BJP's skewed nationalism

Deccan Chronicle, Chennai 12/10/08

BJP’s skewed nationalism –

Kancha IIaiah

Encourage the oppressed
Defend the cause of the fatherless
Plead the case of the widow
Isaiah 10:17

ONE DOES not have to be a Christian to appreciate these lines. They were said by a prophet who lived almost 200 years before Buddha.
If the protagonists of Hindutva – leaders of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and the Sangh Parivar – had imbibed similar moral principles, they would not have attacked orphans and widows in Orissa.
Some weeks ago, VHP leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati and four others were shot dead by Maoists of that area. The Maoists also claimed responsibility for the murder.
It is a known fact that Maoists kill those whom they consider their class enemies. Both Maoists and the Sangh Parivar believe in armed attacks. But instead of retaliating against Maoists, the VHP, Bajrang Dal and RSS forces targeted Christians and attacked orphanages, schools, hospitals and churches in Kandhamal.
These forces have political backing of the Bharatiya Janata Party, which ruled the nation for six years and is still in power in many states, including Orissa as a coalition partner.
The Sangh Parivar claims that it works for the protection of Hindu dharma. The VHP says it is trying to spread Hinduism across the world. But if they kill orphans, burn schools, hospitals and places of worship, does it not make them as bad as terrorists?
If Islamic terrorists plant bombs in public places and kill innocent people, and Hindu terrorists target orphans, their schools and hospitals, then which one of the two is the worst form of terrorism?
People of all religions have been victims of the bombs planted by Islamic terrorists in Mumbai, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad and Delhi. Muslims themselves have fallen prey to these bombs. These bombs are planted as acts of revenge against some wrong that took place against Muslims at some place. This is horrendous and everyone condemns attacks by Islamic terrorists.
But so far, no BJP leader aiming to rule India has condemned the targeting and killing of Christian orphans. This terrorist act is defended as revenge against Christians. There is something pathological in the targeting of orphans. Are the Sangh Parivar forces opposed to Christianity as a religion or are they opposed to orphans getting fed and educated, and widows getting treated as human beings?
BJP leader L. K. Advani’s silence on this killing of children and burning of their schools and orphanages is particularly disturbing since he is aiming to become the Prime Minister of this country.
Do we see humanism in him just because he is shouting against Islamic terrorism from the rooftop? Does he remain a nationalist when he has no word to condemn the brutal murder of orphans and burning of their dwelling places?
Should we neglect what Prophet Isaiah said about the protection of the fatherless, since he belongs to Israel, and only follow Manu who asked us to shave and starve a woman if she is alive after her husband’s death since he belongs to India? Is that what nationalism means?
We should seriously think whether those people involved in the killing of orphans should be granted the right to rule India, whichever caste, creed or religion they might belong to. They shamed us in Gujarat and now they are doing it again in Orissa.
Orissa has a significant tribal and Dalit population. If one travels through Orissa’s villages one can see lack of modernization and absence of social transformation. Untouchability, in its primitive form, is rampant. The fact that the administration of Jagannath temple in Puri does not allow non-Hindus into the temple premises is an indication of rigid nature of Hindu culture there.
The movement of tribals and Dalits turning to Christianity should be seen in this background. The VHP and other Sangh Parivar organizations have not made any effort to reform Hindu society and abolish caste inequalities so that casteless, egalitarian Hinduism could emerge. Instead of doing that, they are targeting the tribals and Dalits who have embraced Christianity. Yet they say that they represent the Indian nation. And tragically, Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, who studied in the West, has one nothing to change this culture. Very sad indeed.

Corruption's real victims

The Hindu, Chennai October 5, 2008

THE OTHER HALF By Kalpana Sharma

Corruption’s real victims

While corruption has eaten into every facet of life,
those hit hardest are the most vulnerable sections of society.

She sat on her haunches. Her face was lines by a hundred years of worry. Saraswati Devi, age unknown, is a widow who lives in Sikandra village in South Bihar’s Nawada district. Her story is not unusual. Yet you weep when you hear it because of the sense of helplessness it brings up.
I was asking Saraswati Devi what the Mukhiya of her Panchayat, a remarkable woman called Veena Devi who lives in the same village, had done for women. Even as I asked the question, a dozen other doorway or craned their necks to look inside the house where this conversation was taking place.
Lack of awareness
"I did not know that I was entitled to a government pension", she said. "It isVeena Devi who helped me get it." So now was she getting her pension, I asked. Yes, she said. She had to go to the nearest post office, some distance away, by whatever means of transport available. And then when she got there, the postman cut Rs.10 from her pension of Rs.100 a month. Why? That is the "fee" for the work he does to give her the pension, she said, with not the slightest tinge of cynicism. When she was told that she actually did not need to travel to the post office and that the postman was supposed to deliver the pension to her in the village, she could not believe it. ‘but then he will ask for Rs. 15", she said.
There must be millions of poor women like Saraswati Devi who either don’t know that they are entitled to a pension, or have to forfeit a part of it to get it. You can’t really blame the postman. He is doing this to recover the costs of payments that he probably has to make at another level. Everyone is trying to recover the costs of corruption. But ultimately the person who pays the price is the most vulnerable person at the very bottom, women like Saraswati Devi.
Of course, illustrations of this are available everywhere. We don’t have to travel to Bihar to see the manner in which corruption has eaten into every facet of life. In fact, apart from an expanding economy, the area covered by corruption in India is also growing every year. According to Transparency International’s 2008 survey of corruption, India’s ranking amongst least corrupt countries has fallen from 72 to 85. The United Nations Development Programme estimates that India’s GDP growth is cut by a quarter of what is possible because of corruption. It is also evident from stories such as this that corruption hits the poor the hardest because they are almost entirely dependent on the largesse of the State.
Apart from Saraswati Devi’s story, there were other illustrations of the costs of corruption. Near Sikandra village is Loharpur, a village with about 400 houses. The majority of the population of the village is Dalit and very poor. The village has a primary and middle school. The same Mukhiya, Veena Devi, is using development funds to build additional buildings for the school.
Yet, for over 500 students, there are only four teachers, including the principal. On the day we visit, an inspector checking the state of 20 schools in the surrounding village is also present. What about the mid-day meal for the primary school students, I ask. Both the inspector and the principal admit that the children have not received a hot meal for almost a year now. Why? Because there are no supplies available, they say. The inspector admits that most of the 20 schools under him have not been serving a mid-day meal for at least a year.
Meanwhile the parents of the children, who are listening to this exchange, get really angry and begin shouting. They accuse those incharge of the school of making off with the grain. Everyone seems to know that "No supplies" is a euphemism for supplies diverted for some other use or to someone’s kitchen. Once again, the most vulnerable, children for whom, the bowl of khichdi is the only decent meal they will get in a day, are paying the price.
Power games
What about electricity? Both Loharpur and Sikandra should have electricity. You can see the electric poles. But there is no light. It comes, I am told, sometimes for a few minutes and occasionally for a couple of hours. In the meantime, kerosene meant for BPL (Below poverty Line) families also never arrives because it is being diverted – for generator pumps of those who can afford to run them. So while the women in these villages look for firewood to light their stoves every day, we in the rest of the country discuss the "energy deficit". The energy story in these villages is literally a world apart from our metropolitan cities.
Readers of this column sometimes complain that I only write about problems without giving any answers. It would be too glib, in the light of the extent to which the rot has seeped into our system, to come up with easy answers. Yet, I was encouraged to see the enthusiasm of the children in both village schools, despite all the shortcomings. And the determination of a woman like the Mukhiya, Veena Devi, to overcome these hurdles and do something good for the people. I suppose as long as our systems till throws up such individuals, there is hope.

