SACW | 7 Nov 2004
sacw
aiindex at mnet.fr
Sat Nov 6 20:07:50 CST 2004
South Asia Citizens Wire | 7 November, 2004
via: www.sacw.net
[1] Pakistan: Supreme Court's philosophical black-hole (Edit, Daily Times)
[2] India: 1984 Riots - Oh, That Other Hindu Riot Of Passage (Khushwant Singh)
[3] India - Rajasthan: Lost tribes - Draw Adivasis into the Hindu
fold, then poison their minds (DK Singh)
[4] India: Gujarat Carnage: Need for Justice being Side Tracked -
Press Release (PUCL Baroda / Vadodara Shanti Abhiyan)
[5] India: On The "Tribal Policy" (All India Democratic Women'S Association)
[6] Asian Africans: `We're all Kenyans here' (Shashi Tharoor)
[7] Upcoming events :
- Film Screening Film: "Bhopal: The Search for Justice" (Toronto, November 30)
--------------
[1]
Daily Times
November 07, 2004
Editorial: SUPREME COURT'S PHILOSOPHICAL BLACK-HOLE
On Friday, a three-member bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan
struck down the Punjab Marriage Functions Act, 2003, and upheld the
Marriages Ordinance passed by the federal government in 2000. The
federal ordinance had banned ostentatious marriages, including the
serving of any meals, while the Punjab government had limited the
number of meals served to one dish and the number of guests to 300.
The limitations on feasting were made in order to discourage the
display of wealth and make it easier for middle-class and low-income
group families to solemnise marriages of their children without
social pressures.
The SC agrees with this logic and its verdict says: "It is the duty
of the state to take steps to encourage the celebration of marriages
in simple and informal ways, such as the performance of the nikah in
the mosque of the locality". Of course, the Court also deemed fit to
refer to the Quran to justify its verdict against ostentation. What
should we make of this?
For a start, the argument that makes the state responsible for
intervening in the life of citizens on those counts where a citizen
is doing no physical "harm" to anyone else is a dangerous one. What
surprises us is that while the Court and the federal government are
prepared to interfere with citizens' private affairs, we have
so-called Islamic laws on the books that determine "body harm" as an
affair between two private citizens rather than an offence against
the state, which it is for the simple reason of its being an
irreparable loss. The recent bill passed by the National Assembly on
'honour killing' is perfidious precisely for the reason that instead
of making murder an offence against the state - which would require
striking down the Qisas and Diyat laws - it has sought to confuse the
issue by creating further anomalies. All this is done because
literalist Islamic jurisprudence cannot move away from the concept of
the wali. While the wali has the right to forgive a murderer, should
the wali not have the right to celebrate his child's marriage as he
deems fit?
The point we are making should be obvious. The state's functioning
and the legal interpretations of it have become ludicrous because
issues are increasingly being decided on the basis of religion rather
than civic common sense. So the state makes a certain type of murder
a private affair and celebration of marriage a public one. That is
turning reason and rationality on their head. But this is not all.
From a legal-political perspective, the SC has come up with an
interesting point about banning provincial legislatures from enacting
laws that are in conflict with federal laws. We say this is
interesting because that principle is already established (Articles
141, 142 and 143). What need should there be for the SC to bring that
in? Pakistan has a written constitution and each authority -
executive, legislature, judiciary - has a clearly prescribed mandate.
The limits on authority are determined. In the event of any grey
areas, the SC has the right to determine whether a transgression has
taken place. Similarly, powers have been distributed on the basis of
three lists - federal, provincial and concurrent. The provincial
governments cannot legislate on any subject given in the federal
list; the federal government would not intervene into any subject on
the provincial list. However, this exclusivity of legislative
authority - the principle of "covered field" - does not belong in the
domain of the concurrent list. Here, a provincial government may
legislate but cannot do so if its legislation is inconsistent with
any existing federal laws.
The issue is fairly clear. However, in its enthusiasm to say the
obvious, the SC may have opened another debate. Should the concurrent
list not have been abolished by now? After all, that was the original
premise on which the 1973 Constitution was accepted by all parties,
including the nationalists in the smaller provinces: namely, that
within ten years the concurrent list will be abolished and all powers
contained therein would be devolved to the provinces. That has not
happened. Should the SC not determine that issue considering that it
brought in the principle of covered field in deciding the question of
performance of marriages?
