SACW | 17-18 June 2006 | Sri Lanka Crisis; World Bank and Pakistan; Pakistan India Impasse; India: Hindutva, Congress, Nagas, AFSPA, Oral tradition, Urdu poetry

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | 17-18 June, 2006 | Dispatch No. 2260


[1]  Sri Lanka: New Phase of Civilian Killing 
Must Be Stopped  (National Peace Council)
[2]  Pakistan's Rot Has World Bank Roots  (Peter Bosshard and Shannon Lawrence)
[3]  Pakistan - India Peace Talk: No progress on the ground (M B Naqvi)
[4]  India: Shades of Hindutva - Congress and BJP 
are two sides of same coin (Edit., Kashmir Times)
[5]  India: NPMHR appeals for an organized and 
persistent resistance against AFSPA
[6]  The Love Song of History - the secular 
legacy of India's oral tradition (Madanjeet Singh)
[7]  Book Review: 'Anthems of Resistance: A 
Celebration of Urdu Poetry', Ali Husain Mir and 
Raza Mir
[8]  A mega rally by Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum in Karachi on June 19, 2006


___

[1]


National Peace Council
of Sri Lanka
12/14 Purana Vihara Road
Colombo 6, Sri Lanka

16.06.06

Media Release

NEW PHASE OF CIVILIAN KILLING MUST BE STOPPED FORTHWITH

The crisis in Sri Lanka has reached a new phase 
with the targeting of civilians for large scale 
killing and the accompanying denial of 
responsibility for such atrocities. The claymore 
mine attack on a civilian bus in Anuradhapura, 
suspected to be by the LTTE, killed over 60 adults
and children and injured over 70 others. This 
incident is a grievous escalation of an already 
terrible conflict in which civilian casualties 
have been overtaking those of armed combatants. 
The National Peace Council condemns this attack 
and condoles with the bereaved families of the 
victims.

We condemn all actions that lead to civilian 
casualties. A strategy of targeting civilians 
cannot be justified under any circumstance and is 
morally reprehensible. In the immediate aftermath 
of this attack, the government has sent its air 
force to bomb targets in the LTTE-controlled 
areas. A strategy of retaliation may not only 
cause serious damage to those who are locked in 
combat, but also to innocent civilians, and will 
do little to address the root causes that led to 
the conflict. On the other hand, a bold and 
non-violent political initiative may generate a 
positive response which will help move the 
country out of its tragic and doomed path.

NPC appeals to the government and LTTE to be 
mindful of the sufferings that are being heaped 
upon the people, and not to abdicate their 
responsibilities by them. Even as our country 
continues to slide worse towards a war-like 
situation, with tragic events that must shock our 
conscience, we believe it is time to pause, and 
to re-think, what path we as a nation must take. 
The European Union and the donor Co-Chairs have 
recently issued statements that contain 
guidelines for a successful peace process.  We 
call on the two parties to immediately meet with 
each other at the negotiating table with a vision 
for a shared future rather than on a battlefield 
in which innocent civilians are being called upon 
to pay the greater price.


Executive Director
On behalf of the Governing Council

_____


[2]

