The book attempts to bring out, through a selection of the seminal writings of M.K. Gandhi, M.N. Roy and Jayaprakash Narayan as well as of critical commentaries on them, the essentials of their intellectual development and their contribution to contemporary Indian political thought. These writings constitute a significant part of the historical debates and contestations of ideas among the thinkers of the nationalist and the internationalist movements of the first half of the twentieth century. The book also brings out several communalities in the though of these three thinkers in spite of differences in their world views. Though they were all nationalists committed to India’s freedom from colonial rule, they went beyond the concept of the nation (state). The attempt to reconstruct society and polity in terms of ‘community’ ‘people’ and, ultimately, the freedom of the individual was common to all the thinkers. They supported the concept of decentralization and inter-linkages among various levels of authority connecting peoples, communities and nations. Their arguments may answer, however partially, the democratic urge to reconcile the ‘iron law’ of organizations with the demand for power to the people.
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