Minutes of the Biennial General Body Meeting of the Indian Renaissance Institute Held on 6th-7th April, 2019 at Gandhi Peace Foundation, New Delhi

 

The Biennial General Body meeting of the IRI was held on 6th land 7th April 2019 at New Delhi. The meeting was attended by the following members and special invitee members:

6TH APRIL 2019

Sr. No.     Name

  1. Dr. Ramesh Awasthi (Pune)
  2. Mr. Vinod Jain (Noida)
  3. Mr. N.D. Pancholi (Delhi)
  4. Mr. Ajit Bhattacharyya (Kolkata)
  5. Mr. S.C. Varma (Delhi)
  6. Mr. Rajender K. Sharma (Delhi)
  7. Dr. Manju Ray (Kolkata)
  8. Mr. Kiran Nanavati (Gujarat)
  9. Mr. Sheo Raj Singh (Delhi)
  10. Md. Nazimuddin SK (Kolkata)
  11. Mr. Mahi Pal Singh (Delhi)
  12. Mr. Debabrata Pal (W.B.)
  13. Mr. Sisir Kumar Chakraborty (W.B.)
  14. Ms. Dipika Chakraborty (W.B.)
  15. Mr. Bhabani Dikshit (Delhi)
  16. Mr. Narottam Vyas (Delhi)
  17. Mr. Arun Kumar Mazi (Delhi)
  18. Ms. Malathi Maithri (Delhi)
  19. Mr. Ved Prakash Arya (Delhi)
  20. Mr. Hawa Singh Hooda (Delhi)
  21. Mr. Biswanath Agarwala (Delhi)
  22. Ms. Dipavali Sen (Gurugram)
  23. Mr. B.S. Shastri (Delhi)
  24. Mr. S.C. Jain (Rajasthan)
  25. Ms. Shalu Nigam (Gurugram)
  26. Ms. Anjali Chakraborty (W.B.)

7TH APRIL 2019

Sr. No.            Name

  1. Dr. Ramesh Awasthi (Pune)
  2. Mr. N.D. Pancholi (Delhi)
  3. Mr. Ajit Bhattacharyya (Kolkata)
  4. Mr. S.C. Varma (Delhi)
  5. Mr. Rajender K. Sharma (Delhi)
  6. Dr. Manju Ray (Kolkata)
  7. Mr. Kiran Nanavati (Gujarat)
  8. Mr. Sheoraj Singh (Delhi)
  9. Md. Nazimuddin SK (Kolkata)
  10. Mr. Mahi Pal Singh (Delhi)
  11. Mr. Debabrata Pal (W.B.)
  12. Mr. Sisir Kumar Chakraborty (W.B.)
  13. Mr. Premnathan (Prem) (Delhi)
  14. Mr. Bhabani Dikshit (Delhi)
  15. 17. Mr. Arun Kumar Maji (Delhi)
  16. Ms. Malathi Maithri (Delhi)
  17. Mr. Ved Prakash Arya (Delhi)
  18. Mr. S.C. Jain (Rajasthan)
  19. Mr. Biswanath Agarwala (Delhi)
  20. Ms. Shalu Nigam (Gurugram)

 Dr. Ramesh Awasthi presided over the meeting on 6th April 2019. First of all the participants stood up in silence in memory of the following members who have expired since the last meeting:

  1. Sh. Gautam Thaker
  2. Prof. Gauripada Bhattacharya
  3. Sh. Suniti Mukherjee

As per the agenda for the biennial meeting of the Indian Renaissance Institute, the following items were taken up:

  1. First of all the minutes of the last General Body Meeting held on 28th and 29th January, 2017 at New Delhi were presented for confirmation and were duly confirmed after a correction in para 8 relating to the Election of the Trustees: Correction: Mr. Ved Prakash Arya was elected as Co-opted Trustee and not as Elected Trustee.

The suggestion of Mr. Narottam Vyas that Action Take Report on the decisions taken in the General Body Meeting should be presented along with the decisions taken when the Minutes are presented for confirmation – was accepted unanimously.

  1. Under the Report of Activities of the IRI from February 2017 onwards, the following report was presented:

            (a) M.N. Roy Memorial Lecture was held on 19th April 2017 and was delivered by (Justice) Ajit Prakash Shah, former Chief Justice of Delhi and Bombay High Courts.

            Due to non-availability of the speaker the lecture due in March 2018 could not be held.

            (b) Renewal of registration of IRI done for five years from 01.05.2017 from the office of the Registrar of Societies, Meerut.

