SACW | Dec 27, 2009 - Jan 2, 2010 / Bangladesh: Promise of Change / Pakistan-India: People's Initiatives For Peace / No religion

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | December 27 2009 - January 2, 2010 |  
Dispatch No. 2680 - Year 12 running
From: www.sacw.net

[ SACW Dispatches for 2009-2010 are dedicated to the memory of Dr.  
Sudarshan Punhani (1933-2009), husband of Professor Tamara Zakon and  
a comrade and friend of Daya Varma ]

____

[1] Sri Lanka:  Election on a precipice (Tisaranee Gunasekara)
      -  War-crime allegations piling up in Sri Lanka (Feizal Samath)
[2] Bangladesh: Promise of Change (Kamal Hossain)
      - ASK strongly protests and condemns the Home Minister’s  
comment on crossfire
      - Govt 'unwilling to stop' extra judicial killings
[3]  Pakistan: A city mourns (Editorial, The News)
      - Q&A: Law and Order May Not Improve in 2010 - interview with  
Rukhshanda Naz (Ashfaq Yusufzai)
      - Dragon’s teeth (Irfan Husain)
[4] Pakistan India Conference – A Road map towards Peace (New Delhi,  
10th - 12th January, 2010)
     + Bridging Partition: People's Initiatives For Peace Between  
India And Pakistan edited by Smitu Kothari and Zia Mian
with Kamla Bhasin, A H Nayyar and Mohammad Tahseen
[5] India: Reduction of troops - J&K continues to be heavily  
militarised state (Editorial, Kashmir Times)
      - South Asian agenda for Jammu & Kashmir (Madanjeet Singh)
      - Safe haven for women beaten and abused in Kashmir
[6] India: Amending the Right to Information Act would be a  
retrograde step (Aruna Roy)
      - Heart of darkness (Dilip Simeon)
      - Goa - Rape, blame and the tourism game (Eric Randolph)
[7] India: Resources For Secular Activists
       (i) No religion please, we're liberals (Mohammed Wajihuddin)
       (ii) India: Communal Riots 2009 (Asghar Ali Engineer)
       (iii) The Hindutva ride (K.N. Panikkar)
      (iv) National Consultation on Communal Violence Bill (New  
Delhi, 12-13 February 2010)
_____


[1] Sri Lanka:

Himal, SouthAsian January 2010

ELECTION ON A PRECIPICE
by Tisaranee Gunasekara

Sarath Fonseka’s candidature in the upcoming presidential elections  
might be a setback for the Rajapakse dynastic project. But the  
general’s Sinhala supremacy agenda cannot calm the minorities.

Sri Lanka’s election season commenced with a thunderbolt, a  
development unthinkable in those heady days six months ago, when the  
demise of the Tamil Tigers was celebrated with milk-rice and  
crackers. Most Sinhalese regard President Mahinda Rajapakse, Defence  
Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapakse and Commander of the Army Sarath  
Fonseka as the ‘heroic trinity’ responsible for their historic  
triumph over the LTTE. Today, that war-time triumvirate has collapsed  
and the Sinhala South is compelled to witness the unseemly sight of  
its saviours battling each other for power.

Until his fallout with the Rajapakse brothers, Fonseka shared most of  
their ideological and political predilections. A Sinhala supremacist  
intolerant of dissent, he was a key player in the Rajapakse project  
of turning Sri Lanka into a Sinhala-dominated national security  
state. But the Rajapakses also have dynastic ambitions; their brazen  
attempts at monopolising the credit for defeating the LTTE irked  
Fonseka, just as his brash effort to claim a lion’s share of the  
credit alarmed the Rajapakses. In this highly charged environment,  
minor irritants became blistering sores, snowballs heralding the  
ultimate avalanche.

Dynamic candidacy
Fonseka’s entrance into the race has deeply affected the political  
dynamics of the upcoming election. To begin with, it has united and  
rejuvenated the United National Party (UNP) and the Janatha Vimukthi  
Peramuna (JVP), the two major opposition parties. A balance between  
the government and the opposition is necessary for the political  
health of any democracy. When the opposition is more powerful than  
the government, instability becomes endemic; when the opposition is  
ineffective, it gives the government a sense of power that is not  
conducive to moderate thinking and conduct. The Rajapakses’ plan was  
to trounce the twice-defeated Ranil Wickremesinghe of the UNP during  
the presidential election, and use that victory as a springboard to  
obtain a two-thirds majority at the parliamentary poll, which must  
take place before 22 April 2010. This would have been sufficient to  
enable them to craft a constitution suited to their dynastic needs.  
The Fonseka factor wreaked havoc on this carefully calibrated plan  
and energised the opposition, thereby partially restoring the  
essential balance between the government and the opposition.

Beyond a reenergised opposition, the impartiality of Dayananda  
Dissanayake, the election commissioner, has also emerged as another  
unexpected obstacle to the Rajapakse behemoth. Through his conduct  
during the now-concluded nomination process, Dissanayake has already  
demonstrated that he is determined to ensure a free and fair  
election. To this end, he plans to set up a competent official body  
to monitor both state and private media to try and ensure impartial  
coverage. Dissanayake also stated that proxy candidates, most of the  
22 contenders, will not be permitted to use the opportunities granted  
to them under the constitution to canvass for their paymasters, as  
has happened in the past. In addition, international election  
observers have also been invited. Perhaps most significantly, he  
warned that if polling is marred by violence, the exercise will be  
declared invalid in the affected constituency and the final national  
result delayed until re-polling is completed.

Without doubt, the upcoming campaign will be acrimonious, perhaps  
even bloody, and the result is likely to be a close affair.  
Rajapakse, with the power and the resources of the state at his  
command, is likely to win. But it will not be the cakewalk he and his  
strategists had expected when they opted for the premature  
presidential poll. If Fonseka can deprive Rajapakse of an outright  
victory by pushing the election into a second round, the fallout may  
limit the ruling United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) to only a  
marginal victory at the parliamentary election, thus preventing any  
legislative intervention in the constitution. The Fonseka factor has  
now rendered uncertain not only the outcome of the presidential  
election but also that of the parliamentary polls and thus the very  
future of the Rajapakse project.

The Rajapakse-Fonseka fallout created much consternation within the  
‘patriotic’ camp. But the Sinhala supremacists, with the exception  
of the JVP which was in the opposition in any case, closed ranks  
around Rajapakse once Fonseka’s candidacy was confirmed. In this  
sense, Fonseka entering the fray is unlikely to cause a big enough  
swing in the Sinhala vote to defeat Rajapakse. On the other hand, the  
general has electrified the opposition, propelling it into vigorous  
action. As the recent provincial council elections confirmed, the UNP  
vote base has remained largely intact. Indeed, the UPFA’s huge  
victories were the result of high levels of abstentions among  
disorganised and demoralised UNP loyalists. For instance, the UPFA  
won the Southern Provincial Council with a huge margin because there  
was a 42.6 percent decrease in the UNP vote from 2005, not because of  
any post-war swing towards the UPFA. Meanwhile, support for the UPFA  
decreased by 3.2 percent from 2005. If there was no groundswell of  
support for the Rajapakses in the South, their home base, there  
cannot be a pro-Rajapakse wave nationally. Since the Fonseka factor  
will galvanise most UNP loyalists into voting, barring a last minute  
hitch, the electoral race is likely to be close, even in the Sinhala  
South.

Fonseka’s impact on the electoral field also demonstrates how the  
minorities could have become the ‘third force’ in Lankan politics  
had they formed a united front on a common minimum platform. As  
things stand, the minority parties are divided. Douglas Devananda’s  
Eelam People’s Democratic Party (EPDP), Arumugam Thondaman’s  
Ceylon Workers Congress (CWC) and Ferial Ashraff’s National Unity  
Alliance (NUA) are backing Rajapakse while Rauf Hakeem’s Sri Lanka  
Muslim Congress (SLMC) and Mano Ganesan’s Western Peoples Front  
(WPF) are supporting Fonseka. The Tamil National Alliance (TNA) is  
undecided while M K Shivajilingam, a TNA parliamentarian, is  
contesting the presidency as an independent.

