SACW | July 06-07, 2007 | Struggle for Sri Lankan Democracy / Bangladesh: Lock Up the Mulla's / Pakistan Time Bomb + time for secular education / India' Shame: Gujarat Genocide's aftermath

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | July 06-07, 2007 | Dispatch No. 2429 - Year 9

[1] The Ongoing Struggle For Democracy in Sri Lanka (Rohini Hensman)
  (ii) Government moves to re-enact criminal 
defamation law (Press release - CPJ)
  (iii) Strengthen National Institutions to Deal 
with Human Rights Violations and Overcome 
National Regression (NPC)
[2]  Bangladesh: Three Down, One To Go (Zafar Sobhan)
[3]  Pakistan: The Pakistan Time Bomb (Stephen P. Cohen)
   (ii) [Say Yes to Mainstream Secular Education ] 
Whither madressah reform? (Editorial, The News)
[4]  Why are India and Pakistan reluctant to 
honour their common hero? (Jawed Naqvi)
[5]  India's Big Shame: Gujarat 2002-2007 - 
Genocide's aftermath (Editors, Communalism Combat)
[6]  India - Business As usual for Fascists in 
Gujarat: Former dean of Baroda's art school 
assaulted (Sahmat release + news report)
[7]  Australian Peace Activists letter Re: India/ 
United States Nuclear Deal/Nuclear Suppliers Group


______


[1]

http://www.sacw.net/peace/rohini06072007.html
www.sacw.net - 7 July 2007

THE ONGOING STRUGGLE FOR DEMOCRACY IN SRI LANKA

by Rohini Hensman

The eviction of hundreds of Tamils from Colombo 
would have been a catastrophe, threatening to 
push the country into the infamous category of 
nations which practice ethnic cleansing, 
internationally defined as a crime against 
humanity. Fortunately, the outcry against the 
move by citizens of all communities, as well as 
international condemnation and the Supreme Court 
ruling ordering the evictions to stop, averted 
this disaster.

The Prime Minister apologised for the gross 
violation of constitutionally guaranteed rights 
which had taken place, saying the government took 
full responsibility for the action. But the 
Defence Secretary continued to maintain that old 
women and small children carried by their 
mothers, reported by Reuters to be among those 
evicted, could have been terrorists, and that 
young men fleeing LTTE conscription should be 
sent back to swell LTTE ranks. Furthermore, 
ethnic cleansing continued in the East, as 
thousands of Tamils displaced from Sampur and 
Muttur East were barred from returning to their 
villages on the pretext that the area was to be 
converted into a High Security Zone. 
State-sponsored programmes displacing Muslims in 
Amparai Province also fuelled fears of ethnic 
cleansing.

This reversal of the expulsion of Tamils from 
Colombo demonstrates that unlike the LTTE, which 
expelled the entire Muslim population of the 
North in 1990 and has never allowed it to return, 
the government of Sri Lanka still retains some 
commitment to democracy. But it also demonstrates 
the alarming degree to which that democracy is 
threatened by senior members of the government 
and security forces. The notion of collective 
punishment -- 'punishing' an entire community for 
the crimes committed by some of its members -- is 
anathema to modern notions of justice and 
democracy.

Democracy cannot be reduced to parliamentary 
elections or the rule of the majority; it is the 
rule of ALL the people, which in turn depends on 
certain fundamental rights for ALL members of the 
population. The right to move freely within the 
country is one such right enshrined in our 
constitution. Interference with it is warranted 
only if there is serious suspicion that a person 
has committed a criminal offence, and the crime 
can be proved in a court of law. No such evidence 
was presented against the people who were 
deported from Colombo. The only other situation in
which deportation is legally (though not 
necessarily morally) justifiable is when the 
person being deported is from a foreign 
nation-state and does not have a valid visa for 
the country in which he or she is residing. Does 
the Government of Sri Lanka agree with the LTTE 
that the Northeast is a separate state?

The strategy of victimising a whole section of 
society in order to eliminate a terrorist threat 
posed by a few of its members, which was 
justified by Gotabhaya Rajapakse, can have 
horrific consequences. His attitude was shared by 
sections of the state during the JVP uprising:
exterminate all the Sinhalese youths in a 
village, they argued, and any JVP members among 
them would be wiped out. These people do not seem 
to think that the price to be paid, in terms of 
extrajudicial executions and the slaughter of 
innocents, is too high. The LTTE thinks in the 
same way, justifying the 'punishment' of innocent 
Muslims and Sinhalese for actions committed by 
other members of their communities. Allowing such 
people to tighten their control over state power 
in Sri Lanka would mean the death of our 
democracy.

Feeding the Tigers

The eviction of Tamils from Colombo puts a big 
question mark not only over the moral and legal 
credentials of those sections of the government 
and security forces who are driving the agenda 
today, but also over their competence and 
intelligence. Presumably they know that a war is 
raging in the North and East, that thousands of 
people have been killed in the last two years, 
lakhs have been displaced, and forcible 
conscription is occurring, including child 
conscription? You don't have to be a genius to 
recognise that people from these troubled 
provinces have very good reasons for seeking 
refuge in more secure parts of the island.

What is achieved by sending these hapless people 
back into LTTE-controlled territory? First and 
foremost, whatever faith they might have had in 
the Sri Lankan government's claim that it is 
trying to liberate them from the Tigers would be 
destroyed: you do not 'liberate' people from a 
terrorist group by forcibly sending them back 
into territory controlled by it! Secondly, as we 
noted, young people fleeing conscription by the 
LTTE would be forced -- by state security forces 
-- into a position where they have no option but 
to join the Tigers and thus strengthen them 
militarily. Thirdly, outrage by Tamils around the 
world at this unjustified attack would tend to 
spur fund-raising efforts by LTTE supporters. 
Such policies, combined with the SLFP's pathetic 
proposals for a political solution, can only give 
credibility to LTTE arguments for Tamil Eelam.

No decent person can justify the ghastly acts of 
terrorism perpetrated by the LTTE, but 
'punishing' innocent people for them is not going 
to stop those acts. On the contrary, the more 
innocent Tamils are attacked, the easier it will 
be for the LTTE to recruit suicide bombers from 
among relatives of the dead who have been driven 
mad by grief and rage. This dynamic has been 
observed in many other situations of terrorism. 
Thus every action of the state which victimises 
innocent Tamils succeeds only in feeding the 
Tigers.

'Bullying' or Assistance?

International concern about rampant human rights 
violations in Sri Lanka has been characterised by 
chauvinist elements in the government as 
'bullying' of a sovereign nation by outsiders. 
The Sinhala nationalist lobby believes, 
apparently, that Sri Lanka is not located on 
planet earth but on some other planet of its own. 
But people who have their feet planted more 
firmly on the ground know that Sri Lanka is a 
small island in the Indian Ocean, it is affected 
by events that occur in other parts of the world, 
and it belongs to the international community. If 
it wishes to be a respected member of that 
community, it must abide by international law. 
These laws have been enacted to protect the weak 
and vulnerable from their oppressors, and all 
those who wish to defend human rights and 
democracy in Sri Lanka see them as a source of 
strength, not of weakness.

