SACW | May 19-20, 2007

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire  | May 19-20, 2007 | Dispatch No. 2408 - Year 9

[1]  Pakistan: Islamabad succumbs (Pervez Hoodbhoy)
[2]  Appeal To The Indian Left From A Progressive Pakistani (M.B. Naqvi)
[3]  Moves by Sri Lanka Military Worry Human Rights Group (Nora Boustany)
[4]  India: March of the righteous brigade (Tavleen Singh)
[5]  India:  Stop This Vigilantism (editorial, People's Democracy)
[6]  India not privilege or monopoly of Hindus 
(News report on Mangalore communalism seminar)
[7]  India: A Press statement on the Hyderabad 
Mosque Bomb blasts (Communalism Combat)
[8]  India: People's Tribunal on Nandigram- Notification ()
[9]  Book Reviews:
      (i) Books on 1857 -  A Riot Of Commemorating (Shahid Amin)
     (ii) Sri Lanka novel lives up to its bzzzzz (Shyam Selvadurai)
[10] Upcoming events:
        India: Activists Sit -in re Fine arts Fac, 
MS University Baroda MS (Ahmedabad, 23 May 2007)

____


[1]

The Guardian
May 17, 2007

ISLAMABAD SUCCUMBS

Pakistan's president is doing nothing to prevent 
the country's capital from becoming an Taliban 
stronghold.

by Pervez Hoodbhoy

After his ill-advised dismissal of the chief 
justice of Pakistan's supreme court ignited 
violent protest, President Pervez Musharraf may 
be banking on Islamic fanatics to create chaos in 
the nation's capital, Islamabad. Many suspect 
that an engineered bloodbath that leads to army 
intervention, and the declaration of a national 
emergency, could serve as a pretext to postpone 
the October 2007 elections. This could make way 
for Musharraf's dictatorial rule to continue into 
its eighth year - and perhaps well beyond.

This perverse strategy sounds almost 
unbelievable. Musharraf, who George Bush 
describes as his "buddy", supports an 
"enlightened moderate" version of Islam, and 
wears two close attempts on his life by religious 
extremists as a badge of honour. But his secret 
reliance upon the Taliban card - one that he has 
been accused of playing for years - is increasing 
as his authority weakens.

Signs of government-engineered chaos abound. In 
the heart of Islamabad, vigilante groups from a 
government-funded mosque, the Lal Masjid, roam 
the streets and bazaars, imposing Islamic 
morality and terrorising citizens in full view of 
the police. Openly sympathetic to the Taliban and 
tribal militants fighting the Pakistan army, the 
two cleric brothers who head Lal Masjid, Maulana 
Abdul Aziz and Maulana Abdur Rashid Ghazi, have 
attracted a core of banned militant organisations 
around them. These include Jaish-e-Muhammad, 
considered a pioneer of suicide bombings in the 
region.

The clerics openly defy the state. Since January 
21, baton-wielding, burka-clad students of the 
Jamia Hafsa, the woman's Islamic university 
located next to the headquarters of Lal Masjid, 
have forcibly occupied a government building, the 
Children's Library. In one of their many forays 
outside the seminary, this burka brigade swooped 
upon a house that they claimed was a brothel, and 
kidnapped three women and a baby.

Male students from Islamabad's many madrasas are 
even more active in terrorising video-shop 
owners, whom they accuse of spreading 
pornography. Newspapers have carried pictures of 
grand bonfires made with seized cassettes and 
CDs. Most video stores in Islamabad have now 
closed. Their owners duly repented after a fresh 
campaign on May 4 by militants blew up a dozen 
music and video stores, barbershops and a girl's 
school in the North-West Frontier Province.

Astonishing patience has been shown by the 
Pakistani state, which on other occasions freely 
used air and artillery power to combat such 
challenges. Lal Masjid seems to operate with 
impunity - no attempt has been made to cut off 
its electricity, gas, phone or website - or even 
to shut down its illegal FM radio station. The 
chief negotiator appointed by Musharraf, Chaudhry 
Shujaat Hussain, described the burka brigade 
kidnappers as "our daughters", with whom 
negotiations would continue and against whom "no 
operation could be contemplated".

Clerics realise that the government wants to play 
ball. Their initial demand - the rebuilding of 
eight illegally constructed mosques that had been 
knocked down by Islamabad's civic administration 
- became a call for enforcement of Sharia law 
across Pakistan. In a radio broadcast on April 
12, the clerics issued a threat: "There will be 
suicide blasts in the nook and cranny of the 
country. We have weapons, grenades, and we are 
expert in manufacturing bombs. We are not afraid 
of death."

Lal Masjid's head cleric, a former student of my 
university in Islamabad, added the following 
chilling message for our women students:

     "The government should abolish coeducation. 
Quaid-e-Azam University has become a brothel. Its 
female professors and students roam in 
objectionable dresses. I think I will have to 
send my daughters of Jamia Hafsa to these immoral 
women. They will have to hide themselves in 
hijab, otherwise they will be punished according 
to Islam. Our female students have not issued the 
threat of throwing acid on the uncovered faces of 
women. However, such a threat could be used for 
creating the fear of Islam among sinful women. 
There is no harm in it. There are far more 
horrible punishments in the hereafter for such 
women."

Indeed, on May 7, a female teacher in the QAU 
history department was physically assaulted in 
her office by a bearded, Taliban-looking man who 
screamed that he had instructions from Allah.

What's next? As Islamabad heads the way of 
Pakistan's tribal towns, the next targets will be 
girls' schools, internet cafes, bookshops, and 
shops selling western clothing, followed by 
purveyors of toilet paper, tampons, underwear, 
mannequins and other un-Islamic goods.

In a sense, the inevitable is coming to pass. 
Until a few years ago, Islamabad was a quiet, 
orderly, modern city no different from any other 
in Pakistan. Still earlier, it was largely the 
abode of Pakistan's elite and foreign diplomats. 
But the rapid transformation of its demography 
brought with it hundreds of mosques with 
multi-barrelled audio cannons mounted on 
minarets, as well as scores of madrasas, 
illegally constructed in what used to be public 
parks and green areas. Now, tens of thousands of 
their students with prayer caps dutifully chant 
the Qu'ran all day. In the evenings, they roam in 
packs through the city's streets and bazaars, 
gaping at store windows and lustfully ogling 
bare-faced women.

