About four days ago, over four hundred Leftists, self-appointed secular intellectuals, and artists issued an appeal that contains a direct call to the people of India not to vote for the BJP. The self-confessed aim of this group is to stop Narendra Modi from becoming the Prime Minister. However, the appeal also contains liberal slurs against both Narendra Modi and the RSS. The following is the full text of the appeal signed and endorsed by such prominent personalities as Achin Vainik, Irfan Habib, Suvira Jaiswal, Ashley Tellis, Harbans Mukhia, Shabnam Hashmi, and Zoya Hassan.
The appeal
Never before in post-independence India have political forces, which are a front for an organization committed to creating a Hindu Rashtra, made as strong a bid for power as in the coming elections. These forces are led by a person who presided over a pogrom against Muslims in Gujarat in 2002 and has never expressed any contrition over his role in that ghastly incident. And they enjoy the backing of the most powerful corporate houses in the country. The prospect of this alliance of corporate capital and communal forces coming to power constitutes a palpable threat to the future of our secular democracy. We urge all responsible individuals and political formations to ponder over the situation and urgently take whatever steps are necessary for defending our secular democracy. We appeal to the electorate to foil this corporate-communal alliance’s bid for power by voting against the BJP-led NDA.
Its shock value
The brazenness of this appeal shocked the nation at large, and other academicians and thinkers specifically. The Centre for Policy Studies (CPS) has issued a strong condemnation of the Left’s appeal, which has been endorsed by eminent scholars, thinkers, and other prominent personalities including Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa, Dr. J.K. Bajaj, Dr. Anirban Ganguly, Dr. Rajput (former Director of NCERT), Madhu Kishwar, and Meenakshi Jain. The full text of the CPS condemnation is given below.
A response to the appeal by Left academics: Rejoice that India is coming into her own
A number of academics have issued a statement warning the nation that the strong possibility of the NDA under the leadership of Shri Narendra Modi coming to power “constitutes a palpable threat to the future of our secular democracy”. They have gone on to issue a direct appeal to the electorate to vote against the BJP-led NDA. In addition they have appealed to various individuals and political formations to “urgently take whatever steps are necessary for defending our secular democracy.”
The academics who have signed this appeal include the usual left leaning activists; some of them are now active leaders of the Aam Aadami Party (AAP). Knowing the sympathies of many of them for violent extremism, one shudders to think what the urgent steps they have called for might mean.
The left-leaning academics of this kind have unfortunately dominated the intellectual discourse of the country since Independence. Through their control of the academic institutions and policy-making bodies, they have ensured that India remains struck in the corrosive self-negating worldview inculcated and nurtured during the colonial times. They have obstructed the path of India recovering pride in herself, her people and her civilisational heritage; and thus, they have kept India from seriously applying herself to the task of nation-building. But, though it may be possible to stop the progress of history for a while, history cannot be kept in abeyance for all times. The people of India have been kept waiting for nearly seven decades; the time has now come for India to break free and begin moving confidently towards her destiny.
We call upon the people of India to rejoice at the emergence of a leadership that is committed to restoring the glory of India as one of the most ancient, populous and important civilisations of the world. Let us rejoice that for the first time since Independence, there has appeared a definite possibility of India developing into a normal nation, comfortable with and proud of her culture and civilisation; and, seriously engaged in quickly uplifting all her people out of the long phase of deprivation and scarcity.
We appeal to the people of India to welcome the possibility of this new dawn of India and do everything necessary to make it happen.
Signed by
Dr. J. K. Bajaj, Director and former Resident Editor, Jansatta; Prof. M. D. Srinivas, Chairman and former Professor of Theoretical Physics, Madras University; Dr. S. L. Bhyrappa, Eminent Thinker and Author, Karnataka; Sri Suryakant Bali, Sr. Journalist, former Editor, Navbharat Times; Sri Rambahadur Rai, Sr. Journalist, New Delhi; Sri Banwari, former Resident Editor, Jansatta, Delhi; Dr. Smt. Santishree D.Pandit, Professor of Politics and Public Administration, University of Pune; Prof. Purabi Roy, Historian and former Professor of International Relations, Jadavpur University, Kolkata; Ms. Madhu Purnima Kishwar, Editor Manushi; Prof. Kapil Kapoor, former Pro-VC, JNU; Prof. Bharat Gupt, Thinker and Author, formerly of DU Prof. K. V. Varadarajan, former Professor of Economics, Chennai; Dr. Mahesh Sharma, former Chairman, KVIC; Sri Adeesh Anand, Thinker and Author, New Delhi; Ambassador Prabhat P. Shukla, former Adviser to PM; Professor Ashwini Mahapatra, SIS, JNU; Shri Shakti Sinha, IAS (retd), former Secretary, GOI; Shri Gaurinandan, formerly of DU; Shri Mayank Jain, Filmmaker and TV Journalist Shri Vijay Kranti, Sr. Journalist Dr. K. N. Singh, Gorakhpur University Dr. Balwan Gautam, Professor, JNU Prof. Pushraj Jain, Professor of Sanskrit, DAV Evening College; Prof. Rajkumar Bhatia, formerly Professor of Economics, DU; Smt. Sandhya Jain, Senior Journalist, New Delhi; Prof. Brij Kishore Kuthiala, VC, Makhanlal Chaturvedi University, Bhopal; Mr. Farooq Khan, ex-IG, J & K; Shri D. C. Nath, IPS (retired); Shri R. K. Ohri, IPS (retired); Shri J. P. Sharma, IPS (retired); Shri Avanijesh, DAV College, DU; Mr. Saurab Dubey, DU; Dr. Amit Awasti, DU; Dr. Shambhu Singh, DU; Dr. Manoj Rana, DU; Dr. Sanjay Kumar, DU; Dr. Abhay Jere, Scientist, Pune; Prof. B. B. Dutta, Shillong; Shri Sandeep Balakrishna, Columnist and Author, Bangalore; Prof. Meenakshi Jain, Historian and Author, DU; Prof. Saradindu Mukherjee, Historian and Author, DU; Colonel (retired) Hoabam Bhubon, former Chairman, Manipur Public Service Commission, Imphal; Prof. N. Joykumar, Manipur University, Imphal. – IndiaFacts, 9 April 2014
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