India, Sept. 16 -- Historian Irfan Habib on Monday said that communists made a vital contribution to India's freedom struggle, though their role has often been marginalised in mainstream accounts of the national movement. Delivering the first Sitaram Yechury Memorial Lecture at HKS Surjeet Bhawan in Delhi, Habib underlined how communist critiques of colonialism drew from global as well as Indian traditions and argued that the movement's interventions are still not adequately recognised in academic and political discourse.

The hall at Surjeet Bhawan was filled to capacity, with party members, historians, students, and activists attending the lecture held in memory of CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury, who passed away last year. At ...