SACW | Nov 29 - Dec 2, 2008 / Gala for War Mongers and Fascists: white vans / storks / bombay bloodbath

Harsh Kapoor aiindex at gmail.com
Tue Dec 2 01:24:06 CST 2008


South Asia Citizens Wire | November 29 - December 2, 2008 | Dispatch  
No. 2587 - Year 11 running
From: www.sacw.net

[1] Democracy in the US and Sri Lanka (Rohini Hensman)
        + Sri Lanka's 'White Van Syndrome' (Roland Buerk)
[2] Bangladesh: Secular forces must organise against bigots (New Age)
    + Islamists arrested for attacking sculptures seen as idols  
(reuters)
[3] India: Mumbai bloodbath - a joint statement by concerned citizens  
of Pakistan and India
[4] India/Pakistan: Pleas For Sanity as Sabres Rattle Over Mumbai  
Mayhem (Beena Sarwar)
[5] India: What They Hate About Mumbai (Suketu Mehta)
[6] India: Mumbai rekindles debate about Muslims, their beard and so  
on (Jawed Naqvi)
[7] India: Tolerating Terrorism (Ram Puniyani)
[8] Announcements:
(i) Panel 'Accounting for Justice' in Kashmir (New York, 2 December  
2008)
(ii) Public Forum : Orissa - Another Hindutva Laboratory? (London, 5  
December 2008)
(iii) Say No To Terror! Say No To Violence!" - Human Chain" in South  
Mumbai, (Bombay, 10 December, 2008)

-----


[1]   Sri Lanka:

DEMOCRACY IN THE US AND SRI LANKA

by Rohini Hensman
http://www.sacw.net/article346.html

o o o

SRI LANKA'S 'WHITE VAN SYNDROME'

by Roland Buerk
BBC Radio 4's Crossing Continents

The Sri Lankan government claims to be on the verge of delivering a  
knockout blow to the Tamil Tigers. But in its pursuit of victory, has  
the government lost the chance of lasting peace?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/crossing_continents/7750100.stm

_____


[2]

New Age, December 1, 2008

Editorial

SECULAR FORCES MUST ORGANISE AGAINST BIGOTS

THE attempted destruction of the Balaka sculpture in Dhaka’s  
Dilkhusha area on Saturday night by a radical Islamist group adds to  
concerns over the growing impunity with which religious extremists  
are attacking political, cultural and social freedoms in our society.  
Just over a month ago, a group of bigots tore down a monument to  
commemorate mystic and folk philosopher Lalon Shah, claiming that  
representations of living beings is forbidden in their medieval  
interpretation of Islam. The following day, the military-controlled  
interim government decided to remove the monument that it itself had  
commissioned. The government has refused to reverse its decision  
since, despite widespread popular demands for restoration of the  
sculpture. Its refusal to stand up to religious bigotry may very well  
have emboldened the obscurantist forces to launch an attack on  
another sculpture in the city.

The law-enforcement agencies did act to prevent the destruction of  
the Balaka sculpture and some of the perpetrators were arrested, so  
reported the national media on Sunday. However, the interim  
government’s apparent policy of political religious hardliners,  
accentuated earlier this year by its backtracking on the women’s  
development policy in the face of week after week of protests by  
obscurantist forces and more recently by its inaction with regard to  
the assault on a freedom-fighter by some Jamaat-e-Islami activists at  
a so-called freedom fighters’ convention, makes this a case of too  
little too late. The incumbents’ tendency to use kid gloves to deal  
with the religious hardliners was also apparent in the immunity that  
the figureheads of the Jamaat-e-Islami have enjoyed during the  
corruption investigations that the government has carried out in the  
past two years.

The destruction of the Baul monument and the latest attack on the  
Balaka monument could be signs that the Islamist radicals may be  
convinced of their political impunity. While the targets are cultural  
representations of Bengali history and tradition, the ultimate aim of  
the bigots seems to be to invade the political sphere and block the  
freedoms that a secular society inherently enjoys. This latest  
incident should be a wake-up call for all democratic and secular  
sections of society to rally in a broad resistance of the medieval  
dogma that these radicals preach. At the heart of this resistance  
must be a political movement to protect democratic freedoms, bringing  
to bear popular pressure on the major political parties to either  
embrace secular thinking or be rejected by the masses.

o o o

The Daily Star
December 01, 2008

  ISLAMISTS ARRESTED FOR ATTACKING SCULPTURES SEEN AS IDOLS

Reuters

Dhaka: Police in Dhaka arrested eight Islamists after they attacked a  
sculpture depicting a group of white storks, in a continuing campaign  
against statues and artwork they say are forbidden by Islam.

"We detained eight members of a fanatic Islamist group for damaging  
the sculptures at Dhaka's Motijheel commercial area around midnight  
on Saturday," police officer Fazlul Haq told Reuters on Sunday.

Witnesses said nearly 400 Ulama Anjumane Al Baiyanat activists  
gathered around the sculptures with shovels and hammers, chanting  
slogans calling for the demolition of all stoneworks, which some  
hardliners consider to be idols.

Clash with police

First they tried to pull down the 13-metre high sculptures by putting  
ropes around the necks of the storks. Unable to do this, the group  
attacked the base with hammers and other tools, the witnesses told  
reporters, before clashing with police trying to disperse them.

Various Islamist groups, including the Al Baiyanat, have been  
vandalising sculptures in Muslim-majority Bangladesh in recent months.

They destroyed a huge statue of mystic poet Lalon Shah outside the  
Dhaka international airport in October, triggering a national protest.

"These are attacks on Bengali culture and a state of impunity has  
encouraged them to carry out such acts," said Mrinal Haque, who  
sculpted both Lalon and the storks.

____


[3] Pakistan / India:

http://www.sacw.net/article354.html

This Joint Statement is being released to the press simultaneously in  
Pakistan and India today, 29th November 2008.

