SACW | June 23-24, 2008 / Lal Masjid 2 / intimidation in Kashmir / CNDP / Tribe, Caste / Hindu Far Right / Production of Difference etc

Harsh Kapoor aiindex at gmail.com
Mon Jun 23 18:37:56 CDT 2008


South Asia Citizens Wire | June 23-24 , 2008 | 
Dispatch No. 2529 - Year 10 running

[1] Pakistan:
   (i) Myth of minorities' protection (Editorial, Daily Times)
   (ii) Another Lal Masjid? (Ahmed Bilal)
[2] International People's Tribunal intimidated 
and detained in Indian - administered Kashmir 
(Press Release)
[3] India: CNDP Press Release, 23 June 2008
[4] India: Tribes And Castes  - competition for backwardness (André Béteille)
[5] India: Hindu Far Right Terror Network - Is anybody taking note ?
    - A New Source of Terror? (Vidyadhar Gadgil)
    - Quietly, hardline Hindu outfits build a 
network across Maharashtra, Goa (Kavitha Iyer)

[6] Production of Difference: Superiority and Separation (Priyamvada Gopal)
[7] Recently Published:
(i) UK: Domestic abuse within South Asian 
communities : I can't tell people what is 
happening at home By Shayma Izzidien
(ii) Review: Partisans of Allah - Jihad in South 
Asia by Ayesha Jalal (reviewed by Kamila Shamsie)
[8] Announcements:
(i) National Convention On "State Repression & 
Black Laws in India" (Raipur, 25-26 June 2008)
(ii) Anti-Emergency Day (New Delhi, 26 June 2008)

______

[1]

Daily Times
June 23, 2008

EDITORIAL: MYTH OF MINORITIES' PROTECTION

The ANP government is challenged by the outlaw 
militants of the Tribal Areas and their followers 
in Peshawar and has vowed to fight back to 
protect the city. But while the resolve is still 
in the process of being strengthened, a gang of 
"bearded youth with long hair" has kidnapped 
around 20 Christians of Banaras Town and savagely 
beaten up the rest. The Christians were gathered 
at a charity dinner and had no idea that they 
would be accused of "bad behaviour". The Taliban 
left a message behind: "Christian population 
should mend its ways". This is a fresh reminder 
for Pakistanis that Pakistan's dirt-poor 
Christians have been killed in the past to avenge 
the killings of Muslims at the hands of American 
"Christians" elsewhere in the world.

Banaras Town or Banarasabad has 350 Christian 
families that go back in history. Peshawar itself 
is a kind of melting pot of nationalities and 
Muslim sects. The act of attacking the poorest 
section of the citizens of Pakistan was dastardly 
in the extreme. The terrorists, arriving in half 
a dozen brand new SUVs and as many pick-ups, 
failed to see the moral contrast of what they 
were doing. A fully armed gang had attacked the 
most disadvantaged section of the city. It would 
be a cruel joke if the 20 abductees are kept as 
hostages to the demand that the Americans should 
leave Afghanistan. Peshawar city has seen 
maltreatment of its non-Muslims at the hands of 
its "pious" extremists in the past, but this is 
the most shameful example of how the city has 
lost control over itself and finds itself in a 
state of siege even as it parleys with the 
Taliban for a "peace" deal.

But why should we single out the NWFP? Punjab has 
had the dubious distinction of staging the most 
gruesome attacks on the life and property of the 
country's constitutionally protected citizens. 
Under the jurisdiction of the last government, 
Sangla Hill saw the wholesale destruction of the 
places of worship of the local Christians after 
one Christian was accused - you have guessed it - 
of "desecrating the Quran and insulting the Holy 
Prophet PBUH". As the government - which boasted 
a mismatch of ideology with its patron President 
Pervez Musharraf - acted against the vandals with 
painful unwillingness, fire-breathing clerics 
from Lahore swooped down on Sangla Hill and saved 
the culprits from punishment under law.

Faisalabad has the distinction of being the scene 
of the self-immolation of Bishop John Jacob after 
the conviction for blasphemy of an innocent 
Christian. It outdid itself again when on June 5, 
2008, the principal of Punjab Medical College, 
one Mr Randhava, rusticated 23 Ahmedi boy and 
girl students from college and ordered them out 
of the college hostel "with immediate effect". 
His decision was triggered by the campaign of 
some one thousand students of the college 
demanding their expulsion. The zealots encircled 
the principal's office and he, instead of calling 
in the administration, got rid of the minority 
students just because they were accused, falsely, 
of trying to proselytise on the college premises. 
The agitation came from students belonging to 
organisations like Muslim Students Federation 
(MSF), Islami Jamiat-e Tulaba (IJT) and Anjuman 
Tulaba-e Islam (ATI). Some politically 
"non-aligned" students joined the siege for the 
sake of their own safety and also for the 
"empowerment" which the weak enjoy by joining the 
strong offenders these days. The rustication 
order read: "Due to the religious dispute, hate 
material distribution and on recommendation of 
the college disciplinary committee, the following 
students are rusticated from the college as well 
as hostel roll under Rule III clause-V of the 
college prospectus with immediate effect to 
maintain the law and order situation in the 
college and hostel premises".

The students clashed on the basis of religion. 
The Ahmedi students tore down the Sunni poster 
against their faith and were threatened. The 
police arrived. Governor Punjab activated the 
administration. A committee has been formed of 
three teachers of the College to find out what 
really happened. But everyone in the College says 
it would be impossible to reinstate the expelled 
Ahmedi students. According to a student, as 
quoted in a newspaper report: "The College has a 
very rich history (sic!) of curbing this fitna 
(evil). In the 1974 movement against the Ahmedis, 
the College played a very important role. Some of 
our teachers, who were then students of the 
College, took an active part in that movement. We 
are once again ready to lead such a movement if 
the Ahmedi students are allowed to come back to 
the College".

Up in Peshawar, the state has lost most of its 
writ; down in Faisalabad, the dominant sect wants 
to finish off an apostatised minority. There are 
very few who would like to prevent Pakistan from 
violating its own Constitution that gives equal 
rights to its minority communities. *


o o o

(ii)

The News,
June 23, 2008

ANOTHER LAL MASJID?

by Ahmed Bilal

In April I had to make an emergency trip to 
Pakistan due to the declining health of my 
father. It was after more than two years that I 
was visiting Pakistan, most of the four weeks to 
be spent in my hometown Bahawalpur. When I had 
visited in 2005, it had been a visit after four 
years, so new roads and cell phones in every hand 
were a fresh sight. This time, little seemed to 
have changed since my last trip. On my way home 
from the airport, it looked like the same old 
desert town with its date palms, the dust and the 
desert wind.

