SACW | 16 April 2005

[sacw]

South Asia Citizens Wire  | 16 April,  2005

[1] UK: Reviled as outsiders (Jonathan Freedland)
[2] Kashmir / Pakistan / India:
- 'Soft border' emerges as common vocabulary (Siddharth Varadarajan)
- A popular initiative (Surendra Mohan)
[3] Bangladesh:  Bigots march in shrouds to drum up support (The Daily Star)
[4] India: Repressed sexuality as a trigger for violence (Rakesh Shukla)
[5] India: Terror and Loveliness (Ramachandra Guha)
[6]  Announcements:
(i) Seminar and Sit-in 'For a law on Separation 
of Religion from Politics' (New Delhi, 18-18 
April 2005)
(ii) Public Forum: The Gujarat Genocide: A 
barbaric and planned tragedy? (London,18 May 2005)

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

[1]

The Guardian - April 16, 2005
Comment

REVILED AS OUTSIDERS

East End Muslims and Jews have more in common than some realise

Jonathan Freedland

Adolf Hitler never got his hands on the Jews of 
Britain. The Nazis drew up a kind of macabre 
shopping list, spanning Europe and beyond, and 
British Jewry was on it. But their plans were 
thwarted; this community stayed out of their 
clutches.

Except on one day. On March 27 1945 the last V2 
rocket of the war landed on Hughes Mansions, a 
block of low-cost housing in London's East End. 
Among the 134 people killed, 120 were Jews.

Last Sunday, survivors of the blast and relatives 
of those killed came back to Hughes Mansions for 
a memorial service. I was there along with much 
of my family, including my mother. Her own 
mother, Feige, and aunt Rivvy were among those 
killed 60 years ago. It took a full day to find 
them in the rubble.

People were choked with emotion from the start; 
they had come back to the spot where they had 
seen brothers, sisters, parents and friends die. 
They were expecting to feel sorrow. What they did 
not bargain for was fear.

Within minutes, the mourners were pelted, first 
with vegetables, then with eggs. Some said they 
saw stones; others said they had been spat at. 
Gathered in old age to remember their dead, they 
felt under siege.

Looking around, it was difficult to spot 
individual culprits. All that were visible were 
groups of young Asian men, standing on the 
balconies of the rebuilt block.

Among the dignitaries at the service was the 
local MP, Oona King. When she spoke, she attacked 
the "ignorance" of the assailants and insisted 
that their real target was her. Later she 
repeated the claim to newspapers, suggesting the 
attack was part of an increasingly vicious 
contest between herself and George Galloway, who 
is seeking to win Bethnal Green and Bow for his 
anti-war Respect party.

Indeed, the episode became part of a new 
escalation in hostilities between the two 
candidates which would later include King's 
charge -emphatically denied - that Respect 
activists were seeking to whip up Muslim 
antagonism against her by highlighting her Jewish 
background.

I was there and I must confess it did not look 
like an attack on Oona King to me. She was not 
especially visible, and no slogans were chanted 
or words uttered - as surely they would have been 
if this was merely a stance against King's 
support of the Iraq war.

Most of those there thought it much more 
straightforward. They believed this was an attack 
by Muslims on Jews. After all, the men wore 
skullcaps, the prayers were in Hebrew. There was 
no doubt who they were.

Still, it was hard to be certain. Not a word was 
spoken to explain the missiles raining down. So 
this week I went back to Hughes Mansions to ask 
around: what was all that about?

Of the dozen or so people I approached, most 
struggled to converse in English. But not all. 
Syed Mumin, a 24-year-old student who has lived 
all his life in the block, was adamant. It was 
nothing to do with King. "And it's nothing to do 
with Iraq or Palestine or anything to do with 
religion," he said.

Instead, Syed explained, the area was overcrowded 
and rundown. "There's a lot of aggression." The 
result is that when the police show up they get 
pelted. If even a resident drives in with a newly 
clean car, he'll get "egged". Here was a group of 
outsiders, so they got the treatment too. His 
friend Bokkar Ali added: "They're just kids 
having a laugh. They do it to everyone."

