1. Freedom & Sons Ltd.: The Enterprise of Free Speech in a Market of Control
- Author:
- Gopalkrishna Gandhi
- Publication Date:
- 12-2019
- Content Type:
- Research Paper
- Institution:
- India International Centre (IIC)
- Abstract:
- As the title of this lecture suggests, it is about dissent, the right to dissent, the freedom to differ, to be able to say ‘I disagree; in fact I oppose…’. And to do so without fear. But no right comes without some difficulty. And sure enough, as I began working on this text, my late brother Professor Ramchandra Gandhi, Ramu as he was widely known, appeared in a hallucinated vision, to express dissent, strong disagreement, over the title of this lecture. He said to me in his inimitable mix of Hindi, Tamil and English: ‘Maine tumhare Mushirul Hasan lecture ka title “Freedom & Sons Ltd.” dekha hai… aur uska matlab samajh rahaa huun… lekin... Freedom & Sons Ltd… Sons…illai …illai….konchum politically incorrect…and not konchum, in fact romba incorrect, romba gender insensitive…. It may have passed muster some twenty or thirty years ago but not today…and certainly not in the IIC where Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay’s spirit is alive, where Durgabai Deshmukh peers over her husband’s shoulders to see that all is done right….The title obscures …in fact it nullifies the roles of India’s daughters…from Rani Lakshmibai of Jhansi and Begum Hazrat Mahal of Avadh to Madame Cama and Annie Besant, Kasturba Gandhi who died, don’t forget, in a Raj prison, and Maulana Azad’s wife Zuleikha Begum who died in Calcutta when he was in the Ahmednagar Fort Prison and would not seek parole…. And then, no less than any of these…the women who stood for freedom not from the white man’s domination but from that of our own male-controlled society, like Mirabai, who broke out of the court and palace to public spaces singing of Krishna, the great emancipator, and M. S. Subbulakshmi, who broke out of the Carnatic kutcheri’s strict repertory to sing Mirabai’s songs of Krishna…’.
- Topic:
- Freedom of Expression, Civil Rights, Freedom, Dissent, and Free Speech
- Political Geography:
- India