[sacw] SACW | 27 Jan. 03

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | 27 January 2003

#1. Pakistan : Nancy Powell's statement (Imtiaz Alam)
#2. Pakistan : Praising a people's festival
#3. Pakistan : Women activists urged to lobby for rights
#4. A gift from Sri Lanka (Kalpana Sharma)
#5. India : An open letter to the Prime Minister (Ranjit Hoskote)
#6. India : Writers flay Sangh Parivar `campaign'
#7. India : Pushing for National icons of the Hindu Rashtra (Amitav Ranjan)
#8. Useful new volume: A Chronicle of the Peacocks: Stories of 
Partition, Exile and Lost Memories
by Intizar Husain
#9. Announcements re Film Screenings:
- "Tales of The Night Fairies" by Shohini Ghosh - on Jan. 28, 2003, New Delhi
- The Men in the Tree: Revisiting the RSS and Hindu fundamentalism by 
Lalit Vachani (January 31, New York City)

__________________________

#1.

The News International
January 27, 2003

Nancy Powell's statement

Imtiaz Alam

The message from the US, first from its Ambassador to Pakistan Nancy 
Powell and now by the State Department spokesman Richard Boucher, is 
loud and clear: 'Completely stop use of Pakistan territory for 
terrorism and infiltration across the Line of Control', as pledged by 
COAS-President in his January 12, 2002, speech. Should General 
Musharraf fulfil his own commitment that he made in 'Pakistan's 
interests' or he succumbs to the religious opposition's demand to 
pick up the cudgel against the US on all conceivable fronts?

Followed by US Ambassador to India, Blackwill's repeated remarks 
against 'continuing cross-border terrorism', the US Ambassador to 
Islamabad Nancy Powell for the first time came out quite bluntly and 
asked Islamabad to live up to its commitment to 'prevent infiltration 
across the Line of Control and end the use of Pakistan (territory) as 
a platform for terrorism'. Her statement provoked a sharp reaction 
from among a wide range of public opinion leaders, especially the 
religious right who demanded her expulsion, and forced the Pakistani 
officials to show a semblance of displeasure.

Trying to play down the controversy over Nancy Powell's statement by 
clarifying that Ambassador Nancy was only echoing the pledge General 
Musharraf had once made that the National Security Council 
reconfirmed in June, 2002, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher 
has gone a step ahead by saying that 'infiltration has gone down and 
come back up somewhat', and 'we do believe infiltration should stop 
completely'. Soft-paddling his stance, Mr Boucher observed 'that has 
been a pledge (by Musharraf) that we have taken seriously and 
something we have to continue to work with Pakistan on'. Given the 
pledge made by General Musharraf, it leaves little to cry about the 
'foreign interference in our internal affairs' since it is no more an 
'internal affair', especially after the successive UN Security 
Council resolutions, including 1372, on terrorism.

No doubt, the US militaristic designs and imperialistic conduct of 
its hawkish establishment have provoked a worldwide reaction against 
not only the impending US war against Iraq, but also on scores of 
other issues, including double standards, international norms, 
rejection of non-proliferation treaties, scuttling down of Koyoto 
treaty on global warming and International Court of Criminal Justice. 
A global anti-war wave, especially in Europe and North America, has 
emerged that creates a worldwide premise for an alternative world 
order. And the Muslim world, where anti-war sentiment is not as 
explicit as it was during the 1991 Gulf War or as it is in the West 
now, finds some room to thwart the US' re-colonising designs in the 
Middle East.

But this should not be confused with a phoney anti-Americanism of our 
reactionary revivalists and militant adventurists, or exploited for 
the wrong reasons, since Pakistan is faced with its own very serious 
predicaments that can cost it too heavily. Under the compulsion of 
extraordinary circumstances created by 9/11, Pakistan's hawkish 
military establishment had to reluctantly retreat from the brink of a 
disastrous Taliban policy. This, however, did not lead to a complete 
shift in our militaristic paradigm. Following the terrorist attack on 
Indian Parliament, General Musharraf had to pledge to stop all kinds 
of terrorism from Pakistan's soil. He did speak about moderation and 
pragmatism, but failed to undertake a comprehensive overhaul and 
consistently pursue a strategy that should have been in conformity 
with our national interest and the new geo-political realities.