Except the culprits did not look like kids; most 
seemed to be in their late teens or 20s. And 
there's the testimony of Aminur Rahman, 18, who 
told me: "There's a lot of hatred towards the 
Jewish. We've got hatred towards them." He knew 
Sunday's group were Jewish because of the 
skullcaps and he knew the story of the 1945 bomb. 
So was it wrong to attack people who were 
grieving? "It was wrong in a way, but I think 
they deserved it because they came into a Muslim 
community."

I don't know who speaks for his neighbours, Syed 
or Aminur. Maybe the truth is halfway between 
them. But I'm still saddened by what I saw. For 
those throwing the eggs have no idea how much 
they have in common with their targets - and it's 
more than a shared history in the same building.

Prewar Jews, like today's East End Muslims, also 
lived in unforgiving poverty. They too were 
herded into the cramped streets of East London as 
the first stop for new immigrants. They too were 
reviled as outsiders, branded as parasites on the 
indigenous society. And they too were feared as a 
potential fifth column, suspected adherents of a 
violent, supranational ideology. The "Jewish 
menace" was said to be first anarchism and then 
Bolshevism. Today's "Muslim peril" is jihadism.

This is what grieved some of those mourners most. 
As they huddled together in fear, one spoke for 
all when she said: "This is so wrong. We should 
be on the same side."

· Jonathan Freedland's family memoir, Jacob's Gift, was published last month

_______


[2]


The Hindu - April 16, 2005

'SOFT BORDER' EMERGES AS COMMON VOCABULARY

Siddharth Varadarajan

India and Pakistan are still far from a 
breakthrough on Kashmir. But by constantly coming 
up with formulae and suggestions, General 
Musharraf's aim is to ensure that the focus 
remains on the Kashmir issue.
http://www.hindu.com/2005/04/16/stories/2005041605591100.htm


