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Tuesday, November 25, 2003
Posted by: Awaaz / 11/25/2003 01:47:46 PMANHAD, 4, Windsor Place, New Delhi-10001 Tel-23327366/ 23327367 e-mail:
PRESS STATEMENT: PROTEST AGAINST NARENDRA MODI AT THE WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM, NEW DELHI, NOVEMBER 24, 2003
There was a massive protest organized by Anhad ( Act Now for Harmony and Democracy) at Taj Palace Hotel in Delhi, the venue for the World Economic Forum summit against Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi and the state-sponsored genocide in Gujarat. The summit had just about begun and while the delegates were waiting for Modi, there was a sudden and huge upsurge of activists from various organizations who assembled at the foyer and blocked the escalator and the main entrance to the summit hall. They were shouting slogans against Modi and the killings in Gujarat, including the crude manner justice has been denied to thousands of victims by the BJP-led Modi government. Modi is shielding the killers, they said.
The slogans included: Mass Murderer of Gujarat Go Back, World Economic Summit and Narendra Modi Down Down, CII and Corporate India Shame Shame, Brand India, Genocide India. The peaceful protest went on for more than an hour with the protestors singing songs at the main entrance to the summit hall, despite the police and security presence.
“How can the World Economic Summit entertain a man and give him a platform who openly flaunted and celebrated the mass murder of hundreds of innocent people and the rapes of women after the tragic Godhra killing,” shouted the protestors. “Has corporate India become totally blind to such blatant injustice?” “Money + Murder = Modi, said a placard. Other placards compared Hitler with Modi.
The protestors included Harsh Mander, Nafisa Ali, Shabnam Hashmi, John Dayal, Apoorvanand and others.
ENDS.
The Hindustan Times November 25, 2003
Protests greet Modi at CII meet venue HT Corporate Bureau (New Delhi, November 24)
Social activist Nafisa Ali along with representatives from the Safdar Hashmi Trust, Action India, Ahad and Basix raised slogans against the decision of Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and World Economic Forum (WEF) to invite Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi to speak on The Competitiveness of States: Sharing Best Practices.
About 40 activists trooped into the lobby of the Taj Palace hotel just before Modi was to address the meeting and sang, "We shall overcome". Shouting slogans like "Modi go back", "Khooni" and "Man who instigated the communal riots", the activists alleged that Modi was responsible for the communal violence and killings in Gujarat last year.
The main demand of the protesters was that Modi should not have been invited. They also said that progress in Gujarat was a sham. Nafisa Ali criticised the CII for inviting Modi. Coming as this episode does after CII director general Tarun Das apologising to Modi earlier this year, the CII-Gujarat CM relationship remains strained.
Later, answering queries from the participants, Modi refuted the charges that there was any victimisation in Gujarat and referred to the fact that Muslims in the state had the highest per capita income. He, however, admitted, "Whatever happened in Gujarat one-and-a-half years ago should not have happened in a civilised society."
Earlier, the chief minster told the conference that Gujarat was the best destination for investment that gave unlimited opportunities to industrial houses.
ENDS.
The Indian Express November 25, 2003 www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=35975
For Sena, the more the merrier AMIT SHARMA LUCKNOW, NOVEMBER 24: Shiv Sena leaders in UP are virtually knocking on every door to encourage Hindu couples to have at least four children. Throwing family-planning caution to the wind, the Shiv Sena has launched a ''produce more children'' campaign for Hindus to counter, what it claims to be the growing population of Muslims.
''Members of the minority community are producing more children. But we have launched a campaign to encourage Hindus to follow the Muslim pattern on the issue,'' state Shiv Sena chief Vijay Tiwari told The Indian Express. He to have Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray's go-ahead on the issue.
''The more the better but four in each family is a must,'' Tiwari says. The Shiv Sena will hold a felicitation programme on December 18 in the state capital for parents with four or more children. The title of ''awakened Hindu family'' will be conferred on these parents.
ENDS.
Daily News 25 November 2003
Assam's 'anti-foreigner' blood-letting
by Lynn Ockersz
Increasingly bloody anti-immigrant violence in India's trouble - hit North-Eastern state of Assam could be considered a scathing indictment of successive state governments' inept handling of ethnic relations in the state.
Recent reports indicated that militant violence unleashed by the United Liberation Front of Asom had targeted migrant settlers from the neighbouring state of Bihar in particular, prompting them to vacate their homesteads in the multitudes.
While brutal, "anti-foreigner" violence of this kind is nothing new to Assam, which is considered a hotbed of tensions arising from an uninterrupted influx to the state of varied ethnic groups from neighbouring states and even countries, such as Nepal, the fact that hardly any progress has been made over the decades in defusing these destructive conflicts points to an abysmal inability on the part of state governments to come to grips with the inflammatory issues which Assam has been throwing-up.
However, not all state governments have made multiculturalism and the establishment of peaceful co-existence among communities a principal platform of governance. In fact, the Asom Gana Parishad which ruled Assam intermittently since the mid-Eighties, initially came to power on an anti-immigrant platform but failed to make any decisive moves against the "foreigner presence" which was projected as the root cause of the woes of ethnic Assamese.
The current ULFA - spurred violence, however, is a gauge of the militant group's dwindling patience with state governments and the political process.
There are lessons here for the South Asian region. Multi-ethnicity is a socio-political fait accompli of the most decisive kind in most states in this region. The deeply-entrenched multi-ethnic composition of these states makes a reversion to the nation-state project of yesteryear impossible.
Attempts to perpetuate state-centric, majoritarian rule in the states of South Asia invariably draw stiff resistance from ethnic minorities, whose presence in these states are as "long" as that of "majority" communities. In fact, the "majority-minority" and "native-foreigner" issues which figure prominently in popular political debate are increasingly revealing themselves to be red-herrings which detract from the urgent and immediate task of building truly democratic societies where equality of opportunity and condition would reign, regardless of the so-called antiquity of individual communities.
In other words, the foundation needs to be laid for multicultural polities and Assam should serve as a warning to those states which wish to evade this historic undertaking. Foot-dragging on this undertaking would only be a spur to separatist violence and on this score too Assam could be viewed as an object lesson. As could be seen the ULFA is desperately trying to wrest the initiative from the state government.
In Assam, as in most states of South Asia, lack of foresight on the part of governments and political elites, in dealing with minority issues, could turn these polities into hotbeds of terror.
Assam's population grew phenomenally over the decades and this growth was spurred mainly by a steady migrant inflow. In fact Assam's population is said to have swelled from 3.3 million in 1901 to 15 million in 1971, a fourfold increase. Migrants seeking livelihoods flowed in from several neighbouring states, Rajasthan, Punjab, Bihar and Bengal, being some of these.
However, corresponding to this migrant inflow, poverty and landlessness among the ethnic Assamese is believed to have also grown alarmingly. In fact, by the Eighties, 77 percent of the local peasantry was believed to have been landless or occupying uneconomical land holdings. This led to ethnic antagonisms.
There was, therefore, a steady build-up to the current strife. State governments had no choice but to work towards a common, shared future for all of Assam's communities. This task, however, was neglected.
ENDS.
Posted by: Awaaz / 11/25/2003 01:47:01 PM
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 2003 11:01:47 +0530 (IST)
Manufacturing History
Ram Puniyani
History has become an important tool in the hands of politics and if one is to assess its influence one has just to see the effect of the mystified notions on the intercommunity relations, its role in demonizing the minorities. By now these myths have become firmly planted in social commonsense. The fertile ground of mystified history gets its reppleshinment on the regular basis from those who stand to benefit from the popularization of such notions. In his recent speech on the occasion of Guru Dakshina, Vijayadashmi (Oct. 2003) RSS supremo came up with latest thesis on conversions to Islam. Mr. Sudarshan pointed out that but ìthe people of Valmiki samaj were originally from warrior class. Some historians maintain that the Islamic invaders used to place two options before the vanquished Hindu warriors; accept Islam or work as scavengers cleaning their toilets. While many so-called upper caste people opted for Islam, these warriors demonstrated their uncompromising commitment to their religion by opting for the mean jobs rather than giving up their religion.î Earlier Ashok Singhal of VHP had on similar lines pointed out that all those communities who defied conversion to Islam by the Muslim armies had to flee to the Jungles, and became impoverished in the process and so became untouchables.
Thus now the origin of untouchability are firmly located with the invasion of Muslim rulers, somewhere around 8th century. And again the internal problems are externalized, coming clean as far as the caste and untochability problems are concerned. This assertion shows the confidence of those percolating such myths that now they have sowed the seeds of this understanding, mythical one, of history so deep that any thing can be passed off as history. Untochability and caste system are much much older than the arrival of Muslim Kings, its mention being there in most of the Puranas, centuries before even the Islam was born. Untouchability became part of the caste system somewhere in first Century A.D. And caste system cannot be separated from the Brahminical Hinduism.
Conversions to Islam and Christianity have been a source of great discomfort to the ideologues of Hindu Right for political reasons. Conversions away from the Brahminical Hinduism are as old as Jain and Buddha religions. These were the earliest religions which challenged the Brahminical system, the caste hierarchy, much before the advent of Christianity and Islam in this land. Christianity was the first amongst these two latter religions to have come here. Its work amongst the poor and adivasis did attract many to embrace this religion, and its appeal continues even till the day, despite the missionaries being beaten up for their travails. As lot of battering is being given to those working amongst Adivasis the result is that working in the remote places is becoming difficult. Despite its being there for centuries the number of adherents to Christianity is 2.18% as per the census of 2001. There was no particular increase in this slow growth during the British rule contrary to the popular notions that it is British who brought Christianity to India.
Islam spread in India first due to the Arab traders, due to their interaction with natives. Later it spread here due the influence of Sufi saints and those who converted to Islam were the low caste untouchables who wanted to escape the tyranny of Brahmins and Janindars, those who aspired for entry in the places of worship which was barred to the low caste, those who aspired for social equality. Swami Vivekanand sums up the cause of conversion to Islam ìIt is wrong to say that Islam spread on the point of sword. It was to escape the tyranny of the Brahmin Landlord that the Shudras embraced Islam.î Dr. Ambedkar did suffer all these agonies before declaring that he wants to leave the Hindu (Brahminic Theology) fold.
To attribute the spread of Islam to Kings defies the whole logic of the goal and agenda of Kings. Religions generally spread due to the humanistic teachings of saints and not due to the tyranny of Kings. Most of the kings did claim that they are ruling so as to spread a particular religion but the only King who made efforts to spread his religion was King Ashoka. Communal interpretation of History has seen religion as the sole and prime motive of the actions of the Kings. Even here we see that the spread of Islam has been more in areas where Shudras were more, away from the direct tyrannical influence of Muslim Kings, e.g. in Kerala and East Bengal. Kings, no doubt, might have used the threat of conversion as a matter of humiliation to the defeated kings. But that again is small number. The alliances of Kings in medieval times defy the religious divide propagated by communal view. The percentage of Hindu officials and Kings in Mughal administration went on rising form the times of Babur to Aurangzeb. Many a Rajput Kings were n alliance with the Mughal rulers. Akbar had two hindu kings amongst his nine jewels, and Raja Mansingh was his important general. Similarly the King who is regarded as the most bigoted, Aurangzed, had the services of many a hindu kings. The same applies to Hindu kings like Shivaji and Rana Pratap, i.e. they having Muslim confidants in their administration. The divide between victor and vanquished is not along the religious lines as asserted by Mr. Sudarshan. Most of the armies of Hindu as well as Muslim kings were mixed armies.
