HORNET'S NEST: SAVE ANCIENT KNOWLEDGE FROM COW DUNG TALES

Novelist and columnist Makarand Paranjape was one of the earliest visible faces of the right-of-center ideological track in the predominantly Left-leaning Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU).

- SIDHARTH MISHRA Author and president, Centre for Reforms, Development & Justice

Publicly heckled by then JNU Students Union (JNUSU) president Kanhaiya Kumar for resisting a strike call by the students, he became the face of the right's opposition to Marxist dogma.

In a recent article (published in this newspaper) Paranjape startled many by mentioning, "I experienced a campus suffocated by ideological conformity; the Left's intolerance was stifling. But Right rigidity and anti-intellectualism are scarcely better. Earlier, I had watched scholars and students shunned for daring to question Marxist dogma or exploring nationalist perspectives. Inquiry gave way to loyalty tests. Now, the pendulum has swung to the other extreme."