[sacw] SACW Dispatch | 2 Aug. 00

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Web Dispatch
2 August 2000
http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex

#1. Pakistan: Cement factory workers loose jobs for forming union
#2. India: Political myth-making about a flood of Bangladeshi migrants in A=
ssam
#3. India: Tributes to Ali Sardar Jafri
#4. India: When the Hindu Lunatic Fringe (VHP / Bajarang Dal) Becomes Centr=
e
#5. India Pakistan Arms Race & Militarisation Watch No 19 (August 2, 2000)
_____________________

#1.

60 Cement Factory workers lost job for forming the union.
Help the Workers in their fight.

By: Farooq Tariq

Dada Bhai Cement Factory, Norrieabad District Dadu, Sind has become
the focus of attention of the labour movement in Pakistan and
internationally. So for, 60 factory workers have lost their jobs for
the crime of forming a union. The factory owner had successfully
blocked the registration of the union with the Labour department. The
leaders of Progressive Workers Union have appealed against the
decision at National Industrial Relation Commission (NIRC). 15 workers
leaders were arrested for breaching the Industrial Peace at the
factory, released on bail are among 60, who have been kicked out of
the factory.

>From 28th June to July 7th, police from Dada Bhai Cement Factory
Norrieabad arrested 13 workers; district Dadu, Sind province of
Pakistan. Their crime was an attempt to form a new union at the
factory. But police charged them for breaking the industrial peace and
other criminal charges. A local court at Hyderabad accepted a bail
plea of the workers and they were released. But the charges are still
there.

Workers from the factory applied to National Industrial Relation
Commission of Pakistan (NIRC) to register a union called progressive
Labour Union Dada Bhai Cement Factory. Workers elected Younas Rahoo as
their general secretary in their mass meeting attended by workers
during May 2000. All other attempts to form a union at the factory
were foiled by the Hasan Dada Bhai, the owner of the factory for the
last 17 years. His family is one of the 22 families who at one time
controlled over 70% of the total economy in Pakistan. Still they are
one of the richest in Pakistan.

Bosses argued in the court against workers plea for a new union on the
ground that there exists a union at Dada Bhoi, s industrial units and
there is no need of a new union. The existing union is a yellow union,
which had been registered by the bosses few years to stop any attempts
of the workers to form the genuine union earlier, to stop any attempts
of the workers to form the genuine union. The union advocates
challenged that plea of the bosses and they gave evidences that some
of that registered union officials have gone out of the country. Four
of them who voted at a referendum held at the factory were already
dead on the date of the referendum. But the NIRC local judge at
Hyderabad decided against the workers request to register a new union.

Within 24 hours of this rejection, the Hyderabad police arrested 9
workers including the general secretary of the union Younas Rahoo.
Earlier, the factory management went to the village of Younas Rahoo
and offered his family Rupees 2 million ($40,000). The father of
Younas rejected this.

The progressive Labour union affiliated itself with Watan Dost Mazdoor
Federation (WDMF), one of the main components of Pakistan Workers
Confederation. The Secretary General of WDMF, Aziz Abbasi, a
nationally known trade union leader along with Dost Mohammed Channa,
Chairman Labour Party Sind province went to jail with the bail paper
for the release of the nine workers, they were arrested on the
instruction of a Military serving Major. Both were released on bail on
3rd of July after three days in Jail. There were been two more arrest
on 4th July.

Most of the union activists have gone into hiding, as they fear more
arrest. The underground activists addressed a press conference on 5th
July At Labour Party Office in Karachi and reiterated their commitment
to form the union what come may. They accused the military officials
at Hyderabad acting on the instructions of the bosses and making
arrests for no reasons.

Since then, 60 workers have lost their jobs at the factory. Their main
crime was to collect the funds for the new union. Most of these
workers have gone back to their villages. But 11 of them have decided
to stay at Hyderabad and fight till the union is formed. They have
collected some funds and have appealed at the NIRC Islamabad against
the decision of the local judge.

