Johnsonian Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University Akeel Bilgrami said that the best tool to understand the subject is to synthesise ideas of Karl Marx and Gandhi.
Despite all the drawbacks, the Left remains as the most important option for the public in our region, said renowned Dalit author C. Ayyappan.
He was speaking after inaugurating the two-day Kochi Letters International Festival (Kochi LIFE) 2010 at the EMS Memorial Town Hall here on Friday.
Commenting on the theme of the festival, ‘Whither Left?’, Mr. Ayyappan said that those deconstructing the Left have the responsibility of rebuilding it as well. Just like writings of scholars and academics on Marxism and Leninism, these discussions should also be aimed at betterment of the Left, he said.
Introducing the vision of the festival, Sashi Kumar, Chairman, Media Development Foundation and Asian College of Journalism, Chennai, said that the idea is to create a space among the qualified public and thereby for a public space where writers, thinkers, activists and artistes can come together to share ideas.
In the lecture that followed on “Themes from the left: Value, Agency and Alienation”, Johnsonian Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University Akeel Bilgrami said that the best tool to understand the subject is to synthesise ideas of Karl Marx and Gandhi.
Caste continues to be neglected
The next lecture was by renowned Sociologist and human rights activist Gail Omvedt. Speaking on the theme “Caste and reconstruction of the Left”, Ms. Omvedt said caste continued to be the most neglected issue in our nation.
The Left requires to form a new vision on the society using a new kind of language and discourse. The Indian history, colonialist past, impact of Hinduism and historical materialism should be passed through a rethinking process, she said.
In her talk on “rethinking the language of feminist politics in India”, Tejaswini Niranjana, Senior Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Culture and Society, Bangalore, said that new vocabulary for protests and struggles are needed to enable feminist politics to establish itself as an alternative to the existing system.
Talks and discussions were followed by a presentation by photographer Ram Rahman based on the photographs by Sunil Janah. In over 500 photographs, Sunil Janah had captured the struggle of Indian independence and emergence of the new India in the Forties and Fifties.
The final day of the festival will have Prabhat Patnaik, Vice Chairman of State Planning Board, speaking on “Reformism or Socialism?” and famous Slovenian philosopher and author Slavoj Zizek speaking on the theme “Whither Left?”
Other speakers are Gopal Guru, professor of social and political theory in the Centre for Political Studies, School of Social Sciences at Jawaharlal Nehru University; Javeed Alam, Chairman of Indian Council of Social Science Research; filmmaker Kumar Sahani; Annapurna Garimella, art historian and designer and Usha Zacharias, assistant professor at Westfield State College (Massachusetts).