The stage is being set for transforming Islamabad 
into a Taliban stronghold. When Musharraf exits - 
which may be sooner rather than later - he will 
leave a bitter legacy that will last for 
generations, all for a little more taste of power.


______


[2]

Mainstream
19 May 2007

Appeal To The Indian Left From A Progressive Pakistani:
EVOLVE ALTERNATIVE PARADIGM OF ECONOMIC GROWTH

by M.B. Naqvi


The following is what the author wanted to 
present at a meeting in Karachi when the leaders 
of the two Indian CPs-the CPI and CPM-visited 
Pakistan in the recent past. -Editor

I intend to ask a few questions to you. But first 
the perspective in which I am talking.

The international order as it has developed since 
the 1990s has been profoundly disturbing. I am 
sure you will share my overall assessment of a 
unipolar world in which one nation possesses far 
too much military strength and has consciously 
decided to make the fullest use of that military 
strength for its political as well as economic 
interests. In the name of leadership it has 
dominated the world. It seeks unquestioning 
privilege of intervening wherever it wants to and 
reserves the right to pre-emptive military 
action. Its conduct is not always truthful. I 
believe you share my belief that this 
international order is not acceptable. There is 
far too much of imperialism in it.

Insofar as imperialism is concerned, it has gone 
beyond the export of capital as Lenin in 1919 had 
defined. It focuses today on a certain economy 
containing a given quantum of resources and the 
potential for development. The name of the game 
now is to develop an economy for the greater 
profit of the developer.

But the name of the game in politics for the US 
is to get control over the sources of strategic 
raw materials, especially oil. The American 
thrust in Asia stands on a tripod. The first leg 
is the Middle East that the US regards as its 
backyard insofar as Asia is concerned. The second 
leg is its strategic alliances with Japan and 
Taiwan. The third leg is the US-India alliance 
with Pakistan somewhere precariously attached. 
One does not mention in it the smaller Far 
Eastern countries and Australia that I regard as 
more or less a part of the American power system 
in Asia (the first leg).

An additional theatre is the policy toward the 
former Soviet Union and China. Insofar as the 
Soviet Union is concerned, it began by 
befriending it and in the name of promoting human 
rights and democracy it is ensuring the dilution 
of the old Russian influence in the Central Asian 
Republics as well as encouraging minority states 
within the Russian Federation to assert against 
Russian authority. How that is to be assessed is 
the question. Does it or does it not sum up a 
policy of encouragement of fissiparous tendencies 
in the Russian power system so that it comes down?

More questions concern China. The rise of Chinese 
power and its economic growth has caused worries 
to the US. But until the end of the Clinton era 
in American politics the policy was to encourage 
China's growth and try and assimilate it in the 
American-led comity of nations. There were, of 
course, voices from what is described as the 
security community. They regarded China as a 
potential rival. But those voices remained in a 
minority. The government was committed to a 
policy of assimilating China in the American-led 
international system. But the start of the Bush 
era changed that. The Americans have not entirely 
given up the policy of engagement. The growth of 
Sino-American trade is a staggering phenomenon 
that rivals the American-Japanese trade. China 
appears to be earning $ 163 billion per year 
surplus in trade with the US. But the Americans 
dare not blackball Chinese exports. Supplies of 
consumer goods and simpler technological goods is 
so vital a component of American consumption that 
its discontinuation or even diminution would hurt 
America more because it is sustaining a standard 
of living that cannot be paid for by American 
exports alone. America has of necessity to run 
huge deficits with China, Japan, Germany and, of 
course, oil producers around the globe. It is 
easy for it. All it has to do is to print dollar 
bills. The US is today world's greatest debtor. 
But instead of being vulnerable to foreign 
pressure, it holds its creditors in thrall. The 
creditors dare not withdraw the bulk of their 
deposits from the American financial system for 
fear of the dollar's crash. All their credits 
will become worthless. It is the Americans who 
hold the whip hand despite being the Big Debtor.

The American modus operandi in the economic field 
is, of course, to earn as much as it can. It has 
revived the cruder form of capitalism everywhere. 
The policy originated in what is remembered as 
the Washington Consensus that gradually became 
the credo of the governments of Margaret Thatcher 
in Britain and Ronald Reagan in America. It came 
to be known as the deregulation, privatisation 
and liberalisation paradigm. Free trade has 
become the chief slogan. The intention is to 
create a global market in which there are few or 
no tariffs. The whole globe should comprise one 
economy. This economic theory is supposed to 
benefit all manner of countries at all stages of 
development. Let's look at what has so far 
occurred?

-

THE former colonies comprising the so-called 
Third World are increasingly at the receiving 
end. A growing number of economies have gone 
belly up, especially in Africa. In the normal 
course of events in all capitalist economies, 
there are some winners and some losers. Only the 
losers are many more than the gainers. That is 
the normal feature of capitalism as you know 
better than what I do. At the international 
level, it is the same. Scores of countries have 
become basket cases with heavy indebtedness. The 
IMF and World Bank have a hard time rescheduling 
and writing off some of their debts without 
hurting the financial system of the West. The 
process is going to accelerate as globalisation 
increases.

Globalisation's working inside each developed 
economy is the same. It produces losers-who lose 
jobs and whose standards of living tend to become 
lower-while the gainers, of course, become richer 
still. The process can be watched not far from 
the place we are sitting today. I mean the 
spectacular economic growth of India in recent 
years has intensified poverty, whatever its 
quantum or extent. I find it is a controversial 
matter among economists. The Indian Government 
insists that it is no more than 24 per cent and 
it is decreasing. The independent economists, 
especially those on the Left, find it actually 
growing or at the very least stagnant. But those 
above the poverty line as defined are also not 
necessarily rich. The cream is appropriated by 
some 250 to 350 million Indians. The rest try to 
make the two ends meet by my non-scientific 
estimate. It is the same in Pakistan. Its 
governments did mimic its Indian counterpart 
about the prospects of growing at eight per cent 
and above. And poverty was to get reduced through 
the trickle-down process. Although the recent 
earthquake in the northern parts seems to have 
created doubts whether really high growth rates 
can be maintained in the sectors of economy that 
are prone to grow faster.

