SACW | 17 Sept. 2003

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire  |  16 September,  2003


[1] Move to Repeal Anti-Women Law Triggers Controversy in Pakistan (Ahmed Raza)
[2] India Pakistan Arms Race and Militarisation Watch Compilation # 135
[3] India: Breaking The Terror Cycle: Tackle causes, not symptoms 
(Praful Bidwai)
[4] India: The  Progenitor of Pseudo-Secularism (I.K.Shukla)
[5] India: Uranium Mine project in Andhra Pradesh,
- Public Hearing on the Proposed Uranium Mine in Lambapur-Peddagattu, 
Nalgonda district, Andhra Pradesh, August 19, 2003 - Submission by 
Praful Bidwai
- Movement Against Uranium Project (MAUP) [ Andhra Pradesh, India]
[6] Events:
- India: Third Dr. Arvind Narayan Das Foundation lecture (New Delhi, 
20 September 2003)
- Sri Lanka: Book release : Nira Wickramasinghe's  "Dressing the 
Colonised Body"
[7] India: Complaint and Draft Petition seeking investigation against 
Dr. Pravin Togadia to the Medical Council of India (Manisha Gupte, 
Amar Jesani, N. Sarojini and Sanjay Nagral )
[8] India: The saffron strategy in Maharashtra (Lyla Bavadam)
[9] India: Justice done  (editorial, The Hindu)
+ Protest against communal violence (Robin David)
  Riot panel bars advocate, witness from facing media
[10] Hindutva at Work:
- BJP defends burning of Christian literature in Uttaranchal
- VHP forming "secret squads" to help temple campaigners
- Gujarat's new Public Prosecutor is a VHP activist (Janyala Sreenivas)


--------------

[1.]

OneWorld South Asia
16 September 2003

Move to Repeal Anti-Women Law Triggers Controversy in Pakistan
Ahmed Raza
http://southasia.oneworld.net/article/view/68164/1/

______


[2.]

India Pakistan Arms Race and Militarisation Watch Compilation # 135
(16 September 2003)
URL: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/IPARMW/message/146


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[3.]

[September 15, 2003]
--
Breaking The Terror Cycle: Tackle causes, not symptoms

By Praful Bidwai

The second anniversary of September 11 should occasion sober 
reflection, serious contemplation, and brutally candid analysis, not 
the tub-thumping macho rhetoric about "fighting terrorism by whatever 
means" that we're all being treated to. The attacks shockingly 
highlighted the menace of terrorism, the vulnerability of the world's 
mightiest nation, and the weakness of its security doctrines, 
including deterrence. They inflicted enormous damage upon those 
ultimate symbols of US power, the Pentagon and Wall Street, and left 
America shaken.  Yet, they were by no means history's most 
destructive instances of terrorism, as is often claimed. Even going 
by the operative part of the US State Department's definition of 
terrorism as "premeditated, politically motivated violence 
perpetrated against non-combatant targets", 9/11 pales into 
insignificance beside the World War-II fire-bombings of Dresden and 
Tokyo, and, above all, the nuclear strikes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 
history's most horrific acts of terrorism. All these were directed at 
non-combatants too, but by states, not "groups or clandestine agents".

In Hiroshima, a single Bomb killed 140,000 people in unspeakably 
gruesome ways---a number that's 40 times higher than the total killed 
on 9/11. A qualitatively new weapon was demonstrated in August 1945, 
which has the capacity to snuff out all life itself, and which 
decisively altered global power equations. Seen in perspective, 9/11 
was the worst attack on the US, but not the world. Yet, President 
Bush's first response was to declare an open-ended, all-out, unending 
war against "global terrorism". Evidently, the world's sole 
Superpower needs a fully global enemy! America's "war on terror" 
would encompass 60 or more countries; Washington would not rest until 
it had wiped out the menace of global terrorism.

Two years, and two wars later, the world has become more skewed, more 
restless, more insecure, and more vulnerable to terrorism. The US and 
its allies swiftly defeated the Taliban militarily. But more than 
two-thirds of its key leaders and sources of inspiration, including 
Osama bin Laden, Ayman Al-Zawahiri and Mullah Omar remain at large. 
Al-Qaeda is furiously regrouping. Afghanistan remains hopelessly 
ungovernable. Mr Hamid Karzai has been called the Mayor of 
Kabul---not inaccurately. Afghanistan's sole state-level military 
force remains under the control of the Panjshiris, while warlords 
rule its remaining territory. The US has failed to make the minimal 
financial or political-military commitment necessary to stabilise 
Afghanistan's society and state. Instability in Afghanistan has only 
strengthened anti-US forces in a huge new Arc of Crisis extending 
from the Middle East to South and Southeast Asia, including Pakistan 
and Saudi Arabia.