Far Eastern Economic Review
May 2006

PAKISTAN'S ROT HAS WORLD BANK ROOTS

By Peter Bosshard and Shannon Lawrence

After closely following the script of his 
predecessor for almost a year, the new World Bank 
President Paul Wolfowitz recently revealed his 
own vision for the embattled development 
institution. Identifying corruption as the single 
largest obstacle to development, he increased the 
budget of the bank's investigative unit, and held 
up loans to India, Bangladesh, Kenya and Chad 
because of corruption concerns. "This is about 
making sure that the bank's resources go to the 
poor and don't end up in the wrong pockets," Mr. 
Wolfowitz told US News & World Report. "It is 
about fighting poverty."
Critics have long accused the bank and other 
donors of turning a blind eye to the leakage of 
development funds, leaving corrupt contractors 
and officials flush with cash, governments 
saddled with "white elephant" projects and odious 
debt, poor people devoid of essential services, 
and the environment unprotected. The World Bank 
began to address the "cancer of corruption" under 
former President James Wolfensohn, and Paul 
Wolfowitz's pledge to "move from talking about 
corruption to dealing with corruption" is welcome.
Yet the world's largest development institution 
still attempts to treat the symptoms and not the 
cause of the disease. In fact, the bank's current 
lending strategies might even be fueling the 
corruption epidemic. Just as the bank vows to get 
tough on corruption, it has simultaneously 
announced a big increase in its support for 
infrastructure, the sector perceived to be the 
most corrupt globally according to NGO 
Transparency International. Water, energy, 
transport and other public works projects are 
attractive targets for corrupt contractors and 
bribe-takers due to their complexity, capital 
intensity, price-tag, and the number of public 
and private players involved. Approximately half 
of the World Bank anticorruption unit's 
investigations that led to specific corrective 
actions were linked to infrastructure projects.
Massive, centrally planned and financed 
construction projects are particularly prone to 
corruption. Unless corruption is checked in the 
earliest stages of the planning process, corrupt 
politicians, and construction companies will 
favor large-scale projects to address a country's 
infrastructure needs.
Development efforts can only be effective if they 
reflect a country's own priorities. The World 
Bank has acknowledged the importance of "country 
ownership" in recent years. Yet it has tended to 
equate country ownership with government 
ownership, and government ownership with 
ownership by finance and infrastructure 
ministries. The bank has limited the 
opportunities for civil society input in the 
development of infrastructure strategies, and cut 
down the preparation time for infrastructure 
projects.
Combined, the bank's push into infrastructure, 
the emphasis on government ownership and the 
limited accountability to civil society are 
creating large opportunities for corruption in a 
sector in which graft is already endemic. If the 
World Bank does not address the incentives for 
corruption upstream, fighting graft in individual 
contracts will be a losing battle.
Pakistan's Experience
The Indus Basin Irrigation System, the world's 
largest water-diversion scheme with more than 1.6 
million kilometers of watercourses in Pakistan, 
is a prominent example of how corruption pervades 
economic development and distorts the priorities 
of infrastructure investment. This project also 
shows how the World Bank's business model and 
development paradigm encourage rather than 
counteract corruption.
For five decades, Pakistan's irrigation system 
has been shaped by the World Bank's approach to 
water infrastructure. In the 1950s, the bank 
brokered a water treaty between India and 
Pakistan and helped devise the policies and 
institutions of Pakistan's water sector in a 
series of master plans and reports. It has since 
loaned almost $20 billion (in 2005 prices) for 
related projects.
The Indus Basin Irrigation System is a central 
planner's dream turned concrete. Its cornerstone, 
the Tarbela Dam, was the largest man-made 
structure on earth at the time of its 
construction, but it is just one of 19 dams that 
block and divert the basin's mighty rivers. Large 
canals, drainage highways and more than 100,000 
distributaries crisscross the Indus basin.
Today, the Indus Basin Irrigation System serves 
an area the size of Bangladesh, and generates 
more than one-fourth of Pakistan's electric 
power. Yet the system is in deep crisis. The 
irrigation network operates extremely 
inefficiently and sedimentation is rapidly 
reducing the capacity of its reservoirs. More 
than 60% of the irrigation water is lost from the 
canal head to the root zone, and then more is 
wasted on thirsty crops such as sugar cane that 
are not suited to the arid region. Average crop 
yields are much lower than in neighboring India.
Moreover, the construction of reservoirs and 
canals caused the forcible displacement of more 
than 200,000 people in Pakistan. Decades after 
they were moved, thousands of families are still 
living in misery. A report prepared for the World 
Bank argues that the lack of replacement land and 
corruption in the system are "creating extreme 
hardship for people."
Pakistan's irrigation network has always served a 
privileged elite at the expense of the poor. 
World Bank and government programs have 
consistently favored feudal landowners. When the 
irrigation system was established, the government 
failed to recognize the land rights of the 
original inhabitants and allotted irrigated plots 
to rich landowners and military personnel. While 
large and very large farmers control 66% of all 
agricultural land in Pakistan, almost half of the 
rural households own no land. A World Bank 
evaluation noted in 1996 that the bank "provided 
large and unnecessary transfers of public 
resources to some of the rural elite."
The collateral damage continues downstream. The 
Indus Basin Irrigation System starves areas of 
Sindh Province-and particularly the Indus 
Delta-of water. And because the sediment trapped 
in the reservoirs does not replenish the delta, 
close to 5,000 square kilometers of farm land 
have already been lost to the sea. Meanwhile, 
salt water is intruding 100 kilometers upstream 
in the Indus.
While the downstream areas suffer from a water 
shortage, wasteful water use is wreaking 
environmental havoc in the command area. 
Overirrigation and inadequate drainage have 
caused the water table to rise across a large 
area. As a result, about 60% of all farm plots in 
Sindh are plagued by waterlogging and salinity.
Pakistan's water sector, like many of those 
around the world, is fraught with large- and 
small-scale corruption. According to a 2003 
survey by Transparency International, Pakistan's 
Water and Power Development Agency is perceived 
to be the second most corrupt institution in the 
country. Close to half of the more than 31,000 
complaints received by Pakistan's anticorruption 
ombudsman in 2002 were related to this one 
institution. As the World Bank's 2005 Pakistan 
water strategy admits, top positions in the 
country's water bureaucracy are sold at a high 
price.
Corruption works in a variety of ways in 
Pakistan's water sector. Officials need to recoup 
the investments in their positions in the form of 
kickbacks. They do so primarily through projects 
that serve construction companies and large 
landowners, not through improved maintenance 
programs and low-cost projects that serve the 
poor. This is why the water bureaucracy, as the 
World Bank puts it, suffers from a 
"build-neglect-rebuild" syndrome, and "has yet to 
make the vital mental transition from that of a 
builder to that of a manager."
Many officials in Pakistan's water sector also 
allocate irrigation water to the highest briber 
and not necessarily the most needy or productive 
farmers. "Payments to irrigation officials to 
ensure the delivery of sanctioned water supplies 
were reported as routine and endemic" the World 
Bank found in 2002.
Corruption is allowed to blossom because 
Pakistan's water sector lacks transparency and 
accountability. The water allocations on all 
levels of the irrigation system are for example 
not disclosed to the public. The World Bank 
concludes: "In the shadows of discretion and lack 
of accountability, of course, lurk all sorts of 
interests-of powerful people who manipulate the 
system for their ends, and of those in the 
bureaucracy who serve them and are rewarded for 
this service."
An Alternative
Brick-and-mortar investments in centrally managed 
dams and canals are not the only way to address 
Pakistan's water and energy needs. Because the 
existing infrastructure is not being properly 
maintained and so much water is being wasted, the 
efficiency of the irrigation system could be 
greatly increased. Plugging the leaks of the 
existing system is environmentally more benign 
than building new dams and canals.
It is also more economical. A World Bank 
evaluation found in 1996 that water conservation 
measures saved more water than the largest new 
dam in Pakistan's investment program could have 
stored, and at one-fifth the cost. The Asian 
Development Bank estimates that an additional 4.7 
million acre-feet of water could be provided 
either by conservation measures at a cost of $1.7 
billion, or by a new dam with a price tag of $4.5 
billion.
Decentralized and nonstructural solutions to 
Pakistan's water crisis also exist. The Indus 
Valley has huge groundwater reservoirs, which 
could store many times as much water as all 
future dams. Recharging these reservoirs would 
require more sustainable flood management 
practices which allow the Indus to overflow its 
banks temporarily rather than confine it within 
massive embankments.
Farmers still irrigate thousands of square 
kilometers of land through traditional techniques 
outside the modern canal system, and without 
support from the government or World Bank. 
Rainwater harvesting and simple, affordable 
treadle pumps provide a steady supply of water to 
farmers, without the added costs of bribes for 
water officials or diesel pumps. Drip irrigation 
kits apply water directly to the roots rather 
than the furrows, and use only half as much 
irrigation water in the process. An innovative 
way of planting rice without standing water 
(called the System of Rice Intensification) 
allows rice-a particularly thirsty crop-to be 
grown using only half the amount of water, while 
also boosting harvests. Such soft approaches have 
been adopted with good success around the world, 
and are being introduced in Pakistan. Shifting 
control over water resources from bureaucrats and 
absentee landlords to poor farmers would ensure a 
more economic use of water, reduce poverty, and 
protect the environment at the same time.
In 2003, the World Bank argued that a "genuine 
paradigm shift" emphasizing the proper management 
of water resources rather than new infrastructure 
was needed in Pakistan. Yet a new water strategy 
which the Bank proposed for the country in 
September 2005 does not reflect this paradigm 
shift. It asserts that "Pakistan has to invest, 
and invest soon, in costly and contentious new 
dams." The strategy recognizes the potential for 
efficiency gains, but does not address the 
maintenance gap in the water sector, and the 
serious social and environmental impacts of the 
current approach. In January 2006, General 
Musharraf announced that his government would 
start construction of the Bhasha and Kalabagh 
Dams by 2016. The two dams will cost more than 
$20 billion, will displace an estimated 160,000 
people, and will further reduce downstream flows.
The World Bank prepared its new water sector 
strategy for Pakistan without any input from 
civil society. It argued that "while all voices 
must be heard, much greater weight must be given 
to the voices of those who have responsibility 
and face the voters, and less to those who are 
self-appointed or who represent small special 
interests." This is a remarkable statement in a 
country that is marred by corruption, in which 
top government positions are for sale, and which 
is run by a self-appointed military ruler.
Why are governments and the World Bank so 
obviously flouting the lessons of the past? The 
bank has always been good at evaluating its own 
performance, but bad at incorporating the lessons 
from such evaluations. Bank managers frequently 
spoke out against corruption in development 
projects even before Paul Wolfowitz took the 
helm. Yet its institutional self-interests 
reinforce the interests of corrupt borrowers and 
contractors in various ways.
The bank covers its administrative costs from the 
profits it makes by lending to middle-income 
countries. It is forced to keep up lending to 
such countries in order to sustain its own 
business model. Middle-income countries can raise 
capital on the private market, and the World Bank 
is forced to keep its lending costs low so it is 
not out-competed by private banks. It is easier 
and cheaper for the bank to invest in large 
brick-and-mortar projects than to process loans 
for small, decentralized irrigation schemes, or 
for cheap but institutionally complex programs to 
improve the maintenance of existing 
infrastructure.
The interests of the World Bank's member 
governments are well aligned with the 
institution's bureaucratic self-interests. 
Northern governments favor loans that pay for the 
contracts of international consultants and 
construction companies. Borrowing governments 
favor bulky projects that yield ribbon-cutting 
opportunities and political prestige, support 
centralized bureaucracies, and offer spoils for 
patronage.
The bank's institutional self-interests translate 
into an incentive structure which rewards staff 
for pushing money out of the door quickly, and 
not for achieving lasting developing impacts. One 
more proof that the World Bank undermines its own 
development objectives and its efforts to fight 
corruption: The author of its new strategy for 
Pakistan's water sector has just been promoted by 
President Wolfowitz to become the country 
director for Brazil.

