SACW | 21-22 May 2005

[sacw]

South Asia Citizens Wire  | 21-22 May,  2005

[1] Bangladesh-India: Locked Out: The 65,000 
Indians on the wrong side of the fence (Justin 
Huggler)
[2] Pakistan:
- Right to freedom of expression (I.A.Rehman)
- Women defy Pakistan road race ban (BBC)
[3] The trial of war criminals still relevant in Bangladesh (Rashed Khan Menon)
[4] 7th Anniversary of India's Nuclear Bomb Tests 
- Scoring nuclear self-goals (Praful Bidwai)
[5] India: Secular Historiography Still Under Attack (Nalini Taneja)
[6] India - Gujarat Riots: Letter to the Editor (Mukul Dube)
[7]  Announcements:
Film Premiere: 'Continuous Journey by Ali Kazimi' 
Documentary on Komagata Maru (Vancouver, May 24)


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


[1]


The Independent - 12 May 2005

LOCKED OUT: THE 65,000 INDIANS ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE FENCE

A 2,500-mile barrier along the border with Bangladesh is intended to keep
out smugglers and illegal immigrants. But thousands of innocent villagers
will also be caught in a trap. Justin Huggler reports

Rabindra Sarkar is abandoning the home he has lived in for 30 years. He is
giving up his farm, and all he owns, to flee with his wife and three small
children to a makeshift shack he has built on a patch of wasteland a short
distance away. He and his brothers are giving up their only livelihood on
the farm. They have no other means of income, and no idea how they are going
to provide for their families.

The reason is India's answer to Israel's West Bank "security fence". It
snakes its way across the hills and through patches of jungle, a series of
barbed wire fences packed with nasty jumbles of razor wire that will
eventually stretch 2,500 miles around the entire border with Bangladesh. It
will also leave 65,000 Indians like Mr Sarkar trapped in a no-man's land
between the fence and the Bangladeshi border. India says it is building the
fence to keep out illegal migrants and stop smuggling. But the fence does
not run along the border itself, but 150 yards inside. The result for
Indians like Mr Sarkar is a disaster.

His village, Sharmalungma, will be cut in half by the fence. Trapped on the
wrong side, he and his family will be cut off from schools, hospitals, even
doctors. They will also be cut off from the protection of Indian security
guards and at the mercy of Bangladeshis who have already begun threatening
them and saying they will seize their farmland once the fence is built.

Israel has been criticised around the world for cutting off Palestinians
like this with its West Bank "security fence". India is doing the same thing
to 65,000 of its own citizens, and the world does not even know about it.

Mr Sarkar's village is a tiny place in the remote state of Tripura, buried
in the north-eastern corner of India. The thousands who will be trapped by
the fence live in villages like this strung all around the border, forgotten
places where the politicians from Delhi never come.

The fence is all about Fortress India. With its economy booming, India wants
to stop the flood of economic migrants from neighbours like Bangladesh. But
the border treaty between the two countries says no fence can be put up
within 150 yards of the border - so India has decided to sacrifice villagers
like Mr Sarkar.

You could almost think you were in the West Bank but for the lush tropical
scenery, watered by the monsoon. Already the villages here are littered with
the ruins of houses demolished to make way for the fence.

Sukhla Sarkar's home has been cut in half by the fence. The house where she
and her husband lived with their one-year-old child lies in ruins, knocked
down because it blocked the path of the fence. Now all they have left is the
makeshift hut of bamboo and corrugated aluminium that her husband's parents
had moved to, to make way for the young couple. Intended to be nothing but a
bedroom for the parents, the tiny hut now has to house the kitchen and
provide shelter for the entire family.

"We don't know what to do," says Ms Sarkar. "We don't have the money to
build another proper house." The villagers are getting no compensation from
the government for the loss of land.

No one wants to stay on the Bangladeshi side. Rabindra Sarkar - they are not
related, all the villagers have the same surname here - says he was
threatened the last time he went to his paddy fields near the border.
"Bangladeshi villagers told me not to come to my field any more. They said
if I did they would shoot me," he says. "They've stolen my rice. Once the
fence is finished, we'll be on the Bangladeshi side. Since we're getting
threats from the Bangladeshis, we don't feel secure."

A series of gates in the fence will let the villagers cross to the Indian
side - but nobody is sure where the gates will be, and they will be locked
at night.

After Indian press reports about the plight of the villagers, the government
ordered construction of the fence to be suspended last week in areas where
houses will be cut off by it while a solution was found. But when The
Independent visited, after that order was given, construction was still
continuing.

Many of the labourers building the fence are the villagers who will be cut
off by it - it's the only work they can get at the moment. In a stretch that
was being built, someone with a sense of irony had written in the wet
foundations: "I love India."

It's not just villagers from Bangladesh the people here are scared of. There
is a history of trouble between the Indian and Bangladeshi border guards
here, and only three weeks ago the local assistant commander of the Indian
Border Security Force (BSF) was killed. India alleges he was dragged across
the border by border guards from the Bangladesh Rifles (BDR), tortured and
then executed.

"If the fence is completed, we will be stuck on the Bangladeshi side," said
Sunil Das, another villager whose house lies on the wrong side of the fence.
"But we're Indian citizens. If we are Indian citizens on the Bangladeshi
side, we will be the next victims. If the tensions between the BSF and the
Bangladeshi guards continues, we will be the next targets."

The tension around the border is palpable. When we visited, Bangladeshi
border guards in plain clothes appeared on their side of the border, closely
watching our every move. Local villagers warned us not to venture into
uninhabited areas where we might wander too close to the border, and run
into the BDR.

Not everyone is leaving, though. The fence has been finished in Mr Das's
village, Sanmura, but though he and his neighbours are scared, they are
staying, for the time being. "Where will we go?" he asks. "What will we do?
We don't have any future. We don't have any money." These people do not have
any savings. They live from day to day off their farmland. Without it, they
will starve. Mr Das and his neighbours say they are waiting to see if the
government offers them compensation, or some land somewhere else. But they
do not believe they can stay here long-term.

