Editorial Note, Mar-Apr, 2018admin

Krishna Mohan Shrimali’s address as the General President of the Indian History Congress session in 2017 is the lead article of the current issue of Social Scientist. At a time when dissent is being suppressed in the country by forces which claim to represent the Indian tradition, his address, a tour de  force investigating the country’s intellectual history over several centuries,
is a valuable reminder of the vigorous tradition of debate and discussion that characterised India throughout its past and constituted a hallmark of all religious tendencies. He also contests the presumed antinomy between ‘faith’ and ‘reason’, upon which a rejection of ‘reason’ is usually founded, citing instances, including that of Mahatma Gandhi, whose self-avowed commitment to reason was not diluted by his Hindu faith.