SACW | 19-21 June 2006 |

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | 19-21 June, 2006 | Dispatch No. 2261


[1]  Pakistan: Paranoia and patriotism . . . 
Citizenship Act of 1951  (Irfan Husain)
[2]  Pakistan: HRCP wants action against jirgas
[3]  India: 'moral policing' in Muzaffarnagar (Shyama Haldar)
[4]  India:  'How to Confront State Violence? 
Dilemma for Peaceful Movements' (NBA release)
[5]  Pakistan: Fishermen's protest rally suppressed in Karachi
[6]  The Bomb, Biography and The Indian Middle Class (Sankaran Krishna)
[7]  Ongoing and Upcoming Events:
     (i)  Rozgar Haq Yatra Launched (across UP and Uttaranchal, 15-22 June)
     (ii) National Urban Development Struggle and 
Action Committee (Bhopal, July 7-8, 2006)
     (iii) 2nd Visa-Free and Peaceful South Asia 
Convention (Lahore, 6-9 Aug, 2006)

___


[1]


Dawn
June 17, 2006

PARANOIA AND PATRIOTISM

by Irfan Husain

THERE are times when I am convinced of our 
irredeemable hypocrisy: the instinct to say one 
thing and do another, and to condemn others for 
what we do every day has become a national trait.

Take, for instance, a news item that appeared in 
a Lahore daily a few weeks ago. It seems that to 
their credit, two members of the National 
Assembly had moved a bill in parliament to end an 
odd anomaly that has existed on our statute books 
for years. If a Pakistani male marries a 
foreigner, his wife has the right to claim 
citizenship. But a foreign man marrying a 
Pakistani woman does not have the same privilege.

In order to end this gender bias in our 
Citizenship Act of 1951, Kunwar Khalid Yunus and 
Mahnaz Rafi had proposed changes to give 
Pakistani women the same right men enjoy when it 
comes to marrying foreigners. The draft 
amendments were sent to the interior ministry for 
comments, and after sitting on them for two 
years, it has apparently orchestrated opposition 
with provincial counterparts as well as sundry 
intelligence agencies.

One of the objections raised by the interior 
ministry reads: "The right to obtain nationality 
can be used by any foreign country to plant its 
agents in Pakistan after arranging their 
marriages with Pakistani women." Presumably, if a 
foreign woman marries a Pakistani man, she cannot 
be a planted agent. Beyond the paranoia inherent 
in this argument, there is the notion that there 
are hordes of spies waiting to get married to 
women here.

And the mandarins and spooks in the ministry seem 
to have forgotten that they are the ones who 
permitted an army of foreign militants into this 
country, ostensibly to fight in Afghanistan. 
These foreign agents stayed on and are now busy 
killing our own people, including our soldiers. 
In fact, Pakistan must be the most welcoming 
country in the world for illegal migrants: 
literally millions of Bengalis and Afghans have 
settled anywhere they chose to without any 
questions being asked. If anything, officials of 
the interior ministry have colluded in this 
influx by handing out ID cards and passports to 
tens of thousands of illegal immigrants.

Those objecting to these progressive changes also 
need to remember that scores of thousands of 
Pakistani men over the years have been granted 
citizenship in the West by marrying women there, 
usually of 'desi' origin. If Britain, for 
instance, were to withdraw this right on the 
(understandable) basis that it permitted too many 
foreign men to settle and claim all kinds of 
social benefits, there would be a hue and cry. 
And no doubt, our government would lead the 
protests. Indeed, many Pakistani men enter into 
such marriages simply because it entitles them to 
settle abroad. And yet, while some of the 
offspring of such matches have become terrorists, 
these Pakistani men have not (yet) been accused 
of acting as 'foreign agents'.

I am not aware of any protests over this 
hypocritical opposition to these changes, nor 
have I come across any letters or editorials in 
newspapers condemning it. The whole issue seems 
to have been largely ignored. But it does say a 
lot about us as a people. At the highest official 
level, we are basically saying that while a man 
can marry a foreigner who can then be 
naturalised, a woman is too stupid to be trusted 
to exercise sound judgment.

But the sad reality is that in Pakistan (and in 
much of the Muslim world), most women do not make 
this most critical of decisions on their own. 
Arranged, and often forced, marriages are the 
norm, not the exception. This being so, why this 
song and dance about 'foreign agents'? If a 
girl's parents are arranging the match, is it 
likely that they will pick a spy for a son-in-law?

While it would appear that these shallow 
arguments are aimed at blocking all foreign men 
from taking advantage of the proposed 
liberalisation of the Citizenship Act, the truth 
is that it is India-specific. Partition divided 
thousands of families, and in a society where 
intermarriage is common, the pool of marriageable 
men and women in various communities has 
shrunken. While it is OK for Pakistani men to 
marry Indian Muslim girls, our interior ministry 
is convinced that if Pakistani girls were to 
marry Indian men, the floodgates would open, and 
we would be swamped by Indian agents.

It would take a very dedicated spy to actually 
get married to pursue secrets or cause problems 
in Pakistan. Unfortunately, our own spooks and 
their masters have yet to enter the 21st century 
where keeping secrets is harder than ever. Google 
Earth, a popular website, can give you detailed 
images of whatever part of the world you want to 
have a close look at. Commercial enterprises 
exist to sell satellite photographs. The Internet 
is a great source of what was once secret 
information.