We do not have the full verdict of the SC, but it is worth asking
whether or not it could have invoked Item 5 on the concurrent list
that deals with "Marriage and divorce, infants and minors, adoption"
as the basis of its decision in conjunction with Article 143 to
strike down the Punjab law? If that be the case, then it is important
to determine whether Item 5 deals with marriage and divorce as a law
solemnising the contract and its operation thereafter or whether it
is also meant to deal with the manner of performance or celebration
of marriage.
As things stand, the SC verdict, far from removing the anomalies, has
actually added to the confusion. In trying to 'progressively'
interpret a 'socially progressive' ordinance, it has pegged its
argument to state intervention in the private sphere, besides
invoking religion to support its argument. In doing so, not
surprisingly, it has ended up in a philosophical black-hole. Someone
should now take the issue of Qisas and Diyat laws on the basis of
this verdict and get the SC to strike them down because they put in
the private sphere something that squarely belongs to the state. *
______
[2]
Outlook Magazine
Nov 15, 2004
84 RIOTS
OH, THAT OTHER HINDU RIOT OF PASSAGE
The assassins of Mrs Gandhi were hanged within four years, while 20
years later, the killers of 10,000 Sikhs remain unpunished. Are there
two sets of laws in the country?
Khushwant Singh
There are two anniversaries so deeply etched in my mind that every
year they come around I recollect with pain what happened on those
two days. They occurred 20 years ago. One is October 31, when Mrs
Gandhi was gunned down by her two Sikh security guards. The other is
the following day, when the 'aftermath' consummated itself: frenzied
Hindu mobs, driven by hate and revenge, finally killed nearly 10,000
innocent Sikhs across north India down to Karnataka. Four years
later, Mrs Gandhi's assassins Satwant Singh and Kehar Singh paid the
penalty for their crime by being hanged to death in Tihar jail.
Twenty years later, the killers of 10,000 Sikhs remain unpunished.
The conclusion is clear: in secular India there is one law for the
Hindu majority, another for Muslims, Christians and Sikhs who are in
minority.
October 31, 1984: The sequence of events remains as vivid as ever.
Around 11 am, I heard of Mrs Gandhi being shot in her house and taken
to hospital. By the afternoon, I heard on the bbc that she was dead.
For a couple of hours, life in Delhi came to a standstill. Then hell
broke loose-mobs yelling khoon ka badla khoon se lenge (we'll avenge
blood with blood) roamed the streets. Ordinary Sikhs going about
their life were waylaid and roughed up. In the evening, I saw a cloud
of black smoke billowing up from Connaught Circus: Sikh-owned shops
had been set on fire. An hour later, mobs were smashing up taxis
owned by Sikhs right opposite my apartment. Sikh-owned shops in Khan
Market were being looted. Over 100 policemen armed with lathis lined
the middle of the road and did nothing. At midnight, truckloads of
men armed with cans of petrol attacked the gurudwara behind my back
garden, beat up the granthi and set fire to the shrine. I was
bewildered and did not know what to do. Early next morning, I rang up
President Zail Singh.
He would not come on the phone. His secretary told me that the
president advised me to move into the home of a Hindu friend till the
trouble was over. The newly-appointed prime minister, Rajiv Gandhi,
was busy receiving guests arriving for his mother's funeral; home
minister Narasimha Rao did not budge from his office; the Lt
Governor of Delhi had no orders to put down the rioters. Seventy-two
gurudwaras were torched and thousands of Sikh houses looted. The next
few days, TV and radio sets were available for less than half their
price.
Mid-morning, a Swedish diplomat came and took me and my wife to his
home in the diplomatic enclave. My aged mother had been taken by
Romesh Thapar to his home. Our family lawyer, Anant Bir Singh, who
lived close to my mother, had his long hair cut off and beard shaved
to avoid being recognised as a Sikh. I watched Mrs Gandhi's cremation
on TV in the home of my Swedish protector. I felt like a Jew must
have in Nazi Germany. I was a refugee in my own homeland because I
was a Sikh.
What I found most distressing was the attitude of many of my Hindu
friends. Two couples made a point to call on me after I returned
home. They were Sri S. Mulgaonkar and his wife, Arun Shourie and his
wife Anita. As for the others, the less said the better. Girilal
Jain, editor of The Times of India, rationalised the violence: the
Hindu cup of patience, he wrote, had become full to the brim. N.C.
Menon, who succeeded me as editor of The Hindustan Times, wrote of
how Sikhs had "clawed their way to prosperity" and well nigh had it
coming to them. Some spread gossip of how Sikhs had poisoned Delhi's
drinking water, how they had attacked trains and slaughtered Hindu
passengers. At the Gymkhana Club where I played tennis every morning,
one man said I had no right to complain after what Sikhs had done to
Hindus in Punjab. At a party, another gloated "Khoob mazaa
chakhaya-we gave them a taste of their own medicine." Word had gone
round: 'Teach the Sikhs a lesson'.
