SACW | 30 June 2006 | Sri Lanka's Displaced; UK: Forced Marriages; India: Honour Killings; Nuclear Proliferation; In memory of Vijay Kanhere

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | 30 June, 2006 | Dispatch No. 2266

[This issue of SACW is dedicated in memory of 
Vijay Kanhere, who passed away recently. Vijay 
was a well known progressive activist who spent a 
life time working for the defence of labouring 
people in Maharashtra, India.]

[1]  Sri Lanka: 560,000 displaced people suffer 
effects of intensifying violence  (Amnesty)
[2]  UK: No one defends forced marriage, but then 
those who practise it don't recognise the label 
(Rahila Gupta)
[3]  India: Love and death: Honor killings in 
Muzaffarnagar, north India (Rati Chaudhary)
[4]  India: Bad News for Nuclear Proliferation - 
Indo-US Nuclear Deal Clears First Hurdle (Praful 
Bidwai)
[5]  India: Obituary - Vijay Kanhere - 1951-2006  (Vinod Mubayi)
[6]  Book Reviews: 
      (i) Desire denied, desire defined  (Gautam Bhan)
      (ii) A future beyond sacred cows (Soumya Bhattacharya)


___


[1]

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
PRESS RELEASE

AI Index: ASA 37/017/2006 (Public)
News Service No: 158
29 June 2006

Embargo Date: 29 June 2006 00:01 GMT

SRI LANKA: 560,000 DISPLACED PEOPLE SUFFER EFFECTS OF INTENSIFYING VIOLENCE

The increasing violence in Sri Lanka is creating 
new waves of displaced people and adding to the 
fear and insecurity felt by the hundreds of 
thousands of people who already have been forced 
from their homes by the conflict and the tsunami.

"The state's failure to provide adequate security 
and to ensure that attacks against civilians are 
prosecuted has resulted in widespread fear and 
panic," said Purna Sen, Asia Director at Amnesty 
International. "Almost every major attack in 
recent months has had a devastating ripple effect 
as people flee from their homes and villages in 
search of sanctuary."

Many of those displaced -- including those living 
in organized camps -- continue to be extremely 
vulnerable to violence and harassment by the 
Tamil Tigers, other armed groups, and even 
members of the Sri Lankan security forces.

On 17 June, one woman was killed and 44 others 
injured when grenades were lobbed into a church 
in the northern village of Pesalai, where 
thousands of people had sought refuge from 
fighting between the Tamil Tigers and government 
forces. Consistent eyewitness accounts have 
identified members of the Sri Lankan security 
forces as responsible for the attack on the 
church.

A total of 39,883 people have been displaced in 
the north and east of Sri Lanka since 7 April 
2006, according to UN figures.

A report released today by Amnesty International 
also describes how as insecurity increases, 
people who have already been displaced several 
times are being forced to move yet again. Many 
have been unable to return home for decades and 
the increase in military activity is a major 
barrier preventing them from resettling and 
rebuilding their lives.

"It is the government's responsibility to protect 
the rights of these displaced people -- and 
numbering over half a million they make up a 
shockingly large constituency. The worsening 
security situation makes it imperative for the 
government to provide them with increased 
protection," said Purna Sen.

Manikkam Maniyam, a 62-year-old Tamil man, is one 
of the many Sri Lankans who has had to move 
between several temporary homes within the 
country and abroad over the last 25 years. He 
first fled his home in Trincomalee in 1990 
because of fighting and because his thatched 
house was burned down. He and his family paid a 
local fisherman to take them to India, where they 
lived in various refugee camps. In 1992 they were 
advised that the security situation was improving 
and moved back to Sri Lanka, living in a welfare 
centre in Alles Garden. Their shelter at the 
welfare centre was then destroyed by the 2004 
tsunami. There are many other thousands of 
displaced people who are still waiting to return 
home.

Fighting between government forces, the Tamil 
Tiger rebels and other armed groups has been 
intensifying for the last six months, with more 
than 700 people killed this year alone according 
to the Sri Lankan Monitoring Mission. Civilians 
face killings, abductions and 'disappearances'. 
Children are being recruited as soldiers.

