Rediscovering India in the Times of Manipulation of History | The AIDEM | P Sainath | Indian History

Summary

In a profound discussion, P Sainath delves into the manipulation of Indian history and the need for its rediscovery. He highlights how historical narratives are often constructed and manipulated by those who have never truly understood India's essence. Sainath discusses various instances where significant historical figures and events have been misrepresented or erased. He argues for the importance of remembering history accurately, as this remembrance serves as a form of resistance against authoritarianism and manipulation. The discussion also touches on current social and political issues, emphasizing the need for a balanced approach to understanding India's past and present.

Highlights

• P Sainath critiques the manipulation of history by political entities. 🤔
• The discussion emphasizes the importance of accurate historical remembrance. 🕰️
• Misrepresentation of historical figures and events is highlighted. 🏛️
• Current political landscapes are compared with past authoritarian regimes. ⚠️
• The resilience of Indians during historical and modern crises is celebrated. 🎉

Key Takeaways

• The manipulation of history is a tool used by those who never truly knew India. 📚
• Rediscovering India means rescuing it from false narratives and histories. 🗺️
• Differences in historical interpretation often reflect deeper ideological divides. ⚔️
• True remembrance of history acts as resistance against oppression and manipulation. ✊
• Activism and journalism play crucial roles in unveiling historical truths. 📰

Overview

In an engaging presentation by acclaimed journalist P Sainath, the realms of history, politics, and social justice come alive. Sainath explores how history is often manipulated to serve the interests of those in power, emphasizing the importance of accurate historical remembrance as a form of resistance. His insights urge audiences to question and revisit the historical narratives that shape current ideologies and policies.

Sainath provides a critical comparison of the past and present, drawing parallels between historical events and contemporary issues. He underlines the erasure of pivotal historical events and figures, challenging the audience to reclaim and rediscover India's true historical narrative. This reclaiming, he argues, is essential for fostering an informed and resistant citizenry.

The presentation is both a call to action and a celebration of India's resilience. Despite attempts to erase and manipulate history, Sainath highlights the strength and activism of Indian citizens, past and present. He advocates for a reinvigoration of collective memory to counter modern-day socio-political challenges, emphasizing that true freedom and progress depend on an honest understanding of history.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 01:00: Introduction and Context Setting The chapter opens with an individual expressing their happiness to be present, particularly in connection with a platform and event that commemorates KP Sashi. The speaker shares a personal connection, having known KP Sashi from their days at JNU and during his time working as an artist and cartoonist in Mumbai.
• 01:00 - 10:00: Manipulation and Erasure of History This chapter explores the theme of rediscovering India and highlights a segment of the population that seems to have never discovered it in the first place. The discussion hints at efforts or phenomena related to understanding and reclaiming cultural, historical, or national identity, possibly contrasting with ongoing narratives or forces that obscure or manipulate historical realities.
• 10:00 - 20:00: Personal Experiences and Anecdotes The chapter examines the notion of rediscovering India, emphasizing the need to address the current situation. It references statements made three weeks prior by Jaban Singh Paya, a former president of Bajrang Dal, known for his aggressive stance. The narrative seems to weave these contemporary political references into a tapestry of personal experiences and anecdotes, reflecting on the socio-political climate and the individuals involved in reshaping India.
• 20:00 - 30:00: Discussions on Modern Examples of Historical Erasure The chapter titled 'Discussions on Modern Examples of Historical Erasure' dives into the conversation around the perceived magnitude of current social movements compared to historic ones. It mentions a statement claiming the Mand movement in Kerala is more significant than the independence and Freedom Movement, and highlights how such opinions would have been dismissed more rigorously 10 to 15 years ago, indicating a shift in public discourse and the acceptance of controversial perspectives.
• 30:00 - 40:00: Corporate Influence on Media and Information The chapter discusses the growing influence of corporations on media and information dissemination. It highlights the impact of corporate ownership on the content and bias of media outlets, leading to potential misrepresentation of facts and censorship of dissenting voices.