Most of those who will lose their homes in Tripura are refugees from what is
now Bangladesh in the first place. The 59-year-old Mr Das's story is
typical. As a child he fled with his parents during the Partition of India
in 1948. Bangladesh was then East Pakistan, and Hindus like Mr Das's family
were being attacked by Muslims who wanted a pure Muslim state. They fled
across the border into Tripura, which was then a princely state, and were
given Indian citizenship. But it wasn't the end of their problems.

Today the majority of Tripura's population is made up of Bengali refugees -
but that has created a new tension with the local Tripurese, known as
"tribals" in India, who resent the takeover of their state by Bengalis.
Militant groups have sprung up demanding independence, and today it is
dangerous to leave the area around the state capital, Agartala, without a
three-vehicle military escort.

In 1980, Mr Das and his family were set upon by Tripurese in their new home.
"My brother, Radhacharan, was killed. He was captured and hacked to death,"
he says. The family fled to the only empty land - up against the border. Now
many of the villagers feel that, with the fence, India is forcing them back
into the country they fled in the first place.

But the local spokesman for the Indian BSF, Y S Bisht, remained
unsympathetic. "These people may be living on Indian soil, but they don't
have any nationality," he said. "They migrated here. Everyone in Tripura is
Bangladeshi except the tribals. They are in league with the smugglers to
prevent the fence being built."

The villagers are not illegal immigrants - they were granted Indian
citizenship decades ago. Even so, it is hard to overstate the paranoia about
Bangladeshi illegal immigrants in India. When the state government of
distant Maharashtra closed down Bombay's dance bars last month, one of the
more bizarre reasons cited by the government was that the dancers were
Bangladeshi migrants who were "spying" and reporting home.

It may seem surprising in the West that India is concerned about illegal
migration, but now that its economy is far outstripping those of its
neighbours, thousands are flooding in from Bangladesh and Nepal in search of
work - and to escape the political tensions in their own countries. With its
own population already in excess of a billion, India wants to keep them out.

On top of that, there is a lucrative smuggling trade across the border that
India wants to put a stop to. India also alleges several separatist militant
groups fighting against the Indian state operate out of camps inside
Bangladesh and infiltrate across the border. Bangladesh, of course, denies
this. The strange case of Assistant Commandant Jiwan Kumar of the BSF tells
you a lot about the mixture of smuggling and political tension that hangs
over the border here. According to the Bangladeshis, Mr Kumar wandered
across the border by mistake and Bangladeshi guards shot him dead in error.
But India claims something altogether more sinister happened.

It started with the alleged kidnapping of a local villager, Ramdhan Pal. Mr
Pal claims he was captured by men in plain clothes, whom he suspects were
Bangladeshi border guards in disguise. India says Mr Kumar, the
second-in-command of the Indian BSF guards here, was told about the incident
and went to investigate. He approached the border but was suddenly set upon
by Bangladeshi guards who dragged him over to the Bangladeshi side.

An Indian guard who was with Mr Kumar but survived has alleged they were
tortured. When Mr Kumar's body was found, he had cuts all over his body. He
was killed by a gunshot. Local reporters say there is more to this. Mr Kumar
was known for refusing to take bribes from the smugglers. The word in
Agartala is that he was set up and killed by guards in the pay of the
smugglers. The BSF has accused Mr Pal of being in on the set-up, and
accepting a bribe from the smugglers to be "kidnapped".

In this murky world, the villagers do not stand a chance. On the night of Mr
Kumar's killing, Indian and Bangladeshi border guards exchanged gunfire
across the border for several hours and some villagers had to evacuate to
nearby schools to get away from the crossfire. But those who will be trapped
on the wrong side of the fence say they fear they will be unable to escape
if a similar incident occurs once the fence is finished.

Jatindra Sarkar is 72. He has lived on his farmland all his life - he is one
of the few villagers who was not a refugee from Partition. He says his
family has been here "since the Britishers' time". But now he too is
thinking of packing up and leaving, as his farm is on the wrong side.

"I'm worried about the fence, but money is my main problem," he says. His
sons have no income except the farm. "How can I build a house on the other
side? If I go over there what will I do? Life is uncertain. I haven't made
up my mind what to do yet."

But for Mr Sarkar, and 65,000 others, time is running out.


_______


[2]

