Freedom First

Summary

This is issue no. 338 of Freedom First (Bombay), dated February 1981, priced at Rs 1, in its 29th year of publication, edited by Nissim Ezekiel and founded by M. R. Masani. The 16-page issue opens with Ezekiel’s editorial “The Two Super-Powers,” weighing the risks of a more confrontational Reagan-era U.S. posture toward the Soviet Union against the dangers of appeasement, and contrasting the self-correcting openness of American society with Soviet totalitarian closure. R. V. Sen’s “Cruelty in Indian Society” uses the Bhagalpur police blindings and the Samastipur killings as a springboard for an argument that everyday authoritarian cruelty — in police stations, schools, homes, and workplaces — is the deeper, more pervasive problem behind headline atrocities. A report by Arvind Deshpande, “People’s Action,” records a December 1980 Bombay planning meeting (with Acharya Dada Dharmadhikari, Vimla Thakar, and others) organising a national convention on civil liberties, decentralisation, and authoritarian drift in the post-JP era. Other pieces in the rendered pages include a short essay on the International Year of the Disabled (Mohini D’Penha), a reprinted commentary on the 1980 Polish strikes titled “Workers and Democracy” (Bayard Rustin, extracted from Free Trade Union News), a three-part “Voices” column by younger contributors on university education (Menka Shivdasani), children’s religious magazines (Pratima Asher), and women’s education (an unsigned report on a talk by Dr. Suma Chitnis), three book reviews under “The World of Books” (on the Dawoodi Bohra priesthood, an anthology of Indian-English prose, and Bapsy Sidhwa’s novel The Crow Eaters), and a full reprint of the 1980 “Secular Humanist Declaration” drafted by Paul Kurtz of Free Inquiry magazine defending free inquiry, church-state separation, and scientific rationalism against religious authoritarianism. The issue’s throughline, across editorial, reportage, and reprints alike, is a liberal preoccupation with authoritarian abuse of power — political, religious, domestic, and institutional — and the civic and intellectual resources needed to resist it.

Essays

The Two Super-Powers

By NISSIM EZEKIEL

Nissim Ezekiel’s editorial weighs whether a more confrontational Reagan-era American posture toward the Soviet Union endangers world peace or is a necessary corrective to appeasement. He argues that despite America’s flaws, its open society allows endless self-criticism and correction, while the Soviet Union is a closed, totalitarian system where dissent is criminalised; he concludes the two superpowers cannot be morally equated in India’s foreign-policy calculus.

• Frames the central question as whether a tougher American stance under Reagan raises or lowers the risk to world peace and non-aligned nations.
• Notes the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ doomsday clock at three minutes to midnight as a marker of nuclear risk.
• Argues ‘Better Red Than Dead’ appeasement logic has given way to recognition that Soviet dominance would itself be a form of death for millions.
• Contrasts America’s open society, self-criticism, and exposure of its own corruption (citing Watergate) with the Soviet Union’s total suppression of dissent.
• Criticises the non-aligned movement as reflexively suspicious of America while blind to Soviet intentions.
• Concludes that America represents flawed democracy and the Soviet Union represents totalitarian dictatorship, and that no diplomatic nuance should obscure that distinction.

Cruelty in Indian Society

By R. V. SEN

R. V. Sen’s essay argues that public outrage over dramatic atrocities like the Bhagalpur blindings and Samastipur killings misses the deeper, ordinary cruelty embedded across Indian institutions — police, schools, homes, and workplaces — and that only addressing this everyday authoritarianism, not commissions of inquiry after each scandal, will produce lasting change.

• Opens from the Bhagalpur police blindings and Samastipur killings as widely publicised instances of state cruelty.
• Argues authoritarian cruelty is not confined to police but pervades schools (teachers beating children), homes (parents beating children, dowry deaths), and workplaces (exploitative bosses and labour leaders alike).
• Invokes Naipaul’s phrase ‘an area of darkness’ (originally about all of India) as applicable to the normalised violence in Bihar and elsewhere.
• Calls commissions of inquiry and delayed reports inadequate; urges immediate, low-cost humane reforms to prison conditions.
• Insists individual citizens must feel implicated in cruelty happening ‘nearer home,’ not just in reported, distant atrocities.

