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IPN Blog Guidelines The blog at IPN is a platform for philosophers and others to write about philosophy in India and also to express philosophically informed opinions. What kind of articles are published in the IPN blog? Philosophy for Society and Public – Articles that explore the questions and events of society from philosophical viewpoints. Life of philosophy and philosophers in India – Articles that explore and document the experiences of philosophers and the nature of philosophy – as a discipline/practice/profession – in India. Academic Philosophy – Articles that introduce (either to fellow academicians or the public) a specific topic in Philosophy. We publish brief, accessible summaries by researchers about their latest publications for wider dissemination. The articles can also be reviews of philosophy books. Who can write for the IPN blog? Given the aim of the IPN blog is to enable a dialogue between philosophers and the public, we accept articles from both philosophers and the public. Philosophers who are not members of IPN, especially undergraduate and graduate philosophy students, can also submit. Kinds of submissions Articles related to the above themes can be sent to the blog-editorial team. If you have a topic for an article in mind, and want to check its viability, you can also send the abstract. Proposals for a series of articles can also be sent. In this case, please submit a concept note on the theme. Submission Guidelines Please email abstract/article/series-proposal to ipnblogteam@gmail.com . The suggested length of articles is around 1000 words. While submitting the article, please share the document over google-doc. The article can also be submitted as a standalone docx file. The article can be in English or any of the vernacular languages. Please use Chicago Manual Style author-date in-line citations and end bibliography. Use endnotes instead of footnotes. Please use Grammarly or other tools to remove spelling and grammar mista kes. We have a non-negotiable policy against plagiarism. Review process The article will be reviewed by the editorial team and suitable comments will be provided Wherever necessary, the editorial team will reach out to other scholars for their feedback and recommendation. Editorial team Manohar Kumar (Faculty, IIIT Delhi) Sania Ismailee (PhD Scholar, IIT Delhi) Siddharth S (Faculty, Sai University) Sushruth Ravish (Faculty, IIT Kanpur) Varun S Bhatta (Faculty, IISER Bhopal)

Academic writing support for philosophers in India IPN Colloquium This is a weekly colloquium, held every Saturday, 10-1130 AM, where a philosophy scholar (faculty or research scholar) will present their work, published or work-in-progress. Through this colloquium, we aim to build a platform through which philosophers become familiar with the works of their colleagues, and create a space where researchers can share early drafts of their work for comments and suggestions. The colloquium will be open to all philosophy scholars. If you would like to attend the colloquium, please write to colloquiumipn@gmail.com . If you would like to present at the colloquium, please fill this form and we will get back to you. You can find the details of upcoming and past talks here . The current moderators of IPN Colloquium are: R. Krishnaswamy (Jindal Global University), Shinod K (University of Hyderabad), Shruti Bhat (Thapar University), Siddharth S (Sai University), Sushruth Ravish (IIT Kanpur), Varun Bhatta (IISER Bhopal) and Vivek Radhakrishnan (Krea University).

Hareesh A G In conversation with Siddharth S (Assistant Professor, Philosophy at Sai University, Chennai) August-September 2021 Siddharth: Hello Hareesh! Thank you for agreeing to this interview. It would be nice if you can begin with a brief biography, to let our readers know about your background. Hareesh: I am currently working as an Assistant Professor at the department of Humanities and Social Sciences, BITS Pilani KK Birla Goa Campus. I did my Ph.D. at the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Indore where I learned and explored different aspects of philosophy. All my studies before Ph.D. were in Kerala—bachelor’s and master’s from the Calicut university and B.Ed. from Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam. I was born and brought up in a remote village of Kerala called Kondazhy (Thrissur District). In fact, it was life in that village that influenced me and shaped me to become a philosophy scholar. The last point you made is really interesting. But before we get to that, can you tell us what your research interests are? My specialisation during my doctoral study was in the area called the philosophy of biology and the title of my thesis was ‘Evolution and Ontological Realism: A Critical Interpretation’. It is still one of the major areas of my research interests. It is an area that has been meagerly explored in our country. I got into this topic through wondering about organic life. Since it is my focal research area, I have published some research papers focusing on the ontological issues related to evolutionary biology (' Ontological Indeterminism and Immanence – Some Aspects of the Metaphysics of Organism' ; 'Realism Through Relativism: Looking at the Possibility of Metaphysics in Species Problem' ; 'A Note on ‘Two-Way’ Ontological Practice in Biology' etc.) Apart from this, I have an intense interest in the metaphysics of science, philosophy of language (Frege, Wittgenstein, the concept of meaning and its relation to syntax). I am working on a project proposal focusing on the ontological aspect of meaning. Besides all these, I am developing an immense interest in the Indian philosophy; specifically, the naturalistic threads of Indian philosophical systems regarding the mind. In the future, I also would like to work on the ontology of memory. Could you tell us a little more about the philosophy of biology as an area of study—what are some of the key questions explored in it—and your doctoral work? In my doctoral studies I had focused more on the ontological issues related to the concepts which are unavoidable in biology. More specifically, I had analysed the ontological issues from an evolutionary point of view as it is a stringent belief that evolution theory of Darwin had given the theoretical base for biology. Remember Dobzhansky’s word that ‘nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution’. However, what interested me was the persistence of metaphysics even in our molecular biological explanations over the biologists’ claim that Darwin ‘murdered’ God by introducing a mechanism called natural selection. It is right that Darwin had put a full stop to the conventional mystic metaphysical explanations surrounding creationism. But that was not the end of the story. On the one hand he abandoned the metaphysical presence of God/deity/intelligent designer/creator etc. but on the other hand he paved the way to a new wave metaphysics concerning concepts without which the whole of biology become void. Say, life, organism, and species. Can we imagine a biological literature without a grounding in these concepts? No. But, biology still cannot define what they are. Evolution theory has an ontological commitment toward them and we take evolution theory as the theoretical framework for our explanation of living phenomena. So, I delved into these to find out a possible answer to the question of ‘why’ metaphysics in biology. How has your experience been of studying and being a part of academic philosophy in India? It was when I thought of doing bachelor’s, after higher secondary studies in science, that I first heard about philosophy. No one in my acquaintance has any idea about what-is-this-thing-called-philosophy. It was fortunate that I have got admitted to a bachelor’s programme in philosophy as the second last person among 60 students. At the time of admission, the Head of the Department told me, ‘Your mark/grade is very low, but don’t feel inferior. Study well’. Those words influenced me to move forward without humiliation. And the very first class was on logic which I found very interesting. After a few days, I held the first position in an internal assessment. And at the end, I graduated at second position in my college and came in the top 10 in the university. The master’s journey amazed me by taking me on a philosophical tour through different topics like science, mind, language, etc., which shaped my rudimentary research interests. I feel that the study of philosophy in Indian universities at bachelor’s level gets students well acquainted with the basic aspects. It is right that post-graduation is an advanced level, but most of our universities offers variety of courses that are still ‘introductory’. Instead of broadening the syllabus with different topics with superficial content, it would be better to focus on specific topics aimed at deep understanding. Could you share your reflections on philosophy as a discipline in India? How do you foresee the development of the discipline? I am proud to be a philosophy scholar in India which has an old philosophical tradition, since the Vedic period. However, I am greatly worried about the status of philosophy in India by realising the stagnancy after the establishment of conventional systems. What I mean by ‘conventional systems’ is the traditional philosophies—six orthodox systems and three heterodox systems (plus some related philosophers’ views, ancient and contemporary, on them). I am not indeed condemning contemporary Indian philosophy; there is merit in it, but it seems they have not explored enough to deal with the nuances of pragmatic life. It seems to me that Indian philosophy binds its explanations/descriptions with ethical threads whereas western traditions are bound with epistemological threads. This might be a reason for the above. Instead of preaching/teaching the conventional stuff, scholars should be ready to explore the hidden possibilities of our philosophy. We still teach different topics like philosophy of science or mind or language etc. by referring to western philosophers. Why don’t we think about the possibilities of developing our own contributions? Say, Indian philosophy of language or mind or science. I am happy that the emerging associations in India like Indian Philosophy Network and the Philosophy of Science Group in India etc. are aiming at the exploration of different aspects of philosophy. Yes, we need all philosophies irrespective of region/race. Every philosophy has its merit. May be, a comparative study of different philosophies would hint at the different hidden possibilities. Apart from these, it is our duty to make society understand the importance of philosophy in life by wiping out misconceptions about philosophy. Your mention of comparative approaches in philosophy raises an interesting question. It seems to me that in comparison to some of the other areas in philosophy, philosophy of science is still largely located within western philosophical traditions. Do you think there is scope for other traditions to contribute to philosophy of science and biology? What I find is that there are central and marginalized areas in philosophy. Most areas are centred around the west (western traditions). In eastern philosophies, such as Chinese, Indian and Middle-Eastern philosophies, we can see that there are nice contributions to medicine, and to philosophy of biology, especially from the middle-east. Whenever we check a syllabus of philosophy of biology or philosophy of science, we see that what is covered will be mostly, eighty to ninety percent, with respect to the western philosophy of science. I see very few philosophy of science or biology syllabi with mentions of eastern or middle-eastern contributions. We need to explore this. Why these became marginalized, I feel, is due to our own activities. I have searched the BA and MA Philosophy syllabi of almost all Indian universities, and I see that there very few universities introduce a critical approach to thinking and topics which people can themselves explore. In Calicut University, during my BA and MA programme, we studied the six orthodox and three heterodox systems and some contemporary Indian thought. This is the conventional practise. I believe that this will change if we give a chance—to teachers and students—to explore and put their views forward. I don’t think that Indian universities give the liberty to teachers to modify the syllabus, apart from IITs and central universities. At IITs, we have at least some liberties to modify. Of course, it is necessary to learn and teach the conventional philosophies, but apart from these, there should be room to discuss our own points—what we believe and what we think about these (conventional systems). Do you think such an approach can help in integrating Indian philosophical thought with philosophy of science? Yes. In the final year of my PhD, I learnt that many Indian contributions have greatly influenced scientific development. But they are not considered as contributions towards philosophy (of science). We started calling something as ‘science’ only after the seventeenth century. Even before that, we have made good contributions to scientific and astronomical fields. Before the seventeenth century, everything (in the west) was considered as Philosophy. But we don’t consider our ancestors who contributed to astronomy or mathematics as philosophers. When we consider them as philosophers and their contributions as philosophical contributions, and consider how these changed worldviews and social systems, we can then philosophise about them and understand them better as philosophy of science. You made a very interesting observation earlier, that it was life in your village that shaped and influenced you to become a philosophy scholar. Could you elaborate on this? I was born and brought up in a remote village. You can find that the people who lived there, or even now, are full of misconceptions, myths and false stories. For example, they believe that mumps and plagues are because of witches and witchcraft. Such kinds of misconceptions were there. I did my +2 in science and then shifted to the arts. When I started philosophy, my first aim was to concentrate on civil services. But, after a point in time, I understood that there were many questions that were unanswered in my mind since my childhood. Something like, ‘What is God?’