o o o

Kashmir Times - April 16, 2005

A POPULAR INITIATIVE
by Surendra Mohan

Opening of the route between Srinagar and 
Muzaffabad and the transport of several persons 
from both destinations to the other by buses has 
been welcomed nationally and internationally. The 
common people all along the way gathered in large 
numbers to greet the passengers. The goodwill 
between the people of the two parts of the 
erstwhile princely State of Jammu and Kashmir, so 
demonstrably expressed by multitudes on both 
sides, has certainly promoted people to people 
contact, but displayed their aspiration for 
closer relations, if not unity. Facets of this 
process brought to light the need to open points 
like this as the bulk of the people settled in 
the Mirpur area of Azad Kashir have a closer 
cultural proximity with those of Uri, Poonchh and 
Doda in Jammu on that sector of the LOC.
It would be foolhardy, however, to imagine that 
this popular initiative will contribute 
significantly in resolving the dispute on Kashmir 
between the two neighbours. If the welcome of 
this move by the Government of Pakistan was not 
as enthusiastic as that of India, the reason is 
that it helps Pakistan little in getting closer 
to its target. A large number of kashmiris in J&K 
had criticized the move before it started, and 
have expressed the same view, again. They believe 
that any accommodation between the two countries 
must involve the people of the region. They 
complain that there was no consultation regarding 
the initiative with the people, whether before or 
after. They are apprehensive that the two 
countries might work out an arrangement between 
them which may not give freedom or autonomy to 
the region, on this side of the LOC or that side. 
In that case, they will continue to suffer as 
they have for over the past half century.
This is not the view confined only to terrorist, 
militant or separatist groups. It is true that 
Dukhtarane- Millat has condemned it. Some Hurriat 
leaders have also done the same. But, 
surprisingly, a trade union center like J&K 
Transport Workers Union, has also displayed the 
same attitude. All those in the State who desire 
that power should be transferred to the people so 
that their democratic rights and civil liberties 
are completely safe, would insist on prior, 
statutory, commitment from the Governments of 
both countries that whatever settlement of the 
dispute might be, this aspirations of theirs 
shall be respected and become part of the 
settlement. Most organizations concerned with the 
civil liberties of the people would join them in 
these just and democratic aspirations. All those 
who have seen the atrocities of the Indian 
Security forces, or the absolutist rule of 
Pakistan over the lives of the people in Azad 
Kashmir, would be fully in agreement with them. 
For, eventually, the armed forces of Pakistan or 
India should have no business in either region 
after cessation of hostilities and complete 
restoration of friendly relations between them, 
on no pretext whatsoever.
Why do groups like these and the more awakened 
Kashmiris have such apprehensions? For one thing, 
transfer of power from the British sovereign to 
the Indian people has not really empowered the 
latter in any meaningful way, except that they 
can vote and change a regime which they may not 
like. There are other legal guarantees against 
arbitrary action like arrest or torture etc., but 
the situation on the ground in slums, small 
villages, far- flung areas and such trouble spots 
as the Northeast, the J&K, the tribal areas, and, 
in particular, women and other disempowered 
persons in these places is quite different.. For 
another, massacre of democratic fundamental human 
rights and civil liberties in all trouble spots 
have been so frequent and so vastly documented 
that no one would trust the Government of either 
country to give up these habitual practices of 
repression, under any conditions. The third 
reason is the nationalism and patriotism of the 
elites of these countries which values land or 
territory rather than people, and therefore, the 
people are naturally concerned and anxious about 
their freedoms.
Nationalism, in either case, is heavily tinged 
with communalism. Pakistan, which claims to have 
born on the basis of the two nations theory, has 
institutionalized this relationship. But, in 
secular India, history of the so- called Islamic 
rule for centuries, partition of the country, the 
three conflicts with Pakistan and the daily 
competition offered by the Muslims who were 
expected to lie low for the permission granted to 
stay in a 'Hindu' India, communalism has taken 
deep roots within the nationalist folklore. This 
is a pernicious situation fraught with long- term 
hazards.
While each country fees so possessive about the 
territory of the erstwhile J&K, neither has 
really cared to overcome the creeping alienation 
that has come about among the people in the two 
regions in their respective control. Unemployment 
and poverty are common, not only in the regions, 
but sub- regions like the Northern areas on the 
other side of the LOC. or Doda in Jammu. The lot 
of Kashmiri pandits is the worst, and while 
historians recall the dominance that they had 
enjoyed and how they treated other communities, 
the old memories of long- lost glory only 
increase their frustrations. No community away 
from its traditional and natural habitat and home 
has ever felt happy, even if it were living in 
prosperity and security, which is not at all the 
case with the Kashmiri Pandits. It is total 
misery which most of them are living out. If 
secularism has any link with humanism, which, in 
truth, is intrinsic to it, then, the treatment 
meted out to this proud community cannot be 
justified on any ground.
The most disturbing is the fact that neither 
country has worked out a realistic, pragmatic 
compromise on the dispute. Neither would go 
further from troop reduction, moving away their 
armies from the international borders, no first 
use of nuclear weapons and the willingness to 
settle the dispute by dialogue. While Pakistan, 
exhausted by long delay in settlement through 
bilateral negotiations as agreed upon in Simla in 
1972, is keen for outside interference, India is 
deadly opposed. Even the present normalcy is 
attributed to the pressure of the USA on both 
Governments, and disappear in no time. India 
maintains that the fundamental values of secular 
nationalism would be lost and the integrity of 
the country endangered if it showed any weakness 
leading to a compromise. Pakistan, having been 
constituted o bring all territories where Muslims 
are in majority in the sub- continent, considers 
the absorption of J&K as its manifest destiny.
A number of solutions have been suggested since 
after the process of track diplomacy 2 started. 
Some like the trifurcation of the State into 
three linguistic-communal units were inimical to 
the secular ethos.
All this cannot deprive this popular initiative 
of its due significance in taking the People to 
People contact to a new height. Nor the true 
situation that exists among the people in the two 
regions of the erstwhile State of J&K. Their real 
sentiments have come into display only through 
such an initiative which provided an opportunity 
for their free expression. While its direct 
contribution to a resolution of the dispute 
between the true countries is minimal, its 
indirect influence on the existing situation 
would be impressive. When the rulers realize that 
the common man is very keen to ensure that there 
is peace, and is not afraid of terrorists, they 
might be help to take some risk in settling the 
dispute.


