SACW | April 12-13, 2008 / A New Nepal / Bangladesh: Islamists Riot Against Women's Rights / Pakistan: Nahid Siddiqui interview / Pak-India Forum for review of prisoners' situation

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | April 12-13, 2008 | 
Dispatch No. 2503 - Year 10 running

[1] Nepal:
   (i) The real work now begins to build a New Nepal (Kanak Mani Dixit)
   (ii) Red Rules Kingdom - Surge catches Delhi napping (Sankarshan Thakur)
[2] Bangladesh: Islamists Riot Against Women's Rights -
   - Violence in the name of religion is 
reprehensible (Editorial,The Daily Star)
   - Islamists oppose constitutional rights of women (Editorial, New Age)
   - "state religion" a breeding ground for the 
Islamists in Bangladesh (Farida Majid)
[3] Pakistan: Nahid Siddiqui interviewed 'Pak 
society does not accept dance even today'
[4] Religion in Uniform (Jawed Naqvi)
[5] India: Identity and separatism: the politics 
of ethno-nationalism (M.S. Prabhakara)
[6] Press release - Pak-India Forum for review of prisoners' situation
[7] Pakistan - India: For lasting peace (Krishna Kumar)
[8] India: Statement from the Second National 
Convention on The Judiciary and The Poor
[9] Announcements: A Package of Films From Other Media Communications

______


[1]

Nepali Times
11 April 08 - 17 April 08

LOST TIME:
THE REAL WORK NOW BEGINS TO BUILD A NEW NEPAL

by Kanak Mani Dixit

They said the people would never rise up, until 
the People's Movement surprised us all. They said 
the parliament could never be revived, but it 
sprang to life. They said elections would never 
happen after being twice postponed, but it 
happened. Now they tell us there will be chaos 
after the elections. How many more times do you 
want to be wrong? The sheer willpower of the 
citizenry that generated the People's Movement 
has propelled us into the Constituent Assembly. 
The constitution will get written amidst 
turbulence, but it will be written. Nepal is just 
not structured to deliver a cut-and-dried peace 
process to those who want to wrap it up and be 
gone to the next world hotspot. Instead, we 
muddle through and get ahead, with the political 
parties in command of the speed and the direction.

The Constituent Assembly is not just part and 
parcel of the peace process, but a 
state-restructuring exercise foremost. It also 
represents a return to pluralism and 
representative government after nine long years. 
This is where the emerging, conflicting and 
complementary demands of communities will be 
discussed, instead of the frustrated recourse to 
burning tyres.

The Nepali spirit will see us through in the days 
ahead, including the vulnerable period over the 
next three weeks while the ballots are counted. 
The political party that gets the largest number 
of votes will take the lead in fashioning the new 
polity, but it must carry along all political 
forces including the Maoists in the running of 
the government and drafting the constitution.

The assembly has to be called within 21 days of 
the final results. The first task at hand will be 
the parties acting on their manifestos to declare 
the country a republic. To be gracious, the 
historical kingship can be thanked for its role 
in the creation of the nation state 239 years ago.

As the constitution-making begins in earnest, the 
601 framers must start with a philosophical 
commitment to values incuded in the superseded 
1990 constitution: multiparty pluralism, 
representative government, fundamental freedoms 
and human rights.

Looking beyond, a set of draft directive 
principles developed by the Interim Parliament 
('federalism', 'secularism' and 'inclusion' 
included) will serve as the basis for the 
sovereign Assembly to begin work on developing a 
samabesi loktantra. The definition of federalism 
will be the most challenging task before the CA, 
and the framers must rise above populism to 
define a provincial structure that is practical 
and economically sound, while responding to 
identity and inclusion demands.

There will be those outside the party-political 
process who will question the right and ability 
of the Constituent Assembly to represent the 
entire populace, but the elected members will 
surely be much more empowered to respond to such 
challenges than the appointed nominees of the 
Interim Parliament. Not to forget that the 
proportional 335 seats, to be approved by the 
Election Commission according to the population 
categories, will make the CA among the most 
inclusive legislative bodies in the world.

While the Assembly itself will be relatively 
inclusive and representative, a countrywide 
participatory consultative process must support 
the assembly and allow the citizens to own the 
document that emerges. It is the new 
constitution, more than any institution, language 
or manufactured mythology, that will henceforth 
provide the glue to bind the people of Nepal.

The Assembly's other task is of course to serve 
as a legislature to back and watchdog the 
executive branch over the next two years and 
more. Immediately, it will be important to 
separate the positions of head of state and head 
of government, responsibilities borne over the 
last two years by Girija Prasad Koirala. The 
ministers of the coalition government which 
emerges in the days ahead will have to be 
answerable to the prime minister rather than to 
their individual party bosses.

The new government must make haste to ensure that 
the people begin to enjoy the long-delayed peace 
dividend, and it must energetically restart 
development projects after a decade of waiting. 
The international community must help.

There is so much more that the needs to be done, 
to give the public confidence in state 
administration and rule of law. We should not 
forget the need for accountability for the 
atrocities of the past, by whichever side. The 
matter of 'security sector reform' must be 
addressed, bringing the Nepal Army even more 
firmly under civilian control. The Maoist 
fighters in the cantonments must be brought into 
the mainstream as a priority.

The Constituent Assembly will write our new Basic 
Law, but the immediate hope of those who voted 
yesterday is that the elections will usher 
political stability, help mend the tattered 
social fabric and trigger economic growth. We 
have to make up for a dozen years of lost time.

o o o


The Telegraph
April 13 , 2008

RED RULES KINGDOM - Surge catches Delhi napping
by Sankarshan Thakur

Maoist supporters celebrate Prachanda's victory 
in Kathmandu on Saturday. (AFP) 

Kathmandu, April 12: The red flag is flying high 
over Kathmandu. Prachanda's Maoists have stolen a 
lightning march over rivals in Nepal, sparing 
none save the Nepali Congress, the nation's 
oldest political party.

