Intellectuals Face Moral Dilemma Amidst Societal Upheaval

There is class in society and an intellectual stratum exists according to class. There are many such intellectuals in the world who possess a vast ocean of knowledge, but the purpose for which they utilize that knowledge is a more crucial and significant question than their possession of knowledge.

There are many such intellectuals who have swallowed all the philosophies, old and new, of the world, but if they are stingy about spending even a pinch of that knowledge in the service of the common people, then from a proletarian class perspective, it is not useful intellectualism.

Therefore, the intellectuals of society, according to their class, and the consciousness and perspective to analyze every situation, also align with class partisanship.

In the words of Noam Chomsky, 'The intellectual is always the opposition to power.' Bertolt Brecht says, 'No matter how difficult it may be, intellectuals must find the courage to write and speak the truth.' It was never easy to perform intellectual work by standing against prevailing but anti-people values and resisting the narrative established by power.

History is a witness, some have been given the death penalty by imposing false charges for clashing with power. Socrates was also such a rebellious philosopher. Galileo Galilei was imprisoned for life for speaking the truth.

There is also the precedent of Mussolini's fascist regime imprisoning Antonio Gramsci and planning to weaken his mind with electric currents, to imprison a sharp intellect. There are many such people who, despite having alternatives to the concessions offered by power, chose to remain in strong opposition to power and continuously warned against the excesses of power.

Looking at the current times, Arundhati Roy is repeatedly forced to face false charges by the Indian state, which intends to trouble her. Not all critics are enemies of the state, yet they consider it their intellectual duty to keep the state in check. All these are not followers of some rigid and old tradition but are conscious and living intellectuals.

How many reeds, how many sal trees stood tall

Drowned in the silence caused by August 23-24, many writers and speakers were stunned on the spot. It is unknown whether they are alive in a 'coma' of consciousness or have already died? Many intellectuals succumbed to the flames of that storm and reached a state of 'singing along' with the power. Many, assessing the potential danger in the future, chose the path of 'self-defense' like cowards.

Despite all this, those who have continued to fulfill their intellectual duty by constantly keeping watch are truly modern 'phoenixes'. That fire did not just destroy physical structures; it pushed people's minds into the deep abyss of despair. Truly, it was not easy to rise from the ashes and return to one's work, yet some still exist – who carry the meaning of being.

Perhaps they are the true sal trees mentioned in the poem by poet Netra Lal Abagi.

During the time of wind and storm

In the moment when the atmosphere is dynamic and turbulent

On the peak of the mountain

Wrestling with the wind and storm

Only one sal tree can stand erect.

Those who stayed away from every power, who performed their intellectual work staying away from the benefits and awards given by power, and who continuously kept the power in check, are now being accused by some of being a 'traditional circle' that cannot accept 'departure' by shedding all their intellect.

In the name of being traditional or modern, how can an 'intellectual' writer reach a place where they praise irresponsible, individualistic, and anarchic 'ego' from a responsible position and deem it correct? There may be separate situations and backgrounds for this, and there is no need to lament much about it. But what has been reconfirmed is that a writer also has their class and their class partisanship.

State's bulldozer, the common man's agony

In Kathmandu, slum settlements were being demolished one after another. To prevent potential public resistance, the state power had deployed a large number of military forces and all available security agencies everywhere. Citizens, already intimidated by the heavy losses incurred during the recent Janji protests, were not ready to die or be maimed again.

Some were quietly moving their belongings elsewhere, while others were crying, screaming, and lamenting as they watched their homes being demolished. That hut, which the state could not bear to see, where countless memories of their age and life were piled up.

In the existing social structure based on private property and family, the demolition of a house was not just the destruction of a physical structure of stones, mud, or bricks. It was the demolition of a pile of memories. It was the demolition of the whole person, their emotions, and their psyche.

For those who were poor, who had nothing but that one hut as capital, this was not a matter of ordinary sadness. It was a pain that words cannot describe or explain. Unable to bear this grief and mental trauma, two citizens chose the path of suicide in grief over the demolition of their homes.