People’s Action

By ARVIND DESHPANDE

Arvind Deshpande reports on a day-long Bombay planning meeting (31 December 1980) convened by Govindrao Deshpande, with Acharya Dada Dharmadhikari’s guidance, that resolved to organise a national convention (27-29 March 1981, near Delhi) on civil liberties, resisting authoritarianism, electoral and economic decentralisation, and rural pauperisation, sponsored by groups including Sarva Seva Sangh, Gandhi Peace Foundation, and PUCL.

• Records participants including Vimla Thakar, Thakurdas Bang, Siddharaj Daddha, Manmohan Choudhry, and Arvind Deshpande himself.
• Concludes that political parties alone cannot address India’s crises and that voluntary organisations and concerned citizens must take initiative ‘in the absence of JP.’
• Sets convention dates (March 27-29, 1981) and venue (Patti Kalyan, near Delhi), with about 150 invitees.
• Lists sponsoring bodies: Sarva Seva Sangh, National People’s Committee, Gandhi Smarak Nidhi, Gandhi Peace Foundation, Citizens for Democracy, PUCL, and Lok Seva Sangh.
• Enumerates a wide agenda: civil liberties, resisting authoritarian/repressive tendencies, electoral reform, Northeast/Assam situation, decentralisation of political and economic power, rural/urban pauperisation, and demographic pressure.
• Notes Rs. 10,000 pledged by Prof. Thakurdas Bang for convention expenses, and a background paper to be prepared by Manmohan Choudhry with L. C. Jain, Rajni Kothari, and Arun Shourie.

International Year of the Disabled

By MOHINI D’PENHA

Mohini D’Penha’s short piece welcomes the UN’s 1981 International Year of the Disabled, citing roughly 30 million disabled persons in India, and argues India’s rehabilitation efforts suffer from poor coordination, inadequate standardisation, and insufficiently trained personnel, calling for a comprehensive, India-specific national policy rather than imported Western norms.

• Cites approximately 30 million disabled persons in India, comparable to the combined populations of Australia and Canada.
• Criticises inadequate consultation, coordination, and standardisation among rehabilitation agencies.
• Calls for a national policy attuned to developing-country ethos rather than Western norms.
• Flags the 1981 census as an opportunity to identify disabled populations if surveys are time-bound and well-targeted.
• Emphasises rural service gaps and the risk of urban migration by disabled persons seeking care.

Workers and Democracy

By BAYARD RUSTIN (reprinted, extract, Free Trade Union News, Washington, Vol. 35, No. 9)

A short reprinted piece by Bayard Rustin (from Free Trade Union News, Washington) frames the 1980 Polish workers’ strikes as an inspiring struggle to democratise an authoritarian society, winning concessions including independent trade unions, while warning that Soviet-pressured reversal remains a real danger and urging continued American labour support for the strikers.

• Describes the Polish strikes as transforming from a wage dispute into a democratisation struggle.
• Notes the key concession won: trade unions independent of government control.
• Warns of the risk that Soviet pressure could cause the Polish leadership to revoke the settlement.
• Draws an explicit comparison to the American civil rights movement’s freedom rides and activists who risked their lives.
• Calls for continued support from American organised labour for the new Polish free trade unions.

Voices 1: Succeeding By Degrees

By MENKA SHIVDASANI

The first ‘Voices’ piece, by Menka Shivdasani, is a young writer’s satirical complaint about the Indian higher-education system: the fetishisation of degrees over ability, the extension of graduation to 21 years with the 10+2+3 system, compulsory attendance rules that fail to raise teaching quality, and a job market that rewards connections over competence.

• Argues intelligence has been reduced to possession of a university degree, even as the degree itself is treated as ‘useless.’
• Criticises the 10+2+3 system for raising the minimum graduation age to 21, calling the extra year unjustified by real educational gain.
• Describes compulsory 75% attendance as pointless when lecture-based teaching is poor and course material is ‘crammed’ before exams.
• Recounts a personal example of being denied a job for lacking a degree despite adequate skill.
• Concludes that job prospects depend more on personal connections (‘so-and-so’) than the value of the degree itself.