Understanding the Khairlanji Verdict

The Hindu, Chennai Sunday, Oct. 5, 2008
In the News

Understanding the Khairlanji Verdict

The Khairlanji Verdict, in which six persons were awarded the death penalty
for the massacre of dalits, is anything but historic.
In treating the massacre as a purely criminal act,
it actually masks caste realities.

S. Anand.
On September 24, 2008, judge S. S. Das of the ad hoc sessions court in Bhandara district, Maharashtra, pronounced the death sentence for six persons and life term for two in the case related to the massacre of four Dalit-Buddhists of the Bhotmange family in Khairlanji village on September 29, 2006. This was hailed as a "historic verdict". For the first time in post-independence India, we were told, "capital punishment was given to killers of dalits". In an editorial comment headlined "A Strong Message", the Times of India (September 26, 2008) wrote, "The Khairlanji verdict sends out a clear message that perpetrators of caste violence won’t be allowed to get away." The reports filed by Meena Menon for The Hindu echoed this view. Menon quoted Milind Fulzele of the Khairlanji Action committee as sayings: "This was the first time the court conducted speedy trial and awarded the death penalty" (September 25, 2008).
However, on September 15, 2008, judge Das had made it clear, in no uncertain terms, that "Khairlanji was a case of murder spurred by revenge for an earlier case of assault involving the police patil of a nearby village." He did not see any ground for invoking the provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, (known as the PoA Act) – 1 legislation regarded as radical though it is rarely invoked in letter and spirit. Das also did not invoke Sections 354 (assault or criminal force with intent to outrage the modesty of a woman) or Sections 375 (that deals with rape) of the Indian Penal Code, though it had been amply demonstrated by several independent fact –finding reports in October-November 2006 that the mother and daughter, Surekha and Priyanka, had not just been raped repeatedly but tortured in ghastly ways (stripped and paraded naked, with reportedly even bullock cart pokers being thrust into their vaginas and Priyanka being raped even after her death).
Destroying evidence
Before the CBI took over the investigations in November 2006, the initial two post-mortem reports had also incredulously ruled out rape and ensured that what little evidence was there was destroyed. After the judge’s September 15 ruling, the sole survivor and key witness, Bhaiyalal Bhotmange and most activists who had worked on the case and led agitations demanding a CBI inquiry and justice, expressed shock and disappointment. They feared that the criminals would be let off with some light punishment. Dalit leaders expressed concern over the ruling out a caste hatred, for, this would embolden caste-Hindu aggressors. Economist and Pune university vice-chancellor Narendra Jadhav demanded stringent punishment for the eight who had been convicted. Meira Kumar, Union Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment, too, expressed concern, saying if such episodes were treated as mere criminal acts, devoid of any casteist motivation, the Prevention of Atrocities Act would lose its relevance. Kumar even wrote to Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh and Home Minister Shivraj Patil demanding a judicial review and action against the State Police personnel for any dereliction of duty. Clearly, between the day of the verdict (September 15) and the day of the announcement of quantum of punishment (September 24), there was social and political pressure mounting for something radical and dramatic. In this sense, the death sentence seems to have been over determined, almost in compensation for not invoking the PoA Act or rape laws.
How do we then understand the verdict? Having weakened all the grounds for stringent punishment, when people were expecting acquittal, the judge slammed death penalty. However, since the judge has ruled out rape, conspiracy and caste hatred, there is a good chance that the High Court will not ratify the death sentence. The little "gain" that seems to have been made would be forfeited in no time.
In many ways the Khairlanji case came to symbolize the everyday injustices dalits suffer – most of which go unnoticed and unreported. The National Crime Records Bureau says every day two dalits are killed, three dalit women are raped and a dalit is assaulted every 18 minutes. And this is the count of only cases that enter the records. According to the 2005 annual report of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, the conviction rate under the PoA Act is a mere 15.71 percent while the conviction rate for cases registered under IPC was over 40 percent in the same year. In Maharashtra, with a backlog of 6,535 cases under PoA Act as of 2004, the rate of disposal of cases filed under the Act between 2000 and 2004 has ranged between 0.24 and 0.84 percent. Given such pervasive apathy and hopelessness, the death penalty in the Khairlanji case, even when the judgement jettisons caste as a ground for the crime, deludes people into thinking that there is some justice, at last.
However, in treating it as just another criminal act and by offering death for death, the judgement decontextualises one of the most horrific caste crimes in post-independence India, and gives us the vicarious pleasure of avenging the brutal killing of the Bhotmanges. By making many feel that those convicted "deserve to be hanged", the verdict manages to successfully mask caste realities. It reduces both the crime and the punishment to abstract "human rage" stripped of all social and political underpinnings. Besides, capital punishment for a handful of the Khairlanji killers cannot be a symbolic compensation for the backlog of cases and the spate of acquittals under the PoA Act. The fact that even as the Khairlanji verdict was being delivered, three dalit women must have been be raped and two dalits murdered somewhere in India should bring some sobriety. Far from acting as a deterrent to caste crimes, such a generalized judgement under provisions of the Indian Penal code even offers the ground to argue that the PoA Act can itself be repeated – a longstanding demand of OBCs-led parties like the Shiv Sena and the Samajwadi Party.
Vicarious revenge
How do we relate this judgement to the campaign to abolish death penalty, a campaign in which many dalits have actively taken part since dalits and other social minorities are the worst victims of this extreme punishment? If some dalits seem to be celebrating, it is because neither the social order nor the State gives them any avenue to avenge the everyday murders. The judgement, then, seems to offer vicarious, temporary revenge. The authority of the State first makes the dalits powerless, and then dons in the garb of their saviour. Reflecting on the issue in 1998, Ravikumar, then president of PUCL’s Tamil Nadu unit, contrasted the kind of symbolic death brought about by the State through death penalty with the routine murder of dalits in India. "There is indeed a kind of death which has no value – the death of a dalit. Such a death is unnoticed and passed over by society. The State does not acknowledge guilt and such deaths do not cause any disturbance in the social order. One doesn’t even need to justify the killing of a dalit as he or she is not considered a part of society. The killing of a dalit is viewed as normal. Even a dead dog makes an impact on the atmosphere because it stinks, but the death of a dalit does not make any."

In the buff

TOI, Patna October 12, 2008.

In the buff

When it comes to aesthetic nudity, mainstream Bollywood has a long way to go,
says Indrani Rajkhowa Banerjee.

