SACW | Jan 30-31 , 2009 / Sri Lanka Alarm / Pak-India: Peace Now / Submission re Hindutva to US body

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | January 30-31, 2009 | Dispatch No. 2603 -  
Year 11 running
From: www.sacw.net

[1] Sri Lanka:
    (i) Civil Society Organisations Deeply Concerned At The Situation  
In Vanni
    (ii) Himal Southasian Special Issue on Sri Lanka - February 2009
    (iii) Sri Lanka:  Govt Ignores Supreme Court (IPS)
[2] Pakistan - India: A peace delegation from India needs to visit  
Pakistan now  (Najam Sethi)
    + Sir Creek dispute affecting fishermen
    + Attacks Stir Another India-Pakistan Border Dispute (Krishna  
Pokharel)
[3] USA - India: Recommendations to US Congressional Task Force on  
International Religious Freedom
following a briefing on ’The Threat Religious Extremism Poses to  
Democracy and Security in India: Focus on Orissa’ (Angana Chatterji)
[4] India: Protest Against Attack on Film Crew by Hindutva goons in  
Bombay
[5] India: Madrasas - Degrees of Populism (Arshad Alam)
[6] India: Israel-based Hindutva govt-in-exile, support from Thai  
contacts (Indian Express)
   + VHP activists bash up Christian missionaries in Allahabad  
(Rediff, January 19, 2009)
   + MNS salute to Hitler, apes Nazi-style greeting
[7] Announcements: Amn Tehreek Peace Rally (Lahore, 31 January 2009)

_____


[1] Sri Lanka:

(i) sacw.net, 29 January 2009
http://www.sacw.net/article559.html

CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANISATIONS DEEPLY CONCERNED AT THE SITUATION IN VANNI

As civil society organizations that have consistently highlighted the  
intensifying humanitarian crisis in the north of Sri Lanka and that  
are deeply concerned about the immense civilian suffering, we once  
again appeal to the Government of Sri Lanka, the LTTE and the  
international community to take immediate steps to respond  
effectively to the unfolding catastrophe.

There are very few independent reports regarding the situation, due  
to the denial of access to media and humanitarian agencies to the  
conflict zones. The few reports that have reached the outside world  
since Monday January 26, 2009, point to the gravity of the situation.

An Urgent Appeal has been issued in the name of the Regional Director  
of Health Services in Mullaitivu, the area most recently captured by  
the Sri Lankan security forces, calling for the most basic of medical  
supplies to be sent to the region immediately. The report highlights  
the killing of around 300 IDPs within the last few days, injuries to  
many more and that others are not accounted for. Basic emergency  
medical care for the injured is not available due to the lack of  
essential drugs and services in Mullaitivu and surrounding areas  
where the fighting is heaviest. Heavy fighting and travel  
restrictions imposed by the fighting forces prevent the health  
authorities from transferring the injured to hospitals outside the  
conflict zones.

The humanitarian crisis in northern Sri Lanka has been highlighted by  
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, UN Under Secretary  
General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator Sir  
John Holmes, as well as by UN agencies in Sri Lanka, by the Jaffna  
Bishop Saundranayagam and by the ICRC.

All have raised concerns regarding the critical situation confronting  
the over 300,000 displaced persons presently trapped within the  
Vanni. The ICRC in a press release on January 27 quoted Jacques de  
Maio, ICRC head of operations for South Asia in Geneva "People are  
being caught in the crossfire, hospitals and ambulances have been hit  
by shelling and several aid workers have been injured while  
evacuating the wounded. " The few thousand civilians who have managed  
to flee the Vanni are detained in camps in Vavuniya, Mannar and  
Jaffna under the guard of the security forces, reportedly for  
screening to ensure that LTTE cadre do not infiltrate the south of  
the country. There are restrictions on the freedom of movement of  
those within these camps, and very limited access to extended family  
members and humanitarian workers, thus seriously compromising the  
‘civilian’ aspect of these camps.

Recently there have also been individual reports of acts of violence  
and human rights abuse from within some of these camps. The  
continuing denial of access to the camps has been reinforced by their  
demarcation as high security zones, making any independent  
confirmation of this information impossible. The high level of  
impunity and lack of credible and independent investigations into  
incidents of abduction, disappearance and extra-judicial killings in  
Vavuniya and Mannar over the past months deter any witnesses to such  
human rights abuses from coming forward to report or seek redress.

As the fighting intensifies over the coming days, and the civilians  
get trapped into smaller spaces, we are gravely concerned that the  
casualties will mount and that the overall humanitarian situation  
will deteriorate even further. Hence we urge immediate action.

We call upon the Government:

     * To permit an international mission of mercy immediate access  
to the Vanni in order to enable an accurate assessment of the  
humanitarian and protection needs of the people of the Vanni.
     * To ensure urgent delivery of food and medicine to the  
Mullaitivu area and allow for the passage of medical convoys

To ensure that the security forces respect areas which are demarcated  
as safe zones

We call upon the LTTE:

     * To allow civilians freedom of movement and respect their right  
to move out of the conflict zones
     * To ensure its cadres respect areas which are demarcated as  
safe zones
     * To allow the passage of medical convoys
     * We call on the international community:
     * To extend its cooperation to the Government of Sri Lanka in  
protecting civilians by preparing an international mission of mercy  
with immediate effect
     * To unreservedly impress upon the LTTE to permit civilians  
trapped within the conflict zone to leave the area

Dated: January 29 2009

Signed by a group of civil society organisations including:

Centre for Policy Alternatives
  Citizen Committee for Displaced People
  Home for Human Rights
  INFORM Human Rights Documentation
  Mothers and Daughters of Lanka
  Rights Now Collective for Democracy
  Women & Media Collective

o o o

HIMAL SOUTHASIAN SPECIAL ISSUE ON SRI LANKA - FEBRUARY 2009

- ‘A people on the run’ by Rajan Hoole
- ‘After the Tigers’ by Ahilan Kadirgamar
- ‘A political, constitutional settlement’ – An interview with  
Jayampathy Wickramaratne by Ahilan Kadirgamar
- ‘Winning the war at a price’ by Jehan Perera
- ‘The next phase’ by Dayan Jayatilleka
- ‘Brotherly dictatorship’ by Anonymous
- ‘The Tamil responsibility’ by Skanda
- ‘Big Brother’s conundrum’ by Satya Sivraman
http://www.himalmag.com/pg=tbl_content

o o o

Inter Press Service

SRI LANKA:  GOVT IGNORES SUPREME COURT
By IPS Correspondents

COLOMBO, Jan 29 (IPS) - Far from heeding charges of human rights  
abuses and stifling dissent, the government has, this week, added  
blatant disregard for judicial fiat to its list of sins.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court (SC) terminated proceedings in a  
controversial oil hedging case, saying the government was no longer  
implementing court orders on the issue.

Sources said the court of Chief Justice Sarath N. Silva backed off  
from taking on the executive after a series of high-profile judgments  
it passed against President Mahinda Rajapakse’s administration were  
simply ignored.

Peace activist and columnist Jehan Perera says that the latest act  
showed that effectively the country’s Constitution had broken down.  
He said there is no constitutional crisis developing only because no  
one dares take on the government."

Another political analyst, who declined to be named, told IPS that  
the checks and balances in the Sri Lankan system have become  
dysfunctional. ’’This effectively is a form of dictatorship. The  
executive (President) is not listening even to the SC,’’ she said.

