revolution
i saw kaalbela today, not that its an exceptional movie or anything...but it made me finally sit and write this down, sort of organize my thoughts and...
well i have been thinking about this for long... wondering about what really happened back then? it has always intrigued me you know, and i have read quite a few books but they were all works of fiction. it seems to me at times that there is this conspiracy of silence as far as the movement of the late sixties is concerned. there is a huge cover up happening somewhere. the movement, the involvement of the students, the repressive action of the state--it was a huge thing. thousands were killed, tortured, imprisoned, raped, maimed for life... and yet as far as i am aware there has been very little research on this.
as i mentioned before, kaalbela, haajaar churaashi-r maa, ontorghaat, honyomaan these are all works of fiction. what about documentary history? there is nothing... nothing... the history we are taught in school ends on the 15th of august 1947. as if since then the history of our nation has been uneventful. and we have sort of "lived happily ever after".
i think the concept of our nationhood, the illusion of unity in diversity ended with independence. with the common foreign enemy gone all the age old domestic demons reared there heads right back up. and new ones are born every day.
anyway, i digress. what is it about the naxalite movement that makes it a taboo subject even today.? till date the people of the previous generation only whisper vaguely that this or that person in the para was a nokshaal. was the repression so savage that people are still afraid to talk about it? but how could they unleash such barbaric violence upon their own people? i mean this kids were scarcely out of school...their tormentors were people they knew, people of the same nation, spoke the same language, maybe had been to the same schools and colleges as their parents, lived in the same localities...
my own sympathies are ambivalent. these kids...they were my age...and...yet they seem (when i read these books or watch these movies) so much older... and there is a kind of idealism thats infectious, inspiring...that makes me want to spit on my compromising existence. at other times i feel they were fools, at other times i feel its me who is older by far, more mature, more cynical albeit a lesser human being. always a lesser human being.
it does not matter today whether they were wise or foolish.
what matters is, as animesh kept asking dipak, were they right or wrong? right or wrong? right in their ideals and wrong in their actions?is affirmative action, however misguided, better than this indolence, this lethargic indifference? is revolution so easy? does not violence always, always, always inevitably beget violence? how could they have not foreseen it?
then again, two decades earlier., when student revolutionaries were practising the politics of violence to get rid of foreign oppression, that was ok. that was laudable. and then all of a sudden, protesting against the oppression of an indigenous government became a crime severe enough to incur the wrath of the savagely retributive state machinery. why?
i don't know. i don't think one can ever know beyond all doubt.
but one can know facts. one can know history. and their history needs to be written.
and somewhere deep down i have a feeling that the only reason we are romanticizing and valourising their quest today, in books and movies, the only reason we sympathise with them, is because they lost. had they won, things would not have been different. not really. its perhaps for the best that they lost. had they won, the disillusionment would have been infinitely greater.
well i have been thinking about this for long... wondering about what really happened back then? it has always intrigued me you know, and i have read quite a few books but they were all works of fiction. it seems to me at times that there is this conspiracy of silence as far as the movement of the late sixties is concerned. there is a huge cover up happening somewhere. the movement, the involvement of the students, the repressive action of the state--it was a huge thing. thousands were killed, tortured, imprisoned, raped, maimed for life... and yet as far as i am aware there has been very little research on this.
as i mentioned before, kaalbela, haajaar churaashi-r maa, ontorghaat, honyomaan these are all works of fiction. what about documentary history? there is nothing... nothing... the history we are taught in school ends on the 15th of august 1947. as if since then the history of our nation has been uneventful. and we have sort of "lived happily ever after".
i think the concept of our nationhood, the illusion of unity in diversity ended with independence. with the common foreign enemy gone all the age old domestic demons reared there heads right back up. and new ones are born every day.
anyway, i digress. what is it about the naxalite movement that makes it a taboo subject even today.? till date the people of the previous generation only whisper vaguely that this or that person in the para was a nokshaal. was the repression so savage that people are still afraid to talk about it? but how could they unleash such barbaric violence upon their own people? i mean this kids were scarcely out of school...their tormentors were people they knew, people of the same nation, spoke the same language, maybe had been to the same schools and colleges as their parents, lived in the same localities...