In Iraq, the US waged an unjust war based on fabricated evidence 
about weapons of mass destruction. It took over a country that was 
patently not a terrorist threat (however repulsive its regime might 
have been) and turned it into a threat---witness the numerous suicide 
bombings, above all, on the UN. The war pitted America against 
countless nations, including its strategic allies, and more 
crucially, against the world's Second Superpower---global public 
opinion. The multiple layers of deception and overwhelming military 
force, on which Washington has relied, with all its arrogance, has 
antagonised Muslims everywhere, who see anti-Islamic prejudice at 
work in American plans.

This has further fuelled the forces of extremism. The US military 
machine, although gigantic, is ill-equipped to vanquish this 
dispersed, decentralised, "amorphous" enemy. In any case, as Gabriel 
Kolko, one of the world's greatest historians of war and diplomacy, 
argues, "military success bears scant relationship to political 
solutions that end wars and greatly reduce the risk of their 
recurring. But this dichotomy between military power and political 
success has existed for most of the past century. The US has always 
been ready to use its superior military strength even though 
employing that power often creates many more problems than it solves".

America's celebration of military solutions to political problems has 
become pathological. One of its worst examples is its coddling of 
Israel under an extreme-right leadership which hysterically opposes a 
just solution to the Palestinian question, and which practises 
barbaric extra-judicial assassination and torture against Palestinian 
civilians. The festering of the Palestinian question, and Israel's 
continuing repressive occupation of its territories, are a potent 
source of global Muslim discontent which has all but scuppered 
America's plans for the Middle East.

America's obsession with security, now bordering on paranoia, is 
leading to draconian domestic restrictions on civil liberties, and 
the racial-profiling of its ethnic minorities. The US is setting an 
extremely negative example. It is this very example that the Indian 
government wishes to emulate---and not merely to curry favour with 
the US and build a "strategic partnership" with it at Pakistan's 
expense. Our official thinking is increasingly skewed in favour of 
purely military approaches to terrorism. This is reflected in the 
perverse solidarity demonstrated by the government with Mr Ariel 
Sharon as he scales up his insanely repressive methods and says Hamas 
leaders are now "marked for death". India's struggle against 
terrorism has nothing in common with Mr Sharon's colonial-militarist 
fight against Palestine's liberation, including its terrorist 
component. Yet, the militarist approach was explicitly commended by 
National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra during his infamous July 
speech to the American Jewish Committee. He dismissed as "nonsense" 
the view that one must address the root-causes of terrorism to combat 
it effectively.

Today, growing numbers of Indian politicians and policemen too 
exhibit the same impatience with the task of understanding that the 
roots of terrorism lie in cesspools of injustice and grievance, and 
of appreciating the importance of minimising hurt to innocent people 
in anti-terrorist operations, besides painstakingly gathering 
evidence before damning specific groups. The worst irresponsibility 
in this regard is to be found in two of our most tragic recent 
incidents, each with over 30 people dead: Akshardham in Gujarat last 
September, and the August 25 Mumbai blasts. Last fortnight, Ahmedabad 
Police Commissioner K.R. Kaushik said the Akshardham attack was 
planned in Saudi Arabia to avenge the post-Godhra violence; 
Jaish-e-Mohammad played a key role in it, with inspiration from 
Pakistan's ISI. He said three terrorists came from Pakistan a week 
before the attack.
However, the Kashmir police have an altogether different story. The 
have arrested Chand Khan, a car mechanic, who says he was ordered by 
the Lashkar to purchase an Ambassador car for use in a suicide-squad 
mission and to transport two terrorists to Gujarat. Their target of 
choice was a Gaurav Yatra planned by Mr Narendra Modi. On learning 
that the yatra won't be held, they decided to attack Akshardham. The 
Gujarat police have also interrogated Chand Khan and corroborated the 
details he cited of his own activities in Gujarat. Their arrests of 
five Gujarati Muslims thus seem based on concocted evidence.

In the Mumbai case, the authorities have given out four mutually 
incompatible versions of who was behind the explosions: 
Jaish-e-Mohammed; Students' Islamic Movement of India and 
Lashkar-a-Tayyaba (L.K. Advani); the Dukhtaran-e-Millat women's group 
from Kashmir; and finally, Ahle-Hadees, a religious organisation with 
"no known history of terrorist violence". These contradictory 
accounts seriously weaken the government's credibility and cast doubt 
upon its sincerity in investigating, leave alone fighting, terrorism. 
They betray reckless disregard for accuracy and caution in dealing 
with life-and-death issues. The official haste to claim success, 
score points, and rush to judgment can only distract from the 
struggle against terrorism, and make us blind to its causes.