It was nervous on the day I did the nude scenes for Maya Memsaab, I had to mentally prepare myself to deal with my family," says actor Deepa Sahi of Maya Memsaab fame. She echoes the thoughts of actors who are professional enough to bare it all to lend authenticity to a role, but have to put up with brickbats from families and the moral police.
Take Nandana Sen, for instance. The actor has posed in the buff for Ketan Mehta’s latest flick Rang Rasiya. Rumour has it the censor board has given it the green signal. Yet Nandana meets the question with silence. Starlet Nikita Anand feels "the major movie-going chunk in India do not live in metros and for them nudity is a strict no-no," So much for the girls’ new-age boldness!
It’s not that mainstream movies in India are timid about nudity. Sherlyn Chopra wanted cameras in the bathroom in the TV series Big Boss. Kangana Ranaut’s now censored wardrobe malfunction in Madhur Bhandarkar’s Fashion has tongues wagging. Even Ranbir Kapoor dropped his towel in Saawariya to give us a fleeting glimpse of his buttocks!
But nudity in our films remains ‘blink-and-miss’. From Zeenat Aman’s nipple peek in Satyam Shivam Sundaram to Dimple Kapadia in Saagar, Mandakini in Ram Teri Ganga Maili, to Madhuri Dixit in Parinda, filmmakers have dabbled with nudity, but the restraint is palpable. Why are Kamasutras and Bandit Queens so far and few between? "In fact, we have become regressive. Today, any bold scene in Bollywood causes a controversy or becomes an issue for political parties. In that sense, earlier generations were much more open-minded," says publicist Dale Bhagwagar.
Sure, we have B-grade stuff like Neha Dhupia’s role in Julie and Manisha Koirala’s in Ek Chotti Si Love Story, but unlike Hollywood, is the industry running shy or scared? "The multiplex audience is mature enough to accept nudity, but naysayers with vested interests play detractors," says Sahi. "In our country too much is made of the issue. Indian philosophy celebrates the female form. During nude scenes for Maya Memsaab I told myself I’m a professional first. I wasn’t ashamed of my body."
Though frontal male nudity is still taboo even in the West, every actor worth his salt has notched at least one nude scene. In India, top actors bor out if a film has a whiff of nudity. In Hollywood, even out-of-shape aging actors show on reluctance to take it all off. Kathy Bates, 59 year old Oscar-winning actress, isn’t waif-thin like every other Hollywood starlet, but carried off a hot tub scene with Jack Nichlson in About Schmidt with aplomb!
When Marilyn Monroe was asked if she had anything on for one of her nude scenes, the sex siren promptly retorted, "Sure, I’ve the radio on!" Such in your face gumption is missing in our actors. They may smooch 17 times, but give them a Bandit Queen and they turn chicken!
While earlier there were two flowers meeting on screen, today, it’s satin sheets and body suits shot in stylized angles. Seema Rahmani, who’s done multiple topless scenes in the thriller Sins, has said, "I play a girl who is in love with a priest (Shiny Ahuja). I was mentally prepared for the topless bedroom scenes as well as the smooching. It helped because I belong to an uninhibited Hollywood culture. "Actor Randeep Hooda agrees. "There’s a scene in Rang Rasiya where I paint my muse’s naked breast. Was I nervous during filming? Nah! I’d do a complete nude scene if the script demands it. Nudity is an integral part of acting. It’s high time the industry as well as audiences grew up!"
But Rehmanis and Hoodas are hard to come by. Rumour has it a body double was used for the frontal nude scenes in Bandit Queen, but Seema Biswas and director Shekhar Kapur vehemently deny this. Gossip mongers said that Biswas’ then husband asked her to state that she had not posed in the nude, but the actor believed it would lessen the impact of the most crucial scene. This apparently led to the couple’s separation!
Hollywood actor Lauren Graham, who has a hot tub scene with Billy Bob Thornton in Bad Santa, sums it up: "People count on actors to reveal something they don’t see everyday. It isn’t a big deal to many people, because they look at it as part of their work. But as an actor, it’s your choice, and your dilemma. Yes, you’re a character, but it’s still your… you’re allowing people to see."

Our politicians versus theirs

TOI, Patna 9/11/08

SUNDAY SENTIMENTS / Karan Thapar

Our politicians versus theirs

India’s top politicians do not present themselves for ‘grilling’.
In fact, they go to great lengths to avoid it.
When in trouble, they need to assue people that they know
how to handle the problem.
They need to show they have the answers,
the resolve to push them through and
the deftness to do so successfully.

WHAT’s THE big differences between our politicians and theirs?" It’s a question I’m often asked but was transfixed by the Obama-McCain battle, everyone I met popped this query. "Why can’t our guys be more like them?"
I don’t know the answer but I can identify one important area of difference between our big politicians and theirs. The later readily give interviews. Our top guns shy away. McCain and Obama sought opportunities to talk to the press. They took the tough questions head-on Knowing they couldn’t duck them.
In contrast, I can’t remember when our top leaders last gave an interview. If you disregard a casual ten-minute chat to The Telegraph, I’m pretty sure the Prime Minister hasn’t given a single interview to an Indian journalist. Vajpayee’s record was equally poor. But this is also true of Sonia Gandhi and, sadly, L. K. Advani, who used to speak but has, of late, opted for silence except to promote his autobiography.
So where does this leave our big four? Well, to start with, it shows an incredible irresponsibility. It’s the moral duty of democratic politicians to be accountable. Answering awkward questions in interviews is usually how this is done. So if they won’t give interviews, clearly, they’re evading this.
Ah, but they give speeches, you might counter, and they address press conferences. Isn’t that accountability? Quite honestly, it’s not. In a speech, you set your own agenda. You speak about what you want to. You avoid what doesn’t suit you. And although at a press conference a politician answers journalists’ questions, he or she has multiple interlocutors, each with his own subject, and because the issue changes with each person there is little follow-up and even less intensity or persistence.
In short, India’s top politicians do not present themselves for ‘grilling’. In fact, they go to great lengths to avoid it. Which naturally leads you to ask why? Are they not capable of standing up to it? Do they have something to hide? Even if you’re kind and put aside such doubts, there’s still one further consequence that’s inescapable.
When in trouble, politicians need to assure people that they know how to handle the problem that’s pulling them down. They need to show they have the answers, the resolve to push them through and the deftness to do so successfully. All of this is shown by answering tough questions.
And that’s where interviews play their role. At such times, if he handles the media effectively, a politician wins respect. If he avoids the media altogether, he leaves the field open to doubters and critics. Remember, their questions remain but his answers are unheard.
So, in the end, refusing to give interviews doesn’t protect but damages a politician. That’s the nub of the point. Obama, McCain and their fellow western politicians understand that. So too did Nehru and, once upon a time, L. K. Advani. Today, it seems, the big guns of the BJP and Congress couldn’t care less.
Perhaps they should learn a lesson from Mrs. Thatcher, one of the greatest prime ministers of the last century. I recall a young cockney electrician once asking her how she decided whether to give an interview or refuse. Her answer was revealing. "When I’m in trouble, when I need to show I have the answers and I have the determination to put things right, I agree to every interview. After all, it’s only when people know that I can remove their doubts that they will have confidence in me. But when things are going right I stay silent. At such times, there’s a danger that if I speak I might put my foot in my mouth and create a problem that doesn’t exist!"
Amazingly, our politicians do the precise opposite. To the extent they give interviews only to gloat, which is why they end up embarrassing themselves. But when they need to reassure and win confidence they opt for hermit-like silence. Which is why they’re so often – and for so long – in trouble.

The paucity of hope

TOI, Patna 9.11.08

The paucity of hope : Pleaders can’t be leaders

While the world is entranced by hope, I find myself more impressed by audacity.

Barack Hussein Obama

could not have found the first without an oversized dose of the second.

