Kritadas by Shripantha [Hardcover]

Me? Who am I?
Where was I born? In which village, by which quiet riverbank, did my home stand? I do not know.

Before me stretches an endless field of sugarcane. The lush green tea gardens rise to my chest. The city that prides itself on civilization and never sleeps—its roads, I built. Look closely, I am the one who has served you unconditionally for centuries.

Yet your friend shot me dead. Your brother dragged me across the world in chains. Your hired men branded my flesh with a searing iron, marking me with a number.

You—some husbands, some wives, some fathers, some mothers—pitted me against wild bulls for sport, laughing as I struggled. With a single strike, you severed my head. You burned me in fire. You drowned me in water, shackled hand and foot, without hesitation.

Who am I? I do not know.
Where is my home? I do not know.
But I know who you are. I know where you live.

You are civilization.
From Europe to America, from Asia to the farthest corners of the world, your empire spreads.
From ancient Greece and Rome to modern America, you have conquered time and space.
You are blind arrogance.

You created me. In the darkest, most shameful chapter of your history, you forged me—as your contradiction.
You named me slave.

But in the end, your darkness could not erase me. I did not forget—slave is not my true identity.
I am human.
I, and the thousands like me—we are human.
Free, self-determined, rebellious human beings.

Time and again, we have proved it through revolt.
And you, too, have carved those rebellions into your history.
For no matter how reluctant, no matter how cruel, civilization has no choice but to become human in the end.

And the more human you become, the more I will haunt you with my memory, my suffering, my defiance.
If you think I am gone, if you wish to forget, if you try to deny me—there is no escape.

This book holds you accountable.
It preserves you, me, our pain, and our tears.
It is filled with facts, logic, and relentless truth.

Read it, O Civilization, and be ashamed once more.