The case in question relate to petitions filed by three Sri Lankan  
citizens, complaining that oil hedging agreements entered into  
between the state-owned Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) and  
Standard Chartered Bank, CitiBank, Deutsche Bank and two local banks  
were one sided and heavily in favour of the banks.

As a result the CPC now owes these banks more than 800 million US  
dollars in hedging payments.

In November, the SC had stayed payments by the CPC to the banks and  
had also suspended the CPC chairman pending the completion of the case.

Subsequently, the Court had also ordered the government to reduce  
petrol prices to Rs 100 (0.8 US dollar) per litre from Rs 122 (1.07  
dollars) a litre after the petitioners complained that the CPC had  
not reduced prices despite world crude prices falling.

However, the government did not fully implement the order, reducing  
the price by just two rupees to Rs 120 rupees (1.05 dollars), a move  
which ultimately led to the Court terminating proceedings in the case.

Analysts say that the latest twist in the drama between the judiciary  
and the government has caused further deterioration in the law and  
order situation in Sri Lanka where abduction and killing of political  
opponents and journalists have become commonplace.

Two weeks ago Lasatha Wickrematunga, a prominent English language  
newspaper editor, was slain by an unidentified group. Earlier this  
week, Upali Tennekoon, editor of a Sinhala language national weekly,  
was stabbed and injured by unidentified men near his home.

At least 14 journalists and media workers have been killed and many  
more abducted or arrested since 2006 in Sri Lanka, drawing concern  
and condemnation from local and international rights groups.

There is a general feeling in the country that the government is  
using the war between teh Sri Lankan army and Tamil rebels in the  
north of the island country as an excuse to beat down criticism on  
any issue, including the handling of the economic crisis.

Last week, a corporate leader who suggested at a public seminar that  
the government should devalue the local currency to revive exports  
was reprimanded by an influential government politician who implied  
that the former was being ‘unpatriotic’.

Rajapakse has ordered the Sri Lankan army to wrest Tamil dominated  
areas in the north and east of the country from the control of the  
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) after unilaterally  
withdrawing from a Norwegian-brokered ceasefire which held the peace  
for five years from February 2002.

On Sunday the government announced the capture of Mullaitivu, the  
last town held by the LTTE, which then retreated into the surrounding  
jungles taking with them a population of around 250,000 Tamils.

Last week, six former U.S. ambassadors to Sri Lanka jointly wrote an  
open letter to Rajapakse expressing concern over the events unfolding  
in the country, particularly the attacks on journalists.

Expressing their personal views, the six ambassadors - Marion  
Creekmore, Teresita Schaffer, Peter Burleigh, Shaun Donnelly, Ashley  
Wills, and Jeffrey Lunstead - said they were upset by the  
developments in Sri Lanka.

‘’We fear that, even as Sri Lanka is enjoying military progress  
against the LTTE, the foundations of democracy in the country are  
under assault,’’ they said in the letter."

"Some have suggested that these events have been carried out not by  
elements of the government, but by other forces hoping to embarrass  
the government. We do not find such arguments credible,’’ the former  
ambassadors said.

Rohan Edrisinha, director at the Centre for Policy Alternatives and  
the country’s best-known constitutional expert, says Tuesday’s ruling  
by the SC creates a major problem by ‘’continuing to ignore the law  
and do what it feels is expedient,’’ he told IPS.

Edrisinha identified the root of the problem as the failure to set up  
set up a bipartisan constitutional council as agreed by Parliament in  
2005. The council was to have been entrusted with the task of making  
key appointments in the judiciary and the police - now the sole  
prerogative of the President.

(END/2009)

_____


[2] PAKISTAN - INDIA:

Mail Today
January 30, 2009

INDIA MUST SEND ACROSS A PEACE GROUP
by Najam Sethi

A PEACE delegation comprising human and women’s rights activists,  
media peaceniks and party political representatives from Pakistan  
recently visited New Delhi. They went with a threefold objective: to  
“ condole” the Mumbai attacks and express solidarity with Indians in  
their hour of grief, to explain how and why Pakistan too is a victim  
of the same sort of terrorism that is threatening to afflict India,  
and to try and put the peace process and people- to- people channel  
back on track.

In view of the adverse travel advisories put out by both countries  
and the war paint put on by both media, the delegation risked being  
branded “ unpatriotic” in Pakistan. But the two leaders of the  
delegation, Asma Jehangir, chairperson of the Human Rights Commission  
of Pakistan, and Imtiaz Alam, Secretary- General of the South Asia  
Free Media Association, are known as fearless crusaders in the region  
for doggedly promoting the cause of peace between India and Pakistan.  
Given the goodwill they personally enjoy in India, they threw caution  
to the wind at home and embarked on their journey across the border  
with great expectations.

In the event, however, even they were surprised by the consistently  
frosty, sometimes hostile, reception that they received at private,  
official and media forums in Delhi. It seemed as if all of India,  
public and private, had consciously united to send out one harsh  
message to Pakistan: that India is deeply wounded and will not take  
another such attack lying down. This is perfectly understandable.

THE terrorist attack was on the Taj Mahal Hotel, the pride and symbol  
of resurgent modern India; it humiliated India’s “ powerful” security  
establishment by exposing its gaping weaknesses; and the terrorists  
targeted innocent civilians rather than any specific military or  
intelligence organ of the state or government, thereby signaling  
their intent to wage war on India, Indians, and indeed the very idea  
of secular India.

Therefore credit must be given to the Indian establishment for  
showing great restraint and maturity, unlike the reckless way in  
which America reacted after 9/ 11.

The post- Mumbai composite view in India has three salient elements.  
First, they say that elements of the Pakistani state were allegedly  
complicit in the planning, organisation and implementation of the  
attack, evidence of which is proffered in the recorded chatter of the  
terrorists with their Pakistani handlers which suggest that this  
message was deliberately meant to be given. The implication of this,  
as India’s foreign minister has expressly stated, is that non- state  
actors and state actors in Pakistan were jointly responsible. Second,  
they believe that the government of President Asif Zardari is  
innocent but weak and Pakistan’s military establishment is guilty and  
strong. The implication of this is that there is no point in India  
talking to a weak civilian government or strong military  
establishment — because both are part of the problem — about  
redressing terrorism and advancing the peace agenda. Third, they  
insist that Pakistan should not mistake India’s overt outrage and  
anger as merely election- related histrionics and that it will be  
business as usual after the elections are over in April. On the  
contrary, they claim there is a consensus in India’s state and  
society that India must align with the international community and  
fashion a united strategic resolve to compel Pakistan’s state and  
society to dismantle its terrorist infrastructure on pain of  
international encirclement, blockade and sanctions.

Unfortunately, however, India and Indians seemed blind to an equally  
harsh reality about their own state and themselves — that terrorism  
is not just Pakistan’s problem but increasingly India’s too. This is  
not because the origins of such terrorism lie exclusively in  
political distortions within Pakistan but also because India has had  
a role in creating conditions conducive to its growth by refusing to  
resolve the regional conflicts that spawn it. Indeed, the truth is  
that the whole business of armed non- state actors in Pakistan, and  
the rise of Military Inc in Pakistan, who are together the bane of  
democratic Pakistan and India, is directly linked to the unresolved  
Kashmir conflict.

Equally, it is profoundly unrealistic for India’s government to claim  
that because the Zardari government in Pakistan is weak, there is no  
one to talk to in Pakistan about how to get the peace process back on  
track. New Delhi had five years of unfruitful dialogue with a strong  
military- led government from 2003- 08 that was ready to think  
outside- the- box and make unbelievable concessions, especially on  
Kashmir, but was constantly thwarted by the statusquo and lumbering  
Indian bureaucracy.