Since there is no leader without a listener, Obama could not have reached the White House, built partly by black slaves bought and sold a few blocks away, unless his nation had also changed. In three decades, America has moved from Reagan’s good morning to clinton’s saucy, sunlit afternoon, to Bush’s eerie twilight. Appropriately, it took a dream to end a nightmare. Since success is the father of sycophancy, Obama will now be compares to every icon short of divinity. He reminds me of Paul Newman in a different skin :a Cool Hand Luke, thirsting to break out of the prison that is his destiny, scornful of the warden, and confident of eventual victory long before the script is written.
Obama rose above the comfort of victim-status. He had to transcend the traps shackling his own community before he could inspire others to rise with him, on the wings of American democracy.
To the question, then, that has been hovering around the table but cannot find the respectability to join the dinner conversation: when will a ‘Hussein’ become prime minister of the world’s largest democracy? Indian democracy has the space; Mayawati has proved this. Why can’t Indian Muslims produce their own Obama?
The demographics are similar, roughly 15%. But the narratives are different. No black was invited to the White House before Theodore Roosevelt broke the taboo in 1901; India is dotted with the palaces of Muslims. Blacks were never empowered, and they did not partition the country to create their own enclave. The trust quotient, so necessary for social cohesion and political mobility, disappeared in India in 1947.
But Muslims are not the only Indian minority to have faced distrust. In 1984 there was carnage against Sikhs across the country. In 2004, a Sikh became Prime Minister. How long will Muslims have to wait?
The unvarnished truth is that neither India nor the Indian Muslims is ready. 1947 was not a solution; it became the source of a running sore that has not healed. Terrorism, and communalism, threaten to turn that sore septic. But if the Obama phenomenon proves anything, it is that alchemy needs an inspirational scientist. The state and the electorate are passive laboratories until that magic moment when a minority leader produces the touchstone that shifts the dynamic of emotion and judgement to create history.
Obama also understood a fundamental fact: change begins at home. You can not expect the majority to reach out while pandering to insularity among the minority. The seminal turn in his campaign came when he told his fellow black Americans that the age of alibis was over; they could not blame the white man for all their ills. Black parents would have to switch off television sets and switch on education; that was the only way to integrate into America’s success story. Equally, he did not appease the white man by turning into an Uncle Tom. His nuanced defence of Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the pastor at his church who had used volatile language, was perhaps his finest hour, he rejected the language, but could not find it in him to reject theman, or the reasons that had drawn the pastor towards rage. White America heard the anguish, and looked inside; the pivot began to swing.
Indian Muslims do not have leaders; they have pleaders. They plead with their mentors for crumbs; and they plead with their electorate once in five years for survival. Since they do not serve constituents, they need artificial inducements to get votes, either middlemen who can be purchased, or fear, which can be provoked. They cannot challenge the ills within the community because they need to hide their own venality.
They reach their perch through a nudge from the top, rather than a struggle from the bottom. They are kept in their place, which is on the midpoint horizon. Their principal, though not exclusive, vehicle for transport has been the Congress, which has no room at the top in any case. The satraps who rule regional parties are, if anything, even more calculating.
The Congress has compromised its Muslim pleadership into a comfort zone, where corruption is the reward for compromise. A seal has been placed on tongues that dare not be broken, no matter what the provocation. This is not a new phenomenon. You could have heard this silence all over the country on the day P. V. Narasimha Rao willfully slept white the Babri mosque was brought down. The reward came in exactly six weeks when Congress Muslims were promoted or inducted through a Cabinet reshuffle.
I recall speaking at a largely Muslim gathering of teachers and professionals in Bangalore. When I suggested that the community should demand facilities like banks that could be sympathetic to Muslim entrepreneurs, the hall burst into involuntary laughter. I was puzzled until someone explained that a prominent neta from the city had done just that, and then embezzled all the funds in the bank. This honourable person is till on the list of high-ranking VIPs.
There is no Obama among Indian Muslims because they have surrendered audacity to pawnbrokers.

THE AUDACITY of HOPE

TOI Patna-Ranchi November 9, 2008.

It’s a great day, a beautiful morning, a new dawn, a new beginning --
not just in America but the world over -–
SPIKE LEE, FILMMAKER.

THE AUDACITY of HOPE

Obama’s victory has given wings to the Dalit dream.

Shobhan Saxena draws a parallel between the two movements.

Hope is a tricky word. It never guarantees anything, but it makes the world go round. Hope was the only possession of the skinny lad with drk skin and a funny name, starting with B, when he arrived in New York, wondering if America had a place for him, too. During his years at Columbia, as he majored in political science, the young man learnt a few important lessons from some American greats. Emerson taught him that "consistency is a virtue of an ass". From Abe Lincoln, he learnt that freedom is worth dying for. As he poured over history books, he became sad and angry. And he came out of the campus craving for Change – not just for himself but for his people who hadn’t been free as long as he could remember. The name of this man was Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, and the year was 1913. Barack Obama came out of the same university with the same degree 70 years later, with the same mantra on his lips: Change.
As he gets ready to assume the most powerful office on this planet, a few skeptics are wondering if Obama is a product of the Black movement for civil rights. To be fair, he has never claimed that legacy. He is not the son of a descendant of those Africans who were abducted from their land and sold as salves in the New World, where they shed sweat as whips lashed and bloodied their skin. Obama might have avoided invoking names like Malcolm X in his stump speeches for practical reasons, but the blacks see him continuing the lineage of King, X & Company. But, they aren’t the only ones who look up to him; the Dalits of India, too, see Obama as a symbol of Black Power, a phenomenon they closely identify with. After all, America’s black movement has had a great influence on the Dalits’ fight for their rights.
So impressed was Ambedkar with Lincoln that when he launched a political party for Dalits, he called it the Republican Party of India – his tribute of Lincoln, the GOP leader who fought for ending slavery in the US. "Like Dalits in India, the blacks in US also fced discrimination in public transport, schools and jobs. When Ambedkar saw this, he could empathise with them and he supported their struggle," says Chandrabhan Prasad, Dalit activist and writer. "Even after he came back to India, Ambedkar kept following the black movement in the US.’
The fifties were feverish – for blacks in the US and Dalits in India. Fired up by the speeches of Martin Luther King Jr, the blacks began to believe that being born in America didn’t make them American. So, they began to fight for their rights. In 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat to white passenger in Mongomery. In 1956, King began to walk for the freedom of his people. In 1963, more than 200,000 people joined King’s March on Washington and listened to his "I have a Dream" speech with tears in their eyes. In India, Ambedkar closely followed the King’s moves and led more than 500,000 Dalits to take refuge in Buddhism in 1956.
During the next couple of decades, the blacks and the Dalits moved on parallel tracks, often influencing and guiding each other. As Dalits veered towards Buddhism, many blacks moved to Islam erected their own churches; the word Negro – a symbol of slavery – was replaced by Black. The Dalits too dumped the term Harijan "as a symbol of Gandhi’s upper caste politics". As Dalits got some benefits of reservation, the blacks Americans too fought for affirmative action and got it in 1965. In 1970, when Dalit Panther was founded by Namdev Dhassal, it was inspired by Black Panthers.
"Because both the communities see themselves as oppressed, there has always been mutual identification and influence between the blacks and Dalits," says Gail Omvedt, an American scholar who has spent decades in India, researching the caste system.
Although race and caste are not the same thing, in practice they are very similar both discriminate on the basis of birth. This week, as politics went beyond race in the US, triggering a wave of hope across the world, the obvious question being asked is: "Will India get its Obama anytime in the near future?" Though Omvedt feels UP Chief Minister Mayawati could be the one, K. P. Singh, who teaches sociology at University of Washington, seattle, is not so hopeful. "I think the Dalit leaders in India are not capable of doing this because they believe in political slavery to their respective parties, not the community. Most Dalit leaders except Ambedkar have betrayed the Dalits. Currently, all political leaders are busy fulfilling their ambitions and achieving their personal growth, but the Dalit community as a whole is left behind unrepresented and unheard,’ says Singh, who is one of the young and educated Dalits trying to link and inspire the Dalit movement with the Afro-american movement.
The inspiration has always been there. Now, thanks to Obama’s campaign and victory, there is a buzz about India’s next leader. "I don’t think that the Indian elite is going to put a Dalit at the top just like that, but they will be under a moral pressure to do so, particularly when the Dalits are all fired up with ‘yes, we can’ slogan of Obama," says Prasad.
Going by the parallel trajectory of the two movements, it shouldn’t be surprising if India, too, launches a leader like Obama. "He did not project himself as a product of the black movement, but the people, particularly the African-Americans, saw him that way. That’s important," says Omvedt. With a wide range of leaders claiming to be true inheritors of ambedkar’s legacy, the competition may be tough, but the Obama victory has done them a great favour: it has destroyed a myth and shattered a barrier between them and the future. As far as the Indian elite is concerned, they seem to be more comfortable with the status quo. "When the whole world was celebrating the change in the US, our leaders, led by the Gandhi family, were busy partying at the coronation of a king in the last kingdom of south Asia," says a Dalit leader of the Congress.
The Dalits seem to be following Malcolm X’s words that "the future belongs to those who prepare for it today". And now, with the great hope generated by Obama, the answer may be already blowing in the wind. It may just be a hope, but it will keep the Dalits going till they find their own Obama.