This is a field about which I need not go 
further. But I would ask a question: those who do 
not like the present paradigm of economic growth 
known as 'reforms' or the globalisation scheme 
carry a moral responsibility. They have to offer 
an alternative paradigm. It is not enough to 
condemn globalisation as iniquitous and as 
something that will not help the poor. It helps 
mainly the rich. There is no doubt that it will 
go on doing these things. The point is: how do we 
counter it? I am aware that the American masses 
surprised the world by the strength of their 
protest in Seattle some years ago. Then the 
Europeans picked up the theme and their protests 
against G-8 and even OECD have only grown. Today 
the leading capitalist countries meet in 
international conferences amidst the tightest 
possible security. They dare not operate freely 
even in the developed West that stands to gain 
more than the people in Asia. The popular 
protests against Americans and the other leaders 
of the West, who are propagators of the 
globalisation programme, are now a familiar 
feature, as Hong Kong the other day has shown. 
There is something missing that is terribly 
important. What is missing is an alternative 
vision-a vision of what can replace it.

Needless to say that even the Left today cannot 
go back to Stalinist planning and 
theover-centralised and bureaucratic economic 
management. A certain amount of market mechanism 
for allocation of resources and various other 
purposes, including pricing of goods and 
services, will be needed. Private capital as such 
has to be given a defined scope for doing its 
business. The allocation of resources by 
bureaucrats is not now an option. But will it now 
be free market forces that will determine 
everything from choosing what to produce and 
selling it at whatever prices they wish? That is 
what the Americans advocate. The point is: what 
does the Left advocate?

-

FRIENDS, I wish to address mainly our guests from 
India. Naturally the question arises: what can 
Pakistanis learn from the Indian political life? 
I suggest that the Left in India has to evolve a 
coherent economic policy or paradigm that should 
guide Indian economic development in days to 
come. That would provide the means for mass 
mobilisation to preserve India's independence in 
decision-making and to give its affairs direction 
that will enable the people of India to make 
economic progress primarily for the benefit of 
the common man. But immediately following it is 
the consideration that all freedoms guaranteed by 
the Indian Constitution, that distinguish it from 
semi-dictatorships in the Third World, should be 
preserved. In other words, the economic paradigm 
must preserve all political liberties while 
raising the standard of living of the common 
Indians-who are today being left out of the 
economic miracle that is supposed to be underway. 
It does look to me that the Indian mainstream 
parties have not adequately learnt the lesson 
from the election of May 2004. The downfall of 
the NDA Government represented the disenchantment 
of the common people, particularly in the 
villages, with the economic policies which Dr 
Manmohan Singh originally initiated. Dr Manmohan 
Singh is not expected to move far out of the four 
walls of that policy which happens to be what the 
World Bank, IMF and American Treasury believes to 
be the panacea for all the world's ills. The aim 
of most of our Indian guests today can only be to 
overcome poverty of the bottom 50 per cent of the 
population and to raise their cultural level-the 
real purpose of economic development. It requires 
thoroughgoing research in economics in the quest 
for a set of economic policies that would 
directly attack the poverty of the broad masses 
and which raises their political and cultural 
awareness amidst all necessary freedoms. I would 
underline the need for this research. India 
particularly is endowed with a wonderful human 
resource base; there are excellent economists on 
the Left as well as the Right. I would suggest 
that the parties of the Indian Left should pool 
their human and financial resources to create a 
Planning Commission with a view to arriving at a 
proper economic development plan for India.

Immediately following that I would suggest that 
India should actually become a leader of South 
Asia. There are historical similarities in all 
the South Asian countries, particularly with 
India in each member of the SAARC today. These 
are all neighbours of India primarily and most of 
the ethnicities in India have overshot the 
political boundary to share with particular 
neighbours. For instance, the language, culture 
and sensitivities of West Bengal are, to a large 
extent, shared with Bangladesh. Similarly there 
are many commonalities of ethnicity between the 
Indians and the Nepalese. Much the same can be 
said about Pakistan and India. And so on with Sri 
Lanka. Only Afghanistan, a new member, is not 
contiguous to India. But via Pakistan there are 
historical and some ethnic commonalities among 
India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. All these 
countries need economic development as well as 
democracy. The need for freedom is as strong in 
Pakistan as in India or in Bangladesh or in Nepal 
or Sri Lanka or other places. The Planning 
Commission that the Indian Left parties may 
establish should aim at creating a viable 
regional economic entity in the shape of a 
reinvented SAARC by putting a social and economic 
content in the idea behind SAARC: regional 
integration of a given kind.

The purpose of planning in all the six countries 
has necessarily to be the same as in India. That 
Planning Commission can have a political wing 
too. It should consider political strategy 
primarily for the Indian Left and extend it to 
relations with various members of the SAARC. 
Politics in all the countries have to be not 
merely informed with the spirit of the economic 
policies but also be based on those economic 
policies. In other words, the main thrust of the 
politics of the pro-people parties should be 
basically similar economic programmes.

One would suggest that a set of common slogans or 
policies has to be found that will fire the 
imagination of the masses. My humble suggestion 
would be that it is now time for the Indian Left 
to go well beyond the limited Employment 
Guarantee Scheme that is hopefully being 
implemented by the UPA Government today. It 
should call for a bold departure here: the aim 
should clearly be Social Security for all; jobs 
for all have to be created and in the case of not 
being able to provide jobs to all unemployed, or 
largely unemployed, the state should be provided 
with some compensatory allowances. The size of 
the allowance can be as low as indicated in the 
Indian scheme today or better. But any country 
that is embarking on a plan to make Social 
Security the sheet-anchor of its economic 
policies will have to reorient its politics in 
the same way. The present rush of the Indian 
establishment to make India a tremendously strong 
military power is actually unnecessary and a 
wastage of scarce resources. India needs to make 
Social Security the sheet-anchor of its policies. 
That will ensure its social and political 
integrity much better than a much stronger Indian 
Army. Human security ought to be taken seriously, 
at least by the Left. If economic programmes are 
made that way, the Left can perhaps move out of 
its provinces of West Bengal, Tripura and Kerala. 
It is time for the Left to properly lead India 
directly on its own behalf.