In Colombo, which has a high concentration of Tamils and Muslims,  
most minority voters are UNP supporters. In 2005, a majority of  
Colombo Tamils obeyed the LTTE and abstained from voting, indirectly  
helping Rajapakse win. Haunted by this memory, most Colombo Tamils  
are likely to vote for Fonseka this time around, just to deny  
Rajapakse a second term. So will a majority of Colombo Muslims, since  
Fonseka is backed by both the UNP and the SLMC. Though the CWC is  
backing Rajapakse, the UNP has a significant presence in the  
plantations and Fonseka may be able to win a sizeable chunk of the  
upcountry Tamil votes as a consequence.

Meanwhile, many Eastern Muslims, fearing the Buddhist revanchists of  
the rightwing Jathika Hela Urumaya (JHU) backing Rajapakse, are  
likely to vote for Fonseka. The squabble between the TMVP’s  
Sivanesathurai Chandrakanthan (‘Pillayan’), chief minister of the  
Eastern Province, and his former leader Vinayagamoorthy Muralitharan  
(‘Karuna’) – currently a government minister – may enable the  
Eastern Tamils to vote with relative freedom. At the August local  
government elections, the UPFA managed to win in Jaffna but was  
trounced in Vavuniya. This indicates that in a free and fair  
election, a majority of the northern Tamils will vote against  
Rajapakse. This does not, however, necessarily mean that they will  
vote for the war-time army commander.

The Tamils have nothing positive to expect from Rajapakse who has  
denied the very existence of the ethnic problem, also implying that  
any Tamil with a close relative in the LTTE is a traitor. But will  
the Tamils of the North and the East be allowed to vote freely? Will  
the power of the state be used to engineer a massive ‘victory’ for  
Rajapakse? Will an independent election commissioner, international  
election observers and Fonseka supporters in the army suffice to  
impede attempts at holding a peaceful but un-free election in the  
North? These are unanswerable questions this side of 26 January.  
Meanwhile, media reports about abysmally low levels of voter  
registration among the internally displaced (7000 out of 200,000)  
indicate that many Tamils may stay away from voting – or will be  
induced to do so by the powers that be, in the hope of replicating  
the 2005 outcome.

Future imperfect
In a display of cognitive dissonance, the Rajapakse camp is warning  
that a Fonseka victory will result in a military dictatorship. It was  
the Rajapakses who allowed, and are allowing, the army to meddle in  
politics, thereby blurring the clear line of demarcation which  
existed in Sri Lanka between the military and the polity even in the  
worst years of the conflict. The Rajapakses also have a history of  
limiting democratic freedoms citing them as incompatible with  
national security needs. In any case, Fonseka is retired. He is  
contesting the election as a civilian and his victory cannot become a  
military coup.

All the same, a Fonseka presidency can imperil democracy in other  
ways. The general has promised to abolish the executive presidency,  
implement the 17th Amendment which seeks to reduce executive powers  
via five independent commissions, provide a political solution which  
goes beyond the 13th Amendment on devolving power to the provinces  
and ensure media freedoms. Lofty promises indeed, but will he honour  
them? What if a victorious Fonseka decides to retain the executive  
presidency, until he has ‘set the country right’? Already there is  
talk of a moderate versus hardliner split in the Fonseka camp with  
the candidate succumbing to the JVP hardliners. Lankan democracy can  
become imperilled irrespective of who wins the election.

Landmines litter Sri Lanka’s path to a post-war future. A huge army  
with war psychosis is incompatible with a country sans a war. Neither  
Rajapakse nor Fonseka has a programme to change, in terms of size and  
psychological makeup, this war-time army to one suited to a peaceful  
democracy. The country has lost the European Union’s Generalised  
System of Preferences (GSP+) as a direct outcome of the Rajapakses’  
refusal to abide by international humanitarian laws and standards.  
The subsequent adverse impact on trade will aggravate the economic  
woes of the masses. The war crime charges will continue to resonate  
internationally. More pertinently, there cannot be a genuine  
reconciliation with the Tamils so long as Sinhalese of all political  
persuasions cling to the myth of a humanitarian offensive and deny  
that the state Lankan forces too engaged in human-rights violations  
during the endgame with LTTE. How can the Tamils forget the past and  
look ahead, if the only future possible is one in which their  
legitimate grievances and demands are denied and their suffering and  
loss belittled?

An election is supposed to provide the possibility of a dramatic  
break away from the crisis mentality, but it is clear that the  
presidential election this January will not provide a solution to any  
of the burning problems. Nor can Rajapakse or Fonseka be trusted to  
act democratically, constitutionally or even moderately after the  
election. But if the Fonseka factor can push the election into a  
second round, it may impede the Rajapakse project of establishing  
dynastic rule behind a democratic façade in a Sinhala dominated Sri  
Lanka. It may also remind Sinhala politicians of all hues that Tamil  
and Muslim voters do matter, even in a post-LTTE Sri Lanka.

Tisarenee Gunasekara is a writer based in Colombo.

o o o

WAR-CRIME ALLEGATIONS PILING UP IN SRI LANKA
by Feizal Samath
http://tinyurl.com/yauzvt3

_____


[2] Bangladesh:

PROMISE OF CHANGE

by Kamal Hossain (Mainstream Weekly, 26 December 2009)

Citizens of Bangladesh have persevered in their effort to establish a  
working democracy. The movement to restore democracy had resulted in  
1990 in an agreed commitment amongst all political forces to restore  
parliamentary democracy and to strengthen democratic institutions— 
the rule of law, an independent judiciary, and a media committed  
fearlessly to truth and to give voice to the people. These  
aspirations for a transparent, responsive and accountable mode of  
governance were powerfully re-affirmed in the concerted efforts for  
political and economic reforms between 2004 to 2008.

       People had sought to rescue themselves from a political  
process which had degenerated and become captive in the hands of  
black money and armed musclemen. A universally shared goal was to  
regenerate healthy politics to rescue the overwhelming majority who  
had suffered as virtual hostages and felt powerless under a system of  
governance which had become authoritarian. A highly centralised  
structure of the government had excluded citizens from participation.  
A confrontational political culture had excluded not only the  
Opposition but the people in general from participation in  
governance. People expected transparency, accountability and the rule  
of law to be an integral part of the democratic political system  
which had been the aim of the electoral and political reforms  
demanded by the people. The election held in December 2008 promised  
to bring about change.

       It is nine months since a government elected by an  
overwhelming majority has been in power. People have been awaiting  
the adoption of polices and strategies and the strengthening of  
institutions needed to deliver good governance, and the changes  
promised by the election manifesto.

       As people continued to await the promised change, they  
expected to see a change in the mindsets of those in power and the  
strengthening of democratic institutions so that these could begin to  
function effectively. They looked forward to a vibrant Parliament  
that played a dynamic role in regenerating democracy. Lively debates  
were expected on policies—on the national economy, on industry,  
agriculture and education, health, economy, environment and other  
vital national sectors. Committees were expected to ensure that the  
executive branch and the administration remained responsive to public  
needs and national priorities. The Opposition has yet to present  
itself in Parliament as people expected it to play a positive role.  
It would be a giant step forward if the Opposition, in addition to  
pointing out deficiencies in official policies or actions of the  
government, would itself put forward well-thought-out alternatives.

       Voters had wished to put behind them the past when, under a  
hierarchical governance system, public servants were reduced to being  
party functionaries. This tendency persists. There is a legitimate  
expectation that appointments and promotion in the public service  
would be on the basis of merit and competence, through a transparent  
process, and not arbitrarily on the basis of party loyalty. The  
administration, manned by public servants, is expected to discharge  
its functions strictly in accordance with law and in the public  
interest and not be made to suffer from harassment and persecution on  
partisan considerations.

       Citizens would not be kept in the dark on the plea of official  
secrecy, and human rights guarantees would be effectively enforced.  
The enactment of the Right to Information Act was welcomed as it  
would prevent a veil of secrecy being placed over official decisions.  
The newly established Human Rights Commission needs to be made fully  
operational with the resources and capacity to fulfill its mandate.  
Resources must be committed to strengthen the independence of the  
judiciary and to fully implement its separation as mandated by the  
Constitution in order for it to play its role as the guardian of  
citizens’ rights and of the Constitution.

       The government should welcome the citizens’ participation by  
consultation through Parliamentary Committees, and through advisory  
groups involving stakeholders and others who can contribute to  
improving the quality of governance. Periodic progress reports need  
to be published on actions taken towards fulfilling the pledges made  
to the people.

       The most critical sphere in which such progress reports must  
be made transparent is in relation to the awarding of major projects,  
in sectors such as power, telecommunication, oil and gas, and major  
infrastructure. Procurement guidelines must not exist only on paper  
but must be respected and effectively implemented by all those who  
are to apply them. Absence of transparency in taking recent decisions  
regarding petroleum exploration contracts has led to public  
controversy, which could have been avoided.