The Maoists' stunning electoral surge, only two 
years after they came overground, left the 
royalists dumbstruck and panicking, the 
mainstream communists of the UML gasping for 
breath, and the Indian mission in the throes of 
anxiety.

Pursued and persecuted till only the other day, 
the Maoist cadres took Kathmandu in a euphoric 
octopus-like embrace this afternoon. They jammed 
the streets, unfurled long and loud processions 
and shook this somnolent capital with the vigour 
of their victory.

The town centre was a throbbing red tableau - 
thousands of flags and banners fluttering and 
seamlessly merging on ground, the air an eruption 
of vermilion. And floating above them, the 
ringing cry that is beginning to unsettle the 
insulated Kathmandu elite: Lal salaam! Lal salaam!

As trends firmed up towards the evening, it 
became apparent the Maoists were headed to become 
the largest single group in the 240 seats that 
are being decided on a first-past-the-post basis. 
Nearly 60 per cent of the 601 seats in the 
Constituent Assembly will be decided by a complex 
proportional representation vote, whose results 
will take a couple of weeks to come. But if 
current results are any indication, the Maoists 
should dominate the proportional vote as well.

Taken by surprise and lost on explanations, a 
senior Indian diplomat said: "We obviously missed 
something, this is astonishing and calls for 
fresh assessments."

Never enamoured of the Maoists, even though 
Prachanda and his second-in-command Baburam 
Bhattarai spent long years underground in India, 
New Delhi had been backing the more 
middle-of-the-road parties like the Nepali 
Congress and the UML to win the bulk of the seats.

Prachanda, on his part, has often bracketed India 
with the US as an unfriendly power. Although he 
sounded conciliatory in the flush of victory - 
"We would like to assure India that we would like 
to work closely with them" - New Delhi may now 
have to scramble to correct what has turned out 
to be a huge miscalculation.

Nepal itself now seems set on the road to 
becoming a republic; the future of King Gyanendra 
and the Shah monarchy hangs by a thread straining 
under the weight of the pro-Maoist mandate.

But sources close to the palace hinted to The 
Telegraph that the king was still trying to 
retain relevance in the power set-up. "Nothing 
can be ruled out. Don't forget, he has his 
linkages with the Maoists, they were talking 
directly at one time," a source said, indicating 
that he could leverage the Nepali Army to strike 
a deal. The Maoists want their PLA integrated 
into the national army and there could be room 
for manoeuvre here.

Most analysts believe, though, that despite 
Gyanendra's desperate feelers to the new victors, 
it is too late in the day for such a deal, 
especially in the face of such a pro-republican 
mandate.

Narainman Bijukchhe of the Left-wing Nepal 
Workers' and Peasants' Party (NWPP), who won in 
neighbouring Bhaktapur yet again, underlined the 
message of the vote thus: "The people want 
fundamental changes, the message from them is 
that a republic headed by a President must be 
created now."

Prachanda, who took the Pharping seat near 
Kathmandu by a mile, appeared briefly to 
acknowledge a jubilant horde at the Birendra 
International Convention Centre. "This is a 
historic day for us and for Nepal," he said. 
"This is a mandate for an inclusive federal 
democratic republic."

Profusely garlanded, his face barely visible 
behind the girdle of marigolds, Prachanda reached 
out to the entire political class to unitedly 
work for a "progressive agenda".

Most top Maoist leaders, including Bhattarai, 
military commander Rambahadur Thapa "Badal", 
Krishna Bahadur Mahara, Pampha Bhusal and Hisila 
Yami, have won their seats. Many others are set 
for victory.

Madhav Nepal, who was projecting himself as the 
next Prime Minister, lost his Kathmandu seat and 
resigned as UML general secretary accepting 
responsibility of the UML rout.

Nepal isn't the only major UML casualty, most of 
his senior colleagues have been drubbed, the 
Left-wing space voraciously eaten up by the 
Maoists.

The Koirala clan, too, has been wiped out in a 
verdict that has left the Nepali Congress 
reduced, though not devastated. Acting party 
president Sushil Koirala was defeated in 
Nepalgunj and resigned his post. Sujata Koirala, 
daughter of Prime Minister G.P. Koirala and 
another claimant for future prime ministership, 
was humbled in the family's pocket borough near 
Biratnagar. Cousin Shekhar Koirala fared no 
better, losing in Morang.

The Koiralas' Terai home ground was run over by 
recently sprung Madhesi rights groups like the 
Madhesi Janadhikar Forum (MJF). Results from 
Madhes are slow to come, but the trends suggest 
local parties have benefited at the expense of 
the Nepali Congress and the Maoists have made 
deep inroads into the Terai's pahadi pockets.

All eyes are now on whether the balance of power 
in Kathmandu will swing drastically towards the 
Maoists. Several key interests - the Kathmandu 
elite, the US and India, the army and the Nepali 
Congress - will probably now seek to politically 
contain the Maoists.

But with the reds leading the run, one analyst 
did not even rule out the possibility of 
Prachanda using the muscle of the mandate to seek 
Prime Minister G.P. Koirala's job which, at the 
moment, combines the roles of head of state and 
head of government.

______


[2]  BANGLADESH: ISLAMISTS RIOT AGAINST WOMEN'S RIGHTS

The Daily Star
April 12, 2008

Editorial
VIOLENCE IN THE NAME OF RELIGION IS REPREHENSIBLE
Let peace and rationality prevail

WE have witnessed to our utter dismay, two 
successive days of clashes between activists of 
Khelafat Majlish and Islami Shashantantra Andolon 
on the one side and the law enforcers on the 
other near the National Mosque during emergency 
centring around demonstrations by the former 
against the Women Development Policy. In the 
fallout many people on both sides have been 
injured and hospitalised, something that should 
have been avoidable in the first place. It 
created a law and order situation at a time when 
the country is grappling with food crisis and 
looking ahead to the national elections due by 
December.