With the coming of British the seeds of communal politics were sown and now the elite of the communities in order to pursue the game of numbers began the acts of conversions. During the first decade of twentieth century missionaries from all the religions began to flock the villages in droves, seeking to convert Dalits and tribal. Many a shudras converted to Sikhism. Shuddhi movement started by Swami Dayanand Saraswati aimed to reconvert those who had ëleftí the fold of Hinduism. Contrary to the popularly propagated notion that Hindus donít proselytize, the techniques of conversion to Hinduism were developed by Arya Samaj and these were called Shuddhi. The proselytizing techniques have been further developed by VHP, washing feet and giving holy bath. To denote that those who have embraced other religions have become impure and now they are being brought back by a method of purification. Similarly Tablighi missionaries were trained to convert people to Islam These Tablighi activists preached the basics of Islam and warned the villagers of the threat of Arya Hindus. The Shuddhi and Tanzim (Tabliqui) movements were the major political conversions.
The current tirade against the Christian missionaries is motivated more by political than by the religious reasons. The Christian missionary work amongst Adivasis has been attracting the adivasis in a sustained manner. With the ascendance of Hindutva the attempt is being made to hinduise the adivasis. It serves multiple purposes. To begin with the empowerment of Adivasis which is a threat to the Hindu elite is halted by attacks on Christian missionaries. Secondly a new support base is created for the Sangh parivar a la the Shuddhi movement of the early twentieth century. Interestingly the ësafety clauseí used here is that these adivasi have strayed away from there religion, Hinduism, so the Gharvapasi is a natural response to bring them back home, to their old masters, the Hindu elite. The projection that Muslim invaders humiliated Hindu Kings serves a very powerful purpose of creating hatred for the Muslims of today as a mechanism of revenge of the past Here the loyalty to ëourí kings is also established and subtly probably a acceptance of social hierarchies prevalent in Kingdoms is also made to be accepted as ënormalí. One can surmise that conversions are due to multiple factors, internal dissatisfaction being the major one. In addition the political onesí have joined in from early twentieth century. Here the deceit of those claiming Gharvapsi is not a conversion is remarkable, as it is as much a conversion as any other to any other religion.
Thus through his newly developed Toilet theory of conversion Mr. Sudarhsn kills many a birds with the single stone. The internal problem of Brahminical values is passed on externally to the Muslim kings,
ENDS.
The Times of India NOVEMBER 21, 2003
Vested interests misinterpreting history: IIT Prof
TIMES NEWS NETWORK LUCKNOW
Very few people know that Mughal emperor Babar had directed his son and successor Humayun in his will to avoid cow slaughter, damage of temples and any other acts which could hurt Hindu sentiments.
Mughal emperor Aurangzeb, who has been described as ⤗fanatic' in the history, had on one occasion razed a mosque at Golconda to dig out a treasure hidden in the premises. On another occasion, he had punished a priest of Kashi Vishwanath temple for molesting a lady, wife of a Hindu King.
Furthermore, there were Muslim spies in Shivaji's army, who warned him about the assassination bid in advance before his meeting with Afzal Khan. Parents of US President George W Bush and Osama Bin Laden have ⤗common' interest -- both have investments in oil wells in middle east. Swami Vivekanand once said: It is a myth that Islam was propagated in India through sword, there were large number of shudras, who adopted Islam to escape the atrocities of brahmins and zamindars. Besides India , Bangladesh has also adopted a poem written by Rabindra Nath Tagore as its national song.
These facts were presented by Ram Puniyani, a professor of biomedical engineering in Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, in a lecture on ⤗Communal politics', organised by National Alliance for People's Movement, at Lucknow University , on Thursday. He said, "Kings in the past used religion and communalism to grab the riches of the land and to rule over the masses. Today history is being ⤗misinterpreted' deliberately by vested interests to instigate communalism and terrorism only for the sake of power."
"We are considering poems and texts written by poets in the royal courts as history," he said. The reality however was that facts have been distorted and exaggerated by the poets to please their masters, he added. "The will of emperor Babar could be seen in the national museum in New Delhi . After reading it, I am not able to believe that he demolished any Ram temple in Ayodhya," he said.
Prof Ram is a teacher of engineering, but after 1992 Bombay riots he decided to launch a fight against communalism in the country.
Describing the US ⤗War on terror' as a farce, he said, "Americans have devastated Afghanistan and Iraq only to drill oil wells of Caspian Sea . Similarly, in India vested interests were instigating riots and communal passions of majority community. Only innocents get killed in riots, which creates ⤗reactionary' tendencies among victims, which are being cashed by anti-social elements for indulging in terrorist activities, he said, while pointing towards the Gujrat riots and subsequent reactions in the form of recent Mumbai blasts." Magsaysay award winner Sandeep Pandey and former LU vice-chancellor Prof Roop Rekha Verma also spoke on the occasion.
ENDS.
The Guardian November 20, 2003
Hindus urged to curb 'Muslim threat' by having big families
Maseeh Rahman in New Delhi
A radical Hindu political party in Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, which is a key ally of the country's ruling party, is encouraging Hindus to have more children because of fears of a Muslim population explosion.
The militant Shiv Sena party announced that it had identified 50 Hindu couples with five or more children in the parliamentary constituency of the Indian prime minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
"We will honour these couples at a special function next month by conferring the title 'Awakened Hindu Family'," said the Shiv Sena's state chief, Vijay Tiwari. Couples with more than 10 children would be given gifts of gold or silver.
The call runs counter to the Indian government's policy of controlling the country's burgeoning population by promoting family planning. The "awakening" that the Shiv Sena wants to bring about stems from the belief that India's Muslim population, already estimated to be about 140 million, will overtake the Hindu, even though Hindus account for 85% of India's population, now more than a billion.
Demographic experts assert that high birth rates are related to illiteracy and poverty, and have nothing to do with religious beliefs.
Radical Hindu leaders claim the percentage of Muslims has been rising. Their propaganda finds a response among Hindus who resent the Muslims' separate civil law permitting men four wives - though most Muslims are too poor to practise polygamy, and educated Muslims reject the idea.
"Even Hindus who do not support parties like the Shiv Sena or the ruling Bharatiya Janata party [BJP] believe that most Muslims have four wives and lots of children," said Dipankar Gupta, a sociologist. The issue even figured in the Gujarat state assembly elections last year, with the BJP's chief minister, Narendra Modi, mocking Muslim families for their "25 children each".
Now the BJP's political ally, the Shiv Sena, hopes for mileage in the spectre of the "Muslim population bomb".
Mr Tiwari said: "When the Muslims become 30% of the population democracy and peace will disappear from India. To maintain the social balance, and to save the nation, we are now asking Hindu couples to have a minimum of four children each."
Mr Tiwari claimed there had been a positive response from Hindus in Uttar Pradesh. But analysts are doubtful.
"The Shiv Sena's appeal has always been its focus on pragmatic issues, such as jobs for its supporters," said Mr Gupta. "Such a madcap campaign could rebound on the party."
ENDS.
New Kerala - 22 November 2003
http://www.newkerala.com/news-daily/news/features.php?action=fullnews&id=1003
India News: Bajrang Dal burns effigy of Christ
Bhubaneswar, Nov 21 Tension has gripped an Orissa district after members of the Hindu radical group Bajrang Dal burnt an effigy of Christ to protest religious conversions. Police officials said about a dozen activists of the group forced their way into a local church in Tileibani in the state Thursday, brought out thousands of religious books and burnt them. District police chief L.D. Naik said they had also misbehaved with a woman. Two cases have been registered against the 12 suspects in connection with the incidents. All of them have been absconding since Thursday, the official said. "Tension is mounting in Tileibani block as a result of which police patrolling has been intensified," Naik told IANS. Adequate security arrangements have been made around the churches located in sensitive areas of the district, he said. According to police officials, the Bajrang Dal activists gathered in Tileibani on Thursday afternoon to protest conversions of Hindus to Christianity, burn the effigy and to submit a memorandum to the district administration. It had started last week when the activists had forced their way into a house in Ambulpali village in Deogarh district after some local residents had complained that three Hindu tribals in the village had converted to Christianity last year. Dara Singh, a Hindu fanatic with links to the hardline group, has been sentenced to death for the brutal killing of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two minor sons, who were torched while they were sleeping in their vehicle in the state's Keonjhar district in January 1999. Twelve of Singh's accomplices were sentenced to life imprisonment for the crime that came amid a campaign against conversions.
ENDS.
The Daily Star (Dhaka) November 23, 2003 Editorial
Ahmadias under attack A blatant violation of people's religious rights The attacks on police by around 500 people, who were planning to evict the members of Ahmadia sect from their own mosque at East Nakhalpara in the city on Friday, are but an example of religious intolerance finding expression in most unsavoury acts of violence.
The news is disquieting, not least because the attacks follow the Kushtia incidents that forced some Ahmadia families to flee their homes.
The plan to oust some people from their mosque was a blatant violation of citizens' right to have freedom in religious matters. It is also very likely to taint the country's image and send wrong signals to the outside world. Religious tolerance and attack on places of worship cannot simply go together.
If such acts are not nipped in the bud, religious obscurantism will continue to divide society and obstruct the emergence of a culture based on respect for the faiths of people, regardless of whoever they might be. The lesson to be learned from Friday's violence is quite clear: the fanatic elements are trying to disrupt social and religious harmony. We must not forget what happened in Pakistan after it failed to thwart the anti- Ahmadia campaign in the late forties, which saw the fanatics pouncing on the members of this small sect. We must also remember what Shia-Sunni sectarian violence has done, and is still doing, to Pakistan.
Bangladesh has traditionally been a moderate country with no record of such intimidating outburst of religious bigotry.
It has transpired that a section of religious leaders are trying to arouse people to frenzied action in the name of service to religion, instead of preaching peace and tolerance-- the real message of Islam. What they have conveniently forgotten is that divisiveness in any form will only add to social tension.
Friday's incidents also indicate that fanatic groups are working in an organised manner. Now, it is the duty of all sane elements in society to resist the disruptive forces. The government, for its part, should take a firm stand on the question of religious tolerance. It must not allow the bigots to decide who is a Muslim and who is not. The role of the Khatib of Rahim Metal Mosque in Tejgaon needs to be investigated by the authorities, as there is ample evidence that he instigated the mob.
Bangladesh is, and must remain, a country of religious tolerance and harmony.
ENDS.
The Daily Star
November 23, 2003
Attacks on Ahmadias No move to arrest attackers, instigators Staff Correspondent Although fundamentalists openly attacked a mosque of the Ahmadia sect in Nakhalpara Friday noon and caused communal disturbance, the government has done nothing to arrest the culprits till yesterday.
