BHUBANESWAR: Though political literature is not a new Indian obsession, there is scope for broadening the reach of writing of this genre as many aspects of this vast subject still remains untouched.
This was the opinion of speakers at the session, “Is Political Literature a new Indian obsession?” on the inaugural day of 6th edition of Odisha Literary Festival-2017 organised by The New Indian Express here on Saturday.Senior Congress leader, former minister and author of several books Jairam Ramesh said political literature should be based on serious research which is missing now-a-days. Stating that books written by politicians cannot be described as political literature, Jairam said writing of biographies in India is awesome.
It is hard to find biographies based on primary source material, the former minister said and added that in such books either the person is demonised or elevated to Godhood. “We should ensure that political books should be based on documentary material and not on what comes to know from listening to different sources,” he said.He said political writing should be based on decisions and processes and not on what one hears from this or that sources.
Jairam said there is a lot of material in the National Archives waiting to be analysed and brought to the fore but a majority of writers do not use this for their books. “I found many such documents there while writing the book on former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi,” he said and added, “if you really do a little digging than you can find many documents and materials to write books.”Former minister and senior Congress leader Manish Tewari said strong political writing emerged from the days when newspapers espousing nationalistic ideology were started and there were many writers, including Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Mahatma Gandhi, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and MN Roy and added that founders of Indian polity were prolific writers.
The former minister said declassification of many documents will lead to better understanding of an incident. “There is a psyche that knowledge will have to be closely held,” he said and added that even many reports of Parliamentary Standing Committees are sanitised.Anirban Ganguly, director of the Shyama Prasad Mookerjee Foundation and National Co-convenor of Library and Documentation Department of BJP, said political literature is not a new obsession of India and referred to 1923 session of Congress at Gaya where two leaders Bhagban Das and Gaya Das presented a constitution for India which sparked off a debate.
He said there are many areas of political literature which are yet to covered and added a book is yet to be written on the political personality of Nivedita.
Conducting the session, eminent columnist and author Shankkar Aiyar said politics has always been an obsession in India and it is good that more people are writing and reading political literature.