       The educational sector has rightly been accorded the highest  
priority as a national goal to ensure meaningful change and overall  
progress. The educational system must be rescued from being an arena  
of unhealthy power politics. It is a legitimate expectation of the  
people that educational institutions must be terror-free and the  
armed cadres which had operated there must be demobilised and  
campuses made free from their predatory activities. This is still  
awaited. This particular malaise has undermined the integrity and  
effectiveness of the major public universities and important  
educational institutions. Universities must regain their reputation  
of excellence in academic standards. Not only must the time targets  
for making education available to all be met but the quality of  
education must be raised across the system.

       A fundamental pillar of democracy is the rule of law and  
access to justice. The key element which demands urgent attention at  
every level of governance is the constitutional mandate of equality  
before the law and equal protection of the law. No one can be above  
the law. No one can claim or enjoy impunity if s/he transgresses the  
law. There must not be any party political interference in the  
impartial and effective implementation of the law. The nightmares of  
the past must be buried when powerful “godfathers” could interfere  
with the police in major investigations giving impunity to those  
charged with war crimes, murder, and rape, major corruption and  
extortion at every level. It is time that people are rescued from  
continued persecution of extortion by organised groups. Restoration  
of the rule of law is imperative.

       A systemic change must be brought about in relation to the  
police. The draft of a new Police Act has been put on the shelf. The  
nineteenth century Police Act and the mindset on which it was based  
require to be replaced by a system where the police is seen as the  
protector of the rights of citizens and the community where they are  
posted. The feudal order, where the powerful could terrorise and  
practice extortion on a scale that reduced ordinary citizens to a  
kind of serfdom, must become history. It cannot be allowed to  
continue in the twentyfirst century.

¨

Given the terrible eruption of brutal violence in the BDR  
headquarters last February, urgent action is needed against those  
responsible, through effective investigation and expeditious trial.  
Not only is this required by the dictates of justice, but is  
imperative in the interest of national security. It must, therefore,  
be given the highest priority. It is part of the basic structure of  
our Constitution that coercive use of armed force, vested in the  
defence services, is regulated by law. There is thus no room for any  
private militias and/or armed cadres. The internal security forces  
and the police are required effectively to be regulated by law. It is  
imperative that the professionalism and neutrality of the defence  
services, entrusted with national security, are not interfered with  
for any party political considerations. Appointment, promotion and  
advancement should be strictly on the basis of merit, keeping in view  
that the highest professional standards are to be aimed for. The best  
international practice should be incorporated in their Manuals, if  
this has not already been done, since our defence services are now  
internationally respected for their significant role in the United  
Nations Peace Keeping Forces.

       There is an urgent need for the state-owned electronic media— 
radio and television—to become an autonomous institution for  
dissemination of information. People do not want to see the state- 
owned media become a government public relations agency, a relic of  
the past. The voices of people must be heard over BTV and state-owned  
radio. An Independent Broadcasting Trust, led by trustees who enjoy  
public confidence and respect, could significantly contribute to the  
process of change. The muted voices of the silent majority could then  
be heard throughout the country so that these can reach their public  
representatives and expect them respond to their needs and priorities.

       The pledges made in the Constitution, need to be strongly  
reaffirmed in the goals set by the government, because it has been  
given a generous mandate. A great deal of time has been lost. The  
time-worn alibi for delay and inaction, namely, “you can’t have  
change overnight”, therefore, cannot be invoked. If the strategic  
goals set for 2021 are to succeed, meaningful change has to be made— 
in our institutions and our political behaviour. The magnitude of the  
challenge that lies ahead has been focused in a recent DFID study, thus:

It is predicted that the population (of Bangladesh) by 2030 will be  
nearly 200 million with 40 per cent under the age of 15. An  
additional 6-8 per cent of Bangladesh will be permanently under  
water; flood-prone areas will increase (from 25 per cent to 40 per  
cent of the country by 2050). Three-quarters of the Himalayan  
glaciers may have vanished with disastrous consequences for areas  
dependent on the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers. Environmental  
refugees from rural areas will be flocking to the cities where flood  
defences will be concentrated and over 80 million people will live in  
urban slums; Dhaka will be one of the world’s largest cities with 30  
million people. In rural areas, this urban migration could mean that  
the countryside is abandoned to the elderly, women-headed households  
and the very poorest of the poor. Arsenic could remain a massive  
health threat, reducing crop productivity and contributing to food  
shortages.

       Time-targeted goals are called for. There are indeed goals  
which will require five, 10, or 15 years. The announced 2021 plan  
itself recognises that it will be implemented in successive stages,  
but the process must commence NOW. The past has to be put behind us:  
the insensitivity, the inertia, the failure to take timely decisions,  
the lack of coordination as powerful groups fought over the spoils,  
while people suffered and the nation’s progress was impeded. The  
need to work together applies to all without exception. Barriers to  
change have been identified which need to be overcome. These are the  
dysfunctional institutions, a run-down educational system and a  
social environment afflicted by violence and terrorism, and major  
deficiencies in infrastructure.

Dr Kamal Hossain, a prominent public figure in Bangladesh, is a  
former Foreign Minister of that country.

o o o

ASK STRONGLY PROTESTS AND CONDEMNS THE HOME MINISTER’S COMMENT ON  
CROSSFIRE IN THE ORIENTATION PROGRAM OF MILESTONE COLLEGE.

We learned from the newspaper reports that the Home Minister has said  
in her response to queries by the press- “There is no such thing  
called crossfire. When the terrorists attack the police, they use  
counter fire to protect themselves.” We heard many times her and  
other ministers of giving such type of statements. But by analyzing  
the documents and evidences and using the common sense, people find  
it difficult to believe in the same statement that when the well  
equipped elite force goes for arms recovery with a captive who is  
handcuffed, his gang mates attack the elite force, the captive makes  
an endeavor to escape and gets killed consequently by the fire of the  
elite force but none of his companion is arrested or receives bullet.  
This type of statement has lost all kinds of credibility in the eyes  
of people.

When the public personalities like the Home Minister and others try  
to establish this doubtful statement as the truth, then this sets up  
a disgraceful example and encourages the law enforcement agencies of  
engaging in such wrong doing. So far we were told that in such  
incidents it is only the so-called terrorists who fire, but at least  
now the Home Minister confessed that shots are fined by the law  
enforcement agencies.

We said it repeatedly that the practice of extra judicial killings is  
not supportive of establishing rule of law or unacceptable in  
democratic culture. In addition to this we would like to say that the  
practice of establishing this type of false statements by the elected  
representatives may result in worsening of the law and order  
situation. The Home Minister said that the government always takes  
initiatives to investigate such incidents. We demand to make the  
details of such investigation public so that people can believe that  
their elected representatives are telling them the truth.

December 27, 2009
Ain o Salish Kendra (ASK)

o o o

GOVT 'UNWILLING TO STOP' EXTRA JUDICIAL KILLINGS
http://bdnews24.com/details.php?id=150013&cid=2


_____


[3] Pakistan:

A CITY MOURNS

Editorial, The News, December 31, 2009

Life in Karachi has slowly been moving back to something resembling  
normal following the Ashura Day suicide attack. The toll from that  
incident is now up to 43. The toll taken on business, and on other  
aspects of life, is still unfolding. For months Karachi had been able  
to stay safe from the deadly terrorist incidents ravaging the rest of  
the country. It has now found itself pulled into the very centre of  
that whirlpool of violence. The losses in terms of human life are  
known. In terms of business the costs are still being calculated. It  
is estimated that the fires which ravaged markets have claimed at  
least 10,000 jobs and caused losses worth Rs30 billion. The  
shopkeepers devastated by the incident hope to gain some  
compensation. The KCCI is assisting them. But the fact is that not  
all the jobs lost will be restored and others, such as transporters  
and labourers who made a living by working at the wholesale market,  
will suffer too. The interior minister has said an inquiry has been  
initiated into why the fire began and how it took hold so rapidly.  
The suspicion being strong that the fire was premeditated.