All it did was to deploy police in the disturbed Nakhalpara area where over 60 people including 17 cops were injured in the Friday's attacks.
Tejgaon Police Station sources said they did not receive 'any directives to arrest anyone'. No case or investigation has been initiated to book the attackers or the instigators who want the Ahmadias declared non-Muslims.
However, police recorded a case against unidentified persons for attacking cops on the spot.
Meanwhile, militant groups like Hifazate Khatme Nabuwat Andolan, Bangladesh brought out a demonstration in the city led by one Abdul Hannan and demanded that the Ahmadia be declared non-Muslims. The law-enforcers did not intercept the demonstration that made insinuating remarks against the Ahmadias.
The Ahmadias in Nakhalpara meanwhile remain confined to their area, specifically to their mosque in fear of further attacks. Some 60 policemen were seen guarding the place.
Prime Minister Khaleda Zia is learnt to have directed the law-enforcers to ensure that no communal attacks on religious sects occur.
"We are neither involved in politics nor craving for any worldly gains. Then why are we being targeted?" Abdul Awwal, a spokesman of Ahmadia Muslim Jamaat, said.
"Our people across the country are now under attacks," Moulana Moazzem Hossain of the Ahmadia mosque at East Nakhalpara said.
"Under the banners of Khatme Nabuwat Co-ordination Commmittee, Jaise Mustafa, Imam Sanghati Parishad, Aamra Dhakabashi, Nabi Darodi and Darade Rasul, they are now united to unleash attacks to evict us from the land," he said.
The worst attack was made in Khulna on October 8, 1999 during Juma prayers when a time bomb planted in a mosque exploded killing seven Ahmadias and injuring 27.
"Shah Alam, a follower of the Ahmadia sect, was killed at Roghunathpur in Jhikargachha, Jessore on October 31 and his wife filed a case accusing 16 the same day. But the killers filed a false case on November 16 accusing four Ahmadias," said another top Ahmadia leader.
Some people attacked Bakshibazar Ahmadia mosque and vandalised it on October 29, 1992.
Besides, extremists confined some 13 Ahmadia families of Bhabanipur in Kushtia since the beginning of Ramadan and thratened to kill them on the Eid day.
Bigots in Ambarnagar of Laxmipur tortured many Ahmadias and vowed to drive them away before the Eid.
The Ahmadias of Fazilpur of Feni are also under threat and found no help of the law-enforcers despite requests.
Moazzem Hossain said the main difference between them and the other Muslims is that the Ahmadias believe Imam Mahdi, who according to the Muslim faith will appear to show the way to light, has already been born and died.
ENDS.
SAHMAT 8, Vithalbhai Patel House Rafi Marg, New Delhi-110001 Tel-23711276/ 23351424 e-mail: sahmat@vsnl.com
18.11.2003
PRESS STATEMENT
The report carried in the telegraph of 17th November 2003 of statements made by Praveen Togadia at a meeting in Ahmedabad is extremely disturbing. The irrational declarations of this fundamentalist constitute a grave and continuing threat to the democratic fabric of our society and nation.
Togadia viciously attack[ed] secular forces working for justice for victims of the Gujarat carnage and the families of those who perished in the Sabarmati Express at Godhra. He singled out Teesta Seetalwad as a prime target of his hate speech and declared that she should be prevented from entering gujarat.
SAHMAT strongly condemns this barely veiled call to the irrational following of the VHP/ Bajrang dal/ Sangh Parivar to take the law into their own hands and pursue individuals as the object of murderous hate campaign.
The 82 year old Mr. Rawal who lost his wife and son in the Godhra incident has repeatedly said that he is being pressurised and subjected to threat. SAHMAT demands that the Gujarat Government and administration ensure that protection is provided to him immediately.
SAHMAT demands that Praveen Togadia should be restrained from making offensive public statements targeting minority communities and individuals working for peace and justice. If he does not desist from his current hate campaign SAHMAT demands that action be taken against him according to the law of the land.
Issued by Ram Rahman SAHMAT
ENDS.
Pakistan: What should minorities do
By M.B. Naqvi [24 November 2003, Karachi]
For minorities, including smaller sects of Islam, should not organise themselves communally. Instead of being protected, they may only help set up a cycle of revenge violence. Their best chance lies in the liberals in the given majority being mobilised for promoting tolerance and peaceful conditions. Counter violence, in the name of either defence (deterrence) or revenge is to step on a slippery slope, which is sure to promote even greater counter mobilisation by the majority. When a minority organizes a militia, it does so at its own peril. For, the majority is sure to ask: they are organizing (uniting) against whom? Its extremists are sure to magnify the danger from the minority and intensify their mobilization, making it more effective or murderous.
This is an unfamiliar and unsought advice and is not likely to please. The dynamism that results from acting on common notions is generally ignored. Doesn't every schoolboy know that unity is strength or smaller numbers can be offset by greater commitment? And yet, what is the evidence? No communal mobilisation by a minority can prevent attacks on its members in the fastnesses of the country. They can only be brought into action for taking revenge. That sets up a tit for tat cycle of violence. Once that takes hold, no minority can win; it is bound to lose more often. No minority can mobilise as many men and material as a majority can.
The experience of late 1980s and 1990s sectarian violence is before us. In order to take on Sipah-i-Sahaba, Lashkar-i-Jhangvi etc., the Shias had formed their Sipah-i-Mohammad. After a decade it is necessary to count who had more people killed? There is no doubt more Shias have died in sectarian violence than Sunnis. Supposing the Shias had not had any organisation for avenging their losses, what would be the situation. True, Shias would still have suffered, losses, in the dead and maimed but the total on both sides, would have been less. By the same token, panic and losses among Shias would have been smaller.
In order to illustrate the point, suppose there was also a Muslim militia in Gujarat last year. Would that have meant fewer losses for the Muslim minority or more? Resistance in kind would surely have meant much greater and even more efficient mobilisation by the majority. Total losses of the Muslims would surely have been far greater, even if many Hindus might also have suffered. In Pakistan, this temptation for defensive communal mobilisation is pointless for religious minorities like Hindus and Christians; they are too few to register on the majority's radar. Sectarian minorities have occupied the place of religious minorities. Majority community takes out its accumulated spleen on the sectarian communities.
Historically too, it is about time to assess what the Muslim community lost and gained from the partition of the Sub-continent, the result of excessive communal frenzy on both sides, involving world's largest ethnic cleansing to date. The Muslims thinking they would never get a fair deal from the Hindu majority forced the issue. As is peculiar to all communalisms, the Muslim League had taken the vast body of Hindus as one undifferentiated unit that would, for all time to come, take just one (hostile and unfair) view and oppress the Muslims. Like any majority Hindus comprised many schools and had their full share of communalists (who took the Muslims as an undifferentiated mass of united people who will always make trouble). More schools of thought will come into being with time. Isn't this true of the Pakistani majority? Aren't there many opinions among Sunni majority about treating the minority sects among Muslims?
The question persists: Was the Muslim League's victory in 1947, with the help of the British, the best solution of Muslim community's backwardness and poverty? If a separatist and inimical approach had not been brought to bear on the situation in 1940s to worsen it, Muslims would now be 400 million or more in India that could scarcely be oppressed or seriously discriminated against. Undivided India would have offered more opportunities for development. Despite the short sightedness of Congress leadership and its hatred for Quaid-i-Azam, there were many schools of thought, among them, i.e. leftists of various hues who were genuinely non-communalists who were keen to eradicate the poverty of all Indians, Hindus, and Muslims alike. Moreover, there were many Hindus who shared a lot of cultural traits with Punjabi and Urdu speaking Muslims, as was the case in Bengal and Bihar.
Opportunities for Muslims would have been incomparably greater in an undivided India; without their substantial support no government could run in Delhi. The very Hindus, who frightened the Muslim League so much had to be politically divided, and thus would have needed their votes. How long could the communalist politicians deny benefits to the voter? Only thing that would have made for fair play and justice for all was democracy. And there could be no chance for a non-democratic government in India then and now.
These are however might have beens of history. They have no direct relevance. India was partitioned, hopefully finally for the benefit of all its parts. Let us try and make Pakistan a success in terms of human freedoms and popular welfare. But Pakistan inherited the blight of a hollow militaristic mind that is moved by a shallow, indeed bogus, pan-Islamic sentiment. The result is the curse of military rule; power balance among political groups is heavily tilted in favour of the military. So it pre-empts democracy and thus subordinates human rights and popular welfare to its own needs and preferences.
One fact is obvious: sectarianism is a part of the larger phenomenon of intolerance, especially over religious matters. It won't go away until people learn to be tolerant of differing views and faiths of other communities, groups or parties. Rationalist attitude of tolerance of the other viewpoint and resolving differences through reasonable argumentation is needed. Religious intolerance against Hindus, Christians, Parsis and others is a kin of sectarianism and all such phenomena stand or fall together. So, if sectarianism is to be exterminated, people will need a society and state that tolerate all faiths, views and groups. In other words, State should promote a tolerant and democratic society.
There are prerequisites of social peace and harmony: a pluralist society cannot be achieved unless it is embedded in human rights that are truly respected - of all men and women, Muslims or non-Muslims. Only in such a society can Shias, Sunnis, Ahle Haddis, Daudi Bohras, Aga Khanis, Zikris, and Ahmedis can happily co-exist and make progress together. Such a society, to repeat, has to recognize the supremacy of and respect for, human beings, qua human beings, over every other value. Guarantees for freedom, primarily of faith and opinions are implicit in humanistic value. In other words, it presupposes a democracy that does not discriminate in favour of any particular faith or opinion or against any religion or sect or parties. For ensuring social peace and solidarity for all Pakistanis, the basic requirement is to make Pakistan strong through unity of all truly secular approach is vitally needed.
Unnecessary confusion has resulted from demands of an Islamic State. A 95 percent Muslim country like Pakistan, any democratic government would be Islamic. Since the ulema's 22 demands before Khwaja Nazimuddin in early 1950s, these have grown. Each time a constitution was made in 1954, 1956, 1962, 1973, or even in the case of abortive one of 19th December 1971 by General Yahya Khan - major ulema had expressed satisfaction over its Islamic provisions adequately. Even in 1971 case, Yahya Khan shared the details of his constitution to the then JI chief, who termed it was adequately Islamic. The same was true in the case of 1973 Constitution. Maulanas Mufti Mahmud, Shah Ahmed Noorani and JI's Professor Ghafoor Ahmad signed it. Even so, they agreed with Zia that scope for more Islamisation exists.
An Islamic dispensation obviously presupposes two things: All Muslims must have no differences over what is Islam or on its rights and obligations for different Muslims and of course non-Muslims. Well, there happens to be no homogenized, simple Musalman; what is to be found, and thanks to ulema as a class, a Sunni Musalman, a Shia Musalman, an Ahmadi or Zikri Musalman. Iqbal, Jinnah or Sir Syed could ignore sectarian distinctions. But can the JUI, JUP, JI or other MMA members do the same? Mufti Mahmud's idea of Islamic State was the enforcement of Shariah as defined by his Hanafi school of thought. For JUP enforcement of 500 fatwas, the Fatwa-i-Alamgiri, plus the acceptance of actual rites and practices of Indian Islam constituted the implementation of Nizam-i-Mustafa.