. We all believe, we all go to temples, we all do prayers, we offer many things to God. Why do we do all these things? These were the questions that triggered me when I started doing philosophy. Then I found that many different answers could be found in philosophy. But, sometimes, our questions can be easily addressed by philosophical discussions. And we find that many of these philosophical discussions, at some point in time, will soothe our urge to know how or why something happens. One of the reasons why I became a philosophy scholar is because, I found that philosophy is solving, answering and at least partially addressing the questions that were formed in my mind through the interactions with my villagers. This is one way [in which my village life shaped my interest in Philosophy]. In my village, no one studied philosophy as a topic or as a subject for their degree. I was the first one—actually, I think I am still the only one who has studied philosophy in my village. When I joined the philosophy program, the educated people in my village blamed me: ’Why are you taking this subject. After you graduate, you are not going to get any job, or any opportunities that you can explore in the future’. My first motto was to focus on civil services. I believed that philosophy could help me in this. After my graduation, I stopped studying completely. I went to work as a truck cleaner in a quarry. I worked for almost one and a half years there. But while working in quarries and trucks, I understood that the questions in my mind were not completely answered. There were remaining questions, and I was not able to discuss them with anyone. My acquaintances then were mainly truck drivers and cleaners, and I was not able to discuss with them the questions that were on my mind. After a point, I understood that I need to go back to academics, and that my mind would cool down only if I get some answers to the different questions. It was not only metaphysical questions, but many questions that I had in my mind at that time. So, I re-joined academics, as a postgraduate student at Government College, Chittoor (Palakkad), in MA Psychology. At the same time, I got admission into MSW at Amrita University, MA Criminology and Juvenile Justice at Madras University, and MA Sociology at Loyola College, Trivandrum. I dropped all of these and joined the MA programme in Philosophy (at Calicut University). My villagers asked, ‘Why are you doing this? You belong to a family that is economically poor and you have to take care of your family. You have to focus on an area that will give you a job. Why are you focusing on philosophy?’ At that time, I did not answer them. Later, in the second year of my PG, I told them I knew how to get a job in philosophy. Apart from getting a job, in our lives, we have to address some of the basic questions that emerge in our minds. I believed that Philosophy could help me answer those. This was my answer to their questions. Apart from these, I was interested in the spiritual practises—we can even call them ‘black magic’ and sacrificial practises—in my village. When I used to watch these things, I used to ask the question, ‘Why?’. I later understood that many of the things that my family members and villagers do are nonsensical. I don’t want to be a nonsensical man in my life. This is how my village influence me in becoming a philosophy researcher. There could be some confusion when I say that some of these practises are nonsensical. It is nonsensical from a philosophical point of view, but it is very much sensible for them. What I understood was—people are going to temples, praying to God and offering many things because it soothes their mind at that point in time. Or they believe that it reveals some truth to them, or solves their problems. They believe in some ultimate reality which they call by different names. But, whenever they are doing something, they are rationally doing it, because they believe that there is a higher being that exists, which either created everything or is the cause of everything. And if we please that cause, our problem will be solved or we will get what we want—this is the rationale behind their activity. So, we cannot say that they are utterly nonsensical, but from a modern, rational point of view, or say a Marxist point of view, we might say that it is nonsensical. But there is a rationale behind it. You mentioned that after your bachelor's, you worked as a truck cleaner and you really felt the need to answer certain questions, which brought you back to academics. This, I think, raises an interesting question about the nature of the philosophy itself. Do you think that common people—people living in villages or those working in physically demanding jobs—engage, or can engage, in philosophy and philosophising? Or is philosophy restricted to academia and other ‘secluded’ institutions? I worked at an NGO sometime in 2008, which was working with sex-workers on problems related to their health. This happened before I joined as a truck cleaner—so I first finished my academics in 2008, joined this NGO and then worked as a truck cleaner. What I understood from these experiences is that everyone follows some philosophy in their lives. We can see that many of the complicated philosophical concepts are easily applied by the layman, without knowing that they are philosophical concepts. What I understood better was—they do what they need. We philosophy scholars may explore many different problems and a wide variety of concepts. Ordinary people focus, knowingly or unknowingly, only on the concepts or theories they need. What kind of career paths in philosophy are you interested in, and think are available in philosophy in India? Teaching still holds the major share among different career possibilities for philosophy scholars in India. And, in fact, I see teaching as a great profession to explore philosophy. It is good that professional and technical institutions also encourage teaching philosophy for their students by realizing its importance. What are some courses you have taught, at BITS or elsewhere? As a discipline, philosophy is dependent on dialogue and discussion, perhaps more so than other disciplines. How do you incorporate this in your teaching practise? I teach Introductory Philosophy and Applied Philosophy for UG students and Philosophical Foundations for Liberal Studies for the M. Phil. Students. As I am teaching in a technical institute, very detailed discussions on philosophical topics, beyond the syllabus, would be too ambitious. We have to stick to the syllabus and make them understand the subject. This is not easy for a large class of students whose orientation is towards technology. Some students are more enthusiastic towards philosophical discussions, so they keep asking doubts and clarifications. More or less, students have a logocentric attitude, in deconstructive terms, towards different disciplines. Most of them are scientistic in nature; an adamant attitude that what the sciences say is right. Thank you Hareesh, for a very interesting and lively conversation. I hope we get to meet each other in person sometime soon!

Back to Liberal Basics Danish Hamid PhD Scholar, Department of HSS , IIT Bombay Feb 22, 2022 This article is part of the series of responses from philosophers on the hijab row . First a story, or what we like to call pretentiously – a thought experiment. Imagine that two brothers, Ravi and Vijay have ventured on a camping trip with a group of friends. They are all near the same age, there being no hierarchy between them. While walking through the forest, Vijay indulges his habit of plucking a single leaf from every low-hanging tree that he comes across. Ravi asks Vijay what he is doing. Of course, he can see what he is doing. What Ravi means is that he must explain his actions as being something worthwhile, sensible, and which someone might have a reason to do. In other words, ‘better give a good reason for doing this, or else, Stop.’ Is Vijay under any obligation to explain it to Ravi? I think not, unless he wants to. The others in the group agree with him. Ravi then turns back to Vijay and asks him to justify it, or offer an excuse for what he is doing. Now, “unlike explanations, justifications and excuses presume at least prima facie fault, a charge to be rebutted”. (Benn, 87) Is Vijay under an obligation to offer a justification for his innocent indulgence? After all, what’s so wrong about plucking a leaf every now and then? And it is not as if he was trespassing in a grove of threatened, near-extinct plants and trees, and neither is Ravi the resident Forest Officer, and last they checked, it was not a crime in any of the books of law. Such being the case, Vijay has “no obligation to meet a challenge to justify his performance until there is a charge to answer”. (ibid) Suppose, however, that in his capacity as an enterprising vigilante on behalf of Chlorophyll everywhere, Ravi decides to handcuff Vijay, thereby preventing him from his indulgence. Now, Vijay can properly demand a justification from him, and a mere ‘tu quoque’ reply (literally – ‘you also!’) that Vijay, on his part had also not offered Ravi a justification for plucking leaves, would just not fly. This is because Vijay’s actions had done nothing to interfere with Ravi’s. “The burden of justification falls on the interferer, not on the person interfered with” (ibid). So while Vijay might properly resent Ravi’s interference, Ravi has no ground of complaint against Vijay. Suppose now that the priggish Ravi does come up with a justification. Vijay, he says, is wasting his time – instead of pointless leaf-plucking, he could be doing something useful - helping the group plan the adventure, or listening to an ebook, or entertaining everyone with the song “Keh duun tumhe”. But, of course, Vijay doesn’t have to accept this justification for interference. Even if Ravi were right, and Vijay could have been doing something useful, what has it to do with Ravi? “An unfavorable evaluation of someone else's action does not necessarily warrant one's interfering to prevent it.” (ibid) The upshot for the Hijab Case – or any analogous case of interference Now, this story, a fabricated mish-mash from Yash Chopra’s Deewar and Stanley Benn’s A Theory of Freedom (1988) , is supposed to convey a simple point. Volatile and non-conformist though Vijay is, he is under no requirement to demonstrate to Ravi that he has good reasons for doing what he was doing. On the other hand, it is required of the conscientious but self-righteous Ravi that he must justify his interference in Vijay’s actions. The two demands for justification are incommensurable so to speak, which is philosopher’s talk to mean that they are not equal or equivalent and thus cannot be spoken of synonymously in any meaningful way. This is the most minimum, yet characteristic claim in liberal political thought – that unless your act is harming someone, nobody has a right to interfere in your actions, or prevent you from carrying them out. What constitutes harm in a given situation will be a job of a 500 page book by someone like Joel Feinberg in which the political philosopher will flesh out all her claims, followed by replies to all anticipated objections and counter-responses by other philosophers. How fun! However, this basic commitment of non-interference, if not an axiom in liberal political philosophy, is still something incredibly intuitive accepted by nearly all liberal political thoughts and its off-shoots, including modern day conservatives, socialists, many feminists, etc. It would just require a very strong argument to refute, and in the Hijab case, no one has offered any persuasive arguments yet. John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty is still the best place to begin thinking about this problem, and a fine example of philosophical writing where the writer anticipates many well worn counter-arguments and writes with characteristic verve. The upshot of this for the Hijab controversy should be clear enough. The Hijab is seemingly a harmless piece of clothing. To prevent women, or in this case specifically, pupils and teachers from wearing it to school would require a justification. Thus, the Preventers ought to justify why there ought to be no Hijabs in school. The Wearers, Donners, Hijabis, have to offer no justification on the liberal view that I laid out above, unless of course the Wearers, Donners, Hijabis, have themselves been forced to wear it (Some, primarily feminist thinkers, include conditioning and socialization also as reasons sufficient enough to question the Hijab. But very few go to the extent of supporting state coercion to wish to remove it). For the Preventers, matters complicate further when they want to single out Hijab over other religious symbols – the most obvious case being turbans sported by Sikh boys and men. But States are Special?! My readers might question me and say that I am misrepresenting the issue, and that the story I have related doesn’t fit the facts of the Hijab controversy. In my story, the characters are equal, there being, recall, ‘no hierarchy between them’. Those are not the facts in the Karnataka Hijab controversy. The state has decided that Hijabs are impermissible. The State is unlike Ravi and Vijay. Is the state, per me, under an obligation to provide any reasons of the sort that Ravi was sought to provide? Now we are in the realm of what Jeremy Waldron calls political Political theory – the nature of state and governmental institutions, political representation, accountability, secularism, the separation of church and state, and the rule of law. Explicating the limits and confines of state power, its relation with religion, with minorities, with religious minorities – that’s another 500 page book. What a fun topic – but certainly what a short article like this would hesitate to go into. It seems obviously true that a State is a different kind of animal, and certainly not like individuals. So while it isn’t OK for me to demand protection-money from you in exchange for protection, the state manages to collect taxes, and on my refusal to pay, may even fine me, or attach my properties, or send me to prison. So the State is special, apparently, and states have rights to make coercive laws and force individuals to do things which other individuals just don’t have. But this is too quick. Maybe the State has the power to do this, in exchange for protecting citizens' rights (and enforcing contracts, and preventing crime, and increasingly in the 20th century, in providing, healthcare, education, even jobs) because citizens agree that the state may be given these powers, along with all the corresponding duties, all neatly enshrined in a constitution, backed by the constituent power of the people. This doesn’t automatically mean that the State has the power to interfere in my personal life – what I eat, what I wear, who I worship, who I sleep with. Furthermore, it takes no philosopher