Pune: Writer Nayantara Sahgal on Tuesday could not attend a function organised to honour her with an award in the city. Hence, she sent a video message, in which she said, “We are living in an India that has no connection with our modern political past. Secularism is under attack. Equal rights and equal citizenship are in tatters and Indians have been divided into the Hindus and others. The truth is this divide is not between the Hindus and others. It is between a militant creed called ‘Hindutva’ and those whom it calls ‘others’, and it is a negation of all that Hinduism represents.”
The function was held at the SM Joshi Socialist Foundation, where she was awarded the first Loknete Bhai Vaidya Smruti Gaurav Praskar 2019, instituted jointly by the Arogya Sena and the Bhai Vaidya Foundation in the memory of socialist leader Bhai Vaidya.
Due to her ill-health, Sahgal could not receive the award personally but conveyed her feelings through the video message.
In the message, she said, “In addition, all differences of opinion with the ruling Hindutva ideology are being condemned as ‘anti-national’ and those who will not fall in line with ‘Hindutva’ are being singled out for punishment. The questioning mind, the scientific outlook, the rational approach, the creative imagination and freedom of expression, have no place in today’s backwards-looking ‘New India’, which is ignoring the fact that India is a democracy.”
“In a democracy, citizens do not get shot dead by gun-toting motorcyclists, as has happened to five eminent rationalists and free thinkers, who have been killed for rejecting superstition in favour of reason, and for their independent views. Above all, in a democracy, criminals are arrested and convicted for their crimes. The reverse is happening here. Criminals roam free, protected and even congratulated by the ruling power,” she added.
“We are watching the destruction of the very meaning of India and of all that Indians have built since independence,” she added.
“I believe Bhai Vaidya had a special interest in education and I can imagine what he must have thought of the four assaults on education. The independence and integrity of universities are being challenged, students have been arrested for their dissenting views, school textbooks are being drastically altered with no regard for facts and history is being re-written. One or two states have wiped the Mughal Empire out of their textbooks. In some, Gandhi and Nehru are either absent or reviled. Museums and Akademis have been put under state control, thereby losing their autonomy and the purpose for which they were founded. Along with all this damage, the scientific frame of mind that has been encouraged and taught since independence as being indispensable to a modern nation is being replaced by myths and fantasies,” she further added.
In the absence of Sahgal, English writer Kiran Nagarkar received this award on her behalf from Baba Adhav, the leader of unorganised labourers. National President of Arogya Sena and Bhai Vaidya Foundation Abhijit Vaidya was also present.