During that tragic time when those scenes of tears and lamentations filled social media, I video-called an acquaintance sister who lived on land without a title deed, termed 'illegal'. Her face looked worn out due to many days of sleeplessness and hunger. In the course of conversation, she said, 'I can't sleep, I don't feel like eating. I don't feel like talking to anyone. If I were alone, I would die, but I am staying for the sake of the children, sister.'

I had no remedy for her worry. I was speechless before her tears. Distraught and heartbroken myself. I tried to offer some solace, but there was no basis for her to believe my platitudes.

Abandoned by her husband, she had arrived on land deemed illegal by the state, without a title deed, while raising her children. Even a corner of the land made expensive by the players of power was not within the reach of the poor.

To make a living, she had somehow built a shelter in the slum settlement. Along with that shelter were her many joys, hopes, and expectations. But, at any time, she was living or dying in the agony of that happiness being snatched away from her and her plight, I could not distinguish.

She is just one example. Imagine 18,000 such living people! It is unknown how much longer she will wander with this fear and agony. Or how many millions of citizens like her are in agony across the country.

If the court had not stopped it in time, the number of suicides would not have been limited to that. To see this sorrow, one must reach the ground, interact with the citizens of the ground. One must be able to empathize with the sorrow. Such pain was not something visible from a cafe in France. From there, only what one wants to see and deems worth seeing is visible.

Poor citizens or enemies of the state

Sister, you saw

That noble wind

Which ruthlessly beat the stick of power

From the laps of the poor

Just yesterday it auctioned

Those who run their lives by the roadside

An investment of a thousand rupees

A daily routine of filling a stomach with a hundred rupees.

It has become common for the state to be cruel to the poor. The state confiscates two bunches of greens from an elderly mother selling by the roadside. The state scatters the handful of berries, which fruit once a year, of a woman who came to sell them, all over the ground, and laughs heartily for establishing legal order.

After all, what crime against the beauty of the state have those two bunches of greens and one basket of berries committed to making it ugly?

Why is this cycle of hitting the poor and working people in the stomach, exploiting and humiliating them, increasing in this country? Looking at the past, the local administration does not seem this cruel to the poor and helpless people. Such toxic air is now spreading from Kathmandu Metropolitan City across the country.

The hero spreading such toxic air is none other than Balendra Shah. This is his gift to the poor with the new ascension to power. While the very people who voted him into power with affection and love are now facing a life-threatening situation, how can the intellectual class remain silent?

As the axe does not know the pain of the chopping block, the dominant power and its sycophants are not much disturbed by the suffering of the poor in front of their comfort. If those who speak out against injustice are accused, is it a broken democracy or a so-called tradition?

Across the country, the poor and landless are living in fear of their homes being demolished at any time. Instead of expressing a shred of anger and criticism against the governmental system that deploys all security forces to the huts of the poor, evicts them, and forces people to die; the writers who have mortgaged all their intellect to attack those who have continuously kept watch against this are actually standing on whose side?

In the 1960s, Indian poet Muktibodh used to ask his friends, 'Friend, what is your politics?' Similarly, today we have to ask – friend, what is your politics? Ambassador or head of the Planning Commission? Just for that?

The reality is that no matter how much philosophy and philosophers from around the world are invoked to prove one's point, if the hardships and sorrows of everyday life in front of one's own eyes are ignored, such knowledge may be useful for 'intellectual indulgence' at the center of power, but it holds no value at the ground level.

It is disheartening to see the intellectual stratum, which sees no flaws in the government, always deems it to be on the right path, and lacks even the slightest critical consciousness, descend directly into the role of a 'spokesperson' for the ruler.

Except for those drenched in the arrogant demeanor of power, no one can consider the government's behavior of terrorizing ordinary citizens as 'transformative' and label critics as 'traditional circles'. And the attempt to dismiss questioners who disagree with one's views as 'politically unconscious' does not represent any intellectual consciousness.

Let's set aside practical matters for a moment; even by the standards of liberal theory, such intellectuals cannot even 'just pass'.

Socrates used to say, 'I know nothing.' By knowing nothing, he knew many things. Sometimes let's look at our own thoughts in reverse. After drinking the water of which pond does such an ego of knowing, seeing oneself as 'conscious' and everyone else as 'unconscious', arise, sir?