Displaced people are particularly vulnerable to 
these abuses because they lack the support 
networks of their communities and local 
authorities. The violence also hinders 
development and aid agencies in their work with 
internally displaced people. In separate 
incidents in May a Norwegian Refugee Council 
employee was shot dead and three NGO offices were 
hit by synchronised grenade attacks.

On top of the insecurity, displaced people have 
to cope with a lack of employment opportunities 
and limited local health and education services. 
Alcohol abuse and high levels of domestic 
violence continue to cause concern.

While most tsunami camps are well-funded and of a 
reasonable standard, camps for those displaced by 
the conflict often lack electricity, transport 
and proper drainage. Residents in some camps say 
they fall ill from drinking dirty well water.

More than 639,400 people are estimated to remain 
displaced in Sri Lanka. Latest UN figures state 
that 314,378 people were displaced by the 
conflict. Around 325,000 people are estimated to 
remain displaced by the tsunami.

The increasing violence is forcing many Sri 
Lankans to flee the country altogether -- more 
than 2,800 people have sought international 
protection in India so far this year, according 
to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.

Notes to editors
The report, Sri Lanka: Waiting to go home - the 
plight of the internally displaced, will be 
available from 29 June at 00:01 GMT at 
http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/engasa370042006

The Sri Lankan government and the Liberation 
Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), known as the Tamil 
Tigers, agreed a ceasefire agreement in 2002, but 
attacks by both parties have continued since then 
and escalated in the last six months.

UNHCR figures state that as at April 2006, 
314,378 people remained displaced by the 
conflict. See www.unhcr.lk for more information.

The majority of displaced persons in Sri Lanka 
are from the north and east, where most of the 
fighting has taken place. Because of their 
geographical concentration in these areas, the 
Tamil population has experienced by far the 
greatest displacement. According to the most 
recent survey, a census of all displaced people 
in Sri Lanka conducted by the Ministry of 
Rehabilitation, Resettlement and Refugees in 
2002, 80.86% of the displaced population was 
Tamil, 13.7% Muslim, and 4.56% Sinhalese.

_____


[2]

The Guardian
June 20, 2006

NO ONE DEFENDS FORCED MARRIAGE, BUT THEN THOSE 
WHO PRACTISE IT DON'T RECOGNISE THE LABEL

by Rahila Gupta

For more than 20 years, ethnic minority women's 
groups have been struggling to get social 
services and other British state agencies to 
recognise forced marriage as domestic violence 
and not as a cultural practice. The tipping point 
came in 1999 when the horrific case of Rukhsana 
Naz from Birmingham hit the headlines. Pregnant 
with her lover's child and refusing to remain in 
a forced marriage, she was strangled by her 
brother while her mother pinned her down.

When the joint home and foreign office 
forced-marriage unit published its consultation 
paper Forced Marriage: a Wrong Not a Right nine 
months ago, it should have been a foregone 
conclusion that a new criminal offence was the 
best way forward. Yet most women's groups argued 
against it. A law would have the symbolic value 
of saying that forced marriage would not be 
tolerated. But who would we be targeting? Forced 
marriage has no apologists, not even among the 
most conservative sections of our communities. 
One of the problems is definition. Those who 
engage in it do not recognise the label.

The vast majority of forced marriages manipulate 
the subtlest emotional and financial levers. How 
do you legislate against this? To raise awareness 
about what behaviour constitutes coercion, we 
need to question the very concept of marriage in 
our communities, and acknowledge not just that 
there is a fine line between arranged and forced 
marriage but that the underlying logic of the 
first opens the door to the second.

Commentators go out of their way to make a 
distinction between arranged and forced marriage 
because they do not wish to be seen as racist. 
But we should not overlook the fact that the 
system of arranged marriage perpetuates caste, 
race and religious purity.