Did the Sikhs deserve to be taught a lesson? I pondered over the
matter for many days and many hours and reluctantly admitted that
Hindus had some justification for their anger against Sikhs. The
starting point was the emergence of Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale as a
leader. He used vituperative language against the Hindus. He exhorted
every Sikh to kill 32 Hindus to solve the Hindu-Sikh problem. Anyone
who opposed him was put on his hit list and some eliminated. His
hoodlums murdered Lala Jagat Narain, founder of the Hind Samachar
group of papers. They killed hawkers who sold their papers.
The list of Bhindranwale's victims, which included both Hindus and
Sikhs, was a long one. More depressing to me was that no one spoke
out openly against him. He had a wily patron in Giani Zail Singh who
had him released when he was charged as an accomplice in the murder
of Jagat Narain. Akali leaders supported him. Some like Badal and
Barnala, who used to tie their beards to their chins, let them down
in deference to his wishes. So did many Sikh civil servants. They
lauded him as the saviour of the Khalsa Panth and called him Sant. I
am proud to say I was the only one who wrote against him and attacked
him as a hate-monger. I was on his hit list and continued to be so on
that of his followers-for 15 long years-and was given police
protection which I never asked for.
Bhindranwale, with the tacit connivance of Akali leaders like
Gurcharan Singh Tohra, turned the Golden Temple into an armed
fortress of Sikh defiance. He provided the Indian government the
excuse to send the army into the temple complex. I warned the
government in Parliament and through my articles against using the
army to get hold of Bhindranwale and his followers as the
consequences would be grave. And so they were. Operation Bluestar was
a blunder of Himalayan proportions. Bhindranwale was killed but
hailed as a martyr. Over 5,000 men and women lost their lives in the
exchange of fire.
The Akal Takht was wrecked.
Symbolic protests did not take long coming. I was part of it; I
surrendered the Padma Bhushan awarded to me. Among the people who
condemned my action was Vinod Mehta, then editor of The Observer. He
wrote that when it came to choosing between being an Indian or a
Sikh, I had chosen to be a Sikh. I stopped contributing to his paper.
I had never believed that I had to be one or the other. I was both an
Indian and a Sikh and proud of being so. I might well have asked
Mehta in return, "Are you a Hindu or an Indian?" Hindus do not have
to prove their nationality; only Muslims, Christians and Sikhs are
required to give evidence of their patriotism.
Anti-Sikh violence gave a boost to the demand for a separate Sikh
state and Khalistan-inspired terrorism in Punjab and abroad. Amongst
the worst was the blowing up of Air India's Kanishka (June 23, 1985),
which killed all its 329 passengers and crew, including over 30
Sikhs. Sant Harchand Singh Longowal, who signed the Rajiv-Longowal
accord (July 29, 1985), was murdered while praying in a gurudwara
just three weeks later. In August 1986, General A.S. Vaidya, who was
chief of staff when Operation Bluestar took place, was gunned down in
Pune in August 1985. The killings went on unabated for almost 10
years. Terrorists ran a parallel government in districts adjoining
Pakistan which also provided them arms training and escape routes. It
is estimated that in those 10 years over 25,000 were killed. Midway,
the Golden Temple had again become a sanctuary for criminals. This
time the Punjab police led by K.P.S. Gill was able to get the better
of them with the loss of only two lives in what came to be known as
Operation Black Thunder (May 13-18, 1988). The terrorist movement
petered out as the terrorists turned gangsters and took to extortion
and robbery.The peasantry turned its back on them.
About the last action of Khalistani terrorists was the murder of
chief minister Beant Singh, who was blown up along with 12 others by
a suicide bomber on July 31, 1995, at Chandigarh.
It is not surprising that with this legacy of ill-will and bloodshed
a sense of alienation grew among the Sikhs. It was reinforced by the
reluctance of successive governments at the Centre to bring the
perpetrators of the anti-Sikh pogrom of October 31 and November 1,
1984. A growing number of non-Sikhs have also come to the conclusion
that grave injustice has been done to the Sikhs. Several non-official
commissions of inquiry-including one headed by retired Supreme Court
chief justice S.M. Sikri, comprising retired ambassadors and senior
civil servants-have categorically named the guilty. However, all that
the government has done is to appoint one commission of inquiry after
another to look into charges of minor relevance to the issue without
taking any action. The Nanavati Commission has been at it for quite
some time: I rendered evidence before it over two years ago. It has
asked for further extension of time, which has been granted till the
end of this year. The only word I can think of using for such
official procrastination is disgraceful.
