Is left-right symmetry the key?

In collaboration with Jogesh Pati, Abdus Salam challenged the chiral gauge nature of the Standard Model by paving the road towards the left-right symmetric electro-weak theory. I describe here the logical and historical construction of this theory, by emphasising the pioneering and key role it played for neutrino mass. I show that it is a self-contained and predictive model with the Higgs origin of Majorana neutrino mass, in complete analogy with the SM situation regarding charged fermions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]