Of course, arranged marriage, especially modern 
versions, operates on the basis of consent. 
However, its popularity comes from the belief 
that it cements community networks and brings 
social and economic advantage to families, and 
that adults know what is good for young people. A 
little pressure, much as in educational choices, 
must surely be acceptable. But at what point does 
this pressure become force?

Rukhsana Naz's mother and brother are serving 
time. There are laws to deal with crimes such as 
imprisonment, assault, abduction and murder. What 
is desperately needed is a system that gives 
women such as Rukhsana the option of safe 
housing, a demand of all women's groups. Instead 
the government has engaged in a symbolic exercise 
by consulting on a "resource-neutral" law, as it 
is known in policy circles. It is sending a 
message that it is serious about forced marriage, 
but a law without resources is worse than 
nothing. Pragna Patel of Southall Black Sisters 
called it "a cynical way of appearing to take 
responsibility while avoiding it".

Women's groups agree that the central question is 
how to encourage women to escape forced 
marriages. In their experience, young women do 
not want to prosecute parents for assault or 
imprisonment. In fact, many have demanded 
assurances that no action will be taken before 
seeking help. The bonds that tie children to 
parents, even where violence exists, are 
different from those that exist between spouses.

The government's decision to shelve the 
criminalisation of forced marriage may have had 
more to do with appeasing religious groups who 
argued against it on the basis that a "minority" 
law could cause racial segregation than with the 
protection of women. However, if it is serious 
about protecting women, it should use this 
opportunity to provide much-needed resources when 
it publishes its action plan in the autumn.

· Rahila Gupta is a member of Southall Black 
Sisters; her book on modern slavery will be 
published next year.

_____


[3] 

One World South Asia
27 June 2006

LOVE AND DEATH: HONOR KILLINGS IN MUZAFFARNAGAR, NORTH INDIA
by Rati Chaudhary

Just the other day in Fugana village, a girl lay 
strung on a tree. She was naked, her face burnt. 
This was the price Radha (name changed) had to 
pay for falling in love with a man her family did 
not approve of. This is the price countless 
Radhas pay ever so often in the rough belt of 
Muzaffarnagar.

And this is the way justice is delivered to youth 
who begin to live on the razor's edge the moment 
they dare to fall in love. Radha's was yet 
another honour killing in Muzaffarnagar, a 
district in western UP that is smeared with the 
blood of innocents. There's never an FIR, hardly 
any action.

At last count, there were 20 young people dead 
till August this year. An All-India Democratic 
Women's Association (AIDWA) survey maintains that 
in Muzaffarnagar alone 10 were killed by 
villagers in 2002. The number shot up to 24 in 
2003. Villagers say there are those who have been 
left maimed and useless for life.

Even the deaths, they say, are more. Apart from 
the killings, 15 "committed suicide" in 2003, 12 
in 2004 and 7 till August this year. Radha's 
father, meanwhile, has neither remorse nor regret.

"Mari chori thi maine mar di. Tane kya?" (She was 
my daughter and I killed her. What's it to you?) 
Muzaffarnagar, which is fast acquiring the 
nickname 'Muhhabatnagar', is a hub of honour 
killings.

Local residents, still steeped in their age old 
traditions, feel that honour comes before 
anything else and love affairs before marriage is 
a breach of that honour. Everything for them is 
fair as far as long as it protects this wild 
concept.

According to local doctor D K Singh, these 
villagers will do anything to protect their 
honour - burn their children alive, push them in 
front of running trains, force them to drink 
urine, eat excreta, shoot them and decapitate 
them. Finally, though, it is death. This is not 
negotiable.

When a TOI team reached village Ukawali, in 
Baraut, and spoke to Rajnath Tyagi, a former 
teacher, he was quick to respond: "Children who 
do not protect our honour should be killed." 
Recently, Tyagi's brother killed his daughter 
Sonika's lover. The girl, however, is missing. 
He, too, justifies the crime.