MUMBAI BLOODBATH

We are deeply shocked and horrified at the bloody mayhem in Mumbai,  
which has claimed more than a hundred and twenty five lives and  
caused grievous injuries to several hundred people, besides sending a  
wave of panic and terror across South Asia and beyond. We convey our  
profound feelings of sorrow and sympathies to the grieving families  
of the unfortunate victims of this heinous crime and express our  
solidarity with them.

As usual, all sorts of speculations are circulating about the  
identity of the perpetrators of this act of barbarism. The truth  
about who are directly involved in this brutal incident and who could  
be the culprits behind the scene is yet to come out and we do not  
wish to indulge in any guesswork or blame game at this point.  
However, one is intrigued at its timing. Can it be termed a  
coincidence that it has happened on the day the Home Secretaries of  
the two countries concluded their talks in Islamabad and announced  
several concrete steps to move forward in the peace process, such as  
the opening of several land routes for trade – Kargil, Wagah-Attari,  
Khokhropar etc –, relaxation in the visa regime,  a soft and liberal  
policy on the issue of release of prisoners and joint efforts to  
fight terrorism? Again, is it just a coincidence that on this fateful  
day the Foreign Minister of Pakistan was in the Indian capital  
holding very useful and productive talks with his Indian  
counterpart?  One thing looks crystal clear. The enemies of peace and  
friendship between the two countries, whatever be the label under  
which they operate, are un-nerved by these healthy developments and  
are hell bent on torpedoing them.

We are of the considered opinion that the continued absence of peace  
in South Asia - peace between and within states - particularly in  
relation to India and Pakistan, is one of the root causes of most of  
the miseries the people of the region are made to endure. It is the  
major reason why our abundantly resource-rich subcontinent is  
wallowing in poverty, unemployment, disease, and ignorance and why  
militarism, religious and sectarian violence and political, economic  
and social injustice are eating into the very vitals of our  
societies, even after more than six decades of independence from  
colonial rule.

At this moment of unmitigated tragedy, the first thing we call upon  
the Governments of India and Pakistan to do is to acknowledge the  
fact that the overwhelming majority of the people of India and  
Pakistan ardently desire peace and, therefore, the peace process must  
be pursued with redoubled speed and determination on both sides. The  
sooner the ruling establishments of India and Pakistan acknowledge  
this fact and push ahead with concrete steps towards lasting peace  
and harmony in the subcontinent, the better it will be not only for  
the people of our two countries but also for the whole of South Asia  
and the world. While the immediate responsibility for unmasking the  
culprits of Mumbai and taking them to task surely rests with the  
Government of India, all of us in South Asia have an obligation to  
join hands and go into the root causes of why and how such forces of  
evil are motivated and emboldened to resort to such acts of anti- 
people terror.

It is extremely important to remind the leaderships of Pakistan and  
India that   issuing statements and signing agreements and  
declarations will have meaning only when they are translated into  
action and implemented honestly, in letter and spirit and without any  
further loss of time. It assumes added urgency in the prevailing  
conditions in South Asia, with the possibility that so many different  
forces prone to religious, sectarian and other forms of intolerance  
and violence may be looking for ways to arm themselves with more and  
more sophisticated weapons of mass murder and destruction. The  
bloodbath in Mumbai must open the eyes of our governments, if it has  
not already happened.

We urge upon the governments of India and Pakistan to immediately  
take the following steps:

    1. Cessation of all hostile propaganda against each other;
    2. Joint action to curb religious extremism of all shades in both  
countries;
    3. Continue and intensify normalization of relations and peaceful  
resolution of all conflicts between the two countries;
    4. Facilitation of trade and cooperation between the two  
countries and in all of South Asia. We welcome the fact that the  
Srinagar-Muzaffarabad and Poonch-Rawlakot borders have been opened  
for trade and that the opening of the road between Kargil and Skardu  
is in the pipeline.
    5. Immediate abolition of the current practice of issuing city- 
specific and police reporting visa and issue country-valid visa  
without restrictions at arrival point, simultaneously initiating  
necessary steps to introduce as early as possible a visa-free travel  
regime, to encourage friendship between the peoples of both countries;
    6. Declaration by India and Pakistan of No First Use of atomic  
weapons;
    7. Concrete measures towards making South Asia nuclear-free;
    8. Radical reduction in military spending and end to militarisation.

Signatories:

Pakistan

    1. Mr. Iqbal Haider, Co-Chairman, Human Rights Commission  
Pakistan and former federal Minister of Pakistan
    2. Dr. Tipu Sultan, President, Pakistan Doctors for Peace &  
Development, Karachi
    3. Dr. Tariq Sohail, Dean, Jinnah Medical & Dental University,  
Karachi
    4. Dr. A. H. Nayyar, President, Pakistan Peace Coalition, Islamabad
    5. Justice (Retd) Rasheed A. Razvi, President, Sindh High Court  
Bar Association
    6. Mr. B.M.Kutty, Secretary General, Pakistan Peace Coalition,  
Karachi
    7. Mr. Karamat Ali, Director, PILER, Karachi, Founding member,  
PIPFPD
    8. Mr. Fareed Awan, General Secretary, Pakistan Workers  
Confederation, Sindh
    9. Mr. Muhammad Ali Shah, Chairman, Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum,  
Karachi
   10. Mr. Zulfiqar Halepoto, Secretary, Sindh Democratic Front,  
Hyderabad
   11. Professor Dr. Sarfraz Khan, Area Studies Centre ( Central  
Asia), Peshawar University
   12. Syed Khadim Ali Shah, Former Member National Assembly, Mirpur  
Khas
   13. Mr. Muhammad Tahseen, Director, South Asia Partnership (PAK),  
Lahore
   14. Mrs. Saleha Athar, Network for Women’s Rights, Karachi
   15. Ms. Sheema Kermani, Tehreek-e-Niswan, Karachi
   16. Ms. Saeeda Diep, President, Institute of Secular Studies, Lahore
   17. Dr. Aly Ercelan, Pakistan Labour Trust, Karachi
   18. Mr. Suleiman G. Abro, Director, Sindh Agricultural & Forestry  
Workers Organisation, Hyderabad
   19. Mr. Sharafat Ali, PILER, Karachi
   20. Mr. Zulfiqar Ali Shah, PILER, Karachi
   21. Mr. Ayub Qureshi, Information Secretary, Pakistan Trade Union  
Federation
   22. Ms. Sheen Farrukh, Director, Interpress Communication  
Pakistan, Karachi
   23. Mr. Zafar Malik, PIPFPD, Lahore
   24. Mr. Adam Malik, Action-Aid Pakistan, Karachi
   25. Mr. Qamarul Hasan, International Union of Food Workers (IUF),  
Karachi
   26. Prof. Muhammad Nauman, NED University, Karachi
   27. Mr. Mirza Maqsood, General Secretary, Mazdoor Mahaz-e-Amal
   28. Ms. Shaista Bukhari, Women Rights Association, Multan