Mr. Bosshard is policy director of International 
Rivers Network. Ms. Lawrence is international 
policy analyst at Environmental Defense.

_____


[3]

Deccan Herald
June 17, 2006

NO PROGRESS ON THE GROUND
By M B Naqvi

New Delhi and Islamabad have to change their 
mindsets towards each other for promotion of 
peaceful relations


Two and a half years have elapsed since Pakistan 
and India have been busy trying to improve mutual 
ties. There is certainly a noticeable relaxation 
in atmospherics created by emotive governmental 
pronouncements. But insofar as the hard issues 
that require to be settled are concerned, there 
have been absolutely no progress, not even on 
supposedly minor ones. Things on the ground are 
exactly as they were in January 2004.

The occasion for this comment is two statements 
made by two important officials: Mr MK Naraynan, 
India's National Security Advisor, has said that 
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh might not 
visit Pakistan this year. He gave the reason that 
terrorism emanating from Pakistan is causing 
trouble in India and unless Pakistan does 
something significant to stop this, India's Prime 
Minister can scarcely be expected to visit 
Pakistan. After all he wants to visit to do 
something. If he cannot achieve solid results - 
on any of the eight recognised disputes - what 
will be the point of his visit.

The second statement was made by Chairman of 
Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee of the Pakistan 
armed forces. Addressing senior military officers 
in Islamabad recently that the Confidence 
Building Measures (CBMs) which are being agreed 
to, do not amount too much; the real issue is 
Kashmir and unless India is ready to do something 
to move the dialogue forward, the entire effort 
is futile.

On the Pakistan side there has been a division of 
work. The President has been airing, from time to 
time, various ideas on a Kashmir solution. Some 
of them were based on American experts' thinking 
with inputs from both India and Pakistan. And he 
is still at it. But he took good care of making 
his Prime Minister say, sotto voce, that unless 
Kashmir is solved the dialogue cannot really 
yield results. This time round the President has 
made the second senior most General to articulate 
the same idea.