The irony of the situation is that even a partial reversal of an 
isolationist policy was too much resented by the religious right and 
a section of conservative democratic opposition due to, an 
unfortunate, militarisation of the civilian mind and the expediencies 
of a self-serving politics. The religious right exploited the war 
against terrorism in Afghanistan to its advantage and wanted Pakistan 
to defy and share the burden of the destruction for no legitimate 
reason. If Pakistan were to follow the call of self-suicidal by 
Mutahida Majlis-i-Amal in solidarity with naive and barbaric Taliban, 
wouldn't it have met the fate as Tora Bora? But matter did not end 
there. Learning no lesson, the MMA still insists on the righteousness 
of its pro-Taliban cause. It continues to come to the rescue of all 
kinds of rogue elements and wants to jeopardise Pakistan's coalition 
with the international community against terrorism that poses a 
threat to Pakistan itself.

Worse, finding Anti-Americanism a populist vehicle, the MMA is not 
ready to take into account the gathering threats to Pakistan, and 
from different sides. It wants to make capital out of every possible 
occasion of American-bashing, regardless of its devastating 
implications for Pakistan. Opposing the US war designs against Iraq 
is one thing, joining a front with Saddam Hussein is an entirely 
dangerous proposition. This is inviting the US to include Pakistan in 
the company of Saddam Hussein. Why not Messrs Fazal, Noorani and Qazi 
join the human shield being erected by the European citizens to 
defend the Iraqi people, instead of putting Pakistan in the dock?

Similarly, what does the MMA want to gain by demanding the expulsion 
of the US ambassador? The fact of the matter is that the MMA wants to 
push Pakistan in total adversity with the sole super power whom we 
cannot afford to annoy or are capable of defeating. By doing so, it 
will only be isolating Pakistan and fulfilling India's militaristic 
designs.

Similarly, and more ferociously, the Jamaat-i-Islami wants the GHQ to 
toe its pro-militancy Kashmir line it has been the main beneficiary 
of and now finds itself in a lurch. The pledge General Musharraf had 
made in his January 12 speech, though unfulfilled so far, is not 
acceptable to Jamaat and its other allies. The fact of the matter is 
that Pakistan cannot afford to continue with cross-border 
infiltration and no justification on whatsoever ground is acceptable 
to the international community. Taking that course in the present 
circumstances will serve only the designs of the Indian hawks and the 
Hindu extremists. Time has come to say farewell to arms and push the 
Kashmir cause on a popular and political place where we can win the 
support of international community for the just cause of the Kashmir 
people. Those who think that militancy is a necessary tool to bring 
India to negotiation table have been proved wrong. It may have served 
some purpose at some point of time, but it has now become 
counter-productive. It's now damaging the Kashmir cause. Tactics 
change with the flow and ebb of the situation which Jamaat doesn't 
understand.

Pakistan must get out of blind alley it was forced into by our flawed 
security paradigm and must not let extremists push it to point of 
no-return. But, unfortunately, both the government and the opposition 
don't have the moral and political courage to call the bluff of the 
MMA. It's time to define what Pakistan can and cannot afford. One 
thing is clear, we can't continue with the militancy in any form and 
on any pretext.

______

#2.

The Daily Times
January 27, 2003
Editorial: Praising a people's festival

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_27-1-2003_pg3_1

______

#3.