On 29th July 40 brave workers of the factory demonstrated outside the
Hyderabad Press Club to demand the reinstatement of the 60 and
recognition of the union by the bosses. On 30th July, over 300 present
at Karachi Press Club building at a conference on the theme of "No To
IMF, World Bank, Do Not Pay the Debts" organized by Labour Party
Pakistan, demanded unanimously for the same demands. The leaders of
the factory union also spoke at the occasion. On 23rd July, Over 300
demanded the reinstatement of the Cement Factory at a meeting of the
Railway workers at Rawalpindi Press Club. There are several more
meetings are planned for the month of August at different district of
Sind. These meetings are part of the preparations for a planned mass
meeting of the workers at the factory gate during the month of
September. Earlier on 10th July, the workers of Mir Purr Mathelo
Fertilizer factory blocked National High Way for one hour. Over a
thousand workers participated in the blockade.

Since October 99, when military took over power, there is a ban on
strikes and public activities. But several ministers have claimed
again and again that there is no ban on the activities of the trade
unions. The reality is that the bosses have taken the liberty to
attack the unions. Military is also taking economic measures, which
goes against the interests of the working class. The introduction of
15% General Sales Tax is one example of that. The prices of Petrol,
Railways, Gas, electricity and transport have gone up during the last
eight months of the military government. But there has been no wage
increase.

In this background, the action of the Dada Bhai Cement factory is one
of the many attacks of the trade union activists around the country.
Railway workers at the workshops have lost at least 30% of their wages
in the shape of a ban on overtime and peace work. Those trade union
leaders who dared to fight against this have been transferred to far
off places from Lahore where they have worked over twenty years. This
is sheer victimization.

One example is of Saif Ur Rehman of Lahore. He is general secretary of
Railway Workers union workshops division. He along with other workers
led the movement of the workers against the military officials posted
at railway administration. He alongside several others has been
transferred to Hyderabad as a punishment. Today on 6th July, the
railway administration even refused to pay him the wages. 8 Railway
workers in Rawalpindi were arrested for few days after they organized
successful demonstration against the demolition of railway workers
quarters.

It is worth noting that all those workers arrested at Rawalpindi or
Hyderabad is members or leaders of the newly established Labour Party
of Pakistan. LPP had held its first congress in April this year at
Lahore where most of the presently arrested workers were present. LPP
has opposed the military regime from the day one. Some of the Left
parties still support the military regime, as this is a liberal
government.

It is clear that military regime want to implement of the so-called
liberal economic agenda of IMF and World Bank. They want to sell out
the family silver. They like to go on for "right sizing" of the public
sector. They want to lay off over 100.000 workers. Only the unions can
fight this onslaught. That is why there is a great resistance of the
bosses to stop the workers to form the unions. But workers like those
of Dada Bhai are determined to go on fighting.

They need your support. Please send your protest messages to the
followings

Hasan Dada Bhai
Dada Bhai Cement Factory head office
Tel: 92 21 4545704 Fax 92 21 4918476
Email: mhdadabhoy@c...

Federal Minister of Labour
Umer Asghar Khan
Fax: 92 51 9224890

Mr. Zia Mahmood Mirza
Chairman National Industrial Relation Commission
Fax: 92 51 9205920

Chief Executive
General Pervaiz Musharaf
Email: ce@p...

Copies: Labour Party Pakistan
Email: lpp@l...

The Union has asked the Labour Party Pakistan to set up a fund to help
the workers who have lost their jobs.

Please send your donations to

Education Foundation Donations
Account number 116 1774808 090
ANZ Grind leys Bank, Gulberg Branch Lahore, Pakistan

From:

Farooq Tariq
General Secretary
Labour Party Pakistan

Date:
31-7-2000

______

#2.

Himal
August 2000
http://www.himalmag.com/aug-2000/content/cover.htm

Political myth-making in postcolonial Assam

The claim of the politicians of Assam, that their state is being overrun by
a continuing flood of Bangladeshis coming north across the border seems
exaggerated. And going back to a 1951 cut-off date to
identify who is 'non-indigenous' would put at peril millions of Muslims
who, for all purposes, are Assam's own.

-by Anindita Dasgupta

"There is no doubt, of course, that those displaced persons who have come
to settle in India are bound to have their citizenship. If the law is
inadequate in this respect, the law should be changed."

-Jawaharlal Nehru in "Refugees and Other Problems", Jawaharlal Nehru=92s
Speeches, Vol:2 (New Delhi,1967).