  1. Audited accounts of the IRI for the year ending 31st March 2018 were presented by Mr. S.C. Varma, Treasurer and passed. He also presented the balance sheet as on 31 March 2019.

Mr. Narottam Vyas suggested that effort should be made to transfer the amount lying in the Bank Account of the Mumbai branch to the FD account of the IRI.

  1. Status of 13 Mohini Road, Dehradun case at Nainital High Court was reported in details and the reasons for the delay in judgement given in details.
  1. Decision regarding the future management of 13 Mohini Road was postponed till the finalization of the case and handing over of the property to the IRI.
  1. Regarding publication and circulation of The Radical Humanist it was reported that after a lot of efforts, its registration in the office of the Registrar of Newspapers has been completed and postal concession has been obtained since January 2018. It was also reported that the magazine is available on the website www.lohiatoday.com.

    As per information and photos sent by Mr. Manohar Ravela, it was reported that all the issues of The Radical Humanist have been bound in hard cover and preserved in the library of Virginia University. Mr. Mahi Pal Singh also reported that every month, apart from our subscribers who get the hard copy of the magazine, a soft copy is sent to about 200 people. Some copies are distributed among the interns of PUCL Delhi who regularly keep coming for internship. Some copies are being sent to college and university libraries in Delhi and outside on complimentary basis and an effort is being made to expand the readers’ base by sending more extra copies to more colleges and universities.

Suggestions for expanding the readers’ number and improving The Radical Humanist

 

  1. Mr. Narottam Vyas suggested that in order to reach out to the non-English knowing readers some pages of the RH should be reserved for material in Hindi. Important articles should be translated into Hindi and published in these pages. He also suggested that activities held at regional levels should also be reported in the RH.

It was decided to consider this suggestion and explore the feasibility of the suggestion of devoting a few pages of the RH for material in Hindi.

 

Mr. Kiran Nanavati promised to send reports of anti-superstition and other activities in Gujarat.

  1. Mr. Vinod Jain remarked that our organization has not done anything for removal of superstition. We can do so by coordinating with rationalist organizations working in this field. He also observed that four prominent rationalists like Dabholkar and Pansare were murdered because their work was affecting many fundamentalist organizations. He suggested that we should publish the ideas of such people even if in short form and if possible articles written by them should also be published in the RH.
  1. Ms. Malathi Maithri told how after reading Periyar, Ambedkar, Marx and M.N. Roy she was attracted towards the radical humanist philosophy. The ideas of such people are important for transforming societies. Tamil Nadu and Puducherry are examples where because of the influence of Periyar there is lesser of superstition than in other parts of the country. As such, she suggested that we should continue our effort to reach out to more and more people.
  1. Dr. Ramesh Awasthi, reporting on activities in Maharashtra, said that many organizations, including MASUM with which he is connected, are doing work for removal of superstition and for inculcating constitutional values of democracy, secularism, spreading human rights education and annihilation of caste etc. and interaction with students of class IX and X during two-day seminars/workshops proves very effective

It was decided that efforts will be made to coordinate activities with other organizations working for the promotion of humanist values, rationalism and secular and democratic values. Efforts will also be made to get articles of murdered rationalists and to publish them in The Radical Humanist.

  1. (i) It was reported that Mr. Mahi Pal Singh has compiled selected articles published in The Radical Humanist since 1970 in two volumes – from 1970 to 2005 and from 2006 to 2018. Because of shortage of funds they cannot be printed as of now and a total of 3 lakhs and 50 thousands of Rupees needs to be raised for their printing. Mr. Mahi Pal Singh’s effort in bringing out this work was lauded. It was also reported that a printed copy is ready and will be released today. It was also reported that Mr. Manohar Ravela has agreed to put it on the website www.lohiatoday.com today itself.

(ii) There is no progress in the publication of Roy’s books and other literature as Renaissance Publishers could not undertake the work on the agreed terms.

(iii) Typing work of the 5th volume of Roy’s work has been completed and proof reading work is in progress.

(iv) Speaking Tiger, a publishing house has brought out a volume ‘3000 Years of Dissent in India’ edited by Sh. Ashok Vajpei in which the article ‘Whither Indian Congress’ written by Roy in 1930s, published in the 4th volume has also been included.

