Book Launch & Discussion of The Last Heroes with P. Saintath

The book launch of P. Sainath's book The Last Heroes: Foot Soldiers of Indian Freedom at its core, was about the necessity of rewriting and reimagining history through a subaltern perspective . In his book, he challenges the popular conception of the Indian freedom movement and attempts to redefine the words "freedom" and "fighter" itself. In popular imagination, the phrase "freedom fighter" evokes certain images. One thinks of Mahatma Gandhi, Bhagat Singh, Subhas Chandra Bose, Jawaharlal Nehru, Chandra Shekhar Azad etc. the blueprint of a typical Indian freedom fighter is a male, politically affiliated patriot. While it is true that many leaders of the independence movement embodied these characteristics, it is important to note that the movement wasn't sustained only by the so called "leaders".

Indian Independence materialized due to the struggle carried out by the masses and the marginalized, who were fighting on two fronts: independence from colonial imperialism and the freedom from inequalities that existed in the social fabric of Indian society. The Dalits, Tribals and Women are some of the most neglected freedom fighters in the movement. Their labor is relegated to a secondary position as they did not fit the prototype of a freedom fighter. Their stories got buried with them. Sainath, in his book has attempted to excavate these tales of bravery from burials of anonymity. One of these stories which came up several times during the discussion was of a woman who did not “fight” the British in the conventional sense of the word, but rather facilitated this struggle by providing care work like cooking for 20-30 people everyday who were more “actively” involved in the freedom movement.

This woman still does not consider her contribution as anything significant, and won’t refer to herself as a freedom fighter. This one anecdote illustrates how our understanding of the freedom movement is one dimensional and erroneous. There are inconsistencies in our narratives and our collective history. If all these great men were out there shedding blood for their nation, then who was feeding their children? Who was taking care of the farm lands and nursing the elderly? This question of erasure of women’s unpaid care work is pertinent even now. Data shows that women put in more hours of work than men everyday but still are far behind in terms of employment.

Sainath also talked about something rather profound. In his book, he talks about the struggle for freedom carried out by the tribal against the landlords or Zamindars. Ambedkar came up in the discussion as an exemplar icon that isn’t traditionally seen as a freedom fighter. A reason behind this could be that Ambedkar, all his life, was more dedicated to social freedom than political. The Satyagrahas organized by Ambedkar aren’t seen as a part of the independence movement. If we compare this to the Satyagrahas of Gandhi, we see

that they are written in history as an essential feature of the movement. Ambedkar’s main agenda wasn’t political freedom. His idea of freedom was freedom from below, freedom from oppressive structures and institutions and freedom from ignorance.

Ambedkar was of the view that political freedom would mean nothing without social freedom. He believed that just becoming independent on paper isn’t enough, we need to radically reform the Indian society for it to be truly liberated.

In the session talked about Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav and, and how there was no mention of a freedom fighter who is still alive. He also talked about how people living in rural areas not only fought against British administration, but also against local landlords Despite all this, they still had to fight to get their certificates.

He also mentioned that in 1877, the queen was titled as empress of India and the grand Darbar was held with 68 thousand guest when during those times 6 to 10 million people died because of hunger and famine. Another interesting takeaway came as a response to a question posed by Manas Tiwari, who asked about the research methodology and the way to obtain such obscure stories. He wanted to know how Sainath found and approached these lost freedom fighters and conducted the research of his book primarily through interacting with these individuals. To this, Sainath replied that the first step is to “just get there”. As reliance on the internet for information grows, we forget that the most accurate way to understand human beings and their journey's is to just simply sit with them and talk. He said, “Chronicle story is the important part of journalism’’.

Sainath left us with this thought and compelled us to rethink the way we derive information and sometimes even overcomplicate research.

At last to mention what Sainath said, and with that we resonate "If you don't know where you are from, you don't know where you are going".

Overall, the event was intellectually stimulating and gave us ample to think about.
- written by Tanishka Urade and Manas Tiwari.