Above description conjures up popular images about progressive writers, as
people who live and breathe communist ideology in its various
manifestations. Stereotypes about such writers are not flattering.
However, I know a different kind of progressive writers who are my friends.
One of them is smt. Tummala Krishna Bai garu of Visakhapatnam. She played a
key role in the progressive literary movement in A. P., particularly in
Virasam, for the past several decades. She is a very unassuming lady, who
truly believed that her work helps the underdog and carried it out with a
rare conviction. (arranging literary get-togethers, organizing meetings,
speaking). She still does it. When I met her last, she acknowledged the
weakening of viplava literary activity, but said she and her colleagues are
still participating in other progressive activities. At present she works
with women's movement, among other things. Her progressiveness is the kind
which comes naturally to any tender hearted person exposed to the realities
there, not a text-book ideology. So, it doesn't die.
Vindhya garu is another such activist. She teaches psychology at Andhra
university, but also participates in what can be called 'progressive' work.
When I met her last she said, 'we go visit these villages every so often.
There is a chilling apathy about everything. Pollution, spouse abuse, dowry
deaths..... everything. People are so resigned to their fate you wouldn't
believe it'. She and her co-workers meet with abused women, provide support
for them. They also work state-wide in the area of civil liberties. Last
year, they were celebrating Chalam (centenary) and his literature, what it
did for women.
I never was an admirer of the progressive-communist literature.
After meeting people like Vindhya and Krishna Bai garu I learned that it is
the person (writer) that holds the magic, not their name brand. They are
aglow with an honesty, capacity for work and clarity of purpose that are
rare among both progressive and 'other-than-progressive' writers, so
whatever they touch is of value. Vindhya's father, Tripura, a retired
English professor and a writer of highest distinction, was (still is) a
close friend of mine. I used to bother him with a lot of questions; I once
asked him why communist writers are so emotional and why they bring
literature down to the level of propaganda. He nodded, but stopped me in
the middle and said (to the effect) 'no need to be so critical of them.
After all, among all these public figures, they are about the only group of
people who even care about the suffering masses, who at least think about
them. Nobody else gives a damn'. Many of the progressive writers are people
like you and me, who give a damn. Their work continues.
KP