SACW | 5-6 Jan 2005 | Tsunami ; Sri Lanka ; India; Hindu Right

[sacw]

South Asia Citizens Wire   | 5-6 Jan.,  2005
via:  www.sacw.net

[1] Sri Lanka - The Tsunami disaster:  Looking 
for Political Mileage out of A Colossal Human 
Tragedy? (Faizun Zackariya)
[2] India - Tsunami Impact:
- Loss of Innocence in the Politics of Aid (Praful Bidwai)
- Tsunami relief and Dixit's legacy (Praful Bidwai)
[3] India/UK 'Help Reconstruct Lives & 
Communities - Beware of Funding Hate' (AWAAZ - 
South Asia Watch)
[4] India: Jokers in the Parivar (Amulya Ganguli)
[5] Sri Lanka Appeal -Medical Supplies Urgently Needed  (SASG / UK)
[6] US: Sri Lanka: Tsunami relief effort by SARID (USA)


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

[1]


LOOKING FOR POLITICAL MILEAGE OUT OF A COLOSSAL 
HUMAN TRAGEDY?  The Tsunami disaster

Faizun Zackariya*.

This brief note is based on my visit to the East 
coast (28-29-30th Dec) especially to the villages 
of Karativu, Sainthamaruthu, Kalmunai Kudi, 
Kalmunai, Pandiruppu and Maruthumanai in the 
Amparai district.

In a country torn by ethnic war that has lasted 
more than twenty years and in a region where 
internal strife has been intense, the North  East 
of Sri Lanka had already been devastated by 
military operations.  Here the war- torn people’s 
endurance has been tested to the maximum while 
the longest ceasefire in the history of the 
conflict is yet to bring them the long promised 
peace dividend.  Displacement and livelihood 
failures caused by the war had impoverished more 
than a million people. The tsunami disaster has 
only compounded the already destitute situation 
and thrown up a multitude of problems which need 
to be addressed anew.

Amidst the outpouring of human emotions and 
sympathies for the affected people all over the 
country, a heartening phenomenon seen throughout 
these last seven days has been the immense 
mobilization at the people’s level - those who 
have come forward in their voluntary capacities 
to help in this humanitarian endeavour with 
relief and other forms of assistance such as 
clearing concrete/debris and recovering dead 
bodies.  The people (irrespective of ethnic 
differences) acted fast, stepped in before the 
government, which has been very slow to act in 
this moment of national emergency. Government 
presence in the form of immediate assistance was 
practically non-existent in these areas. And when 
the government did put its act together  the 
devastation in the South caught the attention of 
the Sinhala politicians fast. For days on end the 
state media relayed the destruction in the 
southern part of Sri Lanka. The Sinhala south has 
remained the vote bank and a scrambling space for 
the major parties including the JVP. The tsunami 
disaster was then another grim reminder that the 
Sinhala constituency had to be immediately taken 
on board. The devastation of the south was like a 
blade struck deep into the sensibilities of these 
politicians and party leaders who went on 
lamenting for days on end of the calamity, using 
the state media to the maximum. The devastation 
in the already war ravaged North  East was not a 
top priority until civil society groups and 
individuals who had visited these areas 
highlighted the bias in the media reports. Some 
politicians even made statements to the effect 
that a tragedy has struck the south  almost 
erasing from their historical memory that the 
people in the North-East had coped with tragedy 
after tragedy for the last 20 years!

At another level, we saw that some businessmen 
and traders who had decided to use this as an 
opportunity to make quick profits by creating 
scarcities and refusing to sell their goods. We 
even saw shops completely closed in some areas 
though there were enough food stocks in store. 
Then there were the looters who lost no time to 
get to the disaster spots to grab jewellery and 
whatever valuables they could get hold of. Recent 
reports also reach us that there were cases of 
rape of young women in a welfare camp.  There 
were still others who in the guise of adoption - 
individuals, brokers and agents -were either 
taking away children or were quick to step in to 
arrange adoption of orphaned children  for 
labour, for trafficking or for other reasons. 
These are again stark reminders that the 
protection of young girls and children and also 
homeless females and widows in the aftermath of 
such disasters, need to be addressed immediately.

In the provision of aid and relief too that is 
pouring in from all over the world, we need to 
coordinate distribution evenly to reach all those 
who are in dire need - going into the interior 
remotest areas. Further, there has to be greater 
transparency in directing aid which has to be 
delivered speedily as well, as we still have 
reports that even medical assistance seems to be 
trickling very slowly or has not reached some 
areas. Proper coordination of information and 
reliable data on the number of people dead, those 
injured and displaced, those missing, people in 
camps or living with others is absolutely needed. 
Actual numbers dead or missing are also being 
distorted and used by various individuals and 
interest groups with ulterior motives. The local 
level government bodies should be actively geared 
to handle such mis-information.

