[sacw] SACW (4 August 01)

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire
4 August 2001
http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex

[Interruption Notice: Please note that the SACW posts would be=20
interrupted from period 6th August 2001 and are expected to resume=20
on the 20th August 2001. ]

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[1.] Post-Agra, time to converge
[2.] The Loneliness of Long-Distance Nationalism
INDIA Arrested Kashmiri officer's only crime was being Muslim
-----------------------------------------

#1.

Frontline
Volume 18 - Issue 16, Aug. 04 - 17, 2001 STORY

Post-Agra, time to converge

Praful Bidwai

The Vajpayee government is under pressure to negate and reverse the=20
gains of Agra. Progressives and peaceniks must hold it down to=20
reconciliation with Pakistan by converging and focussing their=20
energies together.

BARELY a fortnight after the Agra Summit, we are witnessing what=20
might be called a Scissors Phenomenon: increasing divergence between=20
the Indian and Pakistani governments' approaches to the peace and=20
reconciliation agenda. With each passing day, their mid-July success=20
in narrowing differences over the process of dialogue - towards the=20
scissors' midpoint, so to speak - seems like a thing of the past. The=20
distance between the two blades of the scissors is growing as India=20
increasingly hardens its stand and Pakistan makes conciliatory=20
gestures.

The retrograde Scissors Phenomenon could soon throw India and=20
Pakistan back to a situation of dangerous mutual hostility and=20
confrontation. This would be akin to snatching defeat from the jaws=20
of victory - a prospect that seemed tantalisingly close in Agra. That=20
would also substantially damage the gains registered by the social=20
constituency for peace as well as the advance of secularism in both=20
countries. It would spread apathy and cynicism where hope once=20
existed. This column argues that it is incumbent upon progressive=20
political leaders, secular citizens and peace activists to join hands=20
to advance the Agra dialogue process. The present moment offers a=20
unique opportunity for doing so. But first consider this:

After their initial peevish response to General Pervez Musharraf's=20
much-exaggerated media "coup" in Agra, Indian government=20
functionaries are settling into a conservative mould. Despite his=20
reiteration of the relevance of Agra, Foreign Minister Jaswant Singh=20
in his July 17 statement essentially blamed Pakistan's "unifocal"=20
emphasis on Kashmir for the failure of the Summit to produce=20
agreement. Vajpayee's own pronouncements since then point towards=20
disengagement from Pakistan, not re-engagement.

Take his July 24 Parliament statement with its self-justificatory=20
tone. There, he described well-known India-Pakistan differences on=20
Kashmir as the main reason why "we had to abandon the quest for a=20
joint document... My Cabinet colleagues and I were unanimously of the=20
view that our basic principles cannot be sacrificed for the sake of a=20
joint document." Vajpayee characterised "the insurgency in Jammu and=20
Kashmir today, with its foreign mercenaries and generous assistance=20
from abroad", as nothing but "terrorism". He then said: "India has=20
the resolve, strength and stamina to counter terrorism and violence=20
until it is decisively crushed. I want to reiterate this=20
determination today..." By contrast, his assurance that "we will=20
continue to seek dialogue and reconciliation" was feeble.

In his speech to the Parliamentary Party meeting of the Bharatiya=20
Janata Party that day, Vajpayee was even more aggressive. He said=20
Musharraf had returned empty-handed to Pakistan because "I didn't=20
concede anything to him". (This echoed the BJP hawks' congratulations=20
to him for "standing firm"). He also threatened: if Pakistan keeps=20
insisting Kashmir is the "core issue", then we will tell them POK=20
(Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir) is the "core of the core issue". He has=20
since clarified that no dates have been fixed for his return visit to=20
Pakistan. (Officials of the Prime Minister's Office and the Ministry=20
of External Affairs, the MEA, officials say the visit is unlikely=20
this year.)

