SACW | 07 Jan 2004
Harsh Kapoor
aiindex at mnet.fr
Tue Jan 6 20:57:06 CST 2004
South Asia Citizens Wire | 07 January, 2004
via: www.sacw.net
[ANNOUNCEMENT: Please note, SACW dispatches are going to be
interrupted starting today, the January 7 to and are not likely to
resume before February 22, 2004. ]
[1] The Hijab Syndrome (Burhanuddin Hasan)
[2] Pakistan, India urged to respect rights
[3] India: Info. on nuclear installations cannot be made public:
Supreme Court (J. Venkatesan)
[4] India: Louts against history (Edit. , Hindustan Times)
[5] India: Secular space in the media has shrunk
[6] Upcoming International Seminar on Cross Border Movements and
Human Rights (New Delhi)
[7] The latest Issue of INSAF Bulletin is now available
[8] India: Recognition to Witchcraft Illegal and Ill-Founded (Ranjit Sau)
--------------
[1]
[Excerpt . . .]
The News International
January 07, 2004
The 'hijab' syndrome
Burhanuddin Hasan
The Holy Qur'aan has laid down a dress code for men and women,
without specifying any dress or headgear as such. In Sura Al-Aaraf
Qur'aan says:"O Children of Adam! We have revealed unto you raiment's
(dress) to conceal your shame, and splendid vesture but the raiment
of restraint from evil, that is the best". (Translation by Pickthal)
It means that God has provided the sons and daughters of Adam i.e.
all human beings and not only Muslims, with dress to cover those
parts of their bodies which they feel ashamed to reveal and also to
decorate themselves, but the dress of "Taqwa" (restraint from evil)
is the best. The emphasis in this Ayat is on two things - to cover
those parts of body, which one feels ashamed to expose and decorate
those parts, which are exposed; but the most important purpose is to
"restrain from evil". (Taqwa) Qur'aan also addresses the subject of
dress in Sura Al Noor in greater detail:" And tell the Momin men and
women to lower their gaze and be modest and to display of their
adornment only that which is apparent, and to draw their veils over
their bosoms." (Translation by Pickthal) In these Ayat Muslim men and
women both, have been ordered to lower their gaze which means they
should not look at each other with lust and sexual desire.
This in a nutshell is the dress code prescribed by Qur'aan. As Islam
spread out to other countries of the world, Muslim men and women
naturally adopted the dresses of those countries, but tailored them
according to the tenets of Islam as much as possible. In the Indian
subcontinent Muslim men and women before partition were wearing a
large variety of dresses. Men, by and large wore Sherwani -Pajama or
western dress while women wore Kurta Pajama or Saris, which was
basically a Hindu dress: in former East Pakistan, women only wore
Saris, while in West Pakistan, the basic female dress was Kurta
Shalwar, but a large majority of women adopted Saris, like Muslim
women in India and East Pakistan. It was never considered un-Islamic,
till about 25 years ago when fundamentalist elements raised their
head, particularly under the patronage of President Zia ul Haq and
the rise of Taliban in Afghanistan and the Islamic revolution in
Iran. On the contrary, in Turkey by the orders of Attaturk and in
some Arab countries, both men and women started wearing western dress
and no religious lobby ever objected to it. In the Indo-Pakistan
subcontinent Muslim women observed Purdah", but gradually as western
education and enlighten spread this custom was by and large discarded.
As regards Hijab (head scarves) it is worn by village women in Russia
and many other European countries. It is also worn by Muslim women is
Malaysia and Indonesia, and some other Muslim countries but it is not
a part of the Islamic dress code. Muslim women in India, Pakistan and
Bangladesh do not generally wear it. But with the fast spreading
Islamic radicalism, some religious leaders in some countries of
Europe and in the US have made it a symbol of Muslim identity for
schoolgirls, and office workers. These countries are resenting this
as an invasion of their secular values and way of life. In France,
which has the largest Muslim population in Europe, the headscarves
worn by Muslim schoolgirls, is being considered an attack on French
secular character. French President Jacques Chirac has strongly
supported a proposal to put a ban on all conspicuous religious signs
in schools, such as head scarves, worn by Muslim girls, Jewish skull
caps and large Christian crosses. In an address to the nation
recently Mr. Chirac said secularism is France's greatest achievement
and has played a vital role in ensuring social harmony. He said,"
Secularism is one of the great successes of the Republic". It is a
crucial element of social peace and national cohesion. We cannot let
it weaken. French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin said he would
"move quickly" to make sure the proposal become law before the start
of the new school year in September.