DAWN
26 January 2003

Women activists urged to lobby for rights
By Our Staff Reporter

KARACHI, Jan 25: Speakers at a meeting on Saturday urged the masses 
to forge unity and struggle hard to make the government review 
discriminatory laws.
Speaking at a discussion on violence against women organized by the 
Joint Action Committee for People's Rights, they demanded that no 
person or organization be allowed to victimise the masses under the 
garb of religion.
Chief of the National Commission on the Status of Women, Justice 
(retd) Majida Rizvi, said the commission was reviewing the Hudood 
Ordinances and other such laws, and as soon as it got all the reports 
the commission would formulate its recommendations and send them to 
the government, which would take the final decision.
She said there were many laws to deal with different crimes, but 
unfortunately sometimes those laws were not implemented properly.
She urged women activists to lobby with political parties and 
parliamentarians so that they could formulate laws that were not 
discriminatory towards any section of the society. She expressed the 
hope that with a large number of women in the parliament, women's 
issues would be discussed and solved.
Hina Jillani of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan said that it 
was the responsibility of the state to ensure that the rights of the 
marginalized sections of the society were not tempered with. She said 
women were being victimised and oppressed in the name of religion and 
socio-cultural traditions.
She said women activists had been struggling against the Hudood 
Ordinances for nearly two decades now and awareness had been created 
in the society and a substantial number of people wanted that those 
laws to be reviewed or abolished.
She asked what kind of message the government was sending to the 
world community when the country's representative to the United 
Nations was involved in domestic violence and a man accused of being 
involved in gang-rape had been made provincial minister.
Zakia Ghori of the Jamat-i- Islami said that if Islamic laws were 
implemented in the country there would be no violence against women.
Anis Haroon, Ghazala Afghan, Nuzhat Kidwai and others also spoke. the 
question-answer session followed the speeches.
RESOLUTIONS: The meeting also passed resolutions calling for the 
formation of a special committee of MNAs and MPAs to facilitate the 
implementation of the recommendations given by the 1997 Enquiry 
Commission Report.
It was stressed that parallel systems of justice like jirgas and 
panchayats should be abolished and those involved in them be treated 
as criminals, and special trainings be imparted to those dealing with 
the women's issues.
The demanded that the National Commission on the Status of Women 
should be made an independent body with powers to implement its 
recommendations.

______

#4.

The Hindu
Sunday, Jan 26, 2003
Magazine

A gift from Sri Lanka

KALPANA SHARMA

EVEN as war talk dominates the airwaves, the voices for peace can be 
heard. Hundreds of thousands of people gathered on a freezing winter 
morning in Washington on January 18 and shouted their opposition to 
the impending war against Iraq. In 32 cities across the world, a 
similar chorus rejecting war as an option was heard. Does it matter 
that the men and women sitting in the White House and the Pentagon, 
and plotting war moves even as this is being written, are deaf to 
these voices? In the short run, it is frustrating to realise that no 
matter how loudly and how many people protest against confrontation, 
the people determined to wage war remain undeterred. To them such 
opposition just does not matter.

Yet, the growing constituency for peace in many countries has drawn 
together a great assortment of people, from all classes, races, 
creeds and generations. In the United States, where universities had 
been bereft of activism for a couple of decades, suddenly a new 
energy has emerged. Those leading the anti-war rallies have been 
mostly young people. Most of them had not been born when the Vietnam 
war took place. Thus, it is encouraging that a new generation holds 
the same convictions about the destructive and pointless nature of 
war as did their parents who opposed the Vietnam war.

Will these voices for peace eventually make a mark, perhaps when all 
the warring is over? One country where this is beginning to happen is 
in Sri Lanka. It is encouraging that in the midst of all the 
sabre-rattling initiated by the world's only super power, the process 
of forging a lasting peace is making slow and steady progress in Sri 
Lanka. Defying all doomsday predictions, the ceasefire has held and 
the Government of Sri Lanka and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam 
(LTTE) continue to talk. They are now discussing the more difficult 
issues, such as the long-term political arrangements and the High 
Security Zones in the north that are still controlled by the Sri 
Lankan army.

Of course, the process of peace has not been an easy one in Sri 
Lanka. There is still scepticism in many circles and a deep-rooted 
suspicion of the LTTE's motives. There are disturbing stories 
emerging from the north and the east of extortion and threats, of 
minors that continue to be recruited for battle. Yet, last Christmas, 
people enjoyed the first festive season in decades without the pall 
of war hanging over their heads. The scores of military check posts 
that dotted Colombo had disappeared as people shopped as if there 
would be no tomorrow. You could almost believe that the peace that 
prevailed was of a permanent nature.

The largest constituency for peace, which is often silent, or divided 
and therefore fails to speak with one voice, is that of women. For in 
any situation of war or conflict, women shoulder the greatest burden. 
Yet, when the negotiations for peace begin, their perspective is most 
often ignored. In Sri Lanka, too, initially men did the negotiating; 
women watched.

But this has changed quietly and significantly. A New Year gift of 
lasting value is the setting up of a committee that incorporates a 
gendered and rights-based approach to the peace process. At the end 
of the third round of talks in Oslo in December, all the parties 
involved agreed to set up a women's committee to look at gender 
issues in the peace process. And the fourth round of talks held in 
Thailand announced the names of the women, many of them known around 
the world for their work in the area of women and peace. Kumari 
Jayawardene, Deepika Udagama, Faizun Zacheriya and Kumudini Samuel 
are four of 10 women in the committee. The LTTE will nominate five 
Tamil women and in addition there will be a Muslim woman.