We have a bureaucracy that is highly politicized 
and it is no secret that there are charges of 
corruption within the government ranks. The peace 
process had stalled due to short-term party and 
personal political interests taking precedence 
over the future of the country and its people. 
The shameful tragedy is that the same interests 
are at work even at this moment when the country 
is in such a shamble. We have begged for help 
from the whole world and the world has rushed to 
our assistance. The political motivations behind 
countries like the US or India have also to be 
carefully monitored. How this government will 
handle the rebuilding programme in the context of 
all these factors is yet to be seen.

2nd January 2005.

[* Researcher-Activist, Sri Lanka]

______

[2]


TSUNAMI IMPACT:
LOSS OF INNOCENCE IN THE POLITICS OF AID
Analysis - By Praful Bidwai

NEW DELHI, Jan 5 (IPS) - As the international 
summit meeting to coordinate aid for the victims 
of the Indian Ocean tsunami opens in Jakarta on 
Thursday, various states are jockeying for 
political advantage in the region. Prominent 
among them are the United States, India, Japan 
and Australia, which have formed a self-nominated 
''core group'' while bypassing the United Nations.

The Jakarta Summit, convened by the leaders of 
the Association of South-east Asian Nations 
(ASEAN), presents the U.S. with an opportunity to 
assert its global ''leadership'' -- albeit on the 
cheap, with an assistance offer of 350 million 
U.S. dollars, lower than Japan's commitment of 
500 million U.S. dollars - and less than the 
funds collectively pledged by Europe.
Washington started with an offer of a measly 3.5 
million U.S. dollars, a fraction of the 25 
million U.S. dollars which India, with 9,500 dead 
of its own, offered to Sri Lanka. Stung by 
criticism by U.N.'s emergency relief coordinator 
Jan Egeland that it was being ''stingy'', it 
raised the amount first to 15 million U.S. 
dollars, then to 35 million U.S. dollars and 
later, ten times that sum.
More important than the money, the U.S. has 
mobilised two aircraft carrier-groups, with a 
total of 12 ships and 41 helicopters, besides 
many more fixed-wing warplanes for relief work in 
South-east Asia. One of them, the USS Abraham 
Lincoln, was the same carrier from which 
President Goerge W. Bush had triumphantly 
announced victory in the war in Iraq in 2003.
As Sri Lankan political scientist Jayadeva 
Uyangoda puts it: ''Humanitarian (aid) is not 
purely humanitarian'', but might represent an 
opportunity for Bush to ''get a foothold in Sri 
Lanka... There is no innocence in the politics of 
humanitarian assistance.''
The relief operation certainly offers Bush a 
chance to earn some goodwill after the globally 
unpopular occupation of Iraq and Washington's 
political isolation because of its Middle East 
policy.
Yale historian John Lewis Gaddis told 'The New 
York Times': ''This represents an opportunity to 
try to move beyond the frustration of Iraq and 
pre-emption and his tensions with the Islamic 
world. It is an example of an area where the 
US... can work in a cause that no one can argue 
with.''
The U.S. move to launch the four-member ''core 
group'' has drawn criticism within Europe. The 
French media has accused Washington of 
supplanting and sidelining the United Nations.
In Britain, former International Development 
Secretary Clare Short said: ''I think this 
initiative ... sounds like yet another attempt to 
undermine the U.N. when it is the best system we 
have got and the one that needs building up.''
India's decision to join the ''core group'' has 
drawn flak from within the country too.
''This is a clear departure from New Delhi's 
long-established stand for multilateralism and 
working with the U.N. system,'' says Achin 
Vanaik, professor of political science at the 
University of Delhi. ''It also violates the 
pledge made by the eight month-old Manmohan Singh 
government to work for a multipolar world.''
Equally controversial is India's decision to 
reject foreign aid for the victims of the 
tsunami, which has wrought extensive damage in 
the Andaman and Nicobar Islands and claimed 
nearly 9,000 lives in the southern states. In the 
past, India would welcome external aid - as with 
the devastating Gujarat earthquake of 2001 and 
the Orissa cyclone five years ago.
By turning down offers of assistance of the order 
of 1.5 billion U.S. dollars for the tsunami 
victims, New Delhi has sent out the signal that 
India has ''graduated'' from its long-standing 
status as an aid recipient to a donor.
Apart from money, it has sent 1,000 military 
personnel, 13 naval vessels, including a hospital 
ship, a field hospital and six helicopters to Sri 
Lanka, Maldives and Indonesia and is coordinating 
its operations with other ''core group'' members.
Underlying these moves is India's attempt to 
consolidate its ''strategic partnership'' with 
the U.S. and its two close allies in Asia/Oceania 
- Japan, which hosts 134 U.S. bases, and 
Australia, known for its loyalty to Washington 
since the Vietnam War. This is a major step for 
formerly non-aligned India.
Several geopolitical calculations have driven 
this decision. India would like to outmanoeuvre 
and contain China, which has pledged 63 million 
U.S. dollars to the tsunami victims.
Beijing also sent search and rescue teams to 
South-east Asia, but it has fought shy of 
drafting its navy in a big way in the aid 
operation although it has the second largest 
amphibious force in the region (after the U.S. 
Seventh Fleet), and in particular 11 Yutang class 
ships capable of delivering large amounts of 
material to tsunami-battered shorelines.
At another level, the Indian decision to become 
an aid-donor is guided by a larger purpose: to 
promote an image of India as an emerging 
regional, and even world power, which can 
rightfully demand a place at the globe's 'High 
Table'. India recently stepped up its campaign to 
win a permanent seat in the U.N. Security Council.
India's inclusion in the U.S.-sponsored ''core 
group'' has pleased many of New Delhi's 
policy-makers. To them, it signifies the ''great 
importance'' that Washington now attaches to 
India, as U.S. ambassador David Mulford declared 
on Tuesday.
Earlier, for over a decade, India promoted the 
idea of an Indian Ocean Rim grouping of 
countries, from the Persian Gulf to South-east 
Asia, as a regional platform autonomous of the 
great powers. Now, New Delhi is content to be a 
junior partner of Washington.
India's projection of itself as an aid-donor is 
fraught. This means that the government in 
rejecting foreign assistance although it cannot 
fully look after its own citizens' urgent needs. 
Relief provision in many tsunami-devastated 
regions of India is inadequate.
Scores of villages in the south lack access to 
fuel, cooking pots, sanitation, medical supplies 
and health professionals. In the devastated 
Andamans, there is an acute scarcity of drinking 
water (the coral islands have little groundwater) 
and many islands are cut off altogether.
Last week, a group of starving survivors in the 
Nicobar Islands kidnapped government officials to 
protest against poor relief provision.
Many Indians would question the morality of 
rejecting external assistance when their 
government cannot guarantee a minimally decent 
life to its citizens, and half the country's 
children are malnourished.
''This is a strange notion of sovereignty, 
divorced from the people in whom the sovereignty 
rests,'' argues Vanaik. ''It has more to do with 
delusions of grandeur and an elitist search for 
symbols of glory.''
Ironically, India's relief initiative in its 
neighbourhood could prove counter-productive. If 
it is intended more as power projection than 
humanitarian aid, it is likely to provoke 
resentment and charges of a Big Brotherly 
attitude.
India went through a muscle-flexing phase in the 
late 1980s, when it intervened militarily in Sri 
Lanka and the Maldives. The Indian Peace-Keeping 
Force (IPKF) expedition in Sri Lanka produced a 
military and political disaster. New Delhi 
alienated all the parties to the Sri Lankan 
ethnic conflict. The Indian ambassador to Sri 
Lanka, Jyotindra Nath Dixit (who as India's 
national security adviser died on Monday), earned 
the epithet ''Viceroy''.
This time too, India risks being considered 
arrogant and overwhelming towards its neighbours, 
the more so because it is allied with the United 
States. Successful geopolitics is one thing. Good 
neighbourly relations are quite another. 
(END/2005)