Incidentally while suggesting a broad shift from 
the present course of making India a great 
military power, this can only succeed if the Left 
presents and makes it acceptable to most Indians 
a new policy vis-à-vis Pakistan, the arch rival 
that has nuclear weapons. Pakistan needs to do 
exactly the same. Should there be a strong 
Leftist push against militarisation of the 
economy and society in India, it will rub off on 
Pakistan. The much smaller Left here, that does 
not like militarisation, can take a harder line 
if they are strongly supported by a more pacific 
Pakistan policy by India. Similarly India should 
have pacific policies toward other neighbours 
based on equality and fair-play. But it is not a 
very simple matter. India has come of age as a 
capitalist economy. Imperialism is just a step 
ahead of capitalism's success anywhere. The more 
a capitalist economy succeeds, the more it moves 
into other parts of the globe, tries to corner 
markets exercising control over the resources of 
other countries. Indians are entering that stage. 
Indian multinationals are beginning to find their 
feet-elsewhere too. This is now the time to make 
a great dash for pacific and true 
development-oriented policies. That would help 
Left-learning liberal elements in other countries 
of the region to do the same. South Asia should 
be aimed at becoming an island of prosperity and 
social progress in the globalised village.

-

THERE is a short-term policy conundrum for the 
Left in India. I do not think it is a major or 
fundamental question but it remains a question 
for today: how far can the Left go in supporting 
the UPA Government in Delhi, when the Delhi 
Government is hell-bent on becoming the core ally 
of the US and pursuing a military policy that 
virtually pre-empts social progress of the kind 
implied here? It is obvious that either the UPA 
Government has to restrain its love for America 
and globalisation or the Left will have to draw a 
line somewhere. One sometimes fondly thinks that 
there would be a split in the Congress now. It 
has become necessary. Those who go with Dr 
Manmohan Singh's preferred course would be those 
who are ideologically or otherwise closer to the 
BJP than to the Nehruvian Congress. The other 
Congress, possibly run by Sonia Gandhi, would 
remain loyal to an independent foreign policy and 
an economic policy which is at least 
quasi-socialist. If this were to happen, the Left 
can then have a stronger working arrangement with 
that Congress. But I do not see today an Indira 
Gandhi who would intentionally split the Congress 
and isolate the true succesors of the Syndicate 
of the 1960s.

There is another minor question of there being 
half a dozen Communist Parties and a few 
nominally Socialist ones. The origins of most 
divisions date back to the 1920s and 1930s. That 
age has gone. The issues that divided the various 
Leftist-inclined parties are no more. In India 
one is told the activists of various Leftist 
factions or parties are freely cooperating over 
local matters. It is only the leaderships that 
differ. Even they do not differ much over 
significant matters of economic or foreign 
policies. They only differ among themselves for 
personal or at most for partisan reasons. The 
controversial issues today are globalisation, 
foreign policy in this new age and the security 
questions about Asia. On these questions there 
are deepening differences now emerging in India 
whereas in the last almost six decades there has 
been a consensus over foreign policy. Economic 
policy should now divide the Indians. The issues 
of today should be purposefully focused on and 
new programmes have to be evolved. For that 
purpose the old differences between the Leftist 
groups and parties are meaningless. They refer to 
the controversies of the past, especially over 
who would interpret Marxism better for the 
comrades. The challenge today is a new programme 
to be evolved by all the Leftist groups and 
parties together. That would produce political 
unity as well.

The author is a renowned veteran Pakistani journalist based in Karachi.

_____



[3]

Washington Post
May 18, 2007; Page A19

MOVES BY SRI LANKA MILITARY WORRY HUMAN RIGHTS GROUP

by Nora Boustany

A leading human rights activist expressed fears 
that a northbound mobilization of troops in Sri 
Lanka indicated the Colombo government was 
planning to open another front in its push into 
Tamil Tiger territory, in retaliation for 
increasingly brazen rebel attacks involving 
airstrikes against military air bases.

"The government is now thinking of opening a 
front in the north. We have seen a lot of 
mobilization to indicate that, and lots of aerial 
bombing," Ahilan Kadirgamar, a spokesman for the 
London-based Sri Lanka Democracy Forum, said in 
an interview Wednesday in Washington.

"This is in reaction to the Tigers having brought 
in about half a dozen aircraft parts and 
assembled them in the country to attack air bases 
and oil refineries in the south," he said, 
referring to a recent turning point in the 
24-year-old conflict.

Kadirgamar's organization has a network inside 
Sri Lanka and roving monitors working between 
London and New Delhi to keep the international 
human rights community abreast of developments 
through news releases and visits to Washington, 
New York and Geneva.

Since the beginning of this year, the escalation 
of hostilities in Sri Lanka has contributed to 
increasing violence, which, in addition to the 
fighting, now includes the planting of mines 
along civilian bus routes and the abduction of 
scores of residents on both sides of the front 
lines.

Kadirgamar said his group has appealed to the 
international community, particularly the U.N. 
Human Rights Council, to send human rights 
monitors, not peacekeepers, to the island to 
track serious violations.

Two incidents last month targeting passenger 
buses have heightened anxiety over attacks on 
civilians. In one attack, seven civilians were 
killed and 25 wounded in a blast that destroyed a 
bus traveling between Mannar and Vavunia on April 
7. A similar attack aimed at a bus heading from 
Mannar to Colombo, the capital, on April 23 
killed six Tamil civilians and a government 
soldier in civilian clothing. Six other soldiers 
were injured, the group said.

Sri Lanka's Human Rights Commission has recorded 
more than 100 abductions and disappearances this 
year. Last year, 1,000 people were reported 
missing. A March press release from the Democracy 
Forum said that dozens of civilians had pleaded 
with officials to keep them in jail for fear of 
kidnappings or killings. "The LTTE, the Karuna 
faction and the security forces are all being 
held responsible for these violations," the 
release said. The Karuna is a Tamil faction that 
split from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam 
and is collaborating with government forces.

The Karuna has been abducting businessmen in 
Colombo "with the objective of extorting large 
sums of money," the release said.

The rebel group wants a separate state with full 
control over its law enforcement and government 
entities. But a large majority of the island's 
Tamil minority would like to have a solution 
based on federalism and a decentralization of 
power, Kadirgamar said. Tamils comprise 13 
percent of Sri Lanka's population, and Sinhalese 
make up 73 percent.

Last Sunday, unidentified gunmen shot dead a 
senior Buddhist monk close to a demarcation zone 
separating government troops from Tamil Tiger 
territory in the northeast, a day after soldiers 
killed five rebels in separate incidents, wire 
agencies reported. Troops have evicted the rebels 
from areas they controlled under the terms of a 
shattered 2002 cease-fire, which collapsed 
gradually in recent months.

Richard A. Boucher, assistant secretary of state 
for South and Central Asian affairs, who visited 
Sri Lanka last week, announced that Washington 
had suspended aid that was about to be disbursed 
through the Bush administration's Millennium 
Challenge Corp. because of worries about the rate 
of abductions and killings on both sides. Sri 
Lanka's human rights record and ballooning 
defense spending had also prompted Britain to 
suspend about $3 million in debt relief 
assistance.