"This is not love, it is lust." According to 
Rajesh Verma, another local resident, these 
deaths are a daily incident here. "Rarely is any 
FIR lodged," he says. "Even if it is, there is a 
compromise between the girl's and boy's families. 
It is only after this that the police give a 
final report."

Community honour is sometimes avenged with 
retaliatory gangrapes. Memories of one such case 
are still fresh in peoples' minds. Sunita was 
gangraped because her brother ran away with the 
girl he loved. She was stabbed numerous times 
after that. Her body still bears those dreadful 
injuries, her mind the dreadful day.

Police officer Jagdish Vashishth appeared 
powerless. "Almost none of the killings are 
reported," he said. "Villagers tell us that we 
can't interfere in panchayat's decision. They 
have some traditions and they follow them 
religiously, we are kept out of this."

When the TOI team took a policeman along to 
report the murder of Radha, he just sat there 
sipping tea and eating food at the pradhan's 
house. He said nothing about an inquiry. 
Intriguingly, he, along with the villagers, gave 
the impression that they knew nothing about the 
gruesome incident that took place in the village 
just a day before.

Brinda Karat, general secretary, AIDWA, said, "We 
have been pursuing the National Human Rights 
Commission to act against those encouraging 
honour killings, and to force the government to 
take suo motu action whenever such killings come 
to light.

But there is not a single incident in which 
proper action has been taken." There are other 
forms of honour killings. No farmer in this 
village sleeps without keeping a katta (country 
made gun) under his pillow. Just last week, a 
farmer killed another because there was an 
argument over who would tie his buffalo onto the 
village khoonta (peg).

The issue was not about the khoonta nor about the 
buffalo. It was about the moustache, the honour. 
The government will have to wake up and protect 
the young who have no control over their hearts. 
Because in Muzaffarnagar, elders have no control 
over their knives.



_____


[4] 

