Not a single living freedom fighter featured on Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav website, says Sainath

Academia in India is also heavily dominated by upper castes, he says

People’s Archive Of Rural India (PARI) founder and former Rural Affairs Editor of The Hindu P. Sainath on Friday said, “Class formations and the coalition that took power in India after Independence wrote history in their image,” and rued that the Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav website did not feature a single living freedom fighter.

He was speaking at the launch of his book — The Last Heroes: Foot Soldiers of Indian Freedom — that features interviews of 16 freedom fighters, at the Music Academy in Chennai. Criticising the Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav website, he said: “The Government of India, to celebrate the 75th year (since Independence), has put up a website which, by the way, is full of PM’s speech at G20 and about drone technology. It’s got a list of forgotten heroes at the bottom, some of whom are best forgotten, and not a single photograph, not a single item, not a single article, not a single quote, not a single illustration of a living freedom fighter. You know whose photos there are, right? From website to gas cylinders, it is the same photo,” he said.

He spoke about how the right wing view of history coincided with that of imperialist historiography, and said: “For 20-25 years, there was not even an attempt to controvert that history. It starts happening with very progressive historians, the Panikkers, S. Gopal, Romila Thapars.....; and it produced a huge reaction from the communal forces, the Manuvadis of that time and this time, and their history of ancient India coincides very heavily with that of imperialist historiography because both have to show the Mughal period in a very negative light, both have to come to that ground.” He added that academia in India was also heavily dominated by upper castes.

Mr. Sainath said he was offended by B.R. Ambedkar often being missed by many in the list of freedom fighters. “The Indian Constitution is the finest expression, the finest distillation, the essence of the ideals of our freedom struggle. The chief craftsperson of the Constitution has to be seen as a giant of freedom, who launched the greatest struggle for human dignity on the face of the earth, the struggle which still continues and to which, I’m afraid to say, all of us contributed far less than we should have.”

N. Ram, former Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu and Director, The Hindu Group’s publishing company - THG Publishing Private Limited, said: “It’s a very fine statement when Sainath asked about pensions [for freedom fighters] and so on. Sankaraiah [featured in the book] said we fought for freedom, not pensions. And, I think that ran through like an undercurrent to this exercise of discovery. This is an example of the finest journalism, finest traditions of journalism, going back to reporting, verification, cross checking dates. Sainath’s journalism has been marked by that.”