These statements clearly indicate a slideback from Vajpayee's stance=20
in Agra. The hardening is duly paralleled by the drafting of three=20
key Ministers to represent the government's views to the media:=20
Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and Promod Mahajan (in that order of=20
stridency?).

The voices that Vajpayee hears from the rest of his Sangh Parivar all=20
oppose reconciliation with Pakistan. There are many: the Rashtriya=20
Swayamsevak Sangh's M.G. Vaidya, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad's assorted=20
mahants, the BJP's K.R. Malkani, V.K. Malhotra and Chaman Lal Gupta.=20
They all regard Agra as a mistake, one that should not be repeated=20
through an early return visit. RSS organs like Panchajanya (which had=20
launched an essay competition on India-Pakistan friendship jointly=20
with the Pakistani publication Jang) are back spewing anti-Muslim=20
venom. They salute Air Chief Marshal A.Y. Tipnis for not having=20
saluted Musharraf. The "real issue", declares Organiser, is not=20
Kashmir, but "Islamic terror". Vajpayee is doing little to counter or=20
moderate the shrill tone of such counsel for belligerence based on=20
the view that there is a historic inevitability about India-Pakistan=20
enmity; it is irredeemable.

Most disturbingly, Vajpayee is under pressure to accept an MEA=20
"internal assessment" which will make New Delhi set its face against=20
a dialogue with Pakistan and go for a military option in Kashmir. The=20
15-page report, summarised in The Economic Times (July 25),=20
recommends first that Vajpayee and Jaswant Singh should delay their=20
visits to Islamabad. "Second, India should raise the costs of the=20
proxy war to Pakistan. Third, Pakistan's propaganda offensive should=20
be countered aggressively. And fourth, India should take decisive=20
steps to improve its domestic situation in Kashmir so as to=20
strengthen its bargaining position with Pakistan in future." Here,=20
bilateral diplomacy with Pakistan takes the back seat.

The report is based on the assessment that the gains of Agra, limited=20
or flimsy, have been further eroded because "Musharraf's hardline=20
attitude... did not undergo an iota of change". Besides, there is=20
deterioration in the Kashmir situation "and a substantive increase in=20
cross-border terrorism sponsored by Pakistan, as well as an increase=20
in ISI activity". How this conclusion was reached barely three days=20
after Musharraf's departure remains a mystery. But clearly, one of=20
the main premises here is that the invitation to Musharraf, which=20
effectively "forecloses our earlier option of not engaging Pakistan=20
until it stops cross-border terrorism", was misguided. It gave=20
Musharraf domestic legitimacy. In future engagement, "cessation of=20
terrorism should play a pivotal part."

It is hard to believe that the MEA's seemingly suave mandarins could=20
have produced such an unbalanced document - against diplomatic=20
re-engagement with Pakistan - without gentle goading from the top=20
(for example, from Jaswant Singh) or a degree of resentment at being=20
outmanoeuvred by Musharraf in the "media-public relations game".=20
There are any number of security "experts", of course, who blithely=20
pronounce that Musharraf's "compulsions" vis-a-vis his corps=20
commanders (about which they know a lot!) permitted no flexibility in=20
drafting a joint statement; the Summit was doomed; it is pointless to=20
re-engage Pakistan. It is unfortunate that the MEA should replicate=20
such tripe and give credence to people who have done much to vitiate=20
the India-Pakistan climate.

Vajpayee seized the initiative by inviting Musharraf and thereby=20
kindled a pro-peace popular sentiment, if not groundswell. But he did=20
not do enough by way of political and bureaucratic preparation for=20
the Summit. And he lacked the stomach to prevent sabotage of all=20
attempts at an agreement. The resistance came more from his own=20
Cabinet Committee on Security than from Pakistan. In Agra, he allowed=20
Sangh Parivar hawks to exercise a virtual veto. Now he is allowing=20
the reconciliation agenda to slip out of his hands.