The spectre of terrorism in Karachi is an especially menacing one. As  
the hub of business and commerce in the country, unrest here has an  
impact on virtually every other town and city. Disrupted transport  
heading out from Karachi affected the entire southern Punjab on  
Tuesday. There is also the issue of confidence in Pakistan. If  
businessmen and foreign investors fear instability in Karachi, this  
inevitably means a loss in faith and a consequent economic downslide.  
We can simply not afford this at the present time given that re- 
building a sound economy remains a primary priority. Efforts to keep  
Karachi safe from terrorism must be stepped up. The prospect of  
further attacks in the country's largest city is horrendous. We must  
do everything possible to avoid it and thus prevent a further descent  
into mayhem.

o o o

Inter Press Service, 26 December 2009

Q&A:  LAW AND ORDER MAY NOT IMPROVE IN 2010
Ashfaq Yusufzai interviews Rukhshanda Naz, women's activist*

Peshawar, Dec 26 (IPS) - For women in Pakistan’s North Western  
Frontier Province (NWFP), 2009 has been particularly hard.

In an effort to woo the Taliban in the Swat Valley, the provincial  
government imposed the Shariah or Islamic Law – a move that far from  
restoring peace, sparked a full-scale military operation and led to  
the displacement of thousands of civilians.

Civil society groups struggled to cope with the massive influx of  
internally displaced people’s (IDPs).

IPS interviewed Rukhshanda Naz of Aurat Foundation, an NGO which has  
experience of women’s vulnerabilities in war and conflict areas. A  
lawyer by training she has worked for the betterment of women in the  
NWFP since 1993.

Excerpts from the interview:

Q: The government says it has wrested control of many of the areas  
that were earlier under the Taliban factions?

A: They can claim for few areas but the culture developed due to  
Talibanisation and government policies (remain) … People need time  
to recover and trust them (government).

Q: The year started with the imposition of the Shariah in the former  
Malakand division. What is the situation now for women?

A: I don't think there is much difference except less fear of the  
Taliban. Trauma (is widespread); feeling of humiliation during  
displacement has been very high.

Q: Was it men or women who suffered more in the violence unleashed by  
Taliban militants and the military operations that uprooted nearly 2  
million people?

A: I just want to respond through oral (testimonies) which I  
collected with my team.

"About two years ago at 8'o clock in the night the people in our  
house were busy talking with each other after dinner, when suddenly  
15 to 20 Shiite men entered our house.

"At first they grabbed my brother-in-law and slaughtered him in front  
of our eyes. After that they forced my 15 year-old-son Muhammad out  
of the house and into the fields and slaughtered him there. I can  
still here his shouting in my ears.

"Due to fear my body stopped working but I kept my will and together  
with my three daughters, two grandsons and one daughter-in-law I ran  
away.

A woman from Parachinar Kurram agency (part of FATA) testified that  
the Shiite Taliban kidnap women and then rape them. They do this  
because they believe that by having sexual intercourse with Sunni  
women they will go to heaven. They didn't even spare the older women …

A third testimony: "I am happy with the birth of my seven daughters.  
But I am worried because of poverty. One of my daughters has lost her  
shoes. Due to my poor financial condition I can't get her a new one.  
And since then she has been roaming around without them.

A woman from Bajaur: "One day in our village there was a woman who  
was carrying a chicken in her arms. While she was walking on the  
road, suddenly a Taliban car stopped next to her and made her sit in  
the car and asked her to give them the chicken in return for some  
meat which she can cook for herself.

"Because of fear the woman handed over the chicken to them and took  
the meat. When she back to her house and saw the meat it turned out  
to be some woman’s breasts!"

Q: What did displacement do to women?

A: The women of these areas due to cultural norms lived in the  
privacy of their homes. But the sudden push into the public space and  
their forced interaction with other people (has) contributed to high  
levels of mental insecurity.

Q: Peace is essential for the authorities and civil society to  
achieve development goals like gender equality and women's  
empowerment. What has civil society's response to the crisis been?

A: There are number of initiative by civil society. The government  
handled the flood of IDPs due to support from civil society. They not  
only responded quickly to the immediate need of rehabilitation, but  
also raised a number of issues through advocacy programmes.

Q: Like the targeting of schools, and schoolteachers, was there a  
targeting of NGO volunteers or workers by either side?

A: There are cases where NGO workers were killed, kidnapped. In some  
cases families took advantage of terrorism and religious militancy to  
settle family disputes and honour killing cases.

Q: It must require courage to stand up for democratic rights and issues.

A: It's not difficult; (you) just need commitment and belief. If you  
are answerable to yourself it's easier. I never get disheartened  
which always gives me strength and hope.

Q: Do you see the law and order situation improving in 2010?

A: I don't think so but I have one hope – (there will be growing)  
people's resistance and struggle for rights and peace.

Q: Do you think government programmes and NGO activities will resume  
and benefit people?

A: Yes to some extent but both need (to show) more commitment, will  
and (the flexibility to) change strategy.

*with assistance from IPS's Gender Editor Ann Ninan (END/2009)

o o o

Dawn
2 Jan, 2010

DRAGON’S TEETH
by Irfan Husain

IN the ancient Greek myth, when Jason and the Argonauts are on their  
quest to find the golden fleece, one of the more terrifying dangers  
they face comes from the ‘dragon’s teeth’.

These objects, when planted in the ground, cause fierce warriors  
called spertoi to spring forth.

I was reminded of this bit of Greek mythology as I was reading Imtiaz  
Gul’s extremely well-researched book The Al Qaeda Connection. The  
author meticulously lists all the various extremist outfits that kill  
under the banner of the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), as well as  
other equally lethal groups who slaughter the innocent in the name of  
Islam. He also gives us thumbnail sketches of various warlords who  
run these gangs.

Ploughing through these details, I wondered how this hydra-headed  
monster — to bring in another Greek legend — could ever be laid to  
rest. The reality is that as soon as one of these killers is  
eliminated, more spring forward to replace them. After Baitullah  
Mehsud, the vicious leader of the TTP, was finally killed in a drone  
attack, many Pakistanis breathed a sigh of relief. But almost  
immediately, Hakeemullah Mehsud took over, and has been directing a  
ferocious and unending series of suicide attacks across the country.

The latest atrocity on Ashura in Karachi that killed a number of Shia  
mourners shows that it is impossible to stop such attacks aimed at  
soft targets. A procession of tens of thousands, passing through  
miles of densely populated city blocks, simply cannot be safeguarded  
against determined suicide bombers.

The TTP was quick to claim responsibility for the Karachi attack, as  
it has done for a number of others. The question of who is funding  
these killers remains a mystery, although Imtiaz Gul has tried to  
unravel it in his book. While Saudi funding of extremist groups like  
the virulently anti-Shia SSP was an open secret, apparently direct  
government financing from Riyadh ceased after 9/11. However, Gul  
cites anecdotal evidence to suggest that this money has not  
completely dried up.

In one example, he follows the indoctrination of a young would-be  
suicide bomber called Mansoor Khan Dawar of Hurmaz, a small village  
in North Waziristan. Gul quotes Dawar talking of his training under  
Abu Nasir al-Qahtani:

“When I met al-Qahtani, he soon impressed me by his thoughts on  
Islam and America and I decided to become a suicide bomber.… I  
completed my training in the mountains in 20 days. Most of the time  
we were either training or praying, and the speeches by al-Qahtani  
were very emotional and motivating. Our instructors would show videos  
of atrocities on Muslims, and also teach us verses of the Holy Quran  
and hadiths against the infidels.…”

Allowed to visit his parents before his final mission, Dawar was  
engaged by his father, mercifully an educated man, on the jihad being  
waged by the extremists. He asked his son why these militants didn’t  
target Arabs, and whether suicide bombing was in line with the  
Islamic Sharia. Finally, Dawar’s father said he would not block his  
son’s suicidal path if he received satisfactory replies to these  
questions from his mentors.

Dawar posed these questions to a local teacher who passed them on to  
al-Qahtani over the phone. As cited by Gul, the Arab replied: “We  
receive funds from Arab countries, therefore we cannot carry out any  
attack there, and if we commit any wrong there, they will stop supply  
of funds to us. But jihad in Pakistan and Afghanistan is lawful and  
even the Saudis believe so.”

Disturbed by these self-serving replies, Dawar managed to escape the  
clutches of these extremists through an agreement brokered by the  
local teacher. But he is an exception: the vast majority believe that  
they will achieve instant entry into heaven populated by beautiful  
virgins. According to one gullible bomber who failed in his mission  
and was captured alive, his mentor had told him that pulling the  
trigger on his suicide vest was like punching the button that would  
ignite the rocket that would carry him straight to paradise.