to see that the State doesn’t speak in its own impersonal voice. It usually speaks in the voice of the Parliament, a legislative body, or occasionally the courts. On what grounds ought the Parliament decide an issue? Well, many, if not most liberals, would insist that any coercive rule argued for by any individual, or group which speaks for a proposition in the Parliament (from Parler. French, literally ‘talk shop’) ought to be based on a reason which is not sectarian, biased, or idiosyncratic in such a way that it is not acceptable to or justifiable, to all those persons over whom the rule is going to have authority. In a modern democracy, where free and equal citizens disagree with each other over profound or profane matters, including morals, religion, economics, and what constitutes the ‘good life’, how shall any moral or political limits be placed on us? The answer that is usually given by a version of liberalism called justificatory liberalism, is that any such imposition should be justified by an appeal to ideas, values, arguments that all those persons who are affected by said coercive rule, might be able to reasonably accept or endorse. Variations, qualifications, additions on this basic idea, will be a subject of, you guessed it, some more massive tomes by Rawls, Wolterstorff, Eberle, Talisse and other brilliant philosophers. The unsuccessful evasion of Philosophy So, philosophers might bring their tools to dissect and explore all these questions, and make us all the wiser about how the relationship between state, the individual and religious symbols in the public sphere all hang together, and some philosophers have offered to do in the (web)pages on this very network. But some others might suggest that in the interest of time and considering how disputatious philosophers are, there is no need to enter philosophical discussion in the first place. They might suggest that we ought to look instead at the nature of the Indian Constitution, its own version of secularism, the state of case-law and the practice of the Supreme Court. What do the courts say, and how to they decide these issues? What does the Constitution say? It is that document and no other that ought to tell us what the correct answer to this quandary is. So what does the Constitution say? Pertinent to this issue, a cursory look at the state of Indian Constitutionalism will tell us that it promises to its citizens the rights to equality, freedom of expression, right to life with dignity, and many others, while also giving the centre and state right to make laws such as the Karnataka Education Act. The truth is that whether the anti-philosophers like it or not, in deciding a question like this, the court will also have to dip into philosophical complexities. It will have to either balance the rights of the States and the individual (if that is meaningfully possible), or it will have to uphold the right of one party and not the other. In doing that, it will have implicitly and inevitably made a decision about which rights it deems inviolable. So as with everyone else, even the court will have to argue philosophically. One can do it well, and one can do it badly. And the truth is that, these questions are hard. So we might want to be humble, and err on the side of caution, and not be very confident in our considered opinions, to say nothing about our pre-reflective prejudices. The liberal view, I suggest, does just that. It keeps the peace, while seeking to protect the rights of all. And it often succeeds! Where do I stand? After this short explainer (written especially for non-philosophers), it should be obvious that on this Hijab issue, and any such issue where social or state interference prevents individuals from exercising their choice, I come down, unapologetically, on the side of the liberal principle. For me, Mill’s harm principle is not the last word on such matters, but it still ought to be first word. And therefore, I have to come down on the side of those who say that the girls have the right to wear the Hijab to school. I am not particularly invested in what the Muslim women in question choose to do eventually. They owe me or anyone else no explanations. In fact, I go even further. I do not like the mandate of uniforms. Sure, uniforms may have a useful purpose if they help channel the energies of pupils towards education, sport and play, and help them along in the direction of healthy socialization, instead of displaying the stark divides in wealth and incomes. On the flip side, they do seem to privilege regimentation and obedience over spontaneity and creative self expression. Be that as it may, in accordance with my liberal sympathies, I don’t agree that even these goods that I mentioned above are enough reason to force me to conform to uniforms, any uniforms (!), if I don’t want them. The reason you don’t see me (and many others like me) on the streets demonstrating against uniforms is perhaps because it doesn’t seem worth all the trouble, and frankly, a uniform isn’t egregious after all. I don’t like it in principle, but I’m willing to tolerate it. I’d prefer there weren’t any, but they don’t warrant a rebellion. [That’s the problems with us liberals, we did all the protesting we had to hundreds of years ago, when feudal and monarchical power didn’t respect our (liberal) rights to live, liberty and property, err...the pursuit of happiness. Now we wake up only when these rights are threatened...which is happening a little bit too often these days.] Between pragmatism and principle But I digress. There is a time to discuss the perils and benefits of uniforms. But this is not that time. Because the issue here is not merely about uniforms. If it were, then teachers wouldn’t have been seen removing Hijabs outside school premises before entering their classes (a scene which many onlookers have described as humiliating). This issue is after-all a conflict between religious self-expression and the right to education. Moreover, the mandate on ‘ uniform uniforms’ is sure to come a cropper, as soon as we consider other religious symbols such as the Turban. Considering that the mandate is soon to encompass the religious expression of other communities, in a country as diverse as India, one wonders whether an order like this is even rational. More importantly, to put a portion of a religious community in the unenviable position of having to choose between religious expression and education is prima facie unjust. In order to navigate around the above problem, we have seen recourse to pragmatic solutions in the past – such as that the courts shall decide whether a particular religious symbol is ‘essential’ to a particular religion. Now, given that different religious sects, trends, and tendencies in the same religion differ among themselves in their practices of reading, hermeneutical traditions, and their own debates of authority, it is difficult to see how even a constitutional court may be able to adjudicate on complex issues such as this. Anyone who knows anything about how scripture is interpreted is familiar with the deep and complex interpretive controversies, together with the demand of knowing the tradition in and out, along with expertise in a classical language, usually a dead one. What is essential to one sect is non-essential to another. I encourage readers to look up the case of Abdul Karim Shorish Kashmiri v The State of West Pakistan, where the Pakistani Court held that the legal process in incapable of determining the answer to the question ‘who is a Muslim?’, until this question was then determined by a Constitutional Amendment, leading to the change in the legal status of the Ahmadis from being Muslims to a non-Islamic religious minority. My own view is that Courts shouldn’t decide on such abstract issues of doctrine as what constitutes an essential practice, unless the rights of some individuals or vulnerable groups cannot be protected through any other means, or when the traditionalists are bent on abusing the rights of their congregants or other members of the community. Therefore, it is a mistake to go into the theological and scriptural niceties right now (or perhaps ever), about whether the Hijab is obligatory or optional in Islamic scriptures. What is important, however, is this Liberal minimum - that no organ of the state must interfere in the religious expression of a community as long as it doesn't harm people from another community or others within that religious community. Since no such prima facie case has been made, this rule appears coercive and oppressive. On the question of reform ‘Reform’ is a weasel word. What is reform to one section of a community is oppression and persecution for another. The liberal must take the principled stance against interference, without necessarily seeing every instance of it as morally pernicious per se. If an arm of the State is to be mobilized to protect the rights of those who do not wish to wear Hijab, and if this to be called ‘reform’, that is fair too, and that doesn’t by itself go against the principle of non-interference. However, if the reformist goal is the much ambitious one of ‘liberating’ Muslim, whatever that might mean, it is best that it must come from within the Muslim community itself, through dialogue, discussion, education. The truth is that only those who feel stifled by traditional authority and its imposition of Hijab will choose to call it reform. For many others, the word ‘reform’ is an affront against their avowal of religious identity. The state ought to protect those individuals who are harmed by those elements which seek to impose their view of the good life on them. But experience has shown that a purely statist ‘reformist’ interventions will only bury the problem and not solve it. The example of Ataturk’s and successive governments’ restraints on religious expression in the Turkish public sphere is right in front of us. As soon as political conditions in Turkey changed and the Erbakan- Erdogan Islamist governments came to power, Hijabs in a thousand flowery prints bloomed in Taksim Square. Therefore, one, the argument for coercive state intervention in this case needs to be very strong, and I haven't seen any one which I find persuasive. Two, even if those who wish to impose a Hijab-ban are right, their victory won’t be a permanent one. If they believe that educated, rational and reflective human beings would not wear a patriarchal relic like Hijab, they must allow girls to receive a good education, and one which inculcates critical thinking and see where the chips fall. The long march toward secular-reason Now, some might question me and say that the burden of my song has been to exonerate the Hijab, and its advocates. Quite the contrary. My position is that, as a non-Hijab donning man, it is not really my place to comment on the meaning of Hijab for many Muslim women. Although the more vocal among them have come for, against and even, believe it or not, for-and-against it. However, being a naive believer in the (liberal) dogma that correct opinions win out in the long term, if given enough breathing space and a conducive environment, I wish only to urge more discussion on the issue, which is not backed by the coercive arm of the state and the blunt instrument of the law. It seems to me that the correct (justificatory) liberal position is to let Muslim women decide. But what about the appeals to scripture, you may say. How can a liberal be pleased with a situation where religious people decide the issue invoking religious scripture, and speaking in a characteristically religious vocabulary? Well, one response is that ‘religious people, like all people, should get to decide what they want, as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone else.’ That is the quintessential liberal claim. But this aside, there is an academic/historical question about the upshot of religious-style argumentation. I shall quote Jeffrey Stout on this point ...consider the early-modern debates among Christians of various types over moral and political questions. Here we have numerous groups, all of which were committed to treating the Christian Bible as an authoritative source of normative insight into how such questions should be answered. Yet they did not differ only on what this text says and implies. They also differed on who is entitled to interpret it, on whether it is the sole authoritative source of normative insight into such matters, and on who is entitled to resolve apparent conflicts between it and other putative sources of normative insight. Because they differed on all of these points, they eventually found themselves avoiding appeals to biblical authority when trying to resolve their ethical and political differences. The reason was simple; the appeals did not work. So the differing parties increasingly tried to resolve their differences on other grounds. In this respect, their ethical discourse with one another became secularized. (Stout, 93-4) Muslims, including both scholars and the laity, are increasingly coming towards discussions on all issues, about the proper role of religious, pietistic and rational or secular reasons in deciding all kinds of moral and ethical questions, and increasingly in the 20th Century the Muslim world is going through a similar process, that Stout has described above. The increasingly diverse conclusions that interpreters have come to after reading the verses that relate to, or at least seem to relate to something analogous to Hijab, tells us that in order to come to any sort of consensus on the topic, the discourse among Muslims themselves will have to eventually become secular, in that it will have to employ a vocabulary that doesn’t always invoke religious argument. Now, whether between all these competing tendencies it manages to reach a harmonious conclusion or merely a modus Vivendi, will be there for us to see. Regardless, statist interventions will only stifle this process of churning. If anything, the debate needs to be nudged along, not stopped. Unfortunately, in this case, it appears that some secular voices, and not religion, are becoming the conversation-stopper. And that is just not the ‘liberal’ thing to do. References Benn, Stanley. A Theory of Freedom, 1998. Cambridge University Press. Stout, Jeffrey. Democracy and Tradition, 2004. Princeton University Press ___________________________________________________________________________________________ Read other articles in this series: Ariba Zaidi -- A Word of Caution to 'the Uniformist' and 'the Reformist’ Danish Hamid -- Back to Liberal Basics Hina Mushtaq -- Can women decide for themselves? Sania Ismailee -- The Karnataka Hijab row is about Right to Education...

