PATTABI WRITES

The Phoenix Moment: Challenges Confronting the Indian Left by PRAFUL BIDWAI Praful Bidwai (1949-2015) one of our finest public intellectual, outstanding journalist contributed a  lot in almost all the progressive and left journals has authored the above book with all seriousness. I have seen that book first at com D.Gnanaiah’s residence some months back and com D Pandiyan repeatedly mentioned about this book in the course of his lecture at Pondicherry last month   The wrapper of this great book (great labour of Praful ) goes like this."The Phoenix Moment seeks to understand how a communist movement, almost unique within the world’s capitalist democracies, flourished for so long in India, and what accounts for its initially gradual and then rapid decline. It also asks how far and in what manner the Left has accomplished its goals; whether it could have achieved more and what its future prospects are. Crucially, political analyst Praful Bidwai investigates whether the Left’s c

Com Baskar, Chennai based TU leader of SastriBhawan has sent me a serious book that needs intensive and responsible debate. The book was originally written in Telugu- then translated to English and now we have its tamil translation. The author Renganayakkamma was already known for her works of Marx's Capital and she is known for her novels also.She has been consistently fighting for Marxist interpretation of soicety and struggles. This book is "For the sloution of Caste- Buddha is not enough- Ambedkar is not enough either- MARX is a must".. Its tamil tittle is ”சாதிய பிரச்சனைக்கு தீர்வு: புத்தர் போதாது அம்பேத்காரும் போதாது -மார்க்ஸ் அவசியத்தேவை” I have just started reading the book. It is more than 400 pages book. Critical examination is needed about that book also. I hope that I can complete the book within a short span of time and can say some of my impression about the methodology and presentation, issues handled. Thanks to com Baskar for introducing this book

Rajmohan Gandhi has been writing widely on various aspects of Independence movement, pak affairs etc.He has written biographies of both of his grandfathers Mahatma Gandhi and Rajaji. He is the son of Devadas Gandhi. This book "Understanding the Founding Fathers: An Enquiry into the Indian Republic's Beginnings"    was authored   by  him more as a rejoinder to two popular authors viz Swami Sachidanand  of Gujarat, a critic of Gandhi and to prof Perry Anderson for his book The Indian Ideology . Swami is less popular in our area and his writings are less known. But Prof Perry Anderson is known to left circle throughout the world by his write ups thro NLR- New Left Review. His book Indian Ideology    provoked debates and discussion   in the last 3 to 4 years. This book was introduced to me by RAVI (Rathna Ravi Our JAO,TU Activist, Translator of many good works) last year or so. I read it but not impressed much  observing  a kind of bias it shown. Com D Gnanaiah( a livin

Nayantara Sahgal's Book The story of India's Freedom Movement is an impressive one. The presentation is very orderly, clear and simple. No text book way or professorical style is found. For just Rupees  170, our youngsters can avail  comprehensive knowledge about our freedom struggle. I will be happy if the book is introduced and read by Students and Youths  to imbibe the spirit. Shedding tears unavoidable in certain pages, when one involved in this book. Nayantara has authored many books. She is the daughter of Vijayalaxmi Pandit and niece of Jawaharlal Nehru. Recently she fought against aggressive events in the name of Hindutva and Cow and against the ideology of Modi Govt. She returned back her literary awards

No Free Left- The Futures of Indian Communism a much talked about book in 2015 amongst left oriented circles. Vijay Prasad , the author is the General editor of Leftword Books, a CPIM publication Division. Vijay  a prolific writer in Frontline, Hindu ,PD,Marxist etc. The  book is near to 400 pages priced Rs 995 . The first impression I got when reading that book is as if I am reading the compilation of CPM’s Reports of various congresses held chronologically- its Political review report, Org report, Political Resoultion. It does not mean that the book contains subject matter beyond that. But in most of the pages, I had that impression. It is self critical to some extent not to the extent of Critical study of  Praful Bidwai’s Phoneix Moments of the same year 2015. Of course it is easy to analyse write and criticize what happened and easy to draft suggestions and ways for the future, but difficult to organise, monitor and translate.    some excerpts  highlighted by me is given  in