I have to concede that the attitude of the bjp government led by Atal
Behari Vajpayee and L.K. Advani towards the Sikhs has been more
positive than that of the Congress, many of whose leaders were
involved in the 1984 anti-Sikh violence. Some of it may be due to its
alliance with the principal Sikh political party, the Akalis, led by
Parkash Singh Badal. It also gives them a valid excuse to criticise
the Congress leadership. Nevertheless, I welcomed the Congress
party's return to power in the Centre because it also promises a
fairer deal to other minorities like the Muslims and Christians. And
I make no secret of my rejoicing over the choice of Manmohan Singh,
the first Sikh to become prime minister of India and he in his turn
selecting another Sikh, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, to head the Planning
Commission.
The dark months of alienation are over; the new dawn promises blue
skies and sunshine for the minorities with only one black cloud
remaining to be blown away-a fair deal to families of victims of the
anti-Sikh violence of 1984. It was the most horrendous crime
committed on a mass scale since we became an independent nation. Its
perpetrators must be punished because crimes unpunished generate more
criminals.
______
[3]
Communalism Combat
October 2004
Cover Story
LOST TRIBES
DRAW ADIVASIS INTO THE HINDU FOLD, THEN POISON THEIR MINDS AGAINST
THE MINORITIES. WITH THE GROUNDWORK THUS COMPLETED, AND THE STATE
UNDER SAFFRON SWAY, IS RAJASTHAN HEADING FOR A REPLAY OF GUJARAT?
BY DK SINGH
Government and Hindutva
'Compromise' has become a key word to survival for the minority
Christians and Muslims in tribal Rajasthan. They no longer attempt to
fight Hindu extremists. Legal recourse is hardly a remedy any more.
Pushed to the wall by aggressive Hindutva and abandoned by law
enforcement agencies in a secular, socialist, democratic republic,
they have resigned themselves to fate. Go to any part of tribal
Rajasthan and the story is the same.
Nathu Dindor, principal of Salom Mission Primary School at Rohaniya
Laxman village in Banswara, was ambushed by some Hindu extremists in
July 2002. They caused his motorbike to skid on the road, leading to
fractures in Dindor's leg. "I reported it to the police but nobody
was arrested. Later on, I made a deal with the two assailants from
the VHP because I have to pass by the same road daily and cannot
afford to have enmity with them," said the teacher.
In the case of Gautam Pargi from Nal Dhibri village, the police have
been refusing to help him get possession of his land occupied by some
members of the VHP, despite a court order in favour of Pargi.
Currently, over a dozen Muslim families live in makeshift tents at
Kotra in Udaipur district. They have been driven out of their
villages by Hindu extremists over the past three or four years. But
the administration is keeping quiet about it.
"Cops are completely biased against Adivasi Christians. There have
been several incidents of attack against Christians here but people
don't report them to the police any more. The cops either don't
register the FIR or don't act at all." This statement of helplessness
from Father Walling Masih of Bijalpur village in Banswara district
summed up the relationship between Hindu extremists and the official
machinery.
The State as an institution is becoming a tool in the hands of the
sangh parivar. In fact, the Rajasthan government has been allocating
up to Rs. 50 lakh per annum to the Vanwasi Kalyan Parishad, an NGO
affiliated to the sangh parivar, to run hostels for tribals, which
are nothing but training camps for Hindu extremists. (A
Bangalore-based weekly maintained that ironically, this budgetary
allocation continued through the years of Congress rule.)
Take a look at one such VKP-run hostel at Timerabara in Kushalgarh
block of Banswara. The single room hall is made of mud and roofed
with tiles. Pictures of Hindu gods and goddesses adorn the walls. A
large carpet spread out on the floor serves as a bed for poor tribal
students. This 'hostel', aided by the state social welfare
department, has 25 inmates studying in different classes - from Class
VI to X. The department pays Rs. 1.5 lakh per annum to this travesty
of a hostel.
Although the money was to be utilised for students' food, uniforms,
soaps and beds, there was nothing in the room to suggest it. Bharat
Kumawat, who introduced himself as in-charge of the hostel and
district organisation secretary of the VKP, escorted probing visitors
out when questioned about the source of funds and their utilisation.
"It is none of your business," he said.