The formation of this committee is the consequence of consistent 
lobbying by women's groups in Sri Lanka ever since the peace process 
began. To push their case, they organised an International Women's 
Commission that toured the war-ravaged northeast of the country last 
October. The team's report is a blueprint that could be used in any 
peace process practically anywhere in the world. It foregrounds the 
impact of war on women, and spells out in specific detail what this 
means. It also recommends concrete steps that need to be taken as 
part of the process of negotiating a lasting peace. The report states:

"We recognise that women in particular have been victimised by war 
and conflict in Sri Lanka, that they have been subject to the worst 
forms of violence, been displaced and made into refugees, compelled 
to live as war widows. Women have seen family members disappear and 
or join fighting forces. They have suffered physical disabilities and 
psychosocial trauma because of war. Therefore women's experiences and 
women's voices must be an essential part of the peace process in Sri 
Lanka."

The recommendations cover many different aspects. Amongst the 
important issues that are emphasised is the problem of displacement 
as well as resettlement and reconstruction. As women and children 
form the majority of those displaced, they will require specific 
assurances of safety if they want to return to their former homes. 
Land laws will also have to be scrutinised to ensure that 
women-headed households, and widows, are given land deeds. In fact, 
the committee has recommended that even cash compensation should be 
handed over directly to women to ensure that it actually benefits the 
family.

The report also mentions health, education, women's livelihoods, 
political representation, freedom of association, the problem of 
disappeared and missing in action and violence against women. 
Additionally, it draws attention to the problem of thousands of 
landmines that litter this entire region and which pose a daily 
hazard to men, women and children. Ironically, the peace negotiations 
have partly been conducted in Oslo, the city where the international 
treaty calling for the elimination of landmines was initiated. 
Neither Sri Lanka nor the LTTE have signed this treaty.

If the women's committee is allowed to function freely, and if its 
recommendations are incorporated into the peace process, Sri Lanka 
will have pioneered a significantly different and relevant approach 
to resolving conflict and crafting peace.

______

#5.

The Hindu, Sunday, Jan 26, 2003
Magazine

An open letter to the Prime Minister

RANJIT HOSKOTE on the political situation and emerging Indian post-modernity.

My Dear Atalji,

BY the time this letter appears in print, you and the other members 
of the country's leadership will have taken your seats at the 
Republic Day parade, defying the persistent fog that has enveloped 
northern India this past week. The President will have embarked on 
his longest morning, standing at attention to review India's military 
strength as it rolls by in a ceremonial concourse of tanks, planes, 
warship models and delivery systems. And after that, if custom is 
preserved, will follow the mobile tableaux that have represented 
India's ethnic and cultural diversity for five decades, undisturbed 
by ethnic strife, inter-religious violence, regional conflict and 
sub-national aspirations. The hardware of battle-readiness, the 
software of the folk arts: how strange that we should re-affirm our 
commitment to the Republic, year after year, through these twin 
expressions of national identity. The former is a demonstration of 
the sovereignty and strength of a state that could ward off actual 
and potential enemies; the latter, a celebration of what the first is 
meant to defend, a multiplicity of cultures gathered under the 
umbrella of an inclusive nation.

But today, both expressions ring hollow, like fictions that have 
outlived their usefulness.

* * *

I find myself thinking of Gandhiji's seminal work, Hind Swaraj 
(1909), cast as a dialogue between an impetuous Reader and a 
reflective Editor. As you well know, Atalji, the Editor in the book 
is the Gandhian voice, while the character of the Reader is based on 
Savarkar, whom Gandhiji met in London, and towards whose violent 
politics of national liberation he was unsympathetic. Is it not 
ironic that the Republic, which was founded on the principles of the 
Editor/Gandhi, is increasingly being run along lines more congenial 
to the Reader/Savarkar? Like the Reader/Savarkar, many of us say: "We 
must own our navy, our army, and we must have our own splendour, and 
then will India's voice ring through the world." To this, the 
Editor/Gandhi replies that such an idea is premised on the desire to 
control and exploit: such a nation not only oppresses others, but 
also brutalises itself and becomes enslaved to a cycle of violence 
and cynicism. India's overt nuclear weaponisation programme, over 
which you have presided, illustrates this tragic reality to 
perfection: not only has Pokhran been matched by Chagai, but 
Pakistan's declaration of its intent to use nuclear weapons in a 
crisis has rendered us incapable of waging a serious conventional war 
without risking a cataclysm that neither country would survive.