INDIANS worry and warn about a second terrorist attack on their soil.

But just as it is inevitable in one way or another in the future, so  
too is India’s likely response. “ Surgical strikes” and “ limited  
war” may be “ honourable” self- satisfying responses, but they are  
not realistic options between nuclear armed states. Nor should India  
think of responding by manufacturing its own version of state- non-  
state actors to foment trouble in Pakistan. It will only hurtle the  
two peoples and states into confrontation, make India’s problem more  
intractable and hurt it disproportionately because it has more  
economic and political sheen to lose than Pakistan. Equally, if all  
other options are on the table for India in alliance with the  
international community, including punitive sanctions, blockades and  
Pakistan’s total isolation, it should be clear that such an  
occurrence will have disastrous consequences for Pakistan’s tanking  
economy and its equally fragile national unity. Fortunately, the view  
in responsible quarters in India is that even this response, all  
options short of war, is undesirable because it will plunge Pakistan  
into headlong failure. The hawks, on the other hand, argue that at  
least India will have ensured that Military Inc. will have only the  
ruins of Pakistan to preside over if they continue to muddy the  
waters. Thus the debate continues.

A peace delegation from India needs to visit Pakistan now, not to  
explain why India is angry — that message lies in the domain of the  
Pakistani delegation that has just returned from Delhi — but to  
understand why the cause of its established democratic state and  
civil society is the same as that of Pakistan’s fledgling counterparts.

The writer is the editor of The Friday Times


o o o

The News
29 January 2009

SIR CREEK DISPUTE AFFECTING FISHERMEN
Thursday, January 29, 2009
By our correspondent

Karachi

Despite the passage of 62 years to partition, Pakistan and India have  
failed to resolve the dispute over Sir Creek, said Pakistan  
Fisherfolk Forum (PFF) Chairperson, Mohammed Ali Shah.

He was addressing a press conference at the Karachi Press Club on  
Wednesday, along with the relatives of fishermen detained in Indian  
jails. Tracing the history of arresting of fishermen from the open  
sea by border security forces of both the sides, Shah pointed out  
that it started after the 1965 war between the two countries and has  
been going on ever since. Hundreds of fishermen of varying ages are  
in jails and face torture.

In Pakistan, he added, Thatta district coastal communities are the  
main victims of this cruel situation. Whenever tension escalates  
between the two sides, it is the poor fishermen who suffer its wrath  
and their families back home face unending economic and psychological  
distress, after the arrest of their bread earners. Shah also accused  
the Pakistani border security forces personnel of intimidating the  
local fishermen, depriving them of their catch, fishing tools and  
valuables under the seawater.

He further said that fishermen travel long distance out to the open  
sea because increasing marine pollution and over fishing has  
destroyed fish stocks near the seashore. There sole purpose, he  
added, is to catch fish and are not involved in any unlawful  
activities for which they are being given such a cruel punishment.

The PFF has announced to launch a movement against these atrocities  
to force the government to ensure protection of the poor and  
marginalised community, as they are under threats from different  
sides. The tension and insecurity while searching for livelihood in  
the open sea, he added, was making the situation even worse. He  
stressed that the government should take some initiatives to get  
Pakistani fishermen released from Indian jails.

o o o

Wall Street Journal
January 13, 2009

ATTACKS STIR ANOTHER INDIA-PAKISTAN BORDER DISPUTE

By Krishna Pokharel

NEW DELHI -- In the aftermath of the Mumbai attacks, India has  
canceled talks aimed at solving a long-running border dispute with  
Pakistan -- not in Kashmir, but in the teeming fishing waters of Sir  
Creek, which divides the two South Asian nations in the Arabian Sea.

The narrow, 60-mile-long estuary has been a bone of contention  
between the two nations for decades. But the dispute has been given  
new urgency -- and stoked new controversy -- because it featured in  
the buildup to the Mumbai terrorist attacks that left 171 people dead  
in late November. It was in the Sir Creek area where the 10 hijackers  
who set sail from Karachi, Pakistan, hijacked an Indian fishing boat  
that provided them with the cover to reach Mumbai undetected.

Even before the Mumbai attacks, there were concerns that the area  
could prove to be a staging post for terrorists.
[sir creek on india and pakistan border]

On Oct. 21, a group of 26 Indian parliamentarians presented a report  
to the Indian government warning that an unspecified "rogue action"  
could emanate from the disputed western Indian border at Sir Creek.

About a month later on Nov. 22, the Kuber, an Indian fishing boat  
that had ventured into Pakistani waters west of the mouth of Sir  
Creek, was hijacked by the Mumbai attackers, according to an Indian  
coast guard officer in Gujarat, the western Indian state where most  
of the Indian fishing fleet in the area sails from.

India claims the border between the two countries lies in the middle  
of the navigable channel of Sir Creek, about seven to eight nautical  
miles at its widest point, before it opens to the sea. Pakistan says  
the border is on the eastern bank of the creek and thus claims the  
whole creek. The dispute isn't just an academic exercise because  
wherever the line is drawn extends out into the Arabian Sea and could  
affect sovereignty over hundreds of square miles of prime fishing  
ground and potential oil-and-gas exploration.

Since the two nations can't agree on where the border runs, enforcing  
each country's territorial waters has been a murky process. Indian  
fishing boats regularly criss-cross the area and venture far into the  
area Pakistan considers its own.

In the wake of the Mumbai attacks, India accused the terrorists of  
coming from Pakistan, and rhetoric between the two countries has  
become increasingly heated. Last week, Pakistan's prime minister  
ousted its national security adviser after he confirmed the Pakistani  
identity of the terrorist arrested during the Mumbai attack in an  
interview with a news channel.

Pakistan's civilian government has said it favors talks with India  
and has offered help with the investigation, but its own  
prevarication over the identity of the terrorists has raised  
questions about its credibility.

Talks designed to resolve the Sir Creek border dispute have been iced  
just as a May 13 deadline approaches. "There is no point in talking  
about other issues now," a senior official at India's Ministry for  
External Affairs said. The official said the onus was now on Pakistan  
to create a "proper environment" for talks by acting on India's  
demands to act against the planners of Mumbai attacks. Talks have  
been taking place off and on since 1989.

A spokesman for Pakistan's foreign ministry didn't respond to  
repeated phone calls and an email asking for comments for this article.

Yet an official in Pakistan's foreign ministry said the resolution of  
the dispute was still elusive due what he termed the "inconsistency  
of India's claims." He declined to elaborate.

The two sides had been making headway in the recent talks to resolve  
the dispute ahead of the May deadline set by the United Nations  
Convention on the Law of Sea, experts say.

"It's the matter of one or two more meetings" before an agreement  
would have been reached, says Ravi Vohra, a retired Indian rear  
admiral and director of the nongovernmental National Maritime  
Foundation in New Delhi. "But now both countries have more important  
issues politically," he said.

If the stalled talks don't resume by the deadline, the U.N. has the  
power to declare Sir Creek international waters or put the process  
into third-party mediation. While Pakistan has been open to that  
option in the past, India has said the dispute has to be solved  
bilaterally, experts say.

Because of the controversy, the two sides regularly apprehend  
fishermen they view as wandering into their waters. Since 1978, India  
has exchanged 949 Pakistani fishermen it arrested for 2,304 Indian  
fishermen arrested by Pakistan, according to the Indian Coast Guard.  
The fishermen's trade unions in both countries say there are still  
357 Indian fishermen in Pakistani prisons and 48 Pakistani fishermen  
in Indian prisons.

