Indians and Pakistanis are coming together Monday evening to commemorate Bhagat Singh, arguably the most prominent revolutionary freedom fighter of 20th century South Asia as well as other prominent freedom fighters.
The meeting titled Bhagat Singh Tu Zinda Hei; Revolutionary legacy and contemporary issues of Post-Colonial subcontinent, is being organised by the Pakistan-India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy, the area’s largest and oldest people-to-people group.
The “evening of conversation and cultural expressions” will be held online on April 5, 2021 7:00-9:00 pm Pakistan time/ 7:30–9.30 pm India time.
Speakers include academic and well known singer Dr Shahram Azhar, peace activist Saeeda Diep, activist and artist Jyotsna Siddharth, and offerings by singers Razia Abrar and Srijonee Bhattacharjee.
The PIPFPD invitation notes that Bhagat Singh was an ardent supporter of independent critical thinking and reasoning whose ideas “are as relevant today as they were about a hundred years ago”.
“His Marxist approach offers solutions in our chaotic world increasingly besieged by forces of fascism and his concerted efforts for an internationalist revolutionary class struggle offer alternatives above petty nationalism and communalism prevalent in contemporary South Asia.
“His rational thinking and socialist struggle focused not just on the overthrow of imperialism and the British Raj, but also on the true emancipation of humanity through an International Marxist revolution. Bhagat Singh’s interpretation of ‘workers of the world unite’ and ‘inquilab zindabad’ were clearly founded on the contextual analysis of ‘Achoot Samasya’ (the question of untouchability) in a highly casteist and brahminical subcontinental reality”.
The organisers note that merely remembering him as a martyr hero without an understanding and analysis of his political and ideological approach is doing an injustice to his outstanding efforts towards developing a socialist revolutionary movement in the sub-continent.
“Today, the masses in contemporary South Asia are enslaved by capitalism and waves of fascism and can gain much from learning about and reflecting on the legacy of the great revolutionaries who gave their lives for the liberation of the masses”.
The event aims to “revisit the intellectual inheritance and political struggle of Bhagat Singh, Ashfaqulla, Sukhdev, Rajguru, Chandrashekhar, Jatin Das, B.K. Dutt and others, and discuss the political context of new resistances”
To join, participants can log in via Zoom at this link
Meeting ID: 953 9607 6229
Passcode: 000333