As for India's voice ringing out in the world, Atalji, it now rings 
out only as an echo of the proclamations of Emperor Bush. As when we 
claim to be a partner in the "war against terror", fatuously pressing 
our case against the U.S.'s real ally in the region, Pakistan, and 
refusing to recognise that terror, in the Bush phrasebook, is 
something that endangers the interests of the U.S.; terror, if it 
happens to other countries, can always be glossed as a liberation 
struggle or a regional imbalance, the minor ailments of bit-role 
players.

And sometimes, Atalji, our voice does not ring out at all, not even 
within our own borders. As when, exactly a month ago, on December 26, 
2002, the Government of India signed a bilateral agreement of 
sinister import with the U.S. Government, without the slightest 
public debate or public scrutiny. The effect of this agreement is to 
dilute the effectiveness of the International Criminal Court (ICC): 
using the loophole of Article 98 of the ICC Statute, each of the 
signatories agrees not to hand over any former or current official, 
national or representative of the other country to any international 
tribunal, without the express consent of that country. Which means 
that any U.S. national accused of crimes against humanity would be 
safe in India, and any Indian, likewise accused, is beyond the reach 
of international justice in the U.S.. This is a significant 
development, at a time when independent investigators have revealed 
the involvement of U.S. military personnel in the mistreatment and 
slaughter of Taliban troops who had surrendered and been disarmed, in 
the aftermath of the Afghanistan operations last year. And at a time 
when peace and justice activists have been considering ways in which 
your creature Narendra Modi and his henchpersons could be brought 
before an international tribunal, for their role in the systematic 
genocidal violence in Gujarat over 2002.

Atalji, you are fond of staking India's right to sit among the great 
powers at the high table of international debate. But, by signing 
this particular treaty with the U.S., you have placed us on the same 
bench as violators of humanitarian values like Israel, arrivistes in 
the U.S. cosmology like Romania and East Timor, and such victims of 
U.S. arm-twisting as Honduras, the Dominican Republic, Micronesia, 
Sri Lanka, Nepal, and the Marshall Islands.

* * *

And when we look past the rainbow colours of the pretty costumes that 
the charming folk dancers sport, Atalji, who really belongs to your 
India? Who can really be at home in the Bharat that you and Modi, 
moderate and extremist, Good Cop and Bad Cop, are producing, between 
you? Earlier this month, your administration spent Rs. 11 crore on a 
tamasha called the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas, tempting the diaspora 
home by offering dual citizenship to non-resident Indians and people 
of Indian origin. But even here, you enforced a caste system, laying 
out the red carpet for NRIs and PIOs from the U.S., the U.K., Canada, 
New Zealand and a few other chosen countries, while citing "security" 
as the reason to deny this privilege to their confreres from 
elsewhere. May we hazard the possibility, admittedly a speculation, 
that these lesser diasporics, from Malaysia, the Caribbean or Fiji, 
don't feature as donors to the treasury of the RSS and its associate 
organisations?

While experts examine the merits of your offer of dual citizenship - 
whether it will ever translate into a substantial invitation, in the 
absence of conditions that tempt NRIs and PIOs to invest in, or 
return to the homeland - may I request you to hold a corresponding 
Nivasi Bharatiya Divas? Why doesn't your government fulfil its 
Constitutional obligation to ensure that full citizenship rights are 
enjoyed by millions of resident, Indian-born Indians who have never 
enjoyed these, or whose rights have been snatched away? Why don't you 
make an auspicious beginning by restoring citizenship rights to the 
residents of Gujarat's refugee camps, who were disenfranchised during 
the pogrom of 2002?

