The Trial Of chacha manmohan s gandhi

In 1995, I attended the centenary celebrations of the London School of Economics to present a paper at the Department of Government, and the most memorable event I witnessed during those few days was "The Trial of Karl Marx." It was held at the Old Theatre, and had three senior dons performing:

Meghnad, Lord Desai played Dr. Karl Marx;

Professor Kenneth Minogue was the Prosecutor, and

Professor Bernard Crick was the Counsel for the Defence.

The charge was read out to the audience, who were the Jury. The charge was as follows:

You, Dr. Karl Marx, are hereby accused of having wasted the time of humanity with your theories.

If found guilty, Dr. Marx would have to attend First Year BA classes at the LSE.

If found not guilty, he would be free to return to Highgate Cemetery.

The event was hilarious as well as serious. I enjoyed it thoroughly - and even wrote a column on it for The Economic Times. I was a freelancer then.

A similar charge ought to be levelled against our Great Leader, chacha manmohan s gandhi. During his long and illustrious career, spent entirely in State Employment, this man, if you can call him that, also served as Chairman of the University Grants Commission. He is, in reality, an "intellectual bodyguard of the House of Nehru." 

I wrote just the other day about the Theory of the Vicious Circle of Poverty which was taught to me on the very first day of my BA Economics (Hons.) course in Delhi University - and how this is designed to kill the intellect. 

Add to that the neo-Malthusian "population problem" bullshit - and the student of Economics, which is best defined as "the study of the production of wealth through the division of labour and the fragmentation of knowledge," is filled with complete hopelessness, as indeed I was. He sees poverty as inescapable. And he sees his fellow human beings as the problem. He sees State Power as the only solution. 

He is then taught "Indian Economics" - which contains all the pious intentions of the Central Planners, and all the statistical data which must be mugged up. This curriculum was surely designed by our Great Leader. And it is this poison that he seeks to inject into the minds of all the children of this nation. He is misusing State Power for this purpose. His Free Education comes with the Education Tax. And it is also Compulsory.

Here in Pondicherry, when I look out onto the road in the morning, I see these children going to school. What huge heavy bags they carry! How many NCERT books they buy and study. How much mathematics and how much statistics and God alone knows what else our The State has conspired to teach them. What is the need to study so much? That too, for so many years. In my own case, I scarcely remember anything I learnt in school - and the same applies to most people. All I am grateful for are Br. FitzPatrick's English essay classes, where I learnt how to write.

Some seven or eight years ago, when our chacha first announced his "free and compulsory education programme," all the newspaper editors praised him. I alone dissented. I was then writing a monthly column for the editorial page of The Times of India - and my article against State education was rejected! Jug Suraiya was then the editor of the page - and only after a protracted email dialogue, six or seven mails each way, did he finally agree to publish my dissent. This itself shows how gullible we have become BECAUSE of our "education." 

It is something like the Fisheries Department jeep I saw on the road here yesterday. Is our The State now going to catch fish for us? If you go to the seashore, you will see that real fishermen, who KNOW how to fish, lack modern equipment - like, say, a modern fishing trawler or even an outboard motor. The Education Department is much the same as this Fisheries Department. We do NOT know what government is meant for - because it is this government that is miseducating us.

There is a huge amount of "real knowledge" that is NOT allowed into our markets because of State Restrictions - like the dancing ladies of Bombay. I have seen excellent musicians languish in poverty because of restrictions on bars, pubs and nightclubs. There is no "nightlife industry" in any Indian city. We are all forced to go to sleep by their "wee willie winkie" laws. Stay home and watch TV, we are told. Bollywood Bollywood Bollywood. And UndieTV, of course. The Undie of The State.

Whereas Dr. Karl Marx faced the mild charge of having wasted the time of humanity with his theories, to my mind chacha manmohan should face a much more serious charge; indeed, the very charge that Socrates faced. And that is, of "corrupting the minds of the youth."

I would like to be The Prosecutor.


You can read Part 2 of this post here.