Ever since his admission that he served in Nazis’ notorious Waffen SS in World war II, many people – among them many writers, literary critics, politicians, historians, Marxists – have been attacking Nobel-winning writer Guenter Grass in a vociferous way.

Noises they make are mainly about his morality. So, how could he keep such a ‘crime’ under wrap all these years? Is he not an imposter who got away with a ghastly crime? How could he play so long a moral guardian to Germans in particular and the humanity at large? Should not the Nobel committee revoke his Nobel prize for literature now? Et cetra.

I thought the world had become less moral now. But the cacophony of the self-style moralists would have me believe otherwise.

Let us consider it: Grass joined the unit in 1945 when he was just seventeen. It was the time when Adolf Hitler was dominating the world stage with his larger-than-life image and overwhelming jingoism. He was easily the hero of millions of people across the world. In that milieu it was just natural for an immature, callow teenager to worship Adolf and respond to his call for joining the elite SS army. “I was caught up in the ideology,” Grass tells us. “I was blinded.” It’s a grand confession from a grand man of letters that he made a mistake because of his youth.

But note it, Grass did not work here for long. It must have been a terrifying experience to see the atrocities up close. Because he left soon enough, and had converted to a humanist, always denouncing the Nazi past of Germany. Did he execute any crime himself? He says ‘no’ to it, and we have no reason to disbelieve it either.

Now, it’s not really late that he reveals this secret. His writer-friends already knew about this nasty involvement and his torment and anguish as a result of it. Writer Robert Schindol, for example, says that Grass recounted him the experience twenty years ago. Many of his discerning readers, including yours truly, had a hunch of it when they read about Oscar, his alter-ego, in his first novel TIN DRUM. So he didn’t hide it anyway. Like a great soul, he was always ashamed of it, tried to live it down, and in the process learnt the importance of standing up against the evil.

Guenter Grass has always been an epitome of extraordinary courage and consistency. An outspoken pacifist, a true crusader against war and imperialism, he has long since been a beacon of hope and inspiration to the oppressed and underdogs. He is an icon in the truest sense of the term. His public admission to his guilt enhances his image as a writer and a human being.

It is so easy denigrating Grass from a distance but in doing so, one also risks showing one’s malicious and malignant mind.