______


[3]

Daily Star - April 16, 2005

SATKHIRA AHMADIYYA COMPLEX SIEGE PLAN
BIGOTS MARCH IN SHROUDS TO DRUM UP SUPPORT
Our Correspondent, Satkhira
Activists of International Khatme Nabuwat 
Movement (IKNM) wearing burial shrouds took out a 
procession in the town after Jum'a prayers 
yesterday to drum up support for their demand to 
declare the Ahmadiyyas non-Muslim.

The procession paraded the thoroughfares of the 
town, aggravating the tension prevailing in the 
district ahead of the IKNM plan to besiege an 
Ahmadiyya complex at Sundarban Bazar in Shyam 
Nagar upazila tomorrow to drive its demand home.

"At least 10,000 people from the district will 
gather in Harinagar High School ground on April 
17 before the siege," said IKNM Nayeb-e-Amir Noor 
Hossain Nurani. Over 3,000 madrasa students with 
their teachers and people from elsewhere will 
also join the siege, he added.

However, he said the siege will be a peaceful and democratic demonstration.

Nurani said IKNM will declare its next actions if 
the government fails to meet its demand by April 
17. "It [the government) lacks courage to declare 
Ahmadiyyas Kafirs. Those who do not consider 
Kadianis as Kafirs are themselves Kafirs," he 
claimed and threatened that the government will 
face trouble if it does not declare Kadiyanis 
non-Muslim.

On the other hand, he said, if the ruling parties 
declare Ahmadiyyas non-Muslim, they will get 
political support from the Muslim Ulema in 
returning to power.

In the opposition camp, civil society members on 
April 13 night held a meeting at Satkhira Unnayan 
Kendra, an NGO. Speakers at the meeting expressed 
serious apprehension at the IKNM programme and 
said the government will be responsible for any 
untoward incidents during or over the siege.

They condemned the repeated attack on Ahmadiyya 
Jamaat and their persecution by Islami bigots and 
called the IKNM move to lay siege to the 
Ahmadiyya complex a violation of their 
constitutional rights.

On Thursday, leaders of the left-leaning 11-party 
alliance visited the Ahmadiyya complex at 
Sundarban Bazar, the target of IKNM April-17 
siege, and promised the Ahmadiyyas of their full 
support against the IKNM attack.

Later in the evening, at a press briefing at 
Satkhira Unnayan Kendra, 11-party leaders termed 
the IKNM activities militant. Workers Party 
leader Mustafa Lutfullah said the situation is 
deteriorating fast due to government's inaction 
and sheltering Islami bigots directly or 
indirectly.

The same night, at a press briefing at a local 
hotel, Ahmadiyya Missionary Abdul Awal Khan 
Chowdhury urged the government to take proper 
safety measures at their Shyam Nagar complex.

When contacted, the district police super said 
the district administration has taken strict 
measures to protect the Ahmadiyyas and will 
deploy paramilitary BDR and Armed Police to 
thwart any untoward incidents on Sunday.



______

[4]

The Times of India - April 16, 2005

REPRESSED SEXUALITY AS A TRIGGER FOR VIOLENCE

Rakesh Shukla

The Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) decision at a 
recent conclave in Delhi to return to an agenda 
of Hindutva points to the deep roots of fascism 
and its dangers as a social phenomenon. The 
ideology uses the institutions of parliamentary 
democracy to grow, often being disturbingly 
successful in its efforts. But it would be a 
mistake to equate the scope and dangers of 
fascism to processes in the political realm alone.

Fascism would not be such a threat if it were 
confined to groups like the Rashtriya Swayamsevak 
Sangh and the BJP. It is more worrying when a 
sizeable section of people starts subscribing to 
this agenda. This was amply demonstrated by the 
involvement of large mobs in the killing and 
raping of

Muslims in Gujarat amidst widespread approval of 
the Hindu community in the state.

A construct which posits the 'sangh parivar' as 
'fascists' and refuses to see the support of 
common people to the ideology cannot take us 
forward in understanding fascism. Wilhelm Reich's 
interconnections between daily life, sexuality, 
family, workplace and the growth of fascism in 
the 1920s in Germany seems relevant to the spread 
of the ideology in India.