IN contrast to this stands Pakistan's posture. After returning to=20
Islamabad, Musharraf further consolidated his "media advantage". In=20
his July 20 press conference, for which visas were liberally issued=20
to Indian journalists, he skilfully underscored the importance of=20
dialogue, distanced himself further from the "hawks", and appealed to=20
"moderates" and "peace-loving" people in both countries to take the=20
lead in promoting reconciliation. (There was of course the=20
broken-record obsession with Kashmir). He stressed that progress on=20
issues like nuclear restraint, Siachen, and so on would be "in=20
tandem" with an acknowledgement of Kashmir as the core issue in a=20
step-by-step process.

Foreign Minister Sattar has been even more concerned about salvaging=20
the Summit's gains. He told Seema Guha (The Times of India, July 25)=20
that "great restraint on both sides [is] required to zealously=20
preserve the progress made at Agra." He also said: "Real progress in=20
Agra was establishing a structure and framework for future talks and=20
ending the hiatus which brought all negotiations to a halt... Though=20
the agreement was not formalised, many of the points from the=20
document are non-controversial and can be implemented."

Sattar pointedly refused to be drawn into negative or pessimistic=20
interpretations of the Agra talks, says Guha. Most important, he=20
claimed that Musharraf never said it was "Kashmir or nothing." "What=20
he said was progress in Kashmir would pave the way for progress in=20
all spheres of bilateral ties. He said they were twin tracks. The=20
dispute over Kashmir was one while all other issues were part of the=20
second track. The two tracks could move simultaneously."

Privately, Pakistani diplomats say they are embarrassed by the=20
"invisible hand" statement (on the failure of the Agra talks) made by=20
the armed forces spokesperson. They hint that Islamabad might even=20
take some unilateral confidence-building steps. It will certainly not=20
up the ante. The "moderation" might be dictated by economic or=20
political compulsions. But it is real.

Regrettably, much of the Parliamentary debate does not show real=20
recognition of the complexity of the Scissors Phenomenon. The=20
Opposition has rightly grilled the government for its political=20
ineptitude, poor media handling, lack of preparation, and so on.=20
However, some leaders have done so in a manner that leaves it open to=20
a chauvinistic interpretation. This should not be the spirit of any=20
thoughtful criticism of the Summit. The Agra process must be=20
spiritedly defended and taken forward.

This is unlikely to happen if matters rest solely in the hands of=20
Vajpayee and Jaswant Singh or with the MEA mandarins. All those who=20
stand for India-Pakistan reconciliation and a non-military,=20
negotiated, secular solution to the Kashmir crisis must seize the=20
initiative that Vajpayee is losing. They can best do so by joining=20
forces. There are three contingents here: progressive politicians,=20
especially Left-wing party leaders; the Peace Movement; and the=20
secular intelligentsia.

India's progressive political leaders - and there are some in=20
centrist parties - are distinguished by their ability to link social=20
agendas to political realities. Unlike conservatives, they do not=20
defend national sovereignty in its abstract, disembodied form, but=20
link it to the popular interest. They advocate friendly relations=20
with neighbours as the key to security. They also have serious=20
concerns about the human rights situation in Kashmir. They have a=20
stake in India-Pakistan reconciliation through dialogue of the Agra=20
type, based on "the high road", not low-grade realpolitik.

THEY will find a strong ally in the country's growing Peace Movement.=20
This rainbow coalition combines Gandhians and feminists, pacifists=20
and nuclear disarmament campaigners, environmentalists and social=20
justice activists, trade unionists and organisers of urban=20
slum-dwellers and rural labour. It knit together more than 200 groups=20
and non-governmental organisations at the Pakistan-India People's=20
Solidarity Conference in New Delhi (July 12-13). The Declaration=20
adopted there evoked a spectacular response. This comes on top of the=20
constitution last November of the Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament=20
and Peace, which was a major co-sponsor of the Conference. This=20
Movement is uniquely placed to tap the upsurge in the peace sentiment=20
catalysed by Agra. It must run a campaign around the Declaration.