When Pakistani troops captured a TTP stronghold in South Waziristan  
recently, they came across a wall with paintings of scenes from  
heaven; one panel bore images of nude women. It seems these images  
were used in the brainwashing of impressionable, madressah-educated  
young men.

In an interesting section about the sources of funding this war, Gul  
cites a number of Pakistan government initiatives aimed at developing  
Fata. Apparently, warlords have received millions of rupees by way of  
diverted public funds. In addition, the late Baitullah Mehsud was  
given Rs50m to release 280 soldiers captured by him in August 2007.  
It seems that much of the money provided by taxpayers to develop the  
tribal areas is being used to slaughter the same Pakistani citizens.

The ISI connection to these killers has long attracted speculation  
and universal criticism. But Gul quotes both Gen Kayani who headed  
the ISI for some time during Musharraf’s rule, and Gen Pasha, the  
present head of the agency, as stoutly denying any ISI involvement.  
He cites Gen Pasha as declaring: “We would obviously like to fix  
these rogues. They are killing our own people, and are certainly not  
friends of this country.”

For many years, the Pakistani establishment has drawn a line between  
the ‘good Taliban’ and the bad guys. The former are the ones who  
are battling western forces in Afghanistan, while the latter are the  
terrorists who have killed and maimed thousands of Pakistanis. But to  
the rest of the world, this distinction is meaningless: they are all  
seen as murderous extremists who are waging jihad to impose their  
Stone-Age values and rules on the rest of us.

For all the talk of negotiations and deals, the fact is that these  
hardened killers want nothing short of a total victory. They have  
always used talks as a means of gaining respite, and used the time to  
rearm and regroup.

But this article is not a message of despair. These extremists can be  
defeated, provided we are willing to take the tough political  
decisions needed. These include a thorough reform of the madressahs  
that churn out the foot soldiers and the suicide bombers. Thus far,  
both Musharraf and Asif Zardari have failed to take the bull by the  
horns. Until this is done, the dragon’s teeth sown by Gen Zia will  
keep on multiplying.

_____


[4]  INDIA PAKISTAN CONFERENCE – A ROAD MAP TOWARDS PEACE (New  
Delhi, 10 - 12 January, 2010)

Dear Friends,

A number of organizations in India have got together with eminent  
people to organize an India-Pakistan Conference: A Road Map towards  
Peace at India International Center (IIC) on 10-12 January 2010. We  
would like to invite you to participate in the conference.
Both India and Pakistan have, for the last 62 years, seen many ups  
and downs in bilateral relations and talks. But the current phase of  
composite dialogue was significant. Four rounds had been completed,  
and the 5th round was in progress. The November attacks on Mumbai  
completely hijacked this scenario and brought the relationship  
between the two countries to breakdown point. This was further  
intensified by the war hysteria whipped up by the religious right  
wing in both the countries.
Ever since the Indian Government announced a pause on the dialogue  
following the 26/11 attacks, people in both countries who are  
desirous of peace, have been trying to convince their respective  
governments to make serious attempts to restart the dialogue. The  
dialogue is important because it helps us sort out our problems  
peacefully.
This conference is being organized to mobilize the peace activists  
and peace groups from India and Pakistan and influence both the  
governments to resume peace process. We hope that you will make it  
convenient to attend. Activists coming from outside Delhi should get  
in touch with Sonila on sonila(at)focusweb.org  Accomodation  
arrangements can be done on first come first base. There are no  
registration charges.

India Pakistan Conference – A Road map towards Peace

India International Centre, New Delhi

10th - 12th January, 2010

10th January 09.00 – 10.00 Registration

10:00 – 10.30 Welcome & Inaugural
I.	K. Gujral (Former Prime Minister of India) & Kuldip Nayar  
(Chairperson, Organizing Committee & Veteran Journalist) 10.30 –  
1145 A Road map towards Peace

11.45 – 12.30 Mani Shankar Aiyar (Former Union Minister)
Sherry Rehman (Former minister for Information & Broadcasting, Member  
of National Assembly, Pakistan; Pakistan Peoples’ Party)
Admiral L Ramdas (Former Navy Chief, India)
Mehbooba Mufti (President – People’s Democratic Party)
Chair: Seema Mustafa (Senior Journalist)
Questions, Comments, Discussions

12.30 –13.30 Lunch
13.30 – 15.00 Peace and Security in South Asia
15.00	– 16.00 Kamal Chenoy (Prof. of International Relations, JNU)

Salman Haider (Former Foreign Secretary, India)
Iqbal Haider (Former law minister, Pakistan)
Chair: A H Nayar (Physicist & peace activist, Islamabad)
Questions, Comments, Discussions
16.00	– 16.30

18.00 – 20.00
Tea

Book release “Bridging Partition: People’s initiatives for peace  
between India and Pakistan”
Edited by Smitu Kothari, Zia Mian, Kamla Bhasin, A.H. Nayar and  
Mohd.Tahseen at India Islamic Cultural Center

11th January 09.30 – 11.45 Issue of Autonomy: Kashmir and Balochistan
11.45- 12.30 Asma Jehangir (Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, UN  
special rapporteur on freedom of religion & belief)
Siraj Malik Akbar (Senior Journalist, Quetta, Pakistan)
Yasin Malik (Leader JKLF)
Sajjad Lone (President, Peoples Conference, Srinagar)
Bizenjo Hasil Khan, (Senator, Balochistan)
Chair: Rajendra Sacchar (Chief Justice (R) of Delhi High Court & PUCL)
Questions, Comments, Discussions

12.30 –13.30 Lunch

13.30 – 14.30 Climate Change and its impact on Indo-Pak Relations
14.30-15.00
Abid Suleri (SDPI)
Vandana Shiva (Navdanya)
Farooq Tariq (Spokesperson, Pakistan Labour Party)
Chair : Lalita Ramdas (Peace activist and Green Peace)
Questions, Comments, Discussions

15.00 – 16.15 Trade as an instrument of peace

16.15-17.00
Muchkund Dubey (Former Foreign Secretary, India)
Akbar Zaidi (Leading Pakistani Economist)
Punjab Chamber of Commerce
Chair: Dr. Biswajit Dhar (RIS)
Questions, Comments, Discussions
17.00Tea 12th January 09.30 – 11.30 Militancy, joint mechanism and  
role of the US
11.30-12.30 Aijaz Ahmad (Left intellectual, India)
Ayesha Siddiqua (Defense expert, Pakistan)
Chair : I.A. Rehman (Human Rights Commission of Pakistan)

Questions, Comments, Discussions
12.30-13.30 Lunch 13.30 – 15.30 Media & Culture in War and Peace
14.45-15.30 B Murlidhar Reddy (Journalist with The Hindu was in  
Pakistan for 3 years & now in Sri Lanka)
Liaqat Ali Toor (Journalist with Associated Press of Pakistan & now  
in Delhi)
Kuldip Nayar (Veteran Journalist)
Mahesh Bhatt (Film Maker)
Madeeha Gauhar (Theatre Director and Women Rights’ Activist)
Chair: Ved Bhasin (editor, Daily Kashmir Times)

15.30 – 17.00 Declaration & plan of action Chair : Kamla Bhasin  
(Peace, Human & Women Rights activist)

Organisations :
ANHAD, Centre for Policy Analysis, COVA, Focus on the Global South,  
India;
HBF, Hind-Pak Dosti Manch, Peace Mumbai, PIPFPD, SAHR, SANGAT, SAPA  
and various other organizations.


o o o

BRIDGING PARTITION
People's Initiatives For Peace Between India And Pakistan

edited by Smitu Kothari and Zia Mian

with Kamla Bhasin, A H Nayyar and Mohammad Tahseen

and essays by Shehryar Ahmad, Karamat Ali, Sumanta Banerjee, Kamla  
Bhasin, Nirupama Dutt, Madeeha Gauhar, Mubashir Hasan, Pervez  
Hoodboy, Asma Jehangir, Sheema Kirmani, Sanat Mohanty, Kuldip Nayar,  
Sandeep Pandey, Narendra Panjwani, Anand Patwardhan, Balraj Puri,  
Laxminarayan Ramdas, Lalita Ramdas, I A Rehman, Beena Sarwar, Jamila  
Verghese, Achin Vanaik

Over the past three decades, in the shadow of hostile nationalisms  
fuelled by radical Islamic and Hindu politics, military crises, a  
runaway arms race, nuclear weapons and war, an amazing set of civil  
society initiatives has been taking root in India and Pakistan. A  
citizens diplomacy movement embracing thousands of activists,  
scholars, business people and retired government officials has  
emerged in an unprecedented effort to build national and cross-border  
networks for peace and cooperation between the two countries.