o o o o

News International
January 06, 2005

TSUNAMI RELIEF AND DIXIT'S LEGACY
by Praful Bidwai

It is a coincidence that India's active military 
collaboration with the United States through a 
four-member "core group" for "coordinating" 
relief provision to several tsunami-affected 
Indian Ocean countries should begin just when the 
National Security Adviser Jyotindra Nath Dixit 
has died. But it only shows that the Dixit legacy 
is more durable than an individual's life.

Dixit was one of the main architects - probably, 
the most important one - of the rebuilding of the 
India-US relationship during the early post-Cold 
War period. He took over as Foreign Secretary in 
1991 as the Soviet Union was disintegrating, and 
there seemed no alternative to accepting US 
hegemony over a unipolar world. Dixit was also 
the principal executor of New Delhi's policy 
towards smaller neighbours like Sri Lanka and 
Maldives in the 1980s, culminating in the Indian 
Peace-Keeping Force's despatch to Sri Lanka and 
its ignominious retreat.

It is no aberration that India-US "strategic 
partnership" should be flowering as India once 
again projects its power vis-ý-vis not just Sri 
Lanka and Maldives, but even Indonesia, by 
offering them tsunami relief assistance while 
rejecting generous offers to itself. India is 
moving in the direction of what Dixit would have 
called the Big League - one of the major powers 
of the Indian Ocean region and Asia, if not the 
world. Its inclusion in the "core group" set up 
by Washington, along with loyal allies Australia 
and Japan, signifies that movement.