• 40:00 - 50:00: Lessons from Past Movements and Call to Action This chapter discusses the juxtaposition of different figures within historical movements and their varied interactions. It highlights the case of an ill-read individual who is unaware of Subash Chandra Bose and his role with the Indian National Army, offering insights into the significance of understanding past movements. The chapter serves as a reminder of the importance of educating oneself about historical figures and movements to comprehend their impacts on contemporary society.
• 50:00 - 55:00: Conclusion and Call for Remembrance The chapter 'Conclusion and Call for Remembrance' highlights the naming of different brigades after prominent figures. The most well-known is the Jhansi Rani Brigade. Other brigades are named after leaders from the Congress Party, such as Gandhi and Nehru. The chapter underlines the historical context, mentioning the year 1943, and emphasizes remembering these legacies.

Rediscovering India in the Times of Manipulation of History | The AIDEM | P Sainath | Indian History Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 [Music] I'm very happy to be here particularly with the platform and event and process associated with the memory in this instance with of KP Sashi who I knew from my J new days and again when he came back and worked in Mumbai for a while as an artist cartoonist political
• 00:30 - 01:00 cartoonist so I'm glad to be here and I like your theme of rediscovering India though there's it's obvious that there is a growing number of people in our country who have never discovered it in the first place and rescuing in and you know the so the kind of people who've never discovered India are building an
• 01:00 - 01:30 entirely obnoxious construct and rediscovering India will mean necessarily rescuing India from what is happening 3 weeks ago the former president of the bajarang Dal perhaps one of the most aggressive presidents of the bajang Dal jaban Singh Paya told the weak magazine all of you are familiar
• 01:30 - 02:00 with the week it comes out of Kerala the Mand movement is far greater and bigger than the independence and Freedom Movement yeah now you can you can dismiss it as the you know mumblings of an idiot which he undoubtedly is but 10 years ago 15 years ago he could not have said such a thing with without being
• 02:00 - 02:30 challenged today he can and this was just on the eve of the org of January 22 um and then a week ago 10 days ago maybe Governor Ravi of tamilnad declared that Gandhi's contribution and role in the freedom struggle was insignificant it was n subash Chandra BOS who did everything
• 02:30 - 03:00 now here's a fantastic thing of jux opposing figures who actually dealt with each other very differently here is a man a you know here is a ill read unread person who does not know that subash Chandra BOS is Indian national Army
• 03:00 - 03:30 who were the brigades named after we all know jansy Rani of jansy Brigade the other brigades of the army were Gandhi Brigade neheru Brigade all after his onetime comrades in the congress party yeah now again oh by the way on 1943 from
• 03:30 - 04:00 Bangkok so netaji BOS making a speech on Gandhi's birthday said never in history has one individual achieved so much in one lifetime now they had great differences that's why they broke apart that's why they formed different political parties but they were of a class and a
• 04:00 - 04:30 generation and a mindset that dealt with difference very very differently from the way we do today yeah they could they could completely ideologically fight the other but never deny the other their role in history their role in the struggle
• 04:30 - 05:00 some years ago and and by the way on January what was I doing on January 22nd when the prime minister of your nation was playing high priest to Hindu and in fact making the Shankar aaras jealous yeah who many of who all of whom wanted to know what right he has to be doing that that that's our
• 05:00 - 05:30 job anyway while uh and I just it's tiring to remind people you know the Prime Minister actually if you watch the TV coverage and I forced myself to watch some of it I saw very little of Lord Ram I saw a lot of Lord Modi you know Lord Modi
• 05:30 - 06:00 kneeling down lord Modi prostrating himself Lord Modi rolling over lord Moi I don't know what I I I kept looking for the ram laala he was celebrating the return from Exile of ram laala I get tired of reminding people Ram laala was not kicked out of aoda by Babar or Islam which did not EX existed that time Ram was thrown out of
• 06:00 - 06:30 aodha by his flesh and blood he was kicked out by his father and his stepmother now what that has to do with babber what that has to do with Islam is beyond me yeah but you can write your own history now I mean it's just it's fine the difference between the differences you're seeing on these subjects on these issues