However, as the car stopped at the main gate of 
my parents' house, a poster pasted on the gate 
caught my attention. The title of the poster was 
"Azmat-e-Quran Conference," and the key speaker 
was going to be someone named Masood Azhar. Why 
did the name sound familiar? I thought about it 
for a moment, but then as the car moved in, the 
happy feeling of meeting my parents again 
overwhelmed me and I quite forgot about it all. 
The next few days were spent making courtesy 
calls and getting over the jet lag.

Then came the day when I was fresh again to go 
out and meet relatives and family friends in the 
city. As I went out, I saw the same poster pasted 
all over the city with a lot of white flags 
hoisted on all major intersections. I wondered 
what was going on, and the name Masood Azhar 
brought some old memories of watching this man on 
the news. Yes, this is the same Masood Azhar who 
founded the Jaish-e-Muhammad organisation and 
served time in Indian jails before getting freed 
by hijacking an Indian Airlines jet.

Bahawalpur was always a laidback small town where 
everyone knew everyone else. Masood Azhar was a 
neighbour of my cousins and used to have a small 
house which wasn't even visible from the road. I 
remember when he was released. The BBC wanted to 
film his return, from the terrace of my cousins' 
house, but they refused due to privacy concerns. 
Since then we heard little about him, in the news 
or in local gossip. In general, people didn't 
give him much credibility.

My attention was drawn to the graffiti around me. 
Gone were the usual slogans of old times, 
directing people to visit miraculous witchdoctors 
for the solution of all their problems. The walls 
were filled with anti-West hate slogans, with 
"Al-Jihad al-Qital" (holy war, bloody battle) 
written everywhere around the central mosque. 
This was not the Bahawalpur I knew.

As we got closer to the mosque, I saw the 
adjacent ground filled with bearded men in white 
robes, with more of them reaching there in buses, 
chanting the slogans written all over the city. A 
number of men were uniformed, and they had closed 
the road to facilitate the movement of the buses 
into the place. The purpose of the conference was 
to distribute a new book of Masood Azhar, which 
had supposedly substantiated that the jihad these 
men thought they were preparing for was actually 
sanctioned by the verses of the Holy Quran, based 
on their strict politically-motivated 
interpretation.

We reached the house of our family friends with 
mixed thoughts. Disturbed by these developments, 
I asked them what was going on in the city. They 
said it had been silently going on for a long 
time. Over the years, Masood Azhar had converted 
his small house into a multi-storied concrete 
compound housing 700 armed men, who freely did 
target practice there. All this was located in a 
central part of the city, ironically called Model 
Town. The police dared not touch these men, and 
instead of putting pressure on them to stop their 
activities, local politicians actually hired 
these men as bodyguards during the elections.

After leaving their house, as we got closer to my 
cousins' house, a strange tall building with the 
same white flags on top was visible from a 
distance. This was Masood Azhar's compound. A few 
blocks away from my cousins' house our car got 
stuck in a crowd of the same bearded men in white 
robes who flocked outside the compound and 
watched us suspiciously as we drove through them. 
For a moment, I felt like a stranger in my own 
hometown. Everyone at my cousins' house thought 
of all this as something normal and didn't seem 
to be bothered.

Talking to people about this, I had some 
interesting conversations with some of the people 
who were involved in local politics and the 
internal politics of Islamabad. Their 
understanding was that Masood Azhar was like 
Abdur Rashid Ghazi of Lal Masjid. The way they 
explained it, the CIA gets money channelled into 
Pakistan through the ISI. Some of it goes to fund 
extremists, some of it goes to eliminate them, 
and most of it goes into shady bank accounts. The 
agencies get their money, the US benefits from 
the instability in the region to maintain a 
military presence here, Musharraf gets to stay in 
power by showing his performance in the war on 
terror, and the bearded men in white robes think 
they are doing some great service to religion by 
dedicating their lives to militancy. So this was 
clearly a win-win situation for all parties, at 
the expense of the fabric of Pakistani society.

Although I took their explanation with a grain of 
salt, I thought a lot of it did make sense. On my 
way back home, a huge billboard at the heart of 
the city grabbed my attention. It showed a 
passenger plane on fire with a slogan on it: 
"Another victory for Muslims." I had a flight 
back to the US coming up, and the plane on the 
billboard resembled the 777 I took to fly to 
Pakistan. I wondered if the ones behind this 
billboard actually realised what they were 
portraying. Beneath the billboard, the cityscape 
was filled with common Pakistanis going about 
their everyday struggle for survival.

The writer works in the IT industry in the US. 
Email: ahmad.bilal [AT] hotmail [dot] com


______


[2]


For Immediate Release/Press Statement
Srinagar, 21st June 2008

SUBJECT: INTERNATIONAL PEOPLE'S TRIBUNAL 
INTIMIDATED AND DETAINED IN INDIAN - ADMINISTERED 
KASHMIR

CONTACT: Khurram Parvez, Tribunal Liaison
+91-9419013553; +91-194-2482820;
khurramparvez[at]yahoo[dot]com; kparvez[at]kashmirprocess[dot]org

On June 20, the 'International Peoples Tribunal 
on Human Rights and Justice in 
Indian-administered Kashmir' visited the northern 
district of Kupwara, a heavily militarized zone 
about 95 kms from Srinagar, to conduct its 
investigations in the area, as part of its 
ongoing work to be conducted in 2008-2009.

The team comprised of Tribunal Conveners Dr. 
Angana Chatterji and Advocate Parvez Imroz, with 
a Tribunal staff member and camera crew. They 
first visited a mass grave in Trehgam village and 
interacted with inhabitants of the area. After 
which the team reached Regipora around 3pm and 
stopped at a hotel for lunch. After the team came 
out of the hotel two persons were sitting on the 
ladders, one in a blue check shirt and another in 
a white shirt, introducing themselves as Special 
Branch Kashmir (SBK) and Counter Intelligence 
Kashmir (CIK) personnel. They questioned the 
Tribunal staff member about the purpose of their 
visit. After responding, Tribunal members 
proceeded with the fact finding.

The Tribunal team then visited the martyrs' 
graveyard in Regipora, after which they stopped 
at a nearby tea stall to speak with local people 
about the graves. Four persons, including the 
previous two that introduced themselves as the 
SBK, CIK personnel again questioned the members 
of the team: Who are you?, What are you doing 
here?, How many villages you visited from the 
morning?, Who are the persons whom you 
interviewed from the morning? Are you a foreign 
national? (to Dr.  Chatterji who is a citizen of 
India and resident of the US). The team again 
answered their questions without any argument.

