[sacw] sacw dispatch (22 April 00)

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Web Dispatch #1
22 April 2000
__________________________

#1. Why has peace movement in India & Pakistan not taken off
#2. India: Communal by chance?
#3. Networking Groups Build Bridges Between Indians & Pakistanis
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#1.

The Friday Times
April 21-27, 2000

Why has peace movement in India and Pakistan not taken off?

Ejaz Haider says that to become meaningful, the peace movement needs to
work out a viable, alternative framework based on the acceptance of
certain ground realities

Despite all the bonhomie generated by people-to-people contact between
India and Pakistan, peace delegations that regularly cross over, and to
a lesser degree, the track two dialogue that has continued for nearly a
decade at various forums, India and Pakistan are, today, further apart
than at anytime since 1971. Has the peace movement failed? More
appropriately, did it ever take off?

These are important questions and seek to look into the causes of why
there has been no positive movement despite many efforts at various
levels.

The most important issue relates to the problem of a framework. What is
the framework, if any, in which peace movement has worked in India and
Pakistan? Since the statist paradigm on both sides is pegged to the
zero-sum game, it is obvious that the peace movement can make headway
only if it refuses to accept that paradigm. Assuming it does challenge
the statist model, it is only logical that it should provide an
alternative model. But while that model must necessarily be cooperative
rather than conflictual, a cooperative framework per se means nothing
unless its essentials are agreed upon by the concerned parties.
Therefore, while peace may be an ideal, for cooperation to have any
meaning in the realistic mould, it must be based on concrete categories
that are agreed upon by the concerned parties.

Clearly, then, for the cooperative framework to work in
contradistinction to the conflictual statist model, the peace movement
needs to define the elements of cooperation consistently and base its
efforts on agreed principles. Ironically, this is also the lesson of the
conflictual, statist model. While that model is evidently antithetical
to the peace movement, in terms of defining a framework, the movement
can learn from the fact that it perpetuates itself through categories
that are understood on both sides and accepted as underpinning the rules
of the game. Has the peace movement been able to work out a cooperative
framework whose categories are understood and accepted by both sides?

The answer is no. Firstly, the peace movement has not been able to
define a framework in terms of an alternative model; secondly, while one
witnesses a lot of bonhomie when activists from both sides sit together,
the talk generally evades substantive issues, or tackles them in a vague
manner because activists on both sides have not worked out categories -
unlike the states - that are understood and accepted by the two sides.
Therefore, we have a situation without the essentials that require to be
agreed upon by the two sides to work out a viable, alternative model.

Why is this so? The primary blame for this must lie - while honouring
exceptions - with the Indian side of the peace movement. Peace activists
from India may not like the BJP government, or India's nuclearisation,
or the Indian government's policies in Kashmir, or even New Delhi's
overtly hostile attitude to Islamabad, but they are no less imbibed with
the spirit of Indian "nationalism" - in the statist mould - than the
so-called hawks. In fact, in certain respects, the peaceniks'
nationalism may be more dangerous than the nationalism of the hawks
since the hawks at least work within the strategic, security paradigm
and therefore cannot evade the "reality" of Pakistan or the "fact" of
South Asia's nuclearisation. The peaceniks, on the other hand, begin
with a premise that works at two levels. They romanticise the idea of
peace without factoring in the realities of history and geography while
staying the course of a nationalism which requires that peace can only
be maintained if Pakistan stops bothering India and forgets about the
"irritants".

Pakistanis have often wondered at how easily Indians can trivialise
substantive issues like Kashmir. While the hawks do it on the basis of a
calculated equation - Pakistan's diplomatic, military and economic
strength versus India's - and pursue the conflictual model in the
confidence that Pakistan cannot alter the status quo through force,
peace activists advocate cooperation not on the basis of the acceptance
of irritants but on the basis of "peace" per se. Peace is the natural
thing, and it should be the desire of every sane person to live in peace
and amity. There should of course be no talk of the serpent in Eden.

Is it possible to have peace merely by talking about it without
accepting, in real terms, the ground realities? Evidently, not. It is
essential to factor in the ground realities. This is important for two
reasons. Acceptance of these realities will pull the peace movement down
from the ethereal plane where it has achieved nothing beyond expressing
pious sentiments; and it would allow the activists on both sides to
finally square up to those realities on the basis of an alternative,
cooperative, rather than the conflictual statist model. Such acceptance
would also test the true strength of the movement and its intentions
and, if the sentiment is genuine, compel the activists to agree to, and
set down, the basic categories with which to confront the statist model.