• 06:30 - 07:00 is not the difference between different interpretations of history that is not true it's a difference between those who see history as a process history as an evidencebased discipline and those to whom evidence is irrelevant Faith triumphs everywhere
• 07:00 - 07:30 evidence is irrelevant in this school of thought that is the difference it's not two historians fighting over interpretation I covered as a journalist when I was working in Blitz I covered the ram janami movement from between 80 a little after 85 till about 93 when um you know 92 December the demolition took place the
• 07:30 - 08:00 riots took place and the greatest Scandal pre adani the greatest scandle of the the great security scam rocked Dalal Street the stock exchange on Dalal Street where upon you know one side RAM janami and the other side as we put it in Blitz scam janami the stock exchange
• 08:00 - 08:30 I have visited aoda several times and if you go to the aoda faizabad region there is not one but thousands of temples in the larger faizabad region almost every one of I mean half of them claim that Ram was born here they can give you the spot marked X but they cannot tell you when
• 08:30 - 09:00 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 there are temples where Ram you know maybe ate an apple or whatever but there are temples for every moment but there is no Temple which tells you when he was born you know the exact spot the location and you built a huge thing on it on January 22nd and the people's AR of rural India we carried
• 09:00 - 09:30 rabindran tagore's poem from 124 year old poem there is no space for God in your temple that is the poem where tagor writes of a great king who built a gigantic Temple of gold almost piercing the sky and and there was great
• 09:30 - 10:00 effusive enthusiasm Etc but after a while nobody was going there and the courtiers reported to the king that they're all they're all going and listening to some old sadu who sitting under the branches of a tree so the king took his courtiers and went to the sadu and he asked him oh Oh Holy One why
• 10:00 - 10:30 are you sitting here in the open when you have got the temple my temple over there you can preach from there and the sadu says there is no space for God in that Temple and the king gets very angry he says look at it it's pure gold it's piercing the sky I buil such a thing and you're saying my temple is
• 10:30 - 11:00 empty the sadu said 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 your temp there is no space for God in your temple anyway the reason why Governor Ravi or why the bangal ex president are able to
• 11:00 - 11:30 say those things and get away with them is because of the near dangerously near complete Erasure of our history Erasure of our history there is by the way a website an official government website please compare what you saw on January 22 with how your country
• 11:30 - 12:00 celebrated August 15 and January 26 is there any comparison did you get that kind of attention for one of the greatest Freedom struggles Humanity has seen no you didn't see that on August 15 you didn't see anything of it on January 26 Republic
• 12:00 - 12:30 day but you saw the most incredible celebration again it has to do with Erasure the extraordinary thing about the present regime is not merely Erasure of the past they are even erasing the present I'll come to that the present is being erased dramatically like how after losing millions of people in
• 12:30 - 13:00 covid-19 we are now claiming to be the nation that managed covid best in the world and we are the Vish Guru you know and you know who that is for the 75th anniversary of our independence celebration of 75 years of Independence the government of India put up a special website I strongly recommend you have a look at it for very different reasons than those
• 13:00 - 13:30 which they had the website you know this this entire aadi am Mah first tranch of expenditure 110 cres 110 crores and the celebration of 75 years of inde dependence has its logo celebrating 75
• 13:30 - 14:00 years of Independence this website does not contain a single picture a single photograph a single video a single illustration a single story on by or a quote of a living Freedom Fighter they're still alive even in Kerala there are still they don't figure in the website at
• 14:00 - 14:30 all after last heroes came out I'm told they've taken two or three characters from my book and included them but they've been careful to include those characters who have died while the book was being published but not a single mention of a living Freedom Fighter they have one feature forgotten Heroes and there are some very
• 14:30 - 15:00 nice if some forgotten hero is remembered that's a good thing there are people there whom I knew of there are forgotten genuinely forgotten Heroes usually from uh a long time ago no one alive there are others there are some others there who are best forgotten but not a single living Freedom Fighter now I'm not not saying there are no photos on the website there are hundreds