After this episode ended another four persons 
establishing themselves as SBK and CIK personnel 
came to the scene. The personnel asked the 
members, how many foreigners are there in the 
team and are they carrying passports with them? 
The personnel again asked, Who is the Lady? What 
is she? Which are the places you visited from the 
morning? And whom did you talk and interviewed 
from the morning? Three more persons, who were at 
different locations in the market, and seen 
making phone calls constantly, again questioned 
the Tribunal team: 'Did you take any footage and 
pictures from the places you visited?' The team 
again answered to their queries. In total, there 
were 12 intelligence personnel. The questioning 
by the personnel took around one hour. Then the 
team proceeded towards Srinagar. While the team 
rode back, a car started to follow the team. The 
team detoured from the highway and went to 
another mass grave in the area.

After the Tribunal team left the last site, they 
were stopped at Shangargund, Sopore, at around 
6:40 pm by three persons in civilian clothing. 
The personnel ordered the driver of car to get 
down and took him aside. The driver was asked, 
'Which places you visited?' he replied them and 
then the three persons without proving their 
identity forcibly boarded the Tribunal car, which 
was already filled to capacity. These personnel 
without proving their credentials or offering 
justification ordered the Tribunal team to Police 
Station in Sopore. When the members asked for 
identification, they responded that they would 
introduce themselves at the police station.

Police Station Episode:
At the police station Advocate Imroz, Dr. 
Chatterji, and the camerapersons were asked to 
give details of their identity, the purpose of 
their visit to Kupwara, and asked to hand over 
the tapes which the police alleged contained 
'dangerous' and 'objectionable' material. Dr. 
Chatterji and Advocate Imroz stated that the 
Tribunal, a publicly announced process, ongoing 
since April 05, 2008, had been undertaking its 
work peaceably, lawfully, with informed consent 
of local people and that they had not visited 
restricted areas, and stated that the  police had 
no lawful reason to demand the seizure of the 
tapes. At the police station, where the Tribunal 
members were detained for 16 minutes, the 
Tribunal team received calls from presspersons 
and other concerned citizens. After several calls 
to senior police persons, the police released the 
Tribunal team.

After the team left the police station a red 
colored Indica car, which came out from the 
Police Station Sopore, tailed the Tribunal team 
again up to Sangrama. In addition, there are 
Intelligence personnel stationed at Dr. 
Chatterji's hotel. On June 21, she was followed 
from her hotel by Intelligence to the Tribunal's 
office in Lal Chowk, Srinagar, where about 8 
personnel have been stationed the entire day 
questioning any person that leaves or enters the 
office.
The Tribunal is gravely concerned that team 
members are being singled out for intimidation 
and harassment by the government - Police, 
intelligence, and other agencies. As well, Dr. 
Chatterji was stopped and intimidated at 
Immigration while leaving India for the US where 
she is a professor of anthropology, in April 
after announcing the Tribunal, and again on her 
re-entry in June.

The Tribunal is extremely concerned at the 
harassment and intimidation directed at the team 
and how some of its members are surveilled. We 
are concerned that such intimidation and 
harassment makes further dangerous the work of 
the Tribunal which remains daunting under the 
best of circumstances. We remain gravely 
concerned that such interventions stand in the 
way of the Tribunal carrying out its 
responsibilities to communities affected by the 
culture of violence in Kashmir.

We hope and expect that the Tribunal will not be 
harassed, intimidated or threatened and that its 
members, as human rights defenders, can continue 
their work. We call on our colleagues and allies 
to support us in this crucial process and request 
that they remain attentive to the tactics of 
intimidation and violence in Kashmir.

______


[3]

CNDP Condemns Intransigence of Indian Prime 
Minister on the Deplorable Indo-US Nuclear Deal

[23 June 2008]

The Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament and Peace (CNDP)

* a national coalition of organisations and 
individuals for nuclear disarmament - notes with 
great concern the Indian Prime Minister's 
obstinate insistence on going ahead with 
clinching of the India-specific agreement with 
the IAEA. This will be a vital intermediate step 
towards operationalising the Indo-US nuclear deal 
in the teeth of strong opposition within India. 
The Prime Minister wants to go ahead, trampling 
upon democratic norms and values, regardless of 
all rational considerations, let alone ethical 
ones.

The CNDP reiterates its consistent and firm 
opposition to the deal on the following grounds 
as pointed out repeatedly in the past. The deal 
severely undermines the prospects of global 
nuclear disarmament by (selectively and 
arbitrarily) "legitimising" India's nuclear 
status and, in the process, the possession of 
nuclear weapons by the existing nuclear weapon 
states - both "recognised" and "unrecognised" - 
and also the aspirations of other actual and 
potential aspirants.The deal will promote the 
cause of nuclear militarism and nuclear-weapon 
build-up in India against the interests of peace 
and the people in the region. It will further 
intensify the arms race between India and 
Pakistan - both nuclear and conventional. 
Pakistan, in fact, made a strong plea for a 
similar deal. And the brusque refusal by the US, 
instead of dissuading it, would only further 
inflame its passions and thereby turn the nuclear 
mess in South Asia all the more dangerous. This 
deal is also an utterly reprehensible move to 
bring India closer to the US orbit as a regional 
ally to facilitate the execution of its global 
imperial ambitions.This deal is also an utterly 
reprehensible move to bring India closer into the 
US orbit as a regional ally to facilitate the 
execution of its global imperial ambitions. 
Furthermore, the consequent shift in focus in 
favour of highly expensive nuclear power, if  the 
deal comes into operation, will significantly 
distort India's energy options at the cost of 
efforts to develop environmentally benign and 
renewable sources of energy.

The CNDP, on this occasion, calls upon the Indian 
people to rise in protest against the 
intransigence of the Prime Minister and voice 
their strongest opposition to the undemocratic 
move to impose the deplorable deal on  the 
country.

Achin Vanaik  Admiral L Ramdas  J Sriraman  ND 
Jayaparakash  Amarjeet Kaur  Sukla Sen

______


[4]

Hindustan Times
June 24 , 2008

TRIBES AND CASTES
- Politics is being driven by the competition for backwardness

by André Béteille

Politics in India is coming to be driven 
increasingly by the competition for backwardness. 
The principal contenders in this competition are 
not individuals, households, or even classes, but 
castes and tribes. Even the religious minorities, 
whose proud forbears once ruled much of the land, 
are learning to recognize the advantages to be 
gained from being designated as backward.