Quite apart from the spurious espionage angle, 
there are the wider aspects of women's rights. 
The Constitution grants men and women the same 
rights, so how can the interior ministry block 
the proposed changes on the ground that they 
might make their work more difficult? As it is, 
the interior ministry has not exactly set a 
shining example of efficiency thus far: the 
country is awash with illegal guns; murderous 
jihadis have multiplied; crime is flourishing; 
and drug addiction is rampant. Under these 
circumstances, one would have thought the 
interior ministry would have enough to do, rather 
than try and block legislation aimed at removing 
an archaic anomaly from the law.

What was encouraging was that both MNAs who moved 
this private members' bill sit on the government 
benches. Unless their colleagues in the MQM and 
the Muslim League get cold feet after the 
interior ministry salvo, they should be able to 
muster enough support to push their bill through. 
One hopes the PPP will lend a hand. Surely 
General Musharraf should knock heads to enact the 
draft legislation because progressive laws should 
form the basis for his 'enlightened moderation'. 
However, one fears that in the prevailing 
ultra-nationalistic, paranoid and hypocritical 
environment in the country, we will live with the 
existing Citizenship Act of 1951 for another 
fifty years.


_____


[2]

Daily Times
June 20, 2006

HRCP WANTS ACTION AGAINST JIRGAS

Staff Report

LAHORE: The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan 
(HRCP) has demanded action against jirgas in 
Shikarpur and Jacobabad that are perpetuating the 
custom of vani, whereby girls are forcibly 
married off to resolve disputes between feuding 
families.

The jirgas are a clear violation of Sindh High 
Court orders and the government must take action 
against the elected representatives and feudal 
lords responsible for holding jirgas in Shikarpur 
and Jacobabad, HRCP vice chairperson Zohra Yusuf 
said in a statement on Monday.

According to an initial investigation by the 
HRCP, on May 31, in Lucky Ghulam Shah tehsil, 
Shikarpur, advocate Agha Sanaullah Durrani heard 
a complaint from Imdad Sathar against his cousin 
Muhammad Ramzan Sathar for the recovery of 11 
buffaloes. Ramzan failed to pay for the 11 
buffaloes and with the consent of his father and 
grandfather agreed before a jirga to give his 
daughters (9-year-old Heer and 1-year-old Karima) 
as compensation for the buffaloes. In the 
presence of 7 witnesses, Ramzan signed on a stamp 
paper of Rs 50 and promised to deliver his 
daughters within three days. A court in Shikarpur 
gas issued an order against the marriage of the 
two minor girls after HRCP activists raised the 
issue.

During the last week of May, another jirga headed 
by PPPP MNA Mir Hazar Khan Bijarani, Tehsil Nazim 
Thal Akbar Banglani and Pir Bharchoondi Mian 
Abdul Khalique ended a decade-old feud between 
two rival groups by offering five minor girls 
(4-year-old Basheeran, 7-year-old Amna, 
8-year-old Shahzadi, 5-year-old Noor Bano and 
5-year-old Maryam) as compensation, said the HRCP 
statement.

"The HRCP believes that jirgas are being 
encouraged by the Sindh government to strengthen 
the powers of the Sardars and Waderas and to 
further weaken the judicial and law enforcement 
systems," said the statement.

"The HRCP reiterates its demand that clear 
directives be issued to the police and district 
administrations to prevent such gatherings, as 
their decisions are illegal and against the norms 
of human dignity. They violate the rights of 
women and children in particular. A failure to 
take immediate and meaningful action would result 
in more barbaric decisions such as those taken by 
jirgas in Shikarpur and Jacobabad."


_____


[3] 

Tehelka
June 24 , 2006

  ONE DAY IN THE LIFE OF SULLENTOWN

In pursuing a news report on an incident of 
'moral policing' in Muzaffarnagar, Shyama Haldar 
comes upon a place blistered by its own nature

Omkar Singh, co-ordinator of the Muzaffarnagar 
branch of the Sanyukt Hindu Sangharsh Samiti 
(SHSS), is insistent that the truth of the May 27 
Incident at Nandi Sweets be established with 
public finality. "We aren't terrorists, you know; 
we aren't thugs," he says. "That's right, we're 
all cultured people, educated, got our own 
businesses," avers SHSS local president, Sanjay 
Agarwal, between sips of midday tea at Singh's 
garment store in the town's Sadar Bazar. "You 
people, you make mountains from dunghills," Singh 
resumes. "A small matter - boys in the 
neighbourhood having a street scuffle - you twist 
it about and dress it up so people won't switch 
channels on your one-minute-twenty-second 
stories. Television, newspapers, same difference, 
you're all alike."