No one objects to having a foreign coach for our 
cricket team if that helps the team to play 
better; no one would think of calling that 
'bullying'. Nor did we object to the foreign aid 
that poured into Sri Lanka after the tsunami as 
being a form of 'interference' in the affairs of 
our sovereign nation. When we are in need of 
something, and the resources to satisfy that need 
are not available within the country, we are 
grateful for help from abroad. As former Foreign 
Secretary H.M.G.S.Palihakkara correctly pointed 
out, Sri Lanka's peace process has become highly 
internationalised only because our country has 
failed to solve its own problems.

Our greatest need at the moment -- greater even 
than the need for tsunami reconstruction -- is 
the need for assistance to bring to justice the 
perpetrators of heinous crimes, including acts of 
terrorism, murder, enforced disappearances, rape, 
child conscription, forcible conscription of 
adults, abduction, and extortion. These crimes 
are being committed daily, often in broad 
daylight; recently, for example, two humanitarian 
workers of the Red Cross were abducted at Fort 
Station in the heart of Colombo and later found 
murdered, yet the government and security forces 
were unable to identify or catch the criminals. 
The fact that such occurrences have become 
routine, and the perpetrators are never 
prosecuted, indicates that even in areas securely 
under government control, the criminal justice 
system is unable to cope with the task of 
investigating these crimes, locating and 
arresting the criminals, and
bringing them to justice; the very fact that the 
police resorted to indiscriminate expulsion of 
Tamils from Colombo proves that they lack the 
detective skills to identify the real terrorists. 
In areas under LTTE control, torture, killings 
and child conscription go on with complete 
impunity.

Under these circumstances, anyone with an 
interest in justice and security would welcome 
the offer of a UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission 
to investigate these crimes and procure evidence 
enabling the arrest and indictment of the 
perpetrators. Indeed, the only people who might 
oppose such assistance would be the criminals 
themselves. If the government continues to refuse 
the offer of international assistance, the 
suspicion will inevitably grow that the criminals 
currently evading justice include elements within 
the government itself and its security forces, 
since a
government which had nothing to hide would 
welcome all the help it could get to restore the 
rule of law. Such assistance no more constitutes 
foreign interference in internal affairs than 
tsunami aid from foreign countries. Every citizen 
who is sick of the prevailing lawlessness and 
insecurity should press the government to invite 
help from the international community to 
re-establish the rule of law in our country.

Defeating the Tigers, Ending the War

The Defence Secretary has gone on record claiming 
that the LTTE can be defeated militarily with the 
help of the Karuna forces. Is this true? The TMVP 
can certainly help state security forces in the 
East, but what about the North, where Karuna has 
no presence? All the dismal experience of nearly 
25 years of war tells us that any attempt to 
tackle the LTTE militarily in their Northern 
stronghold will cost thousands of lives, and end 
in a stalemate. Meanwhile, the cost of the war 
will drive prices ever higher, tourism and 
investment will suffer, jobs will be lost, 
poverty will sky-rocket. Aid has already been 
cut, and could be slashed further. International 
trade minister G.L.Pieris has bemoaned the 
withholding of aid, saying that it might 
strengthen terrorism, but donor countries have to 
reckon with the possibility that, on the 
contrary, providing aid could strengthen (state) 
terrorism, unless international monitors confirm 
that is not happening.

Worst of all, we would still have the prospect of 
a never-ending war. Isn't it time to try 
something different? Dry up the sources of LTTE 
funding and recruitment, and they will wither 
away. No doubt there will still be a hard core of 
incorrigible LTTE supporters, and the leadership 
will never give up their goal of Tamil Eelam, but 
they will gradually lose their power as they find 
that no one is following them. This is not an 
impossible task. If the majority of Tamils in Sri 
Lanka were convinced that they could live safely 
and securely in a united (NOT unitary) Sri Lanka, 
with their right to equality and dignity 
protected, why would they risk their lives 
fighting for a totalitarian Tamil state? And if 
the international community were convinced that 
the human and democratic rights of Tamils were 
protected in a united Sri Lanka, they would put 
much heavier pressure on the LTTE to lay down 
their arms and accept a democratic political 
solution.

Three things are required to arrive at such a 
goal. One is to clamp down firmly on all attacks 
on Tamil and Muslim civilians, including ethnic 
cleansing of any sort, so that they feel the 
government is on their side. A UN human rights 
mission would help to achieve this. The second is 
to come up with proposals for a political soluton 
which satisfies Muslims and the majority of 
Tamils. Tissa Vitharana's APRC proposal, based on 
a synthesis of the majority and minority reports 
of the panel of experts, has already laid the 
basis for this, although Sinhalese extremists in 
the
SLFP are trying to undermine it. And thirdly, 
military operations must be limited to defensive 
ones. It is certainly legitimate for the security 
forces to foil terrorist attacks and defend 
themselves if attacked, but unnecessary offensive 
operations, which kill civilians as well as 
children and adults who are already victims of 
forcible conscription by the LTTE, should be 
avoided. The aim should be to liberate such 
people, not kill them.

The people of Sri Lanka recently scored a 
significant victory in their struggle to force 
the government to fight the Tigers politically 
instead of feeding them, when they succeeded in 
reversing the policy of evicting Tamils from 
Colombo. They can do more to defeat the Tigers 
and end the war if they press for the policies 
outlined above: inviting a UN human rights 
monitoring mission, finalising a democratic 
political solution acceptable to the majority of 
Tamil-speaking people, and avoiding unnecessary 
military operations.

o o o

(ii)

Committee to Protect Journalists
330 Seventh Avenue, New York, NY 10001 USA    
Phone: (212) 465-1004     Fax: (212) 465-9568 
Web: www.cpj.org     E-Mail: media at cpj.org

SRI LANKA: GOVERNMENT MOVES TO RE-ENACT CRIMINAL DEFAMATION LAW

New York, July 5, 2007-Amid an accelerating 
government attack on media in Sri Lanka, the 
Committee to Protect Journalists is concerned 
about a proposal to reintroduce a criminal 
defamation law that, if implemented, could 
include two-year prison penalties.

Justice Minister Dilan Perera introduced the 
resolution at a June 27 Cabinet meeting. 
According to media reports, the move had the 
backing of President Mahinda Rajapaksa, but three 
Cabinet ministers dissented and the resolution is 
under deliberation. 

"We strongly urge President Rajapaksa's 
government to reject any attempt to reintroduce 
criminal defamation," said Joel Simon, CPJ's 
executive director. "The threat of prison will 
have a chilling effect on the media and greatly 
inhibit journalists' ability to report 
independently on Sri Lanka's ongoing civil 
conflict." 

The move comes as Rajapaksa's government has 
criticized and pressured different private media 
outlets over their reporting of the government's 
renewed military campaign against the rebel Tamil 
Tigers. 
<http://www.cpj.org/news/2007/asia/sri20jun07na.html>Last 
month his government ordered local Internet 
service providers to block access to a pro-rebel 
Web site. Defense Minister Gotabaya Rajapaksa was 
quoted last month by the BBC and other media 
organizations as saying that Tamil Tiger rebels 
were disseminating incorrect information about 
alleged government abuses.

Sri Lanka first scrapped its criminal defamation 
legislation in June 2002, making it one of the 
few countries in the world to do so. Free Media 
Movement, a local press freedom group, said in a 
recent public statement that authorities employed 
criminal defamation charges in the past "to 
silence critical reportage and prosecute editors 
and journalists." 

