India, Dec. 6 -- Which is the better ideology, the Left or the Right? The question is like asking a physician: which disease should I choose? The physician will say: choose health. But health, the state of not being seated in any ideological row, seems unimaginable to us. We have grown accustomed to sitting in camps, identifying ourselves by which chair we occupy.
The very terms "Left" and "Right" came from an accident of seating. In 1789, during the French Revolution, supporters of the King sat to the right of the president's chair in the National Assembly; supporters of the revolution sat to the left. What began as furniture arrangement hardened into identity. Rows became doctrines. Positions became personalities.
The Left now speaks of...