Yet, we should know that terrorism cannot possibly thrive in a 
minimally just and participatory society. It wins popular 
approval---so essential for it---only when certain groups are 
systematically marginalised, excluded, brutalised or subjected to 
pain, insult and humiliation, and when avenues for redressing their 
grievances close down, and when even elementary fairness, leave alone 
justice, seems impossible. Terrorism's ranks swell when innocent 
people are punished and their spirit is crushed. There's a simple 
lesson here: Terror begets terror. State terrorism fuels 
militant-group terrorism.

A truly viable, practical, solution to terrorism must simultaneously 
use humane policing, accurate intelligence, and political approaches 
that will let people vent their grievances and which will reform 
justice delivery and public institutions so they become responsive to 
the marginalised. Many among India's ethnic-religious minorities feel 
discriminated against, but have consciously chosen not to use violent 
methods. Until recently, our Muslims kept out of entanglement with 
global jehadi "causes". Not a single Indian Muslim joined Al-Qaeda or 
other jehadi forces, even in Kashmir.

Then came Gujarat. Last year's barbaric violence produced a new kind 
of despair, hopelessness, anger and humiliation. With the Best Bakery 
judgment, it became apparent that the possibility of bringing the 
guilty to account could be non-existent. Regrettably, despair is 
driving some educated Muslim youth to extremism. This is alarming. It 
speaks of a grave failure of our political system and its inability 
to induce security and a sense of belonging among all our citizens. 
The turn to terrorism will be horrendously counter-productive, indeed 
suicidal, for all concerned. Indiscriminate violence against innocent 
civilians will not bring justice. It will only invite ferocious state 
repression. All citizens then will live in greater fear and 
insecurity. We cannot break out of this vicious cycle of 
terror-counter-terror unless we deal with its root-causes, not just 
symptoms.-end-


______


[4.]

THE  PROGENITOR  OF  PSEUDO-SECULARISM
I.K.Shukla

Alice of the Adventures in Wonderland was not the first to aver that 
words can mean anything you want them to.   The Newspeak in Orwell's 
1984, besides other things, was only a fictional exegesis of her 
"discovery" popularized by Lewis Carroll via Wonderland Adventures 
linguistic and other-wise. The hoary tradition in Sanskrit of 
playfulness with  language aimed to expand and entertain the mind. 
Its resort to ambiguity and its innate polysemy did not seek to 
constrict the mind and inhibit its modes of thinking. One very 
popular statement of fact in sweet and rough versions comes to mind: 
Neeras taruriha vilasati puratah (a withered tree stands in front). 
Rudely worded, it would be, with the same meaning:  Shushko vrikshah 
tishthati agre.

But the uses to which Hindu fascism put the language exceed far 
beyond the mendacity and mauling inherent, as a matter of tactics, in 
any fascistic manipulation. The depth of depravity informing and 
imbuing the saffronazi semantics is mind boggling. Take just two 
examples: Shakha (branch). It obstinately obfuscates and covers up 
the real goings on in the deceptively genteel and boy-scout variety 
of boot camp that RSS has patented. Bauddhik (sessions of moral 
depravity and mental vacuity) hardly lets you guess the malevolent 
farrago of lies and brutal brainwashing that form its staple. 
Indoctrination that drains out the brain and turns one into a robot 
could not be more cruel or total. It is the kind of bold and bald 
lies that Nazis excelled in. What was "national" or "socialist" in 
National Socialism, their ideology they touted and were sworn to? 
Were the Nazis showering socialism on Germany? (An aside. Had they 
been so engaged they would have been smashed by the imperial 
"democracies" of the West long before 1939.)

Similarly, what is either "cultural" or "nationalist" in Cultural 
Nationalism to which the HinduTaliban are wedded? It is not what they 
propound or how they expound it which could settle the issue. Their 
enunciation or exposition of the term, or the ideology subsumed and 
symbolized by it, cannot be trusted as authentic or genuine either in 
terms linguistic or political. What under this rubric they perform 
and present in praxis - that is the evidence and the standard against 
which their definitions and discursive depositions must be weighed 
and evaluated. Imperial Western "democracies" are called "the free 
world"; Latin American dictatorships and juntas are called "liberal 
democracies" in the Western media and academe. It would seem from 
these definitions that butchering millions of people, for the 
privileged predatory few at home, the leaching out of national 
resources to alien corporations abroad, and for keeping millions of 
people permanently destitute and deprived, is a requisite to qualify 
as a "democracy", the more lethal, the more "liberal".