France has around five million Muslims out of which several thousand
teenage girls are estimated to wear headscarves to their classes.
Muslims in France have been well integrated in the French society for
quite a few generations and the school going girls never wore hijab
or headscarves in their classes before, but with the wrong
interpretation of Islamic dress code by radical elements, hijab has
become a controversial emotional issue which might result in its
banning by the French government which in turn will adversely affect
the education of Muslim girls. Sensible Islamic leaders in France
have urged young girls to stay calm and avoid confrontation with the
French government over this issue, which is in no way religious.
Hijab is not the symbol of Islam like the cross or the Jewish scull
cap. It is just a headgear for women, which by no stretch of
imagination can challenge the secular character of the Republic of
France. In Muslim countries like Pakistan and Bangla Desh, very few,
if any school going girls wear hijab to their classes. [...].
_____
[2]
DAWN, January 4, 2003
04 January 2004
Pakistan, India urged to respect rights
By Our Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Jan 3: In a joint statement initialled by peace activists
from both sides of the Indo-Pak border, the Pakistan-India People's
Forum for Peace and Democracy (PIPFPD) has demanded of New Delhi and
Islamabad to respect the rights of their minorities.
It also welcomed the goodwill gestures demonstrated by the
governments of India and Pakistan prior to the Saarc summit. Such
positive overtures would definitely help in moving towards a dialogue
between the two governments, it said.
"We also welcome the move to create a South Asian Free Trade Area in
the region," said the statement that was released to the media on
Saturday. "The consensus that emerged in the foreign secretaries
meeting reflects that governments have taken the first step towards
creating a regional economic block but there is a long way to go."
The statement called for the settlement of the Kashmir dispute,
according to the aspirations of the people of Jammu and Kashmir. It
also called for the withdrawal of troops from the LoC and the
establishment of an effective and accountable mechanism to ensure
protection of life and liberty of the people of J&K, particularly
women.
"We stress that without adequate protection of religious, linguistic,
cultural and political minorities there can be no democracy. There
can be no justice without granting redress to the victims of human
rights abuses especially with connivance of the state," added the
statement.
The statement was initialled, from the Pakistani side, by Dr Mubashir
Hasan, Anis Haroon, Shahid Fiaz, I.A. Rehman, Dr Haroon Ahmed, M.B.
Naqvi, Rahat Saeed, Saleha Athar, Anwer Abbas, Arif Khan, M.H.
Askari, Uzma Noorani and Afrasiab Khattak.
From the Indian side it was signed by Dr Ashok Mitra, Tapan K. Bose,
Gautam Navlakha, Sahiba Hussain, Syeda Hameed, Sushil Khana, Amit
Chakroborty, Neera Adarkar, Vijayan Chauhan, E. Deenadayalan, Vijayan
M.J. Rita Manchanda and Ritu Menon.
______
[3]
The Hindu
January 07, 2004
Information on nuclear installations cannot be made public: Supreme Court
By J. Venkatesan
New Delhi Jan. 6. The Supreme Court today ruled that information
relating to nuclear installations in the country could not be made
public in the national interest, upholding the validity of Section 18
of the Atomic Energy Act, 1962. This empowers the Centre to withhold
all information relating to nuclear power stations.
A Bench comprising the Chief Justice, V.N. Khare and Justice S.B.
Sinha, dismissed two appeals - one by the People's Union for Civil
Liberties and another by the Bombay Sarvoday Mandal - challenging the
Bombay High Court judgment rejecting their petitions.
The appellants had filed petitions in the public interest before the
High Court for a direction to the Centre to supply them copies of the
report of all nuclear power stations to verify whether adequate
safety measures had been adopted to protect human lives and the
ecology in the event of an accident. The petitioners had also
challenged Section 18 of the Act.
Dismissing the appeals, the Bench said that citizens no doubt had a
fundamental right to information under Article 19 (I) (a) of the
Constitution but such a right was subject to reasonable restrictions
in the interest of national security. The appellants were not
entitled to receive documents, which had been declared "secret" under
Section 18 of the Act.
The Bench noted that though the Centre had supplied to the court in
sealed cover, copies of the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board's reports
titled "Safety issues in the Department of Atomic Energy
institutions" and the Attorney-General, Soli Sorabjee, had offered
the court to read the report, "we do not think it appropriate to open
the seal and read the same."