Sociologists of an earlier generation had drawn 
attention to the wide prevalence of 
'Sanskritization', whereby a caste of middle or 
inferior social rank claimed a higher status by 
adopting the habits, practices and rites of the 
twice-born castes and calling themselves 
Kshatriyas or even Brahmins. Today, such castes 
are less eager to represent themselves as 
Brahmins and Kshatriyas than to claim that they 
are backward. It is in this way that the lists of 
the scheduled tribes, the scheduled castes and 
the other backward classes have become 
progressively inflated in the last five or six 
decades.

In a book entitled First We Are People, the 
Swedish anthropologist, Stefan Molund, described 
the changing social position of a caste called 
the Koris in Uttar Pradesh. The Koris had, before 
independence, been grouped with the SCs. This, 
their leaders felt, compromised their dignity by 
tainting them with the stigma of pollution. They 
successfully petitioned the government to have 
their name removed from the list. But shortly 
after independence, their new leaders realized 
that they had foregone the special benefits in 
education and employment by asking for a change 
of status. So they made another plea, again 
successfully, to be re-included in the SC list. 
The Koris are not the only community to have gone 
through this kind of forward and backward 
movement.

What was not widely recognized at first is that 
the competition for backwardness would not stop 
at the boundary between the advanced and the 
backward communities. The Gujjars of Rajasthan, 
who have enjoyed the benefits of inclusion among 
the OBCs, have been agitating for being 
reclassified as a scheduled tribe. They feel that 
they will benefit from the reclassification 
because the OBCs include powerful castes, such as 
the Jats, with whose members they do not wish to 
compete. But their inclusion among the STs is not 
viewed with favour by the Meenas, who already 
enjoy that status and do not wish to have fresh 
competitors.

Leaving aside the rivalries among Meenas, Gujjars 
and Jats, can the claims of the Gujjars, or any 
community, to be designated as a scheduled tribe 
be judged any longer on merit, or on objective 
grounds? Does expert or professional opinion on 
the subject count any more? The problem is not 
simply that the subject itself is replete with 
ambiguity, but that professional opinion on such 
subjects bends so easily to the prevailing 
political winds.

What was so striking about the claims and 
counter-claims made over the designation of the 
Gujjars as a scheduled tribe, was the absence of 
any serious discussion of what we should mean by 
the term 'tribe'. Does a tribe have any specific 
features as a social formation, or can any social 
formation be designated as a tribe because it 
once had, or is presumed to have had, the 
characteristics of a tribe even though its social 
composition and organization have in the meantime 
changed substantially?

Anthropologists have written about tribes for 
well over a hundred years. It was, in fact, one 
of the key concepts of their discipline in its 
formative years. No one will claim that all 
anthropologists have reached complete agreement 
on the definition of tribe, but that does not 
mean that no yardstick exists for deciding which 
groups may be regarded as tribes. One reason why 
anthropologists shifted their attention away from 
tribes is that in the world as a whole there are 
today fewer communities that can be reasonably 
characterized as tribes than there were even a 
hundred years ago.

In October 1960, that is, nearly 50 years ago, 
the Seminar magazine brought out an issue on 
'Tribal India'. In my contribution to that issue, 
I had suggested criteria for the definition of 
tribe, and, like several of the other 
contributors, including N.K. Bose and Verrier 
Elwin, had drawn attention to the many changes in 
tribal life that had already become visible. The 
criteria proposed by me were that a tribe should 
be more or less self-contained as a community, 
and that it should be relatively small and 
compact, and relatively undifferentiated and 
unstratified. Like the other contributors, I too 
had pointed out that what we had in India were 
not so much tribes in their pristine form as 
tribes that were in transition to a different 
mode of organization.

Significant changes have taken place in the 
character and composition of many of the groups 
that continue to be designated as tribes. Despite 
the changes they have undergone since 
independence, there is little prospect of any of 
them being declassified and removed from the list 
of STs. As a matter of fact, new groups have been 
added to the list, so that the officially 
designated tribal population increased 
significantly as a proportion of the total 
population between 1951 and 2001. It is said that 
groups such as the Meenas and the Gujjars were 
organized as tribes at some time in the past. 
This is almost certainly true: the Burgundians 
and the Lombards were also tribes at a certain 
time, and the Germany about which the Roman 
historian, Tacitus, wrote was inhabited mainly by 
tribes. All this changed elsewhere in due course 
of time: only in India, once a tribe, always a 
tribe.

The larger tribes are now less self-contained and 
more closely woven into the fabric of the wider 
society than ever before. They have also become 
progressively more differentiated and more 
stratified. Their members now live in remote 
villages, small towns and large cities. A study 
by Christopher Lakra of the Oraons in Ranchi town 
made about 20 years ago revealed the advance of 
occupational differentiation and social 
stratification among them. The Oraons may 
justifiably continue to regard themselves as 
Oraons, but for how many more decades should we 
continue to regard them as a tribe?

The continuous economic, social and political 
changes of the last 60 years have led to the 
growth of a self-conscious and assertive middle 
class among several of the larger and more 
dominant tribes. They now include lawyers, 
doctors, civil servants, schoolteachers, clerks 
and many others in white collar occupations. 
Reservations in education and employment have 
contributed something to this process, but the 
growth would have taken place even without 
reservations, for the expansion of the middle 
class is an all-India phenomenon which is 
changing the character of Indian society as a 
whole.

A tribe with an assertive and expanding middle 
class is, from the sociological point of view, a 
contradiction in terms. Such a phenomenon would 
have perplexed the anthropologists of the 19th 
century who first embarked on the systematic 
study of tribes. But it is the educated middle 
class, more than any other class or stratum, that 
is most zealous in safeguarding the identity of 
the community to which it belongs, and, 
especially, in ensuring that it continues to be 
designated as a scheduled tribe.

The author is Professor Emeritus of Sociology, 
Delhi School of Economics and National Research 
Professor

______


[5]  [Hindutva's Terror Networking: Is any body listening ? ]

(i)

Herald, Panjim, 22 June 2008

A NEW SOURCE OF TERROR?

----
Four members of the Sanatan Sanstha have been 
arrested in Mumbai for setting off bomb blasts in 
Thane and Navi Mumbai. But the organisation says 
it is not involved. The State Government needs to 
look closely into the workings of this outfit, 
especially since it is headquartered in Goa, says 
Vidyadhar Gadgil.
----

The Hindu Janajagruti Samiti (HJS) and the 
Sanatan Sanstha (SS) have been quick to deny any 
responsibility for the activities of the four 
Sanatan Sanstha full-time activists who were 
recently arrested in Panvel by the Anti-Terrorism 
Squad (ATS) for setting off bomb blasts during 
the screening of a play 'Amhi Pachpute' in Thane 
on 4 June 2008. As news of the arrests spread, 
the concerned organisations went into 
damage-control mode, protesting their innocence 
in the blasts, and condemning the incidents. They 
have also turned around and accused the 
government of persecuting them, saying that the 
enquires by the ATS amount to 'exploitation of 
innocent and nurturing of offenders'.