Who can escape defining a Muslim accurately to know what Islam demands from Muslims and non-Muslims. Jinnah wanted all Pakistanis to be treated equally; he asked JN Mandal to preside over the first session of the Pakistan Constituent Assembly. How can now a Hindu or Parsi be discriminated against? In the Meesaq-i-Madina, the Prophet of Islam included Jews into his Ummat-i-Waheda. Like Jinnah he too wanted a secular dispensation for the Madina's incipient state and there is nothing on record that any discrimination was ever shown towards non-Muslims in Islam other than paying a tax in lieu of compulsory Jihad.
Moreover, further efforts to Islamise Pakistan will stoke the fires of sectarianism among Muslims even, if non-Muslims get ignored. The ulema have achieved one thing: the undifferentiated Musalman of Sir Syed, Iqbal and Jinnah has been killed. For them a Musalman is either a Deobandi kind of Sunni or a Barelwi type of Sunni or sympathizer of JI or a Shia or Ahmadi or Bohra or Agha Khani or Zikri or Ahle Hadis. This sectarianism is a natural product of the efforts to capture power by orthodox leaders.
It is dangerous. Muslims are divided in over a hundred sects. Each sect believes it is the true and the only Islam there is. In matters of faith no compromise is possible. Think of the consequences of religious leaders making politics the means of acquiring more support, influence, money and eventuallypower. If sectarianism spreads, Pakistan as a state would collapse. What will then happen is not foreign invasion or intervention. Jealousies among great and neighbouring powers will prevent that. But once sectarian passions flare up, the next stops will be Somalia or Bosnia. Do we want that?
ENDS.
Posted by: Awaaz / 11/25/2003 01:45:25 PM
The Hindu, Nov 21, 2003
Opinion - Editorials
Assam's shame
THE KILLING OF close to 30 people in Assam in a wave of attacks over the last few days on the Hindi-speaking population of the State has once again exposed the worst face of regional and ethnic chauvinism in the North-East. The attacks, which began with Assamese students preventing Hindi-speakers from writing a selection examination for junior posts in the North-Eastern Frontier Railways (NFR), sparked off reprisals against north-easterners in Bihar, the State to which most Hindi-speakers in Assam trace their roots. This in turn became the excuse for the killings in northern Assam where a large number of Hindi-speaking people live. The Assam Government has been forced to seek the Army's assistance to bring the situation under control. The entire series of events, from the first incident to the last killing, is reprehensible and unacceptable to all who consider themselves part of a civilised society. It has to be condemned as such and a clear message sent out to the perpetrators that such actions cannot be tolerated. To her credit, the Bihar Chief Minister, Rabri Devi, took swift measures to clamp down on the incidents in her State. In Assam, Chief Minister Tarun Gogoi's efforts were evidently inadequate: they failed to prevent the grisly killings.
The latest episode of anti-migrant wrath in Assam has provided the United Liberation Front of Assam a tailor-made opportunity to rear its ugly head again. Since the mid-1990s, the outfit has been languishing on the margins, pushed there by the Assamese because of its resort to terrorism, retributive killings and criminal extortion. Evidence of its unpopularity came when voters defied its call to boycott the 1999 Lok Sabha elections and turned out to vote in large numbers. Hundreds of its cadres have laid down arms, some of them saying they did not agree with the senseless violence it advocates. More recently, the group's call for a boycott of Hindi films evoked no response. In the present spate of violence gripping Assam, the State Government has named ULFA as the main instigator and the perpetrator of the killings. Clearly, the extremist organisation, which has been banned under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, sees in the situation a chance to make a comeback. In all this, the role of the All Assam Students' Union needs to be highlighted. The AASU, which led the agitation in Assam in the 1980s, recently demanded that the NF railway "should be restricted to the region" and it was the first to raise the "foreigner" bogey in the matter of the zonal railway recruitment examinations. In doing so, the student body may have had an eye on its own political fortunes but its strategy has dovetailed neatly with that of the ULFA.
Mr. Gogoi has blamed the troubles on the Central Government's failure to create adequate employment opportunities in Assam. That may be true, but it is only a part of the story and a lazy way out - good for deflecting criticism but bad in the long run because it plays into the hands of the extremists. It reinforces the view that while the mainstream political establishment in Assam may distance itself from groups like ULFA, it is not above using them for its own political gains. Assam needs to look inward for answers to this week's violence. The victims were those whose families had migrated from Bihar generations ago. It is time the so-called "indigenous Assamese" looked at them as an integral part of the State's ethnic mosaic instead of as "outsiders". In this time of crisis, it rests on Mr. Gogoi's shoulders to provide leadership. Above all, he must resist the temptation to fall into the more-Assamese-than-thou trap.
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The Hindu - New Delhi 19.11.2003
President urged to intervene for Mallika New Delhi, Nov 19. (UNI): Eminent Gandhian Nirmala Desh Pandey, noted art historian Kamla Vatsayan, singer Shubha Mudgal and a host of other intellectuals, artists and writers have appealed to the President A P J Abdul Kalam to intervene to desist the Modi Government in Gujarat from "harassing Dr Mallika Sarabhai by implicating her in false cases for filing a PIL in the Supreme Court in connection with Gujarat riots".
Expressing surprise and anger over a local court's restrictions on the movement of the noted danseuse, they also appealed to the Supreme Court to "review all such cases as have been initiated by the Gujarat government against those who spoke and rose up against the genocide in that state, and provide physical and mental security to them,".
A resolution making these demands was passed at a meeting held here last evening. The participants also appealed to Gujarat artists and writers to break their silence and come out in an open support of Dr Sarabhai.
The resolution said allegations against the danseuse have been levelled at the behest of one V K Saxena, who is well-known for supporting Narendra Modi and acting against those carrying on anti-Narmada agitation.
Expressing concern over the goings on in Gujarat, eminent scientist Prof Yash Pal said what had happened in that state was part of a widespreading malaise in the country.
"A very deep criminal conspiracy is going on the state," he said.
It was decided at the meeting that a demonstration will be held outside the venue of the World Economic Forum meeting which will be addressed by Narendra Modi here this week.
ENDS.
Sarabhai paying for PIL against Modi: Writers
Express News Service New Delhi, November 18: SCIENTISTS, writers and visual artists gathered today at Triveni Kala Sangam to protest against the Gujarat court's decision rejecting Mallika Sarabhai's - world renowned dancer - plea to allow her to travel outside Gujarat.
They said the Gujarat government falsely implicated Sarabhai because she was the first artist to have openly criticised Narendra Modi government's role in the communal violence in that state.
Ashok Vajpayee, Hindi poet said: ''The Gujarat government is shamelessly curtailing civil liberties of people who criticised the genocide in Gujarat. ''
Kapila Vatsyayan, art historian said the implication of Sarabhai in a false case and deliberately curtailing of her freedom to travel outside Gujarat ''is cruelly suppressing the human rights'' of the sorts which not even the colonial government had resorted to.
Prof Yashpal, former UGC chairman, said the image of Gujarat as harbinger of civil rights and patron of liberal arts has been shattered by the actions of the Modi government.
Harsh Mandar, former IAS officer said Sarabhai has been falsely implicated as all the money ''Darpana'' owes has been refunded on the cancellation of the dance tour and except Manushi Shah no other student has complained. Sarabhai is implicated because she filed a PIL in Supreme Court against Modi government's role in Gujarat riots, he said.
The meeting also decided to protest before the World Economic Forum building on the day Modi addresses the forum.
ENDS.
The Long Road to Justice: Godhra/Naroda/Best Bakery
A talk by Teesta Setalvad
Friday November 21, 7:00 PM Hunter College (Lex and 68th, Manhattan) [New York City] Hunter North C002
The state sponsored carnage of the Muslim minority in Gujarat in March-April 2002 was a watershed event in the troubled history of secularism in India. More than 2500 innocent muslims were massacred by militant Hindutva (a Hindu nationalist movement) forces and more than 150,000 others were rendered homeless. Within days after the carnage began, Human Rights groups from across the country began mobilizing in an effort to seek justice -- to bring the perpetrators to justice and ensure the safety and security of the muslim minority in Gujarat and elsewhere in India. Now, nearly two years after the genocidal attack not a single person has been convicted and the minorities in Gujarat continue to face inhuman conditions. However, the process of fighting for justice has pushed the limits of the Indian judicial system -- public interest litigations in the Supreme Court, numerous cases in the Gujarat State court system, evidence gathering and witness protection under circumstances of dire threats -- have al continued ceaselessly. Teesta Setalvad, the convener of the Concerned Citizens Tribunal, that produced a two volume report (Crimes Against Humanity) with detailed evidence of State complicity in the massacre, is one of the chief actors in the battle for justice. In her talk, Teesta Setalvad will outline the nature of the contradictions that have emerged over the last year and half of legal work around the Gujarat massacre, especially in the context of the recent Supreme Court directives on the Best bakery case.
Teesta Setalvad, a long time journalist, is currently the co-editor of Communalism Combat, the only Indian magazine in English entirely dedicated to the anti-communal struggle, and the Director of KHOJ, a schools project to promote secular education. Most recently she was the Convener of the Concerned Citizens Tribunal that investigated the killings in Gujarat, published now in a two volume report titled "Crimes Against Humanity." Setalvad has won many awards, including the [Nurem]berg International Human Rights Award, Human Rights Defenders Award, the Pax Christi International Peace Award, the PUCL Human Rights Journalism Award and the Dalit Liberation Education Trusts' Human Rights Award.
ENDS.
The Times of India (Chandigarh Edition), November 21, 2003
From across the border with crossover theatre VANDANA SHUKLA TIMES NEWS NETWORK "The play is openly antimullah, yet we have done it so many times in Pakistan without a hindrance. Here, in this secular democratic country, we were told to delete a few parts from the play at the eleventh hour. They said it might hurt some people," says an anxious Madeeha Gauhar, theatre activist from Ajoka Theare , Pakistan , who is alarmed by such developments in India .
"We would have cancelled the show, but then we saw about thousand people waiting for it. We didn't have the heart to not go ahead with it. So, we removed the character from the play they had objections with," adds Madeeha.
She says such developments "in India are more disappointing as it has been a secular country for 55 years. Pakistan never had pretensions of being secular. It is ironical that this should happen to Bullah and his sufi voice of love and tolerance that gave sanity in times of bigotry 200 years back. Seeing growing intolerance in both countries, the relevance of Bulle Shah convices me".
Bullah, a musical theatre production from Ajoka with its 27-member cast is on an eight- city tour of Punjab . It was performed in Patiala a day before.
Madeeha narrates her first brush with intolerance in India , "To begin with some people had objections with a few words crossover like 'zalim' used for a particular character. We toned it down. Then they asked us to change the name of the character Banda Singh Bahadur, we changed it to Joginder Singh Jogi to avoid controversy."