Inter Press Service,
29 June 2006

INDO-US NUCLEAR DEAL CLEARS FIRST HURDLE
by Praful Bidwai

With the House International Relations Committee 
(HIRC) of the United States House of 
Representatives gaining overwhelming bipartisan 
support for a draft bill to allow resumption of 
civilian nuclear commerce between India and the 
U.S., the path is clearer for the controversial 
nuclear deal signed a year ago between President 
George W. Bush and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
Under the Bush-Singh agreement, India would be 
allowed to keep its nuclear weapons, but must 
separate its civilian nuclear facilities from 
military ones and agree to place the former under 
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) 
safeguards.
No less than 37 members of the 50-member HIRC 
voted in favor of the bill, on Tuesday, while 
only five voted against it. The legislation is 
now slated for a "markup" to the full House of 
Representatives. Thereafter, the Senate Foreign 
Relations Committee is expected to mark up a 
separate version for the Senate.
With this will begin the final push to get U.S. 
Congress to make a one-time exception for India 
in the global nuclear-military order. 
Significantly, one of the amendments approved by 
HIRC emphasizes that the change in rules for the 
45-member nuclear suppliers group (NSG) would 
apply solely to India and no other country.
Another non-binding amendment says that the U.S. 
should "secure India's full and active 
participation in U.S. efforts to dissuade, 
isolate and, if necessary, sanction and contain 
Iran for its efforts to acquire weapons of mass 
destruction, including a nuclear weapons 
capability (including the capability to enrich or 
process nuclear materials) and the means to 
deliver weapons of mass destruction."
Both supporters and opponents of the deal are 
mobilizing themselves hard for the final thrust. 
Among the supporters are administration 
officials, a large number of Republican 
legislators, and the powerful lobby of rich and 
influential nonresident Indians settled in the 
U.S., all backed by sections of the Indian media 
who act as crusaders for the deal.
Already, a series of stories and articles 
promoting the agreement, based on selective 
back-room official briefings, have appeared in 
India in a well-orchestrated campaign. President 
Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and 
now Vice President Dick Cheney have all thrown 
their weight behind the U.S. and India Nuclear 
Cooperation Promotion Act, 2006.
Opposing the deal are peace-minded scientists, 
numerous nonproliferation experts, including some 
being mobilized by the Arms Control Association, 
and a cross-section of U.S. lawmakers, especially 
Democrats, considered nonproliferation "hawks."
Opponents of the deal are reportedly trying to 
make the relevant legislation conditional upon 
India limiting the size of its atomic arsenal by 
agreeing to freeze the production of 
nuclear-weapons fuel (fissile material) 
unilaterally, or through regional arrangements 
involving China and Pakistan.
The Bush administration has been trying hard to 
keep the "markup" drafts of the House and Senate 
Committees strictly within the boundaries of the 
understandings already reached with India in July 
2005 and on March 2.
Many legislators, however, have been pressing for 
language that stresses traditional U.S. concerns 
about proliferation and strong support for the 
Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), which 
India has not signed. Some are laying down other 
criteria too, such as India's backing for a 
fissile materials cutoff treaty (FMCT), now 
before the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva.
However, none of these additional or extraneous 
clauses is of an operative, binding, or 
deal-breaking character. While their language may 
not be palatable to India, it will probably 
accept it so long as it does not impose an 
additional constraint upon it. If further 
amendments are moved, especially relating to the 
FMCT, the Bush administration is likely to 
mobilize votes to defeat them.
"The Indian government has so much to gain from 
the agreement going through the U.S. Congress 
that it should, logically, show a lot of 
flexibility," says Anil Choudhury of the 
Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament and Peace in 
New Delhi. "Having an ineffectual, non-binding 
line here or there won't make a difference."
However, a problem might arise if the U.S. 
administration and Congress reach a compromise on 
the sections dealing with the termination of the 
agreement should India conduct a nuclear test or 
violate its safeguards agreement with the IAEA.
Currently, some furious bargaining is taking 
place on these issues. There is only a narrow 
time-window open for debating the deal and the 
relevant legislation. Congress' calendar has only 
15 working days in July. If it does not complete 
its deliberations by the first week of August, it 
is unlikely to do so before it moves toward 
dissolution and fresh elections.
A strong, indeed overwhelming, bipartisan vote in 
both Houses is considered a precondition for the 
deal to go through. A weak vote would mean that 
some congressmen would be reluctant to take up 
the entire set of bills because they are 
contentious and need a lot of discussion.
From the Indian government's point of view, there 
is another risk, which may be linked to an effort 
to avert a weak vote. To reach a broad, 
bipartisan consensus, the administration may have 
to agree to certain amendments to the original 
text of the concerned bills.
If, in the process, the final text introduces 
oversight conditions or other criteria not 
included in the India-U.S. agreements reached so 
far, that will make the Indian government 
vulnerable to the charge that it has compromised 
the nation's vital interests.
Already sensing an opportunity to corner the 
government, the pro-Hindu, right-wing Bharatiya 
Janata Party, which leads the opposition, has 
hardened its stand against the Indo-U.S. deal. 
Last week, it submitted a memorandum to India's 
president, saying that it opposes it in its 
present form and will not consider it binding 
upon future governments.
The Singh government must look over its shoulder. 
But it knows, like the pro-nuclear Indian elite, 
that the price of making small compromises is 
well worth paying for a deal that allows India to 
keep nuclear weapons and import civilian nuclear 
technology or materials, besides strengthening a 
"strategic partnership" with Washington, with 
which to jointly neutralize China and act as the 
U.S.' most trusted partner in South and Southeast 
Asia.
However, for purely domestic consumption, the 
government presents the deal as a means of 
righting a "historical wrong," namely the denial 
of dual-use and sensitive technologies to India 
for 30 years because of its first nuclear 
explosion in 1974.
In reality, there has been very little denial, 
except in the civilian-nuclear and missile 
fields. Nor has India suffered significantly from 
sanctions. It has only suffered a modest and 
poorly performing nuclear power program. But now, 
India can substantially expand nuclear power 
generation and divert imported uranium to 
military uses, critics say.