Ever since murmurs of protests were heard, the 
government engaged the ulema in a meeting 
clarifying that the Women Development Policy did 
not contain anything repugnant to Islamic 
principles. Then assurances followed from various 
levels of the government including the chief 
adviser and law adviser reiterating the same 
position. Furthermore, as a concrete step to 
remove any misgiving about the Women Development 
Policy, the government has formed a committee to 
go into the whole question. Without waiting for 
the recommendations of the committee, the 
Islamist parties fell into an aggressive mode. 
The fact that the detractors are not prepared to 
be assuaged by the assurances of the government 
is a proof that they are out to make an issue 
when there is none.

Islam, after all, stands for peace; any violence 
in the name of religion is, therefore, 
reprehensible. Let's not forget, our religion 
clearly encourages deliberation and logical 
discourse as a way of resolving any issue or 
problem.

The whole interest of the country now revolves 
around the task of achieving the goal for free, 
fair and credible elections in the country by the 
year end. Any distraction is hardly desirable 
now. The rising prices in the international 
market place and the national arena are a direct 
challenge to the maintenance of minimum living 
standards. Let's get our act together to meet the 
exigencies of the contemporary scenario.

o o o

New Age
April 13, 2008

Editorial
ISLAMISTS OPPOSE CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHTS OF WOMEN

Since March, we have noted with concern repeated 
rallies and protests by radical Islamist 
political groups who oppose women's rights. The 
Islamists in question have transformed their 
violence into a routine phenomenon, that too 
under a state of emergency. These identified 
obscurantists are not only instigating pious 
Muslims and manipulating their sentiments to 
further their narrow political agenda, they are 
also using the national mosque as their central 
base of political activity. The latest clashes on 
Friday saw, as reported in Saturday's New Age, 
more than 100 people injured in Dhaka when a 
section of the Islamists attacked police 
positions near the national mosque.

    The issue at hand may be new, but the 
perpetrators of this violence are not. At various 
times, these Islamists groups have used various 
and changeable excuses to advance their political 
agenda, the latest excuse being their opposition 
to the military-controlled interim government's 
development policy on women.

    It appears from the clashes on Thursday and 
Friday that the police have been instructed by 
the higher authorities of the government to take 
beatings from the Islamists without any effective 
retaliation, although protestors from society's 
progressive sections have been ruthlessly beaten 
up time and again by the same police force. The 
behaviour of the incumbents, in this case, 
resembles very much that of the past governments 
who used to pander, to a varying degree though, 
to these obscurantist elements on the grounds 
that a tough attitude would hurt the sentiments 
of a section of the voters.

    However, we want to clearly state our position 
that the incumbent's development policy on women 
fails to go the adequate distance in ensuring 
women's rights, given that the constitution of 
Bangladesh clearly instructs the state to ensure 
equality of women in all spheres of life - 
political, economic and cultural. We do not know 
why the incumbents have framed such a policy, 
undermining the constitutionally guaranteed 
status of the female citizens, particularly when 
the constitutional provisions concerned do not 
allow a caretaker government to formulate any 
policy affecting people's lives in the first 
place.

    What is, however, an ominous sign is that the 
government has been displaying a subservient 
attitude in tackling the Islamists, who are 
actively opposing the very idea of equal rights 
for women - a proposition clearly stated in the 
Constitution. The obvious result of this was 
witnessed in Chittagong where Madrassah students 
of radical indoctrination, perhaps emboldened by 
the state's soft position, attacked the 
Hathhazari police station on Friday.
    Meanwhile, we believe that Islamists who are 
perpetrating this violence clearly understand 
that the incumbent's policy on women falls short 
of the constitutional guarantee that women are 
entitled to. We therefore interpret their actions 
as a strategy to establish their hegemony in the 
political order of the day, while side by side 
instilling fear in society. They are just using 
the government policy on women's development as 
an excuse. For us the camps are clearly divided: 
those who support equal rights for women are in 
favour of the constitution, and those who oppose 
these rights consequently take a stand against 
the constitution of the state. For us the 
violence unleashed by the Islamists on the 
women's rights is just not a law and order 
problem; it is rather a political issue involving 
the democratic idea of the equal rights of men 
and women. But the government has not yet come 
out with a clear stance on such a vital issue, 
particularly since the Islamist groups resorted 
to violence around the national mosque on a 
regular basis.

    We therefore demand that the government, if it 
at all nurtures any commitment towards democratic 
principles, unambiguously states its political 
position on the subject and tackles the 
obscurantist Islamists who are continually 
rallying against the democratic rights of the 
women.

  o o o

WHEN "STATE RELIGION" REARS ITS UGLY HEAD IN BANGLADESH
Date:	4/12/2008 2:24:55 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time
From:	farida majid

       Whenever someone from the Hindutwa brigade 
comments on the affairs of Bangladesh one 
seemingly improbable but an unpleasant fact gets 
exposed. Jamaati politics based fundamentalism of 
Bangladesh is an important component for the 
growth and maintainance of BJP/RSS and other 
Hindutwavadi politics of India.

        Back in the '80's when Hussein M. Ershad, 
the military dictator, declared Islam as the 
State Religion in complete bald-faced violation 
of the 1972 Constitution of Bangladesh, and 
heartlessly denying the secular idealism of the 
Liberation War of 1971, the BJP/RSS gang of India 
greeted the news with glee. "If Pakistan and 
Bangladesh can have Islam as their state religion 
why can't India have Hinduism as its state 
religion?" piped in the honchos of Hindutwa 
brigade.

         The ordinary people of Bangladesh are not 
fools or toy-things in the hands of religious 
bigots. They, more than the middle class, 
educated lot, are better able to recognize the 
difference between piety and religion-based 
politics, and they expressly reject the latter.

           Please wish them luck in their struggle 
against bigotry and a future of totalitarianism!