When Vajpayee unloaded his homilies on the 125th anniversary of The 
Hindu the other day, he delivered himself of a mouthful. His 
pontifications were a demagogue's wordfest. That his peroration, 
without any whisper of irony or ineptness, included references to 
"our democratic culture", "diversity of viewpoints", "persecution on 
account of one's beliefs", "unknown to our ethos", "poverty, 
unemployment", "open, inclusive, tolerant nation", "no need to be 
skeptical about Indian secularism", must be ascribed to his speech 
writer's drugged state or established notoriety as an  inveterate 
liar.

Democracy, dissent, and diversity excoriated in the official 
documents and ideological commitments of the RSS (Vajpayee's "soul") 
are farthest from the concerns of the Saffron Syndicate. That it is 
dedicated to exclusion, opacity, and intolerance in its political 
credo which blasts and burns the minorities as hurdles in its 
monochromatic and malefic formulation of  "one nation-one 
language-one people" fiat is no more mere rhetoric but a frenzied 
faith, India knows only too well at the cost of lakhs rendered 
homeless, thousands of Muslims-Christians-Dalits-Tribals roasted 
alive, hundreds of minority women raped and children torn to pieces, 
their homes and shops savagely destroyed. But Vajpayee had the 
gumption to blabber these pieties without any qualms. He lied boldest 
when he enumerated "poverty and unemployment" as among the concerns 
of BJP. He omitted BJP's major obsessions : Hindu Rashtra, Mandir, 
Pakistan, Akhand Bharat, Liquidation of Minorities through Genocide.

His feral falsehoods are too well known to wash. What concern me here 
are two of his most egregious pomposities. But when I recall that he 
wrote rhymed slogans and Bhajans for the RSS and publicized them as 
poems, and lately touted his meanderings as musings, I know what to 
expect of a poetaster and a demagogue. He peremptorily pontificated 
on the province of journalism recommending "objective reportage 
(sic)", and criticism to be "fair and balanced." And "objective", in 
his reckoning, is Hindutwa gibberish to be honored as gospel, and 
brazen cover-up of its crimes as "fair and balanced".

As to secularism. Sangh never believed in it, has from its inception 
declared  war on it, and pithily put its anathema in its slogan: 
secularism is no option. Day in and day out, over the years past, 
Rashtra Sanharak Sangh ( Association of Destroyers of the Nation) and 
its brood have expostulated against secularism so obscenely and 
raucously that Vajpayee pretending faith in it should have surprised 
even him after the utterance but for the fact that it all was all 
theatrically well rehearsed and pre-cued beforehand.

Political memory being proverbially short, many in India believe that 
Lal Kishenchand  Advani is the patriarch and prelate of "pseudo 
secularism". But its prime progenitor and  premier pontiff is, 
surprise, surprise, Atal Behari Vajpayee. It is Vajpayee who 
consolidated the vision into a reality in so far as "pseudo 
secularism" is concerned. It is he who realized early on that BJP and 
its Hindutwa cabal needed it very badly, even if as a counterpoint 
against Congress's avowal of secularism. And, the Sanghis and 
Bajrangis left nothing to imagination.

If Congress's secularism could be shown as pseudo, BJP's phantasm of 
secularism would be shown as the real and solid variant. As to what 
its shape and style would be, that too was perfectly and fully 
planned: burning of Muslims and their properties, raping of Christian 
and Muslim women and their bonfire, spearing and shredding of Muslim 
children and fetuses, and proclaiming it all to be "retaliation 
against historical wrongs", "restoration of Hindu glory", recovering 
potency, and shedding inferiority complex. The lab was to be Gujarat, 
which would be staked as the slaughter house and mortuary of both 
minorities and secularism. Modi was anointed as its CM (Charnel 
Manager).

These seem to be harsh words. Here is the evidence. These two 
excerpts from The Hindu Nationalist Movement in India by Christophe 
Jaffrelot, Columbia University Press, New York, 1996, p.376 set the 
record straight:
In January 1987, in an address to the BJP's National Council in 
Vijayawada, he (Advani) referred ominously to the 'dangers of 
minorityism' and 'pseudo-secularism' in an obvious allusion to the 
Congress government's concern to protect certain interests of the 
minorities, as exemplified in the Shah Bano affair.
In the next para:
Although many press reports suggested that the replacement of 
Vajpayee by Advani represented the eclipse of a liberal tendency by 
one which was more hard-line and militant, the reality was much more 
complex. The two leaders differed from each other in some respects 
but they did not represent groups or even ideological tendencies. 
(Interestingly, the expression 'pseudo-secularism' was first used by 
Vajpayee as early as 1969).
The footnote gives the source: 'The bane of pseudo-secularism', in 
S.S.Bhandari (ed.). Jana Sangh Souvenir, pp. 55-8.