Copyright 2006 Inter Press Service

_____


[5] 

http://www.insaf.net/
INSAF Bulletin
July 2006

Obituary

VIJAY KANHERE PASSES AWAY

(Vinod Mubayi based on information from Suhas Paranjape)

Vijay Kanhere, 55, a creative, passionately involved social activist who
worked in the peasant movement and in issues related to occupational
health of workers passed away recently in Mumbai due to cardiac
complications. Vijay was born in 1951, the fourth child of Manorama and
Purushottam Kanhere. His mother had studied only up to the seventh
standard before her marriage. His father, a teacher, had a post graduate
degree in Sanskrit and also a law degree. His mother later studied and
completed her graduation when she was fifty-one years old. All through
she was working outside the home as a teacher and inside the home as the
mother of five children. She studied after her seventh standard as an
external student. Vijay grew up in Tarapore, (now urbanized with an
atomic energy plant and many industries there) a small village then. He
wanted to study pure sciences and later teach. In the last year of his
graduation, in 1971, India was in turmoil. Studies were not engaging
enough. Having read about Baba Amte's 'Workers' University' he left
Mumbai and traveled to Somanath Project in Chandrapur district of
Maharashtra.  Baba Amte accepted him as a student there and they worked
as workers in the fields and read books and discussed amongst
themselves.

At around this time, a movement of adivasis was taking shape in Shahada
taluka of Dhule district in northern Maharashtra bordering Gujarat and
Madhya Pradesh. Five activists went to Shahade in the then Dhulia
district (now Nandurbar). Initially they had given a firm commitment of
working there for six months. But their involvement in the immense
problems of the adivasis in the area led to two of them, including
Vijay, continuing to work there for more than a decade. The initial
issue taken up was the loss of lands of the tribal population. It was
realized through surveys that sixty percent of tribals were landless in
the plains.  A movement of landless labourers began in 1972. Massive
efforts by people gave birth to a lively organization - Shramik
Sanghatana, a path breaking effort. Over the years, a pattern developed
where representatives of labourers consulted with the mass of labourers
gathered outside the place of negotiations all through the process of
negotiations. This practice led to, for the first time, women laborers
sitting face to face with landowners to negotiate their wages.

In a note describing his experiences Vijay wrote: "Men from both sides
asked, 'What is the need for women to sit in this negotiation?'  This
was reported to the gathering outside by me and women objected. They
insisted and they sat through in the negotiations. It is felt by people
that people are recipients of good ideas and leaders provide ideas and
guidance. I took up research to find out attempts made by people before
the emergence of Ambarsing Suratvanti a towering personality and a very
deep thoughtful adivasi leader who was born, brought up and worked in
Dhule. Were people 'active' before Ambarsing and before urban youths
like us joined the movement? I realized and documented efforts by people
in three villages in three different circumstances in that area. I was
able to document long, protracted and heroic struggles of the aadivasi
labourers. These had not been documented and were not part of their
self-image. These were not part of our own thinking either. People used
to say, "Only after you came we became wise, only because of Ambarsing
we improved". We used to respond, "No! No! Organization exists because
of you." This statement needed a solid basis. People had struggled and
learnt lessons from their struggles without any formal leadership. When
the lessons were reflected in a new leadership and organization, they
responded wholeheartedly. People had their own storage of knowledge and
ideas."

This and other similar experiences led to the first 'Women's Shibir' (a
study camp) at Kharavad in 1973. Women complained about, among other
problems, the problem of alcoholism among men. After a suggestion to act
and not remain confined to complaints, all the women went to a nearby
village Karankheda and encircled that small village and broke all the
liquor pots. Later this powerful practice continued not only in that
area but also in other parts of India.

