Struggles against the violations of ordinary life may be said to constitute the political, in an emancipatory sense.
State, Science and Capital are the sources of violation of
ordinary life in the contemporary world. So struggles against Science, against
Capital and against the State constitute emancipatory activities, activities for the recovery of the human in the ordinary sense of the word. In common parlance they will be
radical political activities. But there arises a strange situation thereby. That
activity is thus called political activity which aims at uprooting the
political society. Political society is
the one which has emerged with the appearance of Science, Capital and the
State. By now almost all language, at least the language of the public domain,
is largely the language of this political society. So properly speaking
emancipatory struggles are not political struggles and yet they are called 'political struggle’ in common parlance .
This terminological or linguistic problem is solvable may be in the
context of a radical knowledge movement.
So if one wants to do or talk of
politics in the emancipatory sense then one must locate his/her activity and
discourse in a knowledge movement. Some of these things become very clear when
we see these things happening during Gandhi’s time. We may see Gandhi as the
builder of a new knowledge movement and a new political movement, both of which
may be justifiably called emancipatory movements.
If we see this country as divided between India and Bharat
then all politics after Independence represents India. If you see Science, State and Capital
intertwined with one another you would be seeing India. Politics worth its salt would be produced perhaps by coming
together of a knowledge movement of the people, a lokaidya movement, and
an assertion that ordinary life needs to be restored to its
pre-eminent status.
In the modern world separation of ‘knowledge ‘ and ‘being’
again dates back to the period of emergence of Science, Capital and the State. Seeing
them as chief sources of violation of ordinary life, also gives us that conceptual
space where knowledge and being are not separated. Lokavidya and
ordinary life are then inseparable. Cognition of one without the other is not
possible. Ordinary life is the only dwelling that lokavidya knows and lokavidya
is what knowledge in ordinary life is called. Then we will see that an
emancipatory political movement is not separable from a peoples’ knowledge
movement.
Bharat and India may also be seen as each
being in the other. One can easily point out various aspects of life and
aspirations in Bharat which are similar to the life and aspirations in
India and conversely, one may see various aspects of life in Bharat spread out
in India. The idea of ordinary life bridges division, ought not to create new ones. Ordinary life is not just the life
of ordinary men and women, it is ubiquitous. The sant-parampara is the tradition
of creation and re-creation of ordinary life in thought and in practice in ever
new circumstances (of violation, marginalization, suppression etc.).
Sunil Sahasrabudhey