Yet, it also signifies a major departure from 
India's traditional advocacy of multilateralism 
and emphasis on working through the UN system. It 
breaches the Manmohan Singh government's 
commitment to work for a multipolar globe.

Here lies the contradictory and fraught nature of 
the Dixit legacy, which has been more concerned 
with building "strategic partnership" with the 
US, than with evolving a consistent foreign 
policy based on doctrines and principles, leave 
alone ethics. Indeed, Dixit considered himself a 
"realist" who would never mix foreign policy with 
ethics or morality.

Washington's sponsorship of the four-member "core 
group" is hardly guided by faith or a "bleeding 
heart" concern for human suffering, but by 
well-thought-out, cynical, power calculations. 
Indeed, the US has militarised the very concept 
of relief. The "core group"'s armed forces will 
deliver it.

The US's claim to philanthropy is suspect. On 
foreign aid, it ranks last among the world's 30 
wealthiest countries. It only allocates 0.14 
percent of GDP to aid. The UN-recommended target 
is one percent, revised to 0.7 percent. 
Washington bristled at UN official Jan Egeland's 
remarks that its tsunami aid is "stingy". But as 
a US Agency for International Development 
official puts it: "The US is not a charitable 
organisation where we provide assistance without 
regard to (its) purpose... It's part of our 
foreign policy..."

Washington, mired in Iraq, and politically 
isolated worldwide, has found a chance to assert 
its global "leadership". Yale historian John 
Lewis Gaddis says Bush's initiative "represents 
an opportunity to try to move beyond the 
frustration of Iraq and pre-emption and his 
tensions with the Islamic world. It is an example 
of an area where the US can work in a cause that 
no one can argue with."

Washington has tried to do this on the cheap - by 
first pledging a mere $4 million - less than the 
$25 million which India, with 10,000 dead of its 
own, pledged to Sri Lanka. Embarrassed at 
criticism, it raised this to a measly $15 
million, then to $35 million, and now to $350 
million.

The US's unilateralist initiative has drawn 
criticism in Europe, especially France. In 
Britain, former International Development 
Secretary Clare Short said: "I think this 
initiative ... sounds like yet another attempt to 
undermine the UN when it is the best system we 
have got and the one that needs building up."

The UN is arguably best suited to coordinate 
relief at the international or macro level, while 
national governments handle the micro part. The 
tsunami crisis affects 12 countries in the Asian 
and African continents.

India has agreed to join the US-sponsored "core 
group" in violation of its past positions. Three 
considerations have guided this. All three are 
parochial. First, India wants a "strategic 
partnership" with the US in the neighbourhood. 
This means accepting US primacy or hegemony even 
in the Indian Ocean and jettisoning not just the 
old - and valid - notion of the "Indian Ocean as 
a Zone of Peace"; but also an independent role 
for itself. The Indo-US "partnership" is highly 
unequal. The US will send two huge aircraft 
carrier-groups, comprising 12 ships and 41 
helicopters, besides many more fixed-wing 
warplanes. India will only send two small 
hospital ships.

Second, India would like to counter the 
possibility of China acquiring a larger role 
between the Straits of Malacca and the Persian 
Gulf in case the US thins out its presence here. 
This entails collaborating with the Western bloc 
powers, including loyal US ally, Australia, and 
Japan, which has 134 US bases on its soil. The 
"core group" will more than deliver relief. It 
will define the shape of Indian Ocean strategic 
arrangements in the near future.

Third, India is keen to project itself as an 
aid-donor, not aid-recipient. This is related to 
building a new Great Power image - itself 
inseparable from India's bid for a permanent seat 
on the UN Security Council. The new buzz in the 
South Block is: How can we claim a Council seat 
with a begging bowl in hand? This was part of the 
rationale for India declaring in 2003 that it 
won't accept aid from any sources other than six 
major states.

This rationale is misguided. The Indian 
government cannot provide basic amenities of 
survival to its people; it has no business to 
deny them such help as the international 
community might offer. So long as 47 percent of 
Indian children grow up malnourished, and 
enormous disparities exist between the elite and 
the people, this would amount to unethical 
posturing. Manmohan Singh rightly revised the 
no-aid-but-from-six-sources policy of the 
Vajpayee government (which was a peevish response 
to the European Union's criticism of the Gujarat 
pogrom). It shouldn't return to that perverse 
logic.

New Delhi hasn't fulfilled its own primary 
obligations to the tsunami-affected. Relief is 
inadequate. Mountains of clothes are piling up in 
Nagapattinam because people don't need clothing 
so much as drinking water and medicine. In the 
Nicobar Islands, starving survivors got so 
enraged at the inadequacy of relief that they 
kidnapped civil and police officials.