The tanks pass on, the tableaux fade from view. While your government 
is busy spreading its doctrine of transnational nationalism, it is 
left to grassroots activists to restore basic entitlements to those 
Indians you have left to their fate, like the old and diseased 
abandoned by their families on the ghats of India's sacred cities: 
the millions suffering from tuberculosis, malaria, AIDS; the millions 
denied food and education, or subjected to school-teachers trying to 
force subsidised gruel down their throats. Atalji, many of your 
colleagues in the government and the party would have us believe that 
contemporary India is an influential global player, armed with 
weapons of mass destruction, its vast economic potential waiting to 
be tapped. But yours is the soul of a poet: surely you are not 
deluded by this triumphalist charade? Surely there are moments when 
you, too, turn away from the splendour of official India, to confront 
the real face of the Republic, which is the face of the child sold 
into lifelong slavery, because its parents needed Rs. 200 to buy two 
bags of paddy seed.

Yours sincerely.

_____

#6.

The Hindu
Sunday, Jan 26, 2003

Writers flay Sangh Parivar `campaign'
By Our Staff Reporter

THRISSUR JAN. 25. Several prominent writers including Sukumar 
Azhikode, K.G. Sankara Pillai, Kovilan, VKN, M.N. Vijayan, K.N. 
Panikkar, Attur Ravi Varma and Sara Joseph have condemned the Sangh 
Parivar campaign against the Kendra Sahithya Akademi Secretary, K. 
Sachidanandan, and the writer, Zachariah.

In a statement here today, the writers said the campaign is a 
continuation of the attack on Kamala Surayya, who had won this year's 
Ezhuthachan Puraskaram. The communal politics which have paid rich 
electoral dividends is being used to convert society from top to 
bottom to the parivar's ideological positions. The effort is to 
undermine the very secular foundation of the Constitution by 
converting civil structures and cultural institutions in a systematic 
way into centres for reproducing the ideology of a `Hindu nation'. 
Just like any Indian citizens all writers, artists and intellectuals 
have a legitimate right to raise their voice against engineered 
communal riots and violation of democratic rights. This is a struggle 
for survival against communal fascism. What Mr. Sachidanandan and Mr. 
Zacharia have done is only the organic response of an artist endowed 
with normal qualities of compassion and love for fellow beings.

Emphasising the need for forging unity against attempts to impose the 
wishes of the communal forces on society, they said a meeting of 
like-minded people will be held in Thrissur on January 28 to evolve 
strategies to counter the communal propaganda.

The signatories include C.V. Sreeraman, Vysakhan, B. Rajivan, C.R. 
Parameswaran, K. Venu, K. Aravindakshan , Asokan Cheruvil, M.N. 
Karassery, Balachandran Vadakkedath, Vijayalakshmi, C. Ravunni, V.G. 
Thampi, K.C. Narayanan, K.K. Hiranyan, N. Rajan, K.R. Tony, P. Raman, 
P.N. Gopikrishnan, V.M. Girija, Thayyil Radhakrishnan, P. Surendran, 
P.P. Ramachandran, K. Gopinathan, N. Prabhakaran, T.R. Chandradutt, 
George Pulikuthiyel, I. Shanmughadas, K.A. Mohandas, M. Kamaruddin, 
K.J. Johny, K.V. Baby, Anvar Ali, Damodaran Kaliyath, Robin, Rafeeq 
Ahamed, Kavumbai Balakrishnan and K.R. Janardanan.

____

#7.

The Indian Express
Sunday, January 26, 2003
EXPRESS EXCLUSIVE

Sangh leader is second to Mahatma in I&B pantheon
Govt plans Rs 5.62-crore, 75-volume project on Deen Dayal Upadhyay; 
BJP leader's NGO is source for works
Amitav Ranjan

New Delhi, January 25: The Bharatiya Janata Party-led government has 
decided to repay its debt to one of the founders of the Jan Sangh, 
Deen Dayal Upadhyay. The Information and Broadcasting Ministry will 
publish a 75-volume series on Upadhyay - making him only the second 
Indian after Mahatma Gandhi to get such a tribute.

The series will set the country's exchequer back by Rs 5.62 crore and 
will create 55 more jobs in the Publications Division which the 
Finance Ministry wanted to close down. It will also benefit BJP 
leader Mahesh Chandra Sharma, whose NGO will be the primary source 
for Upadhyay's works.

The series will be published first in Hindi, followed by English and 
other languages. Upadhyay was one of the key functionaries - along 
with Atal Behari Vajpayee and L K Advani - who was sent by the RSS to 
assist Shyama Prasad Mukherjee in forming the previous avatar of the 
BJP, the Jan Sangh.