Dawn - May 17, 2005

RIGHT TO FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION
By I.A.Rehman

IT IS doubtful if any state welcomes queries from 
the UN Special Rapporteur (UNSR) on the promotion 
and protection of the right to freedom of opinion 
and expression because such inquiries relate to 
denial of a key human right. Thus, Islamabad is 
unlikely to take pride in the fact that during 
2004 it was involved in frequent exchanges with 
the rapporteur. An account of this 
correspondence, submitted by the rapporteur to 
the UN Commission on Human Rights in March last, 
however, is not without some credit to Pakistan.
This record shows that during 2004 the government 
took its obligation to respond to the rapporteur 
somewhat more seriously than in the past and that 
is certainly a welcome sign. Before the end of 
the year Pakistan had answered nine of the 14 
communications received from the UNSR. In some 
cases the replies were sent quite promptly. For 
instance, an appeal made in January 2004 was 
answered in the following month and two queries 
made in June were answered in July. It is 
possible that replies to the five appeals left 
unanswered in 2004 could not be sent for lack of 
time as three of them were made during October- 
November.
Another creditable feature of the record is the 
degree of vigilance displayed by the UN 
rapporteur in keeping track of happenings in 
Pakistan that related to the right to freedom of 
expression. The list of cases taken up by him may 
not be exhaustive but it is fairly adequate.
The substance of the UN rapporteur's appeals and 
Pakistan's replies, however, reveal a situation 
that cannot be considered very complimentary to 
the government of Pakistan. The first three of 
the rapporteur's communications related to the 
case involving Khawar Mehdi who was accused of 
helping two French journalists to make a 'fake' 
film on the Taliban.
Khawar Mehdi has recently been acquitted but for 
about a year the case did more damage to 
Pakistan's reputation than the harm alleged to 
have been caused by him. One of the points on 
which the rapporteur expressed concern was the 
accused's trial before an anti- terrorism court. 
Islamabad maintained in its replies of February 
25 and June 10 " that the case of Khawar Mehdi 
Rizvi was not pending before any anti-terrorist 
court." How was it possible to make such a wrong 
assertion? It was in June 2004 that Khawar Mehdi 
was indicted by the Anti-terrorism Court II, 
Quetta.
The next case concerned Dr. A. H. Nayyar, a 
well-known peace activist. He had organized some 
demonstrations in Islamabad in April- May 2003. 
In March 2004 two policemen called on him and 
advised him to secure bail before arrest because 
an FIR had been registered against him.
The government said in reply to the rapporteur's 
appeal that an FIR had been registered against 
Dr. Nayyar for violating Section 144 but it had 
been quashed by the Lahore High Court on the 
ground of its having been filed without lawful 
authority. Islamabad does deserve some 
appreciation for its candour in conceding that 
its officials can ignore the law while initiating 
criminal proceedings for violations of Section 
144.
Some of the answers offered by the government 
cannot easily be appreciated. In June 2004, the 
special rapporteurs on freedom of expression and 
on torture made a joint urgent appeal concerning 
Dewan Hashmat Hayat. His house had been 
demolished by a sectarian mob and then he had 
been arrested on a blasphemy charge and allegedly 
tortured in the Jhelum central jail. He could get 
pain killers only by bribing the jailers.
The government replied quite soon (July 7, 2004) 
and admitted that Hashmat Hayat had indeed 
complained of neighbours' threats to demolish his 
house, and that his house was in fact looted and 
demolished. The culprits were not prosecuted 
because the victim neither pursued the case nor 
presented evidence. As for his arrest, he had 
been held in relation to a homicide case.
This reply furnishes a most unconscionable 
example of government's repudiation of its 
elementary duties to citizens or implies that the 
government was as scared of proceeding against 
the culprits as was Hashmat Hayat.
Even more revealing of the government's 
authoritarian mind is the case of Sarwar Mujahid, 
the Okara reporter who was sent to prison under 
MPO for filing reports on the plight of tenants 
who were being oppressed by the Rangers. A joint 
urgent appeal was made on Sept 14, 2004 by three 
special rapporteurs - on freedom of expression, 
on arbitrary detention and on torture. The 
government in its reply (December 13, 2004) 
insisted that Sarwar Mujahid had been arrested 
and detained in accordance with the provincial 
laws because he was disrupting public order by 
instigating tenants to launch a protest against 
the district administration/ armed forces. He had 
written baseless articles in opposition to 
government policies. The government reply also 
alleged that Sarwar had been warned by the local 
press club and had been involved in a scuffle 
with the police outside the Okara sessions court. 
In any case he was to be released on Sept 30.
The reply was dated 13 December and the 
information that Sarwar had been freed by the 
High Court was omitted. The writer of this note 
obviously has no respect for reason. If Sarwar 
was held for having committed some offences, why 
was he held under a preventive detention law? Why 
was he not prosecuted under a normal law? Above 
all, the official story did not impress the 
Lahore High Court as it held Sarwar's detention 
illegal and ordered his release.
The rapporteur's urgent appeals that remained 
unanswered included the one concerning Javed 
Hashmi, the PML-N and ARD leader who was 
sentenced to 23 years' imprisonment for forgery, 
defamation and 'inciting mutiny in the army.' 
This appeal was made on April 28, on the same day 
that the case of the arrest of journalist Sami 
Yousafzai had been raised. A response to the 
latter appeal was made in good time (on June 10) 
but the appeal regarding Javed Hashmi was ignored.
In Oct 2004, the special rapporteur sent a long 
letter concerning a number of cases. These 
included: denial of official advertising to a 
number of newspapers; attacks on Jang and GEO 
offices in Quetta; burning of newspapers by 
gunmen in Karachi; attacks on the Geo office and 
the Karachi Press Club; the alleged ban on 
reporting on the operations in Waziristan and 
actions against several journalists; interference 
with the work of journalists who were covering 
Shahbaz Sharif's abortive bid to return to 
Lahore; the brief detention of four journalists 
in Waziristan; ban on some Peshawar journalists' 
entry into the Fata; and an Islamabad-based woman 
reporter's detention by a bureaucrat in his 
office. The reason for not responding to this 
letter by the end of 2004 is anybody's guess.
If the government of Pakistan claims to be a 
responsible authority, the references to this 
country in the 2004 report to the UN Commission 
on Human Rights must lead to some serious 
thinking.
It is necessary to realize that denial of freedom 
of expression, or violation of any basic human 
right for that matter, can no longer be concealed 
from international watchdog bodies even if human 
rights activists at home can be disregarded or 
otherwise 'handled', and that no state can afford 
to be found in contempt of international human 
rights norms. The best way to avoid censure is to 
guarantee maximum possible respect for the 
freedom of expression.
However, even the best governments can be led 
into committing violations of this right. 
Statements about such matters before world forums 
have to be drafted with greater regard for truth 
and commonsense than is evident in the work of 
officials retained to issue contradictions and 
clarifications to the national media.
Matters should improve a great deal if the 
government starts releasing to the public the 
communications received from international 
agencies and its rejoinders.
Among other things this may bring some credit to 
the information paraphernalia and enable it to 
disseminate information instead of 
disinformation. Besides, the practice of keeping 
communications to and from the UN secret is by 
itself a denial of the right to freedom of 
expression and information.


o o o o

BBC News - 21 May, 2005, 15:24 GMT 16:24 UK

WOMEN DEFY PAKISTAN ROAD RACE BAN

Asma Jehangir: Violence is counter-productive

Hundreds of Pakistani rights activists have held 
a mixed-sex road race in Lahore in protest at a 
ban on men and women racing alongside each other.
The authorities had pledged to halt the 1km race, 
but police stood by and let it proceed. They used 
force to break up a similar event last Saturday.
Rights activist Asma Jehangir said it was a victory for law and order.
Radical religious demonstrators, who oppose women 
running in mixed races, were kept back by police.
  The authorities realised violence and heavy-handedness are counter-productive
Rights activist Asma Jehangir
Ms Jehangir, head of the nation's Human Rights 
Commission, said she was "glad sense had 
prevailed".