Simple assumptions

The Telegraph, Kolkata 3 October, 2008

Terrorism has mugged Indians into a greater sense of realism

Simple assumptions
Swapan Das Gupta

Till last month’s meltdown left them looking a bit silly, clever young conservatives on both sides of the Atlantic – the ideological progenies of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan – used to define themselves as liberals who had been mugged into reality. The self-image may be characteristically glib but, like all caricatures, was grounded in stark reality. The apparent collapse of an established moral order during the permissive Sixties and the comic inefficiencies of the socialist alternative first prompted cracks n the liberal edifice. However, it was the traumatic after effects of 9/11 and the growth of Islamist terrorism that transformed the shakiness into a full-blown crisis, a crisis of being that won’t be resolved even if Barack Obama wins the US presidency on a strong anti-incumbency plank.
The liberal perception of terrorism is based on a few simple assumptions. First, there is a belief that Muslim anger which transforms middle class kids into nasty suicide bombers is an expression of fury against "imperialist" America and "Zionist" Israel. After 9/11, for example, there were many voices that portrayed the suicide bombers as symbols of oppressed peoples determined to exact vengeance on an arrogant superpower. The implication is that a more sensitive America and a chastened (if not obliterated) Israel is the key to controlling terrorism, Without these two military powers running amok, or so the argument goes, Muslim ummah wouldn’t feel that the world is against it.
Secondly, the "roots of terrorism" in a country such as India is seen to have a socio-economic underpinning. Just as Maoist murderers are perceived as rebels against high-landlordism and feudal iniquity, the Student’s Islamic Movement of India and its colourful offshoot are regarded as angry victims of a community’s sustained deprivation. Here too the prescriptive remedy of liberals is for the government to implement the Rajinder Sachar committee recommendations, employ more Muslims in the organized private sector, and perhaps, have an Indian variant of the British Race Relations Act that deters discrimination, our-laws prejudice and makes it possible for Shabana Azmi to rent the apartment of her choice.
Thirdly, because of the perception that the roots of terror are so complex, liberals believe that the situation must not be exacerbated by intemperate over-reactions. Bred in an environment where punitive deterrence is no longer an aspect of schooling, liberals genuinely feel that terrorism must be fought by using the same laws as are applicable to ordinary law-breakers. Why, one of India’s aggressive liberal TV hostesses asked recently, don’t we treat the bombings in Bangalore, Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Varanasi and Delhi as violent crime, rather than a terrorist assault on India? Why are the vulgarians, they say, so insistent on implementing court orders and awarding capital punishment to one of those responsible for the attack on parliament in 1991? At a recent TV programme, troubled liberals asked why there are disproportionate numbers of Muslism in Indian prisons. The question seemed a transplant from Manhattan anguish over Middle America’s equation of criminality and the Black community.
Finally, there is a specifically Indian angle to the liberal view of terrorism and this, tragically, is centred on the principle of denial, whether fuelled by contrarians such as Michael Moore and Noam Chomsky or wild bloggers, there is a strong perception in the Muslim world that 9/11 was either an insider job or a Jewish conspiracy.
This remarkable piece of negationism has, in turn, bred a galaxy of theories that paint Indian terrorism as something other than what t seems. There is the colourful view that the mujahideen attack on the Indian parliament in 2001 was a sinister BJP conspiracy t polarize India and even provoke an India-Pakistan war. Those demanding freedom for Afzal Guru have based their arguments on this colourful recreation of events.
There is the also the perverse argument that the burning of two coaches of the Sabarmati Express in Godhra station in February 2002 was a state-sponsored ploy to create conditions for a witch-hunt of Muslims. This expedient theory has become the handle to denounce all those reports that suggest that 58 persons were burned to death by a hostile mob. The fact that there was a mob attack on the train in Godhra does not condone what happened in Gujarat subsequently. But to deny that what happened in Godhra station was a crime is perverse. To be an Indian liberal today means believing that 58 persons either committed suicide or died as a result of an electrical short-circuit.
Likewise, it has become fashionable to equate counter-terrorism with Islamophobia. Given the ideological nature of the present wave of bombings in Indian cities, it is inevitable that most, if not all, the suspects are likely to be Muslims. More to the point, they are also likely to be Muslims whose adherence to violence stems from a strong theological commitment. Predictably, this will involve some demonization of the community, and the belief that community organizations are not doing enough to deter this drift to waywardness. However, falling back on untenable platitudes, about the inherent pacifism of all religions and the automatic innocence of the terror suspects won’t improve community relations. It will deepen the polarization.
Grand generalizations centred on momentary hiccups are problematic. During the Khalistan inspired troubles in Punjab, the suspects were invariably Sikhs. At that time, there was a great deal of hand-wringing over the damage to the "Sikh psyche". After the anti-Sikh riots of 1984, there were also dark hints of unbridled majoritarianism. Some of the complaints of wrongful arrests and false encounters had some basis. It was also common knowledge that the secessionist movement was defeated by methods that bore greater resemblance to dirty Harry than Dixon of dock Green. However, ham-handedness and over-zealous policing did not mean that the Establishment had chosen to cast Sikhs out of the Indian nation. Some 15 years after peace returned to Punjab, is it possible to speak of any institutionalized discrimination of Sikhs?
India’s liberals are inclined to protest too much and lose sight of the larger picture. Last month, after two students were arrested after a well publicized ncounter in Delhi’s Muslim dominated Jamia Nagar, Mushirul Hasan, the Vice Chancellor of Jamia Millia Islamia, succumbed to sustained "community" pressure. In a series of ill-considered moves, he equated two alleged murderers with the institution. In a defiant speech, Hasan is reported to have urged students to not be defensive about the arrest of two colleagues, adding, "We owe no explanation to anyone except ourselves and to our faith that unambiguously eschews violence."
Hasan’s assertion was symptomatic of the growing perversion of the so-called Enlightenment tradition. It suggests that a person of impeccable liberal credentials like Hasan no longer feels the need to maintain a healthy detachment between a rarefied institution and the radicalization of Indian Muslims. As a liberal, Hasan was not afraid of swimming against the majoritarian consensus. Tragically, this contrariness merely guided him towards a ghettoized sense of victimhood- one that will be fuelled by the likes of the Indian Mujahideen. Hasan unwritingly confirmed the impression of Middle India that India’s English-speaking liberals are apologists of terror and the destruction of the Indian nation – a feeling that is certain to be strengthened now that the likes of Arundhati Roy have jumped into the Jamia Nagar defence campaign.
Terrorism has certainly mugged the Indian people into a greater sense of realism and an awareness of the threats. The liberal minusculity that has a commanding presence in academia and the media has, however, arrived at the novel conclusion that it owes the mugger a living.

All are entitled to live

New Indian Express, Chennai October 24, 2008

All are entitled to live

Those charged with terrorism have legal defence, political support and even media limelight. But what happened to those whose lives were taken without any rhyme or reason?

Indian society should first and foremost recognise the rights of the victims of terrorism. They also have the right to live, something that the terrorists do not recognise. Yes, even as an ordinary individual, Rajiv Gandhi also had the right to live.