Academic writing support for philosophers in India IPN Lectures Lectures and seminars in academic philosophy in India are usually either introductions to specific topics or presentations of research carried out. There are few forums that discuss important questions about the 'doing' of philosophy itself, such as: How do we teach philosophy? How do we conceptualise and execute philosophy projects? How do we do research, write and publish our work? IPN Lectures aim to initiate conversation and deliberation on these dimensions of philosophy. The first set of IPN Lectures focuses on the theme of writing and publishing in philosophy. These lectures would be aimed at addressing some common questions that philosophy researchers are likely to have, such as: How do I prepare an article for submission to a peer-reviewed journal, and what can I expect from the peer-review process? Which academic journal should I publish in? I have submitted/defended my thesis. How do I convert my thesis into a book? There is an interesting and fertile idea that deserves discussion from various stakeholders in the debate. How do I propose and work on an edited volume on this topic? I have an idea for a book. How do I build a book proposal, and approach publishers? How do I write non-academic articles for the public, and where can I publish them? Any queries regarding the lecture series on writing and publishing can be e-mailed to Sushruth Ravish (sushruth.ravish@gmail.com ) and Siddharth S (siddharth.nias@gmail.com ). If you would like to take the lead on organising lectures on a particular theme, please send an email to indianphilosophynetwork@gmail.com Upcoming and Past Lectures Publishing in Analytic Philosophy Prof. Anand J Vaidya San Jose State University 11 March 2023 From a Thesis to a Treatise Prof. Muzaffar Ali Malla Savitribai Phule Pune University 29 April 2023 Navigating Philosophy Journals: Steering Towards Acceptance Prof. Mitch Green University of Connecticut Editor-in-chief, Philosophia 28 July 2023 Editing Philosophical Writing Prof. Kranti Saran Ashoka University 10 August 2023 Paper Incubator Grants in God and Consciousness in Indian Traditions Prof. Ricardo Silvestre Federal University of Rio de Janeiro 4 Dec 2023

Tarun Kattumana In conversation with Siddharth S (Assistant Professor, Philosophy at Sai University, Chennai) September 2023 Tarun Kattumana is currently completing his PhD in Philosophy at the Husserl Archives, Centre for Phenomenology and Continental Philosophy, at the Institute for Philosophy, KU Leuven. He is also a part of the Access to Medicines Research Centre at KU Leuven. Siddharth: Hello, Tarun. Thank you for agreeing to do this interview as part of Parichay. Could we begin with a brief biography, to let our reader know about your background? Tarun : I was born in Kerala and moved to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at a very young age when my father got a job there. My family spent some time in Sharjah and then moved to Dubai eventually, where both my parents still stay. Growing up in the UAE definitely helped mold my sensibilities and interests. The cosmopolitan environment gave me a thorough sense that my understanding of ‘normal’ was heavily influenced by my upbringing. Especially given the different ‘normal(s)’ of my friends and colleagues of my parents. After school, I went to pursue a bachelors in history at Hans Raj College in Delhi University. To say that my first year in Delhi was a culture shock would be an understatement. Being in Delhi took me outside my caste and class related comfort zones. After my bachelors in history, I felt I wanted to study more but was not really sure what I wanted to study. I had interests in sociology and philosophy. Through a serendipitous turn of events, I got accepted at the Manipal Centre for Philosophy and Humanities (MCPH) where I did an interdisciplinary masters with a specialization in philosophy. This experience gave me an interest in philosophy, especially continental philosophy and felt the need to delve deeper. After working for a year under Prof. A. Raghuramaraju for the E-Pathashala project at the University of Hyderabad, I decided to pursue another master’s in philosophy from KU Leuven, Belgium. I have been here ever since apart from one semester where I was a teaching fellow at Sai University, Chennai (September 2022 -February 2023). Why did you choose to pursue a second master’s, after the first one at the Manipal Centre for Philosophy and Humanities? I did not feel I had a good enough grounding in philosophy at the time. For instance, when looking at other applicants for a PhD in philosophy I felt I was not yet ready to articulate a clear area of interest with sustained engagement or a topic on which I had dealt with substantially enough to present myself as a potential scholar and thereby a competitive candidate. What has been your experience of studying and being part of academic philosophy in India? I did my bachelors in history and there was a lot of interest in philosophical themes in other disciplines. Pursuing these interests is what brought me to philosophy. The first time I encountered philosophy in a classroom was at Manipal. Starting philosophy at the masters level without the required background was daunting. There seemed to be a high barrier to enter the discourse. Or a whole range of preexisting familiarity with concept-clusters, styles of writing, and the history of philosophy, that was required. Studying philosophy came with the feeling of having to constantly catch up. A great learning through this process–something I appreciated only in retrospect–was the ability to jump into texts or discourses knowing fully well that I did not have the pre-requisite background to adequately engage with the material. The ability to make this jump seemed to me entirely contingent on a range of factors. I did not always take this jump but learning how to do it on a rare occasion was crucial for my philosophical research later on. There is never a single moment where every detail on a page is absolutely clear. But it is still required to proceed to the next page hoping things get clarified eventually with more engagement. What are your research interests in philosophy? Can you briefly describe them for our readers? I am broadly interested in Continental philosophy. The emphasis on history, sociality, and intersubjectivity spoke to me, especially given that I began studying philosophy during my masters after a bachelors in history. Currently, my research focuses on Phenomenology which was among the first continental traditions I was introduced to during my masters. I then moved to study philosophy at KU Leuven where the Husserl Archives is housed. Here I got a very different reading of phenomenology which is deeply enriching and ran counter to its general reception. For this reason, I see a strong continuity between thinkers like Husserl and developing trends in phenomenology like critical and engaged phenomenology. My PhD thesis focuses on vaccine hesitancy during the COVID-19 pandemic. This focus brought in new interests in Systems Theory. During the pandemic I was part of a research project that looked into vaccine hesitancy in Flanders, Belgium. The group from my university that was part of this project took a systems theoretic approach. In the process of working with them, I got interested in systemic analysis and combining it with phenomenology. The pandemic also brought into focus the central role of trust which has been a helpful point to bring together phenomenological and systems theoretic approaches to study vaccine hesitancy during the COVID-19 pandemic. Besides my PhD research I have a strong interest in questions of Realism and Anti-Realism. I find this to be among the core questions philosophy can and should deal with. What excites me about continental philosophy and its recent trends is the return to questions of realism in a non-naïve sense and an attempt to break the Analytic-Continental Divide. Another strong interest is in Post Colonial and Decolonial thought which gives me a vantage point to evaluate the process and place of academia in India as it deals with its colonial heritage and baggage. I am also increasingly attempting to better my understanding of Jaina philosophy when time permits. It is interesting to know that you are part of an interdisciplinary project. How has it been, working as part of such a team? Could you elaborate on your contributions to the research as a philosopher? My team consisted of anthropologists, those working in operations management (system dynamics), business engineers, sociologists, psychologists, and virologists. Working with folks from other disciplines is really tough for me. Especially given that as a student of philosophy I am not used to the project setting or used to working together as a team. Additionally, many of the methodological ways of working of other disciplines tend to underplay what would be philosophically significant. Put simply, I realized that my team members and I had been formed in different ways by our disciplinary upbringing and were predisposed to be sensitive/pay attention to different things. To be honest, I was not trying to contribute to the team as a student of philosophy. Most of the time I was conducting interviews, coding the qualitative data, and eventually writing papers with said data. It was not immediately clear to me what a philosopher was supposed to do with qualitative research or systems mapping. My main intention was to learn how practitioners in other disciplines made their academic training relevant. Over time and on occasion, some philosophical distinctions, concepts, or emphasis on history proved important. Moreover, it was the insight that everyone was predisposed to seeing things a specific way owing to disciplinary framing that made me sensitive to identifying when a certain predisposition or disciplinary attitude was getting at the object of inquiry well and when it was mischaracterizing it. This sounds fascinating! Could you share with us some of your published research? My publications have broadly been about the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccine hesitancy. A part of my philosophical research has focused on putting forward a phenomenological analysis of trust in relation to vaccine hesitancy during the COVID-19 pandemic and its role in support for conspiracy theories . I, along with Thomas Bryne, have also provided a phenomenological reading of resistance to public health interventions during the COVID-19 pandemic and a broad five part schema that situates different positions in the debate on public contestations of science in general and vaccine hesitancy in particular which is forthcoming . My interdisciplinary research has been more squarely focused on vaccine hesitancy. My co-authors and I have published on vaccine hesitancy among health care workers and experiences of navigating crises related to the pandemic . Having been part of the philosophy community both in India and in Belgium, could you share your reflections on philosophy as a discipline in India? How do you foresee the development of the discipline? Studying philosophy in India comes with some tensions. On the one hand there is a draw and a pull to study Indian Philosophy given the many interesting concepts and debates at play. On the other hand, there is a demand to become proficient with Western philosophy and its traditions. The need to specialize so early on to get admitted into a PhD program or master’s meant that this tension could not be maintained. The feeling of needing to catch up with both Indian and Western philosophical traditions is altogether heightened. So, any choice feels like a compromise. Maintaining this tension in healthy ways and better collaboration between scholars working in different traditions is a hope for the foreseeable future. Another feature of working in philosophy in India is the increasing interconnectivity. This was not the case before. I really value the work that everyone at IPN is doing. Going forward such a network would help grow collaboration and community among those pursuing philosophy in India. Lastly, but most importantly, choosing to study philosophy can be daunting for those who have pressing financial and familial pressures. Presently, philosophy only offers a career path for those who are willing to stay in academia. Others who still have an active interest but cannot or do not want to stay in academia need to have avenues to engage philosophically. Moving forward, if we are able to make philosophy viable for academic and non-academic forms of life, it might contribute to greater interest in philosophy inside and outside the classroom. I hope this happens What do students in Belgium who study philosophy for their bachelor's and master's do after their programmes? Do most of them end up pursuing a career in academia? It really depends on at what stage the student is leaving philosophy. A student leaving at the bachelor’s level might migrate to another field, work a couple of internships and move towards a stable job. A student leaving the master’s, may already be academically inclined but may migrate to a field where academics and job prospects in the policy field for instance may be a possibility. For those who leave philosophy after the PhD, it is less straightforward. There has been significant time investment in academia. Moreover, in this part of Europe once you have a PhD, your employer has to pay you a salary that is reflective of your qualifications. For this reason, starting low or the kind of opportunities a bachelors student gets may not always be available to you. What kind of career in philosophy are you yourself interested in? Ideally speaking I would be grateful for the ability to teach and do research in philosophy with one foot in academia and another in public action-oriented projects. I am currently hoping to transition into a post-doc position or teaching at a university after I complete my PhD. Could you expand on what you have in mind when you talk of 'public action-oriented projects'? More generally, how do you think philosophers and philosophy can contribute to public discourse ? I would distinguish between two kinds of public action oriented projects. This distinction is only for the sake of clarity and not a distinction that I really see in practice. The first is where the researchers are directly working with members of the general public or a particular community. The second is where the researchers are working with institutions, pressure groups, NGOs who are working on various issues in society. In both cases, the audience of the research is different. This difference influences what counts as successful research. For instance, publication in a journal behind a paywall or read by researchers alone may not count as a successful end product for the first kind of public action oriented project. In my limited experience, students of philosophy should not aim to immediately apply their theoretical ideas or concepts. This would presuppose their applicability. Rather, philosophers should first immerse themselves in the problem and try collaborating with particular actors they hope to deal with. It has become quite clear to me that the philosophical framing of a problem differs quite a bit from other framings of the problem. More concretely, I feel those from different disciplines and schools of thought have immediate or broadly expected ways of framing an issue. For instance, legal experts tend to approach a problem in a way that would differ from anthropologists. This insight is quite explicitly post-Kantian in the sense that social problems do not just exist out there to be discovered by the researcher or policy maker. Rather our observations and framing are a crucial part of the problem. I emphasize that they are a part of the problem to stress that there are 'real' problems and these are not mere constructs. That said, these 'real' problems are framed in ways that can appear natural to the one doing the framing. Once the philosopher has been able to check their own framing of the issue, they may be in a place along with others to identify what grouping of clashing frames to proceed with. Tarun, this has been a wonderful and enriching conversation. Thanks a lot for taking time to do this!

Can women decide for themselves? Hina Mushtaq Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, Aligarh Muslim University Feb 22, 2022 This article is part of the series of responses from philosophers on the hijab row . I have been following the long thread of the debate. I would like to present my views from the standpoint of a Muslim woman who chooses not to cover. There are diverging views on whether the Quran imposes any dress code like burqa, khumur, head scarf or jilbab (cloak) on Muslim woman. If we agree on a view that the Quran does not impose any universal dress code for women and that was a practice of the seventh century Arabia (read slave owning community) to distinguish between free women and slaves, the aim was to make it clear which woman was under the clan protection by the means of veiling. Still, I would not appreciate the measure of banning hijab/ burqa in the current context. Most of the people don't get to read and write their religious texts, especially women. What they term as religious or associate with is most of the time imparted to them by religious scholars. I don't want to get into how religious scholars have created patriarchal interpretations of the Quran. We leave it for some other day. It would not be easier for these women and men to grasp in one go what actually their religion prescribes. The idea of modesty or haya embedded in Muslim girls from a very young age cannot be taken away with just one ban. What has taken so many years to imbibe will not go away in one single day. It is again then taking away their agency to choose. I agree the hijab or burqa are imposed too, however, the idea that all covered women need saving is also superficial and misleading. Covering then becomes just a cultural practice, other factors crucial for women empowerment are overlooked. ( Abu Lughod has written extensively on this.) Each case is different, we cannot generalize and call the hijab detrimental to women's growth. As said by Sania, the ban on hijab will only stop women from going to educational institutions. They and their parents will prefer no education than sending them without coverings to schools or colleges. It is over glorification of the thought that religion (read conservative) will take a back seat with such bannings. Again, women who cover are in a dilemma whether to choose between a covering which has spiritual understanding, brings them closer to God/ gives them an idea of freedom (portable seclusion) and education which is also their right. I believe instead of jumping to the final step, it is important to start with gender friendly readings of the religious texts in schools. Women should have access to diverse views of opinions on different matters which would help in making decisions for themselves. Earlier men decided that women should cover and uncovered women were looked down upon, now men have decided that women should uncover for covered women denote regression. Who is asking these women what they actually want? Can women decide for themselves? ___________________________________________________________________________________________ Read other articles in this series: Ariba Zaidi -- A Word of Caution to 'the Uniformist' and 'the Reformist’ Danish Hamid -- Back to Liberal Basics Hina Mushtaq -- Can women decide for themselves? Sania Ismailee -- The Karnataka Hijab row is about Right to Education...