"The authorities realised violence and 
heavy-handedness are counter-productive," she 
told the BBC News website.
"It was a symbolic marathon to make the point 
that this tyranny had to be broken."

High heels
About 500 men and women took part in the race, 
which underwent a last-minute route change 
through less visible areas of the city.
The BBC's Paul Anderson in Lahore says women 
participants wore traditional dress, the salwar 
kameez, and not all sported running shoes - some 
were in high heels.
It is unclear why the authorities failed to enforce the ban on the race.

Last Saturday's scenes were not repeated

City mayor Mian Amir had promised to stop it. He 
was unavailable for comment afterwards. Lahore 
police chief Aftab Cheema said activists had been 
peaceful.
Ahead of Saturday's event, a leader of the 
country's Islamic alliance accused race 
organisers of being an elite group trying to 
emulate the West.
The deputy parliamentary leader of the Islamic 
alliance, the MMA, Hafiz Hussain Ahmed, told the 
BBC News website: "In our culture, no parent 
would like to see their daughter running on the 
roads along with the boys and that, too, in 
shorts."
Moderates were outraged at police tactics last 
Saturday, when about 30 activists were bundled 
roughly into police vans and briefly detained, Ms 
Jehangir among them.
The ban on mixed gender races was enforced in 
April after Islamic hardliners attacked runners 
in a race in the city of Gujranwala, about 100km 
(60 miles) north of Lahore.


_______


[3]

Holiday - May 13, 2005

THE TRIAL OF WAR CRIMINALS STILL RELEVANT IN BANGLADESH
Rashed Khan Menon

The recent row between China and Japan on the issue of the distortion of the
history of Japanese aggression and war crimes in China in the Second World
War subsided when the Japanese Prime Minister surprised the heads of state
and government present in the Afro-Asian Conference, held in Indonesia to
commemorate the historic Bandung Conference, by apologising in his speech
for these acts. Before that, anger raged through the government and the
public in China.

The Chinese Prime Minister, in his last leg of tour to India in April last,
said very strongly that Japan should give attention to the reaction in China
caused by the understanding of the extent of Japanese aggression and the war
crimes in the school textbooks of Japan. He also made a veiled threat about
blocking the Japanese effort to gain a permanent seat in the UN Security
Council by saying that only those who have respect for history and
acknowledge the misdeeds of the past have the capacity to shoulder
international responsibility. The students of China, on the other hand, came
out on the streets and brick-batted the Japanese embassy in Beijing.

The sale of Japanese goods was stopped. The apology of the Japanese Prime
Minister has cooled down the situation but the dispute still remains and
China will not be satisfied until the textbooks are amended to tell the
schoolboys the proper history of those events.

This recent outburst of reaction in China about history dates back to 1943
when the Japanese captured Nanking and perpetrated a genocide in which three
hundred thousand people were killed and twenty thousand women raped. This
barbarous event, known as 'Nanking Massacre' or 'Rape of Nanking' in
history, was brought to light during Tokyo's trial of the Japanese war
leaders in the International Tribunal after the Second World War. But the
subsequent Japanese rulers tried to put the whole episode in another light
and in the textbooks on history the 'Nanking Massacre' was dubbed the
'Nanking Incident' and it was claimed that the reports on it were overblown.

A Japanese journalist, whose investigation and research brought the gruesome
history to light, was accused of national betrayal. All the subsequent
governments in power backed the rightist reactionaries who tried to justify
the occupation and the actions of the Japanese army in China and in other
countries during that period. The Chinese, Koreans and other governments and
people of those countries always contested the distortion of history and
asked the Japanese government to apologise for those acts. The earlier
Japanese governments, in their effort to mend relations with these
countries, made public apologies. But at the same time their history books
described those events in a way that hurt the sentiments of the people of
those countries. So it remained as a bone of contention between Japan and
other countries.

The debate on history and war crimes between China and Japan is very
relevant for Bangladesh as this country also had to go through mine months
of horrific occupation by the Pakistani army and hundreds of thousands of
its people were killed and raped by them. The night of the twenty-fifth of
March saw the genocide begin in Dhaka, and it continued throughout the
country with unabated ferocity. The Pakistani murderers were joined by the
local collaborators of Jamaat-e-Islami, Muslim League, Nizam-e-Islam and
others in those acts, and millions of people had to flee the country and
take shelter in India, where many of them died in the refugee camps.

The war crimes of the Pakistani army and their collaborators were not
brought to trial and are hardly mentioned in the textbooks of Bangladesh.
The electronic media, controlled by the government, seldom mention the
massacre. Rather there is a conscious effort on the part of the ruling class
of the country to make people forget it. The Nirmul Committee, led by Shahid
Janani Jahanara Imam, revived the demand for trial of the war criminals and
made big advances in that direction by holding a mock trial of those war
criminals in the Gano Adalat. But this was opposed by the then BNP
government, and the participants of the Gano Adalat were charged with
anti-state activities and criminal cases were filed against them. In a
surprise judgement the Supreme Court also gave back the chief collaborator
of the Pakistani army, Jamaat's Amir Golam Azam, his citizenship, which had
been taken away for his war crimes.