The Sir Creek dispute had long been overshadowed by the dispute  
between the two countries over the Himalayan region of Kashmir. But  
in the summer of 1965, frequent skirmishes near Sir Creek between the  
armed forces of the countries developed into a full-fledged war in  
Kashmir, the second of the three India-Pakistan wars.

In 1999, an Indian air force plane shot down a Pakistani naval  
surveillance plane flying over the disputed Sir Creek area. The  
incident sparked fears of a war at sea, a dangerous prospect that  
experts say would affect maritime trade throughout the Arabian Sea.

Write to Krishna Pokharel at krishna.pokharel at wsj.com

_____


[3] USA - India:

sacw.net, 27 January 2009
http://www.sacw.net/article549.html

RECOMMENDATIONS TO THE CONGRESSIONAL TASK FORCE ON INTERNATIONAL  
RELIGIOUS FREEDOM
FOLLOWING A BRIEFING ON ’THE THREAT RELIGIOUS EXTREMISM POSES TO  
DEMOCRACY AND SECURITY IN INDIA: FOCUS ON ORISSA’


To: The Congressional Task Force on International Religious Freedom

From: Dr. Angana Chatterji
  Associate Professor, Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology
  California Institute of Integral Studies
  1453 Mission Street, San Francisco, California 94103
  achatterji at ciis.edu; 415.575.6119 (office); 415.640.4013 (mobile)

December 30, 2008

Re.: Recommendations for action, as requested, following a briefing  
held on December 10, 2008, on ’The Threat Religious Extremism Poses  
to Democracy and Security in India: Focus on Orissa’, at 2168 Rayburn  
in Washington D.C.

I thank the Congressional Task Force on International Religious  
Freedom for honoring me with an invitation to testify at the hearing.  
I submit the following recommendations for consideration related to  
United States policy in its continued association with India, in  
ensuring mutual respect for, and commitment to, freedom of religion,  
a secular state, and the attendant human rights and civil liberties  
of disenfranchised, including minority, groups and peoples.

The following submission is mindful of the political/policy borders  
and boundaries that mediate issues of national sovereignty. The  
implicit assumption is that actions to uphold human rights, civil  
liberties, and democratic governance by the United States Government  
contributes significantly to international discourse in ways that are  
beneficial globally as well as to United States domestic policy and  
practice. The following submission is an appeal for ethical  
negotiation between India and the United States as the most powerful  
(United States) and populous (India) democracies seek to fulfill  
their commitment to human rights and its attendant freedoms. In so  
doing, various constituencies in both nations remain hopeful that any  
opportunity for association between these states will assist in  
enabling mutual adherence to responsible and democratic governance.

The following is in addition to the dossier of my research that I  
submitted at the hearing.

Note:
  I am a Citizen of India and a Permanent Resident of the United  
States. My observations are based on research on religious freedom  
and minority rights conducted by me in Orissa. I have undertaken 16  
trips to the state since June 2002, and undertaken work in 66  
villages, 11 towns, and 4 cities across 17 districts in Orissa. In  
2005-2006, I co-convened the Indian People’s Tribunal on Communalism  
in Orissa through the Indian People’s Tribunal on Environment and  
Human Rights with Advocate Mihir Desai, with a panel led by Former  
Chief Justice K.K. Usha of the Kerala High Court.

Religious violence and the religionization of social life by Hindu  
nationalist organizations have continued to endanger life and  
livelihood for minorities in India, as witnessed in Gujarat (2002),  
Jammu-Kashmir (2008), Orissa (2007-2008), Karnataka (2008), Assam  
(2008), and elsewhere. The violence against Christian minority  
communities in Orissa in August-October 2008 was not unexpected. In  
Orissa, since the mid-1990s, a formidable mobilization has been  
established by Hindu nationalist groups, including in Kandhamal  
district. These groups have acted with egregious impunity with  
adverse impact on society, economy, culture, religion, polity, and  
security in the state. The Sangh Parivar ’family’ of Hindutva, Hindu  
supremacist, organizations has a visible presence in twenty-five of  
thirty districts in Orissa. The Sangh Parivar has amassed between 35  
and 40 major organizations with numerous branches (including  
paramilitary hate camps) in 25 districts in Orissa, with a massive  
base of a few million operating at every level of society, ranging  
from, and connecting, villages to cities, in their campaign to  
’convert’ Orissa for the ’Hindu nation’.

Following the recommendations for action listed below please find a  
note on actions proposed by concerned citizens in India, and a brief  
note on the context of Hindu nationalism in Orissa today.

Recommendations for action in the United States:
  Various diasporic charitable organizations affiliated with Hindu  
nationalist ideologies operate in the United States. This has been  
well documented with details submitted by me in the dossier. These  
organizations routinely maintain links with Hindu nationalist leaders  
and organizations in India, including in Orissa. As well, these  
diasporic organizations seek to influence public discourse and policy  
in the United States that relates to India. They also fundraise to  
export capital and resources to counterpart/affiliate organizations  
in India, including in Orissa, that assist in various ways in  
promulgating Hindu nationalist ideology. It is imperative that  
charities involved in work that promulgates and maintains an  
infrastructure of hate and violence against minorities be so  
designated. A list of such charities must be responsibly developed in  
consultation with academics, researchers, and independent bodies with  
relevant expertise on the subject. Following such identification,  
investigations must be undertaken by relevant authorities into the  
actions of these organizations operating with charitable status.  
Note: The categorization of organizations that promulgate  
divisiveness, hate, and violence must occur with the utmost care and  
in a transparent manner, so as to not infringe on the freedoms,  
rights, and entitlements of organizations that legitimately undertake  
charitable work, or ensue the demonization of vulnerable groups and  
marginal, even unorthodox, perspectives. The objective is not to  
further involve the state in public life, but to note that the state  
is already involved in the ability of these organizations to  
function. Hindu nationalism operates as a transnational movement and  
the reach of its affiliated ’charitable’ organizations in the United  
States continues internationally through groups they fund and support  
in India. Halting their interventions requires new ways of thinking  
about domestic and foreign policy and necessitates coordination  
between the United States and India as a tenet of bilateral cooperation.

Toward the above and further:

1. Undertake a systematic, routine, and detailed investigation into  
the actions of diasporic Hindu nationalist groups to identify and  
investigate their status, actions, finances, and the actions and  
affiliations of their membership in the United States, as well as  
their affiliates and cadre. These groups must be investigated and  
monitored, and, as appropriate, requisite action must be taken and  
sanctions must be imposed on their activities.

2. Many of these organizations, registered as charitable entities in  
the United States, routinely allocate sizeable amounts of money under  
’program services’, disproportionately directed to Hindu nationalist  
and affiliated groups in India. The effects of this have been  
documented in the organized violence against Muslims, aided by  
officials of the state government at the highest level, in Gujarat in  
2002.

3. Certain diasporic organizations affiliated with Hindu nationalism,  
such as the India Development Relief Fund (IDRF, Tax identification  
number 52-1555563) and Vishwa Hindu Parishad of America (VHP-A, Tax  
identification number 51-0156325), Sewa International (Tax  
identification number 20-0638718), and Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation of  
USA (Tax identification number 77-0554248) are registered as charity  
organizations in the United States. As their work appears to be  
political in nature, they should be audited and recognized as  
political organizations. A serious concern is whether the activities  
of these fall within the objectives of their tax-exempt status;  
whether in fact these organizations should have been registered as 501 
(c)3 groups given the nature of their activities, whether the monies  
collected are indeed used for the purposes for which they were  
collected, and whether illegal and political activities are being  
carried out in the name of social work. Given these concerns, the  
charitable status, and the rights and privileges thereof, enjoyed by  
these groups should be reviewed, and, where appropriate, revoked.  
Further, their activities should be monitored to determine their role  
in fomenting hate and undermining the human rights of various  
individuals and groups in India. Note: The VHP failed to gain  
recognition at the United Nations as a ’cultural organization’ in  
1999 because of its philosophical underpinnings, even as the VHP-A  
continues to function as an independent charity, registered in the  
United States since the 1970s.

