KOCHI: Asking questions is very important, said Manu S Pillai, the writer who brought Kerala history into the spotlight internationally. Being a writer on history, essentially a historian takes a lot of work, he said. Pillai was in the city as part of an open discussion at H & C Stores.
“Syndicated Hinduism is a colonial product and we see it massively promoted now,” he said while talking to the audience.
Speaking of the distortion of historical facts and freedom of expression, the writer said: “It has come to a point where we have to ask outright the question as to ‘Who are you to tell us what to think and what not is acceptable, unacceptable, national, anti-national, pro-Hindu, anti-Hindu’. An idea has to grow, however there are attempts to trample on them at the roots.”
While Pillai believes in the importance of learning Indian culture, history and our vast literature, he feels both the ruling party and the former ruling party failed to showcase the richness of our past.
“While the Congress had tried to show the leaders and facts that were on their side of the story, as it always happens with history, the ruling party is now looking for the intellectual base which is why history gets stretched to outrageous proportions like what happened with the plastic surgery argument,” he said. His latest work is ‘Rebel Sultans’ about the rulers of the Deccan.