Why has that not happened? The answer lies largely in the Indians' sense
of nationalism which cuts across the internal political divisions. While
India has evinced much regionalism and many fissures, owing to New
Delhi's centrist policies, there has also been a subterranean process of
gelling together. This phenomenon is owed to the rising middle class in
India, which forms the backbone both of its intelligentsia and its
economy. While politics has been pulling India apart, economy has been
bringing it together. And the latter has proved a stronger incentive for
nationalism than the former.

There may be policy differences among political parties, as indeed there
are, but the ruling elites that formed the "nationalist" vanguard during
the movement against the British were, and remain, agreed on certain
broad principles relating to India's place under the sun. Much before
the BJP came on line, India's destiny was in the hands of the secular
Congress, and to a lesser degree, the left-wing communist parties. The
activists mostly hail from that tradition and inform the same
nationalist categories. Therefore, to think that they might have a
different conception of India's destiny will be a major miscalculation.

Nuclearisation provides a good insight into this phenomenon. Recent
books on India's nuclearisation, including George Perkovich's brilliant
account, bring out one essential common point: the BJP might finally
have gone in for the tests, but it came on-line at the tail-end of the
process. That India was to be a nuclear power commanded a state-society
consensus because India looked at the capability in terms of defining
its very existence, the coming of age of the post-modernist state. In
terms of the symbology of the post-modernist state, the other ingredient
is Information Technology (IT). The classical combination of military,
political and economic power is what defines India, or at least its
perception of itself. These are also the ingredients, despite the German
and Japanese models, of the classical Great Power status. Therefore,
while there may be many voices in India against the nuclear route, the
predominant streak is pro-nuclear. Moreover, a country's destiny, its
policies and its nationalism are not matters merely of numbers. This is
the turf of the ruling elites that work at various levels and actually
control the levers of power.

The other important category is India's sense of secularism. Its
importance does not lie in whether or not it has actually worked -
Pakistanis pooh-pooh it, for instance - but that it continuess to exist
despite the shenanigans of the Sangh Parivar and the BJP's shady
policies. The secular ideal links up with India's positive image; it
also links up, or is made to link up, with India's case on Kashmir. In
the sense that the guarantee for its survival is underpinned by India's
military strength, it also links up with India's nuclearisation. It is
this identity the peace activists bring with them.

So, what are the prospects for the peace movement? Rather murky, unless
the peace movement in India begins to factor in the presence of Pakistan
in a meaningful way and accept that India's forward march depends, among
other things, on how it relates to its biggest neighbour. For their
part, the Pakistani peace activists evince a much greater degree of
dissent from the statist model. There is much more capacity here to be
wary of the state and to accept the limitations that realpolitik puts on
Pakistan. This is partially owed to the fact that Pakistan has, for a
greater part of its life, been ruled by dictators while India has
developed a coercive consensus on issues of nationalism through a
democratic process. Therefore, Pakistanis are much less prone to accept
ing statist categories than the Indians where the state and the society
have not experienced the split that Pakistan has witnessed.

However, in Pakistan, too, the peace movement has failed to win a
following that could allow it to become at least a pressure group.
Again, it is not a matter of numbers, but the inability of the movement
to influence the course of policymaking in any meaningful way by
bringing to bear enough pressure on the governments. To a large extent
this is owed to a lack of framework, which militates even more against
the Pakistan side of the peace movement. What is on offer and through
what process? Since the statist model offers a contending nationalist
identity, and since within the zero-sum model the Indian and Pakistani
identities are exclusionary, what identity can the peace movement offer?
And if there is to be cooperation with India, what are its essential
categories? Are the Indians prepared to accept Kashmir as a dispute or
does peace mean forgetting about it? Sadly, there are no answers to
these questions because the activists themselves have avoided taking
them head-on. However, these are the very issues that need to be tackled
for the cooperative model to develop a framework in an through which the
movement can rise to challenge the statist model.