Review of Venusa Tinyi's book by Aribam Uttam Sharma Aribam Uttam Sharma Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, North-Eastern Hill University Dec 28, 2023 Book review of Venusa Tinyi's On the Foundational Concepts of Norms and Normative Systems (Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, 2023) The author, Venusa Tinyi, makes a case that formalizations that aim to clarify normative concepts like obligation, permission, and prohibition that have a bearing on our actions are inadequate. Based on this claim, the book offers to make amends by proposing a model that offers an alternative approach. The book assumes that there is more to logic than its concern for truth. If logic is understood as a language and the business of language is more than making assertions (Austin 1962), then it should not surprise us that logic's concern cannot be contained by the concern for truth. This wider concern now accorded to logic plays out in the book's take on the prescription/description distinction. Here, the distinction incarnates as that between "What ought to be the case" and "What ought to be done". Whether the logic of norms ought to be theoretical or practical in intent forms a motivational undercurrent of the book. At the center of logic is the notion of logical consequence, i.e., what follows from what. Deontic logic deals with the theoretical interests of how normative concepts contribute and act in logical consequence (McNamara and Putte 2022) . Since normative concepts are supposed to inform our actions, any study of them has to be sensitive to their pragmatic aspect. Thus, deontic logic inherits something of the tension between the prescriptive and descriptive in classical logic. Tinyi rehearses the problems inherent in the formalization of normative concepts and the logic of norms, especially deontic logic. He asserts that there is no aspect of deontic logic that is not fraught with difficulties. He gives attention to von Wright-Anderson debate on the attempts to reduce deontic logic to alethic modal logic. He does this to show that such reduction is futile. Jorgensen’s dilemma , which arises due to the difficulty of reasoning about norms within truth-functional logical apparatus, drives home this point. The particular difficulty encountered in interpreting negation prefixed to an act category also suggests that the logic of norms is a different beast altogether from other standard forms of logic. Deontic logic has been identified as modal logic (Sider 2010) . Yet, drawing parallels between it and other well-known modal systems is ungainly. The author notes that the Axiom of Reflexivity , which says that necessity implies actuality, cannot be adopted in deontic logic. An act, which is obligatory (read as necessary), need not be performed (read as actualized) with or without the pain of punishment. At least in this world, sinners do escape punishment. Around this difficulty, and on the question of the externality of sanction to norms, H. L. A. Hart’s critique of Hans Kelsen and J. L. Austin is given an exposition. The author enters these debates to stress that values, desires, and intentions cannot be divorced from norms. Any formalization, analysis, or reduction that attempts this divorce is deemed inadequate. The author forays into the nature of legal systems. von Wright, the pioneer of modern deontic logic, and whom the author credits for inspiring his book, erred, according to the author, when he tried to analyze deontic terms through legal terms like immunity, liability, punishment, and so on. The author takes this failure as a sign that deontic concepts do have an "axiological" tint that cannot be done away with without making it grate against our intuition. Difficulties and inadequacies give impetus for developments and corrections. This applies to the development of logic too. When one finds problem in the formalization of a domain of reasoning, the usual course of action can either be i) augmentation of the expressive power of the initial formalism, if the fault lies in the inadequacy of expressive power of the said formalism or ii) replacement or modification of the initial formalism, if there is a fundamental problem with the initial formalism itself (McNamara and Putte 2022) . Tinyi finds that the problem with the logic of norms (deontic logic) is of a fundamental kind. So, the book sets out to make amends by replacing/modifying the initial formalism. But he takes this amendment in a novel way. For the same reason, this is a high-stakes approach. When he proposes a quasi-theoretical or quasi-formal model named D-Model , he avoids overhauling the semantics of existing formalism that he has found faulty i.e., modal logic. Rather, he provides a model, which would capture our intuition about basic normative concepts that in one way or the other formed the conceptual base of hitherto existing formalisms. The heart of the book lies in the author's development of D-model that captures our intuitions about normative concepts and the roles they play in the normative aspects of our lives. The proposal is based on the author's conviction that the semantic tools meant for propositional logic (descriptive expressions) cannot determine the significance of deontic expressions. Here the book traces a genealogy of ideas that led to D-model. In this vicinity, a bit of caution is called for. In the D-model context, the reader must be ready to modify the standard understanding of models associated with the semantics of logical systems. And again, since there is already a well-known model called Model-D in modal logic, care could be taken not to mistake the D-model for its more famous kin. The construction of D-Model takes cues from possible world semantics. The basic normative concepts that play central roles in deontic logic are analyzed and put in relation through attendant concepts that are developed around this construction. Deontic heaven, deontic hell, repressive norms, restorative norms, and prospective norms are some of these attendant concepts. There are times one might feel that the author's focus on the analysis of normative concepts pays scant attention to questions of validity, proof procedures, soundness and completeness. But this relegation, to defend the author's intent, is understandable. The author takes D-Model to be "metaphorical". It is not intended to be part of a formal structure that would be prescriptive of normative reasoning. Metaphor, the author observes, is to be judged by the degree of illumination it affords. Measuring by this yardstick, D-model provides illumination on some alternate pathways to understand the core concepts operative in deontic logic, the logic of norms, and our intuitions about these concepts. Through the notion of a deontological gap — the difference between worlds like ours, and the worlds that we would like to be in — the purpose and significance of norms are analyzed as that which induce the narrowing of such gaps. Tinyi gives reasons for not amending the problems of deontic logic with a different formal apparatus. Logical principles, which were once considered unassailable — for example, the traditional laws of thought —- have been challenged via formalisms in which they are locally or globally made to break down. We find this in the logical treatments of paraconsistency, intuitionism, possibilism (Mortensen 1989) . The author cites this fact to warrant the novel approach he takes. Another, perhaps better, reason for this novelty, which the author mentions, is the difficulties that are engendered by a model-theoretic approach to the semantics of deontic logic. These are unique to deontic logic and are not encountered in other standard logical systems. Russell once said to Wittgenstein, "Are you thinking about logic or about your sins?" "Both," Wittgenstein replied (Russell 1968). One could take Wittgenstein's reply as an affirmation of a deep link between logic and ethics. The logic of norms therefore has held interests not only to logicians but also to those concerned by how one should act. Those with interests in logic, ethics, legal studies, the history of philosophy, and their interfaces would find Tinyi’s book engaging and rewarding. References Austin, J. L. 1962. How to Do Things with Words . Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. McNamara, Paul and Frederik Van De Putte, "Deontic Logic", The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2022 Edition), Edward N. Zalta & Uri Nodelman (eds.). https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2022/entries/logic-deontic/ Mortensen, Chris. 1989. "Anything Is Possible." Erkenntnis (30): 319-337. Russell, Bertrand. 1968. The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell: 1914-1944 . Boston: Little, Brown and Company. Sider, Theodore. 2010. Logic for Philosophy . Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Richa Shukla In conversation with Madhvi Prasad (PhD Scholar, University of Mumbai) May 2022 Dr. Richa is Assistant Professor at Jindal Global Business School. She did her M.Phil. on Simone de Beauvoir’s Philosophy. The dissertation was titled as : Webs of Identity: A Relationship between Self and Others in Simone de Beauvoir’s Philosophy. Her PhD was on Feminist Phenomenology. Its titled as: Dialogues in Silence: A Study of Mourning, Shame and Vulnerability in India. Her theoretical leanings goes for Feminist Philosophy, Existentialism, ethics and social and political philosophy. She has numerous peer reviewed publications under her name. She has presented her work and given talks in many international and national conferences. She has worked on few international reserach projects on gender disparity. Dr Shukla is a certified philosophical counsellor from the American Philosophical Association. Dr. Shukla is one of the founders of Collective for women philosophers in India(CWPI). She is also the member of History of Women Philosophers and Scientists (HWPS) Madhvi : Greetings, Dr Richa. Thank you for agreeing to participate in this interview. The first thing I'd like to know about you is your background, varied interests, education, beliefs, motivation and challenges that prompted you to pursue advanced studies in philosophy as well as convey these vibes through your teaching career. Richa : Well as a Philosopher I doubt if I have a very strong sense of belongingness. So I still struggle when people ask me where I belong to? Bombay (currently Mumbai ) and Benaras played a very integral role while shaping me as a human being. I did my education largely from JNU, New Delhi. There's a way educational institutes like JNU affect you. It drills your mind to understand reflection and critical thinking. Mine was no less different. As a young woman when I entered JNU with my set of preconceived notions, it asked me who am I? And the answer to this question continues… Because of the privileges of being born in a certain family, education was given priority above everything and anything. Hence, reading fiction, Hindi, English, and Marathi literature was an everyday affair. In hindsight, when I think of it, reading as a habit was passed on to me by my previous generation. As a result, my family introduced me to Kathak, classical singing. The latter I recognized I wasn't cut for. Kathak brought a certain sense of aesthetics to my life. My generation is the third generation to act as arbitrators, and attorneys hence it was a tough call to not choose the law and think about Philosophy. I see Philosophy as a partner who never abandons you, especially during your challenging times. It stays with you, by you. One of the larger Philosophical questions which I am working on is the idea of the gender gap in the Indian philosophical domain. This has been one of the challenges which I faced while reading Philosophy as a woman of color. I see how the metropolitan city has influenced you to broaden your thinking and, of course, to choose philosophy. The JNU culture has undoubtedly instilled creativity in you, and Kathak art has ingrained aesthetic principles in you. So, my question for you is concerning gender roles and how you describe your contributions to promoting gender equality in society, particularly through the implementation of values such as diversity, openness, and aesthetics. Well to be honest it's not only the cosmopolitan nature of a particular city which has broadened my thinking solely. I am thankful for the cultural capital which I have received being born in a family like mine where there's a lot of intersectionality. My Father to be more precise is the most amazing Philosopher I have seen in my life. He influenced me to pursue Philosophy. I guess the relationship between Philosophy and Law is an interesting one which reshaped my perception of doing Philosophy. But you are right about other aspects here. I think I have a two-fold response to your question. About promoting gender equality, I feel Public Philosophy is a very important tool these days. That's why I categorically started to write in popular tabloids. It helps to share your opinion, and offer multiple perspectives and also solutions. One of the steps taken in this direction came alive when we formed the Collective for Women Philosophers in India . One of the structural differences which can be bought out would be via making more inclusive courses, pedagogies should be directed as such where inclusion, gender diversity and aesthetics should intersect with each other. Heartfelt congratulations on your initiative to support Indian women philosophers. I am sure that it will restore the status and value in a society that women seek. Secondly, while your arguments made about reforming curriculum and pedagogy are fascinating, it is sometimes problematic. The reason is the increasing concerns about the accessibility of educational resources to women who are marginalized, especially rural women living in remote parts. How do you connect such inequalities to the concept of intersectionality? It's a valid observation Madhavi, I must say. But when I answered your question I was specifically speaking about the academic world and its accessibility, and how it can be more diversified in nature. I remember when I got admitted to JNU, I came across this concept called marginalized points or quartile points. It's a simple concept which believes that people come from diverse backgrounds and those who hail from complex social structures should be given advances ahead of others. I was fascinated by this concept. Hence the Canon of JNU was very diversified. It's like you become special because of your differences. I wish we could have more egalitarian steps like these where participation and accessibility can walk together. Getting back to your question, I feel inequality and intersectionality are very closely related to each other. It's like making a puzzle. As I said earlier, more egalitarian steps can help us to build the bridge, also something I realized since I started teaching is that a lot of people have taboos associated with the great rural and urban divide. There should be more dialogue to demystify this myth. I'm delighted you're addressing accessibility and participation in the teaching profession because students confront difficulties in both areas. Aside from that, you mentioned the rural-urban divide. Could you please share some suggestions for closing the gaps? Also, you expressed your personal opinions on the favourable effects of politics, demography, gender, racial, and migratory terms on your career as a philosopher. Do you have any recommendations for people who are experiencing negative effects as a result of the influence of all of the above-mentioned terms? Such as a female student who, despite having promising academic qualifications, is struggling for scholarships and resource accessibility due to her gender, financial status, demography, and migrations. Wonderful question Madhvi. Let me use an everyday example to answer your question. I see marginalization as a Bombay sandwich. Those who are and have stayed in Bombay understand, that it's multiple layers, a few we like, a few we do not. It has multiple layers. By removing one layer, you cannot expect that you got the sandwich you want to consume. Let's try understanding the web of marginalization through this metaphor. In the case of marginalization, all these layers intersect with each other. Hence, your