CPJ is a New York-based, independent, nonprofit 
organization that works to safeguard press 
freedom worldwide. For more information, visit 
www.cpj.org.


  o o o

(iii)

National Peace Council of Sri Lanka
12/14 Purana Vihara Road
Colombo 6
Tel:  2818344, 2854127, 2819064
Tel/Fax:2819064
Internet:  www.peace-srilanka.org

03.07.07

Media Release

STRENGTHEN NATIONAL INSTITUTIONS TO DEAL WITH 
HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS AND OVERCOME NATIONAL 
REGRESSION

The National Peace Council is disturbed by the 
controversy surrounding the Presidential 
Commission of Inquiry into Serious Human Rights 
Violations (COI). This Commission was appointed 
in November 2006 by President Mahinda Rajapaksa 
in the face of mounting concern over the climate 
of impunity and terror with regard to abductions, 
extortions, assassinations and other grave human 
rights violations in the country.

Unfortunately, the functioning of the Commission 
has been tarnished by the recent public 
correspondence between the Commission itself, the 
Attorney General, and the International 
Independent Group of Eminent Persons (IIGEP) 
mandated to observe the investigations carried 
out by the Commissioners. We are relieved that 
President Mahinda Rajapaksa has written to the 
Chairman of the IIEGP, Justice P.N Bhagwati, and 
requested him to continue with his work.  We also 
appreciate the continued work of the Commission, 
and the Sri Lankan Commissioners, who have taken 
up the difficult challenge of seeking to ensure 
justice in a time of impunity.

The Eminent Persons were brought in to observe 
the working of the Commission. So they have to 
express an opinion on whether the Commission is 
working according to international standards, and 
if not, to point out the failings. The National 
Peace Council believes that the IIGEP needs to 
take immediate steps to directly observe the 
investigations conducted by the Commission, in 
the process of fulfilling the desired requisite 
of collective responsibility. Basing their public 
statements solely on information provided by 
intermittently-present assistants may lead to 
misunderstandings.

Given that the Commission's mandate extends only 
to a few cases, a feasible and practicable time 
frame must be set for the culmination of 
inquiries. This will ensure greater efficacy and 
answerability, and place greater pressure on 
responsible parties to give effect to their 
mandate in a timely manner. In this context, the 
National Peace Council welcomes the positive 
recommendations made by the IIGEP to improve the 
functioning of the Commission. We urge all 
parties to coordinate proceedings in accordance 
with international standards and norms and to 
cooperate in a manner which gives due respect to 
the authorized mandates of investigation, 
observation and recommendation. We also encourage 
the COI and IIGEP to work together to complete 
their mandated tasks within a reasonable time 
frame.

The National Peace Council of Sri Lanka 
appreciates the initiatives of the Government to 
enact national legislation that provides 
assistance and protection to victims and 
witnesses, and to amend the Commission of Inquiry 
Act. We insist that these measures be realized 
without delay in Parliament.

As the role of the Attorney General's Department 
is central to the dispute we urge the COI and 
IIGEP to seriously review the matter and seek a 
mutually acceptable solution that ensures 
transparency and impartiality that best serves 
the interests of justice. 

Today, well over a thousand persons are 
reportedly dead or missing and alarming patterns 
of defamatory propaganda and systematic terror 
campaigns have intimidated civil society. The 
Chairman of the Presidential Commission to Probe 
Abductions, Disappearances and Killings, Mahanama 
Tillakaratne has recently stated that 1713 
disappearances were reported in the country 
during the period January 1, 2006 to February 25, 
2007, with 1002 persons subsequently reappearing. 
The majority of killings and abductions were 
reported from the Eastern Province. The 
international ceasefire monitors of the Sri Lanka 
Monitoring Mission recently reported that in June 
2007, in one week alone, there were 34 abductions 
in the East of the country.

The National Peace Council regrets that more than 
seven months have passed since the establishment 
of the Commission, and four months since the 
appointment of the Eminent Persons, but the human 
rights abuses continue without ceasing. Every day 
that passes sees more of the same infringements 
that these two bodies were expected to 
investigate. Their failure to end the spree of 
human rights violations and abuses shows that ad 
hoc and temporary bodies, however well 
intentioned, cannot deal with the major crises of 
governance in our country. 

We believe that Sri Lanka needs a firm political 
will combined with the effective implementation 
of national laws through the proper discharge of 
the Seventeenth Amendment to the Constitution and 
the revitalization and de-politicization of 
national institutions, such as the Judiciary, 
Police and Public Service. We join with other 
civil society organizations that demand that the 
Government work together with the main Opposition 
and other political parties to strengthen those 
national institutions intended to protect the 
Rule of Law, and to ensure justice towards all.


Executive Director
On behalf of the Governing Council

______


[2]

The Daily Star (Dhaka)
July 06, 2007
  	 
Editorial

Straight Talk

THREE DOWN, ONE TO GO
by Zafar Sobhan

The recent contretemps in the JP, with party 
founder and long-time chief Hussein Muhammad 
Ershad calling it quits after 25 years in the 
political arena and leaving his estranged wife 
Rawshan Ershad and his hand-picked successor 
Anisul Islam Mahmud to duke it out over the party 
leadership, indicated clearly that it is not only 
the AL and BNP that the current powers-that-be 
have their sights trained on.

Even so marginal a politician as our one-time 
unelected president needs to be safely confined 
to the dust-bin of history in the current clean 
up. No tears will be shed in this column (nor 
much elsewhere in the country, one rather 
suspects), the octogenarian leader had long 
overstayed his welcome and any deal, which 
ensures his retirement from politics surely has 
the blessings of the nation.

In fact, I personally would be perfectly happy if 
other similar deals could be struck to persuade 
the other various hacks and has-beens who 
continue to suck up the political oxygen to 
accept voluntary retirement. Don't get me wrong. 
I would be as delighted as the next man to see 
some of these people called to account for their 
misdeeds in office and breaking bricks for their 
rest of their lives -- and it is certainly no 
more than many of them deserve.

Nevertheless, from a purely practical point of 
view, if we can get them out of politics I think 
the nation can let its thirst for vengeance go 
unquenched without suffering unduly.

The main thing is to see that they are beyond 
rehabilitation. The danger in cutting deals to 
permit them to weasel out of prison sentences is 
that there remains a real chance that if they are 
let off the hook that they might be back.

But assuming that it is possible to ensure that 
there are no more second acts for those who have 
abused the public trust and enriched themselves 
at the public trough, one could be content to 
merely see such individuals banished from public 
life.

Either way, it now seems clearer than ever that 
the oligopoly of the existing political parties 
is what the current administration is intent on 
breaking up. At one point it seemed as though the 
existing political parties might be resurrected 
under new leadership, but this was always an iffy 
proposition, mainly for the reason that most who 
had been identified as the "new" leadership were 
not new and were as corrupt and compromised as 
the old leadership. The batch of "new" leaders 
are still in the picture, but my guess is that at 
the end of the day they will also be happy enough 
to retire from politics "voluntarily" in order to 
stay out of prison.

So what next?

Well, the current crop of political parties will 
still exist. However, it remains to be seen 
whether their misdeeds of the past fifteen years 
(and before) coupled with the current action that 
has discredited them in the public eye, has 
contaminated their brand identity beyond which it 
is in anyone's interest to try to resurrect them.

The parties will almost certainly continue to 
exist in some form or other, but whether they 
will continue to be the titanic figures they have 
been in the nation's polity thus far or whether 
reformers will choose to rally under a new 
banner, remains to be seen.