Does that mean peace efforts should be abandoned? That would amount to
throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Instead, there is need to see
things more clearly, appreciate the difficulties and square up to them
rather than pretending they do not exist. The realist approach may bring
in some initial disappointments, but at least any revival of the
movement thereafter will be based on more concrete categories rather
than just pious wishes and pronouncements.

While the old models look at peace as a condition between the strong,
which is maintained through fear, the new model perceives it as a
condition of shared interests even where the balance of power -
especially military power - does not work equally. That is the lesson of
realpolitik. However, the sense of shared interests requires that
outstanding issues are talked about, and resolved, in the spirit of a
compromise that is acceptable to both parties. Indian activists, just
like the Indian government, have to realise that India's greater
outreach requires that it come to peace with Pakistan. Pakistan may be
the weaker party but it is no walkover. It has the capacity to keep
India tied up. There is no point in increasing Pakistan's frustration.
The Indian activists therefore need to confront their policymakers on
the imperative of settling matters with Pakistan, if for nothing else
than for the simple reason that it is in India's own interest as much as
it is in Pakistan's interest.
___________

#2.

The Hindustan Times
Last updated[Metro]01:00 IST | Saturday, April 22, 2000, New Delhi
Editorial =20

Communal by chance?

Uttar Pradesh seems to be the hotbed of coincidences. If the State home
department is to be believed, the spate of attacks on missionary schools
there over the last three weeks is just a series of unconnected random
events. While two attacks in Mathura have been explained away as
"altercations between the school management and parents over the issue
of fee hike and admissions", the others have been fitted into the
category of "robbery" - as if both explanations can calm the nerves of
potential targets.

However, from the first reported incident in Bulandshahr where the
principal was manhandled and the school ransacked, to the latest in
Meerut where armed men raided a convent school, the attacks convey the
disturbing impression of targeting a group, specifically Christian
missionary schools.

As far as empirical evidence goes, one has to assume - until proven
otherwise - that there is a campaign being carried out against such
schools in the State. It does not take a conspiracy theorist with acute
levels of paranoia to detect what is really happening in Uttar Pradesh.
The Vishwa Hindu Parishad's Giriraj Kishore continues to stress the need
to remove all hurdles for the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
The Chief Minister has expressed similar views. There has also been a
continuing effort by the saffron lobby for quite some time to depict all
Christian missionaries as usurpers of Hindu souls making Mephistophelian
pacts under the garb of social service and education.

Keeping all this in mind, a clear pattern seems to be emerging. The
official explanation that the attacks were just another form of "secular
violence" fails to explain why only a certain type of educational
institutions is being targeted. The deduction that there is no concerted
action against the Christian community simply because not all missionary
schools have been attacked - three in Mathura were supposedly spared
because they were Hindi-medium schools - is as inane as writing off Dara
Singh as an "ordinary" murderer. The Prime Minister has asked for an
explanation for this recent spate of violence from the Uttar Pradesh
Government. One must be on guard to ensure that the word "robbery" does
not re-enter the lexicon as a euphemism for something far more sinister.

_________
#3.

Columbia News Service
http://cns.jrn.columbia.edu

NETWORKING GROUPS BUILD BRIDGES BETWEEN INDIANS AND PAKISTANIS
by Shaheen Pasha
CNS Staff Reporter

Shaheen Pasha earned a bachelor's degree in speech communications from
Pace University. While an undergraduate, she interned at MTVN, CNBC and
=46orbes Digital Tool. She expects to receive her master's degree from the
Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in May and hopes to go
on to become a foreign correspondent for a news wire or broadcast network.

(c) 2000 Columbia News Service

NEW YORK--The backroom of Maharaja, a tiny restaurant not
far from the United Nations, was filled. A slide projector hummed in the
background as Kamesh Nagarajan, a financial consultant from Salomon Smith
Barney, tried to unravel the complexities of personal investing. Several
dozen men and women, all wearing business suits, jotted notes, sipped
drinks and conferred softly with one another. They were at the restaurant
to attend a networking party, a common occurrence in midtown Manhattan's
corporate culture. But at this gathering, all the guests were South Asian.