Voices 2: A Magazine For Children

By PRATIMA ASHER

The second ‘Voices’ piece, by Pratima Asher, critiques a children’s religious monthly published by an unnamed ‘well-known mission,’ arguing its moralising content on sense-objects, caste, and the existence of God is condescending, poorly reasoned, and either too abstract or too didactic for genuine child readers, ultimately robbing children of imaginative engagement with religion and mythology.

• Describes the magazine’s framing message from a ‘Swamiji’ warning children against sense-pleasures and desire.
• Criticises child-written pieces on the Avatara and the four Varnas as uncritically defending caste hierarchy.
• Argues children’s literature that explains away religious and mythological figures destroys their imaginative power.
• Suggests such magazines are effectively written or heavily edited by adults despite child bylines.
• Calls for children’s religious/moral content to be more rationally explained rather than delivered as unquestioned dogma.

Voices 3: Role of Women

By A CORRESPONDENT

The third ‘Voices’ piece reports on Dr. Suma Chitnis addressing a women’s camp in Bangalore (organised by the Leslie Sawhny Programme) on the history and purpose of women’s education in India, tracing it from Raja Ram Mohan Roy’s 1833 movement through missionary involvement, the 1940s, and post-Independence constitutional guarantees, and arguing that education must equip women to think and decide for themselves rather than merely serve marriageability or motherhood.

• Chitnis defines good leadership in educated women as the capacity to lead oneself into new roles, not merely lead others.
• Traces women’s education history from Raja Ram Mohan Roy’s 1833 movement, through the linkage of higher education with widowhood, missionary involvement, and 1940s wartime employment opportunities.
• Notes constitutional guarantees of free compulsory schooling in the 1950s, with special provisions for Scheduled Castes, tribals, and women.
• Observes that women underperform in exams relative to men despite equal opportunity, attributing this to social conditioning toward compromise.
• Argues current education is too theoretical and abstract, leaving women unequipped to make strong decisions about their own roles.
• Concludes real educational goals must build women’s ability and confidence to think for themselves and act as agents of social change.

The World of Books: Dawoodi Bohras (by Noman Contractor, New Quest Publications)

By PREETH I. BIDDAPA

The World of Books section opens with Preeth I. Biddapa’s review of Noman Contractor’s booklet Dawoodi Bohras (New Quest Publications, Rs 8), which documents how the Dai/Syedna hierarchy exercises near-feudal authority over the Bohra community through excommunication, social boycott (‘barrat’), and control of communal wealth via religious levies, despite legal setbacks such as the Bombay High Court/Supreme Court ruling against the Prevention of Excommunication Act’s suppression by the Syedna.

• Describes the Dai (Syedna)‘s hereditary authority as originating with the 47th Dai’s seizure of the title, becoming a demi-god-like hereditary office.
• Quotes the oath of allegiance every Bohra male must swear, pledging absolute obedience to the Dai/Syedna.
• Details ‘raza’ (permission) as controlling Bohras’ rights to vote, marry, publish, or hold public meetings.
• Notes Morarji Desai’s 1947 Prevention of Excommunication Act and its being ruled ultra vires by the Supreme Court as it ‘negatived the rights of one million Bohras.’
• Describes social boycott (‘barrat’) as a substitute weapon of control used against dissenters after the Act.
• Mentions a reformist Bohra Youth Association in Udaipur pressing only for accountability over Syedna funds, not for doctrinal change.
• Reviewer praises the booklet as ‘dynamic’ in exposing this subjugation despite Bohras being relatively educated and prosperous.

The World of Books: Indian-English Prose: An Anthology (ed. D. Ramakrishna, Arnold Heinemann)

By MEENAKSHI MUKHERJEE

Meenakshi Mukherjee reviews Indian-English Prose: An Anthology, edited by D. Ramakrishna (Arnold Heinemann, Rs 60), praising it as a needed complement to existing Indian-English poetry anthologies but criticising its conventional, non-chronological arrangement, its lack of composition dates for many pieces, its heavy reliance on well-known ‘standard’ authors and lengthy novel extracts, and a superfluous glossary aimed at a non-Indian readership despite the editor’s stated aim of tracing prose’s growth since the early nineteenth century.