The next government, of the Awami League, which came to power by using the
Nirmul Committee's movement, also did not do anything about the trial of the
war criminals, and did not include the true history of liberation war in the
textbooks for the new generation. And now the Bangladesh government not only
boasts about its relations with Pakistan, but two of the main collaborators
of the Pakistan occupation army and its wilful partner in the genocide of
Bangladeshi people, the intellectuals and others, are in the government,
holding very important positions. The senior ministers of this government
are on record saying that by siding with Pakistan, the Jamaat-e-Islam's
members only performed their duty as citizens. The general secretary of the
BNP recently asked people why one cannot be forgiven for his misdeeds of
thirty and more years back. A Pakistani opposition leader of an Islamic
group acknowledged the misdeeds of the Pakistani army in Bangladesh in 1971,
but advised the concerned people to forget them.

But can such atrocities be forgotten? The Japanese war crimes were brought
to trial in the international courts and twenty-seven of the leaders of the
government and army were sentenced in the Tokyo Trial. But the matter did
not end there. Nor did it come to an end in Europe even after Nuremberg
trial convicted the persons involved in the Nazi war crimes in the Second
World War. These crimes are being publicised by the historians, by the
filmmakers and writers, and the people are constantly reminded of them. In
the political arena, no neo-Nazi parties are allowed to function legally.
Even when some of them could sneak to the Parliaments of different countries
of Europe by winning elections, they were not allowed to sit there. The
countries and people of Europe take pride in the victory of the anti-fascist
war and though the Soviet Union is no more there, the glory of the Soviet
army and the valiant fight of the Communist Party were displayed in the
memorial march recently held in Moscow to commemorate the 60th anniversary
of the anti-fascist war where leaders of the world, including the President
of USA, were present.

In the case of the East, the countries of China, Korea, Laos, Vietnam,
Indonesia, who suffered under Japanese occupation, were one in asking
apology from Japan, and Japan, though grudgingly, made the apology.

So history is not forgotten even if time passes, and events like aggression
and war crimes are never forgotten. Rather the people are reminded every
time so that atrocities are not repeated in the future and civilisation can
make progress.

But in Bangladesh the history of Pakistani occupation, its collaborators,
the killing and raping by these people have fallen through the hole of
political expediency, and the mainstream politicians try to bypass the issue
just for the sake of power.

This has led to the distortion of the history of our liberation struggle and
allowed those criminals to rehabilitate themselves socially and politically,
so much so that they are even sharing power with this government.

The recent debate on history and war crimes between China and Japan and also
between Korea and Japan has shown how relevant these issues are for the
countries which have made progress and have got relations with the countries
who committed these crimes. The mention of war crimes or demand for apology
has not spoilt good relations between these countries, but rather put the
relations in a real historical perspective from where they can advance.
Internally it prevents the revival of those criminal politics and outlook
and helps the country to progress.

In Bangladesh, the Constitution of the country was amended to put the war
criminals on trial and a law, the International Crimes (Tribunal) Act, 1973,
was passed in the Parliament to enable detention, prosecution and punishment
of persons responsible for genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and
other crimes under international law. Recently the international community
has also become very vocal about war crimes, and trials have taken place for
atrocities in Rwanda and Bosnia. The Rome Convention has been signed to
bring the perpetrators of war crimes to trial.

So there is constitutional provision, relevant law and international legal
support. What is necessary is the political will of the government because
it is only the government that can bring up allegations about these crimes.
So it has now become very important to force this or subsequent governments
to go for trial of war criminals. This should be made one of the main issues
of the democratic movement if the country is to be saved from the clutch of
the communal and fundamentalist forces who are trying to not only rotate the
wheel of history backward, but also to change the whole basis of this
country.

What is true for the world is also true for us. The mere passing of time
does not make the trial of war criminals a dead issue. It is most urgent to
end the distortion of history and put the glorious history of our liberation
struggle in its proper place.

  (Rashed Khan Menon is a member of the Bangladesh Worker's Party and a long
time progressive politician.)



_______


[4]

Khaleej Times - May 15, 2005

SCORING NUCLEAR SELF-GOALS

By Praful Bidwai

On the seventh anniversary of India's Pokharan-II 
nuclear tests, how do South Asia's strategic and 
political balance-sheets look? The honest answer 
is, distinctly ungainly. The Manmohan Singh 
government did not celebrate the anniversary 
although it observed May 11 as "Science Day." At 
the party level too, there was no enthusiasm for 
celebrating the Shakti tests. Only the Bharatiya 
Janata Party held a commemoration-a small 
symposium, where the tone was peevishly 
self-justificatory.

Party president L.K. Advani used the occasion to 
pillory the Left and demand it be firmly kept out 
of all areas that affect vital national 
interests. He cited Communist Party (Marxist) 
general secretary Prakash Karat's description of 
the nuclear tests as "adventurist and very 
unfortunate" events which weakened India.

Advani was barking up the wrong tree. It is not 
just Karat, but much of the Opposition in 1998, 
which questioned the wisdom behind the nuclear 
blasts, including Manmohan Singh, H.D Deve Gowda, 
Mulayam Singh and many others. During the 1998 
Monsoon Session of Parliament, the government 
came under intense fire over breaking the 
consensus to have a nuclear capability, but not 
to cross the threshold and make weapons. Singh 
went as far as to warn that a defence strategy 
based on nuclear weapons would lead to an arms 
race which would turn out to be so expensive that 
there would be "nothing left to defend."

