Professor Kancha Ilaiah

Recently I happened to listen to Professor Kancha Illaiah. He is a famous dalit scholar in India and has significantly contributed through number of published books and public debate. He is also known for his passion and commitment for pro Mandal movements and Other backward Classes in India. That is it.

Though, i am not a big fan of his view points on many things but yet there are some great insights from his works which we cannot ignore. 

He is the only one who predicted the rising of OBCs political leaders in India and particularly predicted that Mr.Narendra Modi would become Prime Minister candidate of BJP. That is what has happened. See my post in June.

There are many other works by Prof.Kancha. We may not like most of his works but ignoring now will cost us in a big way in future. He is on to different path now and is considerably building the next generation of leftist intellectuals in India. 

Just look at some his books with rather interesting titles:

• Buffalo Nationalism: A Critique of Spiritual Fascism
• The State and Repressive Culture
• Why I Am Not A Hindu
• Post Hindu India

Some pondering lines from his works:

"A people who refuse to listen to new questions and learn new answers will perish and not prosper…"

As a south Indian I would take like his views on language. Some of his Asian Age columns are food for thought particularly when we wanted to see the other idea which is not in our focus or attention.

What is more interesting is the following lines of thoughts from Prof.Kancha. I fully agree with him on the following:

• The dalit's main agenda is not reservations. My way of equality is English education. Even if 10% of our children got English education, the intellectual field would have changed. This country would have changed. My hope is education, not reservation — and I emphasise, English education. Read the full interview from here.