The underlying theme of the talk is about triggering off large scale benevolent change for the good of society. Academicians, some of them outstanding, have on occasion become change agents that had a large scale impact on society. Adam Smith and Karl Marx had a profound impact on modern history. Though not strictly academics, their books and ideas, more than their actions were instrumental in bringing about far reaching change. Noam Chomsky, Edward Said and several others became change agents in modern times. Many academics have been involved in the democratic movements sweeping across Eastern Europe, the Middle East and South America.
In India Kiran Seth who started SPICMACAY and Shantha Sinha who set up the MV Foundation were both professors. Seth got the Padma Shri and Sinha won the Magsaysay Award and put more than a million children involved in child labour back to school. There are some others as well.
Based on the author’s own work, the talk will focus on two initiatives: (i) electoral and political reforms using the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR: www.adrindia.org) as an illustration, and (ii) cooperatives as a means of ushering in prosperity on a large scale amongst the poor using the Centre for Collective Development (CCD:www.ccd.org ) and Farm Veda (www.farmveda.in ) as illustrations, and the dairy movement and AMUL as a backdrop.