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B Sudarshan Reddy invokes Dr Ram Manohar Lohia’s iconic slogans, highlighting public vigilance and democracy, as INDIA bloc’s Vice Presidential candidate in 2025
Ram Manohar Lohia’s words highlight need for public vigilance in democracy. (News18 Hindi)
The political battlefield has once again turned to the legacy of socialist thinker Dr Ram Manohar Lohia, whose fiery slogans once rattled the Nehru government and gave shape to opposition politics in post-independence India. This time, his words have been invoked by none other than the Vice Presidential candidate of the opposition INDIA bloc, B Sudarshan Reddy.
Reddy, in his campaign address, resurrected one of Lohia’s most remembered lines, “Jab sadak khaamosh hai, sadan awara hoti hai (When the streets are silent, the Parliament becomes a wanderer).” The remark, coined by Lohia in the 1950s to stress the need for constant public vigilance, is now being wielded as a sharp critique of what the opposition calls a weakening democratic voice in today’s India.
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Lohia, a socialist stalwart, was not only known for challenging Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru’s towering leadership but also for mobilising backward classes and Dalits across North India. His words carried the force of movements, with slogans crafted in his own hand rather than by committees or party machinery. The impact of those slogans is such that, decades later, they continue to echo in public life and protest movements.
Among his most enduring lines was the declaration that democracy could survive only if people themselves remained awake, engaged, and ready to take to the streets. For him, silence among citizens meant the derailment of Parliament. This thought, opposition leaders argue, is as valid in 2025 as it was in the 1950s.
Lohia’s slogans spanned a wide range of social and political issues. He coined “Pichhde Paaven Sau Mein Saath” to emphasise unity among backward classes, a line that resurfaced with full force during the Mandal Commission era and still animates demands for expanding reservation quotas. During Nehru’s prime ministership, when Congress enjoyed unchallenged dominance, Lohia reminded the nation that the prime minister was the servant of the House, while the owner was the House itself.
His sharp sense of timing also produced slogans like “Daam Bandho (fix the price)”, underscoring his campaign against inflation and the rising cost of living. What set him apart was not just the content of his slogans, but the fact that he penned them himself, each one designed to capture the urgency of the moment.
The irony today lies in Reddy’s reliance on Lohia. The socialist leader had championed “equidistance” from both the Congress and the Communists, rejecting domination by either bloc. Yet, Reddy, now fielded by the Congress-backed INDIA alliance, is channelling Lohia’s firebrand words while standing on the very platform the socialist had once warned against.
If elected, Reddy will preside as Vice President and Chairman of the Rajya Sabha, the very institution that Lohia believed must remain tethered to public energy on the streets.
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