It is time to judge. The two governments have so 
far given their peoples a number of CBMs to play 
with. To repeat, there has been no real progress.

The situation needs to be faced both by Pakistan 
and India with realism. Political parties too 
have to realise that further negotiations within 
this framework will be fruitless.

Although one has always stood for an 
Indo-Pakistan friendship based on a thorough 
going reconciliation covering the entire South 
Asia, hard realities of inter-state situation 
makes one pessimistic. Let's try and move the 
compass. Two solid and antagonist state 
apparatuses, with powerful vested interest in 
Indo-Pak hostility, have grown up. Each has 
conflicting core issues or botttomlines. While 
each pursues power, vis-à-vis each other, the 
chances of the two security establishments 
settling down to a friendly co-existence are next 
to nil. Substance of two national efforts 
involves collision.

A real change requires qualitatively different 
national aims. Unless the main purpose of 
national endeavour in both countries changes 
achieving easily verifiable improvements in the 
way the two people live and work in villages, 
towns and city mohallahs, nothing substantial 
will change. But if the quality of politics 
changes in both countries, the sky will be the 
limit to their cooperation and coming together. 
But that sounds utopian. But that is the only way 
forward. Perhaps reasons should be adduced to why 
current realism will end in a blind alley.

One reason is that no one has realised the 
mischief that the nuclear weapons are playing. 
The two governments do not know, or acknowledge, 
that two antagonistic deterrents sitting cheek by 
jowl cannot long accept any nuclear restraint 
regime. Look, there have three rounds of 
negotiations by the Foreign Secretaries to 
roughhew even an MOU on the restraint subject, 
let alone a proper treaty.

Fact is the two countries are engaged in a fierce 
and comprehensive arms race. The race is on to 
increase and improve conventional and nuclear 
weapons and their delivery vehicles. Why else are 
constant missile experiments being made? Second 
fact is neither establishment can acquiesce in 
the other's Bomb; it simply must not be. A 
factoid is that the only likely use of nuclear 
weapons by India or Pakistan can only be on each 
other's territory. All else is fluff. So long as 
the two governments evade the issue and cover it 
up with deceptive words, things would not move 
forward.

Kashmir is moving into this league. India's 
bottomline is that its sovereignty over the 
Kashmir valley remains unalloyed. Few are 
deceived by beautiful words. Pakistan has 
actually agreed to this but its backwoodsmen 
apparently inside the Army would seem to demand 
something more than mere words, CBMs buses and 
more travel etc.

They want some role across the Line of Control 
whether or not they would extend similar 
facilities to Indian forces on this side of the 
Line of Control. It is an emotive issue. Indians 
cannot conceive of a future without the Kashmir 
Valley being safely inside India. Pakistani 
hardliners apparently cannot conceive a future 
without the Kashmir Valley becoming free of 
Indian control.

All one can say is that new thinking is needed.

_____


[4]

Kashmir Times
June 17, 2006
Editorial

SHADES OF HINDUTVA
CONGRESS AND BJP ARE TWO SIDES OF SAME COIN

The tone and tenor of their utterances may appear 
different and their actions may vary but both the 
ruling Congress, professing to be the champion of 
secularism and opposition BJP, wearing a secular 
mask, speak the same language and act in a 
similar manner. There is a thin dividing line 
between the two parties with one symbolising soft 
Hindutva and the other presenting aggressive 
saffron face. This was evident in Gujarat during 
the post Godhra carnage and subsequently during 
the assembly elections there where the Congress 
while attacking BJP was apologetic about the 
anti-Muslim mayhem organised and perpetrated by 
the Modi-led BJP government. During that period 
the Congress leaders and rank and file failed to 
come out openly against the acts and designs of 
the saffron brigade. This very face of the 
Congress is also visible in Jammu and Kashmir 
where the leaders and workers of the two parties 
speak the same language in different tones. The 
two parties may be opposing each other for 
political power but on the ideological front they 
differ only in the shade. Take the latest case of 
the murderous utterances of the BJP leaders 
during their sinister "Save Doda" a euphemism for 
"Save BJP", agitation launched in Jammu for the 
past few days. When lunatic fanatics of the 
parivar offered a cash award for any one killing 
a militant, an open call for a civil war on 
communal lines, the Congress leaders failed to 
rise to the occasion and come out openly to 
mobilise the public opinion against the saffron 
brigade and expose their nefarious designs. Only 
two days after such treacherous utterances by the 
BJP leaders the chief minister Ghulam Nabi Azad 
came out with a mild denunciation with the State 
government willy nilly registering an FIR against 
them and a down-graded Congress minister raising 
his feeble voice against such utterances. Since 
then not a single Congress leader has come out 
openly to condemn the BJP game plan and fight out 
their pernicious ideology and programme. There 
are instances where the Congress leaders have 
exposed their Hindutva character by speaking the 
parivar's language even in more aggressive 
manner. How would one term the speeches of the 
Congress member of Lok Sabha from Udhampur-Doda 
constituency in Parliament, at the roundtable 
conference and in public rallies when he tried to 
outdo the saffron brigade.
The latest case in point is the utterances of 
none other than the Union minister of state for 
home Jaiprakash Jaiswal during his visit to Jammu 
on Thursday. Instead of coming out vehemently 
against the BJP demand for arming the civilians 
(nee Hindus) in Doda to fight out the militants 
(nee Muslims) he appeared apologetic about the 
sinister suggestion. In a way he did not 
disapprove the demand for arming civilians but 
only pointed out that such arms would not be 
provided to the civilians at " the behest of BJP 
" adding that this would be done if the people 
and the State government so demanded. Jaiswal was 
not opposed to the arming of civilians in 
principle but only said that " it is the 
prerogative of the district administration and 
not of the BJP, if we feel the need and district 
administration in concurrence with the State 
government puts up a demand then we will 
certainly oblige". It is not the absurd demand of 
arming one section against the other that is 
objectionable but a matter of who gets the 
credit. What a perverted logic?
It is not only on the question of dealing with 
the situation in Doda or elsewhere in Jammu and 
Kashmir but on all major policy matters that the 
Congress has either overtly and covertly endorsed 
the BJP stance or it failed to come out openly to 
condemn their ideology and programme and mobilise 
their rank and file to ideologically oppose the 
saffron brigade. Even on the question of 
defending Article 370 the Congress attitude is 
quite lukewarm. Not a single Congress leader has 
come out publicly to condemn the demand for 
abrogation of Article 370, being raised loudly by 
the leaders of BJP and other parivar outfits for 
the past few days. Intriguingly none has so far 
reacted even to the pernicious suggestion of the 
BJP leader Murli Manohar Joshi for changing the 
demographic character of the State by allowing 
people from outside the State settling in Jammu 
and Kashmir. That the Congress is not prepared to 
displease upper caste Hindu communal and casteist 
sentiments was also evident during the recent 
anti-reservation agitation launched by these 
sections. With a few exceptions like the Union 
HRD minister Arjun Singh the Congress leaders and 
activists failed to raise their voice against the 
agitators and come out openly in defence of the 
quota for OBCs, dalits and scheduled tribes. The 
Congress may try to beat the BJP in the power 
game but it is not prepared to fight out the 
saffron brigade ideologically.


