THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: On the eve of 198th birth anniversary of Karl Heinrich Marx on May 5, the official Facebook page of CPM has invited followers to post their famous quotes of the great philosopher of the working class.
The official page carries a Marx quote: “The Executive of the Modern State is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie” with the catchword “Said in 19th century, true in 21st Century – remembering Karl Marx”.
DC contacted CPM General Secretary Sitaram Yechury to get his famous Marx quote. His favourite quote is from a letter Marx wrote to his daughter and it goes; “Nothing human is alien to me.”
The most famous quotes posted by followers include “History will repeat first as tragedy later as force,” “Proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains,” “The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways the point however, is to change it” and “Religion is opium.”
In the run up to Marx birth anniversary, an interesting contest called “Marx Madness” was held recently in which people could vote a panel of 64 Marxist theorists.
The theorists included Che Guevara, Mao, Friedrich Engels, Joseph Stalin, Vladimir Lenin, Antonio Gramsci and Rosa Luxemberg. Just one Indian 73-year-old Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak a professor at Columbia University, figured in the elite group.
In the final round Rosa Luxemberg was voted as champion defeating Antonio Gramsci by a tally of 1560 to 769 votes. And for those who are die hard critics of Marx, there is a message in one of the Facebook pages; “Idiots—Before criticising—at least do me the favour of reading what I actually wrote.”