The success of communal propaganda is not based 
on an appeal to the rational mind or 
establishment of facts through scientific data. A 
sizeable section of the Hindu community is 
convinced that 'Hindus are being persecuted in 
their own country', although that has little 
basis in fact. The erroneous belief of an 
overwhelming majority of Hindus in Gujarat that 
in all prior riots more Hindus were killed, 
played a crucial role in the 2002 assembly 
elections.

About half-a-century after Marx, Freud 
articulated the 'unconscious', dissociating 
sexuality from procreation and laying stress on 
repression of childhood sexuality. In the 
process, he created analytical tools to explore 
the irrational mind. It is, therefore, possible 
to establish connections between the suppression 
of sexuality and the role of familial processes 
on the one hand and the psychology of fascism, 
war hysteria and communal frenzy on the other. 
The creation of the 'other' as enemy is often the 
culmi- nation of this interplay of processes.

The suppression of sexuality in Indian society is 
an accepted fact. Along with disapproval of 
sexual activity, the valorisation of brahmacharya 
is taken to incredible heights in Hindu religion. 
Highly sexualised adole-scents have no outlet, 
literally speaking, for their lust. The revering 
of brahmacharya and beliefs about loss of semen 
leading to weakness of the body, mind and spirit 
act as a block to healthy masturbation. Even when 
"indulged" in, it is ridden with guilt, anxieties 
and fears about the consequences.

Violence is often held in check by a construct 
that broadly comprises morality, thoughts of 
'mother' and 'sister' and societal disapproval. 
But in a situation of Hindu-Muslim antagonism, 
where fallacies are reinforced and a perception 
is created of the majority community being under 
threat, that construct of restraint comes apart 
and an 'othering' takes place. 'Muslim' girls and 
women can never even be imagined as 'mothers and 
sisters' of our 'Hindu' boys. Sexual violence 
against Muslim girls and women becomes a 
righteous moral act to save the "honour" of your 
own mothers and sisters, seemingly emasculating 
Muslim males and "dishonouring" the entire 
community.

In Gujarat, long before any killings began, 
women's bodies were used to successfully polarise 
the two communities. The rallying cry for 
large-scale mobilisation of Hindus and adivasis 
was, "They (Muslims) despoil our women!" In 
Sanjeli village not a single out of the 500 
houses of Muslims remains in the village. The 
"credit" for mobilising about 25-30,000 adivasis 
goes to Dilsukh Maharaj, a Bhil, who runs a 
hostel for children. Dilsukhji claimed that 
Muslims have "violated" at least 100 Bhil women 
in Sanjeli alone.

Grotesque sexual imagery was doing the rounds 
even before the Godhra train incident. The sangh 
parivar used public meetings, pamphlets, schools 
and ashrams to demonise Muslims. After the Godhra 
incident, stories of Hindu women being violated 
and killed, carried as headlines by leading 
Gujarati dailies, played a crucial role in the 
anti-Muslim mobilisation.

It is no coincidence that Hindutva is being 
propagated as "cultural nationalism" - a 
not-too-distant cousin of the "National 
Socialism" of the Nazi Party. The attempts to 
demonise the Muslim community sound astoundingly 
similar to Goebbels' propaganda against the Jews, 
"If someone cracks a whip across your mother's 
face, would you say to him, Thank you! How many 
worse things has the Jew inflicted upon our 
mother Germany and still inflicts upon her! He 
has debauched our race, sapped our energy, 
undermined our customs and broken our strength".

Women as 'mothers' play a crucial role in shaping 
a psyche which snugly fits into fascist ideology 
and participates in the violence against Muslims. 
There are many other areas that deserve greater 
attention: The typically cloying mother-son 
relationship, the impact of role models like 
Shravan Kumar, extreme suppression of sexuality, 
celibacy as a virtue, the Indian males' obsession 
with virginity, concepts of filial duty, honour 
of the family and interconnections with 
anxieties, neuroses, frustrations and sexual 
insecurities.

It is only with a more sophisticated 
understanding of these dimensions that we can 
engage meaningfully with fascism.

The author is a Supreme Court advocate.