• Notes the anthology spans from Rammohun Roy (1823) and Vivekananda (1894) to contemporary writers like Dom Moraes and Ved Mehta.
• Lists contributors including Romilla Thapar, Prakash Tandon, Kusum Nair, Raja Rao, Mulk Raj Anand, Gandhi, Nehru, Rajagopalachari, Radhakrishnan, Tilak, Gokhale, and Sri Aurobindo among others.
• Criticises the near-total absence of composition dates, undermining historical/diachronic reading of the pieces.
• Faults the editor’s deliberate avoidance of chronological ordering as contrary to the anthology’s own stated historical aims, since only two of thirty pieces are from the 19th century.
• Criticises inclusion of a glossary of common Indian English words (karma, ashram, guru) as unnecessary and revealing the intended non-Indian readership.
• Concludes the volume is useful but more conventional and less pedagogically ambitious than a prior anthology (Statements, ed. Jussawalla and de Souza).

The World of Books: The Crow Eaters (by Bapsy Sidhwa, Sangam Books, 1980)

By SHIREEN VAKIL

Shireen Vakil reviews Bapsy Sidhwa’s novel The Crow Eaters (Sangam Books, 1980, Rs 15), finding it a lively but ultimately shallow ‘hilarious saga of a Parsi family’ centred on the rascally, worldly Freddy Junglewalla and his feuding mother-in-law Jerbanoo, whose farcical episodes entertain but reduce Parsi identity to caricature and superstition rather than serious exploration of community and intermarriage issues.

• Summarises the plot: Freedoon ‘Freddy’ Junglewalla builds a prosperous business in Lahore and clashes comically with his shrewish mother-in-law Jerbanoo.
• Notes the novel’s strength lies in its lively, lusty characters rather than plot or story.
• Criticises the novel for reducing Parsi identity to superficial markers (sadra, kusti, customs) rather than exploring distinctive community traits.
• Notes the intermarriage subplot (Yezdi’s affair with an Anglo-Indian girl) is treated lightly, subordinated to the novel’s ‘best-seller’ aims of comedy and sex.
• Compares the novel unfavourably in seriousness to Perin Bharucha’s earlier The Fire Worshippers, while still finding it more successful as comic entertainment.
• Closes by wishing for a more searching, well-considered novel about the Parsi community.

A Secular Humanist Declaration

By Drafted by Paul Kurtz, Editor, Free Inquiry

This is a full reprint of the 1980 ‘Secular Humanist Declaration,’ drafted by Paul Kurtz (editor of Free Inquiry), defending democratic secular humanism against renewed attacks from fundamentalist religion and authoritarian ideologies. It lays out ten principles — free inquiry, church-state separation, freedom, ethics based on critical intelligence, moral education, religious scepticism, reason, science and technology, evolution, and education — arguing that reason, science, and democratic freedom, not divine guidance, are the best foundations for human welfare.

• Frames secular humanism as historically rooted in classical Greek and Roman philosophy, Chinese Confucian thought, and the Carvaka tradition of India.
• Identifies contemporary threats: fundamentalist Christianity, Islamic clericalism, Catholic papal authority, religious Judaism, and ‘bizarre paranormal and occult beliefs’ like astrology.
• Lays out ten numbered principles including Free Inquiry, Separation of Church and State, the Ideal of Freedom, Ethics Based on Critical Intelligence, Moral Education, Religious Scepticism, Reason, Science and Technology, Evolution, and Education.
• Explicitly links historical religious tyranny to modern secular totalitarian ideologies, treating both as threats to free thought.
• Defends evolution against fundamentalist attack as strongly supported by scientific evidence.
• Concludes that reasonable persons should recognise secular humanism’s contributions to human welfare rather than treat it as morally corrupting.

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