The ongoing debate over the police encounter in Batla in New Delhi on September 19 highlights the partisan nature of the Indian polity. Not just political parties, even mainstream intelligentsia abandoned their responsibilities and took refuge under political correctness. It has become fashionable to treat terrorism as yet another form of violence and belittle its devastating consequences. Lives are important, rights are important but only that of those accused of terrorism. Victims of terrorism die in vain for they have no such rights. At least that is how mainstream India behaves.
We need to take a second look at this knee-jerk trade union mentality. Camaraderie is vital for a society but there are times this my member right or wrong attitude needs to change. Rallying around the flag should not be taken to absurd limits.
People holding public offices need to recognize that their responsibility is much wider than their immediate jobs. Social responsibility is larger than their responsibility to a particular institution.
The ongoing debate over terrorism exposes the narrow mindset of the political parties in the country. Moving the goal post is their mantra. They would demand the banning of Hindutva outfits like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal but take a different stand when it comes to SIMI or vice versa. The Bhartiya Janata Party demands the dismissal of the government of Assam for its failure to curb communal violence but sings a different tune over Karnataka and Orissa.
Thus the demand of the BJP for the resignation of the Vice-Chancellor of the Jamia Millia Islamia, Professor Mushirul Hasan, over his stand on the police encounter was accompanied by a deafening silence of its stalwarts over the spat of anti-minority violence that were taking place under their very noses.
But partisanship is not the prerogative of only of politicians. Same is true for a large number of the intelligentsia. Professor Mushirul Hasan, for example, explicitly condemned the New Delhi blasts only after, and not before, the BJP demanded his resignation. Similarly, those who vociferously argued against the demonisation of Jamia would refer only to ‘events of 19th September’ and not of 13th September that rocked the streets of New Delhi. This leads to the next question: guilt by association. No institution, organization or group should be held responsible for the activities f all its members. Even members f the same family are not accountable for the activities of other members of the family.
By no cannons of law, logic or moral standards, can one hold Jamia responsible for the alleged crimes of three of its members. Guilt by association will take us back to the Stone Age.
At the same time once cannot ignore similar situation faced by Saudi Arabia following the September 11 terror attacks on the US. Riyadh could not escape the harsh reality: fifteen out of 19 hijackers who carried the terrorist acts were Saudi nationals.
Many used the terror attack to launch a diatribe against the Gulf state, vilified Saudi society and even sought to demonise Islam. The Saudi state could not be held responsible for the actions of its citizens yet it could not escape from the negative consequences of their actions.
Despite its initial defences, eventually the House of Saud saw the episode as an opportunity for a serious introspection. It did not settle for ostrich like self-denial. Much of the ongoing internal debate in Saudi Arabia over Islam, reforms in the education system and even dialogue with other religions initiated by King Abdullah have to be traced directly to the negative repercussion of the September 11 attacks. Likewise, if the Jamia were to escape from the consequences of the alleged actions of his students, it needs serious introspection. This leads to the next question: human rights. Yes, all citizens have equal rights. Those charged with terrorism have rights to a fair trial and to be treated as innocent unless proven otherwise. They have to be provided adequate legal defence and an opportunity to clear their name. Without this the idea of India would disintegrate.
But in their eagerness to defend the rights of those accused of terrorism, mainstream political parties and intelligentsia alike, ignore some larger issues.
While everyone is innocent unless otherwise proven, those who are charged with terrorist violence could not be placed on par with ordinary citizens. They face serious charges of involvement in the slaughter of innocent civilians. Let us not forget that serial blasts in New Delhi, for example, killed 24 ordinary civilians who were going about their daily routine.
Those charged with terrorism have legal defence, political support and even media limelight. But what happened to those whose lives were taken without any rhyme or reason. Didn’t they have any rights?
Let us not vacillate or look for an escape clause. Terrorism is not an impulsive road rage. Nor is it unintended manslaughter. Terrorism is a cold-blooded, pre-mediated murder of innocent civilians. Just like the rights of the accused, one should also recognize the rights of the victims. We also need to go beyond parochial calculations in speaking out for everyone’s right to live: rights of victims, even if they happened to members of other caste, colour, race, religion and even nationality. One can be a critic of the Congress party and its dynastic politics. But one can still recognise late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s right to life.
His life was cut short by a well-planned well-organised and well-executed political murder carried out by the LTTE. His children were orphaned for no fault of theirs.
Sadly, unlike the slain Indian leader, Nalini Sridharan enjoyed legal defence and was tried and convicted under due process of law. On ‘humanitarian considerations’ her original death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. Now even this is not sufficient, and she and her supporters demand early release. Nalini’s conviction was neither an act of vengeance nor retribution but merely her harvest for her role in the cold blooded murder. Did anyone give a second chance to Rajiv Gandhi?
Rather than worrying about rights of terrorists and the need to protect them against draconian laws, responsible people have to recognize a higher value. Victims of terrorism also have rights. They had no opportunity to hear the charges against them. They enjoyed no legal defence. They are not agents of the state and nor are they linked to the supposed ‘injustice’ meted out to those indulging in terrorism.
This is not politically correct. The Indian society should first and foremost recognize the rights of the victims of terrorism. They also have the right to live, something that the terrorists do not recognize. Yes, even as an ordinary individual, Rajiv Gandhi also had the right to live!

Where are the baby girls?

The New Sunday Express, Chennai October 5, 2008
i.witness
Section 2

Where are the baby girls?

In Andhra Pradesh’s tribal hamlets daughters are at a severe disadvantage.

If a girl escapes death at infancy she is considered lucky, but not for long.

She may be sold for a sum ranging from Rs. 2,000 to Rs. 12,000,

V K Rakesh Reddy finds.