Three weeks ago, a 50-strong contingent of what 
are said to have been SHSS members descended on a 
group of school students - three boys and three 
girls - treating themselves at Nandi Sweets 
restaurant to a round of lemon mint. 
Muzaffarnagar, as a district, is known for its 
frequent appearances in crime report datelines 
and for its primordial revenges upon those who 
love across caste or religious lines - 'honour' 
killings, panchayat-ordered maimings, rapes and 
lynchings. In comparison, the Nandi Sweets fracas 
is a pimple too minor to leave disfigurement, but 
it has upset Singh and Agarwal because their 
names feature in the fir. The incident has been 
reported in the media as yet another case of west 
Uttar Pradesh moral policing - what gives it a 
grimmer edge is the special corrective reserved 
for the one Muslim in the unlucky clutch of 
teenage truants. Five of them were let off with 
admonitions and a little light roughing-up. The 
sixth, the unfavourably-named Aleem, an 
out-of-towner from Deoband, was beaten, stripped, 
and later briefly hospitalised before his parents 
arrived to hasten him away to home and hiding.

This is the police version. As it turns out, it's 
the only account available. At Nandi Sweets - 
polaroid windows, battered airconditioning and an 
out-of-order fountain giving it a prosperous edge 
over other Nai Mandi eateries - it's impossible 
to find anyone who actually saw anything happen 
that weekend. The owner of the establishment was 
away; the waiters work shifts and hadn't come in; 
the cashier was unwell; the manager was present 
but has now left town indefinitely. All the shops 
up and down the street outside also seem to have 
been on unofficial holiday that afternoon: 
everyone was somewhere else, everyone only knows 
about the disturbance second-hand, no-one wants 
their word to be taken for anything, not even 
when asked for their names, no-one here has 
names. At a paan shop, the old man at the counter 
doesn't seem to hear too well. When a younger 
man, perhaps his son, demands to know what's 
being asked for, he tells him, "Oh nothing, they 
want to buy biscuits."

If one scents fear or even collusion in this 
reticence, the crowning stroke is waiting back at 
Singh's shop - the Sanyukt Hindu Sangharsh Samiti 
wasn't on the scene either, not, at any rate, as 
perpetrators. "We had absolutely nothing to do 
with it," Singh declares. "We were in fact called 
in to control the crowd by people from the 
Traders' Association. It's like when someone 
snatches a chain, people get together to beat him 
up, nothing more; but you know what a mob can 
turn into. The shopkeepers were scared; if it 
wasn't for us, who knows what could have 
happened. We talked the boys out of it, sent them 
home. And then we get blamed. Just because we 
helped out. Think about it - someone's had an 
accident and you take him to hospital and then 
you get framed for it."

Speaking strictly hypothetically, only in theory, 
Nai Mandi doesn't like what might be said to have 
happened at Nandi Sweets. Neither, if no one else 
is listening, does it seem too fond of the SHSS. 
"Lousy wasters; nothing else to do with their 
time," mutters a shop clerk; "We're no less than 
anyone else, let them try something smart and 
we'll see them settled," says the owner. Others 
will tell you that the locality is the richest in 
the district and that it stays open for business 
no matter what may disturb the town or the world 
beyond - "Even after Ayodhya, Nai Mandi was 
open." On the incident itself, opinion is 
latticed behind generalised platitudes - 
"Indecency is in the eye of the beholder. If you 
wish to see evil, you'll see it". The only 
articulate criticism comes from a woman who keeps 
a tailoring shop across the street from Nandi 
Sweets; she too remains nameless but her 
neighbours say she's a Pathan married to a Jat. 
"And so what if those kids were sitting together? 
If they can go to school together, sit together 
in class, why can't they share a cold drink - 
it's not a crime yet, is it?"

"Nothing objectionable, nothing wrong with it at 
all," is Singh's reply. Far be it from him to be 
an obstacle to modernity - his own shopfront 
bears two mid-size posters of halter-topped women 
tossing blondish hair. "If a Muslim boy makes 
friends with a Hindu girl there's no problem, 
lekin restaurant mein jakar, pant ke zip khol 
kar, chai peena bahut galat lagta hai (to sit in 
a restaurant drinking tea with your fly open is 
very wrong indeed)." Scepticism quails before 
such conviction. Nonetheless - has Singh actually 
seen any such? No - but he's heard about it.

Rumour, hearsay, insinuation, belief - 
under-currents that turn into rip-tides. Now 
three years old, the SHSS encompasses an 
11-member affiliation of Sangh Parivar usuals - 
Shiv Sena, Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Bajrang Dal, 
Hindu Jagaran Manch and various others. Apart 
from the occasional restaurant rampage (the SHSS 
is also said to be behind another assault earlier 
in May on a restaurant called Vatika), the Samiti 
is not locally famous for any other activity than 
the staging of demonstrations. Some of these can 
turn a little too heated for a town that prides 
itself on having skirted large-scale communal 
confrontation for several decades - despite the 
Babri reverberations, despite Muzaffarnagar's 
uneasy sectarian balance, estimated at 40 percent 
Muslim, 60 percent Hindu. Protests here in 
mid-February over the cartoons of Prophet 
Mohammad saw a turnout reported to have numbered 
over a lakh; a week later, the SHSS was on the 
streets, protesting against MF Husain. Stones 
were pelted, shops were closed, selective curfews 
declared, 18 people arrested. Presence was 
registered.