Today, the BJP's claim that it did both the right 
thing, and the popular thing, by conducting the 
Pokharan blasts, sounds laughable. Opinion polls 
show that 63 to 72 percent of Indians are against 
making or using nuclear weapons. This is in 
keeping with the figures in most major countries 
of those who want nuclear disarmament. These 
range from 67 percent (Russia) and 78 percent 
(Japan) to 87 percent (US, Germany and UK) and 93 
percent (Canada). In most Non-Aligned Movement 
countries, there is an even stronger sentiment 
against nuclear weapons.

Poll ratings apart, South Asia has become more 
insecure since 1998 despite the recent 
improvement in India-Pakistan relations, itself 
uneven, wobbly and reversible. As far as a 
flashpoint for a nuclear confrontation goes, 
South Asia still remains the world's "most 
dangerous place". More than one billion ordinary 
civilians living in that region have become 
vulnerable to a devastating nuclear attack, 
whether intended, accidental or unauthorised, 
against which there is no defence, military, 
civil or medical.

Seven years ago, the Indian Bomb lobby made at 
least five claims about the virtues of 
nuclearisation. It said India and Pakistan would 
become more secure and self-confident because 
neither could now blackmail the other on the 
strength of conventional strategic superiority or 
even covert support to militant groups. This new 
strategic equation would form the bedrock of 
stability. Second, Pakistani and Indian leaders 
would behave "responsibly" and "maturely": the 
Bomb's destructive power would ensure that, 
irrespective of the leaders' qualities.
Third, after the Pokharan-Chagai tests, an 
India-Pakistan conventional war would become 
inconceivable. Doesn't deterrence theory tell you 
that nuclear weapons-states do not go to war with 
one another? The low-intensity skirmishes between 
the USSR and China in the 1960s and 1970s across 
the Ussuri river were only an aberration. That 
doesn't affect the rule.

Fourth, nuclearisation would greatly expand 
India's and Pakistan's capacity for 
political-diplomatic manoeuvre in world affairs. 
And fifth, nuclearisation's adverse 
social-political impact would be minimal, and its 
economic costs affordable.

All five predictions have proved disastrously 
false. India and Pakistan have become edgy, 
nervously unsure about each other's doctrines, 
more prone to panic reactions-and strategically 
unstable. Nuclear weapons have not induced 
"maturity" and "sobriety" into India-Pakistan 
relations. Indeed, they have promoted rank 
adventurism based on the premise that nuclear 
weapons furnish a shield or cover for needling 
and harassing the adversary in numerous 
conventional ways. The casual, cavalier, manner 
in which Indian and Pakistani officials exchanged 
nuclear threats in 1999 and 2002 was 
spine-chilling. The two came close to the brink 
of a nuclear attack at least three times.

Thanks to pure adventurism, Pakistan and India 
went to war at Kargil a year after the 
Pokharan-Chagai nuclear tests. Kargil was a 
serious middle-sized conflict by international 
standards, involving 40,000 Indian troops, 
top-of-the-line weaponry, and billions of 
dollars. The casualties exceeded 1,000.

Take global stature and the supposed ability to 
expand room for international manoeuvre. After 
Chagai, Pakistan became a virtual pariah 
state-until 9/11, which gave it a chance to get 
into an alliance with the US. True, India's 
global profile has risen. But that is more 
because of information technology successes and 
economic growth-and despite nuclear weapons. 
India's bargaining power and room for manoeuvre 
vis-à-vis Washington has shrunk thanks to 
nuclearisation. That's one reason why India had 
to get into an unequal "strategic partnership" 
with the US and take ambivalent positions on many 
US policies and actions.

Nuclearisation's still-unfolding economic costs 
have proved extremely burdensome. India's 
military budget has more than doubled in absolute 
terms since Pokharan-II. Pakistan's spending has 
followed the same trend. This is just for 
starters. As their nuclear programmes proceed 
towards deployment, military spending will 
skyrocket. With an arms race-in the Indian case, 
two races, the other being with China-, it could 
spiral out of control, ruinously, for all 
concerned. The low-end estimate for a small 
arsenal, one which is only one-fifth the size of 
China's, is Rs 60,000 to 100,000 crores. This 
would entail doubling the military budget, which 
is now 3.2 percent of GDP.

All this means paying through our nose to court 
yet more insecurity. The nuclear danger cannot be 
contained or managed while retaining nuclear 
weapons. Systematic elimination of nuclear 
weapons, beginning with the South Asian region, 
is the only solution. India can work for it if it 
revives and upgrades the thoughtful Rajiv Gandhi 
Plan of 1988, which involves a three-stage 
process of global nuclear elimination.

But this means making an extraordinarily bold 
gesture of nuclear restraint in the South Asian 
region. Is India ready for this? The alternative 
is an unsafe world over which the nuclear sword 
will hang forever.-end-

_______


[5]

People's Democracy - May 15, 2005

SECULAR HISTORIOGRAPHY STILL UNDER ATTACK

Nalini Taneja

MOST people think that with the RSS defeated and 
a secular party at the helm of affairs, secular 
historians can breathe easy and secular 
historiography is now safe from attack by the 
goons of the RSS. That this simply cannot be 
taken for granted is clear from the recent 
orchestrated attack by the RSS and its media on 
senior teacher, Zahoor Siddiqi, of School of Open 
Learning, Delhi University. A vilification 
campaign against the said teacher is going on in 
Panchjanya, the RSS mouth piece, and in the 
Jagran owned TV channel, which has been 
organising so-called discussions by 'experts' 
like Tarun Vijay of Panchjanya and leading member 
of the RSS think tank to not just to misreport 
what has actually been written by Zahoor Siddiqi 
in the reading material prepared for the 
correspondence course of the university, but also 
to falsify history itself.

