Special Correspondent
Kannur
When fear is in the air, it is the ethical duty of artists to speak truth to power, which they have forgone now, poet K. Satchidanandan has said. Opening a cultural event held on Friday as part of the 23rd Party Congress of the CPI(M) here on Friday, he said that most of the cultural activists had sided with the state for power and pelf. Mr. Satchidanandan called for a broad movement of democratic forces to unseat the authoritarian regime at the Centre, which had created such a situation. “It is the duty of every writer and artiste to now openly declare their politics, which is on the side of liberation, justice, truth, and fairness etc. Only they have the right to survive,” he said. Su Venkitesan, writer and Madurai MP, alleged that the RSS-BJP combine was trying to misinterpret Brahminical culture as Indian culture. Meat eaters are kept out of the ambit of national culture. He asked if mythical characters such as Kannapan and Guhan, who were believed to have fed gods with fish and meat, would be called un-Hindus. M. Mukesh, MLA, who also spoke at the event, condemned the cultural stasis in Kerala. He claimed that there were fewer platforms to freely express honest criticism of society. At every corner, people were waiting to see if their sentiments were being hurt. He detailed some of his personal experiences before the release of two movies that he produced. Some people threatened legal action against the films even before watching them. Mr. Mukesh said they could be pacified only after they were told the gist of the stories. “Intolerance towards social criticism is a dangerous trend,” he said.