In these essays, leading scholars, activists and writers from India  
and Pakistan reflect on the political and personal impact of crossing  
the border, and explore the possibilities and limits of this new  
movement in its quest to chart a path to peace between the two  
countries.

cover design Bindia Thapar
cover art 60 Years of India Pakistan by K. B. Abro

Published by Orient BlackSwan India
www.orientblackswan.com

_____

[5] Kashmir:

Kashmir Times, 24 December 2009

EDITORIAL: REDUCTION OF TROOPS: J&K CONTINUES TO BE HEAVILY  
MILITARISED STATE

Even though the union defence minister A K Antony has announced the  
withdrawal of 30,000 troops and the issue has become a matter of  
politicking for various parties from New Delhi to the troubled Jammu  
and Kashmir, there is still no clarity about whether there indeed is  
even a marginal withdrawal of forces from the state. The army  
officers in the Northern Command have outrightly rejected these  
claims and maintained that any movement is only a part of routine  
relocation from one place to another. Reports have suggested that  
this relocation has happened over a period of months. It is, however,  
not known whether the troops relocated from specific areas have been  
replaced by fresh troops of the army or other security forces.  
Whatever be the case, the position on the ground does not reveal any  
change or relaxation. If indeed 30,000 troops have moved out from the  
heavily militarised state, the fact that despite shifting out such  
huge number of army personnel every part of the state continues to be  
as militarised as before only goes to prove how disproportionately  
large the presence of troops in Jammu and Kashmir is, impacting the  
social, economic and political fabric of the state. The fresh  
controversy about whether the troops have been moved out or not stems  
from a lack of transparency about the exact number of troops  
operating in Jammu and Kashmir.

Whether or not there has been a constant rise in the number of para- 
military forces in the state in the last couple of years, the grim  
reality of increasing cantonments, bunkers and camps of the security  
forces, many of them virtually extending into villages and even  
people's homes, betrays a persistent policy to militarise areas and  
not de-congest them. Without bringing authentic facts on the table,  
the government has always been in absolute denial of the acute  
militarisation of the state. Yet, the signs are all too evident.  
Jammu and Kashmir, which is not the only border state in the country,  
is heavily burdened by the presence of defence forces, BSF, CRPF and  
other para-military forces and multiplying the local police  
battalions, besides arming the SPOs and VDCs. Additionally all the  
central forces enjoy unlimited powers and unlimited impunity due to  
prevalence of draconian laws and the police force too enjoys extra- 
constitutional powers, all in the name of security. This is a paradox  
in the face of the fact that even as per government own admission, as  
well as the statements of various security agencies, there is a  
substantial decline in militancy related violence in Jammu and  
Kashmir. All these are signs of militarisation that is so badly  
impacting the life of the civilians, denying a healthy democratic  
space and the much needed civil liberties which stand threatened with  
so many men in uniform virtually breathing down the necks of the  
people, especially in the rural areas.
A natural follow up of the decline in militants and militancy related  
violence should have been a reduction in the presence of troops and  
curbing the unlimited powers given to the men in uniform. Even a  
proposed peace process and engagement with the separatists should  
have been preceded by a move to demilitarise the state. This could  
have been one of the major confidence building measures besides  
addressing the human rights issue and imperative for greater  
inclusion of people. Instead, the powers of the security forces and  
the police have been strengthened to the extent that the forces have  
become the unquestioned holy cows with no accountability for their  
acts of omission and commission. Jammu and Kashmir today is one of  
the most militarised zones in the world and this cannot either be  
denied or solely attributed to the fact that this is a border state.  
This state alone does not share its troublesome borders with  
Pakistan. There are several other states that do. Besides, the forces  
do not simply man the borders, they are present in every nook and  
corner of the state, the ratio working out to one armed man in  
uniform for every twenty five persons. Such a scenario can be a major  
stumbling block in the peace process. If security scenario has  
improved, there is no reason why a phased withdrawal of forces should  
not begin. And if security is still quoted to be the pretext, there  
are several areas in the country which intelligence reports warn are  
under severe threat of terror attacks. Then going by this plea, many  
parts of rest of the country including the metropolitan cities too  
should have been militarised. If the security agencies can manage to  
thwart security threats with minimal security apparatus in these  
cities, then why should Jammu and Kashmir be treated any differently?

o o o

SOUTH ASIAN AGENDA FOR JAMMU & KASHMIR

by Madanjeet Singh

The communal fanatics will not give up unless they are reduced to  
nonentities in a secular configuration of South Asia’s unity in  
diversity, as in the European Union.

The separatists’ bullet that killed the moderate Hurriyat leader,  
Fazl Haque Qureshi, also wounded Home Minister Chidambaram’s  
“quiet diplomacy” for settling the Kashmir problem by making the  
Line of Control between India and Pakistan “just lines on a map,”  
as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in Srinagar on March 24, 2006.  
The doubts about the government’s credibility aired by the Qureshi  
assassins was disproved by the withdrawal of two Army divisions  
(about 30,000 troops) from Jammu and Kashmir over the last year and  
there are plans to pull back more troops if the law and order  
situation continues to improve, according to a statement made by  
Defence Minister A.K. Antony on December 18, 2009 (The Hindu,  
December 19, 2009).

A.G. Noorani’s article, “Agenda for Kashmir” (Frontline,  
December 18, 2009), lays out the four main points on which an India- 
Pakistan consensus seems to exist. They are self-governance or self- 
rule for both the Indian and Pakistani parts of the State — “real  
empowerment of the people,” as the Prime Minister stated on February  
25, 2006; making the LoC an open border for trade and commerce; a  
joint management mechanism for both parts; and demilitarisation. Mr.  
Noorani has proposed a draft for a new Article 370 of the  
Constitution that is in step with the fifth Working Group’s  
recommendations to let the people of Jammu & Kashmir decide on  
Article 370.

The “Agenda for Kashmir” is on the same wave length as my article  
published in The Times of India (March 6, 1999) — about which I was  
unaware until journalist N. Ram, whom I met for the first time in  
Khajuraho, informed me as we were going to attend the millennium  
celebration of the ancient Hindu temples, inaugurated by President K.  
R. Narayanan. Evidently the current Editor-in-Chief of The Hindu was  
in accord with what I had written, for he had heavily underlined most  
of the text, as I discovered from a copy of the newspaper slipped  
under the door of my hotel room. “Should common sense prevail,” I  
wrote in that piece, “the first step is obviously to solve the  
problem of Kashmir, which is difficult but not impossible if leaders  
on both sides realise the enormous human and material resources they  
would be saving for the economic benefit of their people by formally  
stabilising the present ‘line of control’ in Kashmir agreed upon  
in 1972.” I further pointed out that now that both India and  
Pakistan had openly become nuclear weapon powers, neither country  
could further its own interests in Kashmir by force of arms.

[. . .]
http://www.hindu.com/2009/12/29/stories/2009122955860800.htm


o o o

SAFE HAVEN FOR WOMEN BEATEN AND ABUSED IN KASHMIR

For the past two decades, domestic violence has been a low priority  
in one of India's most troubled regions. But a bold initiative is now  
addressing the issue – bringing Hindus and Muslims together, reports  
Andy Buncombe
http://tinyurl.com/yddfdw3

_____


[6] India:

A DANGEROUS MOVE: AMENDING THE RIGHT TO INFORMATION ACT WOULD BE A  
RETROGRADE STEP

by Aruna Roy

BEFORE ANY debate starts, we must remind ourselves that India has a  
tendency of corruption. India, though a democracy, has a history of  
reported corruption cases. While the Chief Justice of India, KG  
Balakrishnan, has demanded that PM Manmohan Singh amend the RTI Act  
to ‘protect’ the judiciary from ‘intrusive’ queries, what  
needs to be kept in mind is that the proposed amendments will totally  
defeat the purpose of an RTI Act.