______


[5]

The Telegraph - April 16, 2005

TERROR AND LOVELINESS
- The unnerving tranquillity of the Golden Temple
  Ramachandra Guha

Finally peaceful
The political event that most moved me was the 
butchery of the Sikhs of northern India in the 
first days of November 1984. I grew up in 
Dehradun, a town founded in the late 17th century 
by a dissident Sikh preacher, and further 
nourished by a large in-migration of Sikhs after 
Partition. The Doon is a valley legendary for its 
beauty, but among the many picnics in river and 
forest, the ones I remember most were to Paonta 
Sahib, where Guru Gobind Singh spent much time 
while preparing to fight the Mughals. It took an 
hour to get there, by car, or three hours, by 
bicycle. Whichever way we went, we would reach 
the gurdwara in time for langar, the communal 
meal open to all, regardless of caste and creed.

From Dehradun I moved to college in Delhi, 
another place where the Sikh presence was very 
strong indeed. I grew up with Sikhs, but to say 
that "some of my best friends were Sikhs" would 
be a vulgarity. They were part of my 
consciousness and my unconscious, too. There were 
jokes about the Sikhs, of course, but to me - and 
countless others - what the Sikhs stood for was 
honour and bravery, as well as integrity and 
decency.

However, when the "Punjab crisis" finally 
climaxed, I was based in Calcutta. It was in this 
city that I read, from a very long distance, 
about Sant Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale's 
encouragement by the Congress in the early 
Eighties, about the killings that this "mad monk" 
(as Khushwant Singh called him) had inspired, 
about the Indian army's storming of the Golden 
Temple in June 1984. That attack was answered, 
some months later, by the murder of Prime 
Minister Indira Gandhi at the hands of her 
bodyguards, this, in turn, provoking the killings 
of Sikhs in Delhi and other towns in the North.

In November 1984, I was in Bangalore, preparing 
to get married. The few Sikhs in this city were 
unharmed, as were the many more Sikhs in 
Calcutta, made safe by a firm mandate to his 
police force from Chief Minister Jyoti Basu. But 
in Delhi, in UP, MP and Rajasthan, things were 
quite otherwise. Easily recognizable by their 
headgear, Sikhs were pulled out of cars, trains, 
shops and houses and slaughtered, often with the 
authorities looking on. These were Sikhs innocent 
of any breach of the law, Sikhs who were as 
upright, decent and honourable as the ones I knew 
and grew up with. Yet they were killed - for 
being Sikhs.

After the killings had subsided, the relief work 
began. Friends of mine in Delhi worked heroically 
to bring succour to the victims. Newly married, 
and a month into my first job, I could not join 
them. All I could do was take a private vow of 
penance - that I would visit the Golden Temple as 
soon as circumstances permitted.

I am ashamed to admit that it took twenty years 
for me to redeem this pledge. I made plans, now 
and again, but abandoned them in favour of the 
claims of career and family. Last month, finally, 
I used the opportunity of an "official" visit to 
Patiala to go and pay my respects at the great 
shrine of the Sikhs.

Patiala lies at one end of Punjab; Amritsar at 
the other. To get from here to there takes five 
hours, the road passing through the major factory 
towns of the state. Much of the land in between 
is taken up with farms and fields, but judging 
from the signs along the highway the real boom 
seems to be in the services sector. And the 
favourite name of units old and new is "Lovely". 
There are a few Lovely schools and many Lovely 
dhabas, these all substantively eclipsed by a 
large campus, coming up just outside of Phagwara, 
of the "Lovely Institutes". The buildings are 
spankingly new, and their finish is first-class. 
The board outside the main entrance tells us that 
among the Lovely courses to be offered here are 
an MBA and MSc(IT).

There were other indications that the real growth 
area in Punjab is education, or at least higher 
education, and more specifically still, 
professional courses in engineering and 
management. Some of these new institutes are 
funded by non-resident Punjabis; others by 
religious institutions. That they are coming up 
in such profusion is proof that peace has 
finally, and authoritatively, returned to the 
Punjab. But there was even more conclusive 
evidence to this effect. These were the posters 
advertising the imminent visit of my famous 
fellow townsman, Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. He was 
scheduled to speak at Patiala, Ludhiana and 
Jalandhar, at whose traffic intersections were 
placed large hoardings, inviting people to come 
and soak in the "Divine Presence" of their 
visitor.