It explains what Vajpayee meant by raj dharma in his exhortation to 
Modi last year after the holocaust in Gujarat to which Modi had 
replied "that is what I am doing". Both knew, both concurred. 
Immediately thereafter Vajpayee lost no time in felicitating Modi on 
his birthday. By not saving Muslims in Gujarat, Modi did his 
rajdharma. By not sacking Modi for his crimes (deemed a service to 
Hindu Rashtra), Vajpayee did his rajdharma

It would be salutary to recall a couplet from a Bhopali poet:
	Tarah tarah ke saanp hamari Dilli men
	Atal Behari Shah Bukhari Dilli men
(There are various kinds of snakes in Delhi. [To name only two] Atal 
Behari and Shah Bukhari both are there.)

16 Sep.03

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[5.]

New @ South Asia Citizens Web

Public Hearing on the Proposed Uranium Mine in Lambapur-Peddagattu, 
Nalgonda district, Andhra Pradesh, August 19, 2003
Submission by Praful Bidwai
http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex/new/bidwai19082003.html

o o o

Movement Against Uranium Project (MAUP) [ Andhra Pradesh, India] 
http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex/SAAN/maup/

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[6.]

EVENTS:

(i.)

This is to invite you to the third Dr. Arvind Narayan Das Foundation 
lecture at India International Center [New Delhi] on Sept. 20 2003, 
at 6.15 pm. The lecture will be delivered by famous historian and 
novelist Dr. William Dalrymple, author of books such as The Age Of 
Kali, City of Djinns, Xanadu, At the Court of the Fish Eyed 
Goddess,White Moghuls among others. We look forward to seeing you on 
Sept 20.
regards
Dr. Manoshi Mitra Das
Managing Trustee, ANDFOUND.

o o o

(ii.)

The Daily News [Sri Lanka], September 17, 2003
Exploring political and symbolic meanings in Colonial Sri Lanka

by Irangika Range

Dr. Nira Wickramasinghe's book titled "Dressing the Colonised Body" 
[*] - 'Politics, Clothing, and Identity in Colonial Sri Lanka' will 
be released by the Chairman of the National Heritage Commission Prof. 
Senaka Bandaranayake today at 10.00 a.m. at the Colombo International 
Book Fair, BMICH, Colombo 7.
"Dressing the Colonised Body" explores popular political and symbolic 
meanings assigned to dress in a variety of colonial contexts in Sri 
Lanka.

This well-researched and highly creative book focuses on the politics 
and identity under late colonialism and is an important addition to 
the growing literature on the social history of South Asia.
Proceeding from the understanding that self-representation is at its 
peak at the moment of political independence, the author examines the 
lineages that exist between that moment in Sri Lanka and the colonial 
past, as also the meaning of the commemorations that took place on 
Independence Day.
Simultaneously she attempts to recreate the life of one man through a 
study of his dress as revealed in photographs.
Nira Wickramasinghe obtained her PHD in History from Oxford. She has 
been a Fellow at the School of Public Affairs, University of Maryland 
and Visiting Professor at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences 
Sociales, Paris.
A recipient of the World Bank Robert McNamara Fellowship, 
Wickramasinghe's work focuses on identity, politics, nationalism and 
transnationalism in which areas she has published extensively.
Her publications include Social Theory (1994, co-edited with 
R.Coomaraswamy); Ethnic Politics in Colonial Sri Lanka (1995); 
History Writing: New Trends and Methodologies (2001).

She is currently working on the political history of Sri Lanka in the 
twentieth century.

[*  Published by Orient Longman India]

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[7.]

South Asia Citizens Web | 15 September 2003

Complaint and Draft Petition seeking investigation against Dr. Pravin 
Togadia to the Medical Council of India
by Manisha Gupte, Amar Jesani, N. Sarojini and Sanjay Nagral

A complaint was filed by over 50 doctors under the Medico Friend 
Circle against Dr. Praveen Togadia in the Medical Council of India to 
get his license to practice medicine revoked for his indulgence and 
involvement in hate propaganda and violence.
http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex/new/MFCnote062003.html

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[8.]