India

    1. Kuldip Nayar, journalist, former Indian High Commissioner,  
UK., Delhi
    2. S P Shukla, retired Finance Secretary, former Member, Planning  
Commission, Delhi
    3. PEACE MUMBAI network of 15 organisations, Mumbai
    4. Seema Mustafa, Journalist, Delhi
    5. Manisha Gupte, MASUM, Pune
    6. Dr. Ramesh Awasthi, PUCL, Maharashtra
    7. Jatin Desai, journalist, Mumbai
    8. Prof. Ritu Dewan, University of Mumbai
    9. Prabir Purkayashta, DSF, Delhi
   10. Prof. Pushpa Bhave , Mumbai
   11. Paromita Vohra, filmmaker, Mumbai
   12. Achin Vanaik, CNDP, Delhi
   13. Meena Menon, Focus on the Global South, Mumbai
   14. Romar Correa Professor of Economics, University of Mumbai
   15. Anjum Rajabally, film writer, Mumbai
   16. Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker, Mumbai
   17. Kamla Bhasin, SANGAT, Delhi
   18. Dr. Padmini Swaminathan, MIDS, Chennai
   19. Sumit Bali, CEO, Kotak Mahindra Prime Limited
   20. Dr Walter Fernandes, Director, North Eastern Social Research  
Centre, Assam,
   21. Rabia, Lahore Chitrkar
   22. Rakesh Sharma, filmmaker, Mumbai
   23. Prof. Kamal Mitra Chenoy, JNU, Delhi
   24. Prof. Anuradha Chenoy, JNU, Delhi
   25. P K Das, architect, Mumbai
   26. Neera Adarkar, architect, Mumbai
   27. Datta Iswalkar, Secretary, Textile Workers Action Committee,  
Mumbai
   28. Madhusree Dutta, filmmaker, Majlis, Mumbai
   29. Amrita Chhachhi, Founding member, PIPFPD

______


[4]

Inter Press Service,
December 1, 2008

INDIA/PAKISTAN: PLEAS FOR SANITY AS SABRES RATTLE OVER MUMBAI MAYHEM

by Beena Sarwar

KARACHI, Dec 1 (IPS) - The pattern is all too familiar. Every time  
India and Pakistan head towards dialogue and detente, something  
explosive happens that pushes peace to the backburner and drags them  
back to the familiar old tense relationship, worsened by sabre- 
rattling war cries from both sides.

The relationship between the two nuclear-armed South Asian neighbours  
has been marked by tentative ups and plunging downs, particularly  
over the past decade. This decade is also marked by increasingly  
vocal voices for peace on both sides of the border who openly  
criticise their countries’ political and security establishments.

The fallout from the Mumbai mayhem is no different, if all the more  
ominous for having taken place in the midst of the global ‘war on  
terror’ with its ‘us versus them’ rhetoric that has contributed to  
escalated violence around the world and pushed fence-sitters onto one  
or other side.

On Wednesday a ten-man squad of Islamist warriors armed with assault  
rifles and hand grenades landed in the port city Mumbai and, after  
going on shooting spree, seized control of two of its finest luxury  
hotels and a Jewish centre. By the time commandos neutralised the  
attackers and lifted the sieges Friday, 200 people lay dead — 
including 22 foreign hostages.

Pakistan and India are part of the Indian sub-continent. They share a  
landmass, mountain ranges, rivers and seas, ancient cultures,  
history, languages and religions. Yet they have fought three wars  
since gaining independence from the British in 1947, after the bloody  
partition of the sub-continent into two countries — largely Hindu  
India and Islamic Pakistan.

The fourth major conflict between the two countries was the Kargil  
conflict of 1999 that the political leadership on both sides referred  
to as a ‘war-like situation’. The nuclear threat that underlined this  
situation drew the world’s attention to India-Pakistan relations, and  
the festering issue of the disputed state of Kashmir, as never before.

A year earlier, India and Pakistan’s nuclear tests of May 1998 had  
plunged the region into an unprecedented state of tension. The  
governments celebrated their nuclear capability, feeding rivalry,  
jingoism and nationalism on both sides that the media played up.  
There was far less coverage of those who condemned the tests and the  
governments’ encouragement of reactionary forces that equated  
religion with nationhood.

Those who protested were swimming against the tide, labelled as  
traitors and anti-nationals, and ‘agents’ of the other country, like  
Islamabad-based physicist A.H. Nayyar who has been active in the  
Pakistan-India People’s Forum for Peace and Democracy since the  
organisation was launched in 1995.

As Nayyar and pro-peace activists addressed a press conference  
condemning the nuclearisation of the region, charged-up young men who  
supported Pakistan’s nuclear tests physically attacked them with chairs.

Now, expressing his shock at the "mindless, horrible event" in  
Mumbai, he told IPS: "There are people in both countries who don’t  
like efforts towards rapprochement. They take the first opportunity  
to start blowing the bugles of war and instigate hostility."