Despite his renown, this particular godman has 
always struck me as being slightly fraudulent. 
Still, one must suppress feelings of aesthetic 
distaste to appreciate what those hoardings 
really convey. For so long as Bhindranwale was 
alive, Hindu holy men, whether genuine or bogus, 
could not have publicly preached in the Punjab.

Travelling through the state, listening to people 
and seeing the signs around, it was hard to 
imagine that just a decade previously the Punjab 
countryside was in the grip of a veritable reign 
of terror, imposed jointly by Khalistani 
terrorists and a trigger-happy police. When one 
finally reached Amritsar, and entered the Golden 
Temple, one had, once more, to forcibly remind 
oneself that this was where a bloody battle was 
fought a mere twenty years ago. For the temple is 
as exquisitely tranquil as a place of worship 
should be; spotlessly clean, with orderly queues 
of pilgrims whose eyes shine with devotion, and 
wafts of fine music coming in from the great 
golden dome in the middle.

It was only when I entered the Museum of Sikh 
History, located above the main entrance to the 
temple, that I was reminded that this was, within 
living memory, a place where much blood had been 
shed. The several rooms of the museum run 
chronologically, the paintings depicting the 
heroic sacrifices of the Sikhs through the 
centuries. Plenty of martyrs are commemorated on 
its walls, the last of these being shaheeds 
Satwant, Beant and Kehar Singh. Below them lies a 
picture of the Akal Takth in tatters, with the 
explanation that this was the result of a 
"calculated move" of Indira Gandhi. The text 
notes the deaths of innocent pilgrims in the army 
action, and then adds, "However, the Sikhs soon 
had their revenge." What form this took is not 
spelt out in words, but in pictures: those of 
Satwant, Beant and Kehar above.

To see the killers of Indira Gandhi so ennobled 
was unnerving. However, down below, in the temple 
proper, there were plenty of contrary 
indications, to the effect that the Sikhs were 
now thoroughly at ease with the Indian state. A 
marble slab was paid for by a Sikh colonel, on 
"successful completion" of two years of service 
in the Kashmir Valley. Another was endowed by a 
Hindu colonel, in grateful memory of the 
protection granted him and his men while serving 
in the holy city of Amritsar.

______


[6]     [Upcoming Events: ]

(i)


FOR   ENACTMENT OF A   BILL

FOR

SEPARATION OF RELIGION FROM POLITICS



    SEMINAR ON 17TH April, 05 :  DHARNA  ON : 18TH April.05  

Dear friends,

    Communalism, religious fundamentalism, 
religious extremism, religious terrorism and 
religious genocide are attacking the people like 
Tsunami waves, exterminating common lives and 
precious properties. After independence, more 
than 20,000 religious riots occurred in India, 
destroying thousands of humans. Religious 
terrorism has become a global phenomena.

RELIGION BECOMES  THE REAL ENEMY OF RELIGION ?

  POLITICS + RELIGION = Communalism, extremism, terrorism.

         We have to eradicate the above religious cancers.

For this, SEPARATE Religion from Politics, Govt. 
Systems, Education and Judicial system to enforce 
true SECULARISM in public life.

Secularism is politics without religion. 

Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations 
(FIRA) has prepared a draft Bill for seperation 
of religion from politics, and for secularising 
India in its true sense.

The enactment of  this Bill is unavoidable to 
avoid all types of fundamentalism and terrorism.

        YOU ARE REQUESTED TO PARTICIPATE IN THE FOLLOWING PROGRAMMES :-

17.4.2005     NATIONAL SEMINAR  AT Ambedkar Bhawan,Rani Jhansi Road, New Delhi.

10 AM to  5 PM                        

18.4.2005     DHARNA at Jantar Mantar,Parliament Street,       

                     New Delhi       9 to  2 PM                      

      We invite all humanists, rationalists, 
atheists and  all persons believing in secularism 
to participate.

Prof. Narendra Nayak                                  U.Kala Nathan
President                                                   National Secretary
Mob:049448216343                                  Mob:09447626743    

FEDERATION OF INDIAN RATIONALIST ASSOCIATIONS
Charvakam, Post Vallikunnu,673314 , Kerala  (India)

____

(ii)

AWAAZ PUBLIC FORUM


THE GUJARAT GENOCIDE:
A barbaric and planned tragedy?