• 15:00 - 15:30 of photographs and you all know whose photographs right same photograph that appeared on every single covid-19 vaccine certificate same photograph if we are unfortunate in April May which will appear on every bus ticket in this country so this is aadi
• 15:30 - 16:00 Mah Erasure Erasure even more striking there is not a single paragraph in a huge website I mean it's you you can spend months going through it there is not a single paragraph on British colonialism and what it did to this country so you have Generations who have grown up without knowing what British colonialism did yeah there is
• 16:00 - 16:30 incidentally every year new emerging research on what that colonialism did but that research is not happening in Indian universities in 22 November Jason hickle of London and Dylan Sullivan of Melbourne brought out an astonishing paper you know all of us during covid-19 we
• 16:30 - 17:00 learned this word excess debts what is excess debts mean excess deaths mean if a society has a normal number of deaths each year let us say a big nation has 10 million debts a year one year it has 15 million what is the excess death 5 million are the excess deaths okay that is called excess
• 17:00 - 17:30 deaths you all read this phrase During the covid-19 period 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 Sri Lanka um not Sri Lanka parts of Burma parts of Nepal this is
• 17:30 - 18:00 who you were all these two researchers have done is take 40 years 1880 to 1920 why did they take 1880 the British were there from 1757 but they took those years because your first census was 1871 so from 1880 to 1921 you have comparable data guess the number of excess deaths in
• 18:00 - 18:30 just 40 Years of British imperialism and think why your and know why your freedom fighters fought to liberate you and me from British imperialism there is a high estimate there is a low estimate and a middle estimate the general agreement or
• 18:30 - 19:00 consensus 100 million excess debts the high estimate 168 million excess debts you count how many that is per second now tell me if 1% of 1% of that had occurred in a European country You' be screaming G genocide
• 19:00 - 19:30 right but it was all worthless Brown lives right and a world which has taken aasia to such an extent that we are seeing genocide and unable to condemn it we are seeing genocide in Palestine we are seeing it you are seeing genocide televised life okay and yet it doesn't
• 19:30 - 20:00 move us to action you know one of the things that I am proud of and I want to tell you this about rediscovering remembrance is a very important part of it remembrance is resistance and there is no resistance without remembrance one of the things I remember most proudly about my country the first passport I owned in the first half of the 80s the first page
• 20:00 - 20:30 said all countries except South Africa and Republic of South Africa and Israel do you know that Indian passports had the ban on South Africa even before we became independent the interim government of neheru in 1946 place that all countries except Republic of South Africa a poor country emerging from famine from hundreds of
• 20:30 - 21:00 millions of deaths boycotted South Africa and lost 5% of its external trade because we had a huge Trade Surplus with South Africa you did that on morality yours was a moral position you may not have been a great nuclear power but you were a great moral power Gandhi in the 30s is already condemning what is happening in
• 21:00 - 21:30 Palestine every single Indian national leader worth his salt was condemning what was happening in Palestine because they knew British imperialism they understood what British imperialism does you know I've been to 45 46 colleges and universities in the last one year for one and a half years with my book the last heroes foot soldiers of Indian
• 21:30 - 22:00 Freedom based on the life story of living Freedom Fighters incidentally it is also appeared in Malayalam and is available for you outside here I don't know if the English copy is available but I saw and signed the malum copy every you know when you have completely erased history to this extent yeah natam go resurfaces as a freedom fighter
• 22:00 - 22:30 as a hero saer resurfaces as a hero now incidentally I tell you two things one about myself one about Mr saer I was not trained as a journalist I was trained as a historian and my guide was K okay my teachers were romila taper K
• 22:30 - 23:00 paniker bipin Chandra s bachara s gopal these were my teachers and I want want to tell you now about something about I went from I dropped out of ml PhD and went into journalism now let me give you my understanding of Mr Saar I
• 23:00 - 23:30 believe you know vayak damodar saakar was a genuine Bon ofid revolutionary till 1911 don't let's not also indulge in Erasure of the past he was a genuine Bonafide revolutionary till 1911 that's when they threw him into the andamans and all his revolutionary Zeal