my own sympathies are ambivalent. these kids...they were my age...and...yet they seem (when i read these books or watch these movies) so much older... and there is a kind of idealism thats infectious, inspiring...that makes me want to spit on my compromising existence. at other times i feel they were fools, at other times i feel its me who is older by far, more mature, more cynical albeit a lesser human being. always a lesser human being.
it does not matter today whether they were wise or foolish.
what matters is, as animesh kept asking dipak, were they right or wrong? right or wrong? right in their ideals and wrong in their actions?is affirmative action, however misguided, better than this indolence, this lethargic indifference? is revolution so easy? does not violence always, always, always inevitably beget violence? how could they have not foreseen it?
then again, two decades earlier., when student revolutionaries were practising the politics of violence to get rid of foreign oppression, that was ok. that was laudable. and then all of a sudden, protesting against the oppression of an indigenous government became a crime severe enough to incur the wrath of the savagely retributive state machinery. why?
i don't know. i don't think one can ever know beyond all doubt.
but one can know facts. one can know history. and their history needs to be written.
and somewhere deep down i have a feeling that the only reason we are romanticizing and valourising their quest today, in books and movies, the only reason we sympathise with them, is because they lost. had they won, things would not have been different. not really. its perhaps for the best that they lost. had they won, the disillusionment would have been infinitely greater.
posted by mojo at 11:24 AM
8 Comments:
"and somewhere deep down i have a feeling that the only reason we are romanticizing and valourising their quest today, in books and movies, the only reason we sympathise with them, is because they lost."
Very aptly put down. And I also agree that people hardly talk about the naxal movement. Like, my father was an active member of the naxalite movement (really active, trust me) but he denies to call himself one. he says, "na, amra naxal pore, age marksbaadi" ittyadi ittyadi. jodio i consider myself enough lucky, chotobela e baba ektai golpo janto nokshal andolon er golpo, konodin o onnyo kono golpo bolte shuni ni.
btw cinema ta kemon? boi er sathe meel koto ta re?
lojja-r songe sheekar korchhi boi-taa porini. uttoradhikaar pore theme gechhilam. ebaar porbo. cinema r prothom half ta unwatchable. second ta bhaaloi...ontoto amar legechhe ...overlooking minor glitches etc.
This is one fantastic, thought provoking bit of writing. I suppose the only way to know the truth is to speak to a nokshaal first hand. I know a few, but as you said, they're very hush hush about the past.
@prayag: thanks.
i know what you mean. i've thought about the lack of history too. anyway, i just wanted to say that there are few books available on it, you'll find them listed in the Purbo Poshchim bibliography. amar o porar ichhe achhe, kobe hoye utthbe janina.
i know. my jethu was one. so active that at one point of time he never went anywhere without his trusted pistol.
but then, the idealism withered away. and he got married, had a kid, got a good job, climbed up the corporate ladder rapidly, etc etc.
and even now, WHENEVER i bring up the subject, he just physically gets up and walks away.
almost one entire generation of brilliant minds lost. and peanuts to show for it.
tobe 'purbo poshchim' pore amar naxal thekeo beshi bangladesher mukti juddho sombondhe jante ichche kore.
স্কুল কলেজে খিল
রাস্তায় মিছিল
ক্র্যাকারে কাঁপে রাজপথ, কিনু গোয়ালার গালি
সোনার টুকরো ছেলেরা সব অশ্বমেধের বলি
বারুদ গন্ধ বুকে বয়ে আকাশে ফোঁটে জ্যোৎস্না
ময়লা হাতে ওকে যেনো ছুঁসনা
ওরে আমার মন
পৃথিবীর গভীর গভীরতর অসুখ এখন।
Hi. Someone forwarded your blog and I quite liked your relection on an issue which we are all so "quiet" about.
I had been associated with a theatre personality(wouldn't like to name him)who had, so to say, a very 'first hand experience' of the naxal movement and much of his plays reflect the conflict between "end" and the "means to the end".This, I assume is the all pervasive question of right and wrong.
I just finished " The White Tiger" by Arvind Adiga. The same question pops in.
This demands a very " chul chera " analysis, which I suppose might come by the next gen when the movement can be referred to as "past"- and there would be no one to offend( y' know what i mean;))
Post a Comment
<< Home