As the matter is investigated further, more and 
more skeletons have begun to tumble out of the 
closet. Police say the arrested activists were 
also involved in earlier bomb blasts, during the 
screening of 'Jodha Akbar' and allegedly planted 
a bomb outside a mosque in Pen that failed to 
explode. These events confirm that extremist 
adherents of Hindutva have now begun adopting 
terrorist tactics, something that has been clear 
since the Nanded blasts in April 2006 in which 
two Bajrang Dal militants were killed due to an 
accidental explosion when they were allegedly 
manufacturing bombs at the home of a prominent 
RSS activist.

How much credence is one to give to the denials 
of the HJS and SS regarding their involvement in 
these attacks? The police have stated that at 
least one of the bombs was manufactured on the 
premises of the Sanatan Sanstha 'ashram' at 
Panvel. The arrested activists are committed 
'sevaks' of these organisations. Even if the HJS 
and SS are granted the benefit of doubt with 
regards to the actual preparation and execution 
of the blasts -- and we assume that the activists 
planned these terrorist attacks on their own 
initiative -- we need to look carefully into what 
motivated them.

The accused are reported to have told the police 
that they have no regrets about their actions, 
and are in fact 'proud of what they did to deter 
those who were trying to show our gods and 
goddesses in poor light'. In other words they 
interpret their actions as defending their 
religion.

...best form of defence?

Defence of Hinduism is one of the biggest themes 
in the literature and meetings of the HJS and the 
SS. In the massive 44-volume compilation titled 
'Science of Spirituality', published by the 
Sanatan Bharatiya Sanskruti Sanstha and 
'compiled' by Dr. Jayant Athavale, founder of the 
Sanatan Sanstha, Hinduism is consistently 
portrayed as being under threat from the forces 
of Christianity and Islam, aided and abetted by 
the 'so-called secularists', who are seen as 
traitors to Hinduism. The volumes have titles 
like 'Protecting Seekers and Destroying 
Evildoers' and 'Reinstatement of the Divine 
Kingdom'. Defending the faith against the various 
purported threats by allegedly anti-Hindu forces 
is stated to be the primary duty of all true 
believers.

The nature of this 'defence' is spelt out in 
great detail. It involves identifying those who 
work against 'dharm', making lists of such 
people, and then moving to 'eliminate' them. It 
is claimed that all this is part of 'spiritual 
practice'.

The books even provide a timetable of this 
spiritual practice. The period from 1997-99 was 
meant for 'impressing upon the mind that 
destruction of evildoers is part of the spiritual 
practice'.
From 2000-2006 seekers are enjoined to engage in 
'actual destruction of evildoers at physical, 
psychological and spiritual levels'.
After that comes the preparation for the 'kingdom 
of the Absolute Truth' and then the 'commencement 
of the kingdom of Absolute Truth'.

There is also another series of publications 
which deals with 'self-defence'. These manuals 
contain detailed descriptions of various 
'self-defence' techniques including training in 
firing air rifles.

The 'Science of Spirituality' series also 
contains various volumes which can be broadly 
termed as 'religious'. They focus largely on 
ritual aspects of religion and are full of 
detailed instructions about 'correct' practice of 
these rituals.

Believers are exhorted to guide offenders away 
from the path of incorrect practice. The volumes 
in the series support the regressive and 
obscurantist practices of the past, including the 
caste system, talking repeatedly about the proper 
role of various castes in society.

One of the important themes which the series 
takes up is the role of the disciple and of the 
Guru. The Guru is projected as an essential aid 
in following the path to God, and is set up as 
infallible. The objective, quite clearly, is to 
create a cult of unquestioning obedience to the 
dictates of the Guru.

Insults: Give, but no take?

The Sanatan Sanstha also publishes a newspaper 
called Sanatan Prabhat (as 'part of the spiritual 
practice of seekers of the Sanatan Sanstha'), 
which is widely circulated in its areas of 
influence, mainly coastal Maharashtra and Goa. 
The organisation has claimed in the past, though, 
that it does not publish this paper (which is 
owned by a trust) but is merely associated with 
it.

For an organisation which is so ultra-sensitive 
about the slightest imagined insult to Hinduism 
-- imagined or real -- the literature of the 
Sanatan Sanstha is rife with attacks on other 
religions. Priests are depicted with horns, 
indicating that they are devils. There are 
frequent references to the Bible, alleging that 
it promotes incest and other immoral practices. 
In September 2004, 'Sanatan Prabhat' carried a 
statement saying that the body of St. Francis 
Xavier should be destroyed. It has also carried 
other scurrilous articles about Goa's patron 
saint. In November 2005, 'Sanatan Prabhat' 
published an article, 'Mohd. Paigambar: An 
incarnation of Tripurasur [an 'asur' or demon]', 
which led to rioting in Miraj town of 
Maharashtra, and the imprisonment of the editor 
of 'Sanatan Prabhat'.

After having created an ideological framework 
which creates a fundamentalist mindset and makes 
it the 'duty' of the true seeker to defend the 
faith against all those who are projected as 
attacking it, it is disingenuous of the HJS and 
the SS to disclaim responsibility for the acts 
engaged in by their members. Ex-members of these 
organisations talk about the cult-like atmosphere 
that is created, with unquestioning obedience 
being stressed. Members are then brainwashed into 
believing that Hinduism is under siege. Against 
this background, and with all the talk about 
'defence' and 'elimination of evildoers', it is 
hardly surprising that adherents begin to explore 
ways of taking direct action to defend the faith. 
In this regard, the philosophy of the HJS and the 
SS is not all that different from the philosophy 
of terrorists, whom they claim to oppose.

In the recent past, the SS and the HJS have 
increased the tempo of their activities in Goa. 
'Sanatan Prabhat' has been circulated in Goa for 
some years now. The HJS has been conducting a 
series of 'Dharma Jagruti Sabhas'. The rhetoric 
in these meetings is provocative; speakers cite 
supposed 'attacks' on Hinduism by the minority 
communities and assert that they will not go 
unpunished. In one meeting in Margao, an 'open 
challenge' was thrown to the minority community. 
In this way, the general atmosphere becomes 
communalised and the audience becomes predisposed 
to violence.