            Farida

______


[3]

The Times of India

'Pak society does not accept dance even today'
7 Apr 2008  Meenakshi Sinha

Nahid Siddiqui is one of the finest Kathak 
dancers and choreographers from Pakistan. 
Meenakshi Sinha spoke with her at Jaipur:

Q: Is the Pakistani society open towards dance and other performing arts?

You can assess the Pakistani society's approach 
from the fact that it relates dance with mujra. 
When we travel we carry ghunghroos with us. The 
reaction of co-passengers is: What's this, why 
are you carrying this? Whereas for me, hum 
ibaadat karte hain uski (i worship ghunghroo). In 
this situation who will understand dance unless 
you introduce it to children especially through 
school curriculum? You can't expect mili-tary 
generals to understand art.

Q: But you've had democratic regimes?

Despite sporadic democratic regimes, art never 
flourished in Pakistan because one has to be 
steeped in culture to appre- ciate dance and 
music. Besides, partition led us to deny our 
history. What history can one have in 60 years? 
Unfortunately our leaders don't have the 
understanding. Forget art, basic education is not 
given to children. So how can performing arts 
develop?

Q: What is the situation now?

There is no acceptance of dance in Pakistani 
society except within a niche class that 
appre-ciates it. I haven't ever had any support 
or recognition from the government. The approach 
is not to propagate and advertise your art, but 
to keep mum.

Q: So how do you perform in Pakistan?

There are only closed-door performances for a 
select few. Dance is not encouraged. I used to do 
a series of very popular Kathak performances 
called Payal, which was a first for Pak TV. At 
that time, it got permission under the garb of 
folk dance of five minutes' duration. This is how 
one explained a classical performance then. 
Surely, i was banned by the Zia regime. I had to 
leave the country and move to England in 1979. 
But after a three-year break, i returned in 1984 
to perform. These are very discreet and low-key 
performances.

Q: Was it not pragmatic to work around the system to fight it?

Only if there had not been bomb blasts. I admire 
the fact that there are people like Salima 
Hashmi, activist daughter of poet Faiz Ahmad Faiz 
and Asma Jehangir, who are so progressive that 
they take to the streets for their cause. If i 
were to do that with Kathak, there will be an 
immediate backlash. Today, if you go to Pakistan 
you'll find that everything is OK, streets are 
fine, people are warm, and Lahore is beautiful. 
But deep down there is a divide, which one finds 
only when one lives there.

There is tremendous suffocation in the society 
today. There are many outside influences. Because 
of all this unrest, art has taken a beating. Art 
prospers in a society where there is peace, 
prosperity and harmony. Today, things have gone 
all wrong.



______


[4]


Dawn
April 03, 2008  

RELIGION IN UNIFORM

by Jawed Naqvi

A READER, a former soldier, wrote last week of 
his joy at seeing military columns march to the 
tune of Aiy mard-i-mujahid jaag zara ab 
waqt-i-shahadat hai aya, Allah-o-Akbar at the 
Pakistan Day parade in Islamabad.

He believed the musical theme was banished after 
9/11 because words like 'mujahid' or 'jihad' 
could have worried Pakistan's American friends.

"Oh soldier of faith, rise to the occasion in 
defence of your motherland, even at the peril of 
your life, Allah is the greatest," was how the 
former soldier translated the words, which he 
said were composed "with zero connotations of any 
extremism".

I can't imagine Indian troops marching to a 
religious tune with or without any connotations 
of extremism. On the contrary in January 2004, 
India's military instructed its personnel to not 
even sport bracelets, birthstone rings, 
vermillion streaks or sacred threads precisely to 
maintain a secular image. This is not to say that 
there are no religious or even communal elements 
within the armed forces. In fact the orders on 
religious symbols came only because senior 
officers found that more and more personnel of 
the million-strong army were indulging in overtly 
religious practices.

It is bad enough that Indian troops were 
dispatched to Kashmir, Nagaland or the Golden 
Temple and so on to confront their own alienated 
citizens. Imagine the disaster had they begun to 
sing a Vedic hymn in their efforts to subdue the 
Muslims of Kashmir, Christians of Nagaland or 
Sikhs in the Golden Temple. Given the context of 
Pakistan's most crucial challenge today, it would 
be baffling to even think of army columns 
marching in the name of God in the Swat valley 
against their own embattled and alienated 
citizens who too, by the way, would be singing 
praises to the same God in their effort to tame 
the Pakistani state.

I do not know how it plays out in Pakistan where 
the army has had a domineering political role, 
but in most parts of India where the army does 
not have a menacing presence, in times of ethnic 
strife or communal conflagration (in which the 
police and paramilitary units become readily 
identified as suspects) a flag march by army 
units in the affected areas ensures instant hope 
and a sense of neutrality among the victims.

And yet the nexus between religion and armies is 
so irretrievably rooted in history that without a 
fine balance between the two there would be plain 
havoc. Unit, Corps, God, Country is how the US 
Marines define their purpose in life by and large 
and in war particularly. Any change in the order 
would alter a fundamental world view. It would be 
a worrying sign for all if God, for example, were 
to take precedence over the Unit and the Corps a 
Marine was loyal to. But this is precisely what 
may be happening in a slow, almost imperceptible 
way.

As Jason Leopold says in a Truthout email 
dispatch, the "Christian right has been 
successful in spreading its fundamentalist agenda 
at US military installations around the world for 
decades. But the movement's meteoric rise in the 
US military came in large part after 9/11 and 
immediately after the US invaded Iraq in March of 
2003.

"At a time when the United States is encouraging 
greater religious freedom in Muslim nations, 
soldiers on the battlefield have told disturbing 
stories of being force-fed fundamentalist 
Christianity by highly controversial, apocalyptic 
'End Times' evangelists, who have infiltrated US 
military installations throughout the world with 
the blessing of high-level officials at the 
Pentagon."

Leopold further states in his researched article 
'Military Evangelism Deeper, Wider Than First 
Thought' that "Proselytising among military 
personnel has been conducted openly, in violation 
of the basic tenets of the United States 
Constitution."