The proposed amendments include introducing an exemption for so- 
called ‘vexatious and frivolous’ applications, and excluding from  
the purview of the RTI Act access to ‘file notings’ and decision- 
making processes, this time by excluding ‘discussions or  
consultations that take place before arriving at a decision’. Two  
contemporary nation-wide studies, one done under the aegis of the  
Government of India and the other by people’s organisations (RTI  
Assessment and Accountability Group and the National Campaign for  
People’s Right to Information), have both concluded that the main  
constraints faced by the government in providing information are  
inadequate implementation, the lack of training for staff and poor  
record management. They have also identified the lack of awareness  
and harassment of the applicants as two major constraints that  
prevent citizens from exercising their right to information. Despite  
interviewing thousands of Public Information Officers, neither study  
concluded that frivolous or vexatious applications were frequent  
enough to pose a threat to governance or to the RTI regime in general.

It is strongly believed that it is impossible to come up with  
definitions of ‘vexatious’ and ‘frivolous’ that are not  
completely subjective and, consequently, prone to rampant misuse by  
officials. Would it be fair to judge a decision (or the decision  
maker) without knowing why such a decision was taken and what facts  
and arguments were advanced in its favour and what against? Can one  
hold a government (or an official) accountable, on the basis of what  
they did or did not do without knowing the reasons for their action  
or inaction? Moreover, it’s too early to propose changes to an Act  
which hasn’t even been fully implemented. Section 4, which states  
that all public authorities are supposed to duly catalogue, index and  
publish their records, is yet to be implemented.
The government must initiate public debate to strengthen the Act,  
rather than amending it

We, the people of India, already directly or indirectly know the  
decisions of the government, for we are the ones who bear the  
consequences. What the RTI Act facilitated was a right to know who  
took those decisions and the reasons why the decisions were taken.  
Our right to information is part of the bedrock of democracy. It  
cannot be separated or diluted without denying us our fundamental  
rights.

It is significant that even among Information Commissioners from  
across India, whom the government recently “consulted”, the  
overwhelming consensus was against any amendment to the RTI Act at  
this stage.

The government, therefore, should abandon this ill-advised push to  
amend the Act. Instead, it should initiate a public debate on the  
problems that it might be facing in implementing the Act. It is only  
through such a public debate that a lasting and credible way can be  
found to strengthen the RTI regime.

At a time when there is a popular consensus to strengthen it through  
rules and better implementation, an amendment in the Act would be an  
obviously retrograde step. The fear is that political pressures  
influence our PM. A decision on this issue should be taken after  
careful consideration. If the wrong decision is taken, severe  
criticism is bound to follow. We strongly urge that an unequivocal  
decision be taken to refrain from amending the RTI Act.

Roy is a social activist based in Rajasthan
 From Tehelka Magazine, Vol 6, Issue 50, Dated December 19, 2009

o o o

HEART OF DARKNESS
by Dilip Simeon

sacw.net 2 January 2010
http://www.sacw.net/article1314.html

In 2006 I attended a discussion on Naxalism that included a retired  
police officer and a Maoist spokesman. The policeman called for soul- 
searching from the political class, whom he blamed for the rise of  
left-extremism. He defended the Salwa Judum, a force funded by  
corporates and supported by both Congress and BJP, whose atrocities  
are documented and whose existence was questioned by India’s chief  
justice.

The Maoist spokesman denounced the despotism of the Indian state —  
ironic, considering that he was freely espousing violent revolution  
from a public platform. I welcomed the call for introspection and  
asked whether officialdom too did not need to look within? Wasn’t  
Maoist violence symptomatic of something more far-reaching?

I asked whether only Naxalites indulge in lawless behaviour. Isn’t  
there evidence of politicians and policemen enabling massacres in  
1984 and 2002? Thousands were killed by hooligans patronised by  
mainstream parties, but none of the instigators has been punished.  
Doesn’t our establishment regularly protect criminals? Jihadi  
violence is rightly denounced as terrorism, but why are communalists  
of another colour hailed as patriots?

During the Babri Masjid demolition campaign, a retired DGP of Uttar  
Pradesh joined the VHP and called for India’s Muslims to be stripped  
of voting rights. Charged with hatred, this campaign cost the lives  
of some 1500 citizens in 1990 and 3000 in 1992. Some years ago a  
retired director of the CBI exhorted the Bajrang Dal’s  
’patriotic’ activities at its annual function. Senior retired  
functionaries of RAW openly sympathise with the RSS.

Officers in UP and Maharashtra have been promoted despite strictures  
against them by commissions of inquiry. People are entitled to hold  
extreme views, however much we may dislike them. The question is that  
of using one’s formal power to promote lawlessness. It is here that  
every mainstream party carries a burden of guilt.

Conversely, many serving officers paid a price for upholding the  
Constitution. A senior police officer of Gujarat testified about the  
government’s incitement of criminal activities in 2002. He was  
transferred and denied his promotion. Several officers in Gujarat  
were transferred for curbing communal rioters. If Maoism is a  
challenge to Indian security; how may we describe the elite’s own  
brand of extremism?

In a recently televised discussion, P Chidambaram was asked about  
land acquisition. (A report by the rural development ministry has  
referred to corporate activities in mineral-rich regions as "the  
biggest grab of tribal lands since Columbus.") Dodging the question,  
Chidambaram discussed the benefits of modernity. He did not address  
Schedule 5, that protects tribal land from appropriation; nor its  
systematic violation. The devastation of scheduled areas shows that  
the question is not of ’development’, but development of what kind  
and at whose cost.

On November 20, two Adivasis were killed by the Orissa police in  
Koraput district. They had joined a demonstration by the Chasi Mulia  
Adivasi Sangha against atrocities committed during combing  
operations. Tribals speak of beatings, abuse and confiscation of  
agricultural implements. Meanwhile a satyagraha march protesting the  
reign of terror in Chhattisgarh has been prevented from reaching  
Dantewada. Gandhian activists are assaulted by the police for  
refusing to co-operate with the Salwa Judum. Does the law of the land  
not apply to Chhattisgarh? If the Union can assist the states fight  
insurgency, must it not also safeguard constitutional freedoms?

For their part, Maoists speak of the ongoing war against India’s  
people. But war is the central motif of their politics. Having  
launched "peoples’ war" 42 years ago, they now want the support of  
democratic opinion. Can assassination be a democratic right? The  
Maoist programme works in tandem with the communalists and corporates  
to further erode human rights. It is not capitalists but the poor who  
pay the price. After the Maoists assassinated a VHP Swami in  
Kandhamal in August 2008, the Sangh Parivar assaulted Christian  
villagers, resulting in massive displacements and deaths. The  
comrades left the people to their fate. Collateral damage yet again.

In November 1947 the AICC warned that "the activities of the Muslim  
National Guards, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the Akali  
Volunteers and such other organisations… represent an endeavour to  
bring into being private armies, (and) must be regarded as a menace  
to the hard-won freedom of the country." The proliferation of private  
armies in India over the decades proves the foresight of this  
warning. "Once crime was as solitary as a cry of protest"; said  
Albert Camus; "now it is as universal as science. Yesterday it was  
put on trial; today it determines the law." Sadly, some citizens  
sympathise with criminality. This is the dilemma of our country and  
our time.

The author is a Delhi-based academic

o o o

The Guardian, 27 December 2009

RAPE, BLAME AND THE TOURISM GAME

In Goa, a local politician has implied rape victims are to blame for  
assaults, exploiting concern about the impact of tourism

by Eric Randolph

When I was talking to a well-established journalist friend in Mumbai  
the other day, he ran through what stories one might expect from  
different regions in India. Mumbai was good for business stories;  
Delhi for political and military goings-on; the northeast for  
insurgencies and corruption. As for Goa, there were rape stories  
and ... he paused ... "No, that's it. Goa is rape stories."

Despite the air of facetiousness, he was not joking, and the Goan  
government is acutely aware of this emerging image crisis. There is  
the unresolved murder of UK schoolgirl Scarlett Keeling in February  
2008, the alleged rape of a 14-year-old German girl in October 2008,  
and in the last month the claims by a 25-year-old Russian woman that  
she was raped by a well-known politician.

For a state so dependent on tourism, these stories are bad for  
business. Earlier this month, the state tourism minister voiced his  
fears that Goa may soon "gain a reputation as the rape capital of  
India", with a police force that is "either grossly incompetent or  
influenced by other factors".

Of course, three incidents do not create a "rape capital" in a  
country that records more than 20,000 rapes a year (only a fraction  
of the real number), but in the tourism game, perceptions are  
everything.