This does not argue against providing relief to 
India's neighbours, particularly Sri Lanka. It 
does raise questions, however, about intentions. 
If the primary purpose is to assert India's 
pre-eminence and overwhelming military presence, 
that will be resented by the neighbours.

Indian policy-makers should know better. India's 
mid-1980s intervention in Sri Lanka was a 
disaster. India first backed, trained and armed 
the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), then 
took up arms against it, but couldn't disarm or 
defeat it. Then, it foolishly backed the LTTE's 
rivals in the North and East and R Premadasa 
against Chandrika Kumaratunga. These cynically 
Machiavellian manoeuvres cost India credibility.

But New Delhi is repeating the same mistake - 
this time, under US tutelage. Regrettably, 
Pakistan and China too are extending support to 
the US effort by flying relief sorties or sending 
in personnel. This must change.



______

[3]

AWAAZ - SOUTH ASIA WATCH

PRESS RELEASE: Wednesday, January 05, 2005
ENQUIRIES TO: contact at awaazsaw.org
http://www.awaazsaw.org

HELP RECONSTRUCT LIVES & COMMUNITIES
BEWARE OF FUNDING HATE

The death toll from the deadly tsunami which has 
affected several Asian countries has now crossed 
150,000; hundreds of thousands more people and 
communities have been devastated by the loss of 
families, friends, homes and property. Numerous 
dedicated volunteers and organizations have come 
together to organize relief and rehabilitation. 
Awaaz - South Asia Watch strongly supports these 
efforts and urges all generous individuals and 
organizations in the UK to continue to support 
these initiatives even after the media coverage 
inevitably decreases. The greatest need is for 
immediate relief followed by rehabilitation and 
the restoration of livelihoods - to provide 
people with the means to get back on their own 
feet.

To ensure that their well-intended donations do 
not fall into the wrong hands, Awaaz urges donors 
to channel their contributions through 
organizations with established secular, 
humanitarian and non-violent credentials. 
Unfortunately, there are a small handful of 
self-interested and chauvinist groups associated 
with religious fundamentalism in these regions 
that will make use of this disaster to expand 
their networks and cultivate religious and 
sectarian hatred. Some of these groups have 
powerful front organizations in the UK. Even if 
their appeals today sound well-meaning, the 
longer term consequences of the activities of 
religious fundamentalist groups are the same: 
fundamentalism creates strife between 
communities, polarizes societies, and foments 
hatred and large-scale violence.

BEWARE OF FUNDING SECTARIAN HATRED

We have been asked by numerous supporters in the 
UK about which charities they should donate money 
to. Supporters have expressed concerns that money 
they donate does not aid the expansion of 
extremist Hindutva organizations in India or 
extremist Islamist organizations in Indonesia, 
Malaysia or elsewhere. The following UK 
organizations have been or currently are under 
investigation by the Charity Commission.

Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh (HSS UK)
Sewa International (SI UK)
Vishwa Hindu Parishad UK (VHP UK)

Sewa International UK / Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh 
UK are currently under investigation by the 
Charity Commission in relation to the funds 
raised in the UK following the Gujarat Earthquake 
in 2001. Sewa International UK and the Vishwa 
Hindu Parishad UK are also leading members of the 
ëdisaster relief task forceí recently launched by 
the Hindu Forum UK. Sewa International UK, Hindu 
Swayamsevak Sangh UK and the Vishwa Hindu 
Parishad UK are all associated with a violent, 
fascistic, anti-minority Indian organization, the 
Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). The RSS or its 
affiliates have been repeatedly implicated by 
numerous independent national and international 
human rights groups for involvement in violence 
and the promotion of hatred, including the 
anti-Muslim Gujarat pogroms in 2002 and the 
anti-Christian violence in 1998-2000. Following 
both the Orissa supercyclone in 1999 and the 
Gujarat earthquake in 2001, RSS front 
organizations expanded their activities 
considerably in these two
  states. Awaaz believes that the tsunami disaster 
provides an important opportunity for the RSS to 
expand its activities in southern Indian states, 
including Tamil Nadu, areas where it has had 
relatively limited success. For further 
information, see http://www.awaazsaw.org and 
http://www.stopfundinghate.org. 

HOW TO DONATE

We urge you to donate to neutral, humanitarian, non-sectarian organizations.