Ever since the time of Independence, the constant political refrain in this
pivotal state of the Indian Northeast has been the 'inundation' it is said
to be facing from East Bengali, later Bangladeshi, "illegal" migrants. It
was this issue which fuelled the sons-of-soil Assam agitation of the late
1970s and early 1980s; and even today, no week passes without a politician
making a speech, or a newspaper printing a report or editorial, about
Bangladeshi in-migration. The fear of the Asamiya-speaking indigenous
population is of being demographically, politically and culturally swamped
by Muslims from Bangladesh.

It is a potent invitation to anxiety, and one which has been used to its
fullest by the political elites of Assam. Not only has this matter of
migrating Muslims from across the slack southern border been one of the
defining themes of Assam politics, it is taken largely as a given by the
academics and journalists in other parts of India and elsewhere.

But there is another point of view. An opinion that has long been whispered
among a section of academics in Assam is that the migration is not as
massive as it is portrayed. Certainly, there has been significant inflow of
people in the first decades of the 20th century, but the claim of a
threatening, and continuing influx since Independence, and more
particularly since the all-important cut-off year of 1971, does not seem
plausible. As in so many other developing societies of South Asia, in Assam
too, myths and dogma take root, develop their own reality, and begin to
dictate political debate unchallenged by the mainstream media, academia or
larger intelligentsia. Such is also the case with what can only be called
the myth of continuing Bangladeshi migration into Assam.

The complete article is avaialble at:
http://www.himalmag.com/aug-2000/content/cover.htm
[for those who cant access the WWW and may want the article they should
write for copies of the full text]
______

#3.

Rediff on the Net
REPORT August 1, 2000
http://www.rediff.com/news/2000/aug/01sardar.htm

A giant among poets

Lata Khubchandani in Bombay

Ali Sardar Jafri, who passed away after a prolonged battle with cancer on
Tuesday, was perhaps one of India's best known poets. He is fondly
remembered by his friends and associates at the Progressive Writers
Association and the Indian People's Theatre Association.

Prem Dhawan, a longtime friend and co-writer at IPTA, says, "He was a very
dear friend. I've known him since before the Partition and we've done a lot
of work together. We wrote songs together for films like Dharti ke Lal,
Pardesi etc. I wrote music for a number of documentaries he made for Films'
Division. He's done some fabulous work on people like the poet Iqbal. I
used to compose music for these. He was a man of varied interests. I
remember him making a documentary on tourism. We all belonged to the PWA
and have been together for a long time. I remember the film Dharti Ke Lal
was made in 1946 and Pandit Ravi Shankar had given the music while
Jafrisaab and I had written the lyrics. We were all Leftists and shared
many ideals. We toured the country together. Sardar Jafri received more
awards than anyone I know. He worked so much for the prosperity of the Urdu
language - Urdu Shairi, Urdu poetry and the language itself received a big
fillip through him."

Says veteran journalist Pt Razdan, "Very few people had his felicity of
expression in Urdu, it was poetry par excellence along with depth of
thought - I remember his recent poems and one of these spoke of
Hindu/Muslim tensions. It said, 'Guftugu band na ho'... 'Aap Lahore ko
laiyiye hum Benaras laate hain'. It was just an incredibly beautiful
thought. His work will stand the test of time because it reflected what
he'd seen and heard and was based upon real actualities.'

Dhawan continues, "The PWA was started by Sajjad Zahir and people like Josh
Malihabadi, Majaz Lucknowi, Sahir Ludhianvi, Kaifi Azmi, Sardar Jafri and
Majrooh Sultanpuri were all part of it. We all used to meet on Sundays."

"Jafri has written a lot of beautiful poetry. His greatness lies in the
fact that he has written books on Sant Kabir and Mirabai both in Urdu and
Hindi. For the progress of the Urdu language he took a lot of concessions
from the government and worked hard at popularising it and keeping it
alive. He believed that if Urdu was to remain alive then the work of Urdu
poets should be published in Hindi to make it accessible to those who
couldn't read the Urdu/Arabic script."