Meanwhile, so-called secular parties like the Congress, the Left and
the Janata Dal have all chosen to remain detached from the sangh
parivar's 'business'.
On August 14, 2004, a day before India was to celebrate its 58th
Independence Day, the Pink City of Jaipur, the capital of Rajasthan,
resounded with slogans of "Jai Shri Ram". The VHP, having decided to
thumb its nose at law enforcement agencies, organised a trishul
deeksha (distribution of tridents) programme barely a kilometre away
from the state secretariat. Similar tridents had been used to kill
many a hapless Muslim during the Gujarat carnage of 2002. Alarmed by
the possible fallout of the open distribution of this weapon among
frenzied Hindu youth, the then Congress-run state government had
banned trishul deeksha in early 2003.
The VHP decided to make a mockery of this ban after the BJP took over
the reins of the state. About a year ago, with the Congress at the
helm in Rajasthan, VHP leader Praveen Togadia had been arrested for
participating in a similar programme. But in August 2004, the BJP
government was already nine months old. As the programme began in the
afternoon, senior police officials either switched off their cellular
phones or feigned ignorance about events. Uniformed men from the
local police station were posted outside the venue where the law of
the land was being violated amidst much fan-fare. Following a public
outcry over this flagrant mockery of law, the state home minister,
Gulab Chand Kataria announced a lifting of the ban on trishul deeksha.
There were press releases from opposition parties against this on the
first day but they were not heard thereafter. Secular voices were too
exhausted to question government action any more.
Earlier, in July 2004, the government had made its intentions clear:
it would provide asylum to all Hindu extremists, writing off all
their sins. To start with, the government withdrew five cases against
those accused of indulging in arson, attacks and looting against the
minority community and damaging a mosque in a Banswara township near
Gujarat in September 2002.
In the six FIRs registered at Kalinjara police station after the
incident, five were against more than a hundred people of the Hindu
community while one counter-FIR was against Muslims. The state home
department only withdrew the five cases involving Hindu accused.
Even before the government order was presented in the additional
district judicial magistrate (ADJM) fast track court-II, Banswara, on
July 22, the court had already ordered conviction in one of the
cases. Trial was on in the government versus Nathu case, in which 35
people were challaned for attacking Muslims and damaging the mosque
in Kalinjara; the case was withdrawn following the government order.
The court had earlier acquitted the accused in the other three cases.
The state home department ordered withdrawal of the cases more than a
week before the court had passed a ruling in any of the five cases
naming Hindus as offenders. The Banswara district collector had
communicated the order to the public prosecutor on July 19 but the PP
only received it on July 22. "As a result of the government's order,
one very serious case has been withdrawn. There could be no appeal
against the ADJM court's ruling, even in the four other cases.
Muslims have nowhere to go for justice now," according to Abdul
Gaffar, a Muslim leader in Kalinjara who was one of the victims in
the September 2002 attacks.
On September 8, 2002, a person belonging to the scheduled caste had
died in a truck accident but sangh parivar activists spread the
rumour that Muslims had killed him, Gaffar recounted. The next
morning, scores of people from adjacent villages had gathered and
attacked Muslim houses, burning their properties, and damaging a
mosque and scriptures, following which the FIRs were lodged.
"The order exposed the BJP government's communal agenda. It was like
giving a green signal to communal elements to attack the minority
community," said Congress MLA Sanyam Lodha. Lodha had raised the
issue in the state assembly but there were not many Congressmen on
his side. The issue was left to die, as his party colleagues refused
to speak on the matter outside assembly precincts.
But this was only the beginning. The government went about
withdrawing the cases against BJP ministers and MLAs. Among these
were minister of state, medical & health, Bhawani Joshi, who had been
challaned for slapping a sub-inspector in Banswara, home minister
Gulab Chand Kataria, who had barged into the Rajsamand district
collector's office and grabbed his chair, and BJP MLA from Ghatol in
Banswara, Navneet Neenama.
Around 150 cases had been withdrawn by mid-September 2004 and the
process continued despite vociferous protests from civil rights
organisations. The government steadfastly refused to provide details
about the nature of these cases and the accused involved. But it was
obvious from the cases that came to light that it was the Hindu
extremists whose past deeds were being written off by the executive
organ of the state.
But the so-called secular parties kept mum. As did the civil rights
organisations, which had first raised an outcry in the media.