The nuclear tests were followed by the historic Lahore Declaration of  
Feb. 1999, when Pakistan’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif invited his  
Indian counterpart A. B. Vajpayee to Lahore.

Two months later, the Kargil conflict dashed all hopes for  
rapprochement as it transpired that while the governments talked  
peace, infiltrators from Pakistan were busy grabbing positions in  
Kargil on the Indian-administered side of the disputed state of Kashmir.

Sharif denied knowledge of the operation, but his army chief Pervez  
Musharraf insisted that Sharif had been briefed. It took the  
intervention of then U.S. president Bill Clinton to de-escalate the  
tension and comple the Pakistani army into making the infiltrators  
withdraw by July 1999, pulling the countries back from the brink of a  
nuclear war.

In October, Musharraf ousted Sharif in a military coup. The present  
composite dialogue process began in 2004 during the Musharraf regime,  
but India is now dealing with a democratically elected government for  
the first time in a decade, note observers. They also point out that  
it is for the first time that a Pakistani government appears to be  
genuinely attempting to undo the damage done by past policies.

These policies, linked to Washington’s need to pull down the former  
Soviet Union and drive the Soviet army out of Afghanistan, nurtured  
religious extremism and armed militancy. Later, these armed,  
indoctrinated forces, supported by the Pakistani establishment,  
fuelled the insurgency in Indian-administered Kashmir and led to the  
worst sectarian violence in Pakistan.

The third phase came after ‘9/11’ when Pakistan officially rejected  
these ‘Islamic warriors’.

As the Pakistan government now tries to formulate new security  
paradigms while also combating the terror menace at home, it needs  
support, say observers. "For the first time, it feels like we are at  
war," says a Karachi-based analyst asking not to be named. "Under  
Musharraf, it was a game to show the Americans that we are taking  
action but actually continuing to nurture some militant elements  
against India."

"With the threat of global communism gone, and the need for Middle  
East energy primary, America suddenly recognises India as an ally  
against Islamism, and Pakistan becomes a buffer to be squeezed  
relentlessly," commented Vithal Rajan in Hyderabad, India who works  
with several civil society organizations. "The Indian government in  
relief at winning American friendship has fallen in with this ploy,  
further distancing itself from the fledgling democracy of Pakistan,  
and leaving no real solution in sight."

Mumbai was still burning when Rajan wrote to civil society activists  
in Pakistan and India on Nov. 28 urging them not to "just be reactive  
like the popular press" but take a more thoughtful view of the  
situation.

Angry condemnations "lead us nowhere; political demands (may) make  
vote-catching politicians rethink strategies, but these might remain  
ineffectual. (We) should create space… to think things out in the  
long term…

"...[Lal Krishna] Advani has called this attack in Mumbai by a few  
terrorists as ‘a war.’ This is dangerous stuff and nonsense. A war is  
fought between sovereign countries, not between the police and  
criminals. It is in India’s interest and in Pakistan’s interest to  
have stable, progressive governments."

Advani, who is opposition leader in Indian parliament and represents  
the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), has repeatedly accused  
the ruling Congress party, which professes to be secular, of allowing  
India to turn into a ‘soft state’ in the face of a series of deadly  
bombings in Indian cities, this year, that have been attributed to  
Islamist groups.

Pakistan’s new civilian government has, however, been making attempts  
to step out of the familiar well-worn grooves, note observers.  
President Asif Ali Zardari, for example, has signalled major policy  
shifts by terming the militants in Kashmir as "terrorists", stating  
that India is not Pakistan’s enemy, and then declaring that Pakistan  
had adopted a "no first use" policy on nuclear weapons.

Participating via satellite link in the prestigious ‘Leadership  
Summit’ conducted by India’s prestigious ‘Hindustan Times’ newspaper,  
on Nov. 22, four days before the attack on Mumbai, Zardari quoted his  
late wife Benazir Bhutto to say that there is a ‘’little bit of India  
in every Pakistani and a little bit of Pakistan in every Indian’’.  
Bhutto was assassinated by suicide bombers, last year, while on  
election campaign.

The religious right in Pakistan — and its supporters within the  
establishment — is clearly unhappy at Zardari’s peace overtures  
towards India. Militants involved in fighting the state on Pakistan’s  
north-west border have announced a stepping up of efforts to  
assassinate Pakistan’s political leadership.

Pakistan and India’s fights against extremism "will founder if fought  
alone," noted the young Britain-based Pakistani novelist Mohsin Hamid  
in a recent op-ed in the Guardian, London, warning that India’s rush  
to implicate Pakistan is a "dangerous mistake". "The impulse to  
implicate Pakistan is of course understandable: the past is replete  
with examples of Pakistani and Indian intelligence agencies working  
to destabilise the historical enemy across the border."

Many analysts believe it is too soon to pin the blame on anyone. "To  
take on the government of a country of 1.2 billion just like that is  
unbelievably stupid," says Nayyar in Islamabad, referring to the  
handful of youngsters who held Mumbai hostage for three days. "If it  
is the work of a fringe group then it is very alarming that the  
states are getting worked up to this extent.

"But if the perpetrators were part of an organised group, then it is  
also very alarming. We need to sit down and do our homework all over  
again and see how such groups can be contained, or we will all perish."

Beyond India and Pakistan, the global activist group Avaaz.org is  
launching a message calling for unity following the attacks in  
Mumbai, to be published in newspapers across India and Pakistan and  
delivered to political leaders within one week.

"The message is that these tactics have failed and we are more united  
than ever. And we are determined to work together to stop violent  
extremism, and call on our political and religious leaders to so the  
same. If these attacks cause us to turn on each other in hatred and  
conflict, the terrorists will have won."


______


[5] India:

New York Times
November 28, 2008

WHAT THEY HATE ABOUT MUMBAI

by Suketu Mehta

MY bleeding city. My poor great bleeding heart of a city. Why do they  
go after Mumbai? There’s something about this island-state that  
appalls religious extremists, Hindus and Muslims alike. Perhaps  
because Mumbai stands for lucre, profane dreams and an indiscriminate  
openness.