_________________________________
SOUTH ASIANS AGAINST NUKES (SAAN):
An informal information platform for
activists and scholars concerned about
Nuclearisation in South Asia.
SAAN Web site URL:
www.s-asians-against-nukes.org
South Asians Against Nukes Mailing List:
To subscribe send a blank message to:
<saan_-subscribe at yahoogroups.com>
______
[4]
Hindustan Times
January 7, 2004
Louts against history
The ransacking of the Bhandarkar Institute in Pune is yet another
example of the sense of intolerance which is so much in evidence in
virtually all fields of life.
The perpetrators of this vile deed are the supporters of a relatively
unknown outfit, the Maratha Mahasangh. But it is not difficult to see
that they were trying to emulate an organisation which is better
known for such acts of vandalism. The reason why the Mahasangh
imitated the Shiv Sena was to register its protest against some
allegedly unkind remarks made by a British historian about Shivaji. A
few days ago, Shiv Sainiks had blackened the face of a reputed
scholar for having collaborated with the British writer.
It will be meaningless to point out that these vandals are unlikely
to have read the book in question or are capable of countering the
arguments in it through valid counter-arguments if only because they
may not be able to read at all. But it is these lumpen elements who
now virtually hold the country, and especially the artistic and
academic world, to ransom because of their political clout.
Presumably because of the tacit encouragement they receive from their
masters in the corridors of power, they think nothing of routinely
attacking art galleries, harassing the makers of 'art' films and
destroying rare manuscripts, as in Pune.
Apart from their indoctrination in the politics of hate, what also
propels them is the atmosphere of disrespect for historical studies,
as is evident from the trashing of the historical works of reputed
scholars by a new breed of academics owing allegiance to the saffron
camp. By railing against the historical texts which had been in wide
use till recently, these people have given their endorsement to the
habit of summarily dispensing with views contrary to their own. There
is obviously no respect for scholarship in their attitude. In such an
atmosphere, the attack on the Bhandarkar Institute was hardly
surprising.
______
[5]
The Hindu
Jan 06, 2004
`Secular space in the media has shrunk'
By Our Staff Reporters
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM. JAN. 5. The secular space in the media today has
considerably shrunk not only because of the secular-communal divide
but also because the logic of the communal is increasingly becoming
respectable in almost every newspaper establishment, the
Vice-Chancellor of the Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskrit,
Kalady, K.N. Panikkar, has said.
Speaking at the State-level celebrations of the 125th anniversary of
The Hindu, here today, Dr. Panikkar said that communalism had gained
legitimacy, often through crude and false representations, as a
result of which the popular common sense about key concepts such as
nationalism and secularism were changing.
"This considerably impaired the fundamental commitment of the media
to truth. The truth, however elusive it is, is not an avoidable
luxury, as it is believed by certain sections of the media," he said.
"In the past, The Hindu has consistently defended and supported the
principles of democracy and secularism with rare commitment. So has
it stood for protecting the freedom of expression and civil
liberties," Dr. Panikkar pointed out.
The struggle between secularism and communalism was not merely a
fight for political power, but a clash between two different systems
of values, he said. The outcome, to a large extent, depended on the
media remaining secular.
Dr. Panikkar said the response of a large section of the media to the
massive religious mobilisation around the issue of the construction
of a temple at Ayodhya had been ambivalent. While a section of the
media chose to uncritically accept the communal discourse, others
remained as neutral observers. "The Hindu was then among the few
honourable exceptions who boldly and consistently championed the
secular cause," he said.
The record of The Hindu in championing the cause of the nation and
upholding the "dharma" of journalism had led to conflict with the
State many a time. It occurred not only during the colonial period
but, as witnessed recently, was a continuing phenomenon. The recent
action of the Tamil Nadu Government against The Hindu, both in nature
and execution, was perhaps the most glaring example of this, Dr.
Panikkar said.
_____
[6]
Dear all,
We are writing to invite you to participate in an International
Seminar on Cross Border Movements and Human Rights, to be held in New
Delhi, India, at The Hotel Ambassador, on January 9th and 10th, 2004.