It should be noted at this point that there have 
been a number of reports of a third party being 
bruited under the leadership of a rather obscure 
one-time senior BNP leader which has so far 
attracted a rag-tag group of similarly obscure 
middle-ranking politicians. On the whole, this 
new formation does not seem much of a candidate 
to emerge as the new vital centre of Bangladeshi 
politics. Though one never knows.

However, would it be too alarmist to point out 
that there amidst all the high-profile arrest and 
incarceration and retirement of senior AL, BNP, 
and JP leaders, that there remains in Bangladesh 
a fourth large national party that appears to 
have been left entirely out of the calculations.

I refer, of course, to the Jamaat-e-Islam, a 
party that has been conspicuously absent from the 
headlines these past six months. Conventional 
wisdom suggests that the reason for this is that 
the Jamaat is less corrupt than the other 
parties. Perhaps so. But if it is Jamaat 
corruption you are looking for, please permit me 
to point you in the direction of Pirojpur and 
Rajshahi, for starters.

Nor does the Jamaat lag when it comes to common 
or garden thuggery and hooliganism. Jamaat and 
Shibir cadres control their territories with a 
famously iron hand and their connections to 
organised crime and extortion in the localities 
they run is well established. Indeed, the 
brutality and viciousness of Shibir cadres is 
second to none in the country.

This is not even to mention the party's cast-iron 
connections to militants and radicals.

From time immemorial, non-elected regimes in the 
Muslim world have chosen to target secular 
opposition only.

Time and again, it is the Islamists who are left 
untouched and use the opportunity to strengthen 
and consolidate

Time and again it is the Islamists, who, by 
remaining untouched, rise to the fore-front of 
the democratic opposition.

Time and again, it is they, promising social 
justice and equality and freedom from corruption, 
who step authoritatively into the void created by 
non-democratic rule.

This could be the moment that the Islamists have 
been waiting for these past thirty-six years. 
They have never risen to 10% in the polls, but 
with their secular rivals discredited and their 
leadership and party apparatus more or less 
unscathed, they could emerge as serious players 
in the next elections.

Right now, these are tough times for the interim 
government. No question. The gargantuan and 
unprecedented nature of the project at hand means 
that there will be mistakes and miscalculations. 
That is to be expected.

But it is worth bearing in mind that some 
miscalculations could have massive unexpected 
consequences, and while the government cannot be 
expected to get everything right, if they get the 
question of Islamism wrong, then nothing else 
they accomplish will be worth anything.

If the main political parties are decimated and 
the Islamists are left intact then there will be 
a massive power vacuum that they will sweep in to 
fill. This is elementary history. It has happened 
again and again the length and breadth of the 
Muslim world, and, more than anything else, we 
need to be careful that it does not happen here.

I have seen no evidence that the current 
government is even in the slightest bit aware let 
alone concerned about this phenomenon.

More important than the institutional reforms, 
more important than the corruption cases, more 
important than the political reforms -- the most 
crucial thing is to ensure that no vacuum is 
created that will create an opening to shift the 
country decisively to the right.

Because once we move in that direction, it is a 
long, difficult path back. Bangladesh will be 
changed radically, and irrevocably, for the 
worse. There is no more important concern today 
than to ensure that this does not happen.

Zafar Sobhan is Assistant Editor, The Daily Star.


______


[3]

Washington Post
July 3, 2007

THE PAKISTAN TIME BOMB

by Stephen P. Cohen
Tuesday, July 3, 2007; Page A15

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf is widely 
viewed as a military strongman who should be 
pressed to hold free and fair elections this 
year. Both the characterization of Musharraf and 
the policy recommendation are misguided. 
Musharraf's problem is that he has failed to act 
swiftly and ruthlessly to set Pakistan's politics 
on a proper course, and he knows -- better than 
his critics -- that given the complexity of 
Pakistan's internal problems, the holding of free 
and fair elections might not check Pakistan's 
drift toward extremism.

Musharraf does deserve criticism for the 
deterioration of Pakistani civil society. About 
his only defense is that things were worse under 
his predecessor, the insecure Nawaz Sharif. 
Musharraf had a golden opportunity to set things 
right and develop a strategy that would build up 
civilian competence and allow for the army's 
retreat from governance. He missed it. After his 
coup he rejected advice that he impose emergency 
rule for a few months, meanwhile ordering the 
intelligence services to round up the extremists 
they had nurtured for years. But as a strongman 
Musharraf had a fatal flaw: He wanted to be liked.

Since then his actions as a politician and leader 
have been consistently flawed. He implemented a 
crazy scheme of local government that further 
destroyed Pakistan's civilian bureaucracy. He 
refused to allow former prime ministers Benazir 
Bhutto and Sharif to return to Pakistan and meet 
a real electoral test. And he fabricated a phony 
political party to provide the illusion of 
popular support. He also entered into alliances 
with the Islamists (only to betray them) and with 
a party responsible for rule by terror in certain 
areas of the country.

As a general, Musharraf got mixed reviews from 
his peers. As a politician, he has shown little 
talent. His one strength, until Chief Justice 
Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry defied him, was that 
his opponents were even less inspiring.

Musharraf's rule has not been without merit. 
Going against the views of army hard-liners, he 
lobbed one Kashmir proposal after another at the 
Indian government, putting it on the defensive. 
Under Musharraf, Pakistan's position has changed 
from insistence upon a plebiscite (something 
India will never allow) to one of several 
alternative arrangements, all designed to save 
face for Islamabad.

Musharraf did preside over economic reform, but 
the World Bank has pointed out that income 
disparities and rural poverty have both grown 
while the urban elite make money hand over fist. 
His treatment of the press has been retrograde. 
It is Orwellian for American officials to claim 
that Pakistan is on the road to democracy.

Musharraf receives unstinting American support 
because of his turnabout after Sept. 11, 2001, 
regarding support for the Taliban and al-Qaeda. 
No one doubts his sincerity regarding al-Qaeda; 
as he writes in his fanciful autobiography, these 
were the people who several times tried to kill 
him.

But there is room for skepticism about Pakistan's 
role with regard to the Taliban. Pakistani 
officials freely admit that their main concerns 
in Afghanistan are Indian penetration (which 
would mean encirclement for Islamabad) and Afghan 
President Hamid Karzai's dependence on New Delhi. 
Given this strategic compulsion, it is not 
surprising that Pakistan tolerates, if it does 
not directly support, the Taliban; it has no 
other instrument available to it than this 
Pashtun tribal hammer.

Whatever happens in coming days, we are not 
approaching the end of the "Musharraf system" in 
Pakistan. Even if he were forced out of the 
presidency and ceased to be army chief, his 
military colleagues would continue to rule from 
behind the scenes, finding a pliable politician 
or two to serve as their public face. Abroad, 
they might get tougher with India (what better 
way to unite Pakistanis than a crisis with New 
Delhi?), and they would try to fake it with the 
Americans regarding Afghanistan: They will not 
willingly give up their Taliban assets.

Perhaps such a second coming of the Musharraf 
system would work better with a military leader 
more perceptive than the ebullient but shallow 
Musharraf. But in the end, the army cannot rule 
the state of Pakistan by itself. Perhaps it will 
come to the realization that what it needs is a 
strategy for a systematic withdrawal from 
politics. This would involve heavy investment in 
the quality and competence of the civilian elite, 
a rebuilding of liberal Pakistan, and tough 
measures against defiant, radical Islamists.

