Interview with Dr. M.P. Parameswaran

On July 29, 1999, Dr. M. P. Parameswaran of the Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad (KSSP), presented a talk at Penn State titled 'The Necessity for a Fourth World Outlook'. On this occasion, on behalf of the Association for India's Development (AID) State College, Kavitha Nellore, Priya Nagarajan, and Soma Nag, requested him to share his thoughts on a few issues. Presented below are excerpts from the interview.

Kavitha: You have been involved with the KSSP since 1966. What motivated you to join the KSSP and become a full time activist since 1976, considering that your background is not related to social activism?

Dr. MPP: That is a long story. I got my Ph.D. at the Moscow Power Institute, Russia. At that time some of us used to meet occasionally and discuss what we could do besides our professions when we went back to India. We came up with all kinds of ideas including starting political parties. Many of these ideas were discarded. Finally we thought of developing scientific literature in Indian languages, which would be uncontroversial and useful. I took the responsibility of starting such a movement in both, Marathi and Malayalam. I chose Marathi because I was in Mumbai and could meet people there. I also chose Malayalam as it was my mother tongue. Writing and publishing had been a hobby for me. By the time I went to Moscow, I had published two books. I also wrote on space travel in one of the leading journals of Kerala as a Moscow correspondent.

When I went back to Kerala in 1966 to start an organization, I was told that such an organization already existed. I was associated with this organization for some time. In 1969 I had to go to Kerala on an assignment to develop scientific literature. They had a State Institute for Languages for the production of university text books, mainly in Malayalam. This was based on a grant from the central government. Its director was my friend and I sent him a proposal for five years. He told me not to send him a proposal but to do the whole thing myself. So the state government sent a formal proposal to the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) where I was working since 1957, and asked for my deputation. At BARC I had organized an officers' association, with the director as the president, myself as the secretary, and about 1500 scientists as members. We did not ask for housing or more pay. Instead we asked for more meaningful rather than repetitive work. We thought the organization should have a say in the policy of the establishment. They never liked that, and so they were very happy to relieve me. I got my deputation in 15 days and left for Kerala. During 1969 -73 I was assistant director of the State Institute of Languages. During that time I became conversant with publication and editing. I edited around 200 books. These included books on nuclear engineering, the Fibonacci's mathematics series and the Feynman lectures. It was interesting but by that time I became disillusioned with nuclear energy. I knew it could not sustain itself. So rather than earn my livelihood at an atomic establishment, I realized I could find other methods of doing so. I decided to change my profession from nuclear engineering to publication and science activism . I resigned from BARC as I was not eligible for voluntary retirement. I exchanged my earlier career for something I enjoyed doing and have never regretted it since.

Priya: The KSSP slogan is "Science for Social Revolution". Could you please elaborate on that and tell us how science can be used for social revolution?

Dr. MPP: KSSP started in 1962 but the slogan "Science for Social Revolution" came into existence only in 1974. What does it mean? We have a uniform consensus that Indian society consists of two sections. One group which is continuously getting enriched, while the majority are poor. So there are two movements, one is enrichment and the other is impoverishment. The reverse of these movements is revolution. Revolution is technically a discontinuity so that the people who are continuously getting impoverished start getting enriched. This is possible only if the enrichment process of the minority is simultaneously reversed. Science and technology have been powerful tools in the hands of the minority, by which they get enriched at the expense of the majority. So, a transfer of these tools to the majority helps them in their fight against impoverishment. Science in a broad sense includes technology, natural sciences , social sciences and arts. It is more or less equal to knowledge and education. This is the crux of the slogan.

Soma: We understand that the Bharath Gyan Vigyan Samithi's underlying philosophy is that literacy does not merely mean knowing the word but knowing the world". When you talk about a state becoming 100% literate, as in the case of Kerala, do you mean that everyone just knows how to read and write or does it mean something more than that? Were there any specific reasons for focusing on Kerala?

Dr. MPP: To know the world does not mean knowing only the word. One has to learn from interactions with the world. The literacy campaign was initiated in 1989.At a discussion in Delhi, where the UNESCO director General and many important people from the Government of India were present, it was argued that it is not possible to mount a campaign for literacy in India. This is because, elsewhere where there was such a campaign - Cuba, China , Tanzania, Burma or Russia - there had also been a major social upheaval. So a literacy campaign could only succeed either with or after a social revolution, but not before it. Since there was no semblance of any revolution in India, such campaigns could not succeed. Our own experience has been that on the basis of science we have been able to mobilize people for campaigns, ranging from the silent valley movement to lectures on astronomy. In fact, in 1987 we mobilized tens of thousands of people for a major science campaign, the Jan Vigyan Jatha. So we argued that it is not necessary for literacy to follow social revolution. Rather, literacy could accelerate social revolution. They said there was no precedence for that. I said that anything which is first cannot have a precedence. So, let us try it first.