_____


[4]

Indian Express
May 20, 2007

MARCH OF THE RIGHTEOUS BRIGADE
by Tavleen Singh

Since this column is often wrongly accused of 
nurturing ill-feelings towards Islam, I use the 
chance this week to show that I bear equal 
ill-will towards any religion that tries to 
occupy the public space. How someone chooses to 
worship in private does not interest me, but as 
the citizen of a secular country, I refuse to 
accept the right of priests and religious people 
to impose their faith, sartorial tastes, and 
morals upon the rest of us.

Last week it was the turn of Sikhs to launch 
forth into the public arena. They took to the 
streets in huge numbers wearing medieval costumes 
and brandishing swords because of some imagined 
insult to Guru Govind Singh. They looked like 
lunatics on the loose and as a Sikh, I was 
extremely irritated to see the religion I was 
brought up in turned into a mockery.

Who are these people? How dare they think they 
have a right to speak on behalf of all Sikhs? 
Personally, I was discomfited by the fanatical 
gleam in the eyes of young men who should have 
better things to do than to run around 
brandishing swords and unkempt beards. And over 
what? Some little Baba in some little Punjab town 
wears an outfit that supposedly resembles the 
clothes Guru Govind Singh liked to wear! And we 
are expected to believe that this was good enough 
reason for this public display of religious 
hysteria?

Where were the keepers of law and order? Is it 
not an offence to wander the streets waving 
swords? Why were these protests permitted in 
cities across Punjab? Is it because the Akali 
government is taking revenge on Baba Gurmeet Ram 
Rahim Singh for urging his followers to vote 
Congress in the recent Assembly elections? If it 
is, then the Akalis have learned nothing from the 
mistakes of the past. Mistakes for which 
thousands of innocent people died terrible deaths 
at the hands of terrorists because some fools in 
positions of power thought religion and politics 
made a good mix.

Whenever religion moves beyond private worship to 
the public space this happens. Thousands of 
Indians have died in riots caused by religion, 
India was divided because religion was allowed to 
intervene in matters that should have been 
restricted to politics and still we appear to 
have learned no lessons. We make no objections to 
our political leaders consorting with religious 
men who range from the dangerous to the bizarre.

Remember that Baba from Mathura whose blessings 
came in the form of a kick on the head of 
visiting dignitaries? Remember the dignitaries 
who lined up to be kicked? One of them was 
India's home minister. Unusually for a religious 
person the kicking Baba seems to have had a 
secret sense of humour.

My aversion to religion being allowed to occupy 
the public arena is also because it brings forth 
a particularly loathsome type of righteous 
person. The sort of person who believes he has 
the divine right to become arbiter of public 
morals by using violence and intimidation if 
necessary. The Indian state is easily brought to 
its knees by this kind of 'righteousness' and 
films and books have been banned on account of 
it, but the real laboratory of loathsome 
righteousness is Narenda Modi's Gujarat.

We saw it in action at the M.S . University's 
Faculty of Fine Arts, Vadodara, in the 
Chandramohan incident. Instead of locking up the 
busybody who went poking his nose into other 
people's paintings, the Modi government arrested 
the student whose painting the busybody found 
offensive.

Modi is famous for being loathsomely righteous in 
the name of Hindutva, but this time he exceeded 
his own high standards by showing the world - as 
the sword-waving Sikhs did - that secular India 
is no different from the worst kind of Islamic 
state. The annoying thing about the loathsomely 
righteous is also that they are usually stupid, 
so they demanded a ban on Fanaa because Aamir 
Khan commiserated with Medha Patkar when she 
fasted against the Narmada Dam.

If they had been more intelligent they would have 
noticed that if there was reason to demand a ban 
it should have been because the film's hero is a 
terrorist who steals a nuclear device from the 
Indian army. With Parzania they failed to notice 
that the film lied about Godhra.

The only way to stop being held to ransom by 
people who should not have any right in a secular 
country to occupy the public space is for the 
state to ensure that religion remains a private 
affair. When sword-waving Sikhs take to the 
streets, they should be arrested, as should 
fatwa-issuing maulvis and hate-spewing Hindu 
fanatics. They violate the secular principles on 
which India is built and if that is not an 
offence I do not know what is.


______


[5]

People's Democracy
May 20, 2007

Editorial

STOP THIS VIGILANTISM

The RSS has concluded that the recent rout of the 
BJP in the UP assembly elections was due to the 
fact that it was not aggressive enough with its 
Hindutva agenda. The message is clear. In the 
days to come, all the tentacles of the communal 
octopus are bound to flex their muscles in 
sharpening communal polarisation and spreading 
deeper the venom of communal hatred.

This, naturally, would be accompanied by 
fascistic intolerance unleashed by the `cultural' 
vigilantes of the RSS. This is precisely what 
happened recently at the Maharaja Sayajirao 
University in Vadodara in Gujarat. The local VHP 
`moral police' barged into the fine arts 
department of the university where students had 
put up some paintings as a part of their internal 
assessment. The VHP vandalised the paintings 
claiming that they offend their sentiments and 
sensibilities. The award winning student 
Chandramohan was assaulted and roughed up. In 
typical BJP-led Gujarat style, the police acted 
promptly by arresting the victim of this 
horrendous incident and not the attackers! Not 
satisfied, the pro-vice chancellor of the 
university acting in a manner of being more loyal 
than the king suspended the dean of the faculty 
because he defended his student! Chandramohan had 
to spend nearly a week in jail before getting 
bail. The dean continues to remain suspended. In 
the meanwhile, the VHP vigilantes have laid siege 
to the university, perhaps the premier fine arts 
institution in the country which had been the 
home for eminent artists of the likes of Bhupen 
Khakkar, K G Subramaniam etc.

Naturally, this outrageous fascistic assault has 
been condemned by all democrats, across the 
country, as a brazen affront to the Indian 
Constitution which guarantees the freedom of 
expression. But, such incidents appear to be the 
order of the day in Gujarat under Narendra Modi. 
Popular films like Parzania which documents the 
post-Godhra communal pogrom of 2002 has been 
banned from being screened in Gujarat theatres. M 
F Husain's gallery in Ahmedabad is vandalised, 
part of an unprecedented chain of obnoxious 
events forcing one of India's greatest living 
artists to virtually live abroad in exile. 
Continuous threats are issued that Husain would 
be arrested the moment he sets foot in his own 
country.