• 23:30 - 24:00 vanished there were hundreds of others sent to andamans but he was the only one who wrote seven begging Mercy petitions to the British Raj spare me I will be your you know Advocate there were others who wrote letters asking for remission of sentence in various prisons in India but the anderman prisoners did not write Mercy petitions except s you know the founder the old Gad party
• 24:00 - 24:30 people in Punjab they would write from prison letters the founder of gurmit Singh akan the founder of the Desh bhat yadgar Hall in jalander he would write these letters father dying mother crying want to go and within a week of being released on compassionate grounds he was bombing the British barracks in Hur
• 24:30 - 25:00 railway station this was your revolutionary these were your rol and none of them offered to collaborate with the British please read Mr saker's letters you can see a Nani's book where he's published five of the seven petitions are available to us they're in the National Archives I don't know how long you know but because you know somebody will
• 25:00 - 25:30 invite back Saar from Exile into the National Archives who knows what will happen but that's not where it ends I want some remembrance on this so after sitting and spending his time writing begging Mercy letters to the British he was released 1926 he was confined to the district of ratn he was not house arrest he could not
• 25:30 - 26:00 leave the district and anyway sorry I'm not I'm s 1926 was not the date but in 1926 a book appeared the life of Barrister savaker okay now this was authored by the pseudonym chitra Gupta do you know who chitra Gupta was
• 26:00 - 26:30 historically chitra Gupta was the Scribe and bookkeeper of Lord Yama in 18th century 19th century lot of people used the pseudonym chitra Gupta because it has Authority you know don't listen you don't take me seriously you know I'm yama's right- hand man you better watch out so a lot of writers use this pseudonym and there was a lot of discussion over who was this chitra Gupta nothing came of it the
• 26:30 - 27:00 book was a terrible geography it's available okay it was printed by one of those S princess printers and in fact it is such a e eulogy of saer that uh it gives geography a bad
• 27:00 - 27:30 name then anyway in 194 the book was prescribed in 1926 by the British but in 42 it was published again again the discussion over who was chitragupta 1986 the book is published once again and the publisher proudly reveals from The Source being none other than saar's own younger brother who
• 27:30 - 28:00 reveals that chitra Gupta was none other than saer himself who wrote 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 saer had a very high opinion of Mr saer now
• 28:00 - 28:30 this okay forget this this is the I just wanted to show you that remembrance is necessary a nation that doesn't know where it came from has no clue where it is going okay you you don't know about your freedom struggle if you don't know about the incredible fights of the freedom struggle yeah how people in this country sacrificed for 190
• 28:30 - 29:00 years and your history tells you about as of it all began in 1857 in in uh U the North Long be uh 90 years before the first shot was fired in the north yeah it starts with the Battle of plasi and the ad VES and theit of the Jungle Mahal region resisting the British for
• 29:00 - 29:30 40 years in what was wrongly known as the chuar rebellion in 1790s 6 80s and '90s 60 years before a single shot was fired in the north tipu Sultan ver kab the maruda brothers they LED an the maruda brothers and caboman actually came closest to Bringing Down
• 29:30 - 30:00 the East India Company totally this is your history please know it please remember it yeah it wasn't all happening in up and bear oh by the way soon I think a a book will come from my colleague Josie Joseph former colleague which will tell you I will leave you in susp suspense about that when traven cor declared its
• 30:00 - 30:30 independence and secession in 48 please go back and find who was the first to congratulate them on trying to break away from the Indian Republic go back and see let let Josie's book come and you read it please buy that book and read it uh but let's come to the Erasure of the present where is where does India stand every single
• 30:30 - 31:00 day you know you look at anything that happens split in the mahag bandan of Bihar happens it is never the fault of the btia Jan party because the media are so completely corporatized and so completely sold out if you I can tell you this if you expect corporate media to tell you the truth you're wasting
• 31:00 - 31:30 your time you're participating in the erasa please read them you need your newspaper I also need my newspaper but please read them with analytical understanding and discretion in let us look at where in what happened in covid-19 to this day can any one of you tell me what how many does any Indian know I don't how many Indians died of the