<http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2019/stories/20030926004002300.htm>http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2019/stories/20030926004002300.htm
Frontline: Volume 20 - Issue 19, September 13 - 26, 2003

The saffron strategy in Maharashtra
LYLA BAVADAM

The August 25 blasts have given the Shiv Sena-BJP combine a pretext 
to promote its communal agenda and poll strategy through maha artis, 
while the State government watches in silence. 
IF the Opposition parties in Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena (S.S.) and 
the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), did not have a cogent election 
strategy for the forthcoming State Assembly polls, then the twin 
blasts in Mumbai on August 25 have certainly provided them with a peg.
Ever since the blasts, the S.S.-BJP combine has swung into action, 
attacking the ruling Democratic Front (D.F.) on every count and 
seizing the opportunity to foment communal tensions. The first 
indication of this came with Deputy Prime Minister L.K. Advani's 
perfunctory visit to the blast sites. Addressing the press and the 
public in the Zaveri Bazar area, dominated by the Gujarati community, 
he had no hesitation in pointing a finger at Pakistan and saying that 
"our neighbour" is not doing enough to control terrorism. As proof of 
its sincerity in controlling terrorism, Advani said Pakistan must 
hand over the 20 terrorists, including those wanted in connection 
with the 1993 serial blasts in Mumbai.
Instead of its usual knee-jerk reaction of calling a bandh, the Shiv 
Sena showed a surprising degree of circumspection when its leader Bal 
Thackeray agreed to the State government's appeal not to call a 
bandh. "We cannot have serial bandhs in response to serial blasts," 
he said. Instead, the Sena and the BJP led a silent march, with black 
bands tied around the participants' mouths, from the Gateway of India 
to Mantralaya, the State Secretariat. Banners carried by the 
protesters, who included Trinamul Congress leader Mamata Bannerjee, 
called for a dismissal of the State government.
However, it was just a matter of time before the S.S.-BJP decided to 
use the blasts as an aggressive introduction to their unofficial poll 
campaign. The 10-day-long Ganpati festival, which began on August 31, 
has been co-opted for the S.S.-BJP's political campaign. Many of the 
3,000-plus mandals in the city make a clear political statement, 
often with heavy communal undertones. Two Ganpati mandals in the 
Andheri-Marol region of Mumbai are replicas of the Gateway of India 
explosion - (complete with a taxi and dummies to represent victims) 
and the Zaveri Bazar blast (the replica has a mural depicting the 
scene of brutality). Other mandals have chosen equally provocative 
themes representing other blasts in the city as well as the 
Akshardham temple massacre in Gujarat. Amidst all this, there is one 
example of cross-border harmony. The Arthur Road mandal has chosen to 
use Noor Fatima, the Pakistani girl who underwent heart surgery in 
Bangalore, as an example of hope for the festive season.
Despite its initial reluctance, the Sena has chosen to join the BJP 
in its maha artis. According to the newly elected State BJP president 
Gopinath Munde, maha artis will be held all over the State to "focus 
attention on the Sushilkumar Shinde-Chhagan Bhujbal government that 
has failed in its primary task of providing security to the people".
On the second day of the Ganpati festival, September 1, the SS-BJP 
used a maha arti in the northern suburb of Chembur to rekindle their 
alliance as well as to launch a campaign against the D.F. government. 
The function, which came exactly a week after the twin blasts, was 
led by Munde and senior Shiv Sena leader Subhash Desai. A frenzied 
crowd of at least 3,000, mostly Sainiks and BJP supporters, greeted 
the two leaders who arrived together. The maha arti soon turned into 
a political rally with party flags outnumbering diyas, and BJP Member 
of Parliament Kirit Somaiya egging on the crowd with anti-terrorist 
slogan-shouting. Other leaders who attended the supposedly religious 
ceremony were city BJP president Vijay Girkar and a sprinkling of 
local Sena and BJP MLAs.
The political aspect of the maha arti became even more evident when 
Munde and Desai moved to an improvised dais that overshadowed the 
Ganpati idol, and appealed to the crowd not to rely on "the 
incompetent government, the incompetent Chief Minister (Sushilkumar 
Shinde) and his incompetent deputy (Chhagan Bhujbal)."
The official purpose of the maha artis, according to the organisers, 
is to rally people against terrorism. "It is a maha arti that 
everyone is invited to - Muslims, Christians, Dalits. It is for the 
people of Mumbai," said Munde. Both the Sena and the BJP have 
repeatedly said that the maha artis are not meant to intimidate the 
Muslim community, as had been the case after the serial bomb blasts 
of 1993 when this form of worship was invented by the saffron parties 