The secular intelligentsia sees a link between the cause of=20
India-Pakistan reconciliation and defence of secularism. Communalism=20
in both countries feeds on hawkish attitudes, and vice versa. There=20
is an urgent need to break the vicious circle of India-Pakistan=20
hostility, which feeds on intolerance and militaristic notions of=20
security, in turn leading to greater hostility. The intelligentsia=20
can form a living link between the political Left, the Peace Movement=20
and the larger public.

Today we badly need that link, or convergence, in two ways. We need=20
to converge, that is, target, focus on and zero in on hawkish=20
adversaries, and isolate them. Narrow, sectarian or parochial=20
nationalists of the Hindutva variety have for far too long tried to=20
claim guardianship of the "national interest". They must be exposed=20
as shysters who represent nothing. In the second sense, convergence=20
speaks to the need to coalesce and bring into mutual alignment a=20
range of tendencies, concerns, sensibilities and movements: from the=20
Narmada Valley to the Kashmir Valley, from Gandhian pacifism to=20
radical art, from social justice to gender equality, from sustainable=20
development to food security for the poor. This means convergence of=20
people's rights and entitlements into a broad political platform.=20
That is the need of the hour.

____________

2.

www.tehelka.com

The Loneliness of Long-Distance Nationalism
=
=20
Amitava Kumar

The New York Times, this past June, ran a story headlined "Two
Unlikely Allies Come Together in Fight Against Muslims." One of the
"unlikely allies" was a Hindutva group based in the U.S. and the website
address hinduunity.org.=20=20

The article's first paragraph pretty much summed up the piece: "A web
site run by militant Hindus in Queens and Long Island was recently shut
down by its service provider because of complaints that it advocated
hatred and violence toward Muslims. But a few days later, the site was
back on the Internet. The unlikely rescuers were some radical Jews in
Brooklyn who are under investigation for possible ties to anti-Arab
terrorist organizations in Israel."=20=20

In the New York Times story, we met the Indian man living in a section
of New York who ran the website. This man, who is 30 years old, had
come to the US from India when he was 13. The article mentioned that
followers of the late Rabbi Kahane, a right-wing Jewish leader who had
openly preached violence against the Palestinians, had provided
assistance to the Hindutva group.=20=20

Asked by the reporter to explain the motivation behind the alliance, the
Indian supporter of Hindutva had said: "We are fighting the same war.
Whether you call them Palestinians, Afghans or Pakistanis, the root of
the problem for Hindus and Jews is Islam."

Months before this article came out, I had visited the website. I don't
usually occupy my spare time perusing the fulminations of the right
wing, but here I had a small personal stake. The site boasted a "hit list"
titled "Enemies of Hindutva Exposed" and my own name was on it.=20=20

I logged on to the website once again after the Times broke the story.
Now, the "hitlist" had been changed to the milder "black list" -- although
the URL, once you connected to the list, still said "hitlist." Also, the
more brutal punishments of the main accused, personalities like Pervez
Musharraf, had now been erased. Only their sentences of accusation
remained. But, if you scrolled down, you could still see signs of the
previous rhetoric. The penalty meted out to Laloo Prasad Yadav, for
example, is "2500 lashes, life imprisonment" for the crime of having
"swindled the gau-chara's money." Such fodder for hate for the man who
had stopped Advani's virulent rath-yatra right in its tracks, perhaps the
only thing that Laloo did right.