From August 2004, following orders from the state social welfare
minister, Madan Dilawar, over 21,000 scheduled tribe and scheduled
caste students staying in the 527 government-run hostels started
chanting mantras before meals and reciting Vande Mataram. Spiritual
reasons aside, the purpose behind introducing the mantra was that all
children should eat together, the minister explained. The hostels
would be converted into 'Sanskar Kendras' as part of the hostel
improvement programme. Students from Class VI to Class XII would be
given a "model and patriotic" education.
Bal Sabhas would be organised in the hostels twice a year, where
religious heads, local saints, inspiring men and subject specialists
would give sermons to the students. The hostels would have pictures
of goddess Saraswati, Swami Vivekanand, Maharana Pratap and Dr.
Bhimrao Ambedkar. Residential schools would be named after Shivaji,
Maharana Pratap, Subhas Chandra Bose, Rani of Jhansi, Pannadhay, and
Chandrashekhar Azad. The hostels attached to these schools would be
named after Pandit Deen Dyal Upadhayay and Dr. Shyama Prasad, the
minister announced. There were no protests against the minister's
plans. Nobody seemed to care.
A few weeks after the BJP came to power in Rajasthan, the state
tribal area development minister, Kanak Mal Katara issued a press
statement that a survey would be conducted to identify Christians.
Following an uproar over this by some NGOs, he backtracked. But the
government appeared to have made up its mind. In the first week of
August 2004, Christian missionaries and NGOs in Banswara district
came under the scanner.
District collector Gayatri Rathore ordered an inquiry into the
sources and utilisation of their funds and their activities. She
justified her action saying that she had received a delegation
complaining against these (Christian) institutions for "misutilising"
the funds given by the government of India and agencies from abroad.
She did not remember the name of the organisation that led the
delegation.
"As per the directions of the government of India, I am supposed to
be looking into the utilisation of funds by organisations registered
in my district," Rathore explained.
According to VHP leaders in Banswara, the memorandum was submitted to
the DC by an organisation called Adivasi Ekta Chhatra Sangh (AECS);
the delegation included VHP activists as well. Christian
organisations were "misutilising" the funds to convert innocent
tribals, they are said to have complained.
Christian community leaders remained unfazed, however. "It's good
that an inquiry has been ordered into the funding of Christian
organisations. The final report would shut the mouth of the sangh
parivar for ever," said Udaipur-based Father Jaswant Singh Rana,
founder patron of the Tribal-Christian Welfare Society of India and
joint secretary of the Philadelphia Fellowship. "The district
administration's action is in keeping with the sangh's strategy to
marginalise and prosecute Christians," believes Dr. Narendra Gupta, a
social activist based in Rajasthan.
Activists questioned the administration's action, saying that if
utilisation of funds had to be inquired into, all organisations,
regardless of the religious affiliation of their managers, should
have been put under the scanner and not Christian institutions alone.
But these protests remained little more than mere press statements,
as political parties showed little interest in taking up the issue.
This despite the fact that the Congress had completely lost its base
in the tribal belt, a Congress stronghold prior to the assembly
elections of December 2003. A senior Congress leader confided that
the party leadership saw no point in trying to challenge the sangh
amongst tribals. "We want to discuss development issues to bring them
back to the party fold. Issues like religious conversion or
religion-based prosecution is like fire. If you try to touch it, you
will get your fingers burnt," he said. Communists argued that they
had no presence in the tribal belts but they continued to fight
against communal forces in other areas.
There was apparently no individual or party in Rajasthan to protest
against this saffronisation of the official machinery. And this was
largely a result of their nonchalance rather than the lack of means.
Propaganda as weapon
The sangh parivar does not constantly look to Nazism for inspiration.
Hindutva ideologues are always adopting and adapting their propaganda
methods to demonise and prosecute the Christians in tribal Rajasthan.
From slanderous whispers to blasphemous literature, the sangh reels
out spools of half-truths and blatant lies to expand its network and
influence among the largely illiterate masses.
There are pamphlets, leaflets, calendars and magazines to imprint
their version of truth on impressionable minds in a region where the
literacy rate is yet to cross 50 per cent and life is an endless
struggle against abject poverty. Without modern day scepticism,
hearsay carries tremendous credibility.
[...].
[Full Text at:
http://www.sabrang.com/cc/archive/2004/oct04/cover.html ]
______
[4]
People's Union for Civil Liberties, Baroda and Vadodara Shanti Abhiyan
13, Pratap Kunj Society, Karelibaug, Vadodara - 390 018 [Gujarat, India]
Press Release
November 6, 2004
GUJARAT CARNAGE: NEED FOR JUSTICE BEING SIDE TRACKED
It is extremely unfortunate that the issue of securing justice in the
Best Bakery case is being systematically, continuously and
deliberately being side tracked.