and used both as a political tool and as a tool of intimidation and 
Hindutvawadi aggression. The reason given in 1993 for the maha artis 
was that they were meant to draw the attention of the authorities to 
the traffic problems caused by Muslims attending namaz in mosques 
spilling out onto the roads. Ironically, the present-day maha artis 
disrupt traffic but they are portrayed as integral to a traditional 
form of worship.
The S.S.-BJP's immediate goal is the fall of the D.F. government. 
Indeed, both the parties need the support of the Muslim community and 
cannot afford to alienate it prior to the polls. Even if they fail to 
win over Muslim voters, they at least hope to turn them against the 
D.F. alliance, especially the Congress(I).
However, speeches made at the Chembur maha arti, an unusual feature, 
indicate something else. "Why do we have the blasts in Mumbai when 
the riots happened in Gujarat?" asked Desai rhetorically of the 
crowd. "It's because we have a weak government and Gujarat does not. 
The Narendra Modi government knows how to deal with terrorists while 
the Bhujbal government doesn't." The subtle threat in that statement 
shows that the Sena is for the moment a wolf in sheep's clothing.
In pursuance of its pre-poll strategy, the Shiv Sena had initially 
planned to use the Ganpati festival as a launch pad for its "Mee 
Mumbaikar" campaign. The campaign plans included themes such as 
education, health, sanitation and greening of the city, all with a 
view to inculcate a sense of pride and belonging in Mumbaikars. A 
brainchild of Uddhav Thackeray, the Sena's new working chief, it was 
ostensibly meant to revive the social consciousness that `Lokmanya' 
Tilak had injected into the Ganpati festival when he made it a public 
celebration. In the aftermath of the August 25 blasts, the themes 
remain the same but the emphasis has drastically changed from one 
promoting the idea of being a proud citizen of Mumbai to an 
aggressive assertion of Hinduism.
THE blasts have exposed the `wheels within wheels' situation of 
politics. Old political friendships and enmities have come to the 
fore. Bhujbal, who is also the State Home Minister, continues to be 
the Sena's most hated man for his defection from the party years ago. 
So, even though Shinde is the Chief Minister, it is Bhujbal who comes 
under fire for the intelligence failure in anticipating the blasts. 
(Besides, Shinde and Thackeray are known to have a longstanding 
friendship.)
Never one to miss an opportunity to hit out at his former partyman, 
Thackeray said, "No one wants to work under Bhujbal because he heads 
the most corrupt department (police) in the State." Immediately after 
the blasts, Shiv Sena leader and former Chief Minister Narayan Rane 
called for President's Rule, while Munde expressed his lack of faith 
in Bhujbal and the Mumbai Police and called for a Central Bureau of 
Investigation (CBI) inquiry.
Intra-party tension has also surfaced, with Nationalist Congress 
Party (NCP) members calling for the replacement of Bhujbal. NCP 
President Sharad Pawar has been under considerable pressure from the 
Maratha lobby, which has always resented the priority Pawar has given 
to Bhujbal. It is unlikely that Pawar will oblige it and divest 
Bhujbal of the Home Department. Despite being a strong supporter of 
the NCP president, Bhujbal maintains excellent relations with the 
State Congress. He also has a large number of supporters who would 
follow him should he choose to defect to the Congress.
THERE is no doubt that the blasts have highlighted two failings of 
the D.F. government. The first is its inability to prevent the 
S.S.-BJP from carrying on an aggressive Hindutva campaign. 
Industrialist Rahul Bajaj has referred to this `inability' of the 
government as its inclination to appease the majority community. 
Unable to prevent the S.S.-BJP combine's provocative actions, the 
D.F. government has been left with no option but to ignore the maha 
artis.
Secondly, the blasts have highlighted how political interference has 
weakened the Mumbai Police. And Bhujbal has been blamed for this 
weakening. "Posts are available for a price," said a police source. 
"There are too many problems. Nothing moves without political 
patronage. It has killed the professionalism in the force. Good 
officers have been sidelined and many have opted to quit. Some are so 
disillusioned that they are emigrating."
Highlighting the inadequacies of the Mumbai Police after the blasts, 
the source said, "The most efficient police force cannot prevent 
terrorist activity, but there certainly could have been a better 
network of information. What would have happened if the taxi driver 
had not survived the Gateway blast? What leads would the police have 
worked on?"
Groups working to promote communal harmony have expressed 
apprehension about both the D.F.'s seeming inability to stop the 
saffron agenda as well as the politicisation of the police. But until 
their fears are taken seriously, the Ganpati mandals and the 
law-keepers remain at the disposal of political agendas.