The seminar is conceived of as a gathering of international experts,
scholars and advocates known for their long-standing experience on
issues of migration, trafficking, terrorism and human rights. We view
this seminar as a forum for thinking through and beyond the
parameters within which conceptual and operational work on cross
border movements is currently confined. This seminar will provide a
platform for deep and incisive thinking on these issues from the
standpoint of human rights, with a view to move forward in the arena
of policy, legal interventions as well as future research and
operational directions. Our conversations, particularly over the past
year, with practitioners and researchers concerned with issues of
trafficking and global movements of persons, present a pressing need
for developing new thinking and strategies which move beyond
responses of crime prevention, state control of borders, immigration
control, labour control, cultural essential ism, and public health
concerns. A plethora of organizations, donors and states today speak
the language of human rights but there are few examples on the
ground, which can be deemed as fully centering the interest of
trafficked persons. In fact it is felt that first and foremost today,
we need to tighten the human rights paradigm for cross-border
movements. This is a complex task, which requires deep thinking and
complicated analysis at a collective level.
In view of this need, which has been expressed by several
serious-thinking experts, the Centre for Feminist Legal Research
(CFLR) is taking the lead in organizing and providing a forum for
critical analysis on Cross-Border Movements and Human Rights.
We request your presence and valid contributions in this seminar. For
the programme and more details, visit our website at www.cflr.org/
Yours sincerely,
Monica Mody
Legal Researcher & Coordinator of the Seminar on Cross Border
Movements and Human Rights
Centre for Feminist Legal Research
Flat No. 5, 45 Friends Colony (East)
New Delhi - 110 065, India
____
[7]
The latest issue of the 'Insaf Bulletin' [21] January 1, 2004 is now available
International South Asia Forum
Postal address: Box 272, Westmount Stn., QC, Canada H3Z 2T2 (Tel. 514 346-9477)
(e-mail; insaf at insaf.net or
website: www.insaf.net)
_____
[8]
Economic and Political Weekly
December 27, 2003
Recognition to Witchcraft
Illegal and Ill-Founded
The history of India is one of inchoate assimilation of disparate
tribes - their respective myths, customs and cults left fairly
intact, only incoherently unified in a hierarchical order. This
process of absorption was relatively humane by international
standards, but it became the precursor of a swamp of superstitions.
Placating these superstitions - as evidenced most recently by the
felicitation of witch doctors, shamans and sorcerers - might
momentarily bring votes to the politician in election times, but it
will only exacerbate the deeper fissures.
Ranjit Sau
On September 22, 2003, at a function in Patna, Sanjay Paswan, union
minister of state for human resource development, felicitated 51
witch doctors, shamans, and sorcerers. The Bihar unit of the
International Association of People's Lawyers had asked the police to
stop the function on the ground that it amounted to a gross violation
of Bihar's Prevention of Witch Practices Act, 1999. The Patna-based
Mahila Samajik Sansthan has filed a public interest suit against
Paswan in the Patna High Court, and has demanded his arrest. Social
activists and researchers have accused Paswan of encouraging
superstition for the purpose of gaining votes in election for
political office.
The very fact that as late as 1999 an act had to be passed to outlaw
the practice of witchcraft in Bihar is itself eloquent enough. The
malady is deep-rooted and widespread. One is reminded here of an
observation by Damodar Dharmanand Kosambi: "Ideas (including
superstition) become a force, once they have gripped the masses".
Apparently, the spell of witchcraft had once swayed the masses, and
it has continued ever since.
Paswan said he was "seriously thinking of introducing a new course in
school syllabus on the basis of experiences of witchcraft
practitioners, including ojhas (witch doctors), gunis (shamans,
practitioners of occult), and bhagats (sorcerers)". The neglect of
these people, he added, had made villages vulnerable to natural and
other calamities. "It is they who protected villages from evil
spirits."
We have got two kinds of evil spirits to contend with - one roaming
villages, the other circling the towns. Thus arises in India a dual
system of superstitions. The entire course of ancient Indian history
shows tribal elements being fused into a general society. This
development was in its own way much more humane than in other
countries. The older cults and forms were not demolished by force,
but assimilated with great ingenuity. Superstition reduced the need
for violence. The main work of brahmanism has been to gather the
disparate tribal myths together, to display them as unified cycles of
stories, and to set them in a better-articulated social framework.
Brahmanism thus gave some unity to what would have been social
fragments without a common bond. The process was of crucial
importance in the history of India, first in developing the country
from tribe to society and then holding it back, bogged down in a
swamp of superstition. Much more brutality would have been necessary
had Indian history developed along the same lines as that of Europe
or the Americas.
Kosambi labels one set of beliefs, rituals, practice as 'priestly
superstition'. In decrying the role of superstition when it kept
India backward, he says, it must never be forgotten that priestly
ritual and magic also helped bring civilisation to various localities
in ancient India. Such beliefs turned into fetters when the
class-structure hardened. Mere superstition cannot arise unless it
has some deep productive roots, though it might survive by inertia.
