 You know one of the things we've been discussing across on this issue about how do you actually forge Assemblance of a more You know cohesive united all silly words But in terms of being able to actually build lasting alliances And then we were looking at say the post-emergency period post emergency period when a whole host of social movements came up Across the country and I don't want to bad mouth or name them and they were very inspiring movements But somehow there was no political transformation through the movement everywhere the BJP kept winning wherever these movements came up I'm sorry to say I'm not wherever but in many many places. So what is it about? How do we look at these movements? How do we look at our experiences and how do we actually? Not treat say the political electoral arena as an untouchable arena and yet not get subsumed by it and quote-unquote see that as a single goal and yet keep up many textured Resistances which are multifaceted yet focused etc. And you know, so I mean, it's a huge challenge I mean first thing I I'm sure everybody in this room at least Experiences this I think there is a resistance in every blooming district in this country to say that there no resistances is not to know What's happening people are resisting everywhere in different ways in different forms if we are not able to pick a sense of it Apart from I think a complete abdication by the media. I think is because there's just no real Possibility of us knowing all the time as to where the kinds of things that are happening the kinds of articulations that are taking place And therefore there is a sense of being feeling isolated because there's not enough of a knowledge about it I think A way tried to reply would be to say that we just have to be able to engage in different kinds of struggles You know whether it is LGBT struggles and all that but I think it's a it goes a bit beyond that I think For those of us who believe in a genuinely Left-of-center worldview and believe that there has to be a redistribution of resources At a fundamental level whether it is and the state state should play the role of our welfare state Should be looking at as whichever saying you know public space and all I think we need to understand that that will only happen if there are public and Many many articulations of this in different ways It's not going to be in the same fashion and the same way people are going to articulate this need It's not going to be in the conventional way with which even maybe the national movement sprung up I think it's going to come up in in a myriad different ways and if you're able to see this happening With maybe some very clear non-negotiables that where you don't compromise on but otherwise keep the space and the Mindspace and the organizational space open to a host of possibilities and alliances I think then we'll find the answers. I don't have a complete answer But I keep looking for it by trying to unlearn what one has constantly been learning and to say that just keep yourself very very open Just keep yourself very very as long as there are I mean for me the artist is a non-negotiable I'm let's say from this platform and from any platform, and I'm not to shame I do believe that they are a single most destructive force that I really fundamentally Endangering this country. It's not just artists. I think the Sanatan Sansta also is so if I see the fish workers There's going to be a huge mobilization for the fish workers this November There's going to be a national, you know And they're going to come together from the entire east and western coasts and they're going to converge in Delhi Then I'm really concerned that the fish workers Unions and the fish workers organizations know that the penetration of the Sanatan Sansta in our coastal areas is frightening And I've even aware of it. You know, I've even aware of what the way they are functioning So I think one of the things for me and one means of doing it I think is that we need to explore different means of political re-education And I think this political re-education means Understanding our struggles looking at struggles looking at the fundamentals of those struggles changing Looking at maybe the dynamics of the struggles changing and of course a communication issue That how do we also use communication in the most creative way even the communication process? I feel should just not be only reactive We are sometimes very good at reactions. We are much cleverer than them I think we are more creative than them, but I think it's not enough to just react. I feel we are not able to set our own Creative whether it's a leisure path whether it's a creative path whether it's the kind of world We want to live in whether it's the kind of relations social relations We want to see between men and women between men and men between women and we are not able to articulate this in a really creative way Recognizing that we remain a very very disparate society where the language will have to be Very different for a rural population very different from an urban population. We have 22 official languages I don't know how many 700 plus dialects. There are all these challenges So obviously it cannot be in English and Hindi and Gujjati alone. It has to be in many many more ways and fashions So therefore I think the cultural movement becomes very important And I think this I think is a challenge that everybody at different levels are trying to grapple with Not just Indian cultural forum, but many many people are trying to Figure out that why when was this moment? possible in India post Before and after independence when cultural movements went hand-in-hand with political transformation and Again, we are seeing mushrooming of many of these Articulations, but again, I think whether it's in Chhattisgarh or whether it's in Maharashtra with or many many other places Maybe it's it's there's still going to be a time before it all converges into somewhere where it's more I don't know which what word to use even Whether cohesive can sound dangerous, so I don't want to sound as if it has to come into one hole But somewhere where there is a sense that all of this Alternate culture all of this real culture belongs to us and is actually making that political education possible Because it's doing it through song through dance through stories Through writing and through communication Which is what we've not cracked so far. We've somehow not managed to crack how we're going to do this