Then, she says, they were asked to delete the dialogue between Bulle Shah and Banda Bahadur. The play is set in the time when Mughal oppression was at its peak.
"The play offers a dialogue between two ways of reacting to oppression. One, as preached by Baba Bulle Shah, the sufi way, the other as professed by Banda Singh Bahadur, by confronting violence. In reality Bulle Shah and Banda Singh Bahadur never met. The play uses the poetic license of imagination to convey the message. Without passing judgment, we present both approaches," says Madeeha who adds, "I think artists have the license to use such liberty to articulate a message."
Hence, the reaction disappoints her. "I have been to India many times, but my cast of young people asks me, is this the secular India you talked of," she says with concern.
Even in Pakistan Madeeha's voice has been synonymous with a voice of struggle for secular, democratic and humane rights for the past 20 years.
Barely out of university she dared to do her first theatre production, Badal Sarkar's Juloos way back in 1983 under martial law. Since then Ajoka has not looked back in its endeavour for social justice.
This despite the fact that Pakistan has no NSD to talk of nor do its universities have departments of theatre. To top it, there are censorships, bans and cancellations of theatre shows.
"Bullah was premiered for the World Punjabi Conference in Lahore and received an overwhelming response from Indian delegates who wanted the play to be staged in India ," says Madeeha
Madeeha in return is overwhelmed by the response of people from Tudike, a small village in Punjab , where 2,000 people sang kafis and bols of Bulle Shah along with the cast.
The play Bullah, written by Shahid Nadeem and directed by Madeeha Gauhar w[as] be staged at Tagore Theatre [Chandigarh]on [21 Feb 2003].
ENDS.
The Times of India NOVEMBER 22, 2003 Op-Ed.
State Subversion: Gujarat's Victims Completely Isolated HARSH MANDER
In a recent television interview, deputy prime minister L K Advani dismissed the claim that there has been an extremely grave and deliberate subversion of justice in the aftermath of the Gujarat carnage in 2002.
He suggested that whatever failures occurred were the routine outcome of the general collapse of the criminal justice system in the country, and that there was nothing distinct in the experience of Gujarat.
The fact, however, is that after the riots, the state authorities in Gujarat have mounted a systematic assault on the rights and security of a segment of its citizens, on a scale and with an impunity that is unmatched in independent India, barring the dark months of the Emergency. Of the 4,252 cases registered after the carnage, 2,107 have already been closed on the grounds that there is not enough evidence even to submit a charge-sheet to the courts. In 36 cases, the courts have acquitted the accused. In no case have the accused been punished.
The haste with which almost half the cases have been summarily closed without even submitting these for the scrutiny of courts, within the short span of one-and-a-half years, is the direct result of the exercise of state authority. Across Gujarat, the police authorities themselves filed FIRs, claiming that violence was perpetrated by anonymous mobs, frequently instigated by the victims themselves. FIRs by the victims that named the mob leaders were debarred. Investigations were frequently entrusted to police officers who, according to the victims, had themselves abetted or participated in the violence, and were, therefore, deliberately shoddy and partisan.
The prosecution was placed in the hands of members or office-bearers of the sangh parivar. The mala fide intent of the state authorities is evidenced most in the openly discriminatory application of POTA exclusively against the minorities. After the carnage, of the 240 people held under POTA, 239 are Muslim and one is a Sikh. Not one person in Gujarat from the majority community has been charged under POTA. Muslims are also being widely arrested under serious sections of the IPC. In all these cases, the bail pleas of the Muslim accused have been strenuously opposed by the state authorities, whereas people who led the mobs are left free to intimidate witnesses and subvert investigations. This partisanship of the state began immediately after the carnage, because for the first time in free India, a government refused, as a matter of policy, to provide relief and rehabilitation to segments of its own people, internal refugees who survived what was virtually a pogrom.
In every major incident of sectarian blood-letting in the past, the state has always established and run relief camps. In the makeshift camps established by the crushed community, the government in Gujarat refused even to provide basic facilities, security or a survival stipend. In the run-up to the elections, even these austere private relief camps were forcefully closed, and their tens of thousands residents, still too terrified to return to their homes, were left to fend for themselves.
Contrast this with the situation in which for internal refugees escaping the terrorist violence in the Kashmir valley, relief camps have been appropriately established and run by the state authorities in Jammu, Delhi and elsewhere for well over a decade. The human tragedy of the affected Kashmir people is prodigious, but at least state authorities have extended them relief in a responsible fashion, according to inter- national standards, including payment to camp residents of a monthly stipend. There is absolutely no reason why these same standards should not have been applied to the internal refugees in Gujarat. This injustice has been enabled also by unconscionable delays at the highest levels of the justice system.
There are four major petitions pending before the highest court in the land filed by several respected writers, artists and activists of the country, seeking redressal of precisely the numbing range of injustices mentioned ear-lier. Unfortunately, even after a year and a half, there have not been substantive hearings on these petitions, except the NHRC referral on the Best Bakery, by the Supreme Court. Instead, state authorities have succeeded in inordinately delaying substantive hearings by the Supreme Court. As a direct result of the delays, many of the reliefs sought have become infructuous.
It is too late for the courts to order the state authorities to establish relief camps, and ensure minimum facilities; it is too late to prevent them from mercilessly disbanding the camps; it will soon be too late to impose non-discriminatory standards for compensation and its assessment. As people struggle to rebuild their homes and livelihoods without state support, it will soon be too late to ensure soft loans and other state succour and rehabilitation. In no instance in the history of independent India have the state authorities so openly treated a segment of its citizens in such a discri-minatory and partisan manner, in defiance of every acknowledged principle of justice, rule of law and judicial accountability.
We cannot permit this metamorphosis of the state from an institution for the justice and security of its people, into one that victimises as state policy a section of its population. Too muh is at stake: Justice, our safety, our pluralistic heritage, and indeed our very survival as a humane and democratic society.
ENDS.
Posted by: Awaaz / 11/25/2003 01:44:10 PM
Newsline (Karachi), November 2003
In the Name of Love
Shaista Almani faces possible death under jirga law for marrying of her own free will.
By Zulfiqar Shah
Shaista Almani and Balakh Sher Mahar, a young couple from Ghotki in Sindh, who dared to marry against their families' wishes and reportedly fled the country fearing for their lives, have now been forcibly brought back to Ghotki to face a tribal jirga.
The couple was apparently brought back to Ghotki on October 25 after Ali Gohar Khan Mahar, brother of Chief Minister Ali Mohammad Mahar and sardar of the Mahar tribe, promised the sardar of the Almani tribe that Shaista would be brought back to her family at any cost.
According to reports, Shaista has been handed over to a local sardar, while Balakh Sher Mahar has returned to his village in Ghotki. Following tribal traditions and the jirga justice system, Shaista will remain in the haveli of an impartial sardar, till a grand jirga decides a fitting punishment for marrying without the consent of her family and tribe. In this particular region of upper Sindh, most matters are decided by sardars and tribal lords, rather than the law of the land. The sardars operate with complete impunity and their authority is unquestionable; often even court decisions are flouted.
Shaista and Balakh Sher got married and a court in Karachi ratified their marriage documents, but the Almani sardar was not willing to accept this marriage. "Religion and the courts have their own place, but we have to hand the girl over to her family," says one sardar from Ghotki. Even Chief Minister Ali Mohammad Mahar declared Shaista's and Balakh's marriage against tribal traditions and values. When questioned by a journalist in Sukkur, Mahar said, "The couple did wrong, but the sardars are trying to resolve the matter amicably."
When they appeared in court in the last week of September, Shaista and Balakh Sher openly declared that their lives were under threat. "I have committed no crime. I just got married according to Islamic injunctions, but my life is in danger," said Shaista to reporters. "God will help us, we have done nothing wrong." The couple reportedly left for the UAE in the first week of October after several human rights organisations held demonstrations demanding that the government provide protection to the couple.
Though the furore settled down somewhat after newsreports that the couple had left the country, Shaista's family continued to pressure the Mahar tribe. According to sources, Sardar Ali Gohar Mahar, nazim of district Ghotki, had promised the Almani sardar that Shaista would be brought back in one month. True to his word, Mahar tracked down and brought Shaista back in the stipulated time.
Sources say, Mahar had decided to return Shaista to her tribe from day one, but since the marriage took place in Karachi, where many human rights and women organisations had taken up the cause and since his brother is chief minister, allegedly he himself sent the couple to either Dubai or Islamabad till matters cooled down. Now Sardar Ali Gohar Mahar has fulfilled his promise. The case is a prime example of the ruthless and brutal feudal tradition.
The grand jirga is due to convene in couple of days to decide Shaista's fate. According to reports, Balakh's family has offered two women from the Mahar tribe and 500,000 rupees to the Almani tribe as compensation for allowing Shaista and Balakh to stay married. However, it seems unlikely that this offer will be entertained. According to sources, if the state does not intervene, Shaista will be handed back to the Almani tribe where initially, her safety might be guaranteed. But going by past incidents, Shaista's life will be in jeopardy. Meanwhile, as far as Balakh is concerned, he can be pardoned against compensation paid to the Almanis.
In a few days, Shaista will face the jirga and perhaps yet another innocent life will be snuffed out.
ENDS.
The Daily Times/ November 17, 2003
Pakistan-India People's Forum calls for talks Staff Report
KARACHI: Activists from the Pakistan-India Peoples Forum for Peace and Democracy (PIPFPD) representing the two countries said here on Sunday that war could not help settle disputes and dialogue between the two governments, but that the goal could be achieved by the peoples of the two countries.
"Our people (of the two countries) are sure that war cannot settle disputes and that we can settle our conflicts through negotiations and people-to-people contact," Dr Mubashar representing Pakistan Hasan at the PIPFPD said at a press conference at the Karachi Press Club.
He said he was glad to note that the peoples of India and Pakistan had realised the importance of peace and had begun contacting each other. He said students from the two countries would soon be visiting each other’s countries and more such overtures were in the pipeline, which would bring the two countries to the path of peace.
Referring to the confidence-building measures suggested by Prime Minister Zafarullah Jamali, which inspired his Indian counterpart to propose more friendly gestures, Dr Mubashar said, "We’ll be playing now to accelerate the work for peace". IA Rehman, another PIPFPD delegate, emphasised that peoples from the two countries were paying their own money, and so now it was the delegates’ responsibility achieve positive results. Mr Rehman briefly described the history of the PIP forum. The first Pakistan meeting was in Lahore, and the second in Peshawar. "Now, the sixth joint convention of the forum is going to be held in Karachi on Dec 12 to 14. At least 250 delegates each from India and Pakistan will be participating in it, which is going to take place after a break of three years," he said.
The policies of the two governments had divided families, Mr Rehman said. "It is expensive for people of Sindh to travel to Islamabad for visas. We would like to make strong and concerted moves to make it easier for people to see their relatives across the border. We want to benefit divided families."
