a style="background-color:transparent;box-sizing:border-box;color:rgb(255, 53, 36);display:inline-block;margin:0px;padding:0px;transition:0.4s;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://amzn.in/d/4TijcgO">book</a> “Ganika- In the visual culture of the 19th-20th Century India” at the Art Konsult</figcaption></figure>&nbsp;<img src="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg" alt="4-560x1024.jpg" srcset="https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/thumbnail_4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg 85w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/small_4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg 273w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/medium_4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg 410w,https://strapi.bangalore2.com/uploads/large_4_560x1024_090314e000.jpg 547w," sizes="100vw" width="undefined" height="undefined">When artists in Calcutta packed their wares and set out for Delhi, they knew Siddharth Tagore was there if nothing else worked (perhaps he was their primary destination), along with cigarettes and Old Monk Rum. He never discouraged the people who came to him with a clear intention to exploit. He was not cautious about relationships that brought him a fair amount of heartburn. As I said elsewhere, Tagore was a poet in his heart, with a heart ready to bleed for love and art.</div></div>

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