There is much to quarrel with the Hinduunity website -- which presents
links to the RSS, VHP, Bajrang Dal, Shiv Sena, and other groups -- not
the least being its claim: "Secularism is NOT an option." Rather than
take issue with those claims, however, I want to ask a slightly different
question: How is a literary critic going to approach the rhetoric that is
being spewed by the Hindu right wing and its minions?=20=20

The question might be put a bit differently. How is criticism to combat
bigotry? The question that arises in my mind is one that I want to
address of the phenomenon of long-distance nationalism itself. I'd like to
ask of the Indian man from Queens who runs the Hinduunity website:
What feeling of loss, and perhaps need for faith in one's culture,
prompts a new immigrant from India to turn to extremism?=20=20

Other questions follow quickly on its heels. Why is one's culture and
one's past being understood so narrowly anyway? Is all of this also
related to guilt? The guilt of one who has left one's home and now, from
the privileged position of being an NRI [Non Resident Indian] in the=20
US, wants to connect with
his past in such a vengeful way?=20=20

The opening webpage on the Hindunity site declaims "The loot, plunder
and mass Hindu genocide that occurred in the 1400 years of Islamic
rule in India cannot ever be forgotten. Hindu militancy is the only
solution!"=20=20

This declaration, too, only raises question about the NRI in my mind. Is
the newcomer in this country called America, suddenly robbed of all
past, now all the more attached to old history? This history counts for
nothing when weighed against the realities of the more contemporary
traditions of coexistence. Such assertions do not even have the weight
of a single particle of dust -- especially when weighed against a single
drop of blood, Hindu or Muslim, of your neighbour who has lived next to
you for years, months, or even days. What kind of occult weight does
this assertion about ancient history take in the mind of the long-
distance nationalist to whom any statement of a long forgotten, buried
injustice makes strange sense? Why does this happen?=20=20

These questions are difficult to answer but they provide a landscape for
the critic's exploration.=20=20

A few days ago, an old abandoned mosque was demolished in
Rajasthan. You wince at the description "Since the old structure was
already fragile, it took little time for the 300-strong mob to demolish it.=
"
You see in your mind's eye a group of boys stoning a bent old man on
his way home on a village path.=20=20

The news report mentioned that an idol had been installed at the site of
the demolished mosque. And the newly built temple had been given the
name "Mandir Peer Pachhar Hanuman Ji" -- Temple of Lord Hanuman
who defeated Peer, the Muslim saint buried in the dargah. These are the
Taliban in our midst. What they will leave is only rubble in their wake.
All saints should pack up their belongings and go somewhere else. As I
thought about it more, I began to think that such acts are the small
ways in which a Hindutva nation builds milestones on its path to
barbarity.=20=20

This thought came to me from my reading of a recently published book,
An Ambiguous Journey to the City by Ashis Nandy. The book is a wide-
ranging meditation on the role of place, in particular, the dynamics of
the city and the village in the Indian cultural imagination. Nandy
explores this question with special attention to the work of film directors
like Pramathesh Barua and Mrinal Sen. But, what is relevant for our
present discussion are Nandy's formulations in the book's last chapter
"The Invisible Holocaust and the Journey as an Exodus."=20=20

Nandy has written of the manner in which the journey towards
nationhood for India and Pakistan was tragically through the journey
undertaken during Partition. It was with the help of the mass exodus of
refugees from both sides that India and Pakistan told themselves the
tale of their emergence into nationhood.=20=20

The question that emerges in me regarding the NRI's long-distance
nationalism is prompted by Nandy's writing. It is possible that the
journey for many NRI's, from their homes in villages and towns in India,
to the alien cities of the West presents a crisis: the loss of all anchorin=
g
marks of identity.=20=20

It is in this vacuum that there takes hold the zeal for the lost nation.
Before you came here, you thought of yourself as someone who was
from Nagpur or Rohtas. Then, lost in America, you found yourself with
your passport as your only introduction. You became an Indian. And a
Hindu. Because to be a Hindu and to believe that you had been wronged
gave you a mythic sense of injustice and hurt pride. You also found
"unlikely allies" who, like you, had found a homeland in lies.=20=20

The journey to the West has become a retreat into a medieval identity of
endangered religion. The NRI is the self-constructed hero of this epic of
exile.=20=20