Mumbai is all about dhandha, or transaction. From the street food  
vendor squatting on a sidewalk, fiercely guarding his little  
business, to the tycoons and their dreams of acquiring Hollywood,  
this city understands money and has no guilt about the getting and  
spending of it. I once asked a Muslim man living in a shack without  
indoor plumbing what kept him in the city. “Mumbai is a golden  
songbird,” he said. It flies quick and sly, and you’ll have to work  
hard to catch it, but if you do, a fabulous fortune will open up for  
you. The executives who congregated in the Taj Mahal hotel were  
chasing this golden songbird. The terrorists want to kill the songbird.

Just as cinema is a mass dream of the audience, Mumbai is a mass  
dream of the peoples of South Asia. Bollywood movies are the most  
popular form of entertainment across the subcontinent. Through them,  
every Pakistani and Bangladeshi is familiar with the wedding-cake  
architecture of the Taj and the arc of the Gateway of India, symbols  
of the city that gives the industry its name. It is no wonder that  
one of the first things the Taliban did upon entering Kabul was to  
shut down the Bollywood video rental stores. The Taliban also banned,  
wouldn’t you know it, the keeping of songbirds.

Bollywood dream-makers are shaken. “I am ashamed to say this,”  
Amitabh Bachchan, superstar of a hundred action movies, wrote on his  
blog. “As the events of the terror attack unfolded in front of me, I  
did something for the first time and one that I had hoped never ever  
to be in a situation to do. Before retiring for the night, I pulled  
out my licensed .32 revolver, loaded it and put it under my pillow.”

Mumbai is a “soft target,” the terrorism analysts say. Anybody can  
walk into the hotels, the hospitals, the train stations, and start  
spraying with a machine gun. Where are the metal detectors, the  
random bag checks? In Mumbai, it’s impossible to control the crowd.  
In other cities, if there’s an explosion, people run away from it. In  
Mumbai, people run toward it — to help. Greater Mumbai takes in a  
million new residents a year. This is the problem, say the nativists.  
The city is just too hospitable. You let them in, and they break your  
heart.

In the Bombay I grew up in, your religion was a personal  
eccentricity, like a hairstyle. In my school, you were denominated by  
which cricketer or Bollywood star you worshiped, not which prophet.  
In today’s Mumbai, things have changed. Hindu and Muslim demagogues  
want the mobs to come out again in the streets, and slaughter one  
another in the name of God. They want India and Pakistan to go to  
war. They want Indian Muslims to be expelled. They want India to get  
out of Kashmir. They want mosques torn down. They want temples bombed.

And now it looks as if the latest terrorists were our neighbors,  
young men dressed not in Afghan tunics but in blue jeans and designer  
T-shirts. Being South Asian, they would have grown up watching the  
painted lady that is Mumbai in the movies: a city of flashy cars and  
flashier women. A pleasure-loving city, a sensual city. Everything  
that preachers of every religion thunder against. It is, as a monk of  
the pacifist Jain religion explained to me, “paap-ni-bhoomi”: the  
sinful land.

In 1993, Hindu mobs burned people alive in the streets — for the  
crime of being Muslim in Mumbai. Now these young Muslim men murdered  
people in front of their families — for the crime of visiting Mumbai.  
They attacked the luxury businessmen’s hotels. They attacked the open- 
air Cafe Leopold, where backpackers of the world refresh themselves  
with cheap beer out of three-foot-high towers before heading out into  
India. Their drunken revelry, their shameless flirting, must have  
offended the righteous believers in the jihad. They attacked the  
train station everyone calls V.T., the terminus for runaways and  
dreamers from all across India. And in the attack on the Chabad  
house, for the first time ever, it became dangerous to be Jewish in  
India.

The terrorists’ message was clear: Stay away from Mumbai or you will  
get killed. Cricket matches with visiting English and Australian  
teams have been shelved. Japanese and Western companies have closed  
their Mumbai offices and prohibited their employees from visiting the  
city. Tour groups are canceling long-planned trips.

But the best answer to the terrorists is to dream bigger, make even  
more money, and visit Mumbai more than ever. Dream of making a good  
home for all Mumbaikars, not just the denizens of $500-a-night hotel  
rooms. Dream not just of Bollywood stars like Aishwarya Rai or Shah  
Rukh Khan, but of clean running water, humane mass transit, better  
toilets, a responsive government. Make a killing not in God’s name  
but in the stock market, and then turn up the forbidden music and  
dance; work hard and party harder.

If the rest of the world wants to help, it should run toward the  
explosion. It should fly to Mumbai, and spend money. Where else are  
you going to be safe? New York? London? Madrid?

So I’m booking flights to Mumbai. I’m going to go get a beer at the  
Leopold, stroll over to the Taj for samosas at the Sea Lounge, and  
watch a Bollywood movie at the Metro. Stimulus doesn’t have to be  
just economic.

Suketu Mehta, a professor of journalism at New York University, is  
the author of “Maximum City: Bombay Lost and Found.”
More Articles in Opinion » A version of this article appeared in  
print on November 29, 2008, on page A23 of the New York edition.


______


[6] India:

Dawn
December 1, 2008

MUMBAI REKINDLES DEBATE ABOUT MUSLIMS, THEIR BEARD AND SO ON

By Jawed Naqvi

WHAT else could one do to cope with relentless grief? So I joined an  
impromptu candlelight vigil held by a dozen friends at India Gate,  
where we paid our silent tribute to the fallen brave of Mumbai.  
Scores of men, women and children were visiting there anyway, eating  
ice creams or buying dinky toys. They were ordinary citizens having a  
holiday due to the Delhi assembly elections. Some of them also joined  
us in lighting candles.