In 1984 Vijay got interested in the issue of Occupational Health (OH)
prior to the disaster in Bhopal. As part of this activity, Vijay was
instrumental in the formation of Occupational Health and Safety Center
(OHSC) in Mumbai. He remained the coordinator of OHSC from 1988 till his
death.  The first activity was the study of OH problems of sewer workers
who enter underground sewers. This was done on the suggestion of their
union. He worked consistently with the union of municipal workers in
Mumbai, the Municipal Majdoor Union (MMU) and the union of municipal
nurses and paramedical staff. Later he initiated orientation courses for
doctors, as there are very few inputs on OH issues in their graduation
studies. The idea of 'open house ongoing workers' training' was
initiated by Vijay. Later it spread to Amritsar, Ahmedabad and
Aurangabad. It was converted into an advice and check-up center with a
strong component of training. Vijay worked with groups working on
environmental concerns and was a panelist of the People's Tribunal in
Vadodara organized by the Indian People's Tribunal. Activity with
various sections of municipal workers - garages, malaria control,
hospitals and others in Mumbai led to the idea of building of unity of
worker-citizens and other citizens. Vijay also initiated activity in
Aurangabad, Maharashtra regarding byssinosis - a pulmonary disease of
textile workers caused due to cotton dust - and about starting a
doctors' orientation course.  It was partly due to his efforts that a
National Campaign on Dust Related Lung Diseases was initiated and
activities on byssinosis in Ahmedabad, Mumbai, and Amritsar took shape
as part of this campaign. Vijay played an active role in discussing with
many activists, workers, leaders, environmentalists and scientists in
many countries the vast storage of knowledge on OH among workers and the
realization that efforts by workers to bring in safer workplaces remain
largely undocumented. Vijay was also involved with the environmental
group Parivartan led by Ashok Kadam and the idea of the `People's Plan
of Development'

Vijay leaves behind his younger sister, Swatija Manorama, who is active
in the women's movement and is part of Forum Against Oppression of Women
(FAOW), his wife Sujata Gothoskar who is one of the founders of FAOW and
the Women's Centre and a researcher in problems faced by women workers
in particular, and his daughter Aaloka, a mathematician besides his
countless friends and co-workers.

_____


[6]  BOOK REVIEWS

o o

(i)

Tehelka
July 08 , 2006

DESIRE DENIED, DESIRE DEFINED

A new translation of Hindi writer Ugra reveals 
subtler layers beneath his anti-queer stance, 
finds Gautam Bhan

Writing the history of homophobia is as important 
as writing the history of same-sex 
relationships." This is Ruth Vanita's premise in 
her translation from Hindi of the stories of 
Pandey Bechan Sharma (1900-1960). Under the pen 
name 'Ugra', literally meaning 'extreme', Sharma 
wrote, in 1927, a series of stories called 
Chocolate, remarkable - or notorious - for 
speaking openly of male-male desire at a time 
when sexuality of any kind was absent from public 
discourse, and same-sex desire was virtually 
unimaginable.

In its day, the book sold widely, going into a 
second edition within weeks. The stories caused a 
furore and led to modern India's first public 
debate on homosexuality, representing, in the 
1920s, a level of dialogue that those of us in 
the modern queer movement have cause to envy. 
While Ugra, a known nationalist and a Gandhian, 
was explicit in his intent to "expose and 
eradicate homosexuality", his critics argued 
that, in his "descriptions of beautiful boys", he 
attracted his readers to "unnatural misconduct" 
rather than repulsed them. Each of the stories, 
it is true, carry clear messages that condemn 
same-desire and offer dire consequences for the 
protagonists who espouse it. Yet, as Vanita 
points out, in a context of utter silence, even 
condemned characters constitute a history, and 
form a picture, however distorted, of "the urban 
Indian homosexual and bisexual men's social life 
and language in the early 20th century".

With a lengthy and excellent introduction that 
guides the reader through the complexities of 
Ugra's work, Vanita argues that the stories are 
open to many readings. Many of his characters, 
for example, were upper-class, educated, working 
professionals. Except for one story set in jail, 
none were thought to have turned homosexual due 
to the absence of women. Familiar tropes in 
modern homophobic literature - of disease, mental 
illness, and the lack of women - are absent. None 
of the characters suffer from guilt. Though dire 
material and social consequences are threatened, 
the near-universal existence of same-sex desire 
is not questioned. In each of the stories, the 
protagonist happily expresses his desire, and 
while there is one main morally dissenting voice, 
there are others that accept and appreciate the 
desire. In essence, the stories - while clearly 
against same-sex desire in narrative - also offer 
it space. In the 1920s, when Chocolate was 
perhaps the only publicly accessible homosexual 
text, its potential for subversive reading cannot 
be undermined.