However, competitive agitation is not the SHSS' 
consuming or even dominant preoccupation. For the 
past few years, Singh and Agarwal will tell you, 
a new engine of jehadi malevolence has been in 
insidious motion. Loving Jehad, it's called. 
"They take false admissions to schools and 
colleges," Singh explains, "they wear tilaks and 
karas, just like Hindus; they use names like 
Sonu, Monu, Mintu, Pintu, so they won't be caught 
out. They make friends with Hindu girls, they get 
them to come to their homes on various pretexts. 
There they give the girls new clothes to wear and 
have two other men lying in wait to photograph 
them while they change. Then they blackmail them. 
That's how they get these girls into their 
clutches and through them they get at their 
friends."

The mind boggles at the detailing - how, after 
all, do they know? In the congealing fog of 
suggestion and supposition, one misses the 
recalcitrant Nai Mandi empiricists for whom 
nothing can conclusively be said to exist if they 
have not themselves verified it. "You want 
proof?" asks Agarwal. "In the last six months 
alone, we have rescued 80 Hindu girls who had 
gone with Muslim boys. Of these, 60 girls were 
graduates - some of them MCom, some BCom, some 
BA, some MSc. And the boys - 60 boys - labourers, 
whitewashers, scrap dealers, fruit sellers, house 
painters - can you believe this? A girl of good 
family, studying for her graduation, would she go 
with a labourer, a house painter? This is the new 
jehad. This is what we are trying to make our 
community aware of. That's what the sanghathan is 
for, to make Hindus strong, to make them alert."

Senior Superintendent of Police, Amarendra Kumar 
Sengar is unimpressed. In a town where an 
accidental scratch can spurt into gory vendetta, 
he could do without the SHSS' compound of acids. 
He's been in Muzaffarnagar a year - going by the 
list of his predecessors on the plaque on the 
wall, a year is about as long as anyone lasts 
here. Very shortly after his arrival, he oversaw 
the setting up, under Supreme Court directive, of 
a cell for the protection of this district's 
hunted lovers - the Yugal Branch, it's called. It 
has not been very well publicised; it has not 
received a single case so far. But the killings 
haven't stopped. In just the last two months, 
Sengar's dealt with three 'honour' murders - in 
one of them, the girl survived, was taken to 
hospital; a brother of hers came visiting and 
ended what had been left undone. The ssp's voice 
is low, precise as he describes this - people are 
unbelievably desensitised here, he says.

It is very silent after hours at the Celestial 
Garden nursery school; the enclosure around the 
play-yard so shuts out the town that even the 
wrangle of the traffic that nags you everywhere 
else seems to have fallen back at the gates. 
Qamar Khan, who runs the school, points to the 
tree-tops visible over the wall: there, in the 
house next-door, they had a girl who ran away; 
she was found after two years, brought back and 
killed the same night. Some years later, her 
niece ran away too; she went with a Muslim, they 
haven't found her yet. Qamar's daughter, Binish, 
in her first year of an MA in English, remembers 
a Muslim boy and girl who ran away and should 
never have returned - they were in a rickshaw 
coming in from the station when the girl's father 
and brother caught up with them. The boy was 
killed in the street, the girl taken to a nearby 
masjid, her throat slit and her body cut to 
pieces. "And those people, they still walk 
around, they think they've done something great." 
"But a child must never go against her parents," 
pipes up Binish's younger sister, Alisha, tucking 
her dupatta behind her ears. "They bring you up 
with so much love, it's a terrible sin to not 
obey them. You'd deserve anything after that." 
Alisha gets an earful from Binish - "And it's not 
a sin to kill someone, to kill your child?" - 
Alisha subsides. Later, she says, "Alright, now 
you tell our mother I want to go to SD Degree 
College. She won't let me, she thinks the boys 
are too rowdy there. But it's better than the 
all-girls' one."

The tensions in Muzaffarnagar are not those of 
impoverishment; quite the opposite. Agriculture 
in this fertile district has created a highly 
prosperous peasantry, but its affluence has done 
little for its quality of life, made small dent 
in beliefs about caste, about women, about 
notions of clan honour. If anything, it's given 
them justification, made them more severe. 
Long-time inhabitants say living here grows worse 
by the decade. Dr Dinesh Kumar, principal at the 
Sanatan Dharam Degree College, the town's 
largest, grew up in Muzaffarnagar in the 1950s 
and 60s. His memory of the town is of one known 
for its unhurried life. It was a place where, as 
he puts it, people wanted to settle. "Now, a man 
who lives here, if he's got any chance to get 
out, he grabs it. Everywhere else, even in the 
desert, people develop an attachment to the land 
where they live. Not in these parts. You can't 
enjoy life; you have to keep a low profile, 
otherwise nobody knows what might happen to you. 
Prosperity here has outstripped education."

Deputy Superintendent of Police Kalpana Saxena 
takes a more hopeful view. For her, Muzaffarnagar 
is a regressive pocket in the path of cross-winds 
from two cosmopolitan hubs - Delhi to the west, 
Dehra Dun to the east. "Of course there'll be a 
storm, a tornado," she says, "but it'll subside, 
even if it takes a long time." For her, the 
arrival, after the privatisation of education, of 
new training centres in the town has been a 
revolution: "The government institutions here 
were atrocious; if people wanted their kids to 
study, they had to send them to Meerut, or to 
Delhi if they could afford it. Now, there's 
enough right here, and that means girls get 
chances they didn't have when studying meant 
sending them away."