There was no speech, no slogan, just a silent tribute. I grabbed the  
balloons from a boy vending them and gave him a candle to light. He  
hesitated, not believing that he was being urged to join the nation’s  
grief. Later he said thank you. I am not sure if it was relief at  
being returned the balloons or for being given a candle to light  
along with a class of people for many of whom he was no more than a  
pest. Two other boys in tattered sweaters were walking around the  
colonial war memorial selling hot coffee. I gave them candles too as  
I looked after their steaming kettles.

I handed out candles to a group of evidently upper class women. A  
friend, a woman journalist who doesn’t normally have patience with  
communal gossip, overheard their conversation. She whispered to me  
that the women were suspicious of me. She thought it had something to  
do with my beard and the Afghan cap I wear on cold evenings. Only  
when I introduced myself and declared that India needed a dictator  
did they look relaxed. I said Narendra Modi was my hero, even though  
he sports a different kind of beard. This was a ploy that works when  
there’s no scope for serious discussion. The women said the country  
needed Modi as prime minister. I endorsed the view so that they could  
sleep peacefully that night. We parted on this cordial note.

On the way back, my friend and I discussed how beards had become  
particularly suspect since the advent of Osama bin Laden. And here,  
the Mumbai terrorists who themselves were probably clean-shaven pub- 
crawling college kids, had deepened mistrust that was not just rooted  
in facial hair. They had succeeded in their mission to drive a deeper  
wedge among Indians as evident at India Gate.

It didn’t seem to matter to the women that the Jewish rabbi who was  
killed in Mumbai with his wife also sported a beard. It was  
irrelevant that Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar, the revered icon of the  
RSS wore a mullah-like beard as did the troika of Marx, Engels and  
Lenin. If anything Hitler and Stalin were always neatly shaved. But  
that’s not the point. Today in India it has become difficult to say  
exactly where and how prejudices are given shape such as the kind the  
women exuded.

The next day, on Sunday, I attended Sabina Sehgal Saikai’s simple  
funeral at an electric crematorium near the Nizamuddin Aulia’s  
shrine. She was charred when they found her in the bombed out room at  
the Taj Mahal Hotel from where one of her last messages from her  
mobile phone, as she hid under the bed, said: “They have entered my  
bathroom.” Why the terrorists bombed her room is not known. But it is  
fair to surmise that reckless TV journalists gave her location to  
them with the TRP-linked live coverage. Sabina was a journalist at  
Times of India and we shared a common interest in Indian classical  
music. She learnt singing from an Ustaad of the Dagar family. The  
funeral brought many of her friends together. They ranged from the  
left to the right of the political spectrum. But she was a singularly  
liberal intellectual who joined causes such as the defence of artist  
M.F. Husain against religious fanatics.

Given the range of her friends and the grief Sabina left them with,  
the funeral became a platform to exchange the dominant theme of the  
occasion: What was to be done? Film actress Nandita Das was among the  
mourners that broke into a dozen groups or more, each more worried  
than the other about what was happening to India. Nandita has just  
made a film about the social isolation of Muslims in Gujarat. She  
told me some of her close friends had wondered why she was  
sympathetic to Muslims, and one of them even asked if she had a  
Muslim boyfriend. What I know is that she has a Gujarati mother.

Let me share a bit of an email Nandita sent to her friends the day  
before the funeral. It said: “It hadn’t hit me hard enough till  
Thursday morning…I have to say, it had very little effect on me. My  
predictable response was, not again...more people will die, more  
fear, more prejudice and more hatred. But at some level the response  
was instant and cerebral. But this morning when I got up things felt  
different. Got a message from an unknown no: “See what your friends  
have done.” Strangely a close friend of mine got a similar message  
last night, but from an acquaintance. Just because Firaaq, my film,  
deals with how Muslims ‘also’ get affected by violence, the  
terrorists are supposed to be my friends!

“Today a common young Muslim man around town is probably the most  
vulnerable. I got many messages from my Muslim friends who feel the  
need to condemn it more than anyone else, who feel the need to prove  
their national allegiance in every possible way. They are begging to  
be not clubbed with the terrorists, a fear not unfounded. Then of  
course there were tons of messages from well-wishers across the world  
who asked about me and my loved ones’ safety. I too did the same. And  
strangely that was when tears started rolling down my cheek, almost  
involuntarily. Guess the thought that if our loved ones were fine,  
it’s all ok, seemed like a bizarre way to feel. When will our souls  
ache when anyone is hurt, even those that we have never seen and will  
never see? The more I wrote back in sms’s and emails that I was ok,  
the more miserable I was feeling.”

Nandita’s torment may not be unrelated to the way our democracy has  
evolved. Here you are an unprecedented terror attack by any global  
standards, which begins with the elections in BJP-ruled Madhya  
Pradesh and ends with polls in Congress-ruled Delhi. The outcome will  
not be known till next week. The BJP doesn’t need Muslim votes but it  
doesn’t want the Congress to benefit from this indifference either.  
So it mounts pressure on the Congress, accusing it of being soft on  
terror (forgetting that it was the BJP government that had freed the  
man who went on to kill Daniel Pearl).

A newspaper declared on Sunday that the government had been finally  
jolted from its sleep. How did the newspaper know? The evidence was  
there for all to see, it said. The government had put back on the  
table the hanging of Afzal Guru, the Kashmiri convict, sentenced to  
die for plotting to blow up the 2001 parliament, it says. Will that  
go an inch in curbing terrorism? The killers of Mumbai seemed quite  
prepared to die. Guru himself wants to be hanged. So what’s the logic  
in hastening his death ahead of others who have been languishing on  
the death row for much longer than him? Some years ago they had  
hanged Maqbool Butt who became a Kashmiri hero. You can’t have  
vendetta or prejudice for state policy. It’s a mercy that the women  
at India Gate are not running the government. Or aren’t they?