The priestly class must have had some peculiar function in the early
means of production, some outstanding success that gave it a hold
upon society. One of those contributions was a good calendar. It does
not suffice here, unlike in Europe, for the farmer to note the end of
winter by natural signs. Here the sequence of activities has to be
timely. Land has to be prepared before the monsoon sets in; sowing
can be done only after the proper rainy season has begun, or the
sprouts will die. The fields are best weeded during the mid-monsoon
break. The real difficulty lay in telling the time of the year
accurately. The moon with its phases sufficed for primitive man's
simple ritual; and the birds, beasts and plants themselves furnished
all necessary information to food-gatherers. This left an enduring
heritage of the lunar month, and prognostication by omens.
But the food-producer's year is solar, which requires constant
adjustment of lunar months. The urgent need for a working almanac lay
at the root of astronomy, algebra, the theory of numbers, all of
which were conspicuous achievements of the priestly class. The season
can then be foretold even when the sun and the moon obliterated their
starry background, or were invisible because of clouds.
Primitive reasoning led inevitably to the conclusion that the
heavenly bodies not merely predict but form all-important weather;
the word "meteorology" still implies that. Therefore, the stars and
planets foreshadow and control all of human life. Thus the horoscope
(which even Galileo drew up in his day), astrology, mantras, and
rituals to placate or influence the heavenly spirits were natural
concomitants to the indispensable priestly calendar. It cannot be
without significance that Aryabhatta (who was the first to suggest
that the earth rotates about its axis) and Varahamihira (better known
for his astrology, iconography, prognostication and allied
'sciences') were among the nine jewels of the Gupta court in the late
fifth century.
A great separating line appeared in the course of transition from
tribe to society. Those who refused to take to food production and
plough agriculture fell behind in social and economic status, along
with their totems, taboos and fearsome spirits. Meanwhile, the
deities worshipped by farmers reside high above the sky in mountain
tops, stars and planets, but those propitiated by hunters and
food-gatherers are to be found at a much lower level on earth in
trees, stones or animals. The altitude of the abode is a measure of
the prestige of the occupant spirits.
Caste is class on a primitive level of production. The class
structure hardened by the fifth century, as a serious shortage of
coins of precious metals led to the organised formation of
self-sufficient villages, requiring least amount of cash transaction,
each village having been provided with precisely twelve artisans to
serve the gentry in exchange of subsistence in kind. Then the
doctrine of ancestral-commodity fetishism came to prevent social
mobility. At this point the divine spirits along with the associated
superstitions got partitioned neatly between the artisans on the one
hand and the upper classes on the other. It so happens that the
present ministry of human resource development in Delhi is fortunate
to have spokesmen for both parties. If the minister of state is a
champion of one group, the cabinet minister is a strong protagonist
of the other. If the former is bent on putting witchcraft in schools,
the latter keeps pushing astrology into colleges and universities.
Once it was thought that economic development is a solvent into which
all ignorance melts. And education is the most potent antidote of
all. But the two ministers do not seem economically underdeveloped,
nor do they look lacking in education. Both are said to have the
highest academic degree in physics, and they were lecturers. To
relieve our anxiety on this count, Paswan has issued a statement: "I
strongly believe that whatever they [witch doctors] practice is pure
science." But this has put us in a quandary. For science is a
terrible thing, without even a shred of proof.
The demarcation between science and pseudo-science is not merely a
problem of armchair philosophy; it is of vital relevance for society.
Many philosophers have tried to resolve the problem of demarcation in
the following terms: a statement constitutes knowledge if many people
believe it sufficiently strongly. But the history of thought shows
that many people were totally committed to absurd beliefs. If the
strength of beliefs were a hallmark of knowledge, we should have to
rank some tales about demons, angels, devil and of heaven and hell as
knowledge.
Scientists, on the other hand, are very sceptical of their best
theories. Newton's is the most powerful theory science has yet
produced, but Newton himself never believed that bodies attract each
other at a distance. So no degree of commitments to beliefs make them
knowledge. The cognitive value of a theory has nothing to do with its
psychological influence on people's minds. Belief, commitment,
understanding are states of human mind. But the objective, scientific
value of a theory is independent of the human mind which creates it
or understands it.