The HJS had also organised shows of an exhibition 
on terrorism by Frenchman Francois Gautier. This 
exhibition decontextualises the terrorism in 
Kashmir and, worse, adds its own inflammatory 
captions to the exhibition, telling the viewers 
that if the scenes of Hindus killed by terrorists 
'do not make their blood boil, they are not true 
Hindus'. The HJS also circulates inflammatory 
CDs, which were objected to by various 
organisations when the National Commission for 
Minorities visited Goa.

The rabble-rousing by the HJS and the SS has 
already left a trail of violence in its wake. 
There were bomb blasts and a stabbing in 
Ratnagiri at the residence of a family which had 
converted to Christianity. We have already 
mentioned the rioting in Miraj due to an article 
on the prophet of Islam in 'Sanatan Prabhat'. The 
Karnataka police have also been investigating 
into the recruitment by the HJS for an 'army' 
called the 'Dharma Shakti Sena'. And now 
activists of these organisations have been 
arrested for engaging in terrorist activity....

We are fortunate that despite its activities, 
there has been no overt violence in Goa as a 
result of the activities of these organisations.

But the authorities need to investigate the 
activities of these bodies thoroughly and impose 
curbs on their defamation of other religions and 
prevent them from rabble-rousing in the name of 
'defence of Hinduism'. The ground is being 
prepared for violence, and in the absence of firm 
action, it will not be long before we see violent 
incidents in Goa as well.

Can one realistically hope that the 
administration will act firmly and take action in 
the matter? The extremist right-wing votaries of 
Hindutva have developed a feeling of impunity, 
and of being above the law, due to the less than 
even-handed approach of governments in India when 
it comes to dealing with Muslim and Hindu 
extremism.

A case in point is the Bombay bomb blasts and the 
Shrikrishna Commission Report. While there have 
been many convictions in the Bombay blasts, no 
serious action has been taken on the Shrikrishna 
Commission Report. The feeling of impunity this 
results in can be seen from the recent editorial 
in 'Saamna', the Shiv Sena mouthpiece, which says 
that it is proud that Hindus are taking to 
terrorism, and calls for a 'Hindu bomb' to 
counter the 'Muslim bomb'.

Unless the authorities act firmly and decisively, 
we are in for a bleak future indeed, where the 
two varieties of extremism will feed into each 
other, with innocent citizens of all religions 
trapped in the middle.

o o o

(ii)


Indian Express, 23 June 2008

QUIETLY, HARDLINE HINDU OUTFITS BUILD A NETWORK ACROSS MAHARASHTRA, GOA

by Kavitha Iyer

MUMBAI, JUNE 22: Bal Thackeray may have called 
their bombs "damp squibs" and their parent 
organisations may have quickly disowned the five 
men arrested by Maharashtra police last week in 
connection with the crude explosives planted at 
cultural venues outside Mumbai, but a closer look 
at the groups and the people behind them reveal 
an ominous, new network of Hindu hardliners in 
western India.

The five men were members of the Sanatan Sanstha 
(SS) and the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti (HJS), 
hitherto little-known groups operating in the 
hinterland of Maharashtra and Goa. Two of them 
are also members of another newly launched outfit 
called the Dharmashakti Sena, pictures of whose 
inaugural rally in April show young men dressed 
in military fatigues.

These groups, which work like wheels within 
wheels, have been quietly mobilising Hindus on a 
cocktail of Ramrajya, Hindu dharma and 
"dharmakranti" - religious revolution - in and 
around Mumbai for a few years now, investigations 
by The Indian Express have found.

While the SS and the HJS are both registered in 
Goa as charitable organisations, the Dharmashakti 
Sena was set up in 16 Maharashtra towns and 
cities on Gudi Padwa day this April. Its stated 
aim: establishing "Ramrajya" and to make Hindus 
"capable of action".

Publications linked to the three groups say the 
Dharmashakti Sena offers free training in 
self-defence and the training involves 
inculcating "mental courage". It also reminds 
readers of the "armed battle of revolutionaries 
and saints", RSS leader Golwalkar's work on 
"protecting Hindus" and his teaching that 
"weapons should be countered with weapons".

Conversions of Hindus, genocide, what they say is 
the Congress government's poor track record 
against Islamic terrorism, "persecution at the 
hands of anti-Hindus", are recurrent themes, 
alongside a call for Hindus and Hindu 
organisations to unite.

Unlike leaders of the RSS, VHP and Bajrang Dal, 
the men and women behind these new outfits are 
low profile activists who have been quietly 
chipping away at the mindset of Hindus in 
Maharashtra and Goa. The founder of the SS, the 
oldest of the three groups, is Dr Jayant 
Athavale, a clinical hypnotherapist who practised 
for two decades and also set up the Indian 
Society of Clinical Hypnosis and Research.

But the man, estimated to be about 60 years old, 
rarely emerges from his "writing work" and is no 
longer active in the daily activities of the 
group, activists said. "On account of the task of 
writing books on spirituality as per the 
direction of Guru, spiritual practice and 
illness, H H Dr Jayant Balaji Athavale has kept 
himself away from the activities of Sanatan 
Sanstha and Hindu Janajagruti Samiti for the last 
four years," SS Managing Trustee Virendra Marathe 
told The Indian Express in an e-mail.

"His interaction with others is limited to the 
extent of conveying his thoughts, if any"many of 
the seekers who are associated with Sanatan 
Sanstha from the beginning have not seen him for 
many years, while new seekers have not seen him 
at all," he added.

The clinical hypnosis research institute he set 
up, in Sion, central Mumbai, is now a small 
centre of the Sanstha, where occasional satsangs 
are held. "He travels to all the centres," said 
Abhay Vartak, the Mumbai spokesperson for the 
Sanstha. "Unse milna mushkil hai (it's difficult 
to meet him)."

HJS and SS leaders are also cagey talking about 
Dharmashakti Sena chief Vinay Panvalkar, thought 
to live in the Dadar area of central Mumbai and 
who has travelled extensively across Maharashtra 
after the outfit was launched. At a 
'dharmajagruti sabha' (religious awakening 
conference) in Pune in mid-May, Panvalkar is 
quoted as saying, "Hindus are cornered from all 
sides, but there is no retaliation from them." At 
a later meeting in Thane, he says "The war in 
future will be a dharma-yudh and Dharmashakti 
Sena will be the guiding force."