Wednesday 18th May 2005

5.30pm to 7.30pm

Moses Room,
House of Lords,
Parliament, London SW1

INVITED SPEAKERS INCLUDE                                      

Invited MPs and Peers: Lord Adam Patel, John McDonnell, Jeremy Corbyn, Lord
Eric Avebury; Baroness Helena Kennedy.

Anand Grover (Lawyers Collective representing the Dawood Family in India);
Bilal Dawood (Family Campaigner); Purna Sen (Amnesty International); Imran
Khan (Civil Rights Lawyer); Chetan Bhatt (Reader, Goldsmith College,
University of London); and Indian Muslim Federation. Chair: Suresh Grover
(Dawood Family Campaign and Director of Awaaz and The Monitoring Group)

Three years ago, in March 2002, Gujarat witnessed horrific incidents of
unparalleled violence that can only be described as genocide of innocent
Muslim people. Over 2000 people, including British Asians, were slaughtered
with more than 200,000 people displaced in under-resourced refugee camps.
Houses were systematically looted, businesses burnt down, hundreds women
gang raped and many children murdered. All the evidence suggests that the
Gujarat State Government, led by the current Chief Minister Narendra Modi,
aided by police orchestrated the violence and carnage. Yet still, despite
domestic and international public pressure, not a single prominent
individual has been held to account or brought to justice.

In March this year the horror of the Gujarat tragedy became internationally
recognised. Firstly, on 18th March 2005 the US government revoked the visa
earlier granted to Narendra Modi for his role "in severe violation of
religious freedom". Modi was invited by the Asian American Hotel Owner's
Association (AAHOA) as chief guest for their annual convention in Florida on
March 24-26. This revocation of both diplomatic and business visas had come
about as a result of untiring effort of the US-based Coalition against
Genocide (CAG) which comprises of 38 organisations and 10 supporting groups
alongside individual members from Canada and the USA. The American decision
is unprecedented and cannot be undervalued for its international
consequences. Modi is the first Indian politician to be treated in such a
manner.

Secondly, in a desperate attempt to regain Modi's alleged international
credibility,  his supporters in this country concocted a UK Yatra for him.
According to the organisers of the Gujarat Cultural Festival at the Royal
Albert Hall, Modi's supporters "put unbearable pressure to invite Modi as a
guest speaker" and  attempted to hijack the event so that it could be turned
into a Sangh Parivar rally. The strategy of the Hindu fundamentalists in the
UK is to obtain mainstream recognition by getting a foothold in British
Parliament. They are desperate to both invent and front a saffronised Hindu
identity that is seen to be different from the rest of the Asian community.
The real reasons for the cancellation of the Modi visit include: the reality
of Modi confronting popular and large protests against him, including the
prospect of facing arrest and the refusal by both the Indian and British
Governments to officially recognise his visit. In the end, regardless of the
embarrassing consequences, Modi and his supporters opted for a safer option.
They blamed the cancellation on a fictitious "security threat" when their
real aim was to avoid international spotlight and opposition.

AWAAZ is proud of all the organisations and individuals who campaigned to
Stop Modi. We had urged all progressive & human rights organisations to
mount peaceful demonstrations at places where Modi was scheduled to speak or
visit. We made forceful representations to the British Government not to
allow him into the United Kingdom and organised strong phone and email
campaigns aimed at those agencies or individuals financing or hosting his
alleged meetings.

In reality we have only won a small but important battle. The victims of the
Gujarat Genocide are unlikely to ever see justice unless we are able to
increase international pressure and momentum on this issue. Consequently the
meeting will also aim to initiate a parliamentary focus on Gujarat.

For further information write to: contact at awaazsaw.org.

Due to public demand for the meeting, you may have to reserve your place.
Please email Shivaji on  <admin at monitoring-group.co.uk>
and give your name, address, telephone
details, email and the name of your organisation/society. Alternatively,
telephone 020 8843 2333 and ask for Shivaji.


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

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.