The problem of course begins with President 
George W. Bush who, Leopold says, "has been vocal 
about his fundamentalist Christian beliefs and 
how God has helped him during his presidency." 
Late last year, "the White House sent out 
Christmas cards signed by President Bush and his 
wife Laura that contained a Biblical passage from 
the Old Testament:

"You alone are the LORD. You made the heavens, 
even the highest heavens, and all their starry 
host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas 
and all that is in them. You give life to 
everything, and the multitudes of heaven worship 
you." The inclusion of this passage, says 
Leopold, "caught the attention of long-time 
broadcaster Barbara Walters, who was a recipient 
of the presidential Christmas card."

It seems Walters could not "recall receiving 
'religious' holiday cards from past presidents 
and she wondered how non-Christians would receive 
such an overtly religious greeting. 'Usually in 
the past when I have received a Christmas card, 
it's been 'Happy Holidays' and so on Š Don't you 
think it's a little interesting that the 
president of all the people is sending out a 
religious Christmas card? Does this also go to 
agnostics, and atheists, and Muslims?'"

Perhaps the most influential fundamentalist 
Christian group is the Military Ministry, an 
American "national organisation and a subsidiary 
of the controversial fundamentalist Christian 
organisation Campus Crusade for Christ." 
According to Leopold, "Military Ministry's 
national website boasts it has successfully 
'targeted' basic training installations, or 
'gateways', and has successfully converted 
thousands of soldiers to evangelical 
Christianity."

He adds: "Military Ministry says its staffers are 
responsible for 'working with chaplains and 
military personnel to bring lost soldiers closer 
to Christ, build them in their faith and send 
them out into the world as government paid 
missionaries' - which appears to be a clear-cut 
violation of federal law governing the separation 
of church and state."

In India, there was an occasion recently when, 
during a collection of data on the percentage of 
Muslims in the army, the government had to take a 
call on the Indian military's aloofness from 
religion. "The armed forces are professional, 
apolitical, and secular and the most disciplined 
force the country has today.... We would not like 
to include [the armed forces] in such a type of 
survey, [but)] in the case of other departments 
and ministries such a study will continue," then 
defence minister Pranab Mukherjee told parliament.

There is an interesting story that an elderly 
Muslim lady in Lucknow narrates about a Hindu 
army doctor who asked her for an amulet with 
Quranic prayers. He kept it with him till another 
officer friend saw it and borrowed it for good 
luck in a campaign. And as luck would have it 
this man found himself with his borrowed amulet 
in Pakistan's custody during the 1971 war. The 
officer was eventually freed but the Pakistanis 
kept the amulet because, as one of them told the 
Indian officer, "This belongs to us." And so the 
issue of religion in the armed forces will 
continue to mock us even if there is the 
occasional happy denouement.

The writer is Dawn's correspondent in Delhi.


______


[5]

The Hindu
March 26, 2008

IDENTITY AND SEPARATISM: THE POLITICS OF ETHNO-NATIONALISM

by M.S. Prabhakara

Barring the Left, political parties including the 
Congress in most parts of the country have been 
exploiting identity grievances.

. - Photo: Ranjeet Kumar

Ethno-nationalism is not confined to one StateŠ 
The picture shows Bihari workers arriving in 
Patna after being forced out of Assam

A most curious feature of identity movements 
promoting an exclusivist ideology with language, 
religion, caste, 'ethnicity,' race and any other 
coordinate one may devise, including, perhaps, at 
some point gender, as the focal point of such 
mobilisation is that almost all of them 
eventually split into mutually hostile factions. 
Such is the nature of the beast. Perhaps such is 
also the law of nature for, natural organisms too 
eventually split and reproduce themse lves in 
newer forms. However, the dislocations as may be 
inherent in natural evolution do not as a rule 
violently and immediately impinge on human 
societies. This is not so with identity 
movements, now modishly known as mobilising of 
ethno-nationalism, and their obverse, separatism, 
that of their nature are prone to violent 
atomisation.

Such mobilisations are not unique to Assam and 
its neighbourhood. For instance, the Dravidian 
separatist assertion with secessionist undertones 
that now lie buried deep predates independence. 
This is now represented by several mutually 
hostile structures, crypto-secessionist, 
ultranationalist, some even with rationalist and 
socialist pretensions. The mobilisation of the 
'hurt Telugu pride' was a crucial element in the 
consolidation of Telugu nationalism. Following 
the inescapable split, this ideology is now 
appropriated by the Congress leaving the Telugu 
Desam Party with no agenda. Much the same has 
been the case with the Shiv Sena in Maharashtra 
where the original and its clone are now engaged 
in competitive chauvinism. Spending the last 
seven months of 2007 in Bangalore, I was struck 
not merely by the similarity of the grievances 
articulated by organisations claiming to defend 
the vital interests of the land (Karnataka) and 
the language (Kannada) to what is now the common 
currency of identity mobilisation in Assam and 
its neighbourhood, but also by the fact that the 
noisiest structure promoting Kannada exclusivism 
had split, with the other faction no less 
virulent and exclusivist.

The most successful of such mobilisations based 
on religion, with an imperilled identity (Islam 
under threat) as the rallying cry, was the 
movement for the attainment of a separate nation 
of Pakistan, the Land of the Pure. That 
nationalism could not survive its success for 
even 30 years.

The fact is, barring the Left, political parties 
including the Congress in most parts of the 
country have been exploiting identity grievances, 
adept at playing the 'regional' or 'national' 
card depending on whether they are in power or 
out of power.