DONATING FROM THE UK

DISASTERS EMERGENCY COMMITTEE (DEC)
Donate online at: http://www.dec.org.uk/
or call: 0870 60 60 900

OXFAM
Donate online at: http://www.oxfam.org.uk/
or call: 0870 333 2700

BRITISH RED CROSS
Donate online at: http://www.redcross.org.uk/
or call: 08705 125 125

ACTIONAID
Donate online at: http://www.actionaid.org.uk/
or call: 01460 238 023

UNICEF ASIA EARTHQUAKE CHILDRENíS EMERGENCY APPEAL
Donate online at: http://www.unicef.org.uk/asiaearthquake
or call: 08457 312 312

INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

INTERNATIONAL RED CROSS / RED CRESCENT
http://www.ifrc.org/index.asp (Main)
http://www.redcross.org.sg/press_bayofbengal_appeal.htm (Singapore)
http://www.indianredcross.org (India)
http://redcrescent.org.my/campaigns/donate.html (Malaysia)
http://www.redcross.or.th/english/home/index (Thailand)

ACTIONAID
http://www.actionaid.org.uk

UNICEF
http://www.unicef.org

SAVE THE CHILDREN
http://www.savethechildren.org

DOCTORS WITHOUT BORDERS/MEDECINS SANS FRONTIERES
http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/index.shtml

OXFAM
http://www.oxfam.org.uk

ARCHITECTURE FOR HUMANITY
http://www.architectureforhumanity.org

DONATING DIRECTLY TO INDIAN ORGANIZATIONS

There are a very large number of humanitarian, 
secular and non-sectarian organizations in India 
currently providing relief and rehabilitation in 
the affected areas. The appeals Awaaz receives 
are regularly posted at 
http://www.awaazsaw.org/weblog/awaaz_wlog.html. 
Note that some Indian organizations are 
registered to receive funds from abroad, others 
are not - check with individual organizations 
before sending donations.

PLEASE DO NOT SEND ANY MONEY TO AWAAZ

ABOUT AWAAZ - SOUTH ASIA WATCH

AWAAZ - SOUTH ASIA WATCH is a UK-based secular 
network of individuals and organisations 
committed to monitoring and combating religious 
hatred in South Asia and in the UK.

Awaaz was established following the violence and 
killings of Indian citizens, mainly Muslims, in 
the state of Gujarat after February 2002. The 
Gujarat carnage was a turning point in the recent 
history of India and showed how genocidal 
Hindutva forces have established a firm hold on 
many aspects of Indian society.

Awaaz campaigns against religious fundamentalist 
control of the state, civil society, political 
life and personal freedoms. Awaaz campaigns for 
secular democratic state institutions and civil 
life where all citizens have the right to live in 
peace and security and fully participate in the 
political and civil process and decision-making.

Awaaz stands for peaceful resolution of problems 
between South Asian countries, opposes violation 
of human rights, and opposes discrimination based 
on caste, gender, religion, region, ethnicity, 
race, sexuality and other factors. Awaaz 
unreservedly condemns the political use of 
religion to attack individuals and minorities 
including Muslims in India, Christians and dalits 
across South Asia, Hindus in Bangladesh and Shias 
and Ahmaddis in Pakistan.

Awaaz - South Asia Watch is supported by leading 
civil rights and community organisations in the 
UK and abroad, including Aaj Kay Naam, Asian 
Women's Refuge, Friends of India / All India 
Christian Council (UK), Cambridge South Asia 
Forum, Campaign Against Racism and Fascism 
(CARF), Council of Indian Muslims (UK), Dalit 
Forum for Social Justice (UK), India Forum, 
Indian Muslim Federation (UK), Indian Workers 
Association (GB), National Civil Rights Movement 
(NCRM), Oxford South Asia Forum, Peopleís Unity, 
Southall Black Sisters, Peopleís Empowerment 
Alliance, Southall Monitoring Group, Women 
Against Fundamentalism and many more. Active 
members include Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, 
Muslims, Christians and people of no faith.

AWAAZ - South Asia Watch
PO Box 304
Southall
Middlesex
UB2 5YR
UK
Email: contact at awaazsaw.org

______


[4]

The Asian Age
January 3, 2004
	 
Jokers in the Parivar
Amulya Ganguli

The villain is known. He is the "modern day Nero" 
identified by the Supreme Court. Even his own 
party admits it occasionally vide Smriti Irani, a 
member of the BJP's national executive. But who 
is the clown of 2004? The search was ended by the 
jester - also a rustic, ignorant and ill-bred man 
(various dictionary definitions of the word 
"clown") - when he took charge of the Rashtriya 
Swabhiman Andolan towards the end of December. 
The RSA was set up by K.N. Govindacharya, the man 
who was evicted from the BJP for spilling the 
beans about the Mask. Its objective was to 
campaign against Sonia Gandhi if she became Prime 
Minister. But Govindacharya lost interest in the 
project when it was deprived of its raison 
d'être. But not George Fernandes, who appears to 
have decided to carry on from where Govindacharya 
left off. The latter is not a clown if only 
because he poses a genuine threat - though a 
muted one - to India's civilised polity along 
with the likes of the modern day Neros. But 
Fernandes fits the description of a clown because 
he stands for nothing. If one floats around for 
too long in politics as Fernandes has done, he 
becomes the butt of ridicule. His latest effort, 
therefore, to find a role for himself in the RSA, 
now rechristened as the Rashtriya Swabhiman Manch 
(RSM), cannot but arouse both amusement and 
derision.

