Reading as Resistance

‘Think, think, practise thinking’ – When Neelkantha Bagchi from Ritwik Ghatak’s Jukti Takko Aar Gappo (Reason, Debate, and Deliberation) voiced these words of disconcerting honesty and dialectical wisdom, essential to a generation and a nation, the British Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson was not even born in the fragmented world of today. In fact, the brilliantly insolent cinematic genealogy of the maverick director has always argued, critiqued and interrogated, inspiring a bandwidth of critical thinkers who read, thought and questioned. Bridget has, in 2026, flagged what Ghatak did in 1974. Maybe contextually dissimilar, but seminally similar. In an article for a leading newspaper, Bridget equated the fall in reading habits to children falling for disinformation campaigns and highlighted the rising security concerns owing to it. According to her, Britain needs a generation of readers who can delve deep. She echoed, ‘We need a generation of critical thinkers. We need a generation of problem solvers, equipped to dissect what lands in front of them, to value the truth and to reject the easy temptations of the online world. In short, we need a generation of readers.’ In a world which snacks on propaganda in 30-second reels and 280-word posts, it is literally a silent crisis and a loud war for every nation. Are we ready for the reset?

The crisis has been brewing for a long time. We, perhaps, underestimated the gravitas of it. It unfolded over the years quietly, screen-by-screen, scroll-by-scroll. Sustained and reflective reading has never been merely about gulping down information or boozing on random stuff. It is an act of mental training. It prepares minds to understand complexities, weigh evidence, recognise nuances and build arguments. When minds cease to ponder, the collective consciousness faces the potent danger of ‘shallow certainty’. The remedy is not in denial, but in meaningful cognisance. Social media is ruthlessly aggressive, almost a marauding monster. The algorithm-driven contents are fast and furious as rash flings are vis-à-vis deep love. Here, reels replace reasoning. Opinions arrive gift-wrapped, emotionally charged and carefully designed to evoke reaction over reflection. The whole game is saucy and sexy. As fast food often is.

Reading is real-time cooking. It is slow, deliberate, sometimes messy - but deeply nourishing. When we cook, we engage with the ingredients. We understand proportions, experiment with flavours and learn from mistakes. Similarly, when we read original texts, research deeply and shape our own arguments, we engage with the ideas. We learn the process to conclude, not the conclusions. Social media is an ultra-processed meal, crammed with deadly preservatives which kill the probiotics of contrarian thoughts. It is someone else’s digestion of ideas. It is high on flavour, low on substance.

India has always been a civilisation of texts. Reading has always shaped how we argue, question, and reimagine society. Yet, a quiet intellectual erosion is underway behind the veneer. We are reading less, thinking even less. It has nothing to do with so-called literacy. We have made significant strides in basic education and digital access. The problem is somewhere else. There has been a tectonic shift from profound reading to surface consumption. Information is moving, but understanding is not. The consequences are visible everywhere. Public discourses have grown louder, not wiser. Debates are more about outrage than reason. Propagandists, veiled or unveiled, are eating up malnourished minds. Even modern wars have adopted means of destabilisation through the colonisation of narratives. It perfectly suits absolutism over democracy in broader and expansive terms. We must relearn to agree to disagree. The right to disagree is the heart of democracy. Reading teaches us to hold a multitude of opinions and wrestle with contradictions. Yet, live beautifully with them.

The education structure, too, needs a shake-up. The entire rote culture has to be consciously discouraged, and focus should be on free and fresh interpretations. Exchange of ideas is where and what we can start with. Being a student of English literature at Ramakrishna Mission Vidya Mandira, we were never limited to set notes and set-piece question papers. The classroom was a thriving cauldron of contesting ideas courting each other with logic and grace. With artificial intelligence creepily crawling into every walk of life, we are losing originality. We are losing perspective. Ideation has its genesis in minds which straddle across science, history, non-fiction and fiction with ease. We cannot let ourselves cave into an age which is thick in technology and thin on imagination. Japan has woven reading into daily life, Finland has embedded it in rituals, Iceland has converted it into ceremonial gifting, and Singapore has created a national exercise of it. Uttar Pradesh has also introduced a 10-minute compulsory reading of newspapers in schools. We also can. In our own way, on our own terms.

Reading and critical thinking led to prejudices and flawed consensus in the past. Those were entrenched enough to be presumed as perennial. But, they were not. The movements of fundamental rights across the history of existence happened because we thought and we fought for our thoughts. Once, information was censored to resist readers and thinkers. Today, misinformation is let loose to influence them. Logical reasoning, except on banal papers of competitive exams, is a rarity in an age where artificial intelligence is the master key to all. Both construction and deconstruction are essential needs of a thriving society. Fluidity is a necessity. It can only come from education, which is incisive, from thoughts which can separate the wheat from the chaff. In the era of weaponised echo chambers, academic virtue will be a survival skill, individually and collectively. Martin Luther King Jr. rightly argued, ‘The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically.’ It’s time to act on the clarion call. This is not a call for elitism. Reading need not be confined to classics or academia. What matters is depth, not pedigree. Whether it is science, literature, history, philosophy or authentic journalism, the choice to read remains an act of resistance. An act of conscientious rebellion against our own subjugated selves to read, think and write.

Views expressed are personal. The writer is a communication professional and former journalist