A common, indeed necessary, feature of every such 
mobilisation is the Other, the hated and reviled 
Enemy seen as the root cause of one's own 
perceived diminishment as well as of one's larger 
environment. However, the identity of this Other 
is not always the same, constant. The small 
restaurateur and pavement trader from the south, 
mainly Karnataka and Kerala, who was the Enemy 
for the Shiv Sena over 30 years ago, has now been 
replaced by that even more generalised 'north 
Indian', the Bhayya, seen as the cause and effect 
of Mumbai's urban decay and squalor, and has 
indeed come to symbolise its quintessence. While 
for the present the Tamil stands at the apex of 
the oppressors in the imagination of the 
Kannadiga, with other neighbours lower down the 
line, increasingly this spot is being allotted, 
as in the current demonology of the Shiv Sena and 
its clone, to the 'north Indian', crowding out 
the Kannadigas from Bangalore and other cities.

Two other features are shared by such movements 
of aggressive identity assertion. They are all 
profoundly anti-democratic; and following from 
this, their methods are necessarily coercive, 
eschewing reasonable debate of the issues and 
grievances involved. It would take a courageous 
person to question the increasingly widespread 
opinion in Karnataka that the State and its 
people have been served short by the Union 
government on issues of their vital concern, like 
the sharing of the Cauvery waters and the 
recognition of Kannada as a classical language. 
The daring dissident is straightway put in the 
doghouse. It is not accidental that on both these 
issues the DMK whose support is crucial to the 
survival of the UPA government, is seen as the 
villain of the piece, though there is little 
difference among the various factions of 
Dravidian nationalist articulation on these 
issues.

Not all such assertions are inherently 
anti-democratic, as some Indian 
ultra-nationalists argue. For instance, by 
acknowledging the uniqueness of a people's 
resonance to their language, the very essence of 
their being, and by providing such a language 
identity a political and territorial space, the 
Union government by its Reorganisation of States 
in 1956 responded, however belatedly, to what was 
essentially a democratic demand, something that 
had been built into the very structure of the 
freedom movement as part of the anti-colonial 
struggle.

This did not, however, admit any kind of 
exclusivism, nor was it counterposed to the 
broader inclusive Indian nationalism. The 
anti-colonial struggles had not yet become merely 
ossified memories. Half a century down the line, 
this is not the case. Many developments, local, 
national and international, affecting the economy 
and society consequent upon the policies of 
successive governments have contributed to the 
transformation of what was once a legitimate 
inclusive democratic aspiration into an 
exclusivist and coercive ideology, feeding the 
sense of diminishment and deprivation where 
narrower and narrower definitions of identity 
going under the rubric of 'ethnicity' now 
determine the identity discourse.

For instance, the now apparently irreversible 
transformation of labour, in particular the 
unorganised labour, into another marketable 
commodity freely traded cross the state and, 
increasingly, also across national boundaries 
poses new challenges to the old concepts of the 
nation state as well as to the more limited space 
defined and determined by a people's inviolable 
identity - an almost mystic sense of being what 
they are and articulated in terms mentioned at 
the beginning of this essay. That those who 
exploit such anxieties about the increasing 
threat posed by the rampant outsider in their 
midst are also among those who exploit the 
opportunities opened up by this dynamic of forced 
and closely monitored mobility of unorganised 
labour does not in the least mitigate the pain 
and worse of its passive victims. The terrain of 
struggle is full of pitfalls, holds false 
promises. Yet, 'ethnic mobilisation' is now a 
flourishing growth industry not merely in Assam 
and its neighbourhood, but also in most parts of 
the country.

The difference between the killing, with their 
hands tied behind their back, bearing the 
message, 'Go back to where you came from', of 
Hindi-speaking labourers brought by contractors 
to work on building projects in Manipur, and the 
chasing away of Hindi-speaking youth seeking to 
appear in Railway Recruitment Boards tests in 
Guwahati and Bangalore by competing local youth 
is only one of degree. Coercive violence takes 
all kinds of forms.

Those who scoffed at the Indian freedom struggle, 
not all of them White Colonel Blimps, used to ask 
the supposed argument stopper question: But is 
there an India and are there Indians? The 
question is even now asked by some authentically 
native intellectuals for whom India is merely a 
'colonial construct', the dismantling of which is 
a revolutionary duty. The logical extension of 
such reasoning, at least in Assam, has been the 
asking of a similar question: Who is an Assamese? 
Nothing seemed sillier than this question when it 
was first raised, even when it was solemnly 
debated in the state Assembly.

However, given the trend and direction of 
ethno-nationalistic assertion and mobilisation in 
virtually every part of the country, it may not 
be long before similar questions are asked about 
even the narrowest and most insular definitions 
of oneself. Put simply, to divide is to multiply.



______


[6]


28 March 2008

Press release

PAK-INDIA FORUM FOR REVIEW OF PRISONERS' SITUATION

Lahore, March 28: The Pakistan-India People's 
Forum for Peace and Democracy is gratified to 
note the postponement of Indian national 
Sarabjeet Singh's execution by a month. This 
period should be utilized for a review of the 
convict's case and granting him clemency in the 
interest of goodwill between Pakistan and India.
At the same time, PIPFPD expresses grief on the 
sad demise on Thursday, March 20th of an Indian 
fisherman imprisoned at Malir Jail. The deceased 
Lakshman son of Kanji, was arrested by the 
Maritime Security Agency on February 10, 2006 and 
imprisoned along with a dozen other fishermen 
when they entered Pakistani territorial waters. 
Currently some 430 such fishermen are estimated 
to be held in Pakistani prisons, while India 
holds some 200 Pakistani fishermen.

The Pakistan-India People's Forum has 
consistently urged both governments to establish 
a fair, rational and humane protocol for the 
treatment of each country's nationals tried and 
held in the other country. The reason is not 
merely the indescribable plight of such detainees 
and convicts and the denial of their fundamental 
human rights, but the adverse impact such 
detentions / convictions / executions have on 
bilateral relations. A growing awareness of basic 
rights and revolution in the communications field 
makes each prisoner's issue a matter of great 
public concern in his country. This was evident 
in the case of Sarabjeet Singh, when public 
agitation on his behalf obliged New Delhi to make 
a formal request to Islamabad to pardon him

The Forum is of the considered view that Pakistan 
will gain nothing by taking the life of Sarabjeet 
Singh whose execution will only embitter 
relations between India and Pakistan. Such risks 
are utterly undesirable and unnecessary at a time 
when Pakistan is resuming its journey on the 
democratic path, and speedy normalization of 
relations with India, and indeed with other 
neighbours, should be high on its list of 
priorities. This makes a strong case for reprieve 
to Sarabjeet Singh who has already served 18 
years in prison. The Forum therefore calls upon 
Pakistan's new decision-makers to seize this 
chance to sow the seeds of peace and 
understanding with its close neighbour.