The United States is paying lip service to a 
regime that is collapsing before its eyes and 
that may yet turn truly nasty. Washington treats 
Pakistan as if it were a Cold War ally, dealing 
only with its top leadership. The great danger is 
that this time around, Pakistan may not have the 
internal resources to manage its own rescue. If 
that is the case, then in years to come, a 
nuclear-armed and terrorism-capable Pakistan will 
become everyone's biggest foreign policy problem.

The writer is senior fellow in the Foreign Policy 
Studies Program of the Brookings Institution and 
author of "The Idea of Pakistan."

o o o

The News
July 7 2007

Editorial

WHITHER MADRESSAH REFORM?

While the government may feel that the recent 
events in and around Lal Masjid have been an 
unqualified success, there will hopefully be some 
significant introspection at the highest level 
for the governmentís failure so far to reform the 
madressah system in the country. In that sense, 
whatever happens at Lal Masjid, this is only the 
beginning because it would be fair to assume that 
the kind of brainwashed students seen at Jamia 
Hafsa and Lal Masjid may well be found at many 
other seminaries in the country. Despite many 
claims and pronouncements, often at the highest 
level, the fact is that the system is as 
unregulated as before and that the government 
seems to have little or no say in what is taught 
at most madressahs. According to the ministry of 
education, there are over 10,000 seminaries in 
the country, although the madressah organisations 
themselves claim that the number is over 13,000. 
As far as enrolment is concerned, the 
organisations say that between 1.5-1.7 million 
students are enrolled in madressahs, though the 
religious affairs minister has said it is likely 
to be around one million. Either way, the point 
remains that the system is significant in size 
and hence, like the mainstream system of 
schooling, needs to be under government 
regulation and monitoring.

There are many, including senior government 
functionaries, who are of the view that 
madressahs provide a much-needed service in a 
society like Pakistanís. Since most seminaries 
provide board and lodging as well, to many 
families from impoverished backgrounds, they are 
an affordable option of educating their children. 
Besides, given that religious education is much 
in demand in the country, such an opportunity 
becomes all the more attractive. Unfortunately, 
though, many madressahs do not teach the kind of 
religious education to their students that would 
make them better citizens who contribute to the 
society around them. If anything, many seminaries 
inculcate in their students a high level of 
intolerance of those of other faiths -- and even 
sects. They do not teach worldly education that 
could be useful for their students and generally 
teach them ideas and thoughts that most sensible 
people would agree were better left to the Dark 
Ages. More dangerously, students are taught in 
many instances not to respect the law of the land 
-- the idea being that they must obey a higher 
law, and in pursuit of doing so, it is all right 
to disobey the law of the land.

Furthermore, the students are taught that it is 
okay, in fact their duty, to impose their view of 
religion on the rest of society -- by force if 
need be -- and that in doing so they will be 
fulfilling their duty as a good Muslim. No wonder 
then that most of the banned extremist/jihadi 
groups have been staffed by men who studied in 
madressahs and were often patronised by various 
seminaries and with links to mosques. Some argue 
that not all madressahs have ties to extremist or 
jihadi outfits, but they all by and large promote 
an ideology that justifies the actions of such 
groups. There are many clerics who post-July 3 
have come out vociferously against the Lal Masjid 
brothers but one should be able to see the 
hypocrisy in this, because ideologically most of 
these clerics interpret religion in exactly the 
same way as Maulana Abdul Aziz would. Calls for 
imposing Sharia have been made many times before 
and the Lal Masjid and Jamia Hafsa brigade isnít 
the only extremist group of its kind to have gone 
about imposing its version of religion on others. 
One will have to wait and see what movement takes 
place now on this very pressing matter because 
the government is in a position to use the Lal 
Masjid affair to proceed with the reforming of 
the whole system of madressah education. As it 
does this, it will have to keep in mind that a 
meaningful reform will not be possible unless the 
mainstream system of education is overhauled.

______


[4]

Dawn
July 02, 2007  

WHY ARE INDIA AND PAKISTAN RELUCTANT TO HONOUR THEIR COMMON HERO?

by Jawed Naqvi

A FEW years ago I asked Zameer Akram, then 
Pakistan's ambassador in Nepal, why his country 
was not doing anything to show some respect to 
Begum Hazrat Mahal's memory, whose unmarked 
wayside grave in the heart of Kathmandu is open 
to abuse by humans and stray animals alike. He 
said there was in fact a joint agreement with 
India to build a grand mausoleum at the site. So 
what has happened to that plan, nobody knows.

On May 10 this year, when India was celebrating 
150 years of the 1857 uprising against colonial 
rule, a revolt in which the Begum was a vital 
player, several readers asked me whether Pakistan 
too was marking the occasion with due fervour. I 
told them that as far as I could see Pakistan was 
too busy with its internecine bloodbath in 
Karachi and elsewhere to spare the time for a 
tryst with history. I am not sure if I was right, 
but there was nothing in the Pakistani media that 
I noticed to indicate any official celebration of 
the anti-British rebellion across the border, 
much less about Begum Hazrat Mahal's unique, if 
largely unsung role in it.

I recently came across a fine tribute to the 
Begum, possibly one of a very few that throw 
light on the life of this tenacious fighter and 
an unrelenting rebel. Samarendra Nath Chanda 
wrote the article for The Sunday Statesman of 
Delhi on February 1, 1959, perhaps in the wake of 
the 100th anniversary celebrations of the revolt. 
Also, in Lucknow, the Publication Bureau of Uttar 
Pradesh has compiled rare articles on the freedom 
struggle in Oudh. They contain a must read 
proclamation by Hazrat Mahal even after her 
armies were defeated.

The document is today and was during her time 
known as a "counter-proclamation" because it was 
really a rejoinder to the proclamation by Queen 
Victoria about a new equation her government 
would have with India after 1857. Indians and 
Pakistanis need to read this piece of prose in 
Urdu which the British rulers translated into 
English. They would have been aghast at the 
extent of solidarity that existed between India's 
Hindus and Muslims not so long ago against their 
common foe, the foreign occupiers.

After the capture of Lucknow the Begam was listed 
by the English as No.1 of the enemies still at 
large. From Lucknow she retired with a large 
following across the River Ghagra and posted 
herself in the fort of Baundi, in Bahraich 
district. She fortified the stronghold with heavy 
guns and armed men. A correspondent of the 
government reported: "Š.a force is encamped on 
all sides of the fort, numbering about 15,000 or 
16,000 including followers. Among these there are 
1,500 cavalry and 500 mutineer sepoys, the rest 
are 'nujeebs' and followers."

Unlike Rani Lakshmi Bai of Jhansi, the Begum, 
says Samarendra Nath, had a different beginning 
to her career. She was born at a time and brought 
up in a manner suitable only for a life of gay 
abandon. Her obvious place was in the royal harem 
of the extraordinary King Wajid Ali Shah, 
essentially a poet par excellence and a 
connoisseur of beauty. William Howard Russell in 
his 'My Indian Mutiny Diary' writes: "The Sepoys, 
during the siege of the Residency, never came on 
as boldly as the zamindari levies and nujeebs 
(irregulars). This Begum exhibits great energy 
and ability. She has excited all Oudh to take up 
the interests of her son, and the chiefs have 
sworn to be faithful to him. Will the Government 
treat these men as rebels or as honourable 
enemies? The Begum declares undying war against 
us. It appears, from the energetic character of 
these Ranis and Begums, that the zenanas and 
harems (wield) a considerable amount of actual 
mental power and, at all events, become able 
intriguantes. Their contests for ascendancy over 
the minds of the men give vigour and acuteness to 
their intellect."