The I&B ministry proposes to bring out the 75-volume series 
comprising his published, unpublished and ''scattered'' works in 
association with Research and Development Foundation for Integral 
Humanism, a non-government organisation founded and chaired by 
Sharma, BJP's former chief whip in the Rajya Sabha.

''The towering personality of Pandit Upadhyay and his contribution to 
Indian thought, literature, culture, society and public life can be 
gauged from the fact that he was chosen as the subject of 
doctoral-level thesis by Dr Sharma from Rajasthan University,'' says 
the I&B Ministry's proposal to the Planning Commission.

In addition to the budgetary support, the Ministry has also 
recommended that 55 more posts be created in the Publication Division 
that the Finance Ministry proposed to close down.

These posts would be continued for more than five years as the first 
publication would start in the third year of the project with the 
printing of the first 10 volumes. Subsequently, 10 volumes would be 
brought out each year.

Why Upadhyay and not Sardar Patel? Minister Sushma Swaraj said that 
Upadhyay was selected, and not Patel or others, because there have 
been no other proposal.

''The project was proposed by Deen Dayal Shodha Sansthan. If 
proposals come from other trusts, we will definitely consider them,'' 
she said. She said the project would start from this year but would 
not run for long, unlike the one on Mahatama Gandhi.

A large chunk of Pandit Upadhayay's works would be sourced from 
Sharma through an agreement with his Foundation.

Sharma's foundation is also the beneficiary of the magnanimity of 
another ministry. It will get Rs 1 lakh from the Human Resources 
Ministry for organising a symposium on 'Deen Dayal Upadhyay: The 
Journalist.'

Though Sharma's seminar does not meet the norms for financial 
assistance, the finance division of HRD has agreed to give Rs 1 lakh 
since the ''...honourable HRM has desired that keeping in view the 
importance of the proposal, it should be considered immediately,'' 
says an HRD note.

____

#8.

The Indian Express
Sunday, January 26, 2003

Strangers In The Light
Intizar Husain may have left UP during Partition, but refuses to cede 
a shared heritage in his magical short stories, says Kishwar Ahluwalia

Wajh-e-begangi nahin maloom? Tum jahan ke ho wahan ke hum bhi hain.
(Why do you call us strangers? You belong to the same place that I do.)

Perhaps these lines best express the faith of Intizar Husain, one of 
Pakistan's leading short story writers, who has admitted with 
disarming honesty: "I have always felt there is a Hindu sitting 
inside me." While growing up in India may not have prevented his 
departure post-Partition, it left him with the nostalgia of a 
childhood in UP, amidst Hindu neighbours, watching the Ram Lila, 
participating in community rituals, oblivious of a divided world 
which would soon separate them. It has also given him the felicity 
and strength to write with equal conviction, whether it is about 
Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists or just human relationships, set both in 
India and Pakistan.

These are no borders or boundaries for this writer, he does not need 
the artifice of passports to paint his literary canvas, as he 
understands only too well the hurt and wounded pride beneath the skin 
of these two nations, carved from each other's flesh.

A Chronicle of the Peacocks: Stories of Partition, Exile and Lost Memories
By Intizar Husain
Translated from the Urdu by Alok Bhalla and Vishwamitter Adil
Oxford University Press; Rs 395

[...]

____

#9.

FILM SCREENINGS

(i)

TALES OF THE NIGHT FAIRIES (2002) will have its first public screening at
the INDIA HABITAT CENTRE (MAIN AUDITORIUM), New Delhi at 7PM on Tuesday,
January 28, 2003. The film is 74 mins long.

Synopsis:
Five sexworkers - four women and one man - along with the filmmaker/narrator
embark on a journey of storytelling. The stories explore the power of
collective organizing and resistance. The journey through the labyrinthine
inner cities of Calcutta is both personal and musical.

Script & Direction: Shohini Ghosh /Camera: Sabeena Gadihoke/ Editing:
Shohini Ghosh & Shikha Sen / Sound: Sunder Prasad Singh

_____

(ii)

The Center for Media, Culture and History at New York University
presents

a screening and conversation

THE MEN IN THE TREE
Revisiting the RSS and Hindu fundamentalism
A documentary film by Lalit Vachani (2002, 98 min)

The screening will be followed by a conversation between
Lalit Vachani and Arvind Rajagopal (Culture and Communication)

Friday, January 31 3:00 5:00 pm
Kevorkian Center 
50 Washington Sq S [New York City] 
Screening Room