Police say some of the arrested activists are 
suspected to have had trysts with bombs and 
violence in the past. Maharashtra's 
Anti-Terrorism Squad chief Hemant Karkare said, 
"We will not simply accept the statements of the 
accused that the blasts were their own 
initiative. Various members of these 
organisations are being questioned. If their role 
is found in the planning or the execution of 
these incidents, we will certainly write to the 
Centre and seek that they be banned." - (With 
inputs from Sagnik Chowdhury)

Spreading the word, Melbourne to New Jersey

*Outfits do not have formal memberships; ashrams 
in Goa and Panvel near Mumbai, among others, hold 
satsangs
* Active members offer time to spread the word; 
some travel and are presently in Mauritius
*Funding is through donations. Groups also earn 
from sale of literature, audio tapes, CDs
*Travel funded by members, stay sponsored by hosts
*Sanatan Sanstha has centres in New Jersey, Brisbane, Melbourne, Dubai

The leadership

*Dr Jayant Balaji Athavale, founder of Hindu Janajagruti Samiti
*Virendra Marathe, managing trustee of Sanatan Sanstha
*Vinay Panvalkar, chief of Dharmashakti Sena
*Dr Durgesh Samant, national spokesman of HJS
*Abhay Vartak, Mumbai spokesman of Sanatan Sanstha
*Shivaji Vatkar, Mumbai convenor of HJS

______


[6]

The Guardian/UK
June 19, 2008

SUPERIORITY AND SEPARATION
In a world divided and made unequal by economic 
and military subjugation we need to think about 
points of commonality

by Priyamvada Gopal

Is all enquiry into other cultures problematic? 
Though Edward Said's original text of Orientalism 
was evasive on this question, in a later preface, 
Said made the clear distinction between knowledge 
"that is the result of understanding, compassion, 
careful study and analysis" and "knowledge that 
is part of an overall campaign of 
self-affirmation".

Self-affirmation of this kind is everywhere and 
it is not harmless. Thirty years after 
Orientalism identified this phenomenon as one 
that was used to justify imperialism and 
invasion, "liberal" white British commentators 
still make magisterial pronouncements plucked 
from nowhere on the plight of 
Asian/Muslim/non-western women with no awareness 
of or, indeed, the slightest interest in, the 
history of women's activism in these regions. 
Others call for war-ravaged societies to be 
partitioned on religious lines, oblivious to 
complex histories of co-existence, oblivious to 
the ways that polarities get sharpened by 
invasion and imperialism and, of course, the 
disastrous consequences of partitions in various 
former colonies. Then there are the endless 
encomiums to freedom and progress as 
distinctively "western" values to be protected as 
such. (Why do they let residual political 
correctness stop them short of making a genetic 
case?)

Orientalism argued that uneven power relations 
"between two unequal halves" distort knowledge. 
Even in progressive milieus, non-EuroAmerican 
cultures and peoples remain, for the most part, 
objects of discussion rather than equal 
participants in a global dialogue. If they are 
heard at all, it is selectively, through their 
loudest and most retrograde voices. This then 
bolsters self-affirming claims that those 
cultures are inherently 
despotic/violent/intolerant (fill in the blanks). 
The result is a near-total lack of awareness of 
egalitarian and liberationist traditions in other 
cultures. Let's say this again: the "west" did 
not invent freedom and tolerance, far from it. In 
suggesting otherwise, both the so-called liberal 
commentator and the radical religious preacher 
participate in a false and damaging codification 
of inherently diverse cultures into homogeneous 
and unchanging entities. This co-operative mutual 
hostility does great disservice to real people 
and actually existing cultures.

And that includes the heterogeneous cultures of 
Britain, Europe and North America. A couple of 
years ago, then Labour education minister Charles 
Clarke attacked what he called the "medieval 
concept of the university as a community of 
scholars seeking truth" as well as non-productive 
disciplines [ie the humanities] which didn't 
benefit the economy in some obvious way. This 
kind of emphasis on quantifiable productive 
output at the expense of wide reading and 
critical thinking was the larger problem 
addressed by Orientalism. When knowledge is 
whittled down to manageable bytes of information 
and corporatised "applied" skills, both "our" and 
"their" cultures get reduced to meaningless 
generalisations that stress difference over 
connectedness.

Such segregationist thinking - in a world divided 
and made unequal by economic and military 
subjugation - remains the biggest challenge for 
our troubled times. We need to be thinking about 
points of commonality and intersection instead of 
endlessly reiterating differences. In a 
non-Orientalist framework, knowledge would be a 
shared enterprise rather than a weapon of 
superiority and separation. Said himself remained 
hopeful, arguing that "there was never a 
misinterpretation that could not be revised, 
improved or overturned".

Priyamvada Gopal teaches postcolonial studies at Cambridge University.

______


[7]  ON RECENT PUBLICATIONS:

(i)

DOMESTIC ABUSE WITHIN SOUTH ASIAN COMMUNITIES: 
THE SPECIFIC NEEDS OF WOMEN, CHILDREN AND YOUNG 
PEOPLE

I can't tell people what is happening at home By Shayma Izzidien (June 2008)

"I can't tell people what is happening at home" 
examines the experiences and support needs of 
South Asian women, children and young people who 
have experienced domestic abuse, the barriers 
that deter them from seeking help and the gaps in 
current service provision.

It draws on the findings from existing literature 
on the subject as well as interviews with service 
providers in England and Wales and data from 
NSPCC helpline services.

The findings of the report point to a need for a 
more targeted and culturally-appropriate approach 
to responding to the specific issues and barriers 
that exist in these communities.

Full report:

I can't tell people what is happening at home - 
domestic abuse within South Asian communities: 
the specific needs of women, children and young 
people (PDF, 672KB)

http://www.nspcc.org.uk/Inform/research/Findings/ICantTellFullReport_wdf57889.pdf

---

(ii)

Review: Jihad for peace

KAMILA SHAMSIE ENJOYS AYESHA JALAL'S STUDY OF 
ISLAM AND POLITICS IN SOUTH ASIA, PARTISANS OF 
ALLAH

Saturday June 21, 2008
The Guardian

Partisans of Allah: Jihad in South Asia
by Ayesha Jalal
400pp, Harvard, £19.95

We are four-fifths of the way into Partisans of 
Allah before we come to events in recent history, 
and even then Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida merit 
only passing mention. This is not a book that 
takes the view that the war on terror must be 
placed squarely at the forefront when considering 
jihad. Instead, Ayesha Jalal chronicles the 
shifting discourse on jihad in south Asia over 
three centuries - placing poets, politicians, 
educationalists, mystics and warriors all within 
the frame. Central to Jalal's work is the belief 
that most writing about jihad post-9/11 has 
contributed to a one-dimensional view of a 
concept "that historically has been deployed to 
justify peace with nonbelievers quite as often as 
it has been to justify war".

While discussion of Islam tends to focus on the 
Arab world, Jalal makes a compelling case for 
paying attention to south Asia, where a Muslim 
minority has had a long and complex relationship 
with other communities - each period of history 
seeing a shift in ideas of jihad. While Muslim 
rulers held sway in India, the Wajudi view was in 
the ascendant, stressing the unity of creation 
and encouraging interaction with non-Muslims. But 
as Muslim rule faltered, than collapsed entirely, 
other voices clamoured for attention.