Tidbits of information available about the 
Begum's career as a sovereign reveals the 
statesman in her. To fortify the city of Lucknow 
against advancing relief forces of the English 
she sanctioned five lakhs of rupees to "have a 
wall built round the city." Then, when she was 
informed that the English had purchased the 
friendship of Rana Jang Bahadur of Nepal with the 
promise of Gorakhpur and a share of Oudh, she 
immediately made the Rana a counter-offer of 
"Gorakhpur, Azimgurh, Arrah, Chupra and the 
provinces of Benaras, if he would unite with 
her." Her battle tactics too bear the stamp of an 
expert schemer, says Samarendra Nath. Through 
efficient agents, she contacted the officers of 
the Indian regiments serving the English at 
Cawnpore and settled with them that when they 
were to face the Begum's forces "the regiments 
should fire blank ammunition" and afterwards 
"turn upon the Europeans". She even personally 
appeared in the field (on February 25, 1858) on 
elephant back, along with other officers to 
supervise defence operations.

While the English were busy in re-establishing 
their authority in Lucknow, Begum Hazrat Mahal 
once again successfully fired up the rest of Oudh 
to rebellion. In fact, 1858 saw a series of 
sporadic outbursts in different areas of Oudh, 
and the English experienced some of the toughest 
encounters of the whole history of the rebellion. 
The heroes were mainly and obviously the 
taluqdars and zamindars of Oudh, and there is 
enough evidence on record to show their 
attachment to the Begum.

After the Queen's Proclamation, the English 
wanted to win her over by offers of royal 
clemency and even of a pension. But Begum Hazrat 
Mahal replied with a counter-proclamation under 
the seal of her young son and heir to the Oudh 
crown, Birjis Qadar, warning the people of Oudh 
not to be misled by false promises. The Begum's 
Proclamation, as it is called, stated: "At this 
time certain weak-minded, foolish people, have 
spread a report that the English have forgiven 
the faults and crimes of the people of 
Hindoostan. This appears very astonishing, for it 
is the unvarying custom of the English never to 
forgive a fault, be it great or small, so much so 
that if a small offence be committed through 
ignorance or negligence, they never forgive itŠ.. 
therefore we, the ever-abiding government, 
parents of the people of Oude, with great 
consideration, put forth the present 
proclamation, in order that the real object of 
the chief points may be exposed, and our subjects 
placed on their guard."

In the counter-proclamation, Begum Hazrat Mahal 
comes across as a secular person who was greatly 
troubled by the domination of any one religion 
over others. Her exiled husband Wajid Ali Shah 
was enriched as much by Hindu lore as by his own 
Shia creed to fortify Oudh with an enviably 
syncretic worldview. She rebuts Queen Victoria's 
assertions point by point, but the following one 
surpasses all. "In the proclamation it is 
written, that the Christian religion is true, but 
that no other creed will suffer oppression, and 
that the laws will be observed towards all. What 
has the administration of justice to do with the 
truth or falsehood of religion? That religion is 
true which acknowledges one God, and knows no 
other. Where there are three gods in a religion, 
neither Mussulman nor Hindoo- nay, not even Jews, 
Sun-worshippers, or Fire-worshippers can believe 
it true. To eat pigs and drink- to bite greased 
cartridges, and to mix pig's fat with flour and 
sweetmeats - to destroy Hindoo and Mussalman 
temples on pretence of making roads to build 
churches - to send clergymen into streets and 
alleys to preach the Christian religion - to 
institute English schools , and to pay a monthly 
stipend for learning the English sciences, while 
the places of worship of Hindoos and Mussalmans 
are to this day entirely neglected; with all 
this, how can the people believe that religion 
will not be interfered with? The rebellion began 
with religion, and, for it, millions of men have 
been killed. Let not our subjects be deceived; 
thousands were deprived of their religion in the 
North-West, and thousands were hanged rather than 
abandoned their religion." Any taker for the 
Begum's grave in Kathmandu - Indian, Pakistani, 
or, preferably, both?


______


[5]

Communalism Combat
June 2007

Introduction

GUJARAT 2002-2007 - GENOCIDE'S AFTERMATH :

A CHALLENGE TO THE INDIAN REPUBLIC

Five years after independent India's worst ever 
state sponsored carnage directed against the 
Muslim minority, issues of state impunity for 
mass crimes, accountability to the Constitution, 
deliverance of justice, fair compensation and 
reparation, citizenship rights and an ongoing 
climate of fear and intimidation remain. With 
2007 being the scheduled assembly election year 
in the state of Gujarat, there is also a 
legitimate fear that violence will again be used 
as a tool against the battered minority. It is 
imperative therefore that the nation remains 
watchful, for not much has changed in the state 
of Gujarat in the five years since the genocide.

Indian democracy's response to the Gujarat 
genocide has been mixed. Outrage from the media, 
independent citizens groups, the National Human 
Rights Commission (NHRC) and the Chief Election 
Commission (CEC) contrasted with an initially 
tardy response from the Supreme Court. The 
subsequent, resounding defeat for the National 
Democratic Alliance (NDA) government in the 
general elections of May 2004 offered some 
consolation. The NDA's leading partner, the 
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), wholeheartedly 
supported Modi's execution of the state sponsored 
carnage while its allies covertly lent him their 
support, and still do. A month before the 
electoral results, a rare and unequivocal verdict 
from the Supreme Court delivered a scathing 
critique of Modi's regime in Gujarat when it 
transferred the well-publicised Best Bakery trial 
out of the state into neighbouring Maharashtra, 
undoubtedly influencing the poll's outcome. The 
Bilkees Bano case was also transferred to Mumbai 
and the verdict is still pending. Here, the trial 
for gang rape and multiple murders in Randhikpur, 
Dahod district, was not just subverted but 
involved the destruction of evidence by senior 
medical and police personnel.

Despite these sharp rebukes and setbacks, the 
Modi government and its administration have 
survived in office. Mere months after the 
carnage, Modi was re-elected to a second term in 
power, riding on the genocide. The five years 
since have seen repeated bids for respectability 
with corporate India and even political opponents 
obliging.

If the carnage of 2002 shocked India and her 
people and also became a matter of serious 
concern for international human rights bodies and 
even governments, in the five years since, 
Gujarat emerges as a state with two realities in 
mutual conflict. One is the shameful aftermath of 
post-independent India's first genocide which, 
having wrecked a community at the physical, 
emotional, economic, cultural and religious 
level, has reduced Gujarat's Muslims to a second 
grade status. This ugly reality is itself part of 
the overall story of a repressive state whose 
targets are numerous: the political dissenter, 
artist, women, Adivasis, Dalits.

(Suicides in Gujarat have shown an alarming 
growth even in urban middle class areas. Violence 
against women in general is now commonplace, a 
grim reminder of the unintended long term 
consequences of indoctrinating and setting up 
hate-filled militias for sexual violence against 
women and girls, as seen in 2002.)

Contrasted with this sorry state of affairs are 
the persistent efforts of chief minister, 
Narendra Modi, backed by a significant section of 
the state administration and even part of the 
central United Progressive Alliance (UPA) 
government's bureaucracy, to paint and project a 
picture of normalcy. Modi has spent huge amounts 
of the Gujarati taxpayer's money in staging 
international and national extravaganzas, before 
leaders of business especially, peddling the 
image of a vibrant and normal Gujarat.