First and foremost concern of the citizens of Gujarat and the nation
is justice for the victims of the gruesome tragedies during the
Gujarat carnage. Best Bakery is just one of these horrific tragedies.
It should be pertinent to recall that the highest Court of the
country has taken grave notice of all cases and has passed most
unsavory and condemnatory strictures on the miscarriage of justice in
the State. The circumstances, in which Zaheera Sheikh has resurfaced,
with self-contradictory positions once again in the case, are
shrouded in great mystery that requires a thorough inquiry by an
impartial body like the CBI so that the people of India know the
truth behind the mega plot.
Signed by following Members of PUCL, Vadodara:
Kirit Bhatt J.S.Bandukwalla
Jagdish Shah Ishaq Chinwala
Rohit Prajapati Jehanara Rangrez
Mansoor Saleri S.Srinivasan
Raj Kumar Hans Ranjit Contractor
Trupti Shah Jahnavi Andharia
Nandini Manjrekar Renu Khanna
Rajan Bhatt Neeta Hardikar
Deepta Achar Maya Valecha
Tapan Dasgupta Deepti Bhatt
Amrish Bhrambhatt
______
[5]
ALL INDIA DEMOCRATIC WOMEN'S ASSOCIATION
November 5, 2004
ON THE "TRIBAL POLICY"
The Minister of Tribal Affairs, Shri P.R.Kyndiah assured a delegation
of the AIDWA of sympathetic consideration of their demand to review
the NDA adopted National Tribal policy and to frame a policy which
reflected the needs and aspirations of tribal communities. The
delegation consisting of Brinda Karat, Archana Prasad, Premila Pandhe
and Manjee Rathee pointed out that the NDA tribal policy was made
public only two days before the last general elections and was
"adopted" without any discussions in Parliament. It was unfortunate
that instead of framing a new policy the UPA Government has called
for discussions on this flawed framework. Shockingly, the concerns of
tribal women, the mainstay of tribal economies and communities do not
find even a mention in the policy. They are rendered completely
invisible. The Minister agreed with the delegation on this aspect
and some of the issues raised including the dubious formulation in
the policy regarding the "assimilation" of tribals, a code word for
the RSS understanding of undermining tribal identity. The Minister
said he believed in "integration" not assimilation.' AIDWA pointed
out that there is a multiplicity of authority as far as tribal rights
are concerned since the Environment and Forest Ministry has pursued
policies which are inimical to tribal advance. An example given by
the delegation was the GO issued in May 2002 by the MOF Ministry
which ordered the eviction of tribals from forests in the name of
environment protection. The delegation demanded that the tribal
Affairs Ministry should take this issue up and get the circular
withdrawn. The Minister said this matter would have to go before the
cabinet. The Minister also agreed to an AIDWA request that the
detailed memorandum given to him by the organization should be
included in the ongoing discussions and AIDWA representatives called
in meetings proposed in this regard.
Brinda Karat
General Secretary
______
[6]
Magazine > The Hindu, November 7, 2004
THE SHASHI THAROOR COLUMN
`We're all Kenyans here'
Did this Asian home in Kenya have room for African angels too?
THE HINDU PHOTO LIBRARY
In 1969, before the turmoil ... an Asian trader in Nairobi.
"HERE," said Mr. Shankardass, leading me to his garden, "we live in heaven."
I looked around the lush African foliage, multicoloured flowers
ablaze amidst the verdant Nairobi green. "It certainly looks like
Paradise," I replied.
"I don't mean the garden," my 86-year-old host replied. "I mean
Kenya." Mr. Shankardass' garden was a metaphor: a fertile place in
magnificent bloom, it stood for the life that Asians were able to
lead in this corner of East Africa.
Mr. Shankardass and his wife were both born in Kenya, when it was a
British colony. They had grown up amidst anti-colonial ferment, in
which most Asians - descended mainly from 19th-Century migrants and
indentured workers from the Indian subcontinent - made common cause
with their African fellow-subjects. But when Independence came, some
Africans looked on the Asians as interlopers, foreigners depriving
the locals of jobs and economic opportunity. In next-door Uganda in
1972, the dictator Idi Amin gave his entire Asian population 72 hours
to leave the country for good. The mass expulsion of Ugandan Asians,
mainly people who had never known any other home, sent tremors
through the Asian community in Kenya and Tanzania as well. But their
fears proved unfounded. Asians stayed on in Kenya as honoured and
respected citizens, building flourishing businesses and excelling in
the professions. Mr. Shankardass' garden was emblematic of that.