Pakistan and India must also stop treating those 
who stray across the border as criminals. 
Fishermen are routinely arrested on both sides, 
and their costly boats and equipment seized. 
Precious lives are also sometimes lost when the 
security agencies resort to firing at these 
fishermen. Such incidents are not only gross 
violations of human rights but also affect 
relations between the two countries. PIPFPD has 
long been demanding a fair deal for the 
fisherfolk community. Both governments need to 
set a code of conduct to resolve the matter as 
soon as possible.

Anis Haroon 
Afrasiab Khattak
Secretary-General 
Chairperson
Pakistan-India People's Forum for Peace and Democracy
(Pakistan Chapter)


Pakistan Secretariat: 11-Temple Road, Lahore.
Indian Secretariat: B-14 (SF), Gulmohar Park, New Delhi - 110 049
Sindh Secretariat: Flat#2, 1st Floor, 8-C, 
Zamzama Commercial Lane 3, Phase V, DHA, Karachi


______



[7]


Dawn
April 13, 2007
Book Review

REVIEWS: For lasting peace

By Krishna Kumar

The book centres round Indo-Pak relations in a 
bid to find out ways for lasting peace between 
the two countries.

The plea for friendly relations is advanced on 
different grounds. One of the arguments is 
similarity versus difference axis; similarity in 
terms of culture, that is language, music, eating 
habits and common reflexes etc. When India seeks 
peace on this ground, it disturbs Pakistanis who 
are ardent believers in their separate identity, 
and rightly so. 'Difficult though it is, we have 
to appreciate that Pakistan might have been 
similar to us once, but it is different from us 
now,' says Krishna Kumar, and continues, 'The 
book is about the reasons for this position and 
the challenges it presents to our efforts for 
peace.'

The author argues the need to find an alternative 
to replace the sameness vs difference axis in a 
larger context. India and Pakistan should seek 
for peace, keeping in view the reality that they 
are not only neighbours but a part of the process 
popularly known as globalisation, and as far as 
globalisation is concerned both the countries are 
faced with similar problems. They should realise 
that the world powers are pursuing the 
colonial-style brazenness and are bent upon 
reordering the world so that colonial hegemonies 
can be sustained. If India and Pakistan are to 
respond effectively to the challenges arising 
from the global explicitly political calamity 
they can only do so together,' concludes the 
author.

This demands a rational approach by both the 
countries. There is a need to educate the younger 
generation to understand their neighbour. Instead 
of creating hatred, it requires a newer approach.

Kumar points out that Kashmir has been the core 
issue of all wars between India and Pakistan and 
both have failed to feel the agony caused to the 
Kashmiri people. Pointing to the war of 1971 and 
the Kargil episode of 1991, the 30 years in 
between were used by both the countries to 
stockpile conventional and new arms, large 
amounts of money were used to develop long range 
ballistic missiles. Had this amount been used to 
develop education and healthcare systems, the 
economic picture of both the countries would have 
been different from what it is today. Instead of 
deploying scientific and technological resources 
in development, the two countries continue with 
their pre-Independence policy of divisiveness 
with the result that Indian politics is leaning 
rightwards and as far as Pakistan is concerned, 
the ideology of Islamisation combined with 
politicised fundamentalism is widening the gulf 
between the two.

The Gujarat riots are a sore on India's image; 
they point to a major crisis in society and the 
state and that too, not for the first time.

The author criticises the global perception of 
the Kashmir problem and states that any direction 
of territorial reorganisation on ethnic lines 
will be fatal as it has been in Iraq.

Kumar touches upon the various phases of 
historical events from pre-independence India to 
present day politics of the two countries, 
analysing and criticising the policies of the 
Congress and the Muslim League as well as of 
present day politics. He even criticises the 
secular forces of India who could not foresee 
that a communal riot was in making for a decade 
in the economically advanced state of Gujarat and 
raises the question whether modernisation and 
development are enough to strengthen secularism.

The Gujarat riots are a sore on India's image, 
they point to a major crisis in the society and 
state and that too, not for the first time (for 
example the anti-Sikh riots of 1984 in Delhi, 
after the assassination of Indira Gandhi). The 
role of the government was shocking in both the 
cases. Kumar concludes that at least one source 
of India's vulnerability lies in its hostile 
relationship with Pakistan. Therefore it is in 
the interest of both countries to seek peace, 
more so because a devastated South Asia would be 
more prone to exploitation by big powers.

The author visualises the chances of lasting 
peace through the implementation of an education 
system that will accommodate awareness of 
different identities without challenging the 
nation-building role of education. In conclusion, 
he puts emphasis on the realisation that 'the 
politics of war and the social mindset which 
supports it are our own creations, and therefore, 
we are the only ones who can change them.'

Battle for Peace
[by Krishna Kumar]
Penguin Books, India
ISBN O-14-310194-3
153pp. Rs175

Reviewed by Syeda Saleha


______


[8]

We Repeat: Reclaim And Reinvent The Judiciary

The official statement of the Second National 
Convention on The Judiciary and The Poor

The Second National convention is of the view 
that the judiciary of the country is not 
functioning as an instrument to provide justice 
to the vast majority of the people in the 
country. On the other hand, most of the Judiciary 
appears to be working in the interest of wealthy 
corporate interests which are today controlling 
the entire ruling establishment of the country. 
Thus, more often than not, its orders today have 
the effect of depriving the poor of their rights, 
than restoring their rights, which are being 
rampantly violated by the powerful and the State.