PIPFPD’s representative from India Tapan K. Bose explained the forum was founded in 1993 but this was the first time representative of the two countries had come into direct contact. He said people of Pakistan and India could talk on political issues, something which until now the two governments had made their exclusive playground. "The Kashmir issue does not only relate to politicians and the governments of India and Pakistan. Mainly, it is an issue of the people, who are the victims. Vested interests in the two countries have made this important issue a barometer of patriotism," he said.
He said if the people of the two countries wanted democracy in their countries, so too was it the right of the people of Kashmir. "Let the people of Kashmir decide for themselves and let their decision be respected," he said.
He said the Kashmir conflict was not a military or territorial issue. "The Kashmiris are a direct party to the dispute and they should be given the option to decide their destiny for themselves," Mr Bose said.
The Indian delegate said the two neighbours should reduce their defence spending and reduce their forces by 25 percent as the first step to full confidence in each other. He said the peoples of the two countries had a right to visit each other. Mr Bose said, "Such restrictions clearly show the ruling elite is panicked and unpopular, otherwise they would have no reason to restrict people-to-people contact."
ENDS.
Bangladesh's exiled feminist Nasreen blasts ban on latest novel
Fri Nov 14,12:08 PM ET
DHAKA (AFP) - Exiled Bangladeshi feminist author Taslima Nasreen blasted a court order to halt circulation of her latest novel here, saying controversial passages about fellow writers were based on personal experience.
Nasreen, who fled in 1994 after threats from Muslim fundamentalists, told Bangladeshi expatriates in the United States that she "described only the facts," the US-based Bengali news service ENA reported Friday.
"This is my personal liberty. I am not afraid of court cases," Nasreen told the gathering at Tufts University near Boston.
A Dhaka court Wednesday halted production, distribution and sale of Nasreen's novel "Ka," giving the publisher 15 days to explain why the book should be allowed in Bangladesh.
The injunction came after prominent writer Syed Shamsul Haque sued Nasreen for one billion taka (1.72 million dollars) saying his image was tarnished by "Ka," which stands for the first letter in the Bengali-language script.
In his petition, Haque said Nasreen wrote that he took two women to a provincial guesthouse and was seen throwing up the next day after getting drunk.
Nasreen said the descriptions in "Ka" were based on her own relationships with unspecified authors and journalists in Bangladesh and neighbouring India.
"They should have refuted my narration of facts by their own version instead of going to court," she was quoted saying.
"Readers could have easily judged which one is true ... This is not a civilized reaction," she said of Haque's legal challenge.
Nasreen, 41, fled Bangladesh after Muslim fundamentalists called for her death over the book "Lajja," or "Shame." The novel, also banned in Bangladesh, described abuses against the country's Hindu minority.
Nasreen, who is also a doctor, has since lived in self-exile in Europe and the United States and has caused further anger by renouncing religion.
ENDS.
The Telegraph 17 November 2003 http://www.telegraphindia.com/1031117/asp/nation/story_2579590.asp
Togadia fumes as Godhra victim kin stay away
by BASANT RAWAT
Ahmedabad, Nov. 16: What was supposed to be a prayer meeting, organised by the VHP for Godhra victims, ended with Praveen Togadia lashing out at the minority community. The meeting, at the outfit's headquarters this evening, came two days after the Railway Claims Tribunal ordered compensation to families of 34 Godhra victims. But conspicuous by their absence were the families of Girish Rawal and four others from Janata Nagar Ramol who had recently lashed out at the VHP's "hate politics". They have filed a case against the outfit. Eighty-two-year-old Rawal lost his wife in the train carnage of February 27, 2002, and his son, who was the president of a VHP unit in Janata Nagar, in the riots that followed. Rawal has filed a petition in the Supreme Court asking for all riot cases to be transferred outside Gujarat. The families kept away from the meeting to show their resentment towards the manner in which the VHP treated them. "They dumped us. We were left to fend for ourselves," an angry Bharat Panchal, who like Rawal chose to keep away from the prayer meeting, said. VHP general secretary Togadia, obviously irked by their absence, had an explanation ready. "Dr Girish Rawal has fallen prey to a Muslim conspiracy," he said. As for the "conspiracy", Togadia blamed Mumbai-based human rights activist, Teesta Setalvad. He said Setalvad, "who has married a Muslim man", was behind the "conspiracy" to malign the VHP. The best way to do this was to brainwash the family members of the Godhra victims and that is what she has done in Rawal’s case, he alleged. Togadia also put an international angle to this "conspiracy", saying that the effort to malign the VHP was being financed by the Arab world. Money was being pumped in from there to give legal assistance to set the Godhra accused and conspirators free and get innocent VHP workers punished, he said. Till midnight, a group of VHP workers tried to persuade Rawal and the family members of other Godhra victims to attend the prayer meeting. "They tried every trick but I told them nothing doing. I have made up my mind. Now I know you guys," Panchal claimed to have told the VHP workers who came to his house after 18 months. "They reminded us that it was because of the efforts of the VHP that we will be getting compensation from the railways," Panchal said. "Are you so ungrateful?" he was asked. When VHP workers requested Rawal to attend the prayer meeting, he asked them why they had not bothered to visit his house when they seemed so concerned about his son's death. Togadia has now instructed VHP workers to oppose any plea to transfer riot cases outside Gujarat and ensure that Teesta Setalvad does not enter the state. The VHP leader has also ordered his workers not to speak to reporters, especially he said those of the English-language press, as they were opposed to the VHP and may be working for Setalvad.
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The Times of India, November 15, 2003
Gujarat censor board bans Maulana Azad play
NINA MARTYRIS
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 2003 01:43:52 AM ]
MUMBAI: In a move that has upset theatre circles, the Gujarat Censor Board has banned the performance of Sayeed Alam's historical play Maulana Azad in the state.
The Urdu production, which explores the patriot's views on politics, music, jasmine tea, Mecca and Gandhi, was scheduled to play on November 9 at Ahmedabad's Darpana Academy run by Mallika Sarabhai.
A week before that, however, a letter from the censor's office arrived stating that "in the present circumstances" a performance of the play would not be possible. The team was unofficially told that if the play was performed " hungama ho jayega".
Those involved say that the decision could be part of the campaign to target danseuse Mallika Sarabhai who has been singled out by the Narendra Modi government for speaking out against alleged state atrocities during last year's Gujarat riots.
Produced by Ashok Curang's Pierrot's Troupe, the play, which features Tom Alter in the lead role, has performed in Mumbai, Delhi, Dehra Dun, Mussoorie and Hyderabad without the whiff of a " hungama". "The censor board did not tell us specifically what they found objectionable about the play- whether it was the theme, title or dialogue," says Mr Alam, who is based in Delhi.
"The play has been reviewed by almost every major paper in the country and there's no mention of anything controversial."
Mr Alam feels that what the censor board may have taken objection to is one line in the play where Azad,who is dictating his book 'India Wins Freedom' to Humayun Kabir says, 'To a large extent Sardar Patel was responsible for Partition.'
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Dawn 20 November 2003
Cure beyond bias By Sadia Qasim Shah
The MMA government passed a resolution which lays down that women patients will be examined and given test only by female medical staff, in a province where health facilities are already inadequate, reports Sadia Qasim Shah. Zubaida Bibi holds a diploma in electro cardiography (ECG) and is the only ECG technician in the NWFP. This makes her quite sought after byhundreds of women patients who hesitate to have medical tests conducted by male technicians in the other hospitals. Zubaida said that many women patients come to her at the Khyber Teaching Hospital, one of the city's main public hospitals, from far off districts only because they have heard that a female ECG technician is available at the hospital. There are some tests like the Exercise Tolerance Test (ETT) which involves contact with the chest of the patient and female patients feel embarrassed when treated by a male technician since there are no female ones around.
Zubaida observes that the reason why women don't become technicians is because there are no prospects for them in this field. There is one Paramedical Training Institute at the Lady Reading Hospital (LRH) but it has no female technician. To obtain a diploma, the candidate must have an Intermediate (science group) certificate and two years of training without a stipend, after which they become technicians but without any surety that they will get a BPS-05 scale government job. The pay is very low and without any reasonable incentives for women which is why they prefer nursing. Women seek nursing schools also because they have a better chance of promotions in the profession, says Zubaida. She works in the morning shift and performs ECG tests on around a 100 female patients daily at the KTH. Often when she is not around the nurses on duty are asked to perform the ECG tests, but Zubaida observes that a nurse cannot conduct them better than a trained ECG technician. In a province where ignorance and poverty prevails and district hospitals even lack male technicians and doctors, a resolution passed on the segregation of treatment of patients on the basis of gender is completely unrealistic, especially when there is already a shortage of female staff at public hospitals. This only goes to show how legislators are far removed from reality. The medical facilities in the district headquarter hospitals are not satisfactory, so critical patients are usually referred to the Khyber Teaching Hospital, Lady Reading Hospital or the Hayatabad Medical Complex, the main hospitals of the provincial metropolis which treat patients not only from all over the province but also from Afghanistan. These hospitals are burdened with hundreds of patients including purdah observing women who are examined by male doctors, and their medical tests are performed by male technicians or nurses due to lack of female technicians. One resolution passed in May by a majority, led by an MMA member of the provincial assembly, Dr Zakir Shah, addressed the deployment of women technicians at public hospitals for checkups of female patients. The majority passed this resolution keeping in view that it is against religion and culture for male doctors or technicians to examine women. Dr Simeen Mehmood, an MPA of PML-Q, immediately opposed the resolution. She said that it was not possible at this time to adopt such a measure.She stressed how emphasis needs to be put on saving lives, without any discrimination on the basis of gender. The so-called think tanks of the MMA government did not go through the official records to check whether female staff especially the trained female technicians were available or not. They just went ahead and issued directives to all public sector hospitals in August that ECG and ultrasound examinations of women patients were to be conducted by female staff. There are no hospitals exclusively for women with trained women technicians, so without the administrative capability to provide such health facilities, it is impossible to implement the resolution. But the resolution was passed unanimously so it is binding on the government to implement it. The NWFP health department had issued directives to the administration of all the public sector hospitals to ensure that electrocardiography and ultrasound of women patients are conducted by women staff and technicians. But, according to a health department official, only one female ECG technician is available across the province. The only female ECG technician at the Khyber Teaching Hospital performs her duty in the morning shift and the male technicians works in the evening while there is no female technician in the Lady Reading Hospital, another one of the public hospitals of the city where women patients from the surrounding districts come for treatment and medical tests. There is no female ultrasound specialist in any public hospital of the province. The province's only qualified ultrasonographist has left the country for good. According to a male ultrasound specialist, about 100 ultrasounds are performed daily on female patients, if men were to stop carrying these out then where would all the female patients go, as there is no female ultrasound specialist in any public sector hospital in the entire province? There is no female anaesthesia technician and dispenser throughout the province. Female patients are operated upon for haemorrhoids or piles by male surgeons because there are only two female general surgeons in the entire province. The hospitals still lack the services of female X-ray, laboratory and physiotherapy technicians. There is no female radiographer in the 1,300 bed hospital, a radiologist of KTH said. Any sensible person can see that hospitals need to be equipped with the latest medical health facilities and qualified and trained staff need to be appointed before gender restrictions can be imposed. It is the government's responsibility to first and foremost provide the best medical care to all its citizens without any discrimination, prejudice or bias on any basis - least of all gender.