However the initial trial should be in a place where it is easiest to achieve success, viz. Kerala. This is because in Kerala, the literacy level was higher than in other places. In addition, the KSSP was a very large organization with 40,000 members and units everywhere. It had a lot of credibility, and the Ernakulam district collector at that time was a former vice president of the KSSP. He said that he would be game to such an experiment which would help make Ernakulam 100% literate. So, we joined forces and the government of India gave about Rs. 1 crore. We then had to mobilize about 15,000 volunteers to educate approximately 170,000 people. These volunteers conducted saturation propaganda through face to face discussions, multimedia and street theater. They visited every household. Ultimately 160,000 people enrolled, and of these, 130,000 became literate. This meant that they could read and understand around 35 words per minute, write 7 or 8 words per minute without mistakes, and perform numerical calculations with two digit numbers. Beyond this, we took each of them on 3-4 visits to the police station, post office, bus stand, collector's office etc. Most of the villagers were afraid to go to these places. So this exercise helped to increase their confidence level, and reduce their fear of the bureaucracy.

This achievement in Ernakulam caught the imagination of people all over the country. Similar campaigns were started in Pondicherry (Tamil Nadu), Bijapur (Karnataka), Midnapore (West Bengal), and Durg (Madhya Pradesh). The following year, it spread nationwide.

However, the term 100% literacy is used figuratively. In reality, nothing is 100% - about 70-80% of people may be functionally literate, while the other 20% may be marginally literate. So anything above 90% should be known as total literacy and not 100% literacy. But even that term is a misnomer when expanded to the rest of India, and should instead be referred to as a mass literacy campaign.

Nevertheless, total literacy became a fashion and about 400 districts in India took it up. Every collector and minister took it up as a prestige issue. The result is that about 120 million people participated in the literacy campaign. Of these, about 20% became totally literate, while the rest could only sign their name. But even this was a massive process which required a volunteer force of more than 10 million. Each volunteer committed about 400 hours per year. During the process, the outlook of the volunteers changed by discussing with and learning from groups of people who had enrolled in the campaign. Many of the learners were more knowledgeable than the volunteers. The volunteers knew only the alphabet. So, an interesting relationship started. As a result, the demand for primary education shot up since these people wanted their children to be literate. Initially there was extreme cynicism, and to break that we needed plenty of optimism.

This achievement may not be called literacy per se. Rather it could be referred to as an increased level of awareness because of the increased demand for education and active involvement. For instance, movements like the Nellore anti arrack and the quarry workers' women's movement developed as a result of this campaign.

Kavitha: How did you mobilize so many volunteers and convince people to be literate?

Dr MPP: With saturation propaganda, the literacy movement became the fashion of the day. Word of mouth also helped immensely to spread awareness of the issue, leading to a multiplier effect. In terms of mobilizing volunteers and preparing a district, the time taken could range from 2 - 2.5 years. This again depends upon the place - in some places it is fast, while in others it is slow. As far as learners are concerned, they basically want to learn. Initially they are cynical, but once they understand and accept your sincerity, they are ready. However there may be problems in case of shifting populations or migratory workers. But in settled villages and towns, there is maximum success.

Priya: What other practical difficulties did you face when you started working on these projects, especially in terms of convincing people? How did you overcome them?

Dr. MPP: For all of us, this was a new field where we learnt through doing. One of the major difficulties was insufficient training and not enough trainers. As a result, some projects lasted only for a month or a year, and then died. Another problem was getting persons to work full time (16 hours per day). For example, the University Grants Commission offered 150 fellowships to people to work in this area. But we never got more than 45 volunteers in this way. This is because university teaching required a commitment of 300-400 hours per year, while in our case the commitment was about 2,000 hours per year. So unless someone was committed enough, it became slightly difficult to attract volunteers. Finally, the primers used to teach had to be approved by the government. This is because the primers contained material on campaigns such as the Nellore anti arrack movement.

Soma: How successful has the National Literacy Mission been? Right now we believe that India has a 64% literacy rate? Do you think we are in the process of attaining 100% literacy sometime in the future?

Dr. MPP: I don't think India will become 100% literate that fast. However primary education, drinking water, and health campaigns (campaigns which revert back to literacy), may be able to achieve that over a longer period of time.

Kavitha: With reference to your talk today, you have mentioned that it has become necessary to consider a new world order called the Fourth World. In your opinion, how would the Fourth World differ from the First World in terms of philosophy and functioning?

Dr. MPP: There are two major differences. First, the First World is essentially a private, profit motivated industrial society. It believes in an exponential increase in consumption of goods and services, without any limit. It fails to differentiate between need and greed. Second, the government is for the people, but not by all the people (where everyone is involved in running the affairs of society, viz. at the county or neighborhood level).