Stung by international criticism and a silent 
message sent out by several international 
diplomatic missions, Modi has tried hard to 
overcome the humiliation of being India's first 
chief minister to have been denied a visa by the 
USA (in March 2005). The fact that the 
ambassadors of some western powers continue to 
boycott Modi is a sore point for a man whose 
megalomaniacal tendencies are evident from the 
way every corner of the state is plastered with 
images of his face. Now bags and biscuit packets 
for school children, and even condoms are being 
used to drill the mass murderer's persona into 
people's consciousness.

To some extent, Modi has succeeded. Captains of 
industry, with their own vision of 'India 
shining', appear mighty impressed with the 
"strong political leadership of Mr Narendra 
Modi". Early this year, Ratan Tata of the Tata 
group, who had wept on the streets of Mumbai in 
empathy with Mumbai's victims of communal 
violence in 1992-1993, had no problems sharing a 
dais with a politician accused of criminal 
conspiracy and mass murder. Not surprisingly, the 
Ambanis of the Reliance group, Shashi Ruia of the 
Essar group and Kumaramangalam Birla of the 
Aditya Birla group of industries joined in too, 
signalling corporate India's readiness to help 
wipe the blood off Modi's hands and help him gain 
respectability. The inexplicable and much 
publicised report of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation 
calling Gujarat the best governed state (sic), 
made public months after the UPA came to power, 
was one more feather in Modi's cap.

"Normalisation" and "strong leadership" are 
nomenclatures that have been attributed to a 
vindictive administration that shows no remorse 
for having engineered mass crimes, that sees 
political advantage in villages, cities and 
mohallas or neighbourhoods remaining divided by 
borders, that threatens victim survivors and 
human rights defenders who stand up for justice 
with arrest and torture. Gujarat is nothing but a 
showpiece of unchallenged state power.

The comfort of the Indian political class with 
the state of affairs in Gujarat has also been 
reflected in the lacklustre debates on the issue 
in the state's assembly and in Parliament. The 
genocide's aftermath has not been high on the 
list of priorities for elected representatives 
who protest and force adjournments on all kinds 
of issues a lot of the time. It is not just the 
Congress party, other partners in the UPA 
coalition, including the Left parties, have also 
been reluctant to take the issue of punishment 
for mass crimes to Gujarat's streets.

Despite the change of political guard in New 
Delhi, the conduct of the central government in 
the courts where the struggle for justice is 
being vigorously fought has, in the five years 
since 2002, been ambivalent and equivocal. In 
none of the cases being fought in the Gujarat 
High Court or the Supreme Court, barring one 
exception, has the central government been 
forthright in supporting the Gujarat genocide 
survivor's fight for justice. Only recently, 
during the hearing of the Sohrabuddin Sheikh 
encounter case, were vociferous arguments made by 
India's attorney general, Milon Banerjee, arguing 
for a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) 
inquiry. This stance actually put off the apex 
court and denied the petitioner (Rubabuddin 
Sheikh) his legitimate demand for transfer of the 
investigation to the CBI. Counsel for the CBI and 
central government have been quick to adjust and 
compromise with the government of Gujarat's 
counsel in a host of cases, reducing the Centre's 
political battle cry against Modi's fascism to 
somewhat hollow and hypocritical utterances.

[. . . ]
FULL TEXT AT:
http://www.sabrang.com/cc/archive/2007/june07/intro.html


______


[6]  [Its business as usual for Fascists in 
Gujarat - India's federal govt just sits and 
twiddles its thumb: Goons from the Hindu right 
again attacked Prof. Shivji Panikkar the former 
dean of India's leading art school, while on way 
to inaugurate an exhibit. Some weeks ago the 
whole intelligentsia was up in arms protesting at 
the attack on Art and defending the courageous 
Prof Pannikar for speaking up against the Hindu 
right in Gujarat. Raise your voice again. See 
press release by Sahmat and a news report 
describing the latest assault by the Hindu right. 
]

o o o

http://communalism.blogspot.com/2007/07/sahmat-condemns-assault-on-professor.html
  SAHMAT CONDEMNS THE ASSAULT ON PROFESSOR SHIVJI PANIKKAR IN AHMEDABAD

SAHMAT

8, Vithalbhai Patel House, Rafi Marg
  New Delhi-110001, India
Tel- 23711276/ 23351424
e-mail: sahmat at vsnl.com

6.7.2007

    Sahmat strongly condemns the assault on art 
historian Shivji Panikkar which took place in 
Ahmedabad today. Professor Panikkar was assaulted 
in his car on the way to preside as a chief guest 
at a film festival, and the windows of his car 
were smashed. Recently suspended  from the 
faculty of fine arts at the MS University in 
Baroda after a jury review was disrupted by BJP 
leader Niraj Jain, Professor Panikkar had been 
threatened with 'dire consequences' by Mr. Jain, 
for protecting the rights of his students and the 
integrity of the academic proceedings of his 
department. Today’s attack is obviously 
orchestrated by the sangh parivar and seeks to 
continue their attempt to impose their 
politically motivated cultural agenda by fear and 
terror.

We call on the authorities to immediately proceed 
against the attackers. Meanwhile, the functioning 
of the department of art at MSU continues to be 
stalled, with the still incomplete results from 
the last session, disrupted by the BJP. The 
admissions process is also stalled, and the 
students are on an indefinite strike calling for 
reinstatement of Professor Panikkar. Since the 
University Authorities do not seem to be keen on 
resolving this situation, we call on the Governor 
of Gujarat, to take action in his capacity as 
visitor to MS University to restore the 
world-famous department to it's normal 
functioning.

Ram Rahman
M.K.Raina

o o o

The Hindu
July 07, 2007

SANGH PARIVAR ACTIVISTS ATTACK PANIKKAR

by Manas Dasgupta

Panikkar and driver escaped after lathi blows

He is leading an agitation against BJP leader

AHMEDABAD: The sangh parivar's "moral police" on 
Friday attacked the former acting dean of the 
fine arts faculty of the Maharaja Sayajirao 
University of Vadodara.

Shivaji Panikkar, who was the acting dean and is 
still leading an agitation by the university 
students fighting for their right to freedom of 
expression, was here to inaugurate a painting 
exhibition. It was organised by the Delhi-based 
voluntary organisation Anhad on the themes of 
communal harmony and unity in diversity. The 
paintings are a collection from school students 
from all over the country and a selected few are 
on display here.

As soon as Mr. Panikkar arrived at the venue, 
about 30 Parivar activists armed with lathis and 
stones attacked his car and damaged it. Both the 
driver and Mr. Panikkar received lathi blows.

They escaped serious injuries as the driver sped 
on the advice of Anhad convener Shabnam Hashmi.

Ms. Hashmi later said a few people had come on 
Thursday to enquire about the exhibition. But she 
now realised their intentions when she saw them 
among the attackers.

Mr. Panikkar lodged a complaint with the 
Navrangpura police against his unidentified 
assailants.

While there was no apparent motive for the 
attack, the reason could be Mr. Panikkar leading 
the agitation against a local BJP leader, Niraj 
Jain, who led a crowd of Parivar activists to 
ransack the faculty a couple of months ago for 
allegedly hurting the religious sentiments of 
Hindus.