"Currently he had just finished work on a book on Mir Taki Mir - it was in
the printing stages. That's the kind of work he made available to the
public - something that cannot be valued," Dhawan said

Javed Akhtar, an acknowledged writer himself received particular
benevolence from Jafri. In fact when Akhtar's first book of poetry,
Tarkash, was published recently, Jafri wrote the preface praising the
coming of age of this son of Jan Nissar Akhtar.

Akhtar, on his way to Jafri's funeral, said, "What can I say? He was
perhaps the biggest living poet in India or even in the sub-continent. He
was not only a poet but an intellectual, a thinker and a great symbol of
national integration. All the positive values that this society can think
of were embodied in him. Recently when Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee
took the bus ride to Pakistan he had taken a cassette of Jafri's poems in
which he'd written about Hindustan and Pakistan and the relationship
between the two countries. Sardar Jafri was a great linguist and a thinker.
It's a great loss. I can't even recall how long my association with him has
been - he's been part of my life ever since I became conscious of the world
around me. He, my father my uncle were all in the PWA. He was very kind to
me, when I was getting my book Tarkash published he was the only person I
showed the book to and he wrote a beautiful article about my poetry."

Sardar Malik, father of composer Anu Malik, too was an associate of
Jafri. He says, "What a fearless writer he was. If we just pay tribute to
him and put away his work, that'll be doing him a grave injustice. If we
can bring alive his thoughts that'll be a real tribute but just saying he
was a great writer is shortchanging this man's depth. Once Faiz Ahmad Faiz
said, "I'm not interested in your saying that I'm a great writer. If
instead you can get my thoughts that'll be enough for me." I'd say the same
for Sardar Jafri - if you close a man's mouth and then tell him to speak
that's not much use - now that he's no more it would be appropriate to keep
alive his thoughts. I've known him since the IPTA days. He was one of the
finest writers I've ever met. His thought was so deep that most people
couldn't understand him. But those who did, could write reams on him. He
had so much to him," he says.

Composer Khayyam says, "He's been one of the biggest poets of our country
- he was part of the progressive writers movement and in his poetry you
always found a glimpse of the fact that the underdog should get his rights
- he worked for unity and wrote extensively about it. All of us were
enamoured of his poetry, we were enthused by what he wrote and when we sat
with him we always learnt from him. We used to meet at Red Flag Hall, his
place in Girgaum where Leftist meetings were held. Jafri's contribution to
India is of no mean order. He was a scholar and whatever awards he got he
fully deserved. It was my good fortune that he wrote for two of my films -
Footpath and Dhobi Doctor - in fact two great writers Sardar Jafri and
Majrooh Sultanpuri wrote for these films. As a human being he was wonderful
- you felt he loved the whole of humanity - he never spoke ill of anyone.
In fact even in a light moment I never heard loose talk from him. He
always looked at the positive points of everybody - and this is a mark of
greatness. In India's Urdu literature his place is supreme and for those
who love literature his passing away is a great loss. But one should keep
such artistes alive by giving importance to their work. I've been meeting
him since 1947 and whenever I got to attend meetings where he was present I
always learnt from him. He had so much to communicate. Just to sit with him
was my good fortune. Not everyone has this good fortune."

______

#4.

The Hindustan Times
Wednesday, August 2, 2000, New Delhi

Opinion=20

When fringe becomes centre

(Dominic Emmanuel asks whether VHP-Bajrang Dal is a representative of all
Hindus)

A survey was carried out
on the Hindustan Times Internet edition which asked respondents to answer
the following question: =93Do the VHP-Bajrang Dal have the right credential=
s
to represent Hindu opinion in any dialogue with Christian leaders?=94

The results showed that a good 52.44 per cent believed that the
VHP-Bajrang Dal did not have the right credentials.

One often looks with suspicion at quantitative surveys such as those
conducted every day by various organisations to measure the success or
failure of a product or an idea. However, even those suspicious of such
surveys concede that these do indicate a firm trend and markets often use
them to boost their sales.

The HT poll result raised some basic questions for the larger thinking
public. For instance, were some of the Christian lay leaders completely off
the mark in raising questions which the poll attempted to answer? Were they
being led into a trap? How did the VHP, which has been throwing a blatant
challenge to the Prime Minister, the Supreme Court, the Constitution of
India and the Government on the question of the Ram temple, suddenly become
so docile to the call of the National Commission for Minorities?