Infant mortality is a given in any poor community, but in Andhra Pradesh’s tribal hamlets (tandas) of Devarakonda mandal, mothers often "lose" their daughters. It is quite common for at least one girl child in a family to go missing this way. On the very day this reporter sat down to file this story, a little girl was rescued from a fate that could have been anything from being sold to a stranger to being done to death.
The latter seems to be a common fate of girls in several mandals, Devarakonda, Dindi, Chandampeta, PA Pally and Chintapally in Nalgonda district. If a girl escapes death at infancy she is considered lucky – but not for long. She is usually sold for a sum ranging from Rs. 2,000 to Rs. 12,000.
There are over 300 tandas in these mandals adjoining the Nallamala forests of the state. Its inhabitants are essentially people whose world collapsed when the British Raj took away their right to the forests around which their lives revolved. Since then, they have more or less drifted on the margins, mostly illiterate and untrained, desperately poor.
Ten years ago, Lavdiya Bheetni of Jodubai tanda sold her daughter – her ninth child – for Rs. 2,000 to someone she had never even heard of. Her previous eight deliveries had resulted in three stillborn babies. Of the five who survive, four are girls and one is a boy.
"We had to sell her," she says. "We had nothing to eat and had taken to begging on the streets of Hyderabad. That Rs. 2,000 saw us back in the tanda along with our other kids," Bheetni adds with a shudder (many women in her position have been arrested and prosecuted by police on the basis of media reports).
In the absence of official records, it may be surmised that Devarakonda mandal has seen around 3,000 infanticides, foeticides or illegal adoptions over the last 10 years. Even this figure could be a gross underestimate.
Nearly every family has a horrific tale to tell. Indravat Vijaya is a mother of three, including a boy who is chronically ill. She gave away a girl, child to "Buyala" (Telugu for cradle), a body funded by Green Cross, a local NGO. It has kept cradles at various locations where mothers can leave an unwanted child without questions being asked. The child is cared for by the NGO or under the Integrated Child Development Services scheme.
Asked how she felt giving her two-day-old baby away, Vijaya’s eyes brimmed over, even as people around her described her helplessness in the matter.
"You will not understand the pain, sir. Only a mother will," says D. Venkatamma.
"Such stories are common here. A few years ago, these people used to sell their children. But once it became public knowledge, they fell back on an even worse option – killing the girl child," adds Venkataramana, who heads Green Cross. The NGO works in the tribal hamlets on various issues.
The daughters that remain with their parents generally suffer from malnutrition. A great many babies suffer from Kwashiorkor (a type of malnutrition commonly believed to be caused by insufficient protein intake) and Marasmus (a form of severe protein-energy malnutrition characterized by energy deficiency which often proves fatal), although official records might gloss over this fact.
"Had it not been for protein supplements given by dedicated ICDS supervisors on a day-to-day basis, things would have been much worse," says Venkataramana, acknowledging the services of Bhagyamma and Venkatamma, both of whom are ICDS supervisors stationed at Devarakonda.
There are no roads to Pandiriguntapalli tanda and other such places. Even if there are, the bus services are few and far between. This means that pregnant women have no chance of anything like expert pre- and post-natal care – if they can afford it in the first place. Many give birth in the hamlet itself.
But the root of the problem is the irrational preference for a male child. Ironically, even the women prefer boys. "What good is a female child?" is the rhetorical question of Islavat Suvali, a celebrity of sorts in Pandiriguntla tanda for her "feat" of giving birth to three male children consecutively.
Another major reason for girl children being sold or killed is the belief that a woman will "under any circumstances" conceive a male child in her fifth pregnancy.
"Their husbands ask them to come home with a male child from their mothers’ homes," says Lavdiya Kesli. "If the child is a female, often the maternal grandparents themselves put it to death or abandon it. They are afraid that if the son-in-law learns that he has had a daughter he will take another wife," she explains. Kesli, and elderly woman, herself gave birth to 12 children, 11 of them daughters.
"I gave two of my daughters to the same man because the first wasn’t able to conceive a male child," she says. "It is better that he took her sister rather than some unrelated woman," she maintains.
The state government has not been idle, but seems unable to make any headway. It announced a package of Rs. 26 crore for the region some time ago. Some of the money went into the hands of middlemen while the rest was used to start a sheep-rearing scheme to give the tribals a source of livelihood. The intention was good, but the scheme was ill-conceived as Devarakonda gets hardly any rain. Moreover, the tribal areas are excessively rocky. Pasturage, consequently, proved inadequate. In the end, defeated, the tribals simply slaughtered most of the animals.
The government should study ground realities carefully before taking up schemes, suggests Venkataramana. Something like that is certainly needed f Nalgonda’s daughters are to be saved from death or worse.

Political parties are root of all vice: Shankaracharya

H.T., Patna 9.11.08

Political parties are root of all vice: Shankaracharya

Sanjay Sahay, Bokaro, Nov 8

SHANKARACHARYA OF Puri, Swami Nischalanand Saraswati, has said that the policies adopted by various political parties are responsible for the problems besetting the country. He alleged that the rise of Hindu militant groups was also the product of wrong party policies.
"The political parties have mistaken the liberal attitude of the Hindu community as its weakness and taken many decisions that challenge the age-old beliefs of the community," he said. He pointed out the stand taken by the leaders on the issue of Ram Setu Bridge was an instance. He also alleged that the suppression of the common practices and beliefs of the community had led some to react violently.
Saraswati however pointed out that during riots the common man, who is least concerned with the disputes, gets affected. "Since policies of political parties are the causes of violent incidents, their members should be punished," he said.
He said that the parties are only interested in grabbing power, adding, they are using religion, caste and regional feelings to build vote-banks. Recently Maharashtra Navnirman Sena has gained publicity owing to its anti-north Indian stand, opined Saraswati.
On the case of Sadhvi Pragya, the Shankaracharya said that it was too early to pass a judgement, as the accusations raised against her were yet to be proved in the court. He said that the police had accused several public figures in the past too, but had not been successful in proving such charges.
Incidentally, Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur was arrested on October 23. She had been arrested for murder, attempt to murder, conspiracy for a terror act, unlawful assembly, making bomb and various sections of the Unlawful Activities Preventions Act and Explosives Act.

Saffron has a go at history

HT, Patna 9.11.08

Saffron has a go at history

With Malice Towards One And All
Khuswant Singh

I WASN’T aware that the Hindu Mahasabha and the RSS had set up many schools across the country, known as Saraswati Shishu Mandirs and Vidya Bharti Schools. The number of teachers employed runs into thousands; the number of students into hundreds of thousands. They also have a publishing house to print their own text books. I was happy to learn that as our country needs more schools – the more the better – as well as more text-books. However, when I discovered what they teach in these schools, I was sorely disappointed. It is make-believe historical fiction to boost our morale and foster suspicion and hatred against Indian born minorities who don’t share the same kind of pride in our past, notably Muslims and Christians.
To start with, it is assumed that Bharat Varsha is co-terminous with Aryavarta: Dravidians, who were Indians before the Aryans came to inhabit the southern half of our country, are ignored. Their role model is Adolf Hitler who purged Aryan Germany of semitic races by gassing millions of Jews and Gypsies, while Germans of today regard Hitler as the devil-incarnate and are ashamed of him. RSS & Sena leaders hero-worship him.
Buddhism and its great propagator, Emperor Ashoka, who preached ahimsa (non-violence) were, according to them, unmitigated disasters as they robbed us of our martial qualities, made us cowardly and unable to resist marauding muslim armies wielding swords in one hand and Koran in the other: they were, according to K. B. Hedgewar, founder of the RSS, "hissing Yavana snakes". A few examples from these text-books are pertinent: Muslims’ greatest wish to have a darshan of the black stone, shivalinga, installed in Mecca. The Qutub Minar of Delhi was built by Emperor Samudragupta and known as the Vishnu Stambha. (The fact that it is festooned with verses from the Koran is not mentioned).
It is asserted that the Babri Masjid was never a Masjid because namaaz was never performed in it. (Photographs of the building before demolition showed three domes and a wall facing Mecca). An outrageous statement was made by the present head of the RSS, K. S. Sudarshan, in November 2001 in which he dismissed eminent historians as ‘anti Hindu’ Euro-Indians.
He claimed that "in ancient India, we knew about nuclear energy and sage Bharadwaja and Raja Bhoj not only described the construction of aeroplanes, but also discussed details like what types of aeroplanes would fly and at what height." It is not surprising that all this so-called history fabricated earlier was given respectability during the tenure of Murli Manohar Joshi as Education Minister in the Vajpayee-led BJP government. Joshiji also initiated astrology as a subject in universities. However, while his horoscope assured him victory, he lost the election to the Lok Sabha.
A significant outcome of the kind of history being taught in these schools is downgrading the role of Mahatma Gandhi in the freedom movement and exalting that of Veer Savarkar. Though Savarkar was acquitted on technical grounds of the charge of conspiracy to kill Gandhi, the Justice Kapur Commission later squarely implicated him as the man who inspired the foul deed. His portrait was installed in Parliament House during the rule of the B.J.P. Before you accuse me of anti-RSS and BJP bias, take a look at a booklet – RSS, School Texts and the Murder of Mahatma Gandhi (Sage). It is complied by three distinguished professors of history at JNU (Aditya Mukherjee, Mridula Mukherjee and Sucheta Mahajan). The source of every quotation is given to prove its authenticity. The basic text is barely 80 pages.
Finally, ask yourself, is this kind of brainwashing of young minds and filling them with hate good for the country? It will turn our sweet dreams of a hate-free Hindustan into a nightmare of vicious civil strife.
My angry neighbour
MY NEXT-DOOR neighbour Reeta Devi Verma of Cooch Bihar is a very angry person. She is a Hindu-Buddhist who worked with Mother Teresa sometime after she quite her job as an Air India hostess. She continues her association with the Sisters of Charity in Guwahati and Delhi. Her current occupation is running two mobile clinics donated to her Ila Trust by Sir Elton John and Cabinet Minister Kapil Sibal. She takes them to different parts of Delhi and gives free medical aid and medicines to the needy. Her latest beat includes Batla House in Jamia Nagar.
At one time, among many of her callers was Naveen Patnaik, currently Chief Minister of Orissa. Through her I met him a couple of times. He was then busy writing about nature. I found him urbane, sophisticated, soft-spoken and cultured. Also, at the same time, effeminate. I think he wasn’t cut out to be a politician or an administrator. However, riding on the esteem his father Biju Patnak enjoyed in Orissa, he found himself at the helm of affairs of his home state.
He has evidently failed to stamp out anti-Christian violence perpetrated by a rabid section of Bajrang Dal. His police pay little heed to his orders and let vandals burn churches and molest nuns. In short, he has proved to be an incompetent and effete ruler of a large and important state. So Reeta Devi lost her cool and fired off and angry letter to him. It goes somewhat as follows: "Dear Naveen: You might recall the days when you used to drop in on me. You might remember I gave you a Mother Teresa rosary because I thought you admired her and the work her Missionaries of Charity were doing. I am disappointed by your inability to put down goondagardi against Christians. I am ashamed of you."