In the last 10 years, networking groups and gatherings have
become a staple of New York City's South Asian social scene. Groups like
as the Network of Indian Professionals (NET-IP), which hosted the personal
investing seminar that turned into a party, and the South Asian Networking
Association (SANA) are increasingly popular among Indian and Pakistani
professionals, easing some--but certainly not all--traditional tensions
between the two communities.

Young Indian and Pakistani professionals may not agree on politics, but
many agree on the need for a place where they can mingle with others from
their own culture.

"Networking organizations are a great idea," said Manik
Jassal, 28, the president of NET-IP, whose 700 members pay $50 in annual
dues. "They allow people from the Indian subcontinent to meet and share
ideas in a social setting. I haven't seen the different conflicts that
come from religion and boundaries here. I guess our generation is much
more tolerant and open than our parents were."

Even so, Jassal conceded, many Pakistanis were initially
turned off by the name of the organization. "If I could go back to the
beginning I would have called it the Network of South Asian
Professionals," he said. "However, I think it matters less now. I don't
differentiate between South Asians and I encourage everyone to gain from
what NET-IP offers."

At least 100 people, often many more, turn out for the
biweekly parties sponsored by SANA, and the topic of South Asian politics
sometimes emerges. "At these parties, most people try to steer away from
Indian and Pakistani politics, " said Jay Elengical, 23, a research
assistant at Standard & Poors. "If it happens and someone that you're
talking to is obviously Pakistani, the Indians will be diplomatic about it
and drop it quickly. But if you're solely among Indians, the conversation
can become very anti-Pakistan."

Sandhya Shukla, an assistant professor of anthropology and
Asian studies at Columbia University who has studied the relationship
between Indians and Pakistanis in Western society, said she was not
surprised that political barriers still exist. While many Indians and
Pakistanis have no problem referring to themselves as South Asians in a
professional environment, she said, they may prefer to hold on to their
national identity in a social setting.

"It greatly depends on what sphere your class and generation
is in," she said. "Many middle-class, first-generation South Asian
immigrants experience intense nationalism, whether it be religious or
political. Often times among Indians, a very Hindu-centric notion impedes
social and political interaction. Sometime it's useful and important to
separate social networks from professional networks."

Young Indian and Pakistani professionals may not agree on politics, but
many agree on the need for a place where they can mingle with others from
own culture.

"I saw a definite market for South Asians who just wanted
to have a good time with people that came from the same background," said
SANA's founder and president, Veda Reddy, 26, for whom managing the group
is a full-time job. SANA has no dues or membership requirements. Attendees
at SANA gatherings, held in lounges and clubs around Manhattan, are
required to sign in and provide contact information that is added to
Reddy's data base of invitees. "Professionals come after work, bring
their business cards, hang out, dance to Indian music,'' she said. " If
they want to network they can. If not, they can just relax."

Farina Sial, an obstetrical resident, scanned the scene at the
most recent SANA gathering from her barstool at Webster Hall, a popular
nightclub. As a classic Hindi film song began to play, Dr. Sial, 26,
smiled. "Parties like this are important for me," she said. "I grew up
in Pakistan and I don't really feel like I fit in American society. Here
I feel comfortable and have fun."

So, it seemed, did most of the others at the club, where
drinking and dancing--not networking--seemed to be the preferred activity
and few business cards changed hands.

"SANA's networking party is just another word for an Indian
club-party for older people," said 26-year-old Vikas Sharma, a marketing
manager for Madison Square Garden. "I'm here with my friends and I
generally only talk to the people I know. I think most people are like
that here."

Naresh Rajpal, a 22-year-old database analyst, chimed in: "I
come to this for the good-looking girls. That's the kind of networking we
do here."

Nagarajan, the financial consultant who had lectured at the
NET-IP party, agreed that most other networking organizations focus more
on social and less on business concerns. "There is nothing better than a
room full of beautiful Indian women," he said, smiling broadly. "But some
people take advantage and then it just becomes a big meat market. If you
get involved with NET-IP just to party, you're not complete."

And you may be in the wrong place. In the last two years, the
group has made a conscious effort to separate itself from the party scene.
"We are focused on charitable causes and professional development here,"
Jassal, the president, said. "We have social events and they give people
the opportunity to walk in as a nobody and meet and speak with CEOs of big
corporations or other important figures in various fields. A few of our
members have met at our parties and gone into business together. That's
what networking organizations should be about."

-30-
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