SACW - 6 April 2012 | Farmland Grab / Distorting secularism / Rangoon goons / Assault on freedom / PMANE report on Kudankulam / Poverty line / Illegal mining / Memoirs Claude Lanzmann / Legal protection for challenging evolution

[Harsh Kapoor]

    South Asia Citizens Wire - 6 April 2012 - No. 2739
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Contents:

1. Sri Lanka: New Farmland Grab (B. Skanthakumar)
2. Pakistan: A case for bipartisanship (I.A Rehman) 
3. Pakistan: [English Urdu Dictionary] Deliberately distorting secularism (Arshad Mahmood)  
4. India: Assault on freedom (Praful Bidwai)
5. India - Assam: Intellectuals decry Govt move against play under pressure from Hindu Far Right
6. Report of The People’s Movement Against Nuclear Energy (PMANE) Expert Committee On Safety, Feasibility And Alternatives To Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KKNPP)
7. Myanmar: Rangoon goons (Bachi Karkaria)
8. India: Victims of Hate and division not broken in spirit (Harsh Mander)
9. India: IIllegal Mining - unabated (Chetan Chauhan)
10. ‘We can’t rid India of the tyranny of the poverty line without a struggle’ (interview with Biraj Patnaik)

Books & Papers:
11. Hindu Mahasabha in Colonial North India, 1915-1930: Constructing Nation and History (Bapu, Prabhu)        
12. Book review: Nothing he hasn’t done, nowhere he hasn’t been (Adam Shatz)

International: 
13. USA: Tennessee bill protects teachers who challenge evolution and climate change (Suzanne Goldenberg)
14. Sex and Sharia: Muslim women punished for failed marriages (Charlotte Rachael Proudman)
15. Announcements:
(i)  Applications are invited for the Tenth Annual Orientation Course on Forced Migration to be held in Kolkata, India (1-15 October 2012).

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1. SRI LANKA: NEW FARMLAND GRAB
by B. Skanthakumar
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http://www.sacw.net/article2623.html

Colombo – 5 April 2012

Sri Lanka’s farmlands are being aggressively marketed as investment opportunities for agro-export agriculture by the island’s foreign missions in the Gulf, and to Gulf-based businesses, including at the recently concluded Sri Lanka Expo 2012 (28-31 March) in Colombo.

The island’s Consul-General in Dubai was quoted recently urging emiratis to acquire land in Sri Lanka to produce food for export to the Gulf: “UAE’s imports of food products have significantly increased over the recent years. Investing in agricultural land will greatly benefit in preventing steep increase in prices and ensuring steady supply.”[1]

While the acquisition of arable lands abroad may be a short-term response to the shortage of land for food production and to the demand for vegetables and fruits which cannot be met through local production in the Gulf states; it spells ruin for farmers and consumers in Sri Lanka: a net-food importing country itself that is not self-reliant even in the cultivation of staple foods and vegetables.

45 million hectares of farmland have been acquired by agribusiness companies in just two years (2008-9), mainly in Sub-Saharan Africa, but also in Latin America and Asia. Kuwait has obtained 50,000 hectares of Cambodian farmland. Indian commercial interests have bought or leased lands in Africa, for the cultivation of food grains, pulses and edible oils, including vast territories in Ethiopia.[2]

The rush for farmlands for export purposes undermines local economies, distorts production of appropriate foods for the domestic market, while inevitably increasing the volatility and upward spiral of food prices; pushes people off customary lands or turns them into seasonal labour for the new owners; increases peasant dependence on the market for food; reduces or even removes their share of natural resources such as water for irrigation; increases the cost of external inputs into small-scale agriculture; and so on.

Women – whose land rights are already precarious as there is gender bias in the award and succession to state lands under the Land Development Ordinance 1935 and Land Grants Act 1979, as well as in the entrenched perception that the ‘head of the household’ is always male – are likely to be less protected from acquisition of lands which they access through customary rights, and less likely to benefit from compensation.

