Maharashtra Governor K Sankaranarayanan has stressed the need for taking all stake holders into confidence before the authorities making interventions in sensitive issues like education reforms.
Inaugurating the 134th Mannam Jayanthi celebrations here on Sunday, Mr Sankaranaryanan said that the ideal way would be to arrive at a ‘positive’ decision before initiating reforms in the education sector.
Organisations like the Nair Service Society (NSS) had taken up their service to the society in the education sector when there were none else to serve the needy. “As such anyone trying to challenge the interests of such organizations and discredit their services would not be spared by the people,” Mr Sankaranaryanan said.
The essence of Indian democracy was the variety of cultures the nation possessed and the protection of the right to ensure the identities of the various communities, embedded in the Constitution, he pointed out and added that every community organization had the right to fight for safeguarding its identity.
As a pioneering organization serving the society in the area of education and health, the NSS and its present leadership had the responsibility to carry forward and augment the work done by their predecessors. “The present leadership has the Right and freedom to oppose any move that would hinder the democratically and Constitutionally bestowed rights enjoyed by the organization and the community,” Mr Sankaranarayanan said.
Paying tributes to Mannath Padmanabhan on his 134th birth anniversary, Mr Sankaranarayanan said it was wrong to evaluate the contributions of persons like Mannathu Padmanabhan in terms of his service to the community to which he was borne into. “Tall visionaries like Mannathu Padmanabhan belonged to the humanity as it was people like him who had taken the lead in the humanity’s march forward,”.
Not even governments of present day would be able to initiate reforms which Mannathu Padmanabhan single handedly took up nearly a century back, Mr Sankaranarayanan said. According to him, leaders like Mannathu Padmanabhan drew the ability to attempt and successfully complete Herculean tasks from the love and affection bestowed on them by the people. “That is the essence of democracy,” he said.
Delivering his Memorial Talk, P J Kurian Congress leader and MP said time has come to sort out the contradictions in ensuring social justice under the peculiar situation prevailing in the State. Unlike the social situation at the national level, the ground realities in Kerala remained positive for the minority communities who controlled majority of the educational institutions. The different reality calls for different strategies for ensuring social justice, economic justice and equality among communities, he pointed out.
It was high time we looked into the possibility of sorting out such contradictions at the State level, since the Federal structure of administration envisioned in the Constitution provided one with the opportunity to do so, he said. Mr Kurian felt that the policy of equidistance being followed by the NSS, had originated at the time of Mannathu Padmanabhan who had taken issue based principled stands during his fight for social justice for his community and all those were discriminated against. “The policy had never been static, but was of dynamic nature as it sided with justice all the time,” he said.
P V Chandran, Managing Editor, Mathrubhumi daily, extended felicitation. NSS president P V Neelakanta Pillai presided. NSS general secretary P K Narayana Panicker made the introductory remarks.
G Sukaumaran Nair, secretary, welcomed the gathering. KPCC(I) president Ramesh Chennithala, N Peethambara Kurup, Anto Antony, Kodikunnil Suresh, K C Venugopal, Jose K Mani (all MPs), Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan MLA and K Suresh Kurup MP were among the gathering.