Amitav Ghosh, the writer, has an explanation for 
Fernandes's tortuous journey from being a member 
of the Socialist International(!) to the company 
of K.S. Sudarshan and Ashok Singhal who 
(dis)graced the RSM's meeting. In his book on 
Pokhran II, Countdown, Ghosh says that Fernandes 
had "spent a lifetime in politics and the system 
had spun him around until what he did and what he 
believed in no longer had the remotest 
connection". What led to this disorientation? 
Fernandes has an explanation. "People joke," he 
once said, "that my alliance with the BJP is due 
to an injury in which my brain had moved by about 
one-and-a-half inches." That internal jolt may 
explain his celebrated overnight switching of 
allegiance from Morarji Desai to Charan Singh in 
1979. Fernandes has a reason for that abrupt 
manoeuvre as well. When fellow socialist (at that 
time) Madhu Dandavate queried him about why he 
had defected, "I asked Madhu if he really wanted 
to know the reason. When he insisted on it, I 
told him I had stopped thinking."

That may have been the last spin - to return to 
what Ghosh said - which made the rupture between 
thought and action, between "what he did and what 
he believed in" complete. Since then, the 
non-thinking former socialist has followed a 
relatively straight line - relatively because no 
one will repose full faith in him - as an 
energetic drum-beater of the saffron camp. The 
transition from socialism to fascism may have 
made his restless soul find peace, for he has 
been fairly consistent in the last few years in 
his devotion to the Sangh Parivar. May be, the 
new Manch, with the RSS and the VHP keeping a 
close watch, will be his last port of call, for 
he cannot hope to become a minister again. The 
two saffron outfits are not ungrateful. They know 
how well he has served them. Not only has he said 
that if the RSS is fascist, so is he - perhaps an 
inadvertent truth - but one of his most notable 
services was to airily describe the Graham 
Staines murder as an "international conspiracy." 
Another acolyte of the parivar, Naveen Patnaik, 
sat demurely by his side when Fernandes 
pronounced this verdict without providing a 
single piece of evidence during a flying visit to 
the scene of crime.

But it isn't only Fernandes's opportunism which 
gives him the attributes of a clown. There are 
opportunists galore in the Indian political scene 
and switching parties is no big deal. Nor is the 
kind of servility which Fernandes has displayed 
to his masters. What makes him a rustic jester, 
to use two synonyms for "clown," is his casual 
flouting of his own behaviour patterns when he 
realises that he may have acted in a respectable 
manner. For instance, his resignation from the 
Atal Behari Vajpayee Cabinet after the Tehelka 
exposure was the right thing to do. But then he 
must have realised that that wasn't the way in 
which an ill-bred person, to use another synonym, 
behaves if only because the step robbed him of 
the sole reason for being with the communal gang 
- to be a minister. So, shamelessly, he returned 
to the Cabinet. And why did his saffron bosses 
take him back? It couldn't only have been 
Fernandes's ability to skirt round the truth, as 
in the Graham Staines case, which led to his 
restoration. A more cogent explanation probably 
lies in what a commentator said in this context 
in the Hindu about Lyndon Baines Johnson's 
response to a question as to why he retained 
Edgar Hoover as the FBI director: "It is better 
that he remains inside the tent pissing out 
rather the other way round."

There is little doubt that the Hindutva lobby 
finds Fernandes useful in many ways. His 
Christian, "non-Indian," name can convey the 
impression that the saffron camp is not only 
about breaking mosques and burning churches. So, 
he can be sent to Gujarat at the height of the 
riots to denote concern although his contribution 
towards peace was zilch. Who else but Fernandes 
can take up Govindacharya's cudgels against Sonia 
Gandhi, something for which the BJP is loath to 
depute any of its own members lest they, too, be 
branded as clowns? The man is so much of a 
maverick that even his own party of the present, 
the Janata Dal (United) - tomorrow it may be 
Samata again - will turn a blind eye to his 
antics in the RSA, just as it did when Fernandes 
virtually justified the rapes committed during 
the Gujarat riots, for which L.K. Advani slapped 
him down in the Lok Sabha by saying that 
Fernandes's remarks were unacceptable ("mujhe 
kuch atpata sa laga"). While Advani was 
forthright in his criticism, Nitish Kumar offered 
a weird explanation in a TV programme to explain 
Fernandes's casual observations about the rapes. 
Kumar put it down to Fernandes's supposedly 
inadequate command over Hindi. As is known, 
prevarication has a habit of piling up.

