The myth of farmer suicides

In The Republic, Plato said there was an old quarrel between philosophy and poetry. According to him, if poetry was allowed in his ideal state, "not law and the reason of mankind, which by common consent have ever been deemed best, but pleasure and pain will be the rulers in our state". And so he banished poets from his ideal state. In India, however, the foundation principles of polity are poetic in nature. It is not surprising that sentimentality and sanctimoniousness - those illegitimate children of poetry - animate the manifestoes...

Read Full Story>>