One thing that Partisans of Allah makes clear is 
that religious discourse within Islam fluctuates 
widely, and is entwined with geopolitics. During 
colonial rule, in the post-1857 period, 
discussion of jihad was shaped around the need 
for Indian Muslims to prove their status as loyal 
citizens. Significant attention was paid to the 
injunction that it could only be fought when 
Muslims were prevented from freely practising 
their religion. But in the 20th century's early 
years, jihad was redefined to take its place 
within anti-colonial nationalism. The two leading 
figures who took up its banner during this period 
were vastly different: Abul Kalam Azad was a 
member of Gandhi and Nehru's secular Indian 
National Congress, while Maulana Mawdudi was the 
founder of the Jamaat-e-Islami, which went on to 
play an important role in Pakistan's political 
history.

It's particularly fascinating to read how 
Mawdudi's hardline ideas developed from his 
notion that Islam had been maligned as a 
"religion of the sword" by an increasingly 
influential and militaristic western world which 
controlled the production of knowledge. Those who 
view him as just a step or two away from the 
militants of today miss one crucial distinction - 
Mawdudi believed it was the duty of the state, 
not the individual, to declare jihad. The 
interpretation of contemporary radicals, in 
declaring it a matter of individual conscience, 
is "without parallel in the Islamic tradition". 
But the drawback of a book with such a wide scope 
is the limited opportunity for delving deeply 
into any one character - it settles instead for a 
broader but shallower look at a number of key 
players.

Partisans of Allah is a dense read, and it 
certainly helps to have some background in south 
Asian history and Islamic thought before 
embarking on it. But while it has some 
frustrating omissions and elisions, it remains an 
erudite and thought-provoking study of the 
interplay of religion and politics, with some 
particularly interesting things to say about the 
history of south Asian Muslims' focus on the 
"outer husk" of religion, often to the detriment 
of "inner faith".
· Kamila Shamsie's most recent novel is Broken Verses (Bloomsbury)


______


[8] Announcements:


(i)  National Convention On "State Repression & Black Laws in India"

25th & 26th June 2008
Gass Memorial Centre, Raipur (CG)

OUTLINE OF THE PROGRAMME

25th June 2008 (Wednesday)

10 to 10:30 am     : Introduction - Context & 
Purpose of the Convention -     Rajendra K Sail, 
President, Chhattisgarh PUCL

10:30 to 11:30 am : 1. Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act 2005

                 -Sudha Bhardwaj, Advocate, Member, State EC, PUCL-CG

           2. Attacks on the Human Rights Defenders

           - Adv Henri Tiphagne, People's Watch (Madurai, T Nadu)

           Moderator: Ms. Rashmi Diwedi, Vice-President, PUCL-CG

11:30 am to 1:30 pm          : Theme Address:

           "State Repression & Black Laws in India"

Main Speaker: Mr. Rajendar Sachar, Ex-Chief Justice, Delhi High Court

Moderator : Mr. Kanak Tiwari, Senior Advocate, Chhattisgarh High Court

03:00 pm      : Rally (From Dharna Sthal, Burha Talab, Raipur)

04:00 pm     : Public Meeting (At Burha Talab, Raipur)

07:00 pm     : Film Show (Gass Memorial Centre Hall)

11:30 pm to 00:30 hrs : MIDNIGHT VIGIL
(At the occasion of Declaration of Emergency Rule in India in 1975)


26th June, 2008 (Thursday)

09:00 to 10:00 am : Socio-Economic Context of State Repression
                     & Black Laws

-     Anil Chawdhary, Former National President, INSAF
-     Gautam Naulakha, Delhi University

      Moderator: Dr. Sandeep Pandey, Magsasay Award Winner

10:00 am                : Tea

10:30 am to 12 Noon     : Terror of Black Laws (Reports from States)

1.     Rajasthan ( Kavita Srivastava, PUCL)
2.     Uttar Pradesh ( Chittaranjan Singh, PUCL)
3.     Jharkhand (Dayamani Barla, INSAF)
4.     Bihar (Irfan, INSAF)
Moderator: Com. Janak Lal Thakur, President, Chhattisgarh Mukti Morcha

12:30 to 1:30 pm          : Terror of Black Laws (State Reports)

5.     Chhattisgarh ( Himanshu,Vanvasi Chetna Ashram,Dantewara)
6.     Madhya Pradesh ( Shyam Bahadur 'Namr')
7.     Maharashtra 8. West Bengal

           Moderator: Dr. A Raghwan, IAS

1:30 to 2:30 pm          : Lunch

2:30 to 04:00 pm      Strategies & Agenda for Future ( Open Session)

      Moderator: Dr. Ilina Sen, Dean, Central University, Wardha

04:00 to 04:30 pm          : Tea & Conclusion


PEOPLE'S UNION FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES-
CHHATTISGARH
Post Box No. 87, Main Post Office, Raipur - 492001: Chhattisgarh: India
E-mail: pucl.cg at gmail.com

(iii)


PEOPLE'S UNION FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES:DELHI
C-105, D.A. Flats, Sindhora Kalan, Delhi-110 052

Dear Friends,

As you are aware PUCL-Delhi organizes 
Anti-Emergency Day meeting every year to take 
stock of the prevailing human rights and civil 
liberties situation in the country. As black laws 
continue to exist in various parts of the 
country, and misused by various governments, 
arresting and putting behind the bars not only 
innocent citizens but also human rights activists 
whose efforts are the only hope of securing the 
human rights of people. Guns continue to be used 
in place of talks to resolve the differences 
between people and governments. People like Dr. 
Binayak Sen and T.G. Ajay, the leaders of human 
rights movement, continue to face the ire of 
governments for opposing/exposing their 
anti-people policies. The situation does not seem 
to be qualitatively much different from the black 
days of Emergency as life and liberties of people 
still continue to be threatened.

You are invited to come and share your views on these issues on
ANTI-EMERGENCY DAY
26th of June, 2008 at 5.00 p.m.
at GANDHI PEACE FOUNDATION
Deen Dayal Upadhaya Marg, ITO, New Delhi.

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

Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on
matters of peace and democratisation in South
Asia. SACW is an independent & non-profit
citizens wire service run since 1998 by South
Asia Citizens Web: www.sacw.net/
SACW archive is available at: http://sacw.net/pipermail/sacw_insaf.net/

DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in materials carried in the posts do not
necessarily reflect the views of SACW compilers.



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