And how could the Bajrang Dal, which is running camps for mostly
unemployed youth and training them to use guns all over Uttar Pradesh, show
such meek readiness for

dialogue? Did their docility and meekness have anything to do with the
Bajrang Dal engaging with the National Human Rights Commission after the
vituperative statements it made about =91ousting=92 Christians from this
country and that Christians were even a greater threat than Muslims?

How the NCM itself came to believe that the two sides =97 the VHP-Bajrang
Dal and the Churches =97 were equal partners in dialogue is more than
intriguing. The NHRC had not called upon the Christian leaders and asked
them to explain and/or withdraw their statements against anyone. Was it
that the NHRC, unlike the NCM, was able to distinguish that among the two
parties, one was aggrieved and the other the aggressor, hence not equal
partners in dialogue?

The poll results also make a good case that the respondents were perhaps
more perceptive than one would initially think. The result only gives
figures in percentages. It does not, for example, say what led the
respondents to state what they did. What leads to these responses is the
basic question of whether the current problem of Christian-bashing in the
country is merely a VHP-Christian community problem or something larger
than that. The Church leaders have repeatedly emphasised that they feel
safe among the =91larger Hindu society=92 but feel unsafe at the hands of
fringe, lunatic fundamentalist groups.

Or does the NCM plan a series of dialogues, say between VHP-Bajrang Dal
and Muslims; VHP-Bajrang Dal and Sikhs and Buddhists and so on? Who would
arrange a dialogue between the VHP-Bajrang Dal and Deepa Mehta, for
instance, for burning the sets of her film Water? Were L.K. Advani and Bal
Thackeray the right dialogue partners in the controversy of India-Pakistan
cricket match series after the pitch was dug up in Delhi? Is the
VHP-Bajrang Dal working under a larger design to assimilate the Sikhs,
Buddhists, Jains and tribals into one group on the one hand and isolate the
other minorities as =91enemies of the country=92 on the other?

The Christian leaders were blamed by the VHP-Bajrang Dal combine for
=91backing out=92 of the dialogue for =93fear of being exposed to truth=94.

The Christian leadership did not have to blow its trumpet about a
readiness for dialogue as it had already once engaged in such an exercise
with some prominent leaders like BJP president Kushabhau Thakre, RSS chief
K.S. Sudarshan, VHP general secretary Narender Modi and a host of others.

This so-called =91dialogue=92, organised by some non-resident Indians from=
the
United States, took place on December 18, 1998 at the Delhi office of the
Catholic Bishops=92 Conference of India. Sadly, a week after that dialogue,
which culminated in the delegation meeting Home Minister L.K. Advani, all
hell was let loose in Dangs district of south Gujarat against Christians.

That the Church leaders already had a dialogue is evidence enough that
they are open and keen on dialogue. But the fact of the matter is that the
churches were not really consulted =97 neither about the subject of dialogu=
e
nor about the dates. As it turned out, hardly any one of the Church leaders
was free for a meeting on July 11.

In the meantime, voices within the Church, mainly of lay Christians, began
to be raised. Before giving into the NCM call, they wanted the parameters
of this dialogue to be clarified. Who was really behind such a move? Who
was or was not consulted? The Church leaders, for example, came to know
about it only through newspaper reports. Would the Church leaders be giving
legitimacy to some fundamentalist groups? And indeed, even before the HT
poll results came out, does the VHP-Bajrang Dal, allegedly behind the
attacks on Christian churches and their institutions, possess the
credentials to speak for the larger tolerant Hindu community?

It would be certainly interesting to know the mind of the larger Indian
public and whether as a nation we are getting more religiously
fundamentalist or moving forward with modern times.

______

#5.

India Pakistan Arms Race & Militarisation Watch No 19 (August 2, 2000)
is now available at: http://www.egroups.com/group/IPARMW

All the back issues of IPARMW are also available at the above address. The
first 18 issues have been distributed to all on the SACW list, but now
these would be available to only those who have expressed interest in
continuing to recieve IPARMW. If you are interested and would like to be on
a dedicated list of IPARMW recipients, then send a message to:
<subscribe-IPARMW@egroups.com>

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