Pramod-da: An ordinary person who stood up for free expression at Presidency College | The Indian Express

Pramod-da: An ordinary person who stood up for free expression at Presidency College | The Indian Express

Written by Sourav Roy Barman |Updated: September 30, 2019 4:24:57 pm

Pramod-da: An ordinary person who stood up for free expression at Presidency College

Just when the institution of Henry Louis Vivian Derozio, one of the principal forces behind the Bengal Renaissance, was beginning to fail us, Pramod Sain, simply Pramod-da for generations of Presidencians, stepped forward.

The disdain for critical thinking coming out of our universities aside, such statements advance the notion of a society besieged by inimical forces, in desperate need of a decisive and strong leader to tackle the imagined adversary.

Anti-nationals, urban naxals — these epithets are recent additions to our public discourse, but the tendency to pigeonhole voices of dissent and resistance as “leftists” or “Maoists” predates the Narendra Modi government. Much before Babul Supriyo heaped scorn on the vice-chancellor of Jadavpur University, Mamata Banerjee had called my friend, a student of Presidency College, a “Maoist” on national television, for questioning her government’s track record on women’s safety.