Earliest attempt on deconstruction of the authority to knowledge

According to Chattampi Swamikal, the minority in power maintained their control by monopolizing knowledge. To keep this power, they linked caste and religion and employed various strategies to monopolize knowledge. They misinterpreted religious texts to divide society, restrict the majority’s access to knowledge, and prevent them from learning the language of knowledge transmission. This exclusion kept the majority from gaining social status, economic resources, and political power. Swamikal fought against this monopoly of knowledge by intellectually challenging the distortions in scriptural texts and rejecting the rigid societal divisions based on birth. He opposed all norms that restricted access to knowledge and started a movement to make knowledge available in the common language. This intellectual approach was not a form of modernism imposed by colonialism but an indigenous alternative modernism. It was a blend of modernism, righteousness, and Indian values achieved by Chattampi Swamikal a century ago against colonial domination and social injustices imposed by a powerful minority on the majority. This concept of linking knowledge to power has only become widely recognized in the last two decades through movements like Open Access Initiatives (OAI), Open Science, and Open Knowledge in Western academic circles, leading to changes in relevant national and international laws. The paper suggests that the author of the century-old book Vedadhikara Nirupanam, who advocated for Open Access to Knowledge, was remarkably ahead of his time, making his ideas highly relevant in today’s society.