There is a further twist. You find that Prime Minister Vajpayee, while
paying a visit to the Hindus in Long Island, uses his own journey to
these shores to proclaim his own return to a fundamental identity: on
September 9 last year, Vajpayee told a cheering audience of NRIs,
"Today I am the Prime Minister, tomorrow I won't be. There are plenty of
such examples in Delhi. But nobody can take away my right to remain
a swayamsewak."=20=20

The ordinary NRI's espousal of hard, sectarian identity can be seen as
tragedy. It is a sad part of our contemporary history. But, when this
condition is exploited by the Prime Minister of an allegedly secular
nation to proclaim a similar turn toward bigorty, this history gets
repeated as both a farce and a tragedy.=20=20

Amitava Kumar teaches English at Penn State
University and is the author of Passport Photos
(University of California Press and Penguin-India). =
You
can write to the author at aik4@p...

____________

3.

South China Morning Post
Saturday, August 4, 2001

INDIA Arrested Kashmiri officer's only crime was being Muslim

S. N. M. ABDI in New Delhi

The arrest of a senior Kashmiri police officer in New Delhi-where=20
he had gone to attend a Home Ministry seminar-has exposed the=20
administration's bias against Muslims in general and Kashmiris in=20
particular.

Sheikh Abdul Rashid was dragged out of his relative's house in the=20
Indian capital as a "suspected terrorist" by Delhi police on=20
Thursday and illegally detained for five hours before a senior=20
officer ordered his release.

The Indian Express newspaper wrote yesterday that the officer's only=20
crime was that "he was a Muslim, had flown in from Srinagar and was=20
sleeping in a house owned by a Muslim".

Ironically, Mr Rashid, 50, who belongs to the elite Indian Police=20
Service, is in charge of the high-security Baramulla jail in=20
Indian-administered Kashmir, where many alleged terrorists belonging=20
to banned outfits such as the Lashkare-Toiba and Hizbul Mujahedeen=20
are held. He was in Delhi to attend a seminar on drug abuse in=20
prisons.

"I kept telling the policemen who barged into the flat I was a=20
senior police officer and not a militant. But they dragged me to the=20
Vasant Kunj police station in southwest Delhi," he said.

"I showed them my official identity card and the invitation card for=20
the Home Ministry seminar. The policemen retorted that Kashmiri=20
militants had mastered the art of forging identity papers."

Mr Rashid's pleas for permission to call senior police officers were=20
rudely turned down and he was interrogated for five hours about his=20
"mission" in Delhi.

Eventually, he was allowed to speak to the regional police chief,=20
who ordered his immediate release. "If this can happen to me,=20
imagine the plight of ordinary Kashmiris," said the father of two.

What has angered many human rights activists is the observation of a=20
senior Delhi police officer that the Kashmiri officer was "at least=20
not manhandled inside the police station".

The police justified his arrest and interrogation on the grounds=20
that the background of every Kashmiri coming to Delhi has to be=20
verified, particularly before August 15, India's Independence Day,=20
when Kashmiri militants usually step up their attacks.

But Praful Bidwai, a leading political commentator, criticised=20
Indian security agencies for treating every Kashmiri as a terrorist.

"Their systematic persecution and rampant violation of their=20
fundamental rights is completely alienating them from the Indian=20
Government," Mr Bidwai said. According to another analyst, newspaper=20
columnist Vidya Subrahmaniam, "there is no family today in=20
Kashmir-India's only Muslim-majority state-that has not made the=20
mandatory trip to the interrogation cell".

The chairman of Kashmir's main separatist alliance, Abdul Gani Bhat,=20
and former chairman Syed Ali Geelani were put under house arrest=20
yesterday. The two were reportedly detained to prevent them from=20
taking part in a ceremony to mark the killing on Tuesday of three=20
leading separatist militants.

Copyright =A9 2001. South China=20
Morning Post Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.

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