The Democratic Teachers' Front (DTF) of Delhi 
University has issued a strong press release on 
the matter (see box) and is also writing to the 
university officials. As the press release makes 
clear the reading material targeted is not new, 
and neither is the attack on it by the RSS a 
first time attack. Similar attempts were made in 
1979 and 1983, questions were raised by RSS 
linked MPs in parliament, and the usual 
vilification with peppering of words like 'sons 
of Macaulay' and 'agents of madrassas' was 
carried out through out the city of Delhi and in 
national newspapers. It is to the credit of the 
Department of History that it had stood steadfast 
in defense of secular historiography and academic 
freedom of a teacher. Under the headship of Prof 
D N Jha, the well known historian, the department 
unanimously defended the reading material, and a 
report clearly stating that there was not only 
nothing unobjectionable but also nothing 
factually wrong in the material being objected to 
by the RSS was sent to the university and the 
then vice chancellor, Moonis Raza.

One can of course then wonder what all the fuss 
is about once again - except that by now we are 
only too familiar with the fascist Goebelsian 
methods perfected by the RSS over time, and that 
it is not willing to lose any opportunity. The 
teacher, Zahoor Siddiqi, has now retired, and the 
RSS probably thinks the university and teachers 
organisations will perhaps not take that much of 
an interest. He has, of course, impeccable 
secular and Left credentials. He has taken the 
initiative to bring out an Urdu fortnightly 
Altamash, which obviously is Left and 
anti-communal, and he has also been an active 
member of the BJP Harao Manch.

The RSS has sent a legal notice to Zahoor 
Siddiqi, as well as to the university and the 
college, the main points of which are that he has 
"distorted" history with reference to the RSS, 
and also the Indian Constitution, made certain 
negative references about Sardar Patel etc. In 
other words, the RSS thinks he must be penalised 
for showing the RSS and its leaders as communal, 
for referring to constitutional debates which did 
not allow for greater democratic content, and for 
pointing towards the role of Godse brothers in 
the Gandhi murder - all of which, as we well 
know, are commonplace facts available in all 
secular history texts, including textbooks 
prescribed in the university.  Zahoor Siddiqi had 
quoted some of these in the preparation of the 
reading material.

Dinanath Batra, convenor of the RSS history cell, 
has in a pamphlet called the reading material a 
"serious criminal conspiracy to distort history". 
He has called for meetings, demonstrations and 
using all other avenues of protest they think 
suitable for expressing their anger to the Delhi 
University VC.

While the Democratic Teachers' Front has come out 
in Zahoor Siddiqi's defense, the same cannot be 
said for the college and the university, whose 
definition of academic freedom is that it is a 
teacher concern what he/she writes and says!

This, as we can clearly see, is an attitude that 
has broad academic, political and legal 
implications. Any reading material, published by 
the university, and circulated by it must be 
assumed to have the sanction of the university, 
and the university must hold itself accountable 
for it. An academic institution must defend 
academic freedom against any unlawful and 
unwarranted attacks. Such defense is not the 
responsibility of the teacher alone, who has 
written or delivered a lecture or made a 
presentation at a seminar etc in the service of 
scholarship and his academic contribution to the 
institution.

On the flip side, any reading material which may 
be communal and against the spirit of the 
Constitution, and which is prepared by any 
individual teacher or department, and is being 
circulated in the name of the university, must 
not only not be defended, it must be withdrawn 
after adopting the proper procedures and 
ascertaining its unsuitability. This is the real 
meaning of academic freedom. 

An institution of repute cannot absolve itself of 
defending secular history or letting communal 
history be circulated in its name, in the name of 
academic freedom of the teacher concerned. 

If the circulation of RSS sponsored textbooks is 
being tolerated in our country today it is a 
reflection of the weakness of our secularism, of 
the lack of political will of the government and 
the bourgeois political leadership, not because 
academic freedom demands that that myths be 
taught in the name of history in schools.

Zahoor Siddiqi has prepared the reading material 
as part of his duties as a teacher of the 
university, and was assigned this work by his 
institution, through his department. His is not a 
speech made at some open forum or a book 
published by him on his own, which may be a 
matter of citizens' concern, but with which the 
university officially has an option to involve 
itself or not. This is an officially approved 
reading material belonging to the university, and 
circulated by it. Moreover, it is material, which 
already having come under controversy earlier, 
has been unanimously supported and approved of by 
the History Department of the university in 1983. 
The Delhi University is therefore, bound, from 
all points of view, to defend it against 
motivated communal attacks by the RSS, and to 
stand by the teacher.

It is, therefore, regrettable that in this case 
the university is yet to make its position clear 
and to take any steps to defend Zahoor Siddiqi 
against vilification and intimidation by RSS 
linked goons.

______

[6]

The Hindu - May 20, 2005 |  Editorials

A shocking absence of outrage

The gruesome attack on a woman engaged in a 
campaign against child marriage in Madhya Pradesh 
is a reminder that despite claims to being on the 
threshold of developed nation status, India has 
not been free from the worst forms of social 
backwardness and obscurantism. As if the incident 
was not shocking enough, the initial reaction of 
the State Government was scandalous. Instead of 
condemning the assault on Shakuntala Verma, a 
child welfare worker of the State Government, 
Chief Minister Babulal Gaur threw up his hands 
and asserted that it was not possible to stop 
child marriages. Ms. Verma was attacked by a 
sword-wielding man who barged into her home and 
tried to chop her hands off. After initially 
trying to pin the motive for the attack on 
personal enmity, the Madhya Pradesh Government 
belatedly admitted that it was indeed linked to 
the social worker's attempts to prevent a child 
marriage in a village in Dhar district. One 
person has been arrested but this has come 
following street protests in Bihar, anger in 
Parliament, and a Supreme Court notice to the 
State Government on a petition on behalf of the 
injured woman. Aside from seeking compensation, 
the petition demands the arrest of those behind 
the attack, and the prosecution of all officials 
concerned, including the Chief Minister, for a 
negligent attitude towards child marriages. The 
official attitude bears the hallmark of a `soft 
state' bordering on collusion with social 
reaction and law breaking.