_____


[5] 

Naga Peoples Movement for Human Rights
PB# 718, II Floor K.N.Sekhose Complex, Near Hotel Fira, Jail Colony Kohima,
797001 Nagaland
http// www.npmhr.org

NPMHR appeals for an organized and persistent resistance against AFSPA

Dimapur, 14 June 2006


The Naga Peoples Movement for Human Rights (NPMHR) condemns the position of
the Government of India for extension of 'Disturbed Areas Act' and
rejection of the just demand for repealing the Armed Forces Special Powers Act
(AFSPA); one of the most inhumane law ever legislated across the world
reflecting India's enduring democratic deficit. NPMHR consider this
imposition of martial law provision on the Nagas and other struggling
communities, denying them of their basic human dignity under the pretense of
'protecting territorial integrity and promoting national security' by
democratic India, as a serious threat to world peace and security.

The ancestry of the imposition of this AFSPA by the then newly Independent
India (supplanting the former British colonial policy under which it suffered
immensely), has been that of the campaign to suppress the Naga national
movement in the 1950's by brute military force through its manipulative
propaganda of quelling 'a few misguided Naga tribesmen' on its frontiers.
Despite the Government of India entering a formal ceasefire with the Naga
resistance since 1997 and 'the recognition of the unique history and
situation of the Nagas', the political process has not made significant
progress so far. In this prolonged process of 'talking about talks', the
Government of India has launched its massive 'psychological warfare'
programme to further confuse and divide the people, leading to increasing
bloodshed amongst the Nagas. NPMHR cautioned the Naga public to be careful
about the questionable developmental packages dole out by the Indian military
through its various civic contact programs under 'Operation Good
Samaritan'. Under any Government the role of the military is to protect
national interest/borders through search, identify and destruction of the
enemy but not development which is the realm of the executive. Naga Public
should remember the many decades of bloodbath in Naga homeland and be
farsighted about its role in peace building process where many vested
interests forces are out to 'win the hearts and mind' of the common people
to limit our potential as a struggling nation.

NPMHR holds Government of India wholly responsible for the continuing cases of
killings of civilians and clashes amongst the armed cadres. Even with the
existence of a loose ceasefire monitoring mechanism and rising demands for
amendment in the ground rules for effective enforcement, Government of India
deliberately continues to ignore the efficient implementation of the ceasefire
ground rules exacerbating the tension and multiplying the casualties among the
Nagas. India will have no moral standing in the international community to
speak and claim itself as the largest democratic country while these genocidal
policies continues to be perpetrated in its so called backyard occupied north
east and the Naga homeland.

NPMHR considers India's quest for positions in international forum such as
UN Council of Human rights and the UN Security Council as serious deception
due to its dismal human rights record in Naga homeland and possesses grave
threat to minority and indigenous peoples struggling for basic human security
and the recognition of their right to self determination.

NPMHR demands that India ratify the Rome statute on the International Criminal
Court (ICC) with universal jurisdiction over cases of genocide, crime against
humanity, war crimes, torture, extrajudicial executions and disappearance;
which will strengthen her assertion as a functional democracy to maintain
accountability and transparency towards its commitment to the various
international Human rights treaties it had ratified so far. The AFSPA promotes
impunity by allowing torture, extrajudicial executions and disappearance,
besides many other forms of human rights violations leaving behind a huge
'Accountability gap' leading to destruction of our common humanity and
dignity.

NPMHR appeals to the Government of India to demonstrate sincerity and
commitment to the Indo-Naga peace process by repealing the draconian Armed
Forces Special Powers Act and restoration of democratic space to Nagas and
other struggling communities. How can structures of violence coexist with the
genuine commitment in the search for peace, unless those structures are
dismantled?  Is the Government of India ruling the Nagas through their free
express informed consent or imposing their authority by substituting the
powers of the state through repression and manipulation, for the consent of
the people? India's governing of Naga homeland has so far relied on a system
of repressive legislation overseen by a complaint judiciary and enforced by
(its) military forces. Without scrapping this anti-democratic legislation from
the statute books, there is no hope for dignified survival and unless
Government of India listens to the common cry of the people and constructively
creates space for democratic values to re-emerge, it is tantamount to
diminishing its own avowed principles of participatory democracy and
non-violence.