In a classic case of the kettle calling the pot 
black, the fascistic `cultural police' of the RSS 
tentacles accuse the likes of Chandramohan and M 
F Husain of promoting enmity and hurting 
religious sentiments of the people. (The arrest 
warrants are under Section 153 (A) of the Indian 
Penal Code which relates to this precise charge.) 
The pretensions to moral outrage comes from a 
government in Gujarat whose top police officers 
shoot innocent couples after branding them as LeT 
agents!

The BJP, in the meantime, has come out in a 
brazen defence of the cultural vigilantism 
displayed by the RSS tentacles, Vishwa Hindu 
Parishad and Bajrang Dal. Speaking at the BJP's 
parliamentary party meeting, the leader of the 
opposition, Advani, has stated that the BJP could 
not support a concept of personal artistic 
freedom to hurt religious sentiments. And, of 
course, what is not stated is that the 
RSS/BJP/VHP/Bajrang Dal are the only ones who can 
judge on such matters. The fascistic storm 
troopers will, thus, as always and anywhere, be 
both the prosecutor and the judge.

What makes this incident at the M S University 
all the more outrageous is the fact that 
routinely students display copies of many temple 
sculptures in their academic work. In this 
particular instance, as well, this occurred. In 
any case, these exhibitions were, as stated 
above, part of the internal academic assessment 
and not meant for any public display. 
Nevertheless, even if they were, will the saffron 
brigade now target the temples at Khajuraho and 
Konarak for their sexually explicit sculptures?

Clearly, the motivation behind such attacks by 
the self-proclaimed defenders of religious 
sentiments is to sharpen communal polarisation 
for political and electoral gains. The casualty, 
in the process, are the very freedoms guaranteed 
in our Constitution. It is high time that the 
secular democratic public opinion must rise 
unitedly to put an end to such a situation in 
which self-styled cultural vigilantes of the RSS 
tentacles can violate and deny others the 
fundamental rights enshrined in our Constitution.


______


[6] 

Deccan Herald
May 20, 2007

INDIA NOT PRIVILEGE OR MONOPOLY OF HINDUS
Mangalore, DH News Service:
Delivering the inaugural address at the national 
seminar on Communalism and Media, Justice Sachar 
opined that there is a very conscious effort by 
those who pretend to be the keepers of the 
country to spread negative news about Muslims in 
the country.

    "India is not the privilege or monopoly of 
Hindus. Muslims are very much a part of India's 
history, culture, pride and heritage," said 
former Supreme Court Judge Justice Rajendra 
Sachar.
    Delivering the inaugural address at the 
national seminar on "Communalism and Media" 
organised by Karnataka Communal Harmony Forum 
here on Saturday, Justice Sachar opined that 
there is a very conscious effort by those who 
pretend to be the keepers of the country to 
spread negative news about Muslims in the country.
    No one has a right to ask a person whether he 
or she is loyal to the country. Loyalty to a 
country is nobody's preserve. It is automatic to 
any natural citizen, Justice Sachar said and 
added that the communal version that the Muslims 
do not belong to the country and that they have 
their sympathies to Pakistan is a vicious lie.
    "Muslims are minorities because they are less 
in number. This doesn't mean they have less 
rights," he said and added that anyone who doubts 
or makes fun of secularism is a traitor and is 
violating the Constitution.
    Senior journalist and film maker Nupur Basu 
opined that media in India has become a very 
powerful animal in the last one and a half decade 
and that its increasing polarisation is a very 
troubling trend. The various communal riots that 
took place in the country recently were not 
spontaneous as the politicians are trying to 
prorogate, but were well engineered projects, she 
said and added that the journalists have not done 
enough on this matter yet.
    Senior journalist and columnist Praful Bidwai 
stated that Karnataka is one of the most rapidly 
saffronising states in the country.
    "Around 20,000 people were killed in communal 
riots in India only in the last 10 years. This is 
higher than the number of people killed in 
terrorist attacks," Mr Bidwai said and added, 
"The fact that Narendra Modi who has executed the 
killing of 1,500 Muslims in Gujarat is the Chief 
Minister of the state even 5 years after the 
Godhra riots is extremely shameful to the whole 
country".
    Media is not just about Chronicling, it has to 
analyse, has to remind people about past events 
and act as a watch dog of the society, he said 
and flayed the 'Murdochisation' and massive 
decliner in diversity in the media.
    Writer and activist Arundhati Roy opined that 
the Modi government in Gujarat is using democracy 
as a tool to prorogate fascism. She also said 
that it is not right to blame the politicians 
alone for the condition in Gujarat, for it is the 
people who voted them to power, and hence they 
are also responsible for their condition. She 
further elaborated on the growth of RSS as a 
prominent force in Indian politics.
    Vartha Bharathi Editor Abdusalaam Puttige, 
writer G Rajashekhar, Karnataka Communal Harmony 
Forum State Secretary K L Ashok, district 
president C N Shetty, Roshni Nilaya lecturer Prof 
Rita Noronha, Karnataka Forum for Dignity 
Secretary Abdul Lateef, PUCL President P B D'Sa, 
Mangalore University Chair in Christianity 
Chairman Fr John Fernandes and Chitra 
Publications Managing Director B V Seetharam 
among others were present on the occasion. 

______


[7] 

Communalism Combat


May 18, 2007

PRESS STATEMENT

We as citizens of India, committed to Peace 
between peoples, communities and nations, 
standing for equality for all strongly condemn 
the dastardly blasts after Friday prayers at the 
Hyderabad Mecca Mosque today. Terror attacks have 
no religion and victims of all communities fall 
prey to these premeditated and violent attacks. 
India being a secular democratic republic 
committed to its constitutional mandate must 
ensure that all its agencies of State and Law 
Enforcement look at all acts of terror 
dispassionately and acknowledge that these can be 
planned and carried out by outfits of all colours 
and hue who eschew and promote hatred and 
violence. International terror outfits as well as 
those that use religion to generate terror from 
within the country. All must be equally put under 
intelligence scanners. To date the activities of 
all such outfits, despite their proven and public 
record of generating acts of terror and violence 
including perpetrating pogroms against sections 
of Indians, have NOT been scrutinized with the 
same rigour as those of know terror outfits. We 
must not forget the lessons, unraveled, and yet 
to be unraveled following the nanded (2006 and 
2007) and Malegaon (2006) blasts in Maharashtra.