But even if the BJP is wary of Fernandes, it 
cannot take the risk of letting him go because of 
the Edgar Hoover factor. It is worth recalling 
that Fernandes was quite active at one stage to 
revive the Janata conglomerate, an endeavour 
which was suspected by the BJP to be a move to 
build up a pressure group within the NDA. He 
engineered the humiliation of Ramakrishna Hegde 
in that period, presumably to deny him a major 
leadership role in case a new Janata took shape. 
A similar unsentimental attitude towards 
political friends was evident when, after his 
resignation in the wake of the Tehelka scandal, 
some of the allegations against Brajesh Mishra 
and others associated with Vajpayee were said to 
have been floated by Fernandes. Given such a 
cynical track record, one can understand why 
Fernandes is a loner. Amitav Ghosh says that 
Fernandes told him that before joining the 
communal brigade, he had knocked on the doors of 
every secular party, but no one would have him. 
They were wise not to let him in, for he is 
obviously nothing but trouble for whoever gets 
close to him. For the present, he is with the 
BJP, but it cannot but be aware of his dubious 
reputation. If the party goes down and down, as 
seems likely in the near future, Fernandes may 
again begin knocking on secular doors. At the 
moment, however, his usefulness for the parivar 
is mainly as a clown. If the modern day Neros 
present the ugly face of the Hindutva lobby, the 
clowns and the time-servers - Fernandes, Uma 
Bharti, Subramanian Swamy, Jaya Jaitly - are the 
Achilles' heel of fascism. They serve the dual 
purpose of, first, reminding everyone about its 
lunatic propensities and, secondly, keeping even 
the fascists on tenterhooks, for no one can be 
sure in which direction they will suddenly veer 
off because of the disconnection between what 
they do and what they believe in.



______



[5]


Sri Lanka Appeal -Medical Supplies Urgently Needed

The death toll in the Tsunami disaster is continually rising.
Children are particularly vulnerable, if relief efforts fail
to stop the spread of disease in the wake of the devastation.
South Asia Solidarity Group has been collecting for victims
of the disaster. This is a special appeal for north eastern
Sri Lanka where we are directly in touch with individuals and
local organisations involved in the relief effort.
We are currently collecting for the Kandy Relief and Health
Care group, an ad hoc organisation made up of doctors and
medical students - of all communities - from Peradeniya
hospital who have been engaged in providing medical care for
survivors in Thrukoivel in Ampara in the North East of Sri
Lanka. Ampara, just south of Batticaloa is the worst affected
area of Sri Lanka. Many areas have been cut off by the flood
water and larger aid agencies have not reached them. The
population in these areas is Muslim, Tamil and Sinhalese .
Kandy Relief and Health Care volunteers urgently need money
for medical supplies and have asked friends abroad for
contributions.


Any contribution you can make is much appreciated. Please
make any cheques payable to 'South Asia Solidarity Group'.
Please include your postal address so that we can send you a
receipt.
          
  southasia at hotmail.com www.southasiasolidarity.org
c/o Londec, 299, Kentish Town Road, London NW5 2TJ

______


[6]

The South Asia Research Institute for Development 
(SARID) is a Cambridge, Massachusts, USA-based 
non-profit that works to promote sustainable 
development & communal harmony in South Asia 
through small-scale projects involving indigenous 
resources, education, research, vocational 
training & intermediate technology.

<http://www.sarid.net/support/index.htm>SARID is 
participating in the ongoing Tsunami relief 
effort and have collected funds in the Boston 
area. They have already gone to Sri Lanka, where 
our representative Vinod Moonesinghe, along with 
a number of SARID's volunteers, is supplying 
affected small townships and communities in Sri 
Lanka with food, medicine and other provisions. 
<http://www.sarid.net/projects/tsunamis/press-release-1.htm>http://www.sarid.net/projects/tsunamis/press-release-1.htm

By giving money through SARID, you can allow us 
to give it directly to affected people, dispense 
it via several local relief organizations, or you 
can dictate which relief organization the money 
should go to. However, 100% of your donation will 
be sent. If you give money through SARID you will 
be acknowledged on our SARID bulletin board for 
your help (the amount will not be shown, unless 
you ask that it be shown).

For more information, please contact:  Dr. Janaki 
Blum, Spokeswoman/Director, SARID, tel.: 
617.492.0764, e-mail: jblum at sarid.net

_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

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.sacw.net/
SACW archive is available at:  bridget.jatol.com/pipermail/sacw_insaf.net/

Sister initiatives :
South Asia Counter Information Project :  snipurl.com/sacip
South Asians Against Nukes: www.s-asians-against-nukes.org
Communalism Watch: communalism.blogspot.com/

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