NPMHR asserts that if Nagas continues to be excluded from a rights-creating
process, the only way to realize more attention and understanding will
'depend on our organized and persistent acts of defiance and resistance to
this annihilation processes'.  NPMHR appeal to the Naga Public, solidarity
groups in India and the international community to rise up against this
anti-peoples legislation for the larger interest of just peace and global
security as 'violation of human rights in any part of the world is a threat
to the human race as a whole and protection and promotion of human rights is
the concern for all'.

Nepuni Piku
Secretary General, NPMHR


____


[6]

Tehelka
June 24 , 2006

The Love Song of History

UNESCO goodwill ambassador Madanjeet Singh traces 
the secular legacy of India's oral tradition

IT WAS in Kashmir that I first became aware of 
the prevailing influence of oral folk culture in 
India. There, I met Aasi, the 'coolie poet', an 
illiterate Muslim labourer in Srinagar. His 
secular poetry had inspired all communities, 
Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and Christians, 
to form a cultural front against the kabaili 
(tribal) invaders who attacked the valley in 1948 
soon after partition. He was a devotee of 
Kashmir's patron Sufi saint, Hazrat Nuruddin 
Nurani and often went to pray in his shrine - one 
floor used as a temple, the other as a mosque.

Many Kashmiri poets like Lalla and Lal Ded (14th 
century), were women, who wrote poems about 
Shiva. Hubb Khatun (16th century) and Arani-mal 
(18th century) were famous for their love lyrics. 
And a lot of poetic literature by Muslims in 
Kashmiri betrays strong Hindu influences.

Aasi's poetry took the form of verses intoned as 
if part of a Vedic ritual. The Vedas (c.1500-1200 
bc) are inherently secular. They extolled Nature 
deities such as Agni (fire), Surya (sun), Usha 
(the dawn) and Indra (rain and storm). This 
liturgical corpus preserved orally and handed 
down through generations. The addition of rhythm 
and beat aided memorisation, and thus music, 
became an integral part of this oral tradition, 
which resonates throughout Indian folk culture 
now.

South Asian folk music and dance are 
predominantly secular as the oral traditions 
derive from animistic cultures, which've been 
preserved by tribal communities. The adivasis of 
central and eastern India (Murias, Bhils, Gonds, 
Juangs and Santhals) are the most uninhibited in 
their song and dance. Bauls, the lonely wandering 
minstrels of Bengal, do not belong to any 
religious denomination. They believe in the 
religion of 'humanity' and roam endlessly seeking 
the 'Supreme Being' within, through music, 
devotion and love.

Be it Bhangra, the male harvest dance of Punjab, 
the Rajasthani ghoomar, the Lambadi gypsy women 
of Andhra Pradesh, or the kolyacha dance 
indigenous to the Konkan coast, the variety of 
ritualistic folk dances in India are all 
inherently secular. Many also have magical 
significance and are connected with ancient cults.

The karakam dance of Tamil Nadu is mainly 
performed at an annual festival in front of the 
image of Mariyammai (the goddess of pestilence) 
to deter her from unleashing an epidemic. 
Kathakali, indigenous to southwestern India, 
takes its subject matter from the Ramayana, the 
Maha-bharata, and Saiva literature. The faces of 
the dancers are made-up elaborately to look like 
painted masks.

Masked dances, in fact, are among the most 
ancient of cultural objects. The Himalayan region 
is known for its fantastic masked dancers. In 
Ladakh, dancers impersonate yaks with men mounted 
on their back. In sada tapa tsen, men wear 
gorgeous brocades and long tunics with wide 
flapping sleeves. Skulls arranged as a diadem are 
a prominent feature of their grotesquely grinning 
wooden masks, representing spirits of the other 
world. The chhau, a unique form in Bihar, have 
masks with predominantly human features slightly 
modified to suggest the element they portray - 
rainbows, night, flowers. Their serene 
expressions painted in simple, flat colours 
differ radically from the elaborate makeup of 
kathakali, or the exaggerated ghoulishness of the 
Noh and Kandyan masks.

In Kerala, the Therayattam festival is held to 
propitiate gods and demons. Dancers in 
awe-inspiring costumes and hideous masks, enact 
weird rituals before the village shrine. In 
Madhya Pradesh, men and women of the Muria tribe, 
perform the bison horn dance. Wearing horned 
headdresses with a tall tuft of feathers and a 
fringe of cowry shells over their faces, the men 
carry a log-shaped drum around their necks. The 
women, their heads surmounted by solid-brass 
chaplets and their breasts covered with heavy 
metal necklaces, carry sticks in their right 
hands like drum majorettes. About a 100 
performers dance at a time. The 'bisons' attack 
each other, spearing up leaves with their horns 
and chasing the female dancers in a dynamic 
interpretation of nature's mating season.

The all-embracing character of this folk culture 
comes into focus as it travels around the world, 
blending with the mythology, history and 
geography of different countries. Until recently, 
it was marvellous to see the Mahabharata and the 
Ramayana played by Indonesian Muslims at the 
roadside. So also the Wayang puppet theatre, 
where the master puppeteer enacted characters 
from great Indian epics, interwoven with 
indigenous myths, while singers and musicians 
play melodies on local bronze instruments and 
beat on gamelan drums.

Folk music can be very contemporary and 
political. Folk songs can serve as chronicle, 
newspaper and agent of enculturation. In modern 
societies, folk music is perpetuated by ethnic 
and religious minorities, among whom it is 
thought to promote self-esteem and social 
solidarity.