• 31:30 - 32:00 pandemic yeah does anyone know for sure how many Indians died in the pandemic we are claiming to have handled it better than anyone in the world it's like Ram was born here but we can't say when some people died but we were the best in the world we are the V Guru in hand handling it what happened let me give you what are the global estimates
• 32:00 - 32:30 by institutions of advanced research and monitoring w u wh said 4.7 million Indians died lanet medical journal with whom I have frequent clashes but a medical journal of some repute it said 4.2 million
• 32:30 - 33:00 Indians died Johns Hopkins gave three different estimates it was running all of them in millions World Development Council Washington DC said 4.9 Millions Indians died of the covid-19 pandemic it also shows in various ways please
• 33:00 - 33:30 remember that you know the International Institute of population studies director was thrown out of his job for doing studies that questioned all the great achievements of India in life expectancy which the nhfs the national Family Health survey it showed that all the figures that we are using are questionable but anyway come back to
• 33:30 - 34:00 covid-19 so all these different organizations differred 4.2 4.7 but they were all agreed India lost the largest number of lives in covid-19 but visha Guru said 4 lakh 86,000 and that was it no question no newspaper no no Channel no one has done investigations later they revised it to
• 34:00 - 34:30 5 lakh 21,000 but then you should also revise that 4.7 million into 5 million or whatever okay so complete there is something so frightening going on Erasure of the past is extending to Erasure of the present we are a nation living in a
• 34:30 - 35:00 dangerously delusional State this is self delusion on a mass scale my friend sudish was asking me on the way here how does the present situation compare with the um emergency I was leader of a students union in the emergency and but down south in tamilnad we didn't suffer as much of the north but I tell you one
• 35:00 - 35:30 thing I do not remember any of us being as scared and frightened as we are today I do not remember that I do not remember my friends up north being so scared and so and I do not remember the scale of sellout of people we once respected as intellectuals people we once respected
• 35:30 - 36:00 as public intellectuals of people we once respected as editors owners of newspapers the scale of that sellout which has very solid economic Roots the Indian press was the child of the freedom struggle the first Indian owned journal to make a Mark was is 202 years old now rajar Ram moan Roy's
• 36:00 - 36:30 mirat Akbar which incidentally was not in Bengali it was in Persia but the last 40 years youve seen the corporatization of everything in the world including the media when the country's richest man and biggest corporate leader Mukesh Amani is also the biggest owner of media in the country he owns the largest bouquet of television channels called Network
• 36:30 - 37:00 18 you know when you see ETV Malayalam ETV Telugu oh sorry not Telugu ETV Malayalam ETV marati you all think it's inadu television owned by RI no for the last 15 years it has been owned by Mukesh Amani only the five Telugu channels remain with inadu in Telugu in Andhra Pradesh and
• 37:00 - 37:30 Telangana nowhere else all the other languages now the richest man 19th richest man in the world richest man in India rich rich biggest corporate leader is also the owner of the media and Mr adani has now decided to get into that purchasing NDTV one decent Channel we had and buying Quint and you know various other things that the entire scale apparatus
• 37:30 - 38:00 of brainwashing never did you you saw many people remain silent in the emergency but the amount of crawling the amount of crawling that is happening each time Mr Modi speaks anything anything whatever he says is like some ch revelation of Commandments or whatever
• 38:00 - 38:30 that is that's where we are now so you're looking at a what what was the difference between I'll tell you for me politically the difference between the emergency and today in that regime you can say that the emergency saw the consolidation of State as authoritarian today we are seeing the emergence of State as
• 38:30 - 39:00 sociopath it's astonishing it is not enough to defeat your adversary you have to humiliate him you have to Heap cruelty on them you have to take great pleasure in humiliating and destroying your enemy even after defeating him how many people are in in jail for no reason other than they criticize Mr
• 39:00 - 39:30 Modi or Mr adani yeah I think it's a very frightening I think it's a very frightening situation so back to covid-19 yeah so in covid-19 for instance and there's one thing involving Kerala there on March 31st 2020 the Attorney General of India gave an affidavit in Supreme
