The history of Indian Radical Humanist Association can be traced back to 1920 when M N Roy, the founder of the new Humanist Movement in India started his long and arduous efforts from Moscow to give a social content to the Nationalist Movement for India’s freedom from British rule. The movement gathered momentum after Roy’s arrival in India at the end of 1930, but much more so after his release from jail in 1936. Thereafter, groups of intellectuals agreeing with the thoughts of M N Roy, in several cities in India, came together and formed the League of Radical Congressmen in 1939.

Inaugurating the Conference in Pune, in western India near Bombay, Roy stated: “The welfare of the nation as a whole is conditional upon certain revolutionary changes in its social structure, and those changes cannot be brought about until political power has been captured by the masses.” Stating the goal he said “We stand for revolution inside the Congress, a revolution in the outlook, a revolution in methods, a revolution in its structure—so that it can become the leader of the revolution which must take place in the country to establish freedom needed for the progress and prosperity of the Nation.”

Development

India’s Radical Humanists regard freedom as the birthright of every human being. In Hitler’s onslaught on Europe the Radicals saw the danger not only to the freedom of Europe, but to that of the whole world including India. For the Radicals the Second World War was an anti-Fascist war right from the beginning.

Considering Fascism as the greatest menace to human civilisation, the Radicals were helping the British in their war effort. This despite the fact, that the Radicals wanted the British to leave India as any other Indian. That is to say the menace of Fascism was not a thing to be ignored, despite the bad name it brought to the Radicals who had to suffer the taunts of lay Indians who could not understand and appreciate the menace of Fascism in far away Europe.

At the same time the Radicals were continuously engaged in ideological and philosophical explorations. These explorations eventually crystallized themselves in the form of the philosophy of New Humanism. This was endorsed at a conference in Bombay in 1946.

The idea, that society has to be reorganised, and that it has to pass through a comprehensive and an all-embracing revolution was already accepted by Radicals as Marxists. Having seen the extreme form of nationalism transforming itself into Fascism, the Radicals realised that Nationalism was based on a collective ego which could lead to the sacrifice and slavery of the individual.

The Thought

The necessity to understand life in a comprehensive sense was realised. Man should use his power of reason, his rationality, which is inherent in him / her. Scientists like Charles Darwin have enabled man to understand himself and to know that he is a part of this cosmic universe. He has evolved in the natural process spread over millions of years. Man is essentially rational. The innate rationality of man is the only guarantee of a harmonious social order, which will also be a moral order, because morality is a rational function. Only man’s innate rationality can make man moral, spontaneously and voluntarily. Reason is the only sanction of morality. Morality is an appeal to conscience. Conscience is no longer mystical or mysterious.

The axiology (the theory of value judgments) of New Humanism deduces all values from the supreme value of freedom. Freedom for us is the progressive removal of all impediments to the integrated growth of every human being. New Humanism holds that, for creating a new world for liberty and social justice, revolution must go beyond an economic reorganisation of society. The urge for freedom being the basic incentive of life, the purpose of all rational human endeavour must be to strive for the removal of social conditions which restrain the unfolding of potentialities of man. New/Radical Humanism will lead to cosmopolitan commonwealth of spiritually free individuals, and will not be limited to the borders of national states—Capitalist, Fascist, Socialist, Communist, or of any other kind—which will gradually disappear under the impact of a New Renaissance.

The whole world is witness to the fast developments in the fields of science and technology. On account of these developments the old structures based on nationalism and established religions are shaking and dwindling. These would be obsolete sooner or later. The only philosophy and way of life, which may keep humanity alive and together, is the philosophy of Radical or Cosmopolitan Humanism and organised democracy with freedom of individuals as its foundation.

The Radicals and their Movement

Eminent intellectuals and public figures adopted the credo of New Humanism. These people made their mark in their respective fields as thinkers, leaders, writers, educationists, scholars, social workers, trade unionists, journalists, advocates, medical practitioners, judges, economists, freedom fighters, film producers etc.

Some ten magazines on Humanism, in different Indian languages, are published regularly. The Radical Humanist, in English, is one of them. It is being published uninterruptedly for the last 73 years.

When Prime Minister Indira Gandhi imposed a state of Emergency in June 1975 and suspended civil liberties, the Radical Humanists stood up as one man to form the organisation ‘Citizens For Democracy’ (CFD) in cooperation with other democratically inclined individuals and groups. The CFD fought, in whatever little way it could, the onslaught on India’s democracy.

Subsequently, the Humanist Movement in India gradually ran out of steam. The Radicals could not adjust themselves to changed circumstances. They had started as part of the freedom movement. After freedom was attained and M N Roy was no more, the Radicals could not take up new challenges. The Radicals failed dismally to attract and induct people of the younger generation to carry on the torch of the Humanist Movement in the new environment of a free India. And as earlier Humanists were fading away with time, and newer ones were not to be seen, very few were left to attend to activities.

It was in these circumstances, that in the July 2009 conference, a new board of the Indian Radical Humanist Association (IRHA) was constituted. This board at the suggestion of its new president (Vinod Jain) agreed to launch a youth programme. The programme has been launched in September 2009 in a college in the pink city of Jaipur in the northern state of Rajasthan. There is a lot of enthusiasm about it already. Hopefully, it will grow reasonably well as the programme progresses from college to college, from state to state.

The youth programme picks up issues which are fundamental to our society, culture, civilization and history. These issues are discussed by the youth, questioned by them and answered by them publicly. Even though senior people are around, they do not lecture at all.

The new youth programme, however, is facing a problem. When the new board of IRHA took over, it did not have anything in its coffers.

India’s Humanist movement has the potential to become the largest Humanist movement in the world if it is not held up for lack of funds.

The idea is to encourage the youth to start thinking about the fundamental socio-cultural issues of the Indian society. If that gets going, the movement gets going.

Vinod Jain