Vanita's introduction is a much-needed guard 
against a purely homophobic reading of the book. 
It ensures that the contexts and complexities of 
the text are appreciated. In the language of 
homophobia, there is also embedded the language 
of change. Understanding this will make 
responding to our own contemporary conservative 
forces that much easier.

Gautam Bhan is a queer rights activist


o o o o


(ii)


The Observer
June 25, 2006

A FUTURE BEYOND SACRED COWS

In Pankaj Mishra's Temptations of the West: How 
to be Modern in India, Pakistan and Beyond, 
Soumya Bhattacharya finds a compelling blend of 
memoir, narrative history, politics, religion and 
philosophy


Temptations of the West: How to be Modern in India, Pakistan and Beyond
by Pankaj Mishra
Picador £16.99, pp439

In the second of the nine essays in this engaging 
and illuminating anthology, Pankaj Mishra meets 
Tarun Vijay, editor of the Hindi magazine of the 
RSS, an evangelical organisation 'dedicated to 
establishing a Hindu nation by uniting Hindus 
from all castes and sects and by forcing Muslims, 
Christians and other Indian minorities to embrace 
Hindu culture'. When they meet, India is ruled by 
a coalition led by the right-wing Hindu 
nationalist party, the BJP.

The RSS, Mishra finds, seeks 'an alternative 
route to Western modernity'. This becomes clearer 
when an exultant Vijay shows Mishra a story in 
his magazine about the patenting of cow urine in 
America. 'Western science,' he said, 'had 
validated the ancient Hindu belief in the 
holiness of the cow.'

This passage offers a sort of coda to Temptations 
of the West, an urgent examination of societies 
trying to come to terms with modernity. The 
passage is typical of the manner in which Mishra 
builds his case. He is a keen observer of people, 
he has a great eye for detail, and he lets his 
thorough, uncompromising reportage speak for 
itself. And his writing is often backlit by a 
sly, delightful sense of humour.

For years now, Mishra has written superbly about 
India. Several essays in this book were written 
when the BJP-led government ruled India. It was 
voted out in 2004 after the party, having 
conflated the concerns of the urban rich with 
those of the 72 per cent of the population that 
lives in the hinterland, fought an election on 
the slogan 'India Shining'. That election showed 
again that India's metropolitan elite is hardly 
representative of the country. Which is why, 
despite much talk about India being the back 
office of the world and the boom in the IT 
sector, the internet still reaches only 2 per 
cent of the population. The Economist recently 
said that India has to grow much faster 'if the 
260 million who live on less than $1 a day are to 
be lifted out of poverty'.

Mishra brings out the gulf between the 
aggressively consumerist, affluent urban elite 
and the vast majority of the poor, living in 
shocking deprivation.

As the subtitle suggests, this book is not merely 
about India. Travelling to Afghanistan, Mishra 
discovers that 'the obstinacy and the 
destructiveness of the Taliban now appear to be 
part of the history of Afghanistan's calamitous 
encounter with the modern world'. Tibet shows him 
how, 'like all traditional people faced with 
modernisation, their choices are drastically 
limited. To embrace the glittering new world of 
China is to become as materialist and secular as 
the post-communist Chinese.'

Mishra offers a compelling blend of memoir, 
narrative history, politics, religion and 
philosophy. The template of modernity he shows us 
is from the West, but it is not always ideal. 
Thoughtful, intelligent and rigorous, this is a 
deep, insightful study of the very notion of 
modernity.

· To order the Temptations of the West for £15.99 
with free UK p&p, go to observer.co.uk/bookshop 
or call 0870 836 0885


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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.