• 39:30 - 40:00 Court March 31 2020 that is a week after the lockdown is declared as of today I can state that there is not a single migrant left on the highways okay not a single migrant left on the highways my friends the last largest movement of human beings in recorded
• 40:00 - 40:30 history happened at that time I can show you how many I can give you a glimpse of how many people moved we were the ones that covered it in the people's Archive of rural India anyway on March 31st attorney general says not a single migrant on the highways as of 11:30 this morning as of 11 a.m. this morning April 14 the same attorney general appears
• 40:30 - 41:00 before the same innocent Supreme Court bench and says governments plural have opened 23573 relief centers food and relief centers across the country for he did not mention that 62% % of those relief centers were opened in the single state
• 41:00 - 41:30 of Kerala 62% were opened just in Kerala by governmental non-governmental or yeah and he did not mention at all numbers of how many were in up Bihar and other places dominated by the ruling party yeah do you know then again they try bringing being quiet but the numbers are
• 41:30 - 42:00 moving millions of people walked hundreds of kilometers to reach home rather than stay in the cities the media beat its chest in anguish and said why are they leaving there's a better chance of survival in the city better chance of medical help why are they leaving that was the wrong question the real question and brings me to Erasure of the present the real
• 42:00 - 42:30 question was not why they were leaving the cities and going back to the Villages the real question was why did they leave The Villages and come here in the first place and the answer to that was two words agrarian crisis T of millions of people whose livelihoods were destroyed by the increasing corporate ization of Agriculture came skilled Farmers worked
• 42:30 - 43:00 as your cook or my driver yeah and that's why we were so unhappy to see them go cheap labor going but the railways gave away the game they started the special shamic trains remember the shamic trains to transport labor already millions of people have moved when on May 1st first Labor Day the Indian railways introduces shamic trains on May 26th the Indian
• 43:00 - 43:30 railways give on May 26th the Indian railways put out a press release and I proud of the Indian railways they claimed and I'm proud of them in 25 days between May 21 and May 25 the railways transported they they transported 91
• 43:30 - 44:00 lakh workers on the shamic trains that means almost 1 CR in 25 days but please remember there was March and April before that when people went by foot when people went by any means they could not less than 20 million human beings left their places of work and res residents and the nrgs nearly collapses
• 44:00 - 44:30 with the additional load they have to put another 20 40,000 cres in it but there's no discussion about this there is absolutely not and there is no discussion about The Agrarian crisis now more than 400,000 Farmers have taken their own lives since 1995 and those are official figures they are
• 44:30 - 45:00 huge underestimates like not a single migrant is on the streets today and also remembrance is resistance ReDiscover what happened in did your media tell you that what happened that farmers kissan andolan the farmer struggle the farmer struggle in at the gates of
• 45:00 - 45:30 Delhi was the single greatest largest peaceful constitutional Democratic protest the world has seen in 25 years prior to that the most famous Global struggle for justice was 2011 Occupy Wall Street Occupy Wall Street a few thousand young idealistic
• 45:30 - 46:00 Americans occupied Zuko Park a privately owned Park in New York on Wall Street and they put out slogans we are the 99% you are the 1% yeah it was a great slogan it was a great fight but at the end of 9 weeks the New York mayor decided throw them out even though the old owner of the park was not saying anything the man who owned Zuko Park did not ask for them to
• 46:00 - 46:30 be thrown out yeah but it took NYPD 10 12 hours to throw everybody out of there 24 hours they cleaned it out your Farmers lasted 53 weeks at the Gate of the capital attacked not just by police but by see C ISF crpf when I went there many times it
• 46:30 - 47:00 looked like there was a greater mobilization to fight your Farmers than you would find on the line of actual control with China yeah 20 foot by 10t trenches in the National highways dug by your government in violation of their own law or destruction of public property thousands of feet of barbed wire the worst winter in 40 years water
• 47:00 - 47:30 cannon freezing cold water hitting old men sometimes in their 80s who died of hypothermia all this happening there your Farmers did not budge they represent they please know this Not only was that the greatest Democratic protest far greater than walk Occupy Wall Street they fought for you and me