Brown man's burden

HT, Patna, Sunday November 9,2008

Brown man’s burden

The Obama victory shows us that we may be the world’s largest democracy, but America is the world’s greatest democracy. It’s not just the obvious fact of a Black man getting to the White House. It’s also the way in which he did it, by taking on the powers that be in his party and by refusing to run as the caricature ‘Black candidate’. In India, we are a long way from that point.
IS THERE anything left to say about Barack Obama’s victory after so many days of saturation media coverage? And even if there is, wouldn’t you rather hear it from Maureen Dowd. Thomas Friedman and all the other top American columnists whose pieces are so widely reproduced in Indian papers these days? Do you really want the perspective of an Indian outsider? (One who told you many months ago that he thought John McCain would win!).
Of course, you don’t.
So I’m not going to give you the benefit of my two bits on why Obama won, on what his victory means for Black America or what he should do now.
But yes, there is something that we don’t talk about often enough. And that’s about how they conduct elections in America and how it shows up our own political system for the tawdry, ideologically bankrupt, family business that it really is.
Let’s start with the biggest mistake that all of us are making: projecting an Indian matrix on the US election. "Isn’t Obama’s victory great?" we say. "Do you think Mayawati could ever become Prime Minister?" Or, "This shows the growing power of the black community in the US."
It’s understandable that we should see things this way. Over the last ten years, politics in India have become increasingly about identity. People ask us to vote for them not because of what they’ve achieved or even what they’ll do but because of the families they were born into.
At its simplest level, this is about dynasty. Vote for me, they say, because I am the daughter or the son of so and so. At a more complex level, it is about caste, ethnicity and religion: vote for me because like you, I am a Dalit/ a Reddy/ a Jat/ a Yadav/ a Hindu etc.
Dalits are expected to vote for Mayawati, not because she is a great politician, but because they are Dalits and they should vote for a Dalit leader. The backwards will vote for Mulayam singh Yadav because he is one of them. And so on.
Issues are selected because of the appeal they will have to castes and communities. For instance, the BJP will focus on terrorism not necessarily because t is a serious problem but because the party hopes to capitalize on Hindu fears of violence from Muslims. Similarly Muslim leaders will go on about police brutality not necessarily because it is a genuine problem but because they want to make Muslims feel vulnerable and exposed.
The interesting thing about the Obama victory was that t was not predicated on identity. First of all, Obama is not a Black American by birth or upbringing. His father (who left when he was very young) was Kenyan, his mother was a white American and he was brought up by white grandparents. Whatever experience he has of the Black American identity came in later life and especially after his marriage to Michelle (who is a Black American). So, he was not campaigning on an accident of birth, in the way that say, Mayawati, Mulayam or Bal Thackeray do.
Secondly, his victory also ended another kind of birth-dominated politics. Ever since the first George Bush was elected in 1998, two families – the Bushes and the Clintons – have dominated American politics. After the second George Bush, we thought it would be the turn of Hillary Clinton.
Part of the significance of the Obama victory is that tmarks the triumph of democracy over dynasty. Hillary Clinton believed she had the Democratic nomination in her handbag. Nobody thought that a half Black, first-term Senator from Illinois had any chance of winning the nomination, let alone the Presidency.
It wouldn’t happen here. And it couldn’t happen here. Indian politics is now largly a family affair. Nearly everybody who matters (including Mayawati, incidentally) is in politics because of a parent, a husband, a boy friend, or whatever. Such is the hold of dynasty that non-dynasts hardly get room to breathe, let alone grow.
This is not to say that dynastic politicians are necessarily bad (nobody thinks Hillary was stupid; nor are many of our political sons and daughters) but only that they are dynastic politicians.
This was brought home to me when I read two excellent opinion pieces on the Obama victory in the Indian Express by two of India’s brightest young politicians, one from the Congress and one from the BJP. Both men very perceptive. But they were also sons of former ministers who had joined politics because it was the family tradition.
An Obama in India? Don’t see how: where’s the room?
It’s also important to recognize that Obama did not fight this election as the candidate of the Black community: he fought it as an American.
That rarely happens in India. Any minority candidate in India stands as the representative of the minority. His (or her) appeal is nearly always framed in terms of righting the injustices done to his (or her) community or, at the very least, of delivering future benefits to the community.
Can you imagine Mayawati standing for election and not promising to usher in a new era for Dalits? Where would be Thackerays be if they did not promise to advance the interests of Maharashtrians? Would there be any Muslim politics in India if leaders could not clam that Islam was in danger or that the Prophet had been insulted (by a Danish cartoonist, by Salman Rushdie or anybody else)?
In fact, some Black American leaders attacked Obama for not focusing enough on race. But he refused to change the tenor of his campaign, made no attempt to capitalize on victimhood and promised nothing special to his community.
Only once in his campaign did race become an issue that he was forced to confront and that was when TV channels focused on inflammatory speeches made by the pastor of his church. Even then, Obama did not play the Black victim of white racism. Instead, he made a brilliant and complex speech (possibly his finest of the campaign) in which he called for greater understanding between races, recalling that his white grandmother was often frightened when she saw Black people.
Can you see any Indian politician rising to that level? Any Indian politician refusing to capitalize on his minority status? Hell, we live in a country where even the so-called party of the majority community likes to pretend that all Hindus are victims (of jehad, of ‘pseudo-secularism’ and God alone known what else) so that it can win their votes.
We underestimate the strength of American democracy at our peril. Over the last few years, with a moron in the Oval Office, it had become easy to sneer at America. And certainly, American politics has its dark side and its share of clowns (the appalling Sarah Palin for instance, who only learnt during the campaign that Africa was a continent, not a country).
The Obama victory shows us that we may be the world’s largest democracy, but America is the world’s greatest democracy. It’s not just the obvious fact of a Black man getting to the White House. It’s also the way in which he did it, by taking on the powers that be in his party and by refusing to run as the caricature ‘Black candidate’. Which other country has an electoral system that is so truly representative that a man can come from virtually nowhere and end up in the White House?
We are a long way from that point. Over the last two decades, Indian politics has got worse rather than better: obsessed with caste, predicated on identity, favouring regional perspective over national interest and filling its ranks with the sons and daughters of the powerful.
When Obama stood up in Chicago and declared, "If there is anybody out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible… today is your answer", we had to agree.
And, for one, wondered when such a day would come in India.