4. The Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh-USA (Tax identification number  
52-1647017, an ideological affiliate of the militant Rashtriya  
Swayamsevak Sangh in India) and VHP-Overseas (Tax identification  
number 04-3576058) are registered as 501(c)3 groups and operate as  
cultural organizations, seeking to mainstream and lobby Hindu  
nationalist concerns in the United States. The impact of their  
activities in promulgating hate and perpetrating ’terror’ and  
communal violence in India must be investigated.

5. Monitor visa issuance to, and the travel of, Hindu nationalist  
leaders and activists charged with involvement in criminal acts. A  
case in point is Mr. Narendra Modi, the incumbent Chief Minister of  
Gujarat, who has been implicated in the violence orchestrated against  
Muslims in 2002, and whose visa was revoked by the United States in  
2005, following advocacy on part of civil society groups and  
academics in the United States and support from Congressional members.

6. Ensure that appointees to federal and state positions, or those  
that serve in an advisory capacity, or as experts to state officials  
are scrutinized for affiliations or linkages they may hold within  
Hindu nationalist groups. These affiliations, where they exist,  
should not be treated as benign, and a reasoned investigation must be  
undertaken to determine whether the prospective appointee or advisor  
is able to fulfill requisite service obligations with ideological and  
practical distance from Hindu nationalist agendas. A case in point is  
Ms. Sonal Shah, who was appointed to President-elect Barack Obama’s  
15-member Transition Team in November 2008. While her list of  
accomplishments and expertise run high, she has worked as a National  
Coordinator for the VHP-A and served on its Governing Council, and  
her organization, Indify, affiliated with Ekal Vidyalaya of India,  
and supported the ideological and political premises of Hindu  
nationalism, and their action programs.

7. Ensure that international human rights and independent monitoring  
groups are invited to India on a regular basis to monitor the status  
of religious freedom and human rights of minority communities and  
allied faith and secular peoples and groups. The ability of  
international human rights and independent monitoring groups to work  
in alliance with local civil society institutions is crucial to  
interrupting the isolation disenfranchised/minority groups experience  
and producing accountability.

8. Ensure that the constitutionality and transparent implementation  
of security laws of India, as they pertain to religious groups and  
religious freedoms, are able to be rigorously monitored by  
international human rights and independent monitoring groups in  
alliance with local civil society institutions. These laws have been,  
without due cause, disproportionately and variously used by law  
enforcement agencies in India against minority communities and those  
dissenting unethical practices of the state, and their rights have  
not been duly protected.

9. All bilateral projects must be assessed for their human rights  
implications, and cost-benefit analyses undertaken to determine/ 
ensure that these projects are in fact positioned to make  
contributions that are empowering for disenfranchised groups,  
including minorities, so as to enable the restructuring of  
inequitable and institutionalized relations of power that lead to  
majoritarianism and communal violence.

Actions applicable to Orissa and at the national level in India:
  Reciprocally, it is important to note certain actions that have  
been proposed by concerned citizens in India that the Government of  
India and Government of Orissa must undertake toward effective  
intervention into the organization and growth of Hindu nationalism.  
Toward this:

1. In India, the Central Bureau of Investigation must be required to  
expeditiously investigate the activities of the Bajrang Dal, Vishwa  
Hindu Parishad (VHP), and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) in  
Orissa, and apply, wherever necessary, relevant provisions of the  
Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. Section 2G of the Act,  
’unlawful association’ denotes: (1) ’that which has for its object  
any unlawful activity, or which encourages or aids persons to  
undertake any unlawful activity, or through which the members  
undertake such activity’; or (2) ’which has for its object any  
activity which is punishable under Section 153A or Section 153B of  
the Indian Penal Code 1860 ([Central Act] 45 of 1860) or which  
encourages or aids persons to undertake any such activity; or of  
which the members undertake any such activity’.

2. A review panel must be appointed by the Government of Orissa, in  
consultation with the National Human Rights Commission, the National  
Minorities Commission, and other relevant independent bodies, such as  
the People’s Union for Democratic Rights and People’s Union for Civil  
Liberties, to identify and investigate the status, actions, finances,  
and membership of Hindu nationalist groups and their affiliates and  
cadre, and the actions of their membership. These groups must be  
investigated and monitored, and, as appropriate, requisite action  
must be taken and sanctions must be imposed on their activities, and  
reparations must be made retroactively to the affected communities  
and individuals. The Government of Orissa must act to stop instances  
of communalization from escalating into violent episodes.

3. Hindu nationalist leaders, activists, and organizations in Orissa  
charged with involvement in criminal acts and involvement in actions  
that have led, or may lead, to communal violence must be investigated  
and prosecuted.

4. Certain organizations, such as the VHP and Vanavasi Kalyan Ashram,  
are registered as cultural and charitable organizations. As their  
work appears to be political in nature, they should be audited and  
recognized as political organizations. A serious concern is whether  
the activities of Hindu nationalist charitable organizations fall  
within the objectives of the social trust/public charitable trust and  
whether in fact these organizations should have been registered as  
social trusts given the nature of their activities; whether the  
monies collected are indeed used for the purposes for which they were  
collected and whether illegal and political activities are being  
carried out in the name of social work. Given these concerns, the  
charitable status, and the rights and privileges thereof, enjoyed by  
these groups must be reviewed and necessary action taken.

5. The Government of Orissa and the Central Government must make  
concerted efforts to identify, investigate, and eradicate  
paramilitary hate camps being operated in Orissa by the Hindu  
nationalist groups that instruct cadre in arms training and militancy  
with the express purpose of threatening and destroying  
disenfranchised and minority populations through social and economic  
boycotts, sporadic and organized intimidation, arson, rape, murder,  
and other forms of social, gendered, sexualized, economic, and  
physical violence.

6. Various police and court investigations related to crimes against  
minorities have not been undertaken in Orissa. On various occasions,  
the police have refused to file First Information Reports (FIR).  
Police desks should be set up for registering minority grievances and  
filing FIRs, and the Government of Orissa must appoint a team of  
Special Public Prosecutors to conduct proceedings as necessary.  
Toward this, independent monitoring bodies must be supported and  
protected.

7. The Government of India and the Government of Orissa must take  
adequate and expeditious steps to ensure that those who convert  
voluntarily to Christianity, Islam, or any other faith are allowed to  
practice their religion. Failing to do so is in serious violation of  
Articles 25-28 of the Constitution of India, which define the  
Fundamental Rights of every citizen of India, and those that the  
Government of India and the Government of Orissa are obligated to  
uphold. Toward this, independent monitoring bodies must be supported  
and protected.