A bit of Saxena's "revolution" can be seen 
outside the building that's shared by the Howard 
Institute of World Class English Speaking and the 
American Institute of English Language (also the 
place where the Nandi Sweets group were 
classmates). A hive of these spoken-English 
coaching shops is clustered on Bhopa Road, a 
little way up from the turn to Nai Mandi. For 
around Rs 500 every three months, their students 
can expect a grounding not so much in precision 
of grammar and pronunciation, but in overcoming 
the one real lack that the backwaters' 
indifferent schooling has left them with - that 
of confidence. A batch of 'Howardians' coming out 
of class says they swear by the approach - "The 
basic thing is confidence, not Hindi-English" 
says Vivek Kumar, who's 23. "We get that here - 
if you have confidence, no language can stop 
you." "We only knew how to read English when we 
left school," says 22-year-old Visalaxi Tyagi, 
who like most other Muzaffarnagar children went 
through the UP Board. "But you can't compete 
anywhere if you don't speak English." Vivek bears 
his schooling no grudge, but he does say, "If 
we'd had an environment like this one before, we 
could have been anywhere."

Being elsewhere - Delhi, at the least - is very 
much part of these youngsters' future plans. 
Touch on the Nandi Sweets incident and Lokesh 
Verma, also in his early 20s, says, "If people 
think like this, they'll never be able to cope if 
they ever leave Muzaffarnagar." An assault in a 
restaurant isn't baggage this lot wants to carry 
with it, though - "There will be change," asserts 
Vivek. "We are from this society and our 
generation is coming up - they know." His elders 
may not give this much credence, but, he says, 
"If I'm capable, there's no way they can pressure 
me."


_____


[4] 

NARMADA BACHAO ANDOLAN

Press Note/ June 19, 2006

Shuglu Committee Discredited the PMO and NSSO.

'DEFEATING NBA WAS NECESSARY FOR CORPORATIZATION 
OF LAND, WATER, RESOURCES: BUT PEOPLE WILL 
RESIST'- MEDHA

'How to Confront State Violence? Dilemma for Peaceful Movements'.

" A joint offensive by the bureaucrats in the 
Union government - including those in the Prime 
Minister's Office (PMO), the corporate powers and 
multilateral financial agencies, encouraged by 
the unconstitutional attitude of the Supreme 
Court, has been  instrumental in suppressing the 
Narmada Bachao Andolan's (NBA) truggle for the 
rights of Adivasis and farmers. It was necessary 
to push forward the controversial interlinking 
rivers project and subsequent privatization of 
rivers and water ", asserted Medha Patkar while 
describing the present situation in the Narmada 
valley and elsewhere.

"This clique is so fanatically opposed to any 
opposition to any project and policy of usurping 
people's rights and livelihoods, that it has been 
manipulating the all legal and constitutional 
processes and making it impossible for any 
democratic and non-violent struggle to survive", 
she said in various programmes in Pune on June 
17. Medha Patkar held meetings with the close 
supporters, intellectuals in the city and 
delivered special lecture on the death 
anniversary of veteran socialist ideologue, late 
the N.G. Goray, on 'Politics of People's 
Movements'.

She castigated the incoming report of Prime 
Ministers' Oversight committee (Shunglu 
Committee) on Narmada resettlement as, "merely 
eyewash to justify the fraudulent action taken 
report (ATR) of Madhya Pradesh government on 
rehabilitation. The credibility of the Prime 
Minister's office, the National Sample Survey 
organization and the Supreme Court is at stake, 
if they become agents of the corporate interests".

" For these vested interests, entrenched in the 
government, we - the NBA and NAPM have become an 
obstacle in their larger agenda. The NBA and the 
National Alliance or People's Movements (NAPM), 
have been building resistance to the rural and 
urban displacement, against the land-mafias, 
builder-contractor lobby and against the 
privatization of water and other public services. 
They are furious of our strong opposition to the 
capitalist Globalization and neo-liberal 
policies. It is unfortunate that Indian ruling 
class,  and the laws and regulations are being 
manipulated for the sake of the multinational and 
Indian capitalists and market-economy at the cost 
of people's rights and livelihood", she made 
clear while addressing the overflowing auditorium 
at S.M Joshi Socialist Foundation  gathered to 
hear her.

She strongly hinted that this 'collective of the 
bureaucrats, corporate powers, political managers 
and multilateral organizations' is bent upon 
closing all the options for the non-violent and 
democratic struggles. " We are firm believers in 
the non-violent resistance, but the state and 
corporate brutality has created doubt about the 
efficacy of non-violent resistance. It may drive 
some of them to opt for some other means", she 
cautioned.       

Corporate War on People

"It is not only about the Narmada struggle, but 
also about the issues of fisherpeople's struggle, 
or the brutal evictions in Delhi or Mumbai, the 
firing at Kalinganagar and repression in other 
mining Adivasi areas, suppressing the 
mill-workers in Mumbai, brutally demolishing the 
slums and jhuggis in Mumbai, Delhi  or evicting 
the hawkers regarding the issue of the 
reservations for the OBCs in the higher education 
and jobs - everywhere the government, managed by 
the bureaucrats, is openly serving the interests 
of the Indian or global capitalists, by depriving 
the people of their rights, resources and by 
suppressing their resistance", she pointed out. 
"The Manmohan Singh led the  United Progressive 
Alliance government at centre is hobnobbing with 
the communal-fascist government of Narendra Modi 
in Gujarat on Narmada issue, while, the Left 
front government in W. Bengal too is implementing 
the same neo-liberal agenda".