Every year, in the six States of Madhya Pradesh, 
Chattisgarh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, and 
Jharkhand, on a particular day of the Hindu 
calendar known in north India as akha teej and in 
the south as akshaya tritiya, thousands of 
children are married. This, in blatant violation 
of the 1929 Child Marriages Restraint Act (CMRA) 
under which no girl under the age of 18 or boy 
under 21 can wed. This year too, despite a 
directive from the National Human Rights 
Commission to the governments concerned to take 
all measures to prevent child marriages, many 
instances have been reported. According to a 2001 
UNICEF study, the number of prosecutions under 
the CMRA did not exceed 89 in any year. 
Admittedly, the law as it stands is weak. Child 
marriage is not a cognisable offence; carrying 
out arrests of offenders is difficult; and most 
important, the marriage itself remains valid. The 
Prevention of Child Marriages Bill introduced in 
the Rajya Sabha in December 2004 is more 
comprehensive and has some teeth. It seeks to 
empower courts to "stay" child marriages and 
provides for declaring such marriages void 
(although only on the basis of a complaint by the 
child). If the Government is at all serious about 
stamping out the outrageous practice, officials 
responsible for enforcing the law must be made 
accountable for every case of violation. In the 
long term, there is no solution other than making 
registration of marriages compulsory.

______



[7]  [Letters to the Editor]


D-504 Purvasha
Mayur Vihar 1
Delhi 110091

13 May 2005

Sundar Singh Bhandari, old RSS hand and Governor of Gujarat
when his own "family" massacred Muslims there in 2002, now
says (see "Governor in the time of riots Bhandari 
slams Modi " *Indian Express* 
[www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=70286] 
) that Modi and the BJP's
central leadership failed to react quickly and firmly. "The
riots were taken lightly," he said, keeping up the pretence
that the violence was not a pogrom -- in the planning of
which, moreover, he himself has been held by many to have
been central.

Can it be coincidence that Sevak Bhandari speaks of the
"blot" just days after Sevak Pramod Mahajan did the same?
Can it be coincidence that neither *sevak* said anything
remotely like this for thirty-eight months, not even when
Sevak Advani, then Home Minister, told Parliament that Modi
was in control, in London praised Modi's "stern action",
and told a U.S. news magazine that he was "satisfied" with
Modi's handling of the situation? Can it be coincidence
that K.R. Narayanan, then President of India, very recently
said that the then Prime Minister, Sevak Vajpayee, had
ignored his advice on the proper use of the army?

It is not only that the rats have begun to scurry madly
among their lies now that the truth is coming out. The
rats are also attacking one another. All this promises to
become a fine soap opera about rodent behaviour: "Choohe Jo
Kabhi Sher Bante The". But we should never forget that rats
can also be carriers of bubonic plague.

Mukul Dube

______

[8]     [Announcements: ]


Dear members and friends of SANSAD:

We draw your attention to the Vancouver premiere of the
award-winning, ground-breaking documentary

Continuous Journey
by
Ali Kazimi

Tuesday, May 24, 2005
7:30 p.m.
The Vogue Theatre
(918 Granville Street, Vancouver)

Based on eight years of detailed research and 
drawing from solid archival material, Continuous 
Journey documents the tragic and shameful saga of 
the Komagata Maru ship, which almost to the day 
ninety-one years ago, on May 23, 1914, arrived on 
the Vancouver shores with 376 aspiring immigrants 
from India.

The ship's arrival was also an act of defiance 
against the overtly racist policies of this 
country. After practically decimating the 
indigenous peoples of this land, and forcing the 
left-overs into tiny, isolated Reserves, "White 
Canada for Ever" didn't want anymore brown, 
yellow and black people to come here. However, 
they could not formally keep the people of India 
from coming; India being as much a colony of the 
British empire as was Canada. The Canadian 
government thus passed an ordinance stating that 
people were welcome to come, as long as they came 
on a "continuous journey"; and their masters in 
the United Kingdom made sure that no shipping 
company travelled directly from India to Canada.

Komagata Maru, as a chartered ship, arrived here 
after two months on the open seas in a 
"continuous journey". it sat in the Burrad Inlet 
for another two months. Not only the Government 
of Canada but also the entire British empire 
conspired to keep the passengers from coming on 
shore. Finally the ship was forced out of 
Canadain waters with the guns of Canadian Naval 
ship pointed at it.

Continuous Journey is a documentary
which must be seen by everyone who wants to know 
about the history of this land.

And it must be seen by us, the South Asians - 
people whose ancestral roots go back to the 
Indian sub-continent. For us, the Komagata Maru 
episode is of profound historical significance. 
The 386 Hindu, Muslim and Sikh men, women and 
children on that ship were among the pioneers who 
laid the solid foundation of our people's 
struggles in Canada. They suffered much hardship. 
They suffered hunger and thirst. They suffered 
the humiliation of being turned back from these 
shores. Many were killed by the British police 
when they reached back in India, many were 
incarcerated. But through all this they 
symbolized unity, perseverance, determination, 
and a daring to struggle for their rights.

Komagata Maru is a common heritage for all of us.

And Continuous Journey by Ali Kazimi brings this 
heritage alive in a very creative manner.

*******

So make it a date. Come to the Vogue Theatre on Tuesday, May 24, 7:30 p.m.

Ali Kazimi, the director, and many other 
distinguished guests will be in attendance.

****

The screening of Continuous Journey is the gala 
opening of a week-long annual DOXA Docementary 
Film and Video Festival of Vancouver.

For full listing of other films and venues in the 
Doxa festival, go to this site:
www.doxafestival.ca

Advance tickets for the gala night ($15.00 per person) are available at

Bibliophile Bookshop, Videomatica
and Festival Box Office at 604.257.0366 or www.festivalboxoffice.com
Information: 604.646.3200 or www.doxafestival.ca


Hari Sharma
for SANSAD

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

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