  1. 8. Appointment of Research Director for IRI:

 

Mr. Ajit Bhattacharyya suggested that as the main work of the IRI is research and publication of humanist literature, a Research Director should be appointed, who will get financial grants for the task to be undertaken by him. For this task he proposed the name of Mr. N.D. Pancholi. Mr. Pancholi was requested to submit a proposal paper regarding the task to be undertaken and the finances required for that. Mr. Pancholi agreed to do so. It was decided that after receiving the proposal of Mr. Pancholi, the task of appointment of the Research Director will be undertaken.

 

  1. Issue of renewal of the membership of IRI with the Humanist International (New Name for International Ethical and Humanist Association) was discussed and Dr. Ramesh Awasthi volunteered to undertake the work.

Election of the Board of Trustees

It was reported that some members of the Board of Trustees have expressed their inability to attend the meeting on 7th April due to unavoidable reasons and requested that the election of the trustees be undertaken today. The request was unanimously accepted.

Chairperson, Dr. Ramesh Awasthi, who was presiding over the meeting, vacated the chair and asked for the election of a neutral Returning Officer from amongst the present members.

Mr. Sheoraj Singh’s name was proposed and accepted unanimously as the Returning Officer.

Mr. Sheoraj Singh reported that as per the IRI Constitution, there are a total of 17 Trustees in the Board of Trustees. They are:

8 Life Trustees

7 Elected Trustees

2 Co-opted Trustees

 

Election of a Life Trustee:

 

He reported that there are at present seven Life Trustees and because of the death of Mr. Gautam Thaker, one vacancy has occurred among Life Trustees for which election is to be held. He invited members to propose the name of a member for Life Trustee.

Mr. S.C. Jain’s name was proposed and seconded.

Since there was no other candidate for Life Trustee, Mr. Jain was declared elected as a Life Trustee unanimously. After his election, the following are Life Trustees of the IRI:

  1. Dr. Ramesh Awasthi
  2. Mr. N.D. Pancholi
  3. Mr. Jayanti Patel
  4. Mr. Vinod Jain
  5. Mr. Narottam Vyas
  6. Ms. Rekha Saraswat
  7. Mr. Ajit Bhattachryya
  8. Mr. S.C. Jain

Election of Elected Trustees:

 

Mr. Sheoraj Singh reported that as per record the following members were elected as Elected Trustees in the last General Body Meeting for two years:

  1. Mr. S.C. Jain,
  2. Mr. Mahi Pal Singh
  3. Mr. S.C. Varma,
  4. Mr. S.K. Nazimuddin,
  5. Ms. Anjali Chakraborty, and
  6. Mr. Vidya Sagar
  7. Vacant

Mr. Singh informed that all the seven Elected Trustees have to be elected for the next two years. He invited names for the same.

A proposal was given that except Mr. S.C. Jain who has been elected a Life Trustee, the remaining Trustees be re-elected. The proposal was unanimously accepted.

After that Mr. Singh declared that there are now two more vacancies for the Elected Trustees for which he invited names. The names of

Mr. Kiran Nanavati and Mr. G. Veeranna were proposed. Since no other names were proposed, they were elected unanimously.

After the election of Elected Trustees, the following members stood as elected:

  1. Mr. Mahi Pal Singh
  2. Mr. S.C. Varma,
  3. Mr. S.K. Nazimuddin,
  4. Ms. Anjali Chakraborty, and
  5. Mr. Vidya Sagar
  6. Mr. Kiran Nanavati, and
  7. Mr. G. Veeranna

Mr. Singh declared that the election of the Board of Trustees was complete. It is the prerogative of the Board of Trustees to co-opt two members, they will be elected by the BoT.

Approval of the new membership of the IRI:

 

The General Body of the IRI approved the new membership of the following individuals:

  1. Mr. Sheo Raj Singh (Delhi) – Life Membership
  2. Mr. Hawa Singh Hooda (Delhi) – Life Membership
  3. Dr. Manju Ray (Kolkata) – Life Membership
  4. Mr. Debabrata Pal (West Bengal) – Life Membership
  5. Mr. Levidi Viswanath Reddy (Hyderabad) – Annual Membership
  6. Dr. V. Laxminarayana (Karnataka) – Annual Membership
  7. Mr. D.R. Kapahi (Delhi) – Annual Membership
  8. Dr. B.S. Dikshit (Delhi) – Annual Membership

Release of the two volumes of ‘Selections from The Radical Humanist’

 

Dr. Ramesh Awasthi, Sh. N.D. Pancholi, Sh. S.C. Jain and Sh. Satish Chandra Varma released the two volumes of ‘Selections from The Radical Humanist’.

Immediately after the release of the two volumes, Mr. Mahi Pal Singh reported that, as promised by Mr. Manohar Ravela, today they have also been put on the website www.lohiatoday.com.