To begin with, the judicial system of the country 
is not even accessible to the vast majority of 
the people, who are poor. This is because of 
distance, expense and the procedural complexity 
of the system. It cannot be accessed without 
lawyers, without whom they cannot even enter the 
system. Obviously, the poor cannot afford 
lawyers. In fact, a poor person accused of an 
offence has no hope of defending himself in the 
present judicial system and is condemned to its 
mercy. That is why so many poor persons spend 
more time in jail as under-trials than the 
maximum sentence that can be imposed upon them 
for their alleged crimes.

Even worse than the lack of access, is the 
increasingly elitist and anti poor attitude of 
the majority of the Judges, particularly of the 
Supreme Court. The ideology of the courts today, 
as reflected in their judgments, is more right 
wing and reactionary than even the government 
which is functioning as an agent of powerful 
corporate interests. The judiciary has remained 
largely impervious to the daily and widespread 
indignities heaped upon the poor. Thus when the 
poor are deprived of their land and natural 
resources on which they survive, without any 
rehabilitation, the Courts have, barring few 
exceptions, refused to interfere, even when they 
are petitioned on behalf of these people, and 
even when such dispossession is for the benefit 
of private corporate interests.

Even worse however, is the fact, that the courts 
have often in the recent past, themselves ordered 
the eviction of poor slum dwellers from their 
dwellings without rehabilitation. This has been 
done without hearing them, in violation of the 
principles of Natural Justice and in violation of 
their right to shelter. This has been done 
sometimes on the ground that the slum dwellers do 
not legally own the land on which their jhuggis 
are put up, and sometimes on the ground that they 
are on the banks of the Yamuna or on the Ridge 
which are environmentally sensitive areas.  But 
when shopping malls come up on the ridge, or the 
powerful Akshardham temple comes up on the same 
banks of the River, all kinds of other flimsy 
excuses are trotted out to allow them.

The courts have also ordered the removal of 
hawkers from the streets of several towns, again 
without a hearing, without rehabilitation and in 
violation of their right to livelihood. They have 
ordered the removal of rickshaw pullers from the 
streets of Delhi in a similar fashion. These are 
actions which even the governments dared not take 
because of their democratic accountability, but 
could be taken by a judiciary which is totally 
unaccountable.

We have seen in recent times the gradual 
dismantling of labour protection laws at the 
hands of the judiciary as it has refused to 
implement the Contract Labour Act and "creatively 
reinterpreted" various labour laws in favour of 
big business. In one judgement, the Supreme Court 
has gone so far as to say that labour laws should 
be interpreted in line with the economic policies 
of the government! Thus, they have achieved for 
the government what it could not get done 
legislatively because of the lack of consensus in 
Parliament.

This Convention finds the same bias against the 
poor when we examine the courts orders in matters 
involving civil rights. Bail applications of the 
poor and the weak are often not heard for years, 
while those of the wealthy and powerful, argued 
by corporate lawyers get heard immediately. Even 
Civil rights activists like Binayak Sen get 
hostile treatment from the courts and are denied 
bail, while smugglers and white collar racketeers 
are granted bail with alacrity.

The time has therefore come for the people of the 
country to reinvent the judicial system. A people 
friendly judicial system must be one which is 
simple enough to be accessed without the 
mediation of professional lawyers. It must 
function in a participatory and transparent 
manner. The laws and procedures must be 
simplified, so as to enable a better 
understanding and improved access to the judicial 
system by the common person. The proceedings of 
all courts must be videographed and the records 
made available to all citizens under the Right to 
Information Act. The recently proposed Gram 
Nyayalayas seem to be a step in the right 
direction. An adequate number of them must be set 
up so that they are available at every block 
level. This, along with a simple procedure will 
help in making justice quicker. We can outline 
the broad contours of a people's judiciary here, 
but its detailed blueprint needs to be prepared.

Most importantly, the judges who man such 
people's courts must be selected in a transparent 
manner with much greater involvement and 
participation of the people. The system of 
selection must also take into account the social 
and political philosophy of the proposed 
appointee to ensure that it is in tune with the 
social and political philosophy of the 
Constitution, and in particular that the 
appointees have some demonstrable understanding 
and sensitivity towards the poor. For this, we 
need a Judicial Appointment Commission manned by 
persons other than judges, which will conduct 
public confirmation hearings, allowing full 
participation of the people thereby conforming 
with the basic principles of democracy.

There must also be a transparent and 
participatory system of evaluating and reviewing 
the performance of judges and dealing with 
judicial misconduct and delinquency. Judges must 
be accountable not merely for corruption, but 
every kind of misconduct, including betrayal of 
the principles of the constitution-for action as 
well as inaction. A full time, independent, 
judicial performance commission, with an 
investigative machinery under its control must 
constantly review the performance of judges.

It is often said, even in "Official" seminars 
that the Judicial system is in a state of 
collapse, because justice delivery is very slow. 
However, merely speeding it up, will not make it 
an effective system of justice for the poor. For 
that we need to reconstruct the entire system. 
Such radical restructuring of the judiciary 
however, will need a powerful people's movement 
in the country. Though that may still be distant, 
yet, public discussion and debate must begin on 
this issue. For, it is clear, that no amount of 
tinkering with the present system is likely to 
yield significant results. Drastic surgery is 
required.

The call given in the first Convention in 2007 is 
reiterated that the Judiciary in the country 
needs to be "reclaimed and reinvented" by the 
people.

This statement was released by Ms.Arundhati Roy, 
Mr.Prashant Bhushan and Dr.Anoop Saraya on behalf 
of the speakers and participants of the 2nd 
National Convention on the Judiciary and the 
Poor, organised by the Campaign for Judicial 
Accountability and Reform and held on the 23rd 
and 24th of February 2008 at the Indian Society 
for International Law.

______



[9] Announcements:


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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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