Homo Mythos

All around the world, the left is failing to stem the rising tide of fascism. Whether identity-based, populist, or anti-colonial in approach, all our political formations are lacking something. How can we build a new revolutionary class?

Saroj Giri points the way to a new understanding of left strategy and political formation, through an analysis of one event: the 200th anniversary commemoration of the 1818 Battle of Koregaon in India, which saw the defeat of the Brahmin regime of the Peshwas by a much smaller force of so-called 'Untouchables', Indian Muslims and Jews, fighting, paradoxically, for the colonizing forces of the East India Company. A historical episode with great contemporary resonance, it is commemorated by Dalit and Adivasi indigenous communities who oppose the Hindutva nationalism of Narendra Modi and the BJP.

With roots in diverse communities, including the lowest orders of society and tribal peoples, and eschewing any electoral strategy, the Bhima Koregaon movement offers us a novel conception of the revolutionary class, with potentially global repercussions.