ABSTRACT
One of the central tenets of the otherwise diverse postcolonial literature is to challenge, escape, and overcome the haunting grip and gaze of Orientalism that resides in the inner depth of the discursive practices in the Southern countries and which functions there still with remarkable resilience and flexibility. While we applaud this struggle against Orientalism, and embrace it in our own work, we are equally disturbed by a peculiar trait in much postcolonial literature: namely, that often in the name of critiquing the economism of orthodox Marxism, the economy is banished altogether from its discursive terrain. Searching for, and exploring, the Marxism-postcolonial lineage as part of a long and ongoing research project for at least two decades required revisiting the various travails and questions of Leftist movements and Marxian theorizations in the Southern context generally, and more specifically in the context of India.