In the Fourth World, every citizen is actively involved, and development is not based upon consumption. Rather, cultural and social development will increase exponentially. This is the crux of it, on which I will elaborate further in my talk.

Priya: What do you think are the major social and educational issues to be tackled in India today?

Dr. MPP: According to me, in India, there are only a minuscule number of people involved in activism. The majority are pessimistic. So, without generating some amount of optimism, there won't be any action. The generation of this optimism has to be based upon facts and reason, and this would again differ from place-to-place.

Other issues include primary education, food, clothing, shelter, and health. To deal with these issues requires massive programs, maybe at the tehsil level.

It is equally important to counter blind emulation of the West, in its fallacies and not in its virtues. This can be done only through the development of counter cultures - there is no other way to it.

Soma: Speaking of issues, we believe that the KSSP played an apex role in the Silent Valley Revolution. Could you please elaborate on that?

Dr. MPP: The Silent Valley Hydro Electric Project in Palghat, Kerala, was intended to generate 120 megawatts of power, This was equivalent to about 500 million units of energy per year, in comparison with a consumption level of 9,000 million units of energy per year. But, in the process it would have destroyed a very unique forest system. So it did not seem worthwhile to produce those 500 million units of energy per year.

The KSSP advocated alternative sources of energy, and in the process became the most knowledgeable group in energy planning.

Soma: Are there any alternatives to large development projects?

Dr. MPP: Several decades hence, most large projects will have to give way to small, local ones. This requires a belief in the philosophy propagated by E.F. Schumacher in his book 'Small is Beautiful". But small cannot just be beautiful, it has to be powerful too. In this regard, science and technology can play a very important role to make small powerful and effective.

Kavitha: Who, in your opinion, can be considered as good role models to motivate the youth in India?

Dr. MPP: The concept of individual role models is not good enough. Ultimately to accomplish something, motivation and consciousness has to come from within the individual.

Priya: AID is a very young organization trying to examine its role in development. What in your opinion does development mean?

Dr. MPP: AID is a very special kind of group. First, it is based in the U.S., and not in India. Second, it consists of people who are transient - students and youngsters - who join it and then later may get dispersed. Therefore, it may be difficult to have a cohesive group. However, a core group may emerge in 10-15 years. This limitation must first be understood. Then, beyond supporting one or two projects - which can lead to disillusionment - AID should have a collective consciousness and consensus on its own vision of the future. This consciousness and vision must be shared by individuals, and pertain not only to India but also to the rest of the world.

After this it can think of relating to major movements in India with similar visions. One thing to be careful about is that if AID is too obsessed with its own banner, then other banners may reject associating with it. This bannerism caused some difficulties for KSSP in broadening its activism. The important lesson we learnt is to "put our eyes on the vision and not on the banner".

In terms of actual operations, groups can be formed to study in detail an issue or area, e.g. education - what we can take or reject from American education, and convey the information to people in India who are working in this field. Groups can even be formed to study the technology and economics pertaining to areas such as composting, solid waste management, land fill, bio gas etc. For instance, I am helping the Integrated Rural Technology Center, Palghat (Kerala), to develop aerobic composting plants for 2-3 municipalities. Similarly, AID can help small entrepreneurs or villages to set up their own production units, which would mainly rely on local materials and local consumption. Some of these products, viz. handicrafts, could even be marketed here. This kind of involvement would serve a greater purpose than just haphazardly helping projects piecemeal.

About Dr. M.P. Parameswaran:

Dr. M. P. Parameswaran received a Bachelor's degree in Engineering from the College of

Engineering, Kerala, India in 1956, and a Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering from the Moscow Power Institute in 1965. He was a scientist with the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, Bombay, from 1957 to 1975. Since 1975 he has been a full-time activist with the Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad (KSSP). Dr. Parameswaran also currently serves as the Vice-Chair of the Bharat Gyan Vigyan Samiti (BGVS) and as the Chair of the Total Health and Sanitation Mission, Kerala.

The Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad (which literally means the Science Writers' Forum of Kerala) has earned wide acclaim for activities related to generating environmental consciousness, literacy campaigns, and decentralized, micro-level planning. The KSSP is a recipient of the Right Livelihood Award (dubbed the alternate Nobel Prize) in 1996, the UNESCO Literacy Award (King Sejong Prize) in 1990, the UNEP's Global 500, and the Vriksha Mitra award.

About AID

AID State College is a registered organization with Penn State University, and a local

chapter of the Association for India's Development. AID is committed to the cause of alleviating poverty in India. To learn more about AID visit www.aidindia.org

Note: For a complete version of this interview, please contact Kavitha Nellore (kxn153@psu.edu), Priya Nagarajan (pxn121@psu.edu), or Soma Nag (sxn124@psu.edu).