Surendra
Mohan


Conscience
of
a
liberal
India

Conscience of a liberal India
By Uday Dandavate
December 18th, 2010

Surendra Mohan’s passing away has changed my world. I have lost a father
figure. He was one of the few who filled the emptiness that was created with the
loss of my parents.

Just three weeks ago, I had spoken to him over the phone. While inquiring about
his health I said “ you are a strong willed person with a weak heart”, not realizing
that his weak heart would finally lose the silent battle he was fighting for the last
fifty years. The battles he really cared for were the ones he fought for the
downtrodden and against the injustice in our social, political and economic
system.

Surendra Mohan was a inspiration for many. He provided clarity of thought and
an alternative vision for the future to grass root level political activists, to people
who stood up for preservation of civil liberties, to his peers in the trade union
movement and to those who dedicated their lives to liberate India from its
colonial and feudal past and to fight the corruption in our political system and the
social inequalities.

To me personally he was a member of our family. My memories of Surendra

Mohan are linked more to some of the more humane moments I shared with him
and his family. As a child I remember he teaching me Kannada translations of
the sentences What is your name? Where are you going? during the national
conference of the Praja Socialist Party in Bangalore in late 1960s. I remember
eating fish and jumping into the waters of Kolva Beach with him in Goa during the
National Executive Meeting of the Socialist Party. I remember doing Shramadan,
at the Sakharwadi conference in Maharashtra.
I also remember the time when he was courting Manju Mathur (now Mohan) in
Vitthalbhai Patel house, in New Delhi in early 1970’s. I remember my parents
acting as their guarantors to concerned relatives. My father once remarked,
“Surendra is a strong willed person he will ultimately outlive me” which he truly
did. Without compromising on the rigors of public life, he worked relentlessly until
he passed away quietly. My mother passed away on December 31st 2001. We
were away in the United States at the time. It was Surendra Mohan and Bapu
Kaldate who stood by my father during the most painful night of his life. It was
Manju who took charge of the house and prepared the home for friends to offer
condolences.

Surendra Mohan and my mother shared a common trait; they fought for causes
they believed in without compromise. That sense of unyielding commitment
brought them together in many of the battles that transcended the electoral
politics. I remember accompanying them when they fought alongside
Jayaprakash, the young trade unionist from Modinagar who was ultimately
murdered by rival trade union members by throwing him into a boiler. I remember
their work with Swami Agnivesh when he was fighting for the rights of bonded
labor in Bhatti mines of Haryana, or when they worked with Mr. Mr. H.D. Shourie
and Mr. Yashpal Chibbar of People’s Union of Civil Liberties (PUCL). He sided
with environmentalists such as Sundarlal Bahuguna and with the Narmada
Bachao Movement led by Medha Patkar. His firm commitment to change often
made him a suspect in the eyes of professional politicians. He was a unsung
hero in the world of electoral politics and his contribution was not acknowledged.
He was rarely entrusted with key governmental responsibilities for bringing a
change that his party promised. That did not deter him, regardless of whether his
party was in government or in the opposition, he always remained on the side of
people, on the side of change. He was acknowledged activists around the
country as the conscience of an alternate change that they aspired for in India, a
change based on participatory development.
Surendra Mohan’s life and his work will continue to refuel the conscience of
activists who are pursuing an alternate vision for a liberalized India.