point is very valid. Dialogue on all levels is the key to bridging the gap. There should be discomforting dialogues in families, classrooms, cafes and whatnot. Remember, feminists struggled when they said personal is political. It's important that the elephant in the room gets addressed. Secondly, there should be more policies, and scholarships to bridge the gap between these two spheres. And most importantly, more sensitization programs to help people unlearn. Unlearning the preconceived notions is the key here. Unlearning the feudal ways of looking and existing. The example of a female student which you gave could also be understood as a form of resistance, that despite every hindrance she is trying her level best. Even though the gatekeepers of morality are trying their level best to keep her silent and marginalized. I wish there could be more institutes like JNU which offers another world, another perspective, another kind of training and which give strength to all kinds of voices. And of course unless and until policies and dialogues would not happen it won't make sense. Thanks for bringing the solution so vibrantly. My next question is a bit personal. What would you do if a colleague said something racist, misogynistic, prejudiced, or otherwise offensive to you, or if you witnessed someone dealing with these issues? What stand would you take? Also, How will you encourage diversity, equality, and inclusion among your subordinates? Well, you have to corner and confront people all the time. Though it depends on whether I would use humour, satire, a movie example or whatsoever. You see, showing a mirror is important. But don't blame me, if you don't like what you see. Well, ideally I believe it should be taken care of by the institute itself. But I will share this exercise which I always do with my students. It's a social experiment called privilege walk. Here, I ask all of them to stand in a line and with the yes to each question they have to come forward, and with a no, they take a step back. It highlights exclusively the gender gap, social exclusion, etc. I usually have a Playlist of certain scenes from movies (Regional, Hindi and English) which I share with them. I think engagement is essential. That’s a superb idea and l think other people should also implement such important moves to promote diversity, equality and inclusion. Apart from this, I am also highly impressed by your teaching styles. Could you describe more about it? Well, thank you Madhvi. Because I'm a Philosopher, dialogue has been a key in my classes too. I usually begin my lectures after playing a video/ some scenes from a popular show/ movie or song. After playing it, I usually ask the students what they think about it? I try to place one different opinion over another. Then I weave concepts and introduce philosophers. This becomes a really interactive way of doing theories and it reaches people too. Secondly, I always have this segment in my class once my class gets over. It's titled, Samjho Toh. ( try to understand) Here, I ask any student to come up with anything interesting they are reading/ listening/ painting etc. Sometimes students come with prose, poetry, a line from some story, a movie character, or a painting. It helps to understand their inner world and what they are thinking. It also helps in diversification in terms of thought processes. Once the student has shared, I ask for multiple perspectives. So far it's been working good. Fingers crossed! Thank you Dr Richa for participating so actively in this interview and for elegantly expressing your ideas. Your approach to philosophy would undoubtedly bring a meaningful change to this world. I wish you success in all of your upcoming endeavours.

Review of Meera Baindur's novel by Manish Sharma Manish Sharma Assistant Professor, Kurukshetra University Nov 24, 2023 Book review of Meera Baindur's Sharvay (Speaking Tiger, 2023) When it comes to women philosophers in India, Maitreyi, Gargi, Meera, and Sulabha come immediately to mind. However, these are little more than names, since their philosophies and lives are rarely discussed, let alone their teachings. We need stories of the women who devised wings, dared to take flight in the gusty winds of oppression, and sailed to otherwise forbidden heights. It is equally important to understand how they were bruised, how they grieved, and most importantly, how they failed. Sharvay is one such attempt that envisions the journey of a mixed caste (mishra varna) girl from the claustrophobic confines of a palace where she was born and brought up. The novel presents the concrete circumstances of the socio-cultural and historical setting of south-central India in the 8th century. It depicts the life of a human being of that era from one of the most vulnerable sections of its society and explores what it might be like for her to become a philosopher. Besides presenting the obstacles on the way to becoming a philosopher, the writer also suggests what kind of position that philosopher would take in the given situations. Spider Web around the Elephant Statue This novel explores the socio-economic circumstances from the viewpoint of a mishra varna woman. It was the era of Buddhist Rinpoche Padmasambhava, Sankara, and Dantidurga's uncle and successor, King Krishna. The story takes us through several locations, starting in the palace and concluding in a little town called Kolahalpur after passing through jungles and towns like Amravati. Born as a child of unknown parentage, Sharvay, the protagonist, was fostered by a woman in service of the Queen. She grew up alongside the haughty princess as herpeekadhari and socha-upcharika holding a silver spittoon in her hands for the princess to spit out her chewed betel leaves. Here, Sharvay shows first signs of curiosity as she wonders how the green leaves turn red upon chewing. However, her desire to learn was limited by her duties towards her mistress, the princess. She secretly stole knowledge as much as possible in circumstances that came her way accidentally. Since the pursuit and practice of knowledge were generally restricted. Even though all her faculties including her hands were growing more capable with time, she still wasn’t allowed to reach for anything beyond the spittoon. “Both Sharvay and Karmani grew within the palace like lengthening shadows in the setting sun”, writes Mansi (pen name used by Meera Baindur), depicting precisely the desolate condition of working women in a place. In the very beginning of the novel, Sharvay is shown preoccupied by the sight of a spider building a web across the large carving of an elephant on one of the pillars. And she thought, “Can a spider trap an elephant in a spider web?” In this metaphor, we may see that Sharvay was wondering about her fate. Would she, a feeble spider with her delicate web, tame and fetter the giant, elephant-like oppression of regime and social structures? Can she overcome the overarching constraints with her little efforts? The picture does not change much as Sharvay moves to a new town with the princess when the latter gets married, until she meets a fatal accident which proves to be a blessing in disguise. This accident freed her from the bondage of her mistress and the tethers of her previous identity as a mishra varna. She comes across an exciting chance to create a new identity, a new name, and a different role in life. So now, Sharvay was Kumbaja, an upper-caste woman and because she now found a foster father in a Vaidya, she was a healer and medicinal practitioner. Thereon, she finds a friend till her last in Bakumi, a partner in Madhavakara, and a guide in Tara (a Buddhist Bhikkhuni). The community of healers dwelling in the forest, of which her foster father was a part, saw frequent visits by travellers, healers, and philosophers. In the favoured social circumstances, she could chase after her long-drawn curiosities, although not without the challenges of being a woman. Gradually Sharvay learns and grows bold and ultimately starts to emit what she has absorbed. She embarks on a journey that tries to free knowledge from the stranglehold of a few and make it ubiquitous. Quest for Self-discovery In this novel, you'll be enthralled by a woman's bravery in defying all social conventions to venture into the uncharted realm of knowledge. You might discover that she can still get support from other women and forge an affiliation with them even under the direst of circumstances. This is the story of a woman's struggle, bravery, uncertain future, and release from the shackles of prevailing socioeconomic and cultural conventions. Sharvay embarks on a journey of philosophical development and lives her life with various identities and names to find integrity eventually. In the novel the issue of identity is raised when Sharvay wonders, “Why am I called 'peekadhari?'… Am I a person who does the work or has my work itself become me?" (Mansi, 2023, pp 98-99) No philosophy can remain untouched by the social, economic, and cultural circumstances of its time, rather these circumstances of the philosopher's life shape her philosophy. I have attempted to view this novel written by Mansi based on this thought. The beauty of the novel lies in its ability to depict the philosophical viewpoint through the protagonist's decisions and actions taken in different situations instead of relying on lengthy arguments. This novel will give you a taste of the famous philosophical debates called Shastrarthas and the influence of their patronage on their workings both from the public and the kings. If Shastrarthas were organized by public funding, they were under the pressure of being entertaining. However, if they were funded by kings’ money then they were influenced by the king’s religious or philosophical preference. The author expresses curiosity about having heard the names of numerous women philosophers in India's history but is unable to access their concrete lives and philosophical ideas. Hence, it becomes impossible to create a clear thought about their life choices and philosophies. In this novel, the author attempts to portray a clear image of one such female philosopher; how they would have dealt with the discourses and situations of their time. Freedom versus Social Structure At times, this novel reminds us of Sartre’s notion of freedom and suggests that humans always have the choice to be free. Let’s look at this line of the novel, “Every time she was called Peekadhari, she repeated 'Sarvamedhini' to herself. She wanted a name that described who she was and did not just represent what she did.” (Mansi, 2023, p.100) This way of thinking implies that, despite being in more impoverished circumstances, a person can overcome them by having the proper kind of self-image. In another instance, the debate between social conditions and the so-called spiritual awakening is raised in a very subtle way when the author comments on the working conditions of Sharvay, the peekadhari, and her adaptation to these conditions. The author writes: She had learned long ago that being mindful in these moments only caused her to be upset and angry. It was best to be mindless, except as needed to make her body obey other people's words. She had trained her mind to stay in an indifferent state. (Mansi, 2023, p.40) These lines hint towards what Erich Fromm calls 'the pathology of normalcy' which suggests that there are certain aspects in every society where pathological behaviour is normalized. In the above situation, being aware would be problematic for Sharvay as her working conditions do not allow it. Thus, while accepting the will to be free, the novel does not emphasize the unlimited capability of human freedom but rather suggests the limitations of freedom by the given choices. Moral Dilemma: Truth or Freedom? In this novel, along with accompanying Sharvay on her philosophical journey, you also set out on a philosophical journey of your own, reflecting on your obstacles, readiness, and mysteries. Numerous circumstances in her life would shock you and cause you to ponder. For me, this moment comes when Sharvay had to camouflage as an upper caste woman and as a man to participate in a debate on the truth and metaphysics. Let’s see her dilemma, when she talks to herself while hiding her caste from her saviours, "Should she tell these people everything and go back to her old life? Or should she be free now and take her steps into a new life, away from the limits of her past?" (Mansi, 2023, p.103) At this juncture, philosophical debates appear to be nothing more than a farce. It awakens us to our lack of ability to hear the truth. Many times, we turn a common phenomenon into a mystery by giving it a mythological shape and tend to forget the truth in that mystery. In this condition, Sharvay had to choose between truth or freedom and she chose freedom over truth as the society was not ready to listen to her truth. Dialogue with the Author The author's philosophical vision can be inferred from various instances in this novel. For example, the author wants to portray a picture of a woman philosopher, but for this work, she tries to raise those philosophical thoughts in the mind of the reader through her story. Although, many times, as a reader, it came to my mind that it would have been better if the philosophical debate initiated in the novel had been longer. The novel's plot implicitly raises philosophical questions at many points. It occasionally reminds us of Sophie’s World and suggests the possibility of a similar book in the context of Indian philosophy. When it comes to the author's philosophical assumptions, she has been very explicit on the significance of Apta Pramana but not limited to some special ones. She has also emphasized the body's epistemological significance numerous times. In this context, the author has acknowledged the significance of Ayurveda , which emphasizes observation as an epistemological tool. Besides, the author seems to value observation and analysis over philosophy's speculation. In addition, she believes that the kind of philosophical speculation, that reduces people to objects, is the cause of social inequity. In this novel, she investigates the possibility of the philosophy that places the human body and experience at its core and that may be developed based on the reality that each person encounters. If I examine the author's presumptions regarding the freedom of women, her picture of women's independence with the family appears challenging. She thus presents Sharvay's figure as being more independent without family. In addition, despite emphasizing the importance of the body, the author did not highlight the impact of pregnancy on a woman's life, though it is a significant part of a woman's physical life. One explanation for this would be that she considers this trait to be a weakness in women. I also find the kind of comradeship portrayed in the novel among the women, especially between Sharvay and Bakumi seems quite imaginary and imposed from our times. I believe this kind of comradeship was absent at that time even nowadays. This is the main reason, women have not been able to become a political pressure group in Indian political discourses yet. This novel was also interesting to me because it portrays a vivid picture of the historical cities of Central and South India which are completely new to me. It brings up some historical characters that I was unaware of, being a North Indian. It provides detailed pictures of the cities, their economies, artists, and artworks. There is an unknown thrill while reading this novel, especially the character of the Buddhist Bhikhuni, Tara, who has been presented in a very mysterious and attractive manner. The character of the protagonist, Sharvay, is also heartfelt and real. It has not been portrayed in an unnecessarily romantic style. This is the reason why the novel has been quite successful in highlighting the inhumanity prevalent in the society of that time. This work will be thought-provoking and interesting to philosophy students, anyone who is interested in issues about women, and to the readers of historical fiction. This book may make you reflect on a variety of subjects, including the veracity of existentialist philosophy, freedom, and potentiality, questions of identity and integrity, the advantages and disadvantages of public and private funding, etc.