The web of these oral interactions laid the 
foundation of some of the most magnificent 
monuments worldwide. This is illustrated by a 
series of sun temples built on the premise of 
identical mythologies. Legend has it that 
Krishna's son, Samba cured his leprosy by 
spending 12 years in Mitrabana, the forest of 
Mitra, found on the bank of the river 
Chandrabrabha. Grateful, Samba built a great sun 
temple at Sambapura (modern day Multan in 
Pakistan). Long after the Multan shrine was 
destroyed, the Chandrabrabha myth was carried on 
the wings of traditional folklore. The legend 
spread as far as Indonesia where a 5th century 
inscription, attributed to Samba by the 
Indonesian king Purnavaman, mentions the river 
Chandraprabha. Curiously, the myth does not stop 
in Indonesia but returns to Konarak in India, 
where a magnificent 13th century Surya temple was 
built and the river Chandraprabha identified with 
a pool of water in a nearby forest called 
Mitrabana.

Great works of art were also created by oral 
cultures. Having achieved Enlightenment, the 
Buddha (born c. 563 bc) travelled far preaching 
his secular message of 'religious agnosticism'. 
After his death (c. 483 bc), his followers 
propagated his Theravada doctrine as they built 
cave monasteries along the silk route. These 
'cultural stopovers' became important adjuncts to 
the oral tradition and local scribes, painters 
and sculptors propagated the Buddha's message.

The Jataka stories of the Ajanta cave paintings, 
in fact, are said to derive from another 
storehouse of Indian oral and intangible heritage 
- Panchatantra, Sanskrit for 'Five Chapters'. The 
original Sanskrit work, now lost, may have 
originated at any time between 100 bc and ad 500. 
The Persian royal physician, Burzo translated it 
into Pahlavi (Middle Persian) in the 6th century. 
Although this work is also lost, a Syriac 
translation has survived, together with the 
famous 8th century Arabic translation of Ibn 
al-Muqaffa known as Kalilah wa Dimnah after the 
two jackals that figure in the first story. The 
Arabic translation led on to various other 
versions, including a second Syriac translation 
and an 11th century version in Greek, the Stepha 
nites kai lehnelates, from which translations 
were made into Latin and various Slavic 
languages. The 17th century Turkish translation, 
the Hilmayunname, was based on a 15th century 
Persian version, the Anwar-e-Suhayli. In Europe, 
a version was written in Latin hexameters by the 
fabulist Baldo, probably in the 12th century, and 
in the 13th century, a Spanish translation was 
made on the orders of Alfonso X of Leon and 
Castile. It was the 12th century Hebrew version 
of Rabbi Joel, however, that became the source of 
most European versions. The Panchatantra stories 
also travelled to Indonesia through Old Javanese 
written literature and possibly through oral 
versions.

At the turn of the millennium, South Asia's 
social, cultural and religious landscape 
underwent a radical transformation. The simple 
secular tenets of Theravada, conceived by the 
historical Buddha, were discarded for 
metaphysical notions of Mahayana and Vajrayana 
(Tantric) Buddhism and both were rejected by an 
increasingly aggressive Hindu orthodoxy. The 
common people felt left out by the Sanskrit 
curricula of the Gupta Empire, preferring the use 
of their own locally spoken languages. At the 
same time, a large number of Bhakti cults 
mushroomed around the mythology of Krishna, the 
'black', the lover, the rebel.

In southern India, the Alvar and Nayanar hymnists 
roamed the countryside from the 7th to the 10th 
century. However, it was not until Bhakti notions 
interacted with Sufism that a South Asian 
'renaissance' flourished, inspiring superb poetry 
and literature in regional languages rather than 
Sanskrit. Foreign influences included the Sufi 
mysticism of Rabiah al-Adawiyah, an Iraqi woman 
from Basra, who died in 801 ad, as well as others 
from Egypt, Iran and Turkey. The Bhakti 
poet-saints hailed from all sections of society, 
ranging from mendicants like Namdev, Tukaram, 
Tulsidas, Surdas, Gorakhnath and Chandidas, to 
the Rajput princess of Jodhpur, Mira Bai.

Mir Bulleh Shah (1680-1758) was among the great 
Punjabi Sufi poets of the Qadiri Shatari sect. He 
became the disciple of Inayat Shah, a low caste 
gardener, and was subsequently known as 'the 
sheikh of both worlds'. To accept a menial worker 
as his master in the social conditions of his 
times shook society to its core especially as he 
traced his descent from the Prophet Mohammad. 
Musicians invariably accompanied the poet-saints. 
Bala, a Hindu tabla player, and Mardana, a Muslim 
player of the string instrument rabab, invariably 
accompanied Nanak, the first guru of the Sikhs. 
Together, they reached as far as Mecca and 
Medina. The foundation stone of the holiest of 
Sikh shrines in Amritsar was laid by Mian Mir, a 
Sufi ascetic and its inner sanctum is named 
Harmandir after Shiva.

One of the oldest Bengali books, Gorakhavijaya 
was written by Abd-ul-Karim. Muslims also 
authored many padyavalis, poems celebrating the 
love of Krishna and Radha. Bengali culture in 
particular emphasised the element of love, which 
changed the notion of asceticism to mysticism. 
Several religious sects attempted to harmonise 
Hindu and Muslim religious traditions at 
different levels. The story of the Rajput 
princess Padmavati, originally a romance, was 
beautifully recorded in Hindi by the 16thcentury 
Sufi poet Malik Muhammad Jayasi, and later by the 
17th century Bengali Muslim poet Alaol. This 
tradition inspired modern poets such as 
Rabindranath Tagore and Mohammad Iqbal. The 
synthesis between Bhakti and Sufi elements also 
incorporated aspects from Buddhist literature, 
such as certain Ismaili texts like Umm al-kitab. 
The Kalachakra also speaks of Mecca and 
introduces Islamic formulas into mantras. This 
trend of religious syncretisation appears to have 
continued as late as the 19th century, when Raja 
Pratap Singh Judeo of Chhatarpur attempted to 
translate the Bhakti-Sufi spirit into temple 
architecture. In one temple (on the unesco list 
of culture heritage), the traditional domes on 
the top of a shrine represent a Hindu shikara, a 
Buddhist stupa and the dome of a mosque. The raja 
wanted the shrine to be open for worship to 
everyone, irrespective of sex, class, caste or 
religion, much like the Sufi shrine in Kashmir, 
where one floor was used as a temple and the 
other as a mosque.