Teesta Setalvad
Javed Anand
Arvind Krishnaswamy
Nandan Maluste
Rajendra Prasad


Sabrang Communications & Publishing Pvt. Ltd.
P.O.Box 28253, Juhu Post Office, Juhu, Mumbai 400 
049. Tel.: 26602288 / 26603927, Fax: 26602288
Email: sabrang at bom2.vsnl.net.in. Web: www.sabrang.com

______


[8]

                  People's Tribunal on Nandigram

NOTIFICATION

WHEREAS on 14th March, 2007, a large section of people/local residents
protesting against the entry of the huge armed contingent of police
and other categories of armed forces in Nandigram area, Purba
Medinipur, West Bengal, were allegedly attacked, and injured and
killed in the police firing;

AND whereas 14 people including women (according to the government
version) were officially confirmed as being killed in the violence
while many women and men were severely injured by firing, lathi-
beating and /or use of toxic materials;

And whereas there were also incidents of arson, carnage, violence,
killing and flight from affected villages starting from the month of
January 2007, including the incidents of violence on 6 / 7th January
2007;

And whereas there has been continuation of such violence even after
14th March incident, including that on 30th April 2007;

And whereas there has been considerable public reaction, outcry and
commotion over the14th March incident; and other incidents of
violence; and whereas it has been prima-facie established that the
police action of 14 March 2007 is violative of Article 21 of
Constitution of India and of various provisions of the laws of the
land and of human rights.

And whereas the All India Citizens' Initiative are of the firm opinion
that it is necessary to constitute an independent People's Tribunal
for the purpose of finding truth about the aforesaid matter(s), which
is definitely a matter of public importance;

And whereas no Judicial Inquiry Commission has been set up by the
Government authorities to inquire into the aforesaid matter(s);

  Therefore, in these circumstances, the All India Citizens'
Initiative, comprising of eminent citizens from various sections of
society of India, decides to set up a people's Tribunal consisting of
judges and juries namely.:

Justice Bhargava, Ex-Chief Justice Sikkim High Court
Prabash Joshi, Editor, Jansatta
Minakshi Sen Bandopadhyay, Ex-Member, Womens Commission, Tripura
Lalita Ramdas, Social Activist
John Dayal, Journalist and Human Rights Activist
Jyotirmay Samajder, Doctor
And others

in order to investigate the aforesaid matter(s)


The TERMS OF REFERENCE OF THE TRIBUNAL shall be as follows:

(i)	to inquire into the background, causes, course, nature and motive,
if any leading to the incident of 14th March;

(ii)	to consider whether any organized group or groups of people or
individual/individuals was/were involved in the incident and /or were
behind the incident;

(iii)	to ascertain whether the reported state violence and alleged
mass killings were done or purported to be done for restoration of
public order and for establishment of rule of law in the affected
areas, and to find out responsibility of the state authorities,
administrative as well as law enforcing agencies;

(iv)	to inquire into the nature of social, economic and medical
consequences upon the victims in particular as well as the people of
Nandigram and adjoining areas at large;

(v)	to examine whether there was any cases of disappearances/missing
arising out of the police action/or state-supported actions and also
to examine truthfulness of allegations of lapse or failure on the part
of police and medical practitioners towards injured victims;

(vi)	to consider such other matters relevant or incidental to the
aforesaid terms of reference  as the tribunal may deem fit and
proper .


With this TERMS OF REFERENCE, the TRIBUNAL is now issuing this public
notification [ ref.no PTN-01/05/007 dt  16.05.07] inviting the State
Government, District Administration, Purba Medinipur, including police
administration of  both State and District level, the Chief Medical
Officer of Health of the District and other doctors and sisters
attached to health departments and hospitals of the district,
political parties, associations /organizations /(mass and /or social )/
NGOs, members  of the public  having knowledge or acquainted  with the
INCIDENT or other incidents or facts relevant to the above TERMS OF
REFERENCE, to furnish to the Tribunal Statements of Facts relating to
the aforesaid incident or the above terms of reference.


_____


[9]  BOOK REVIEWS:

(i)

Outlook Magazine | May 28, 2007

A RIOT OF COMMEMORATING
The mutiny as seen through literature, folksong, 
missives and a canonical episode ...
by Shahid Amin


BOOKS ON 1857
	All nations, old and new, claim their antiquity in their own ways.
Nation-states-Firangi, Francisi, Amriki, or our 
own-find it impossible to recollect without 
commemorating. As national markers, 
commemorations allow for the passage of 
identity-bearing citizens through hallowed time. 
During such hooplas, both the Republic and the 
public make demands for historical 'item numbers'.

But how does one convey the tumult that was 1857: 
mutiny and insurgency, plebeian disorder and 
state terror, atavistic proclamations and radical 
stirrings, within the contours of the India of 
today? How does one narrate the 'Ghadar', when 
the voice of the native rebel (of sundry accents) 
has been strangled into oblivion? Till very 
recently, most accounts of 1857, both learned and 
popular, have not been too bothered by the 
paucity of 'native sources'. The records of the 
past-as also in the present-are generated and 
kept by victors, or rulers, even if we elect them 
ourselves.

Rebellion 1857, published 50 years ago, and now 
reissued, represents the best of popular Marxist 
scholarship. A handy compendium which highlights 
the impress of the Upsurge on Urdu literature and 
folk songs, it underscores the contribution of 
peasants, artisans and 'Muslim revivalists' to 
the making of the Ghadar. It has a detailed piece 
on the making of the rebellion, especially in 
Delhi, where Bahadur Shah Zafar was a prisoner of 
the sepoys, and of history. The irony of 
featuring a reclining Zafar as a huge puppet, 
perched atop the Red Fort, stirring daintily in 
response to the pull of strings, was perhaps 
deliberately invoked in the recent mega show in 
the capital! An illuminating essay on Ghalib's 
view of the loss and recapture of Delhi, and 
another on the folk songs of 1857 present the 
non-combatants' perceptions of the events.