A Word of Caution to 'the Uniformist' and 'the Reformist' Ariba Zaidi Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy, Zakir Husain Delhi College Feb 22, 2022 This article is part of the series of responses from philosophers on the hijab row . Through this piece of writing, my endeavour is to present my arguments to the Uniformist and the Reformist demonstrating that their attempts to get the practice of hijab banned are misplaced even if they have come to believe that their hearts are not. The term ‘Reformist’ here refers to the set of people who believe the practice of hijab or its imposition to be a regressive socio-cultural practice and therefore are calling for a prohibition by way of imposition. The term ‘Uniformist’, on the other hand, refers to the section that believes the practice to be incompatible with the various symbols of uniformity (uniforms in the current context) that are instituted to promote equality and fraternity, and through them, arguably, unity in a diverse society such as ours. Why the uniformist insistence on the hijab ban is untenable Given the current context and the likely grave implications that may follow, I would like to draw the attention of the Uniformist first. What does the symbol of uniformity represent? One may not disagree that the intent is to bring uniformity, but uniformity in itself doesn’t represent any merit in most societies unless it is a means to attain other social values, which are 'equality' and 'fraternity' and through such ideals 'unity' that binds the social fabric. My argument is – the spirit of uniformity is what gives meaning to the symbols of uniformity . Further, if a society is not able to appreciate what the spirit of uniformity means or what its significance is, and to what extent it can be pursued, the likely-hood of self-sabotaging the ends , i.e., equality, fraternity and unity for which such symbols of uniformity were instituted in the first place can’t be discounted. The spirit of uniformity is often mistaken to be seeking uniformity in all the spheres of social life. The error lies in not recognizing that not all domains of social life are equally amenable to a quest for uniformity. There are some domains where the quest for uniformity is a just and a meaningful pursuit, but there are also provinces where it cannot be accorded a justifiable place. Social, economic and political spheres are such domains where the quest for uniformity is arguably a legitimate pursuit. More so in the context of our society where economic and social hierarchies are deep-rooted, but regardless of the realities of a society, to have uniform basic minimum standards of dignified living, and absence of social hierarchies ought to be one of the prime objectives for any progressive society. Thus, the spirit of uniformity is a requisite quest in the foregoing domains. However, society is a union of more than these three stated sets. This brings me to the sphere of culture . Can we seek uniformity in the domain of culture, which in our society is composed of many diverse elements? Culture is a slightly different set than others, where each element (cultural element) of the set often happens to be the assumed identity of the ones who belong to that particular culture. For instance, should we seek uniformity in languages or dialects, in religion or its sub-sects, in rituals, customs and traditions etc.? Each of these elements can be a part of someone’s assumed identity. Any short-sighted attempt to dilute the integrity of such identities, as history indicates, are fraught with danger, often with detrimental effects to some of the goals for which the uniformity is sought in the first place, i.e., fraternity and through it unity in the society. Alternatively stated, uniformity becomes the instrument of sabotaging the same very goals to pursue which it was instituted in the first place. Thus, while instituting the symbols of uniformity such as uniforms, one ought to be guided by the spirit of uniformity, which is to strive for uniformity within the socio-politico-economic domains without undermining the diversity in the cultural domain . I am, therefore, urging all the Uniformists, who are in concurrence with the call for a hijab ban, to be guided by the spirit of uniformity. Otherwise, knowingly or unknowingly, they are grossly undervaluing the goals for which uniformity is sought. Why the Reformist insistence on the hijab ban is untenable The following sets of arguments are addressed to the Reformists, who, as I stated earlier, are those set of people who believe the practice of hijab or its imposition to be a regressive socio-cultural practice and therefore are calling for a prohibition by way of imposition. I don’t intend to keep the willful (autonomous) practice of hijab, with or without any justification, within the same bracket as the imposed or culturally-conditioned practice of it (even if some of the members fall within the intersection of the culturally-conditioned class and the autonomous class). The question is: Does the imposition of hijab or similar regressive practices regardless of their religious or cultural affiliation deserve a top-down imposition of ban or any other form of restriction? I agree with the Reformists that our society is a simmering ground of many regressive practices and arguably there is no religion that doesn’t contribute to it. It is significant for us, therefore, as a collective, to arrive at a generalization or a guiding framework to address such regressive issues and choose wisely when it comes to opting for a path to bring reforms. My attempt, through the following, is to demonstrate to the Reformists that a well-recognized framework already exists in most of the thriving democratic societies, and inference from such a framework doesn’t justify a top-down imposition of ban on hijab or similar practices. When it comes to socio-cultural reforms, one can immediately think of two preferred modes by most societies worldwide to carry out reforms viz., the consensus-based approach and the top-down impositions . One is likely to associate a consensus-based approach with a thriving democracy, but a top-down imposition isn’t entirely incompatible within a democratic political structure either. Of course, a consensus-based approach has to be the norm , but exceptions can be cited that often warrant a quick decision making, where waiting for consensus may prove to be debilitating. We have the instances of child marriage abolition, abolition of untouchability, the PNDT act, abolition of slavery in the US etc., where waiting for consensus would have proven self-defeating. I am inclined to keep abolition of sati too in this category although it was imposed by an imperialist regime. The question to be asked is what is the basis to determine whether a case for reform fits the consensus-based approach or the top-down imposition. The foregoing instances of top-down impositions and other similar incidents that have not found a mention here can probably be a promising source to inductively arrive at some generalization. In my humble attempt, I find that a breach of someone’s ‘right to life’ and ‘ right to live with dignity’ are two factors that provided the ground for impositions in all such instances. One may wish to keep disruption of peace and public order in this category, but it is also arguably one of the most misused basis by most governments to impose sanctions on our liberties. Thus, in my opinion, the breach of ‘right to life’ and ‘right to live with dignity’ seems to be the only basis for a top-down imposition in a democratic polity in most cases if not all. In all other contexts, a consensus-based approach should be the norm for any democracy to be meaningful to its citizenry. Now, the question is can school/college going hijab-wearing girls be seen as breaching any of these inalienable rights that warrant a top-down imposition. I am sure that our Reformist zeal is not blinded enough to see it that way, but there may be some who would still want to point that women forced to be behind the veil are living a less dignified life, and the situation according to the chosen parameters warrants imposition of the ban. I would like to argue that by forcing the issue of the hijab ban, it is the Reformist who is stealing the chance of a Muslim woman to live a dignified life. By forcing the issue, they are preparing a ground for many Muslim orthodox parents to not let their daughters see the corridors of schools and colleges and pushing the women who have autonomously adopted the practice to avoid such spaces. The Reformist enthusiasm of the hijab ban advocates is most likely to end up stealing a girl child’s right to education, her probably only chance to get out of this vicious trap in which her parents are trapped, her only chance to question her socio-cultural conditioning and associated cognitive biases, her only chance to make a decision for herself whether she wants to be behind the veil or not. Thus, at least to me, the Reformist demand for a ban on hijab and similar practices is unjust and uncalled for, and consensus mode seems to be the way forward. Consensus mode appears to be the way forward, but… Thus, the Reformists, if they are honest in their attempt to bring reforms, ought to pay more attention to devise ways to bring consensus amongst all the stakeholders. The essence of following this path lies in understanding what is central to building consensus . Central to any consensus building attempt, it can be argued, lies our ability to forge a constructive dialogue around the issues that require consensus. Any dialogue, as we all know, is composed of arguments, a logic-driven structure where claims are supported by premises. Likewise, the strength of the argument lies in its validity and soundness, where the truth of the premises plays a significant part. The question is where do these premises come from? In a society where education is still struggling to penetrate and expand its reach, it’s unreasonable to assume that their premises are likely to represent facts or truth by empirical standards. Most likely, socio-cultural conditionings, various forms of custom and tradition enforced beliefs or some form of authority are the general sources of many of their premises. What makes matters further complex is that almost all the sections of our society, in varying degrees, subscribe to such premises where each of these sections has its own sets of customs, traditions, social-conditioning, and authorities. A dialogue is probably difficult to conceive in a situation where participating members or sections of society appeal to different grounds of truth for many of their premises in the arguments advanced by them . Thus, what we get is a stalemate in return, and our Reformist zeal, instead of recognizing the true nemesis and finding a solution to it, pushes for the quick fixes , often in the form of top-down insensitive impositions as it can be witnessed in the context of the call for hijab ban. What a Reformist needs to do instead is to find a way to push through this stalemate and ensure that the dialogue happens , but how can they do it? The stumbling block in the dialogues seems to be ‘ the different grounds for truth ’ of their premises, but can we ensure uniformity in it. My preferred criteria would be empirical facts for obvious reasons, but can we push for it? I think we should not. Then what should be done? My take is that we ought to focus on the prospective participants in the dialogue, i.e. children and in them inculcate the skill of reflectivity . From reflectivity what I mean is the ability to challenge one’s own beliefs and those of others, the ability to seek justification for such beliefs and keep such justifications under constant scrutiny, the ability to identify fallacies and cognitive biases and the ability to overcome the conditionings enforced by the accident of birth. Given the fact that they are able to question themselves with the same intensity that they question others, participants of this kind in a dialogue are more likely to come up with some agreeable common grounds of truth for their premises and make their dialogue and consequently reforms more successful. One may ask why children alone? I am not pessimistic in this regard, but I have come to understand that, barring a few exceptions, the grown-up population is way too conditioned (even the educated ones) to give upon their rigidities. Efforts can nevertheless be made in this direction. What is it that the Reformists should do to actualise the foregoing? Considering that they are true in their intent to reform the society, and want to put an end to regressive practices without causing much of a social discord and discontentment, they should spend their energies in creating and shaping an education system that promotes reflectivity of the kind stated above in the students at the grass-root level. I am not implying here that all our social and cultural problems will be resolved once our citizenry is educated in the stated manner. It would be naïve to think so given the complexities at play, and I don’t intend to underappreciate the human tenacity to abandon reason when it suits them, but with all that could be there to impede dialogue, by adopting this course, surely we will give ourselves the best chance to reform our society without inciting social discord. These are my well-considered views, but I can be naïve in such considerations. __________________________________________________________________________________________ Read other articles in this series: Ariba Zaidi -- A Word of Caution to 'the Uniformist' and 'the Reformist’ Danish Hamid -- Back to Liberal Basics Hina Mushtaq -- Can women decide for themselves? Sania Ismailee -- The Karnataka Hijab row is about Right to Education...

