#gopal krishna

Gopal Krishna

          In Indian political life Lohia belonged to a lost generation – the generation that came into the national movement in the early thirties. These men played a creditable role in the movement but were too young to claim a share in power immediately after Independence, and by the time conditions were propitious for change of leadership they were too old.

         During the last years of his life Lohia’s non-conformism received greater notice than his many insights into the processes of history and politics.

         To be a non-conformist is a rare enough virtue in a conformist society such as ours, but there was a great deal more to Rammanohar Lohia; he embodied some noble aspirations for his country and represented an important strand of opinion in Indian political life. And in the socialist movement, his was the decisive influence at many critical turning points.

CONSCIENCE–KEEPER OF SOCIALISM

         Rammanohar Lohia was one of the founders of the Indian socialist movement and was acknowledged as the most lively and thoughtful among its leaders. I did not know him well and was not among his ardent followers. But those of us who were drawn to the socialist movement after Independence were impressed by the quality of his intelligence, his imagination, his passion for equality and hatred of the inequities of Indian society....He laboured under a strong sense that the cause of Indian unity and of socialism had been betrayed by the leadership and he took on himself the heroic, if unpleasant, role of a conscience-keeper of public life, on the alert to denounce corruption and deviations.