8. Hindu nationalist organizations are forcibly converting Christians  
and other non-Hindus in Orissa to Hinduism. Sangh Parivar activists  
claim India to be a Hindu nation and all Adivasis (tribals,  
indigenous peoples) and Dalits (erstwhile ’untouchable’ groups) to be  
’originally’ Hindus, even as Adivasis and Dalits often do not self- 
identify as such. Drawing on such rationales, Hindu nationalist  
organizations justify coercion in ’bringing back’ Adivasis or Dalits  
to Hinduism. Urgent steps should be taken to stop the Hinduization of  
these communities by means of coercion or duress. The police and  
courts must act immediately and authoritatively to stop Hindu  
nationalists from enacting forcible conversions or ’reconversions’,  
and the police must be required to submit regular and public reports  
documenting their work in this matter.

9. The disparagement, demonization, and vilification of any religion  
should be statutorily prohibited and held punishable under the Indian  
Penal Code.

10. The Orissa Freedom of Religion Act, 1967, must be reviewed and  
repealed.

11. The Orissa Prevention of Cow Slaughter Act, 1960, must be  
reviewed and repealed.

12. The Government of Orissa must establish and activate the State  
Minorities Commission.

13. The BJD-BJP coalition government in Orissa must honor the  
Constitutional mandate requiring the separation of religion from state.

14. Police, judicial, and governmental reform, including diversity  
training, must be addressed by relevant state institutions, and  
action taken against officers of the law and political servants who  
abuse their position of public trust by using their power to  
influence and support Hindu nationalist organizations and sustain a  
climate of communalism in Orissa.

15. The Government of Orissa must adopt an integrated and sustainable  
approach to community development, and take concrete efforts to stop  
further ghettoization of minority communities. The Government of  
Orissa must promote non-segregated localities, housing complexes,  
housing societies, clubs, educational, and recreational institutions,  
and that the Government of Orissa must publicly support social  
interactions, including voluntary inter-caste, inter-faith, and inter- 
class unions, marriages, and partnerships.

16. The Government of India must issue a White Paper on bomb blasts  
and terror attacks in India and constitute a Joint Parliamentary  
Committee that investigates such incidents.

17. The law should be amended to obviate the requirement of prior  
sanction of the state before prosecuting anyone for hate speech.

18. The Communal Violence (Prevention, Control and Rehabilitation of  
Victims) Bill, 2005, introduced in the Parliament of India in  
December 2005 and approved by the Union Cabinet in March 2007, must  
be passed, and with the requisite clauses to ensure state  
accountability. The bill, advocated by citizen motivated efforts for  
the prevention of genocide and crimes against humanity, in its  
official formulation as introduced by the Congress government,  
remained deficient in defining procedures for state and public  
accountability. As presently drafted, the law will become applicable  
only selectively. An amendment should do away with the law being made  
applicable only selectively, at places and times as convenient to the  
state. In addition, there exist no dedicated provisions for  
reparation and rehabilitation of victims/survivors. The bill fails to  
address issues of negligence displayed by state authorities in  
preventing and controlling communal violence, and in disbursing  
timely and just compensation and psychosocial rehabilitation, as well  
as establishing parameters for witness protection and for soliciting  
and recording victim testimonies. It fails to chart measures to bring  
justice and accountability with regard to gender and sex-based crimes  
in the event of communal violence (which is not effectively addressed  
by the Indian Penal Code or separate legislation), and in imposing  
checks and balances on the state and its police and security forces,  
whose inertia and majoritarianist complicity in communal collisions  
have been consistent.

19. On 29 November 1949, India became a signatory to the Convention  
on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, approved  
by the United Nations General Assembly resolution 260 A (III) of 9  
December 1948. On 27 August 1959, India ratified the Genocide  
Convention. However, India is yet to fulfill its obligatory  
commitment to enact legislation to implement the convention, which it  
must be compelled to undertake.

Context of Hindu nationalism in Orissa:
  Conscription into Hindu activism is coordinated through political  
reform, propaganda/thought control, cultural and religious  
interventions, developmental/social service and charitable work,  
sectarian health care, unionization, and revisionist education. Hindu  
nationalists have inaugurated various trusts and branches of national  
and international institutions in Orissa to aid fundraising,  
including, reportedly, the Friends of Tribal Society, Samarpan  
Charitable Trust, Sookruti, Yasodha Sadan, Utkal Bipanna Sahayata  
Samiti, and Odisha International Centre. It is noteworthy that since  
March 2000, the state government has comprised of a coalition of the  
Biju Janata Dal and the Bharatiya Janata Party (the parliamentary  
wing of Hindu nationalism).
  The Sangh Parivar has built a cadre comprised of Hindus, men and  
women, in targeting Christians, Muslims, Adivasis and Dalits, and  
other disenfranchised, progressive, and secular groups in Orissa.  
Orissa has a population of 36.8 million (Census 2001). Of this,  
761,985 - 2.1 percent - are Muslims. Orissa Christians number 897,861  
- just 2.4 percent of the state’s population per the census of 2001  
(in 1991, it was 2.1 percent, and in 1981, 1.7 percent). There are  
6.08 million Dalits in Orissa, 16.5 percent of the population.  
Adivasis are 8.14 million in number, 22.1 percent of the population,  
the largest among all states in India.

The Sangh Parivar’s agenda is enabled by the staggering inequities  
present in the state, where severe social and institutionalized forms  
of caste, class, and gendered oppressions are rampant, facilitative  
of regularized violence, including sexualized violence. Unemployment  
is on the rise in Orissa and abysmal daily wages prevail; 47.2  
percent of the total population lives in poverty while 48 percent of  
the rural population is poor (87 percent of the state’s population  
lives in villages currently and per the 2001 census, there are 51,352  
villages in Orissa). Among the Adivasi population, 63.6 percent are  
poor while 40.5 percent of Dalits live in poverty. Among the Muslim  
population, 70 percent are poor in Cuttack, Jagatsinghpur and Puri  
districts, where they are concentrated.

During the 2008 violence in Orissa, various militant Hindu  
nationalist organizations acted with impunity. The violence was led  
by the following groups — the Bajrang Dal, VHP, and RSS. Following  
the riots and extended violence against Christian communities in  
Kandhamal district of Orissa in August-October 2008, the Government  
of Orissa and police, military, paramilitary forces deployed in the  
state failed to respond effectively, efficiently, or appropriately.  
This posed a serious threat to democratic governance in the state and  
the ability of government to ensure the security and sanctity of  
peoples and groups made vulnerable through majoritarian communalism  
as perpetrated by Hindu nationalist organizations in the state. The  
Central Government in New Delhi as well failed to respond in a timely  
and effective manner and with due concern.

It is only after the violence drew significant national and  
international attention, and began to generate other and political  
consequences, that both state and central governments responded to  
stop the violations against Christian minority groups in Orissa. The  
outrage and response of the state failed to match the proportion and  
extent of violence perpetrated by Hindu nationalist organizations. As  
of 25 December 2008, rehabilitation measures and provisions ensuring  
the security of vulnerable groups in rural areas and towns in  
Kandhamal district remained vastly inadequate.

The matters and circumstances that led to the Kandhamal violence of  
2007 and 2008 in Orissa continue to pose a threat to the sanctity and  
security of human rights in the state, particularly of religious and  
ethnic minorities such as Christians and Muslims, disenfranchised  
Adivasi, Dalit, and caste groups, and other vulnerable groups such as  
women, and secular organizations and active individuals across the  
state. Failure to take preventative and effective action continues to  
jeopardize the rule of law, the right to life and livelihood, freedom  
of religion, of speech, movement, assembly, inquiry, and the right to  
information in Orissa. As I write this, the situation in Orissa  
remains beleaguered and volatile, de facto in a state of emergency.