Traditional vs Colonial: Navigating Dichotomies of Philosophy in India Ankita Kushwaha and Megha Kapoor PhD scholars, Jawaharlal Nehru University and Delhi University (respectively) and Teaching Fellows, Sai University Dec 14, 2023 The realm of philosophy in India has diverse thinking traditions reflecting a blend of orthodox, heterodox, and various local cultural ideologies. Contemporary scholars find themselves caught in a pronounced dichotomy in the engagement with traditions, primarily shaped by historical forces. They are either charged for aligning with glorifying traditional concepts or critiqued for viewing the tradition through a colonial lens. Here, we seek to explore the challenges faced by contemporary philosophers of India while engaging with the philosophical concepts embedded in various traditional sources. We argue that in engaging with these concepts, philosophers are required to address the challenges posed by the above-mentioned dichotomous relationship. Moreover, as we navigate this dichotomy, our primary purpose is to stress the importance of thoroughly looking into traditional ideas. Noteworthily, in many instances, scholars accept the text without critical analysis and provide justifications that contribute to the glorification. In light of this, our primary objective is to emphasise an urgent need for a more rigorous and discerning philosophical inquiry that furthers the development of a more detailed understanding of the traditional ways of thinking. The Importance of Engaging with Traditional Ideologies How we perceive ourselves individually and socially is impacted by the environment in which we are born and grow. Any theorisation, therefore, cannot be in isolation. The theorisation must have an understanding of our traditions and local norms; at the same time, it must encompass our present lived experiences (Guru and Sarukkai 2012). Understanding various traditional sources is essential because they encompass the lived experiences of the past, which continue to shape our present experiences. The term "traditional" is often used to describe generational practices, values, and customs. These sources manifest in classical texts, typically composed in dominant languages like Sanskrit and Persian (Chandhoke 2019, 80), offering well-structured and organised insights into tradition. These local thoughts are embedded in diverse forms such as stories, folklore, fables, songs, and other cultural expressions. They not only provide a window into the historical aspects of a particular geographical location and community but also incorporate contemporary elements unique to their context. The recent discussion regarding the decolonisation of philosophy in India operates under the assumption that the colonisers have influenced the philosophical perspective. It necessitates a decolonisation effort to address the burden of Western thought that hinders the accurate representation of Indian intellectual traditions. However, the blame on colonisation from the perspective of Brahminism needs to be revisited. When colonisation occurred, Brahmins, well-versed in Sanskrit and holding higher positions, assisted the colonisers in shaping a new understanding of India, which led to the emergence of a form of Hindu philosophy that was dominantly Sanskritised, further resulting in the under-representation of thoughts from other traditions. Interestingly, despite being practised by a small portion of the population, Brahmanism managed to establish a subcontinental identity. Its popularity can be attributed to its ritual functions, ceremonies, and the adoption of Sanskrit as a common language (Thapar 1989, 209–231). The Dichotomy of Traditional vs Colonial The texts and ideologies of India represent various philosophical thoughts that provide insight into the intricate fabric of Indian society. Engaging with these texts and ideologies in a contemporary context allows for a deeper understanding of cultural heritage, providing a platform for critical dialogue. While acknowledging their historical roots, scholars must avoid absolutism to promote further an evaluative approach accommodating evolving perspectives. Therefore, in contemporary times, a conscious effort exists to critique colonial impact on philosophy in India by reviving and re-evaluating indigenous thought systems. However, the challenge lies in avoiding oversimplification and essentialisation. This task becomes even more complex, considering that many Indian intellectuals predominantly come from upper-caste backgrounds. This background gives them a privilege that does not necessitate them to critically examine their inherited traditions (Nanda 2010, 185). Consequently, this lack of critical examination from a segment of the intellectual elite further complicates the nuanced process of re-evaluating and revitalising philosophical traditions in India in the post-colonial context. This issue can be explored more closely by delving into the Mahabharata scholarship. When scholars discuss Mahabharata[1] as a foundational text for the Indian subcontinent, their use of terminologies and explanations may suggest that it is the greatest epic of all time for India. However, it is crucial to ask for whom it holds this esteemed position. Edward Dimock describes Mahabharata as the "founding library of Brahmin-Indian civilization," emphasising its role as an encyclopedia covering history, legend, edification, religion, art, drama, and morality specific to that civilisation (Dimock 1974, 53). Janaky adds another layer to this perspective, highlighting how the Bhrgus or Brahmins asserted authority over social, political, and moral realms not by controlling princes but through their influence on Mahabharata scholarship (Janaky 1992, 1997–1999). Overlooking this aspect universalises Mahabharata as a text for all, whereas, as Ambedkar points out, sacred texts of India contain a social philosophy responsible for the degradation of non-Brahmins (Ambedkar 2019, 393-395). Ambedkar further criticises the insufficient critical engagement with sacred literature, emphasising the detrimental impact of two contrasting attitudes: the uncritical commendation by a Brahmin scholar and the unsparing condemnation by a non-Brahmin. Both approaches, according to Ambedkar, hinder the progress of historical research ( ibid , 393). The disadvantage of such an approach is that either they miss the regressive ideas or articulate them in an oversimplified manner that ultimately glorifies the regressive Brahminical ideas. Therefore, there is a need for a more nuanced and critical examination of sacred texts to understand their implications on social history in the true sense. Moreover, another aspect of evaluation exists where scholars discard or appropriate various conceptions of Mahabharata because of evaluating certain aspects of the text from a colonial lens. For instance, German Indoligists interpreted Mahabharata as "framing Brahmans as 'priests,' and presenting themselves as reformers and liberators, while they collaborated with the Prussian (and later, Nazi) state" (Adluri 2016). As a response, a group of scholars in contemporary philosophy in India talk about the need for the revival of Indian traditional and religious thought. They hold that the modern liberal framework for conceptualising Indian society is the product of colonialism, as that has constantly undermined the significance of Indian traditional and religious thoughts. De Roover argues that even though liberalism "presents itself as a freestanding conception independent from any comprehensive doctrines or substantive conceptions of the good… [but] it continues to depend on a conception of the person and human social life that secularises protestant Christian ideas by transforming them into the topoi of political thought" (De Roover 2015, 237). Thus, he emphasises that Western liberal categories of thinking are not fruitful in conceptualising Indian society and polity as they are from different historical and political contexts. Even though the revival is significant and decolonisation requires discarding the underlying colonial mindset, the problem arose because of a similar pattern. There has been a constant effort to derive the themes or subjects of political thought from traditional ideas.[2] This pattern constrains critical engagement that further ends in accusing all liberal concepts as irrelevant to the Indian context (Nandy 1988, 189) merely because they are the products of Western civilisation (De Roover 2015, 234-239). Contrary to this, Patel says there is a need to engage with tradition without romanticising the past. She also emphasises that it should not also be a denial of all modern concepts. Thus, Patel emphasises a decolonial approach, which is "not a retrieval of premodern assessments that would consist of a folkloric affirmation of the past, nor an antimodern project of the kind put forward by conservative, right-wing, populist or fascist groups, nor a postmodern project that would deny modernity and would critique all reason" (Patel 2020, 10-11). Further, she suggests that there is a need for a new approach to social theorisation that critiques the Western conceptual framework through the inclusion of the experiences of the people. Additionally, the problem in reviving the traditional ideas is that India today no longer has the same structure as it used to have earlier. Various traditional concepts are not relevant in the theorisation of contemporary society. It is crucial today to theorise the contemporary issues along with the lived experiences of the ordinary masses. At the same time, we cannot accept the colonial framework without analysing its relevance to the lived experiences of the masses. When accepted without critical analysis, a philosophical inquiry may result in the glorification of either of the categories (traditional or liberal). The need is to not unquestioningly accept or discredit the traditional norms as well as the liberal frameworks of thinking altogether. Conclusion Navigating the dichotomies of glorification of tradition vs colonial mindsets presents a challenge for contemporary scholars. The revival of philosophy in India should not be limited to a mere glorification of tradition but should involve critical analysis that engages with the complexity and dynamism of the philosophical heritage. Therefore, a few critical questions arise in the discourse of philosophy today: what approach is suitable for philosophy in India? How can we decolonise philosophy without glorifying the past? What are its challenges? How will these challenges be resolved? Answering these questions necessitates a deep understanding of the challenges posed by the dichotomy. Hence, further research is imperative to engage with these intricate philosophical inquiries, offering a more comprehensive approach to the decolonisation of philosophy in India. [1] In reference to the Mahabharata, it’s important to note that there are multiple versions. Here, we specifically refer to the ancient Mahabharata of Krishna Dvaipayana, also known as Veda Vyasa. Our focus, in this context, pertains solely to the philosophical aspects of the text. [2] As de Roover argues that liberal ideas are the topoi of Protestant Christian ideas, various Indian political concepts are also topoi of Indian Tradition. For instance, in Gandhi’s thought, secularism refers to sarvadhrama sambhava. The idea of sarvadharma sambhava is rooted in the idea that the truth has many sides and cannot be grasped by human beings completely. Therefore, according to Gandhi, we should respect all conceptions of the good (see Gandhi 1995). References Adluri, Vishwa. 2016. “How We Should Approach The Phenomenon Of Studying Hinduism.” Swarajya , https://swarajyamag.com/culture/how-we-should-approach-the-phenomenon-of-studying-hinduism . Ambedkar, B.R. 2019. The Essential Writings of B.R. Ambedkar , edited by V. Rodrigues. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Chandhoke, Neera. 2019. Rethinking Pluralism, Secularism, and Tolerance: Anxieties of Coexistence . New Delhi: Sage Publication. De Roover, Jakob. 2015. Europe, India, and the Limits of Secularism . New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Dimock, Edward. 1974. The Literatures of India: An Introduction . University of Chicago. Gandhi, M.K. 1995. Hindu Dharma . New Delhi: Orient Paperbacks. Guru, Gopal, and Sarukkai, Sundar. 2012. The Cracked Mirror: An Indian Debate on Experience and Theory . New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Janaky. 1992. “On the Trail of the Mahabharata: A Response.” Economic and Political Weekly 27 (37): 1997–1999. Nanda, Meera. 2010. “Arguments for an Indian Enlightenment.” In Indian Political Thought : A Reader , edited by A. Singh and S. Mohapatra, 175–186. Routledge. Nandy, Ashis. 1988. “The Politics of Secularism and the Recovery of Religious Tolerance.” Alternatives: Global, Local, Political 13 (2): 177–194. Patel, Sujata. 2020. “Social Theory Today: Eurocentrism and Decolonial Theory.” Madras Institute of Development Studies . Accessed November 8, 2023. https://www.mids.ac.in/assets/doc/WP_240.pdf . Thapar, Romila. 1989. “Imagined Religious Communities? Ancient History and the Modern Search for a Hindu Identity.” Modern Asian Studies 23 (2): 209–231. http://www.jstor.org/stable/312738 .