But, we know, all scientific theories are equally unprovable; for
every theory in turn depends upon another theory. For example,
Galileo claimed that he could observe mountains on the moon and spots
on the sun, and that these observations refuted the time-honoured
Aristotelian theory that celestial bodies are faultless crystal
balls. But his observations were not observed by unaided senses:
their reliability depended upon the reliability of his telescope -
and of the optical theory of the telescope - which was violently
questioned by his contemporaries. It was not Galileo's pure,
untheoretical observations that confronted Aristotelian theory; but
rather Galileo's observations in the light of his optical theory that
confronted the Aristotelians' observations in the light of their
theory of the heavens. It is all circular reasoning.
Recourse to the probability of occurrence does not help much either.
For the mathematical probability of all theories, given any amount of
evidence, is zero. We do not know, for sure, how long the series of
experiments has to be in order to yield the correct estimate of
probabilities; nor shall we ever know. "When is a series of
experiments to be called long [enough]?", asks Karl Popper. "We
cannot know when, or whether, we have reached an approximation to the
probability. How can we know that the desired approximation has in
fact been reached?" Thus reckoned, scientific theories are not only
equally unprovable, but also equally improbable.
So, science proceeds by trial and error, taking risk on the way.
Theories in science live in a world of Darwinian struggle; the
fittest survive, for a while. There is no perfect theory, only better
theory, for the time being. Newton was challenged by Einstein; so is
Einstein by a host of others. That is how knowledge advances.
In respect of society and spirituality there is even less scope for
experimentation or proof by other means. But that does not mean we
cannot discriminate between beliefs. Mahatma Gandhi had characterised
the devastating earthquake of January 1934 in Bihar as "a divine
chastisement sent by God for our sins" - in particular the sin of
practising untouchability. "For me", he said, "there is a vital
connection between the Bihar calamity and the [custom of]
untouchability." Rabindranath Tagore was equally against that social
scourge. Yet he was constrained to distance himself from Gandhiji's
judgment that related a natural disaster such as earthquake to some
extraterrestrial dispensation of justice. "It is", Tagore wrote, "all
the more unfortunate because this kind of unscientific view of
phenomena is too easily accepted by a large section of our
countrymen."
Once upon a time man had claimed himself to be the sole cosmic
purpose. He placed himself at the centre of the universe, leaving all
heavenly bodies to rotate about his home-planet, the earth. But, then
the successive discoveries of the solar system, the Milky Way, the
existence of innumerable galaxies, and so on had the effect of
dethroning him from the pinnacle of creation. Similarly, he had to
give up the prejudice that diseases were a retribution for our
ethical failure. Comets are no longer looked upon as an advance
warning of an impending catastrophe attracted by his sin.
On social and spiritual matters, we can, much like Galileo, observe
other communities, especially their rituals, customs and beliefs, and
compare them with ours. Much like the theories of science, there may
be no perfect belief about society and spirituality, but there could
be better ones by some measure. To put it in more concrete terms,
Paswan may like to compare the performance of the ojhas with that of
the doctors at the New Moon Hospital, at Chichra, for instance. To
take another example, rural electrification and provision of good
schools, drinkable water and efficient medical service may be a
better way of keeping the evil spirits at bay than by, say,
appointing 50 witch doctors, shamans and gunis.
Of course, a politician need not always actually believe in what he
says or does. His metric is how to face the ballot box within a year
or two. He dares not perturb the age-old social prejudice. He would
rather titillate than challenge the ruling regime of silent
exploitation. Such politics only goes to undermine the very basis of
democracy. In 1938, Rabindranath wrote: "We who often glorify our
tendency to ignore reason, installing in its place blind faith,
valuing it as spiritual, are ever paying for its cost with
obscuration of our mind and destiny. ...This irrational force of
credulity in our people ... might have had a quick result [of
building] a superstructure, while sapping the foundation."
Placed by the side of comparable countries like China, Russia and the
US, or the smaller countries like England, France and Germany, India
has the dubious distinction of recording by far the largest volume of
dissent, disturbance and insurgency within its border. India does not
seem to have crossed the stage of being an uneasy complex of
disparate tribes. The prevailing politics is exacerbating the tribal
divisions and subdivisions without providing the canopy of a
collective identity. Promotion of witchcraft, shamanism and sorcery
is not to be conflated with renaissance. It is a crash obscurantism
that gnaws at the very foundation of a rational society of justice
and democracy, while deceptively supporting a broad superstructure of
toleration and generosity.
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
Buzz on the perils of fundamentalist politics, on matters of peace
and democratisation in South Asia. SACW is an independent &
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