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Posted by: Awaaz / 11/25/2003 01:41:55 PM
The Hindu [Chennai], Nov 18, 2003 http://www.thehindu.com/2003/11/18/stories/2003111805111200.htm
Conflict yields dividends only for vested interests: Asma Jehangir
By Kalpana Sharma
MUMBAI Nov. 17. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extra-judicial Killings is one of the many hats the fiery and determined human rights activist from Pakistan, Asma Jehangir, wears. In Mumbai to attend a closed-door meeting of jurists from South Asia, Ms. Jehangir, who has taken on the military establishment and the religious fundamentalists in Pakistan, was at her outspoken best at a meeting with a small group of journalists.
Asked what she thought about the latest peace moves between India and Pakistan, she said that in Pakistan there were different views. "Just as there are some people in India who don't want anything to do with Pakistan but to conquer it, there are people in Pakistan who would like to see our flag on the Red Fort," she said. "But this is vicious thinking. A large number of Pakistanis want peace. Families are separated. People on both sides have suffered. Peace has its own dividends for ordinary people. Conflict yields dividends only for vested interests."
She said people on both sides had a great deal to gain from peace economically and culturally. "Our cinema houses are on the verge of closure because they cannot show Indian films. Why don't you ask Lata Mangeshkar to apply for a Pakistani visa? If our government denies it, there will be protests and riots in Pakistan."
As one of the founder-members of the South Asians for Human Rights, Ms. Jehangir said they welcomed India's peace initiative. "First, India and Pakistan must have a reasonable relationship where there can be proper dialogue." Eventually, the Kashmir issue would have to be tackled. "Kashmir is not about territorial gain at the cost of people's lives. It is far more important to have a process that leads to dialogue. Kashmiris need the space to say what they feel and by this I include people in `Azad Kashmir'. Have we heard them? Have you heard them? Just because `Azad Kashmir' is better off than the Indian part doesn't mean we can violate their rights."
The Indian Government, Ms Jehangir suggested, had to "make its own amends to the Kashmiris living in India. It's time Indians recognised that there have been excesses. Once you recognise and say this has happened there, you will create a situation for Kashmiris to come back into the fold."
On the shape of politics in the future in Pakistan, Ms. Jehangir, who set up the Pakistan Human Rights Commission in 1989, said she was confident that if Pakistan had "fair and free" elections, religious and fundamentalist parties and alliances like the Muttahida Majlis Amal (MMA) would never be elected. "The fact is that the last election was rigged. The main political parties had been badly eroded by the establishment."
In the absence of other players, she said, a coalition of religious parties like the MMA did well.
Ms. Jehangir also questioned the Pakistan President, Pervez Musharraf's constant assurances to the rest of the world that the country was moving towards democracy. "If this was the case, the first step he should have taken was to set up an independent election commission as you have here."
Instead, she said, the same man who had been around for the referendum that confirmed General Musharraf's hold on power continued to function as the sole election commissioner.
The Pakistan human rights lawyer also spoke out against the United States' policies in the region. "They speak of `moderate' Islam, `moderate' Taliban. What does Bush mean by that?" she asked. "We don't know how they define moderation. Is the `moderate' democracy that Bush wants in Afghanistan like what we have in Pakistan?" she wondered.
Ms. Jehangir said that instability in Afghanistan would have its impact on Pakistan. "My grouse against the U.S. is that it has no post-Cold War policy. How will it pick up the pieces it has left behind in places like Afghanistan?" The rest of the world, she pointed out, could not be expected to clear up the mess left behind by it.
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PLEASE CIRCULATE, INFORM OTHERS
WALK FOR PEACE
An appeal to all peace-loving people of Ahmedabad to Join our
Walk for Peace
Walk for Peace, Communal Harmony and Justice
For the sake of the next generations lets join hands and come together for a cause- let the cause be peace
Date November 18, 2003 Time 2.30- 4.30pm Route: beginning from Shah Alam Darwaza to Tagore Hall
Youth For Peace Anhad for details contact 079- 7449742- anhad office Ahmedabad +919811807558- Shabnam Hashmi, Anhad Kamna- 9824376350- Youth For Peace, Ahmedabad 982555029- Manan, Anhad, Ahmedabad
ENDS.
Asian Age (New Delhi) November 11, 2003 | Op-ed.
Learning in Saffron: RSS Schools Orissa
Angana Chatterji
In Orissa, over the last five years the Sangh Parivar's tentacles have spread and thickened. Minorities, refugees, and the poor -- the social crevices in which they live narrow from neglect. The disenfranchised struggle to confront social violence. The annexation of territory and resources from the subaltern, the imposition of virulent ideologies and alienating economies, have produced diverse identity politics defining contested practices of citizenship. At the intersections of globalisation and hyper nationalism, Hindutva intervenes, unravelling the fragile fabric of democracy.
The communalisation of education is a serious concern across India. Sectarian education campaigns undertaken by Hindu extremist groups demonize minorities through the teaching of fundamentalist curricula. Such corruption of education incites the political and social fires of communalism. The RSS has spearheaded the movement, successfully penetrating into the educational systems of both the grassroots and centralised regulatory commissions. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) has fashioned an institutional umbrella that is having a damaging impact on education at the grassroots. The RSS has established Vanvasi Kalyan Parishads, Vivekananda Kendras, Sewa Bharatis and other groups to advance the ideological agenda of Hindu nationalism. The RSS administers 9,300 Ekal Vidyalayas in adivasi areas. For the diversity of cultures allied under the rubric of 'adivasi', the ongoing reality of Hinduisation offers evidence of their gradual and brutal incorporation into this caste system.
Created by the RSS in 1978, the Vidya Bharati Akhil Bharatiya Shiksha Sansthan network focuses on moral, extracurricular and physical education for 'mind, body and spirit'. The Vidya Bharati system supervises over 18,000 schools across India, with 1.8 million students and 80,000 teachers. A shared curriculum is used across the country. The Vidya Bharati operates 60 graduate institutions. About 5,000 Vidya Bharatis are endorsed by Education Boards primarily in states where the Bharatiya Janata Party is in power..
Known as Shiksha Vikas Samiti, Vidya Bharati directs 391 Saraswati Shishu Mandir schools with 111,000 students in Orissa. The RSS has constructed a network of educational institutions across the state. Initially the RSS maintained a public distance between the Sangh and Vidya Bharati. In recent years, as Hindutva consolidates its position in Orissa, the RSS has actively declared its affiliation with these schools. Rashtra Deepa, the RSS Oriya weekly, regularly chronicles some of the academic aspirations of the Sangh Parivar. Most RSS run schools are affiliated with the State Board of Education and adhere to the state approved curricula. As the Sangh infiltrates into regulatory bodies and actively leads the rewriting of textbooks and reorganisation of the curriculum, the classroom transforms into an agent of Hindutva.
With the increasing impetus on the privatization of education, the RSS has been actively inaugurating schools in areas across Orissa where the government fails to provide public funding. The vigorous assertion of Sanskrit provides for the erasure and Hinduisation of minority languages. History, science, geography, literature, religious texts are interpreted into Hindutva. These texts, written in Oriya, are taught in schools and available in bookstores. The texts weave disparaging and malevolent fictions about minority groups, inciting Hindus to revenge history. The curriculum is censored and obscurantist, interpreted to legitimate the sanctity of a 'Hindu worldview' in India and the assembling of a Hindu state. It enables Hindu nationalism in advancing 'righteous' violence for ethnic cleansing. The RSS broadcasts this education as 'holistic', patriotic and accessible.
These schools are financed by individual donations and contributions from various charitable organisations such as the Mumbai based Bhansali Trust. These schools also offer income generation and computer skills. They serve as gathering places for Sangh organisations providing youth contact with Hindutva leaders. Parents say they are drawn to RSS run schools because they are affordable and profess to educate children in culture and religion, history and ritual.
Students receive ideological training through extra-curricular activity as well. They participate in development work and disaster relief, politicising education and linking it to social service. An RSS worker in Bhubaneswar speaks with pride. "We ask people to devote one hour a day for their country, in the name of the motherland. To gather in a field and play Indian games; with sticks, swords, other exercises, teach youth to march, some musical instruments. And then we workers discuss the ideology of the RSS -- what Hinduism is, how Hindu culture was great and how it is fading, how the youth must become involved to revive and purify it."
Through regular educational camps, he continues, the RSS recruits teachers and campaigners. Their task is to draw people to the Sangh. "To convince people that the country is in danger, the motherland is in danger. To tell people that no matter who they are, if they return to Hinduism there is place for them in the nation." After training, RSS state and district units send campaigners to serve within the different wings of the Sangh Parivar, and to the rural areas to recruit and organise the Sangh cadre.
The RSS holds month long training sessions across Orissa during summer vacations to attract students and young children. From these sessions, the RSS recruits for the Officers Training Camps (OTC). Held twice a year, the OTC provides schooling in self-defense and leadership. Around 500 people attend each year. On completion, approximately100 join the organisation as campaigners. Graduates take an oath, "I will devote my body, mind, and money (tana, mana, bhana) to the motherland." For about 10 recruits, this develops into a lifelong, intense and full time commitment. Each December, the RSS organises the Sita Shibir, a 7-10 day winter camp. The families of attendees finance the camps. The growth of the RSS testifies to the success of these camps. The RSS boasts of 50,000 shakhas in India, 2500 in Orissa with a 100,000 strong cadre.
In Orissa, the RSS charges that aggressive Hinduisation is a 'rational' and warranted response to, among other factors, the growth of missionary activity leading to an increase in the Christian population. In fact, Christians constitute less than 3 percent of the population in the state, with a 1 percent increase since 1981. The Christian population in India does not record any appreciable increase from 2.6 percent in 1971, to 2.43 in 1981, 2.34 in 1991, and 2.6 in 2001.
History is animated through extra curricular activities, seminars and workshops. New heroes, timelines, events emerge to construct India's antiquity, to naturalize her geo-political borders, to define her heritage as Hindu. History is rewritten to determine belonging and unbelonging. Difference is represented as 'other', a threat to the integrity of India as a Hindu nation, unless manipulated and straitjacketed. A whole new generation is being grown indoctrinated in Hindutva. It is a devious strategy to teach hate to the young.
Note: Information used in this article is derived from multiple sources, including interviews with persons affiliated with Sangh organisations.
Angana Chatterji is a professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the California Institute of Integral Studies.
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Newsline (Karachi), November 2003 Cover Story
Till Death Do Us Part By Zulfiqar Shah
On October 8, 2003, Shazia Khaskheli and Mohammad Hassan Solangi, a young, recently married couple, were brutally murdered in Sanghar, Sindh. The murders followed hours of unimaginably inhuman torture inflicted on the victims, in full cognisance of thousands of townspeople - hundreds of whom were present at the scene - and the authorities. Shazia and Hasan were mowed down not for any crime, but simply because they had followed their hearts and married of their own choice. And their murder was not a crime of passion, but a premeditated execution.