The writer is Founder, South Asia Foundation and
has written many books on heritage and culture



_____


[7]

Literary Review / The Hindu
June 4, 2006

LITERARY HISTORY

Aesthetics of resistance

M. ASADUDDIN

Anthems chronicles the achievements of the Urdu Progressive Writers' Movement.

Anthems of Resistance: A Celebration of Urdu 
Poetry, Ali Husain Mir and Raza Mir, India Ink, 
Roli Books, 2006, p.xix + 248, Rs. 295.


ART'S relationship with life has always remained 
a subject of fierce contention among writers and 
ideologues. In India, the debates about art for 
art's sake and "engaged' literature animated the 
literary scene in the 1930s and 40s. The 
Progressive Writers' Movement (PWM) that 
spearheaded this debate changed the complexion of 
literature in a couple of Indian languages, Urdu 
being the most prominent among them.

Urdu poets had a dominant presence in the 
movement and the way they posited a radical 
aesthetics of resistance against oppressive 
hegemonies of all kinds had few parallels in 
South Asian literature. Some poems/ couplets 
swept a generation of readers off their feet, 
making poetry the most potent weapon in the 
process of social transformation. Good poetry has 
never been known to be didactic. However, some 
progressive poets, notably Faiz Ahmad Faiz, could 
blend ideology with poetry with such finesse, 
with such consummate artistry, that it has added 
charm to their art rather than resulting in the 
loss of depth or lyricism.

The book under review chronicles the achievements 
of the PWM through the works of the more 
prominent among them. Divided into 11 chapters of 
moderate length, the book proceeds from a 
discussion of the theoretical/ideological issues 
to the exemplars of the ideology, always 
elucidating the points through a sumptuous 
sampling of verses both in original Urdu and in 
lucid English translation.

Different responses

The chapter on progressive aesthetic discusses 
the notion of people's art as propounded by 
Mayakovsky, Gorky and Mao. The response to such 
an aesthetic by Urdu poets has not been uniform, 
even though the broad principle that literature 
should engage with the plight of the marginalised 
was accepted by all. While many poets valorised 
content over form, others like Majrooh Sultanpuri 
and Kaifi Azmi worked within the form of 
traditional genres like the ghazal but extended 
the expressive possibilities of the form to 
convey revolutionary ideas.

In several chapters the authors discuss the 
contributions made by stalwarts like Ali Sardar 
Jafri, Kaifi Azmi, Jaan Nisar Akhtar, Asrarul Haq 
Majaz and Makhdoom Mohiuddin. In the chapter, 
"Dream and Nightmare" they show how the robust 
and uncritical optimism shown by the progressives 
in a teleological notion of history and the 
liberating potential of modernity got a rude jolt 
when the apocalyptic moment of freedom and 
decolonisation of India was scarred by the worst 
form of fratricidal violence and genocide in the 
history of the subcontinent. Faiz's poem "Subh 
Azadi", beginning with Ye dagh dagh ujala ye 
shabgazida sehar, Majaz's Awara (though written 
much earlier) and Kaifi's "Mera Maazi mere 
kaandhe pe" demonstrate the Progressives' 
disillusionment with India's freedom and their 
ambivalent relationship with modernity.

To the authors of this book, Sahir Ludhianvi is 
the best exemplar of progressive poetry and they 
substantiate their assertion through the film 
lyrics that he wrote over several decades. Urdu 
writers associated with the PWM had a marked 
presence in the Bombay film industry from the 
1940s and this in no small measure accounts for 
the fact that the strand of progressive ideology 
runs as an undercurrent through the films then 
produced, before it gets dissipated by the 
widespread cynicism brought in by mounting 
corruption in public life. However, despite the 
constraints imposed by a new medium and the 
changing perceptions in the Mumbai film industry 
poets like Majrooh and Javed Akhtar managed to 
insert progressive elements in their lyrics. 
Akhtar's "Tarkash" has been taken up for detailed 
analysis by the authors to demonstrate the 
continuance and even reassertion of the 
progressive strand in Urdu poetry.

The spirit survives

The authors argue that though PWM lost steam for 
a number of reasons, the spirit of resistance 
still survives, which is notably visible in the 
strand of feminist Urdu poetry in Pakistan. They 
see it at work in the poetry of a radical and 
fiercely independent band of women poets like 
Fahmida Riyaz, Kishwar Naheed, Parvin Shakir and 
others who have been waging a fierce battle 
against patriarchy and the fascist tendencies of 
the oppressive military regimes in Pakistan.

In recent years, we have had at least two 
critical accounts of the PWM, by Geeta Patel in 
her book on Miraji and Priyambada Gopal in her 
book on the literature of resistance, 
respectively. The authors of Anthems of 
Resistance, however, declare unabashedly that 
theirs is not a critical or dispassionate 
account. It is a celebration of the spirit of 
resistance encapsulated in a particular phase of 
Urdu poetry. The book has been successful in 
capturing the excitement and ebullience of that 
moment when, to quote Wordsworth in the context 
of the French Revolution, "Bliss was it then to 
be alive/ But to be young was very heaven!"


_____


[8]

In view of dismal conditions of basic facilities 
available to fishermen villages, threats to the 
livelihood of both coastal and inland fishing, 
the contract system on inland fishing, Pakistan 
Fisherfolk Forum is organizing a mega rally in 
Karachi on June 19, 2006 from Mazar-e-Quaid to 
Sindh Assembly Building at 11.00 am.


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

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/

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