_____


[4] INDIA:  PROTEST AGAINST ATTACK ON FILM CREW BY HINDUTVA GOONS!
[message from filmmaker Rakesh Sharma]

Please help by registering your strongest protest to the Police  
Commissioner as instead of taking any action against the mob  
attacking the crew at midnight (asking for Richa to be bodysearched,  
tearing Rvviu’s clothes, snatching the camera, taking the ffotage  
away), the police seemed to pander to them, and have confiscated our  
footage illegally!

January 29, 2009 Fax CP 22621835

Hasan Ghafoor, IPS
The Commissioner of Police, Mumbai

Sub:	Harassment of documentary film crew and illegal confiscation of  
footage

Dear Sir,

We are working with Rakesh Sharma (98203 43103), well-known  
independent documentary film-maker. Today, we were filming for his  
latest film which deals with the human tragedy of terror and hate  
attacks, among other things documenting the diversity of responses  
from the civil society in the last few weeks. These have included  
memorial and felicitation functions, interviews with victims,  
patients and their families, peace marches, workshops and several  
other miscellaneous events. Today evening, as part of our ongoing  
filming, we were shooting at the Sadhu Sammelan on peace and terror  
at their public meeting at Somaiya grounds on Sion-Chunnabhatti road.
We took the required permissions from the organizers and were  
escorted by them into the press enclosure to enable us to film the  
speakers. After the meeting, as is our usual practice, we were taking  
audience reactions. While filming with an audience member from Simla,  
we were suddenly surrounded by a mob of approx 100-150 people, who  
identified themselves as members of Bajrang Dal and the Dharma Raksha  
Manch, raising objections to the interview. Though we tried to reason  
with them, the mob grew increasingly hostile and manhandled the  
cameraman Rrivu Laha and snatched the camera.  They intimidated Ms  
Richa Hushing and demanded that she be body searched by one of the  
Durga Vahini members. The local event co-ordinator of the Vishwa  
Hindu Parishad who identified himself as being in-charge of security,  
intervened to stop further manhandling and demanded that the footage  
recently shot by the crew, be immediately erased in their presence.  
The tape itself was physically snatched by the mob from the cameraman.
At this time, the police wireless van attached to the Wadala Truck  
Terminus Police Station, reached the spot and intervened. They  
escorted us to their van and PI Chavan questioned us and offered to  
register a formal complaint.  In the meanwhile, the other policemen  
went into the mob and brought a man named Wankhede with the tape that  
had been snatched by the mob. While the police were questioning him,  
two people arrived – one of them a delegate who had earlier addressed  
the meeting and the other, a local politician contacted by Wankhede.  
They then insisted that the crew be allowed to leave only after the  
tape had been formally confiscated by the police.
As we had just been subjected to mob violence, harassment,  
intimidation and were under duress, we agreed to comply with the  
demands of the mob and left the scene as we had a continuing fear of  
our safety. We are writing this complaint immediately on our arrival  
in our office.
We request you to treat this letter as a formal complaint and take  
appropriate action. Further, our footage containing not just the said  
interview but also much of our filming throughout the evening has not  
yet been restored to us. We urge that our tape be handed over to us  
urgently. We have spoken to SI Chavan telephonically at 1.30 am and  
informed him that this formal complaint is being lodged and have  
ascertained that the said tape remains in his personal possession.
Yours sincerely,

Richa Hushing Rrivu Laha, Jogesh Malakar

independent fim-maker (9969879319) cinematographer (9372446397) AD  
(65882504)
CC:

SI, Wadala Truck Terminus Police Station
DCP of the zone
Indian Documentary Producers’ Association

_____


[5] India's Screwed Up Secularism

outlookindia.om
Web | January 29, 2009

MADRASAS: DEGREES OF POPULISM

Without spending a penny, the government wants to show the Muslims  
that it is doing something for them -- its move to legally recognise  
madrasa degrees is a regressive and measure that was tried, with  
disastrous results, in Pakistan by the Zia ul Haq regime

by Arshad Alam

One of the key recommendations of the Sachar Committee report was to  
open quality schools in areas of Muslim concentration. Stating that  
only about three percent Muslims access madrasa education and that by  
and large Muslims prefer to enrol their wards in government schools,  
the recommendation, if made into a policy, would have gone a long way  
in correcting the abysmal state of education among the Muslims.  
Rather than doing this, the present government is content to dole out  
sops, primarily aimed at the madrasas. The recent government  
announcement of making madrasa degrees at par with a college or  
university degree is one such example.

There is a lot to be said about this exercise in electoral populism.  
But first, the economics of it which seems to be fairly clear. The  
move is targeted at 7000 madrasas controlled by various madrasa  
boards in India which enrol around 3.5 lakh students. Without  
spending a penny, the government wants to show the Muslims that it is  
doing something for them. Providing quality education for the Muslims  
would have cost the government much more which it clearly does not  
want to do. The whole exercise of making madrasa degrees equivalent  
to a regular degree is thus an exercise in vacuous symbolism and will  
not lead to any substantive benefits to madrasa students.

It is important to understand that there are roughly two kinds of  
madrasas in India. Some madrasas are affiliated to madrasa boards in  
various states and apart from teaching Islam, they also teach  
subjects such as sciences and social sciences. On the other hand, the  
vast majority of madrasas are independent of these various madrasa  
boards. They have their own system of examination and they teach  
their students nothing except Islam. These independent madrasas have  
successfully resisted attempts from various quarters, including the  
state, to change their curriculum. Now, the government measure of  
equivalence of madrasa certificates will only apply to madrasas  
controlled by the various boards which form only a small part of the  
madrasa network in India. What is the government doing about the  
students enrolled in independent madrasas?

There are other problems which should have been thought about before  
making a policy announcement. Where will the madrasa students gain  
admission? Madrasa certificates are already recognized for admission  
in the undergraduate programs of universities such as Jamia, Aligarh  
and JNU. The latest government move is thus not a novel instrument of  
policy but merely an extension of something which is already in  
practice. That apart, most of the madrasa graduates get admission in  
Urdu, Persian and Arabic departments of these universities. The  
equivalence criteria will do nothing to change such a state of  
affairs. If anything else, this academic ghettoisation of Muslim  
students will only increase in the near future. Without effective  
curricular reforms, madrasa students would not be admitted in the  
science or social science departments. As stated earlier, madrasa  
controlled by the boards do teach modern subjects, but not in  
English. A madrasa student, entering a university, without even a  
working knowledge of English, is bound to be involved in a  
frustrating struggle to cope up with his more fortunate peers.