Citing the recent actions of the Union government 
and judiciary in the case of the Narmada, urban 
poor, and mill workers or interlinking of rivers, 
Medha Patkar pointed out that "the state 
apparatus, including the bureaucracy and 
judiciary, has turned against the rights and 
interests of the common and poor people and 
instead facilitating the rule of the market and 
capital. It has become inimical to very existence 
of tribals, dalits, farmers, organized and 
unorganized workers and marginalized communities; 
the political leaders, the dominant political 
parties, the dominant media are trying to smother 
the dissenting voices and resistance. The 
nation's policy is being dictated by these 
corporate and multilateral houses and agencies. 
They do not wish the movements like the NBA to be 
able to secure the rights of the Adivasis and 
farmers and the NAPM to challenge the 
builders-bureaucrats-politicians nexus. That is 
why the have declared no holds barred war on the 
people, using the police, corporate media, and 
even co-opting the 'progressive' elite". She 
criticized the Supreme Court of India for, 
"destroying the spirit of equality and justice 
enshrined by its architect Dr. B.R. Ambedkar."

The bureaucrats and multilateral financial 
agencies have vested interests in the 
Interlinking of Rivers Project (ILR). The World 
Bank, has again started financing to the 
large-scale projects, against its own earlier 
policies. It also shrugged off the report of 
World Commission on Dams, of which the Bank was a 
sponsor. "As the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has 
been thinking about financing this trillion 
dollars project, destroying the land, water 
sources and forests along with the communities 
through large scale displacement, we heard that 
the World Bank President Wolfowitz had already 
visited India and cleared the loan to the ILR, 
which it had previously denied. The ILR means 
building up of hundreds of large dams, without 
caring for environmental clearances, or the 
displacement of the billions of people and their 
forests and their rights. It is the clear sign of 
privatization or rivers and water and land on a 
massive level".   

Government for Corporates

People's resistance to the massive evictions for 
so called 'infrastructure projects' in Mumbai, 
Delhi, Kolkata and many other cities has forced 
the corporate powers and bureaucrats to unleash 
the repression, demolition and arson on the 
working people living in the slums. The 
government is handing over the prime land to the 
builders lobby and their high-rise projects. The 
media also has been influenced by these 
interests, as they do not highlight the 
tribulations of and resistance by the poor, she 
said. "The large corporate houses like Reliance 
are purchasing fertile land tracts in the command 
area of the Sardar Sarovar Project, though the 
government could hardly harness barely 10% of the 
water made available in the canals at the dam 
height of 110 meters. Despite exposing one myth 
after another regarding the dam and its benefits, 
the entire state apparatus including judiciary is 
not ready to evoke the rule of law" she 
alleged.    

In her comprehensive analysis of the political, 
social, national and international aspects of the 
politics of people's movements, Medha Patkar 
dealt with the interaction with the Left parties. 
Terming them as the 'natural alleys of people's 
movements', she appreciated that the Left parties 
are the only mainstream parties to take a 
pro-people and pro-NBA stand- though considerably 
late and if not fully. She hoped that the through 
continuous mutual interaction, the areas of 
differences and agreements and cooperation would 
be clearer.

She made it clear that the people's movements 
have an independent standing and purpose from the 
electoral party, though some of the former may 
wish to raise a pro-people party. The progressive 
party and movement are the two main areas in 
larger people's politics.  Medha Patkar appealed 
to all the citizens concerned with democratic 
rights, equality and justice to participate in 
any possible way - right from writing letters, 
articles in the newspapers to highlight the 
people's issues and about the designs of vested 
interests.      

Sanjay Sangvai 
Suniti S.R.

_____


[5]


Dawn
June 20, 2006

KARACHI: FISHERMEN'S PROTEST RALLY SUPPRESSED

By Our Staff Reporter

KARACHI, June 19: Police fired blank shots and 
teargas shells to disperse fishermen who had 
converged on Toll Plaza, Super Highway and 
National Highway to enter the city with intention 
to take part in a rally organised by the Pakistan 
Fisherfolk Forum (PFF) on Monday.

At least 22 PPF members were arrested and the PFF 
claimed that another 17, including two women, 
were unaccounted for.

The forum had planned to hold a protest 
demonstration at the Mazar-i-Quaid and march 
towards the Sindh Assembly to draw the 
government's attention to the plight of fishermen 
communities of Sindh. Its demands included end to 
the contract system for fishing in the inland 
water bodies and ban on deep-sea trawlers.

Fishermen from the remote areas of Sindh had 
travelled to Karachi to take part in the rally.

Meanwhile, PFF President Mohammad Ali Shah has 
condemned the police action and told Dawn that 17 
participants, including two women who had come 
from Badin, were still unaccounted for since the 
police launched the crackdown.

Terming the police action 'injustice with the 
fisherman community', he argued that it was not a 
political rally. "We are part of the civil 
society, and fighting for our due rightsŠtaking 
out a peaceful rally and staging a demonstration 
is our constitutional right," he argued.