The Penguin 1857 Reader is a fresh collection, 
where the documents of the time, and extracts 
from a spate of British 'Mutiny Narratives' that 
followed, speak to us directly. We have here some 
interesting letters, impressions, recollections 
and analyses of actors and contemporary and 
near-contemporary writers. The pre-revolt 
missives sent by Laxmibai to British officers, 
the report on the circulation of chapatis by 
Delhi policemen, the plight of English officers 
and families, and accounts of British reprisals. 
There are extracts from the trial of Bahadur Shah 
Zafar, Queen Victoria's proclamation offering 
amnesty to all save those charged with the 
killing of 'British subjects', translations of 
folk songs, newsreports from Europe and US, and 
the representation of 1857 in English fiction. 
Brief introductions provide the context.

Nayar's companion volume, The Great Uprising, has 
a much tighter storyline. Well-researched, it 
provides a potted history of British rule in 
India, settling down to an innovative retelling 
of the events in the "many theatres of the war". 
To recount the entire story of 'The Sepoy War', 
cluttered as it is with disparately connected 
events, without letting the reader's attention 
waver is a major achievement. The downside is the 
virtual absence in Nayar's account of the 
generalised uprising, especially in the Ganga 
valley. He links 1857 rather coyly with Gandhian 
nationalism, thus muddying a fine copybook 
unnecessarily.

Rudrangshu Mukherjee's Spectre of Violence makes 
no such leap of imagination. He focuses instead 
on a canonical episode of rebel violence: the 
massacre of besieged and depleted English 
combatants and women and children at Satichaura 
Ghat, and subsequently at the enclosed 
Bibighar.In a finely tuned analysis, Mukherjee 
dares to look this violence-and the evidence-in 
the face, not to hail it, but to show how the 
various British accounts of these events got 
constructed by an interplay between what was 
witnessed, remembered and enshrined. We have 
already moved away from a head count-colonialist 
and nationalist-in the grisly sense of that term. 
And entered history's estate, where historians 
are often in a position to establish not just 
what happened in the past, but also how memory 
and memorialisation play on the certitude of 
facts.

o o o

(ii)


The Globe and Mail
May 19, 2007

SRI LANKA NOVEL LIVES UP TO ITS BZZZZZ

by Shyam Selvadurai


Mosquito
By Roma Tearne
HarperCollins, 296 pages, $29.95

In 1987, Theo Samarajeeva, the hero of Roma 
Tearne's debut novel Mosquito, leaves behind his 
life in England and returns to Sri Lanka, the 
country of his birth. What drives him back is the 
tragic death of his Italian wife, Anna, during a 
mugging. Theo, a world-renowned novelist, is 
hoping to lick his wounds and resume work on a 
book in an idyllic seaside villa along Sri 
Lanka's southern coast.

The world around Theo, however, is far from 
idyllic. He has returned into what is often 
regarded as the most turbulent time in Sri 
Lanka's 23-year-old civil war. The government has 
extended its term in parliament without an 
election. In order to combat the Tamil Tigers in 
the north and a growing Maoist revolution in the 
south, the government has armed civilian units 
known as Home Guards. These militia are not 
answerable to anyone and have begun to kill 
scores of young people in the south, burying them 
in mass graves.

Since his arrival at the villa, Theo has taken an 
interest in Nulani Mendis, a 17-year-old girl 
from the neighbourhood who visits him regularly. 
Her father was murdered some years before for his 
political opinions, and the girl has remained 
mute since then, taking refuge in her drawings. 
Theo sees immediately that Nulani is a gifted 
artist, and under his care and affection she 
begins to emerge from her shell. Soon Theo finds 
he is falling in love with her.

Theo is unaware of the dark undercurrents in this 
idyllic village by the sea. His loyal manservant, 
Sugi, who is from the village, knows better. "Be 
careful sir," Sugi warns him. "You do not yet 
fully understand this ruined place. ... We are so 
confused by the war."

Sugi is particularly concerned about Theo's 
relationship with Nulani. Her uncle, the leader 
of the local Home Guard unit, has other plans for 
his niece. But it is not in Theo's nature to be 
careful. Soon things come to a head and Theo is 
abducted by Nulani's uncle, acting on 
instructions from the Sri Lankan army. Theo is 
imprisoned by the army and tortured.

This abduction puzzled me. Why would a government 
risk worldwide censure by imprisoning and 
torturing a writer of Theo's stature? His books 
expressed sympathy toward the Tamils, it's true, 
but he has maintained a low profile and not been 
involved in any muck-raking.

It is equally puzzling that the four-year 
disappearance of a writer of this stature raises 
no stir in the publishing world or in the media. 
When Theo does turn up, all his agent has to say 
is, "For God's sake, Theo, I thought you were 
dead. I sent you letter after letter but you 
never replied. I tried phoning but your lines 
were constantly down."

Writer Frank O'Connor has said that the novel is 
an art form that builds around the nature of time 
and the effects that time has on events and 
characters. I believe this is the great pleasure 
of the novel, and in this aspect, Mosquito amply 
rewards. Tearne, a Sri Lankan visual artist 
educated and living in England, uses her keen eye 
to render details of place and character in a 
startling and original way.

And once she has established her world, readers 
witness how people and places change over time: 
Marriages collapse and come back together, 
beloved characters die, others grow old, the 
young become disillusioned. The rural village 
grows more metropolitan, until it becomes almost 
a suburb of Colombo, the capital. Tearne does 
wonderfully what any novelist writing about 
modern Sri Lanka must do: capture a balance 
between its aching beauty and its horror.

Shyam Selvadurai's most recent novel is Cinnamon Garden.


_____

[10]  EVENTS:

Calling students, artists, poets, journalists, 
film-makers, designers, art historians, critics, 
art lovers, doctors, architects, scientists, 
writers, lawyers, activists and all other 
citizens!
The recent Sangh Parivar offensive against the 
Fine Arts Faculty of M.S. University is another 
episode of blatant bullying in the name of 
religion.
A Dharna is organised to demand:
1.	Dismissal of case against Chandra Mohan
2.	Immediate revoking of the suspension order against Dr. Shivaji
Panikkar
3.	Vice-Chancellor's resignation/removal for 
his inability to take any action against the 
intruders

We, the citizens against fascism, stand for our 
democratic rights to free expression. Please do 
come in large numbers to strengthen the voice.

Venue: In front of Town Hall, Ellisbridge, Ashram Road, Ahmedabad
Date:	Wednesday, 23rd May 2007
	Time: 5:00 pm onwards

Please circulate this email to as many people as possible. Thanks!
For details please contact: 98240 26069 (Pravin Mishra), 079 26463792,
26447691 (Imran Ali)


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

Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on
matters of peace and democratisation in South
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DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in materials carried in the posts do not
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