This frustration can have various political implications. It is  
important to understand that only few madrasa graduates access  
regular higher education. Part of the reason is their self- 
elimination through strategic thinking which tells them that it is  
futile to think about entering the domain of regular colleges or  
universities. They have their own religious economy which somehow is  
able to sustain them. The equivalence criterion gives them false  
hopes without substantially enhancing their educational  
capabilities.They would come to institutions of higher learning only  
to be disappointed with their inability to crack the code of modern  
pedagogy. The universities and colleges in turn will label them as  
'failures'. Cumulatively this will lead to new kinds of frustrations  
which could be channelised for a political mobilisation of a not so  
benign nature. It is important to recall here that a similar exercise  
was done in Pakistan by the Zia ul Haq regime. While the move allowed  
madrasa graduates to apply for jobs, the market rejected them as they  
did not have the requisite educational capital. The fallout of such a  
policy is there for all to see: Madrasa graduates form an important  
part of the landscape of terrorism in that country.
There are some pre-requisites for the policy of equivalence to  
succeed. First of all there has to be an all India madrasa Board. All  
madrasas, including the independent ones, have to be compulsorily  
part of this board. This Board should adopt a common curriculum for  
all madrasas, which would include modern subjects and English.  
Sufficient numbers of trained teachers for this purpose should be  
provided for the Board. But for all this to happen, one needs to have  
a genuine political will. It is true that the government did initiate  
a measure to form an all India Madrasa Board. But sensing opposition  
from the Ulama, the plan was shelved in no time. It requires no deep  
thinking that the Ulama would always oppose such a move by the  
government: After all why would they surrender their autonomy, more  
importantly, their financial autonomy? The state, however, needs to  
look beyond the sectarian interests of the Ulama and focus on the  
interests of poor and destitute students of the madrasa, even if that  
means bypassing the madrasa system altogether. The Ulama have been  
playing with the future of madrasa students for a long time. One can  
only hope that the state does not do so.
Arshad Alam teaches at the Center for Jawaharlal Nehru Studies, Jamia  
Milia Islamia

_____


[6] INDIA: IN TIMES OF HINDUTVA

Indian Express,
January 20, 2009

PUROHIT PLANNED ISRAEL-BASED HINDU GOVT-IN-EXILE, SUPPORT FROM THAI  
CONTACTS: ATS CHARGESHEET TODAY

The Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad chargesheet in the Malegaon  
blast case claims that as per statements from the accused the town  
was singled out for the blast as "it was the ideal place where the  
Muslim community crowd was the maximum" and that prime accused Lt Col  
Prasad Purohit had told fellow conspirators it was time to set up a  
parallel, Hindu government-in-exile which could operate out of Israel  
and ensure a completely sashastra (armed) India. Purohit, according  
to the chargesheet, promised "all logistic help" with finances from  
several quarters and support from some of his contacts in Thailand.  
The ATS chargesheet, which includes two important confession  
statements, statements of witnesses under Section 164, laptop  
records, telephonic records, detailed SMSes and financial  
transactions across states, will be filed tomorrow in the designated  
MCOCA court chaired by sessions judge Y D Shinde.

The ATS will tell the court how a group called Abhinav Bharat became  
a "front organisation" for a conspiracy which led to an explosion at  
9.26 pm on September 29, 2008 at Bhikku Chowk, Malegaon. While all  
eleven accused have been charged with conspiracy, logistics and  
execution of the blast, the key roles, according to the ATS, were  
those of Purohit, Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur and Sudhakar Dardwivedi  
alias Dayanand Pandey. This will be the first case where a probe has  
been able to reach the conspirators - unlike other cases where only  
those who planted bombs have been arrested. In this case, the alleged  
bomb planters - Sameer Dange, Ramji Kalsangra - and Pravin Patil,  
another on the wanted list, remain at large. Patil also used the  
cover name of Mutalik and is a close aide of Purohit.

While the forensic finding of the chassis and engine number of the  
motorcycle used in the blast - it was a Gujarat registration number  
GJ-05-1920, owned by Pragya Singh Thakur - led the ATS to Gujarat, it  
was the statements of witnesses and the forensic report that helped  
the ATS build a strong case. The ATS chargesheet has relied heavily  
on the statement of Sudhakar Chaturvedi (37), the last to be  
arrested, who said Purohit had called him on September 17, asking him  
to give the keys of his house in Deolali to a person named Pawar.  
According to the ATS, Pawar handed the keys to Ramji Kalsangra who  
along with some others used the house to assemble the bomb that was  
eventually used in Malegaon. The ATS team took a picture of Ramji to  
the locality where Chaturvedi stayed. Two witnesses identified him  
and confirmed that Ramji did come to the house. A search of the house  
revealed remains of items used in making the bomb - this was verified  
by a forensic team. Evidences include recordings from the laptop of  
Sudhakar Dardwivedi which also has footage of various meetings.

Of the arrested, it is Rakesh Dataram Dhavde's involvement in the  
conspiracy that led the ATS to slap MCOCA charges against all ten  
accused. Pragya Singh's telephonic conversations recorded with  
accused Shyam Sahu immediately after the blasts will be included in  
the chargesheet. According to the ATS, the Abhinav Bharat, a group  
founded on June 12, 2006 in Raigad where Shivaji was coronated,  
initially had retired Major Ramesh Upadhyay in the role of working  
president. Later, under the control of Purohit, it became the "front  
for an agenda of creating a Hindu Rajya". While the "anger and the  
determination" to create a parallel government which "gives power to  
Hindus" can be seen in the records of the many meetings that  
transpired between the accused, the ATS says that it was at a meeting  
in Bhopal where the conspiracy for Malegaon was hatched.

Purohit was said to have convinced the group that the time had come  
for a parallel government - and he detailed the idea of a bomb  
blast.The group, according to many statements of the accused, was  
told about possible safe houses in Israel from where the conspirators  
could operate once their ideology took root and their numbers  
increased. According to the ATS, Pragya Singh promised "two of her  
men" from Gujarat. Upadhyay and Pune-based Ajay Rahirkar played key  
roles in logistics, conspiracy meetings and finances while Sudhakar  
and Sameer Kulkarni, the ATS says, were active foot soldiers of  
Abhinav Bharat who were paid a monthly sum of Rs 5,000 and were  
called 'Chanakyas'.

o o o

VHP activists bash up Christian missionaries in Allahabad (Rediff,  
January 19, 2009)
http://www.rediff.com/news/2009/jan/19vhp-activists-bash-up-christian- 
missionaries-in-allahabad.htm

MNS salute to Hitler, apes Nazi-style greeting (Indian Express, Jan  
24, 2009)
http://www.indianexpress.com/story_print.php?storyid=414639

_____

[7] Announcements:

(i) PEACE RALLY IN LAHORE

Friends, comrades

If you are scared for the life and security of your family and  
friends, act now. If you are concerned about the security situation  
in the country, do something. If you hope for peace and prosperity in  
the country and world at large, you will have to take action. There  
is no other option!

All of us are affected by violence and terror. No one can escape the  
misery and horror unleashed by suicide bombings. Just because acts of  
violence and aggression are on the rise, does not mean we can become  
de-sensitized to their consequences. In fact, this is all the more  
reason to intensify our efforts to curb it, and reform the society we  
live in.

If you remain silent in the hope that you will not come under attack,  
or keep quiet because it was not you who was affected, you are wrong.  
You are terribly mistaken to think you will survive war unscathed.  
For this is war. We are under attack from different fronts.

We are fearful, yes, but not powerless. We are tired, but not  
defeated. We are struggling, but have not lost, not yet. Friends,  
this is about our lives, our very survival. War does not benefit  
anyone. We all lose in the end. Act while you can, before it is too  
late.

JOIN THE AMN TEHREEK PEACE RALLY ON SATURDAY, JANUARY 31 at REAGEL  
CHOWK THE MALL LAHORE 3.00 PM

On the spectrum of needs and wants, peace is an absolute necessity.  
Join the rally because it is your way of showing the government, the  
international community, and most importantly fellow Pakistanis that  
you care about your life and theirs. Come because you choose life  
over death! Come because you choose peace, not war!

Institute for peace and Secular studies
91-G johar Town Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan
Ph 042-5219862/ 042-5219863
  mobile 0321-844-5072,0300-844-5072
www.peaceandsecularstudies.org
"you must be the change you want to see in the world" Gandhi


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S o u t h      A s i a      C i t i z e n s      W i r e
Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on
matters of peace and democratisation in South
Asia. An offshoot of South Asia Citizens Web: www.sacw.net/

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