Referring to the police action at Gaghar Phatak, 
Mr Shah said the police first allowed the 
protesters to go ahead after stopping them 
briefly at the place. However, shortly 
afterwards, the policemen who had taken up 
positions around started firing teargas shells at 
the buses carrying men and women.

At Toll Plaza on Super Highway also, police 
chased and beat up the fishermen with batons as 
if they were animals, he deplored, claiming that 
at least 200 people were injured in the police 
action.

Despite the police action, a number of protesters 
had managed to reach Mazar-i-Quaid where they 
were encircled by police and told not to move 
ahead, he added.

According to the PFF chief, his organisation had 
written to the TPOs Jamshed and Saddar, DIG 
Operations, CCPO Karachi and the provincial home 
department several weeks back for protection to 
the planned rally, but there was no response from 
any of them.

"At least they could have intimated us if they 
were not going to allow holding of the rally," he 
contended.

Meanwhile, senior police officials could not be 
reached to comment when contacted.

According to PPI, Mr Shah told a rally at the 
Mazar-i-Quaid that holding peaceful protest was 
their basic right as enshrined in the 
constitution.

He claimed that more than 7,000 people from 
across Sindh had come to Karachi to participate 
in the rally but had been stopped by 
law-enforcement agencies at Toll Plaza using 
force in violation of the democratic norms and 
standards.

He claimed that the agencies applied baton-charge 
and fired teargas shells to block the rally 
injuring more than a dozen of participants.

However, he said, fishermen would not stop their 
protest until their demands were met. He 
threatened to organise a march up to Islamabad 
and rallies in all major cities of the country if 
the government failed to take concrete measure 
towards resolving the problems being faced by 
fishermen. He said that the issues would be 
raised at international forums.

Terming the contract system for fishing in inland 
water bodies 'economic murder of fishermen', he 
pointed out that fishermen across Sindh were 
facing starvation due to the system but the 
rulers were least concerned about their miseries.

PFF leaders demanded abolition of contract system 
and implementation of licence system in its 
place. They urged the Sindh government to fulfil 
its commitment by introducing the fishermen 
cooperative societies system.

"Even if licence system is introduced, there is 
fear that the influential people who have been 
exploiting the fishing resources would not allow 
fishermen to fish independently. Therefore, the 
government should make appropriate arrangements 
to protect fisherman communities' interests," 
speakers on the occasion said, urging the 
government to bring illegal occupation of fishing 
waters to an end and take stern action against 
occupiers.

They pointed out that the fisherman communities 
of Sindh had been fishing freely in these waters 
to earn their livelihood since 1947 but, with the 
objective of regulating fishing and registering 
local fishermen, the Sindh government had 
introduced licence system in 1977 and provided it 
legal cover through the Sindh Fisheries Act-1980.

A few years back, they said, the Sindh government 
introduced contract/auction system that resulted 
in transfer of fishing rights to influential 
contractors, rendering the local fishermen almost 
without a livelihood.

They deplored that the government during the 
current year started the process of abolishing 
the licence system across the province.

Leaders and workers of the Muttahida Labour 
Federation, Pearl Continental Hotel Workers' 
Union, Sindh Hari Mazdoor Mahigeer Alliance, 
Mazdoor Mahaz Amal and others worker unions and 
organisations attended the rally in a large 
number.
_____


[6]

South Asians Against Nukes Post
June 20, 2006

THE BOMB, BIOGRAPHY AND THE INDIAN MIDDLE CLASS

The Indian middle class often sees itself as 
living amongst, but not living with the
majority of its fellow citizens. Through a close 
reading of the autobiography of the late
nuclear scientist Raja Ramanna, this article 
argues that one of the existential realities
of being a middle class Indian is an inescapable 
desire to escape the rest of India.

by Sankaran Krishna (Economic and Political Weekly, June 10, 2006)

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SAAN_/message/920?l=1


_____


[7]  ON - GOING AND UPCOMING EVENTS

(i)  ROZGAR HAQ YATRA LAUNCHED

Four months  spent after India launched 'the 
world's biggest social security scheme called 
National Employment Guarantee Act Schemes doubts 
are creeping up on the workability of a programme 
to provide work for 25 million unemployed rural 
people.

Several questions are cropping up. Has the 
National Rural Employment Guarantee (NREG) 
programme been able to halt migration from 
villages to cities? Is the money enough? Do 
eligible rural adult youth including women and 
physically challenged person are coming forward 
for registration? Is the work going to the 
genuinely needy? Does it will provide space for 
women and physically challenged person? Do 
villagers will get work under this? Do Panchayat 
will provide liberty to gram sabha members for 
Panchayat Planning as per their needs and 
provisions? How much corruption has crept in? Do 
all the records could be maintain properly at 
every level? Does the vigilance committee will 
become functional in reality? Starvation deaths 
of Kushi Nagar and other districts  also raising 
these questions.

