An Introduction
‘Arvind Memorial Trust’ is dedicated to the cause of the emancipation of the toiling masses for which Com. Arvind dedicated his life.
The principal task of the trust is to lay the foundation and to coordinate the ‘Arvind Institute of Marxist Studies’.
It is our clear and firm opinion that Marxism is meaningful insofar as it acts as a guiding principle for social action. The myriad interpretations of the world are meaningful only if they are aimed at changing the world. Plekhanov rightly said, “living people think on living issues”. It is obvious that our objective cannot be “research for the sake of it”. The objective of the various endeavours related to research and study under the ‘Arvind Institute of Marxist Studies’ is to assist in the efforts of solving the live and burning theoretical questions confronting the world communist movement today. Some of these questions are related to the analysis and sum-up of the successes and failures of the 20th century proletarian revolutions. A deep and exhaustive research and study on the problems of socialism and the reasons for capitalist restoration is imperative to prepare a prelude of new proletariat revolutions. Such a need arises also because passive academic Marxists have spread a lot of confusion on this subject by their writings and most of the young left intellectuals, instead of going to the original reference material of the theoretical writings and basic documents and debates of the revolutions, are mislead by reading the writings of intellectuals from the academic left, ‘Frankfurt School’ and numerous sub streams of the ‘new left’.
The second question is that of having a comprehensive understanding of the structure and the process of production and exchange of the world capitalism and its political and cultural-ideological superstructural machinery in the era of globalisation. It is essential to understand them in order to develop new forms of labour resistance and the new line of the world proletarian revolution.
The third issue which is related to the second one is to have a comprehensive understanding of the dynamics of the socio-economic development of India and other post-colonial agrarian countries – to study the industrial development and the capitalist transformation of the land-relations, to study the political-cultural-social changes and to study the nature of the relations between imperialism and domestic capital.
The fourth question is related to the study of organising the industrial and rural labour movement in the new circumstances; determining its direction and path; the history of the communist movement of India and the challenges and tasks of its rebuilding.
Fifth, it will be an important task of the institute to undertake research and study on the theoretical questions and the history of the cultural movement in the context of the challenges and tasks of rebuilding the proletarian cultural movement in India.
The sixth sphere of research of the institute will be media studies from a Marxist viewpoint. TV, computer-internet and digital technology has not only expanded the reach of media to the masses, but has also made the electronic media the most effective instrument of ideological-cultural hegemony of the ruling classes. Today the Marxist study of media remains a burning topic the world over and we also feel its importance. The question is not only to study and analyse the “cultural industry” of the bourgeois media, but also to develop the alternative people’s media and alternative cultural media.
The seventh agenda of research and study will be the philosophical-theoretical sphere. Along with the continuous development of social life, social consciousness and natural sciences the debate and thought process on the fundamental questions of philosophy also deepens and expands. The debate on the comprehension and exposition of dialectical materialism goes on till date. There are several explanations of many concepts of historical materialism. There is a direct connection between the on-going theoretical work and debate towards the unification of quantum physics and general theory of relativity with the development of dialectical materialism and concerned thinkers and scientists are doing a lot of work on these questions. Another theoretical question is related to the contribution to the Marxist critique of post-modernism and similar bourgeois thoughts. Neo-Marxist intellectuals like Zizek and Alain Badiou and even some Marxist-Leninist organisations who have turned into “free thinkers”, are writing a lot on issues such as socialist experiments, the inter-relationships between party-state-class, the inter-relationship between class and gender etc. It is extremely important to present a revolutionary Marxist stand point and engage in polemics on these issues.
All such issues cannot be listed beforehand. We can only mention the outline of the topics.
‘Arvind Institute of Marxist Studies ‘ will provide the relevant material from its library and documentation centre (preparations are on for the establishment of these) to fellows undertaking research-study individually or collectively on the above topics. Since we would not take governmental or institutional grants and our only source of income would be individual grants from the citizens who agree with the objectives, it would not be possible for us to provide scholarships to the persons undertaking research-study. However facilities such as free use of library, documentation centre, internet; free of cost accommodation and a mess running on ‘no profit-no loss’ basis would be provided to the researchers and scholars. After the approval of the institute’s screening committee, the institute can take the responsibility of publication of the research material.
The institute would also conduct seminars, symposiums, colloquiums and workshops on its campus throughout the year on different issues and the compilation of the articles and research papers presented in them would be published.
The institute would run a website which will present materials related to theoretical and practical questions of Marxism and communist movement. We also have a long-term plan to start an e-journal focussed on media and society.
The publication of an ideological magazine on Marxism would begin from this year. The republishing of the cultural-ideological magazine ‘Srijan Pariprekshya’ would possibly begin from next year. Now it will be published from the institute itself.
The institute would commence its work from a building in Lucknow for the time being. It is our endeavour to develop a campus with beautiful natural surroundings near Lucknow city as soon as possible, but it would take some years for this.
We appeal to fellow travellers throughout the country to donate to the library and the documentation centre of the institute, their personal collections of the books-magazines, documents related to the communist movement, cultural movement and other social movements, personal documents and letters of communist activists, cultural activists and writers. We promise to keep safely and conserve all such historical heritage for the coming generations.
Other tasks of Arvind Memorial Trust:
The ‘Arvind Memorial Trust’ will, under the leadership of activists trained in the art, organise a team for the making of documentaries on the life and struggles of workers, common masses, various movements and social issues. Regular shows of these would be organised particularly in the working class neighbourhoods and amongst the intellectuals, students-youth.
The trust will prepare a collection of world famous revolutionary, progressive films (we have already done substantial work in this regard). It would arrange for their subtitling and dubbing in Hindi and film societies would be organised for regular shows and discussions in different cities.
The trust, apart from opening libraries, reading rooms, woman education centres, child education centres, would also try to run a hospital for workers and mobile clinics for workers’ bastis with the help of doctor friends.
The registered office of the ‘Arvind Memorial Trust’ will be in Delhi. But its executive headquarter will be Lucknow. There will be a regional office in Gorakhpur. In due course, regional offices would be opened in Punjab and other parts of the country as per the expansion of its work.
Our policy regarding funding is very clear. We will not take any institutional financial grants (from government or government departments, multi-national companies and corporate houses and their trusts, electoral parties and international funding agencies). Only individual grants would be taken based on the agreement with the objectives.
The trust and the institute would work with institutions having similar objectives on the basis of the policy of mutual aid and cooperation.
We appeal to all pro-people intellectuals and the enlightened citizens committed to social change to help the ‘Arvind Memorial Trust’ and ‘Arvind Institute of Marxist Studies’ with all possible means. If you agree on their objectives, you must definitely be with us.
With revolutionary greetings,
Meenakshy
Managing Trustee
Arvind Memorial Trust
Board of Trustees : Anand Singh, Charu Chandra, G.P. Bhatt, Jai Pushp, Katyayani, Kamta Prasad,
Parimal Kumar, Premprakash, Rambabu, Sandeep, Sanjay Srivastav, Satyam and Vijay Shankar.