New Delhi: The speech delivered by the winner of the Governor’s Prize at the convocation of the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras on July 19 is being lauded for its incisive look at the role science plays in propagating human suffering.
Dhananjay Balakrishnan, who won the prize – given to an all-rounder each year – after having completed a dual degree in Mechanical Engineering, brought up the Palestinian genocide in his speech.
Vast numbers of people have been killed, injured and displaced in Palestine as Israel has responded to Hamas’s October 7 attacks over the last nine months.
At a time when news is doing the rounds on how cutting-edge technology and artificial intelligence is aiding Israel’s brutal attack on Palestinians, Balakrishnan sought to draw his cohorts’ attention to the roles they play as engineers and researchers in the field of science, technology, engineering and math or STEM.
IIT Madras is a premium engineering institute, entry to which is highly coveted among science students across India.
“Now I feel like I will be doing myself and everything I believe in a great injustice if I do not use the stage I am presented with to say something very important. This is a call for action. There is a mass genocide going on in Palestine. People are dying in vast numbers and there is no visible end in sight,” he is heard saying in video clips that have been shared multiple times on social media now.
“Why should we be bothered by this, you ask? Because STEM as a field in itself has historically been used to advance the ulterior motive of imperial powers, such as Israel,” Balakrishnan says.
He then goes deeper into the issue:
“As engineering students we work hard to get top-level jobs at tech giants which offer very lucrative pays and great benefits. However, these tech giants control various aspects of our lives today, as you know better than anyone. Many of these prestigious companies are also directly and indirectly implicated in the war against Palestine, providing the state of Israel with technology – technology that’s used to kill.”
With institutional and government bodies keen to rap supporters of Palestine on the knuckles – there are reports of arrests over raising Palestine flags – Balakrishnan’s call to action rings out as rare. Authorities in countries which are favoured destinations of Indian engineering graduates have also taken a dim view of pro-Palestine protests – a fact which puts this speech into a category of distinct bravery.
Balakrishnan then says:
“There are no easy solutions and I don’t have all the answers. But I do know this. As engineers graduating into the real world, it is our job to be aware of the consequences of the work we do. And also to interrogate our own position in these complex systems of power imbalance. I hope that we can incorporate this awareness more into our daily lives, attempting to understand what we can do to liberate the oppressed on the lines of caste, class, creed and gender. I believe that that is the first step to curb the never-ending cycle of suffering.”
Wonderful to see a call to action on the Palestinian genocide being made by a young graduating engineer from IIT M at their convocation.
AdvertisementEspecially the part where he calls on fellow engineers to interrogate how their own work fits into systems of global oppression. https://t.co/v5oNfTUOYM pic.twitter.com/tqC7pXaJkV
— Sarayu Pani (@sarayupani) July 19, 2024
Quoting Isaac Newton, Balakrishnan said near the end of his speech that the scientist had said that he “stood on the shoulders of giants” to take him where he wanted to go. He then added a rousing bit:
“I want to say this, I am here rather, we are here, by standing on the shoulders of the magnanimous Indian populace and we owe it to them to lift every single person out of their misery. Inaction is complicity and I hope that you and I and all of us can take action to make the right decisions however hard they might be.”
TNM has noted in its report that the chief guest of the event was 2012 Chemistry Nobel winner Brian K. Kobilka, who was one of the signatories in a letter that was recently written by 51 Nobel Laureates to religious leaders, United Nations and other world leaders calling for a ceasefire in Ukraine and Gaza.