Sh. N.D. Pancholi welcomed the inclusion of withdrawal of Armed Forces Special Powers Act and removal of Sedition law in the manifesto of the Congress Party.

Decisions Taken Regarding Future Programmes:

 

On the suggestion of members the following decisions were taken:

  1. Revival of Renaissance Club. PUCL Delhi Interns could be made part of it.

 

  1. Meeting of the Board of Trustees to be held at Pune in November 2019. Details to be finalized by Dr. Ramesh Awasthi and communicated at appropriate time.

 

  1. Seminar to be organized on important issues facing the country. To be held at Kolkata in August 2019. Sh. Ajit Bhattacharyya to finalize details and communicate at appropriate time.

Papers presented at the Seminar:

 

  1. Role of the Radical Humanist in the Present Political and Social Scenario in the Country: Presented by Mr. Kiran Nanavati

Mr. Nanavati observed that India is basically a religious society seeking answers to our problems from mythology. This is also reflected in politics. There is also hero worship. Corruption is present in our religion and bribing of gods and goddesses is prevalent in our society.

 

Participating in the discussion, Mr. Sheo Raj Singh commented that the rise of Kejriwal and turning into a completely corrupt politician has resulted into loss of credibility and new movements cannot take place easily because nobody believes in them

Mr. Rajender Kumar Sharma commented on the undemocratic working of Kejriwal.

  1. Mr. Ajit Bhattacharyya present a paper containing topics like United Independents, Indo-Pak Conflict, J&K Imbroglio and Bengal Politics.

Mr. Ajit Bhattacharyya advocated that upright persons should contest elections as independent candidates, as Roy had also advised in the very first parliamentary election.

In his opinion, the root cause of all consequent troubles in Kashmir is that the Govt. of India found the assurance of the ‘Instrument of Accession’ signed on 26th October 1947 by Maharaja Hari Singh being “confirmed by the people of the State” ‘un-implementable’.

He felt that Mamata Banerjee, the Chief Minister of West Bengal, does not have ‘ a deep faith in democratic principles.

Commenting on this, Dr. Manju Ray and Mr. Nazimuddin said that there is so much corruption that for filing nomination papers for election to the gram Panchayats and district panchayats, money has to be paid to Trinamool Congress. Under the TMC there is the rule of goons. The RSS is going to every house telling people that this is the last time they can vote and change the rulers.

  1. Mr. Arun Maji spoke on Parliamentary Democracy: Role of the State

Mr. Maji said that after 1971 the State became a rigid State having control over almost everything.  After the introduction of Panchayati Raj Institution the State became even more powerful. Capital has crony capital trying to control government, judiciary and even the election process in order to control parliament as well as the government unlike in the past when groups of teachers, labourers etc. tried to influence decision making. Today people cannot really elect their own representatives. Even media has failed to question this. Hence there is need of good people participating in active politics.

  1. Mr. Premnathan (Prem) spoke on the influence of E.V. Ramaswami Periyar in fighting the menace of caste because of which many people have dropped their caste surnames in Tamil Nadu and Puducherry. However, the saffron elements belonging to the Hindutva fold are trying to enter the Dravidian society through temples and trying to promote religion and caste but because of the prevalence of and acceptability of Periyar’s ideas and women friendly ideology, they hardly have any influence there.
  1. Dr. Bhabani Dikshit said that all political parties are monolithic – controlled by one person. One party is not different from another – Congress or BJP.

Theoretically we may be correct but practically we are becoming irrelevant. In spite of the fact that there are good people around and so many electoral reforms have taken place, but bribe to the voters continues and all the rules are flouted. Perhaps our democratic system is still evolving

  1. Dr. Ramesh Awasthi said that under the Panchayati Raj system theoretically the elected bodies are above bureaucracy – democratization of the State system – but because of corruption things have not improved. Even Co-operative system, which is no more democratic, (district co-op banks, housing co-ops etc. with Secretaries from the government side) in Maharashtra and Karnataka for example, has not made much difference as they are controlled by powerful political persons who decide who will be who. Land reforms have also not been implemented. People are backward. Money, sarees etc. are distributed in villages and their votes are purchased

Roy’s speech on dissolution of the Radical Democratic Party delivered at Calcutta, which throws light on these aspects, should be read.

  1. Some members threw light on the cult of violence in polls in West Bengal which is an additional challenge.

Conference ended with thanks to the Chair.

(Mahi Pal Singh)

 Secretary, IRI