But I couldn't help wondering, as I devoured a delicious Punjabi
lunch on his porch with three generations of his Kenya-born family,
whether the garden was an oasis as well, isolating the Asians from
the Africans amongst whom they prospered. Indians abroad are often an
insular people, focusing on their own community, customs and (as I
could savour it) cuisine. Did Mr. Shankardass' heaven have room for
African angels too?
It didn't take me long to find out I needn't have worried. Later that
day I attended a party in my honour thrown by another Kenyan Asian,
the media entrepreneur Sudhir Vidyarthi, to whom I had been
introduced by my good friend and former U.N. colleague Salim Lone, a
Kashmiri Kenyan. Mr. Vidyarthi's father had run an anti-British
newspaper, The Colonial Times, in which the legendary Jomo Kenyatta
had first published his nationalist screeds. The elder Vidyarthi had
gone to jail for his pains, and his son had continued in the family
tradition, as a courageous anti-establishment publisher.
A striking ethnic mix
Sudhir Vidyarthi's garden, with its outdoor deck and outsize bar, was
even grander and more impressive than Mr. Shankardass', but as 50
guests milled about on the patio, what struck me most was their
ethnic mix. An Indian DJ bantered with the African CEO of a rival
radio station; a Ugandan Asian journalist questioned the newly
appointed Government spokesman; a senior government official, a
striking woman with a vivid tribal scar down her cheek, held forth to
an older lady in a graceful sari. Asians and Africans melded
seamlessly into one. "We're all Kenyans here," my host said simply.
A group of Kenyan South Asians was publishing a magazine called
Awaaz, subtitled the Authoritative Journal of Kenyan South Asian
History. I was given a copy of the latest issue. On the cover was a
photo of the recently deceased Pranlal Sheth, a hero of Kenyan
independence who was then deported from his country by the Kenyatta
Government and died in exile in England. If that seemed discouraging,
the same issue carried a review of a new play by a Kenyan-Indian
playwright, Kuldip Sondhi, dealing with shop demolitions in Mombasa.
And a portfolio of photographs by the legendary Mohammed Amin, who
first broke the news of the Ethiopian famine with his searing
pictures, lost a leg in the Somali civil war but went on
immortalising East Africa through his lens till he was killed in a
plane crash five years ago.
There was much talk at the party about a new exhibition that had just
been mounted by the National Museum of Kenya. It was called "The
Asian African Heritage: Identity and History"; through photographs,
documents and artefacts, the exhibition depicted two centuries of
Asian assimilation into Kenya. Indian labour had built forts in Kenya
as early as the 16th Century; Indian masons and carpenters had
practised their craft in even larger numbers from 1820, and over
31,000 contract labourers from Punjab and Gujarat had built the
famous Mombasa railroad, 2,500 of them perishing in the process. The
city of Nairobi (like 43 other railway towns along the line) was
erected by Indian hands.
"This is our home," said Pheroze Nowrojee, who had authored the text
of the exhibition. "Our social identity rests on our bi-continental
tradition. We are both Asian and African. We are Asian African."
Sudhir Vidyarthi soon emerged, proudly holding a little black toddler
in his arms. "Meet my new daughter," he beamed. "She's been with us
since she was four months old; the official adoption comes through
next week." His excitement was as palpable as his affection for the
girl, who nibbled at Indian hors d'oeuvres from his palm. "Give Daddy
a kiss," he told her in Swahili, and the tiny tot, bits of samosa and
kebab still on her lips, duly obliged.
I looked at them - Asian father, African daughter, sharing Indian
food and chatting in an East African tongue - and I raised a silent
toast to their Kenyan garden. I only wished I knew the Swahili word
for heaven.
______
[7]
National Film Board Film: "Bhopal: The Search for Justice".
The screening of the National Film Board Film: "Bhopal: The Search for Justice"
will take place on November 30 at 7 pm at:
The Royal Cinema
609 College Street
Toronto, Ontario
There will be a panel discussion with the filmmakers following the screening.
Below find a synopsis of the film for your information.
Please promote this showing and the CBC Nature of Things showing later in the
week. This is part of an effort to generate strong support for the survivors as
the 20th anniversary of the accident approaches and their case goes back to the
Supreme Court of India in December.
For further details contact:
Mark Haslam <mnhaslam at bellnet.ca>
Park Palace Productions
79 Hallam Street
Toronto, ON
M6H 1W7
416-537-7742
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
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