______


[9.]

The Hindu, September 17, 2003  | Editorial

Justice done

THE CONVICTION OF Rabindra Kumar Pal - - better known by the assumed 
name of Dara Singh - and 12 others for the gruesome murder of the 
Australian missionary, Graham Stuart Staines and his two sons in 
Orissa, is indeed a cause for satisfaction. The Central Bureau of 
Investigation (CBI), to which the case was entrusted, deserves much 
credit. Staines and his two little boys, Phillip and Timothy, 
perished after the jeep in which they spent the night of January 22, 
1999, was set on fire. This grisly act, described by President K.R. 
Narayanan as belonging to the "world's inventory of black deeds," was 
a challenge posed to the administration as much as to civil society. 
The sequence of events in the few months after the murder caused some 
apprehension over the course of the investigation. A team of Central 
Ministers visited Manoharpur soon after the killings and held that 
there was an international conspiracy behind the killings. This was 
after the local police had named Dara Singh as an accused in the 
crime. He was well known in the region. His name figured in police 
records; he was engaged in campaigns, sometimes violent, for cow 
protection and the prevention of religious conversions. The remarks 
by the Central Ministers were widely interpreted as an attempt to 
scuttle the investigation. To make matters worse, Dara Singh was 
arrested only in February 2000, more than a year after the crime. 
That the CBI, to which the case was handed over at a later stage, 
could present legally sustainable evidence against 13 of the 14 
persons accused of the murder is a real feather in its cap.

The Staines murder had another implication. It appeared that the 
murderous attack was very much part of a vicious sectarian campaign 
against missionaries on the same lines witnessed in parts of Gujarat 
and Madhya Pradesh with a large tribal population. While the Enquiry 
Commission headed by a Supreme Court Judge, Justice D.P. Wadhwa, did 
not find evidence to establish any links between Dara Singh and the 
Bajrang Dal, the police records in Keonjhar told a different story. 
D.R. Karthikeyan, in his capacity as Director General of the National 
Human Rights Commission, held that Dara Singh was a "sympathiser" of 
the Bajrang Dal. Further, an investigation team appointed by the 
Wadhwa Commission found that Dara Singh was "an activist/supporter of 
the Bajrang Dal;'' it added, however, that there was no "documentary 
evidence to prove that he [was] a member or office-bearer." For all 
the evidence, the Commission absolved the Bajrang Dal of any role in 
the killings. All this seemed to inject partisan politics into the 
investigation and prosecution of the brutal crime.

The killing of Graham Staines and his two boys by religious fanatics 
became an international issue, adversely affecting India's secular 
and democratic image. Questions were raised about the establishment's 
commitment to the rule of law. The Manoharpur killings were not an 
isolated incident. There were subsequent incidents of targeted 
violence in other villages in the region. All this produced a sense 
of insecurity among missionaries and the people who went along with 
them in the tribal tracts of Orissa. In the wake of the tragedy, the 
resilience shown by Gladys Staines was heroic and wonderful. She took 
up the work of her husband among poor tribal folk afflicted with 
leprosy. She repeatedly said she had forgiven the murderers of her 
husband and their two boys, demonstrating a nobility of spirit and 
constructiveness that was her own principled answer to the politics 
of hate. The CBI's labours, resulting in the trial court convictions, 
have helped refurbish the image of India as a land of justice.

o o o

Protest against communal violence
ROBIN DAVID
TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 17, 2003 12:04:30 AM ]
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com:80/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?msid=185334

o o o

Riot panel bars advocate, witness from facing media
http://www.indian-express.com/full_story.php?content_id=31665

o o o

GUJARAT casts shadow over Asia Pacific Week in Berlin - Hindustan Times, India
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_378587,0005.htm


______


[10.]

Hindutva at Work:

BJP defends burning of Christian literature in Uttaranchal  (Hindustan Times)
http://www.hindustantimes.com/news/181_377905,000900010007.htm

VHP forming "secret squads" to help temple campaigners (Deccan 
Herald, September 16, 2003)
 From Subodh Ghildiyal DH News Service LUCKNOW, Sept 15
http://www.deccanherald.com/deccanherald/sep16/n7.asp

Look who's just got the keys to justice in riots
On VHP panel, he defended all 35 accused of murder of Jafri, 38 
others. He's new Public Prosecutor
Janyala Sreenivas
http://www.indianexpress.com/archive_full_story.php?content_id=31507
     

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Buzz on the perils of fundamentalist politics, on matters of peace 
and democratisation in South Asia. SACW is an independent & 
non-profit citizens wire service run since 1998 by South Asia 
Citizens Web (www.mnet.fr/aiindex).
The complete SACW archive is available at: http://sacw.insaf.net

DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in materials carried in the posts do not
necessarily reflect the views of SACW compilers.

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