______


[7] India:

TOLERATING TERRORISM

by Ram Puniyani

Things have been changing by the day on the issue of terrorism  
investigation since the proof of Sadhvi Prgya Singh Thakur’s  
involvement in the Malegaon blast has come to the surface. So far the  
word Islamic terrorism has been in the air in the post 9/11 phase  
when the US administration ensured that media takes up this new word  
and propagates it. The social common sense that ‘all terrorists are  
Muslims’ went to such a pass that many a lawyers taking up the cases  
of terror suspects were not only  beaten up but also some of the Bar  
Associations passed the resolutions, contrary to their own  
professional ethics, that they will not take up the cases of the  
terror suspects. The basic adage that one is innocent till proved  
guilty was turned upside down. The legal aid to many of these  
suspects was meager if at all.

Matters change with Sadhvi being arrested by the Maharashtra ATS. The  
RSS associates, VHP, Shiv Sena rushed to put together the team of  
lawyers to stand for the terror accused. The Shiv Sena is calling a  
bandh in support of Pragya and Co. We are hearing strange arguments;  
Hindus can’t be terrorists as it is not in their genes. This  
statement also subtly hinted that terrorism is in the genes of ‘some’  
other community. But lets be clear terrorism is not a genetic  
problem, it is due to social, political and economic reasons.

It was stated that Maharashtra Government is doing all this at the  
behest of the Government, reducing all investigations to being merely  
politically motivated one. Not that these things don’t happen but one  
has also to see that in the prevailing situation where the social  
mind set accepts the formulation that ‘all terrorists are Muslims’,  
to suspect a non Muslim will require more than a mere grain of truth  
to venture and touch any non Muslim and that too one with divine robe  
adorning on one’s body or the one wearing the green fatigues of army  
with its holy cow image. Logically no officer in the right frame of  
mind can even dare think of such a move unless impeccable evidence is  
there.

In pre-Sadhvi period of terrorism RSS affiliates accused the Congress  
of being soft on terrorism, in turn encouraging terrorism. They came  
up with the formulation that they will provide a Government with Zero  
tolerance for terrorism, meaning a total high handed ness in case of  
terror accused. Now the matters stand turned upside down and no  
question of zero tolerance for terror accused, special efforts are  
being made to ensure that popular pressure is built up to save the  
likes of Sadhvi, Acharya or Lt Col. Not only that, the issue is being  
communalized and many right wing political parties are offering the  
accused the tickets for the forthcoming elections. At the same time  
propaganda is launched that the holy person like sadhvi is being  
targeted for political reasons or that the noble institution of army  
is being sullied by the Congress Government. Both these are baseless  
as the investigation seems to be proceeding with extreme caution and  
the leads provided by Sadhvi’s motor cycle, used in Malegaon blasts  
is being pursued meticulously.

Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur and the Lt Col. Prasad Purohit have  
alleged that they were tortured in the police custody. A major  
morning newspaper reports that the training camp conducted by Abhinav  
Bharat, instructed the trainees that in order to deflect the  
investigation, all should be done to implicate the investigation  
authorities themselves. So one does not know whether they were  
tortured or they have been tutored to say so. One waits with baited  
breath for the real truth to come out. It goes without saying that  
torture of accused in police custody is not a matter of surprise, it  
must be condemned and there is no place for compromising with the  
human rights of accused, who so ever one is. One will condemn the  
authorities if the torture of Sadhvi and company has taken place.

So far no one from RSS affiliates talked of human rights of accused.  
Now this section is talking that the terror accused are being  
tortured and that their human rights are being violated. One must  
ensure the truth behind this. While police is capable of using its  
usual arms twisting methods to extort confession, one will doubt if  
the police can dare touch a saffron robed sadhvi or green uniformed  
Lt Col. Let the inquiry decide, whether it is a genuine complaint or  
a ploy to deflect the investigation.

One interesting aside to the investigation of acts of terror is that  
so far during last few years, the Muslim youth were caught hold of  
after every terror attack, for a couple of days the media was abuzz  
with the same news and then once they were produced in the court for  
the lack of evidence many of them were quietly let off. This part was  
generally not in the news. While a wrong person is accused, that  
person does suffer all the humiliation etc, the additional point is  
that because of this the real culprit merrily keeps planning the  
further things. And that seems to be the case. As despite the leads  
provided by Nanded blasts, where two Bajrang Dal workers were killed  
while making bomb. Despite this the other acts of terror were not  
investigated on this line, so one after the other the tragedy kept  
happening. Hopefully with this the further blasts will be arrested in  
the tracks.

Overall the logic of the events as unfolding makes it clear that the  
RSS affiliates have been caught with their pants down. How so ever  
much they deny the ideological and organizational difference, it  
seems that there is lot of proof to point the finger towards the  
Abhinav Bharat and ex workers of ABVP as a part of the plot of  
Malegaon blasts, Ajmer blasts and Samjhauta express blasts. The  
proximity of the accused to many a top brass of the organizations is  
being reported day in and day out.

To deflect from the issue a campaign has been started to defame the  
ATS, the Mahrashtra Government and even the Sonia Gandhi. Rumors are  
being spread that these are the one’s who are framing and torturing  
the accused. One is amazed at the double standards of those saying  
this. Till yesterday when the police was blindly apprehending the  
Muslim youth for all these crimes, especially police was being  
cheered for the investigation. In the aftermath of Ahmedabad blasts  
and the series of bombs found in Surat, hanging on trees and all  
that, Modi took the credit for showing the way to deal with  
terrorism. Now with his own ideological associates accused in the  
acts of terror, another type of offensive has been launched to  
wriggle out of the situation. One hopes that truth alone will prevail  
and guilty, irrespective of their religion, holiness, and military  
uniform are given punishment for the suffering they have inflicted on  
the nation.

--
Issues in Secular Politics
November, 2008 III

______


[8] Announcements:

(i) A panel on
'Accounting for Justice'
Contemporary Kashmir through international frameworks

Tuesday, December 02, 6.00-8.00 pm, 2008

Sponsored by NYU's Law Students for Human Rights
New York University School of Law
Address: 110 West Third Street, New York, NY 10012
Venue: Lipton Hall


Speakers

Betsy Apple, Former Director, Crimes Against Humanity Program, Human  
Rights First and Adjunct Professor, School of International and  
Public Affairs, Columbia University.