On Mr. Jain's complaint, Vice-Chancellor Manoj 
Soni suspended Mr. Panikkar and locked the fine 
arts department just before the summer vacation. 
After the university reopened last month, the 
students resumed their agitation and some of them 
led by Mr. Panikkar have threatened to go on 
indefinite fast demanding action against Mr. Jain 
and his supporters.

[Reproduced at: 
http://communalism.blogspot.com/2007/07/sangh-parivar-activists-attack-former.html 
]

______


[7]


PND NUCLEAR FLASHPOINTS PROJECT
AUSTRALIAN PEACE COMMITTEE SA
PEOPLE FOR NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT W.A.,
ENVIRONMENT CENTRE OF THE NORTHERN TERRITORY (ECNT)
ARID LANDS ENVIRONMENT CENTRE, BEYOND NUCLEAR INITIATIVE ALICE SPRINGS NT
MARRICKVILLE PEACE GROUP
SENATOR LYN ALLISON
JULIA IRWIN MP


To:
Alexander Downer, Minister for Foreign Affairs 6273-4112 62612151
cc
Caroline Millar, Ambassador to CD, 41 22 799 9175
Kevin Rudd (07)3899 5755, 6277 8508
Peter Garrett 9349 8089, 6277 8402
Robert Mc Clelland 6277 4323, 9587 8047

RE: INDIA/ UNITED STATES NUCLEAR DEAL/NUCLEAR SUPPLIERS GROUP

Dear Mr Downer:

The groups above are writing to you to urge you to:

1) Refrain from taking steps on the Nuclear 
Suppliers Group to facilitate the export of 
nuclear technology and/or materials to India

2) We urge you to lobby actively on the NSG to 
discourage and other nations from taking such 
action.

Australia should use all the influence we have on 
the nuclear suppliers group to discourage the NSG 
from facilitating the transfer of nuclear 
technology or materials to countries that are not 
NPT signatories.

Australia should not be considering the sale of 
nuclear materials, especially uranium, to 
countries that are not only not signatories to 
the NPT, but which in 2002-2003, for an extended 
period actually threatened each other with 
nuclear war and which even now are actively 
engaged in enlarging and optimising their nuclear 
arsenals.

The US India nuclear deal:

1.Violates the NPT (see analysis in Abolition 
2000 Briefing Paper1 distributed to diplomats at 
the NPT PrepCom in May this year).

2. The deal violates a unanimous 1998 UN Security 
Council Resolution calling on India and Pakistan 
"immediately to stop their nuclear weapon 
development programs, to refrain from 
weaponization or from the deployment of nuclear 
weapons, to cease development of ballistic 
missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons 
and any further production of fissile material 
for nuclear weapons." Neither India nor Pakistan 
has complied with this demand. The Resolution 
also "encourages all States to prevent the export 
of equipment, materials or technology that could 
in any way assist programs in India or Pakistan 
for nuclear weapons."

A number of studies, notably by physicist MV 
Ramana and Fran Von Hippel, have indicated that 
the export of uranium to India will increase the 
supply of non-safeguarded uranium for weapons 
purposes.

3. By permitting nuclear trade with India, which 
developed nuclear weapons outside the framework 
of the Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) and which 
has made no commitment to abandoning its nuclear 
weapons, the deal sends precisely the wrong 
message to countries which might be thinking of 
developing nuclear weapons themselves. Such 
countries will conclude that they will not be 
denied the privileges of nuclear trade for long.

4. The three other countries which remain outside 
the NPT - Pakistan, Israel and North Korea - will 
expect the same treatment as India. Israel and 
Pakistan have already asked for this.

5. The deal puts no pressure on the five 
officially recognized nuclear weapons states to 
give up their nuclear weapons. Rather, it 
effectively recognizes India as a sixth nuclear 
weapon state.

As a uranium exporter, Australia has considerable 
influence in the nuclear suppliers group.

Australia should use this influence to demand the following at the NSG:

1. that India agree to stop producing fissile materials;
2. that India join the CTBT;
3. that India accept full-scope safeguards on all its nuclear facilities;
4. that India join the NPT as a non-nuclear weapon state.

This would be consistent with the excellent and 
very widely supported resolution that Australia 
and Japan co-sponsor every year in the UN First 
Committee, 'Renewed Determination Toward the 
Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons', which:

"3. Reaffirms the importance of the universality 
of the Treaty [NPT] and calls upon states not 
party to the Treaty to accede to it as non - 
nuclear weapon states without delay and without 
conditions and pending their accession to refrain 
from acts that would defeat the objective and 
purpose of the treaty as well as to take 
practical steps in support of the Treaty"

A number of countries have expressed reservations 
about the US/India nuclear deal.

According to Switzerland:
"...the project of co-operation in the field of 
civilian nuclear energy between India and the USA 
will not be without consequences for the 
non-proliferation regime based on the NPT. If 
this project is carried out it will call into 
question the validity of the compromise which 
enabled a consensus to be found on the extension 
of the NPT at the 1995 Review Conference."

While according to Japan, Australia;s co-sponsor 
(and primary sponsor) in Renewed Determination:

"For the purpose of achieving the universality of 
the NPT, Japan reiterates its calls for India, 
Israel and Pakistan to accede to the Treaty as 
non-nuclear-weapon States."

The New Agenda working paper noted that:

15. The New Agenda Coalition calls upon all 
States Parties to spare no effort to achieve the 
universality of the NPT, and in that regard urges 
India, Israel and Pakistan, which are not yet 
Parties to the Treaty to accede to it as 
non-nuclear-weapon States promptly and without 
any conditions.
16. The New Agenda Coalition recalls that, at the 
Review Conference in 2000, States Parties 
reaffirmed the unanimous agreement at the Review 
and Extension Conference in 1995 not to enter 
into new nuclear supply arrangements with parties 
that did not accept IAEA full-scope safeguards on 
their nuclear facilities."

According to the Chairs Final summary,

6. States parties further stressed that continued 
support to achieve universality of the Treaty 
remains essential. Concern was expressed about 
the lack of achievement in universality. States 
parties called upon States outside the Treaty to 
accede to the Treaty as non-nuclear-weapon 
States, promptly and without condition. They were 
also called upon to bring into force the required 
comprehensive safeguards agreements, together 
with additional protocols, for ensuring nuclear 
non-proliferation, and to reverse clearly and 
urgently any policies to pursue any nuclear 
weapons development, testing or deployment, and 
to refrain from any action that could undermine 
regional and international peace and security and 
the international community's efforts towards 
nuclear disarmament and the prevention of nuclear 
weapons proliferation. States parties called upon 
India and Pakistan to maintain moratoria on 
testing and called upon India, Israel and 
Pakistan to become party to the Comprehensive 
Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT).

Australia has an excellent record on nuclear 
disarmament and nonproliferation. We should not 
undermine the excellent initiatives that we 
support in fora such as UNGA First Committee and 
the NPT Prepcoms and Revcons, by facilitating 
nuclear trade with non-NPT signatory nations and 
even less so should we consider exporting uranium 
to such countries. Rather, Australia must use its 
influence to strengthen not weaken the 
nonproliferation regime.


John Hallam Nuclear Flashpoints
Jo Vallentine, PND-W.A.,
Environment Centre of the Northern Territory (ECNT)
Natalie Wasley, Arid Lands Environment Centre Beyond Nuclear Initiative
Irene Gale AM, Australian Peace Committee
Joe Errey Marrickville Peace Group
Senator Lyn Alison
Julia Irwin MP


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Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on
matters of peace and democratisation in South
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