• 47:30 - 48:00 because can anyone of you tell me that your media that your mainstream media can you name a channel can you name a magazine can you name a newspaper or a portal that carried the full text of the three Farm laws full text of the three Farm laws if you read the text if you read the text you will find that the farm laws were not not only against Farmers they were against every one of us they the
• 48:00 - 48:30 specific Clause removed the fundamental right 32 of the Indian constitution the right to Legal remedy which is one of the three most important rights in a democracy the right to Legal redress which made the Supreme Court of India one of the most powerful Supreme Courts in the world the Clause 17 of 14 States categorically this law is outside the
• 48:30 - 49:00 Beyond is outside the jurisdiction of the Civil courts it would instead go to some appellate tribunal headed by deputy collector tar who are all going to eager to fight Amani and adani huh the farmers 720 of them died according to the SU yuk kasan Mor's last estimate they fought for you my friends they fought for
• 49:00 - 49:30 me yeah don't let us forget them and on that brings me to an appeal I make to all of you on 16th February 12 days from now there is going to be because the farm laws are being reintroduced through the back door by the way the farm laws many of after they were defeated and withdrawn only then did the farmers leave they were not thrown out they refused to be
• 49:30 - 50:00 thrown out 720 died but please know this those Clauses from those laws have been introduced through the back door in many other laws including in the anti cow slaughter law it's an interesting thing for people in Kerala should know incidentally I believe I believe the best uh beef in the world that I have eaten is in
• 50:00 - 50:30 Kerala and I try never I never visit and not have it okay uh please bear that in night in mind for tonight yeah so uh in the in the Karnataka anti- cow slaughter law what did they do they have put a clause there from an old Colonial thing they put a clause
• 50:30 - 51:00 that those acting in good faith under this law might be deemed to be public servants so I take a gank and raid aflak Khan's house Lynch him torture his family and say there was beef in the I believe there was beef in their phe I'm acting in good faith I can be declared a public servant it actually
• 51:00 - 51:30 uses the word can be it's an old Colonial thing for collaborators this Clause was written for your bajarang Dal and vhp I mean reintroduced for them it's still there on the kataka law so what it was introduced as an ordinance and then made a law so this sort of a thing you know we every January 25th all of us GA June 25th We Gather in remembrance of the
• 51:30 - 52:00 emergency and signify our rejection of the emergency but every year we institutionalize our em Embrace of the emergency with new laws with new acts with new curbs on freedoms the farmers fought for that another group that fought for it the farmers showed us the meaning of the word resistance that they showed us and they
• 52:00 - 52:30 were the ones who showed us that in 1857 as well it was not a SEO Mutiny it was the greatest agrarian apprising the world had seen even see it was not the people of lakau citizens of lakau kpur and mirat who revolted it was the soldiers in the cantonement who who were the soldiers then and today please know the Indian
• 52:30 - 53:00 Javan is a kissan in uniform he has to reflect the mood of The Village at that time the land the land actions taken undertaken by the British dispossessed millions of even the nawabs were dispossessed in in aat many of them were dispossessed of land and fought it yeah and that led to Europe Uprising because of the famines and the millions of deaths that followed so guys
• 53:00 - 53:30 friends I'm asking you to remember memory is the weapon remembrance is resistance rediscovery means rescuing a country which is supposed to be doing so fabulously but India has fallen to 111 out of 121 nations in the global hunger index the
• 53:30 - 54:00 hungriest number of largest number of hungry people in the world India has fallen to rank 161 out of 180 countries in the world press Freedom index India has fallen to 132 out of 100 out of 100 32 out of 188 nations in the United Nations human
• 54:00 - 54:30 development index in the environmental performance index India in 2022 fell to 180 out of 180 but on one index we are top and that's what I want filmmakers artists look the great the thing the power of poets artists film makers is is in is incalculable it may be intangible
• 54:30 - 55:00 but in five verses a poet can say more than an academic in five volumes so too with filmmakers and documentary makers who in half an hour to one hour can pack something that can absolutely set a nation thinking and acting yeah we need that remembrance we
• 55:00 - 55:30 need that we need that is the process of rediscovery I ask you to make