For keeping in mind these questions, we  lunched 
a campaign called - Rozgar Haq Abhiyan in 22 
districts of Uttar Pradesh and 3 Districts of 
Uttaranchal. Under this campaign we will organize 
a week long ROZGAR HAQ YATRA in all the 25 
districts ( U.P.and Uttaranchal) starting from 
today (15 June). And during it final culmination 
day, we will organize a public hearing to 
consolidate our learning and experiences on 22 
June 2006


o o  o

(ii)

MEETING OF NATIONAL URBAN DEVELOPMENT STRUGGLE AND ACTION COMMITTEE ON JULY 7-8

National Urban Development Struggle and Action Committee
C/o Lokayan, 13, Alipur Road Delhi- 13
Phone: 09868200316 , E-mail: rajendra_ravi at idsindia.net, mumbainapm at gmail.com

Dear Friends,

The urban poor across the country are facing an 
unprecedented onslaught, of the capitalist and 
consumerist forces and undemocratically imposed 
plans. The resultant eviction is brutal and 
unconstitutional. The Right to Shelter, 
livelihood and every constitutional right is 
being violated, and the people are denied even a 
basic support and citizen’s right to democratic 
participation. The toiling, unorganised working 
class that builds and runs the city, beyond caste 
and creed, class and community is excluded from 
the development benefits and instead, are 
compelled to face the backlash in the form of 
displacement to destitution.

The scenario has changed into the most inhuman 
and accelerated State attack with bulldozers to 
arsons as the weapons, used and approved by every 
organ of the State. The large percentage of city 
dwellers, in slums and chawls, in hawking and 
trade are facing this, but also raising voice, 
struggling against all odds. Even with a shrunken 
space, when we question our own government, the 
vested interests and exploitative economics, the 
foreign and Indian capital invested in the name 
of urban renewal, infrastructure or development 
facilitated by international financing 
institutions, the World Bank, ADB are playing a 
foul game. The policy changes be it land ceiling 
to the National Urban Renewal Mission indicate 
distorted priorities and hence need serious and 
strong questioning with propagating pro-poor, 
sustainable and equitable alternatives.

This is not a small task nor is it a short-term 
goal. It requires an alliance amongst all those 
working with the urban poor slum dwellers to 
workers, women, children and all the deprived, 
that would lead a national movement. The urban 
poor in action can and will join the rural poor 
their counterparts in the regions, they 
themselves were thrown out of.
It is towards this end that a major plan with 
humble aim of a national challenge to the state 
and its investor-lender allies is planned under 
the banner of the National Urban Development 
Struggle and Action Committee formed during the 
national convention held in Mumbai

We intend to hold a meeting on July 7th and 8th 
night, during and as a part of the National 
Meeting on Displacement and Development to be 
conveyed by NAPM at Gandhi Bhavan, Shyamala 
Hills, Near Polytechnic Chauraha, Bhopal.

Please do attend.

Thereafter a month long national tour of various 
cities and a few towns in the country by senior 
activists eminent persons and representatives of 
urban mass based organizations and supporters 
will commence from September 28th the Shaheed 
Niyogi Diwas and the Harsud Day. This will 
obviously be turned into a National Conference in 
Delhi on October 28th to 30th to discuss and 
deliberate on NURM, the various facets of urban 
development, analyze the States role and our 
rights as also to evolve effective strategies. We 
all must know that Desh Bachao Desh Banao 
Andolan, conceived to be initiated in 2007 will 
also have a large participation of the urban 
struggles and strugglers

Your participation in all of these programmes 
beginning from July 7-8th is therefore, 
indispensable (a separate invitation is enclosed).

Do write to us with your views, suggestions and 
commitments seen as likely, at the earliest.

With regards,
Rajendra Ravi, Shaktiman Ghosh,  Raju Bhise,  Sushil George, and Medha Patkar

o o o

(iii)

2ND VISA-FREE AND PEACEFUL SOUTH ASIA CONVENTION
  6 to 9 [2006] August in Lahore, Pakistan

Friends,

Many people on both sides of the Pakistan-India 
border are working for peace and friendship 
between the two countries. Last year we organized 
a phenomenal peace march from India to Pakistan 
that involved the citizens of both countries and 
fostered feelings of friendship and hospitality.

The friends who joined us in the march felt the 
need after the peace march to continue the 
process of peace and friendship in South Asia. We 
decided that the dates should be from Hiroshima 
Day (August 6) to Nagasaki Day (August 9) for a 
peace convention. As a result we had the first 
Peace Convention with the agenda of a Visa and 
Nuclear-Free South Asia in Delhi.

This year we want to continue the tradition of 
dialogue on peace and the struggle for a just 
society. This is an invitation to join the Second 
Seminar on a Nuclear and Visa Free South Asia. We 
hope this year to have more representation from 
other South Asian countries, not just Pakistan 
and India.

So all who have been or want to get involved in 
the peace movement are welcome. Whether you are a 
writer or journalist, work with a theatre group 
or musical band or wish to participate in any 
other way, the Seminar for a Nuclear and Visa 
Free South Asia can be your platform and an 
excellent opportunity to meet other South Asian 
peace activists.

  If you are interested in participating in the 
Peace Convention please send your inquiries to 
visafreesouthasia at yahoo.com . If you are from 
India please contact Rajeshwar at 
ojha at valleyus.com  Also please note that if you 
are participating from outside Pakistan please 
send your passport details before June 15, 2006.

Please find below the resolution passed in the 
first Visa free and Peaceful South Asia 
Convention in 2005.

  Comradely,
Diep


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

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/

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necessarily reflect the views of SACW compilers.