If the minister had hoped his words would stir his fellow officers to  
action, he had not counted on the actions of one Goa politician,  
Shantaram Naik, who stood up before India's upper house in Delhi on  
15 December to declare that cases in which women hang around with  
strangers after midnight "are to be treated on different footings".  
In doing so, Naik triggered an international row, with the Russian  
consulate writing a stinging letter of rebuke to the Indian  
government and threatening a curfew for its citizens in Goa.

Naik's suggestion that the victim is somehow to blame is depressingly  
familiar, the most famous example being the comments by Australia's  
most senior Muslim cleric in 2006 when he compared rape victims to  
"uncovered meat" that young men could not help but sexually assault.  
Such attitudes are embedded in legal systems in Iran, Saudi Arabia  
and elsewhere, where rape victims risk adultery charges if they come  
forward, and at a less conspicuous level the world over as the  
residue of long-established structures of patriarchal domination.

Despite their familiarity, it is always worth deconstructing such  
attitudes afresh. As the philosopher Slavoj Zizek argues in his  
recent book, Violence, such reasoning implies that men are entirely  
helpless in the face of sexual temptation and cannot be blamed for  
their ravenous instincts. Inadvertently, this gives far too much  
credit to western society by suggesting that its open attitudes to  
female eroticism are only made possible by the development of  
hitherto unknown levels of restraint, that western men have somehow  
evolved past the primitive state of males in more conservative  
societies. Otherwise, the nightclubs of Paris and London and New York  
would be home to apocalyptic scenes of endless, unstoppable sexual  
assaults.

In reality, the urge to rape is not some essential characteristic of  
the male ego. The vast majority of cases happen between people who  
already know each other, and are the result of complex dynamics  
within those personal relationships, coloured by embedded, but  
changeable, cultural structures and triggered by individual  
humiliations, insecurities and social pressure. Setting aside cases  
when rape is used as an instrument of war or ethnic cleansing, rape  
tends to be the most intensely personal of crimes.

That subjective core to the act is what permits a manipulation of the  
facts by the accused, and yet there is also a core of the incident –  
the trauma experienced by the victim – that is purely objective. The  
fraught task for the judicial system is to unpick the subjective  
account of the specific circumstances of a case from the objective  
trauma felt by the victim.

That Naik or others feel this highly delicate task can be pre-judged  
by reference to general cultural trends is not just an act of  
ignorance, but one which seeks to render the victim's trauma  
irrelevant. There is a wider evil in Naik's words, however, in his  
willingness to instrumentalise these incidents for his own agenda, to  
transform something intensely private into something political.

The message that seeps in between the lines of his ludicrous comments  
is a mantra increasingly heard from populists across India – one of  
suspicion towards outsiders, of cultures under threat, of the need to  
harden ethnic and linguistic boundaries.

Such messages find particularly fertile ground in times of  
uncertainty. Long an unspoiled hippie paradise, over the last two  
decades Goa has seen large-scale development along its coastline,  
attracting increasing numbers of workers from India's poorer states.  
As with tourist hubs the world over, outside influences breed  
tensions. Amid a global downturn, which has led to half-empty hotels  
in peak season, these tensions rise to the surface in the form of  
groups such as the Movement for a Special Status [*], formed in 2008  
to call for a limit on the number of internal migrants to the state.

Such groups reflect a realisation that tourism has made the state  
vulnerable, fostering corrupt collusion between developers and  
powerbrokers that threatens Goa's natural beauty and risks creating a  
level of supply that tourist demand cannot always meet. Populist  
politicians exploit these uncertainties by giving the impression that  
outside cultures and alien values are somehow damaging Goa's reputation.

It is in this context that the rape of a girl can be transformed into  
the rape of a state. Naik tapped into a vein of concern about Goa's  
future that represented both a heartless disregard for the victims  
and an archetypal political sleight of hand. He was not speaking to  
parliament, still less the international community; he was speaking  
to the constituency back home, but in doing so he gave a platform to  
deeply unhealthy views on sexual assault. Through such naked  
politicking are ignorance and bigotry perpetuated.


[* http://tinyurl.com/ybqdxj4 ]


_____


[7] India: Resources For Secular Activists

(i) NO RELIGION PLEASE, WE'RE LIBERALS
     by Mohammed Wajihuddin (The Times of India, 27 December 2009)

Mumbai: At an airy, spacious flat overlooking a verdant green patch  
in Versova, a three-week-old baby boy sleeps in his little cot. His  
mother

Aditi Shedde, glowing with newly acquired motherhood, is on her toes;  
she flits in and out of the room, asking the ayah to change the  
infant's nappy and cover him in a sanitised towel. The baby is kept  
at arms' length when the flat's expensive marble floor is mopped and  
sofas dusted several times a day.

So what's so different about this new-born who's being cossetted in  
his prosperous home? Well, he has no religion. His Hindu  
Maharashtrian mother and Gujarati Muslim father have decided to leave  
the choice to him when he grows up. By itself, that may not be overly  
unusual; there are very many people who give similar choices to their  
children.

Where Aditi and her husband Aalif Surti differ is that they chose to  
battle an unremitting bureaucracy from the very start and refused to  
fill in the column titled 'Religion' in their child's most basic  
document, the birth certificate.

It wasn't a spur-of-the-moment decision. "A few months into my  
pregnancy, we had decided that we would not give our child any  
religious identity," says Aditi. "We are not against religion, but  
who are we to choose a religion on our baby's behalf? We will expose  
him to the values of different faiths and cultures, and when he grows  
up he will be free to follow any faith—or none if he wishes."

Of course, getting the birth certificate wasn't easy. The first  
hurdle cropped up at the hospital itself—the authorities were  
alarmed when the young parents said they would leave the religion  
column blank in the documents.

Every hospital has to intimate the BMC about new births within 15  
days, on the basis of which the BMC issues birth certificates. "You  
will have to talk to the officer in the BMC," a hospital staff member  
told the couple.
"Since Aditi speaks fluent Marathi, I asked her to patao the  
municipality," says Aalif, creative director with a film production  
and distribution company. Next, Aditi was at the K-ward (Andheri)  
office of the BMC, bracing for the battle ahead.

"Are you ashamed of your Hindu identity? Why don't you want your  
child to be known as a Hindu?" an officer asked her rudely. Aditi  
shot back that while she was proud of her Hindu roots, she was not a  
practising Hindu. "Why in a democratic, secular country can't parents  
take a decision like not giving any religion to their children?" she  
asked the officer.

Unconvinced, the officer cited a more technical problem—birth  
certificates these days are generated via automated machines, which  
reject an application form if any column is left blank. When Aditi  
persisted, she was eventually led to a higher authority. "This  
officer heard me patiently and said he appreciated my feelings, but  
again pointed out the same technical problem. He also said he had  
never received such a request in his career—to which I told him  
there was always a first time," recalls Aditi.

The couple had almost hit a dead end. There were four choices on the  
form—Hindu, Muslim, Christian and Others. Aditi says she did not  
want any of them for her child, as even Others required them to  
identify the sect or community. She argued with the officer some more  
and finally agreed on Others, but without any identification. "Others  
is just to facilitate the generation of the certificate. We know our  
child has no religion," she says.

The couple attributes their decision to their liberal upbringing.  
Aditi grew up in Kuwait, where she had many Muslim classmates and  
even picked up a few verses from the Quran. Aalif, son of Abid Surti— 
a popular writer-cartoonist who counts Osho Rajneesh, Atal Bihari  
Vajpayee and Amitabh Bachchan among his fans—grew up in what was  
then a more cosmopolitan Bandra. Said 75-year-old Abid: "I never  
wanted any particular religious identity for my two sons. I failed to  
get their birth certificates without the mention of religion, but I  
am glad my son and bahu have succeeded in what I failed years ago."

Aalif and Aditi might have crossed the first barrier. But it's just  
the beginning of the several hurdles which are bound to crop up ahead 
—at the time of school admission or securing a passport for the  
child, for instance. "We are prepared for those battles too," says  
Aditi determinedly. Meanwhile, the baby plays in the pram, blissfully  
unaware of the unique identity his parents have secured for him.

(ii)  India: Communal Riots 2009
       by Asghar Ali Engineer
       http://www.sacw.net/article1315.html

(iii) The Hindutva ride
       by K.N. Panikkar
       http://www.flonnet.com/stories/20100115270104200.htm

(iv) National Consultation on Communal Violence Bill (12-13 Feb.  
2010, New Delhi) [By invitation only]
       http://tinyurl.com/ydeekhb

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South Asia Citizens Wire
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.