Amazingly, in overwhelmingly feudal Sindh, the incident was not considered shocking, not even out of the ordinary. It was murder conducted in the name of karo kari - honour-killing. And according to the findings of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), just in the past nine months, more than 290 people have been murdered in Sindh in the name of karo kari. Of the victims, 176 were women.
The daughter of a bank officer and member of the Khaskheli tribe, Shazia, an intermediate student, left her Shah Latif Colony home on September 27 and eloped with Mohammad Hassan Solangi, the driver at a neighbour's house. Says a resident of the locality, "After that, the elders and youths of the Khaskheli tribe held daily meetings to devise a mode of punishment for Shazia who had dared to dishonour the tribe by marrying a lowly driver from another tribe." The Solangis, who are also called 'Machi' - fish traders - are perceived as a lower caste by the Khaskhelis. The latter are mostly disciples of the spiritual leader Pir Pagara, and many of them claim to be descended from the Hurs - the militant wing of his followers - who fought against the British.
When a notice appeared in a Karachi newspaper announcing Shazia's marriage to Hassan Solangi, the tribesmen really got down to business. Although Shazia's parents reportedly pleaded that their daughter's life be spared, the tribesmen were determined that Shazia pay the price for her actions. A death squad was constituted by them and despatched to Karachi to hunt Shazia down.
The tribesmen also started to exert pressure on Abdullah Sariwal, Hassan Solangi's employer, to locate and bring the couple back to Sanghar. Though Sariwal declined to talk to the press, his friends reveal that he was threatened with dire consequences by the tribesmen if he failed to meet their demands.
Meanwhile, Shazia's father, Mir Hassan Khaskheli, an assistant vice president (AVP) at Muslim Commercial Bank's regional office in Mirpurkhas, lodged an FIR at the Sanghar police station in which he declared that Mohammad Hassan Solangi had kidnapped his 19-year-old daughter. In the FIR he claimed Shazia was married to another man at the time of her abduction.
It is not clear why Shazia and Hassan returned to Sanghar. Some reports suggest that the conflicting stories about their marriage made the couple decide to voluntarily return to Sanghar to set the record straight. Others maintain they were told if they returned with valid marriage documents and issued statements to the effect, they would be forgiven.
According to sources, on October 7, Mohammad Hassan Solangi met the district police officer (DPO) investigations, Ali Sher Jakhrani, who advised him to come to his office the following day along with Shazia, so that they could record their statements and thereby have the case against them disposed off.
It was while they were en route to meet the DPO the next day, that a group of armed people intercepted their car barely 500 metres away from his office. The men dragged the couple out of the vehicle and then, in full view of several onlookers and in broad daylight, proceeded to beat them. Following this Shazia and Hassan were pushed into another vehicle and driven away.
According to eyewitnesses, the car stopped at Shazia's house in Shah Latif Colony for a few minutes, but then proceeded onwards. News of the couples' abduction spread like wildfire in the city. Later, some people claimed they had informed the police on the helpline about what was transpiring. While this cannot be verified, there is little doubt that the police were aware of what was happening and, by all accounts, they did nothing to prevent the murder.
According to sources, the couple were brought to a house in Nizamani Mohalla around 1:00 pm, and for three hours were subjected to severe torture.
A witness recounts: "The tribesmen cut Hassan with knives and poured salt and chilli powder into the wounds. Then they broke his arms and legs." Reports indicate he was also sodomised by over a dozen men, and then petrol was poured over his genitals. Shazia meanwhile, was given a choice. She was told if she stated she had been kidnapped by Hassan, she would be allowed to go. However, she refused and was also tortured, as a result of which she was blinded in one eye. While the couple were being brutalised, a huge crowd had collected outside the house. Says one of those present at the scene, "It was like a big mela outside the house. Everyone knew what was happening, but no one dared to intervene."
Eventually, a woman from the tribe, who presumably could no longer endure the shrieks emanating from the house, attempted to intervene and begged the tribesmen to spare the young woman. Instead, the men grabbed her and shaved her hair for "collaborating" with Shazia.
At about 4:00 pm, Shazia and Hassan, both barely alive, were taken to a nallah (drain) about three kilometres outside the city precincts and shot in the head. The police arrived at the scene only in time to collect the corpses.
To add insult to injury, nobody, even from her family, was willing to claim Shazia's body. Usually, a kari is not considered worth burying. However, eventually, even though the couple's murderers threatened that she should not be given a Muslim burial, Shazia's mother managed, after prostrating herself before one of the area's influentials, to have a few of her relatives collect the corpse from the police station and bury her daughter in the dark of the night.
According to sources, after Shazia's murder, a group of her friends went to her house to offer their condolences. However, her family members refused to entertain them, saying there was to be no mourning for Shazia because she was a kari.
Hassan's parents, meanwhile, only learnt of their son's death through newspaper reports two days later. Subsequently they told the judge, who is conducting an enquiry into the incident on the orders of the Supreme Court, that the police refused to hand over their son's body when they went to retrieve it and also refused to register a case against his murderers.
Although the postmortem reports on the murders have not yet been made public, there are apprehensions about how authentic the reports of the findings will be. Since Sanghar is a stronghold of Pir Pagara's jamaat, and considering that not only are all the postings in the area made on the jamaat's recommendations, but that even most of the officers themselves belong to the order - including the civil surgeon who has conducted the autopsies - it is highly unlikely that any members of the jamaat will be implicated in the murders.
While, in a welcome development, the Supreme Court on the basis of reports in Sindhi newspapers, took suo moto notice of the brutal incident and asked the area's session judge to conduct an enquiry, there is a general belief the present administration will stymie such an investigation at every turn.
Interestingly, shortly after the murders, the police arrested Shazia's father for involvement, but he was freed when 70-year-old Chutto Khaskheli, one of Shazia's maternal uncles, voluntarily surrendered to the police claiming he had killed the couple. He maintained that Shazia had been officially betrothed to his son, and since a nikah had taken place, her marriage to Hassan Solangi was polygamous and illegal, in addition to being dishonourable. As such he said, he had killed the couple in a wild rage.
Significantly, it was only once the newspapers got wind of the incident and the Supreme Court took notice, that Shazia's relatives, including her father, began to maintain that she was married to her maternal cousin when she was seduced by Solangi, a man twice her age who was already married and a father of two daughters.
However, in Sanghar it is commonly known that Shazia was not betrothed to anyone else at the time of her marriage to Solangi.
Subsequent to Chutto Khaskheli's confession, Shazia's father told reporters in Sanghar, "Though [Shazia] had taken the wrong step, I had forgiven her. But people from my tribe killed her because they could not." He requested the press to desist from continuing reportage on the case since it hurt him and his family members.
Those close to Shazia's family corroborate her father's contention. They disclose that the girl's immediately family members - i.e. her father, mother and brothers - did not agree with the decision taken by the tribesmen to kill the couple, but they were helpless in the face of the odds.
Interestingly, while local newspapers carried reports on the story as soon as it broke, and the initial newstories emanated from Sanghar, subsequent reports had different datelines. Reportedly local journalists following the story were threatened by Khaskheli tribesmen and either had to resort to pseudonyms or file stories from elsewhere. A local journalist disclosed how the tribesmen even objected to the use of words like premee joro (couple in love).
While karo kari murders are tragically commonplace in interior Sindh, this one came with some variations. "It is a new trend when people other than the immediate family declare a girl kari and kill her without the consent of her father," says a retired teacher of the elementary college in Sanghar. He adds that since the incident there has been a pall of gloom in Sanghar and many people have stopped their girls from going to college. "This incident will have a negative impact on females who are already marginalised," he contends.
Most of the residents of Sanghar district are mureeds (followers) of Pir Pagara, and female literacy is merely 17 per cent. Despite being the district headquarters, Sanghar remains one of Sindh's more underdeveloped areas. In fact, according to locals, most disputes in the area are solved by Pir Pagara's khalifas (lieutenants) through "faislas" (decisions) usually taken at jirgas, and it is only afterwards, and only sometimes, that there is recourse to the law of the land.
"This incident is one of the worst violations of human rights," says Qasim Adil Leghari, president of the Sindhi Adabi Sangat Sanghar, a literary body. "Nobody has the right to brutalise and kill people just because they married of their own free will."
Says Amar Leghari, an assistant professor at a local college and a writer, "This incident happened because of police negligence. Since the couple had intimated to the authorities that they wanted to appear before them, it was the duty of the police and the judiciary to provide them protection. Instead, through their silence they became accomplices to the crime."
Others question why the DPO investigations, Ali Sher Jakhrani did not make any security arrangements for the couple given the situation. Many, in fact, maintain that Jakhrani leaked the news to the Khaskheli tribesmen that the couple would be appearing before him the next day, thereby providing them the opportunity to make their deadly plans.
Although the DPO generally enjoys a good reputation in the area, it is surmised that since he is himself the son of a Jakhrani sardar from Jacobabad - a feudal and tribal - his response to the situation was merely in keeping with his heredity. Certainly, he has solved most disputes and complaints that have come his way through an open kutchery or through the auspices of local influentials rather than following police procedure, or referring to the courts.
Despite several attempts to contact the DPO, he remains incommunicado. Another senior officer of the Sindh police, however, was quite willing to express his views. "I think Solangi deserved what happened to him," he says. "The man was already married and the father of two daughters. He had no right to seduce that young girl. I don't think it was love - he destroyed her life."
Lawyers and human rights activists vehemently disagree. Under no circumstances has anyone the right to kill another. "Even if they had done something wrong, like an illegal marriage - even though there is no proof of this - no one had the right to kill them. There are laws to deal with such situations," says Noor Naz Agha, a high court advocate and human rights activist.
According to her, murder in the name of honour is one of the worst kinds of crimes - and women are usually the greater victims due to certain laws that seem to provide the license to kill them. "Under the qisas and diyat law, the legal heirs of murder victims have the right to forgive the murderer. In this manner often those culpable of honour killings have gotten away.
"When more than 99 per cent of the culprits go free even after they have confessed, how do you expect any decline in these kinds of crimes?" she asks.
To date three men have been arrested by the police for Shazia and Mohammad Hassan Solangi's murders. They include 70-year-old Chuthoo Khaskheli and two other tribesmen. However, it is commonly understood that these are the "fall" guys - chosen by the tribal chiefs to take the rap for those who "saved the honour of the tribe by executing the murders."
Interestingly, instead of Hassan Solangi's parents, the local SHO has become the complainant in his case. There are reports that his family members, who are extremely poor, are being pressurised and threatened not to come forward, so that the case is rendered weak.
Advocate Agha believes the fate of this case will be no different from that of earlier such cases. "It's easy; the father of the girl will forgive the murderers, and since those responsible are influential, they will also manage to convince Solangi's relatives to drop the charges so they will be free in no time," she says.
ENDS.
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