Dr. Angana Chatterji, Co-convener, International People's Tribunal on  
Human Rights and Justice in Indian-administered Kashmir and Associate  
Professor, Anthropology, California Institute of Integral Studies.

Nusrat Durrani, Senior Vice President and General Manager of MTV  
World, envisioning an advocacy campaign on Kashmir.

Accompanied by an exhibit by photojournalist, Robert Nickelsberg, who  
has documented Kashmir since 1989. His work has appeared in TIME,  
Newsweek, The New York Times, Getty Images, and Human Rights Watch.

Chaired by Dr. Mridu Rai, Associate Professor, History, Yale University.
Introduced by Mohsin Mohi-Ud-Din, Fulbright Scholar and Program  
Assistant, Crimes Against Humanity Program, Human Rights First.


Free and open to the public
Directions: http://www.nyu.edu/about/campusinfo.html; Phone:  
212.998.6714
Event coordinated by Krista Minteer
For further information - Phone: 212.845.5207; E-mail:  
MinteerK at humanrightsfirst.org


- - -

(ii)

SOLIDARITY MEETING FOR MUMBAI AND INDIA

Trocadero, Thursday, 4th december, 6.30pm

The recent events of Mumbai have left us all in a state of shock. The  
indiscriminate killing of people by the terrorists - in hotels, at  
Railway stations and on the roads - were an attack on India, on that  
very founding idea of India, which has stood, with all its  
weaknesses, for a multi-religious, multi-cultural and multi- 
linguistic democracy. Leaving the hows and whys of such acts to be  
debated tomorrow, let us get together to express our sorrow at the  
loss of life in Mumbai and to stand for a world of peace, harmony and  
justice.

It might be appropriate for everyone to bring a candle to light on  
this occasion in memory of those who died or suffered in Mumbai, and  
for anyone who has suffered at the hands of a mindless violence.

Indians, India-sympathisers and advocates of a better tomorrow,  
regardless of their nationality, are requested to assemble at the  
Parvis des Droits de l’Homme, Place du Trocadéro (Metro: Trocadéro)  
on Thursday, 4th December 2008 at 6.30 pm.

Pour plus d’information:

Fédération des Associations Franco-Indiennes

Tel : 01 42 53 03 12 Email : dassaradan at orange.fr

- - -

(ii) ORISSA: ANOTHER HINDUTVA LABORATORY?

An Awaaz – South Asia Watch Public Forum

On the eve of the 16th anniversary of the demolition of the Babri  
Masjid in Ayodhya, Awaaz South Asia Watch invites you to a public  
meeting on the anti-Christian violence in Orissa and in other parts  
of India.

5 December 2008, 6.00pm – 8.00pm
Room B111, School of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS)
University of London, Thornhaugh Street, Russell Square, London, WC1H  
0XG
Nearest tube: Goodge Street / Russell Sq
Attendance is free

Speakers:
Baroness Caroline Cox (recently visited Orissa)
Ramesh Gopalakrishnan (Amnesty International)
Bipin Jojo (Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai)

Merely six years after the Gujarat massacres of Muslim citizens,  
Christians in Orissa and elsewhere in India are facing attacks from  
Hindutva groups. Numerous Christian men and women have been killed,  
injured or raped; several thousand churches have been destroyed, and  
more than 50,000 people have been rendered homeless in Orissa alone.
What explains this latest and ongoing outbreak of violence against  
another religious minority in India?
What has been the role of the police and state governments in these  
episodes of violence?
Is the Hindu Right (specifically the Sangh Parivar) renewing its  
project of Hindutva by creating new objects of hate?

The meeting will be chaired by Rosemary Morris and Dr. Rashmi Varma  
of Awaaz-South Asia Watch
More info: www.awaazsaw.org

- - -

(iii)


Calling all Citizens of Mumbai!

Join "Human Chain" in South Mumbai, afternoon 1 pm on December 10th,  
2008 International Human Rights Day!

                                                                         
                  SAY NO TO TERROR! SAY NO TO VIOLENCE!

We, the people of Mumbai, from all walks of life, of all faiths, all  
linguistic groups, all ages, will express our  commitment to peace,  
and our condemnation of terror and violence in any form, by coming  
out on the streets on the day when the world will be commemorating  
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted in 1948. The theme  
for 2008, which is "Dignity and justice" has a poignant resonance for  
the people of Mumbai, traumatized and fearful after the attack on its  
spirit by criminals who are without a shred of humanity or conscience.

We demand:

    1. Government must take responsibility and map out long term and  
short term strategies, and take action on them.
    2. Joint action between India and Pakistan governments to curb  
religious extremism of all shades in both countries.
    3. Better coordination amongst various security and intelligence  
agencies to deal with terror; and sharing of intelligence and  
information.
    4. Punishment of those responsible for attacks on minorities,  
which are also an attack on the majority and the multi-cultural body  
politic of India.
    5. Swift, transparent and credible trial and punishment for all  
those involved in terror, whatever the religion they may profess,
    6. A comprehensive Communal Violence Bill in place of the one  
pending in Parliament.
    7. Immediate implementation of Police reforms, providing  
equipment and training, basic service conditions to police personnel  
and state security forces.  Active facilitation of community  
participation in security and intelligence gathering.
    8. Ensuring moderation and sensitivity in media reporting of  
violence whether terrorist or any other form, through self-regulation  
or fiat.
    9. Evolve a policy for legal action against hate speech and  
demonization of any religion or community.

NO MORE SILENCE! WE MUST SPEAK OUT!

    MUMBAI FOR PEACE: a campaign of Mumbai based organizations.

Contact:

Enquires:  Dolphy: 9820226227, Datta: 9224197954, Jatin: 9322255812,  
Meena: 9821038474,

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

Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on
matters of peace and democratisation in South
Asia. SACW is an independent & non-profit
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