Ram Manohar Lohia one of our greatest Modern Political Thinkers, a socialist of his own terms delivered a speech at Hyderabad in 1952 about India's Socialist path taking Gandhi's action and vision LOhia's Article on Caste wrttten 58 years ago still have relevance and classical sense.This article was reproduced In JANATA issue of Mar 20,2011.I have placed here for the benefit of FB friends and comrades( Both articles in my FB)

One of the best analytical lecture I heard recently is given below. Irfan a great historian and scholar of medieval India analysed the best efforts of Mahatma Gandhi .Down below given was Yogendra's lecture. Both the lectures opening bigger horizon of our thought process and helping us how to construct text for our speeches. Not a single word is uttered unnecessarily.. every word uttered is so meaningful. It is difficult for TU/Political leaders to find time to listen because of day to day activities.If find time kindly listen( my FB) Two responsible good speeches of two public intellectuals -one by prof Yogendra social activist and Lohia expert is given below. It is difficult for our TU/Political leaders to find time to hear the speech because of their day to day activities.. If find time hear the speech.. it may fine tune our thinking process( placed in my FB acct) Gandhi and Marx a Book by Gandhian Scholar Kishorlal Ghanshyamlal Mashruwala ( K G Mashruwala) published du

நினவு சுழல் தோழ்ர் எஸ் வி ராஜதுரை எழுதியுள்ள எழுத்துக்களை எரித்தல் – கருத்துக்களை ஒடுக்குதல் புத்தகம் படித்துக்கொண்டிருக்கிறேன். NCBH வெளியிட்டுள்ளது. கலை-இலக்கிய-வரலாற்று குறிப்பு கட்டுரைகள். தோழர் ரகுபதி எனது பணிஓய்விற்கு வாழ்த்துக்களை இப்புத்தகம் மூலம் தெரிவித்தார். தோழர் SVR எழுத்துக்களை எனக்கு 25 ஆண்டுகளுக்கு முன்னர் தோழர் கே.வெங்கட்ராமன் அறிமுகப்படுத்தினார். தோழர் KV அப்போது CITU/CPM திருவாரூர் மாவட்டக்குழுவின் முன்னணி தலைவர்களுள் ஒருவர். 50க்கும் மேற்பட்ட தொழிற்சங்கங்களின் ஒருங்கிணைப்பான திருவாரூர் தொழிற்சங்க கூட்டமைப்பின் தலைவர். அவர் கொடுத்த புத்தகம் அந்நியமாதல். அப்போது விவசாய இயக்கத்தின் தலைவரும், மாவட்ட செயலராக இருந்தவரும், பின்னாட்களில் சட்டமன்ற உறுப்பினராக இருந்தவருமான தோழர் கோ. வீரையன் (GV) காவேரி புத்தக நிலையம் என்ற ஒன்றை இடதுசாரி புத்தகங்கள் விற்பனைக்காக வைத்தார். அங்கு வாங்கி படிப்போம்.  ஆரம்பத்தில் பேராசியர் ராமசாமியும், நானும் NEWAGE வாங்கக்கூடியவர்களாக இருந்தோம். Prof VRக்கு தா.பா தலைமையில் திருமணமாகியிருந்தது. வீடுகளுக்கு வரக்கூடிய அளவு பழக்கம் இருந்தது. திருவிக

I have recently read this book Essays on Scientific Socialism -McManus, Gordon ( Excerpts from that Book) ·          What became of Scientific Socialism? Is ‘Marxism-Leninism’ the ‘natural’ development from Scientific Socialism? ·          'Globalization' is a phase of Imperialism and thus assert that 'Globalization' is Imperialism'. Is this correct? ·          European countries that took the socialist path after the defeat of fascist Germany and occupation. The system of socialism that developed was based on the ‘model’ in the Soviet Union. The system in the Soviet Union was the ‘state monopoly ·          The ‘state monopoly’ system is where social ownership of the means of production is expressed in ‘state ownership’. This leads to the State becoming the dominant force in the building of socialism. There developed a socialist ‘bureaucracy’ led by the Communist Party to run the economy consisting of ‘state industries’ and ‘state enterprises’. ·