As a larger proportion of the active labour force in Sri Lanka is dependent on agriculture (32.7%) compared to industry (24.2%) for employment; as around 80% of the poor live in the rural sector; and as the majority of the poor are women; the consequences of large scale investments in farmland will be multiple and far-reaching.

This isn’t scare-mongering. A study on international investments in agriculture recently asked: “Can such international investment in land be a means to improve agricultural productivity and rural livelihoods?” The high level panel of experts concluded: “The evidence from this land rush to date shows very few such cases. Rather, large scale investment is damaging the food security, incomes, livelihoods and environment for local people.”[3]

Once again, the yawning gap between the populist pro-small farmer rhetoric of this government; and the neoliberal thrust of its macro-economic policies is plain to see.

The 2012 Budget liberalised use and control of state lands, through permitting foreign investors (in joint ventures with local capitalists) to lease unlimited acreages for up to 99 years.

In its 2010 election manifesto, Mahinda Chinthanaya – Vision for the Future, the government claimed that “44% of the agricultural lands are sparsely used but have a huge potential for development...the end of the prolonged conflict has released a huge amount of arable land that can be utilised for productive purposes.” One ‘productive purpose’ identified is the establishment of 1,500 floriculture villages (for production of cut-flowers for export) in the Western, North-Western and Central Provinces by 2020.

The farmland grab is just one of other forms of land-grabbing that are underway in Sri Lanka today – for purposes as varied as bio-fuel production; tourist development; energy production; special economic zones, construction or expansion of permanent military camps and so on – and where the actors are as diverse as private individuals, local and national politicians, state agencies, the state security forces etc.[4]

Industrial agriculture for export is not a new idea in Sri Lanka. Over 30 years ago, the United National Party government of JR Jayewardene that introduced ‘open economy’ reforms first mooted the creation of agricultural promotion zones.

Similar to industrial zones, these areas were to be earmarked for foreign investments in non-traditional crops (i.e. not tea, rubber and coconut), such as soya, cut-flowers, fruits and vegetables for export to the world market, and with tax-holidays and export concessions as incentives.[5]

However, the areas identified were adjacent to, or in the, conflict area and the outbreak of war after July 1983 stalled the establishment of these zones in the districts of Mannar, Vavuniya and Moneragala.

Only in Moneragala was it possible – after protracted peasant struggles that were ultimately overwhelmed in the violence in the South in the late 1980s – to privatise land for sugar cane cultivation. However, two sugar cane plantations quickly folded-up, sugar production has been on a downward trend, and the remaining factories plagued by political machinations. Sri Lanka imports 95% of its sugar consumption.

Now that the war has ended, and conflict-affected territories have been pacified through saturated military occupation, a new wave of neo-liberalism is underway; driven by state policy and directed by an avowedly left-of-centre regime raiding the policy toolkit of its one-time ideological opposite, the United National Party.

In the government’s sights is the accumulation of dizzying degrees of private wealth, through the dispossession of the peasantry of its farmland.

(ENDS)

* Law & Society Trust, Colombo, Sri Lanka.

[1] “Sri Lanka seeks investment in agriculture”, Emirates 24/7, 05 March 2012, http://www.emirates247.com/business/economy-finance/sri-lanka-seeks-investment-in-agriculture-2012-03-05-1.446738.

[2] Rowden, Rick 2011. India’s Role in the New Global Farmland Grab: An examination of the Role of the Indian Government and Indian Companies Engaged in Overseas Agricultural Land Acquisitions in Developing Countries, New Delhi: GRAIN and Economic Research Foundation 2011,   http://www.networkideas.org/featart/aug2011/Rick_Rowden.pdf.

[3] High Level Panel of Experts 2011. Land tenure and international investments in agriculture: A report by the High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition of the Committee on World Food Security, Rome 2011, p. 8, http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/user_upload/hlpe/hlpe_documents/HLPE-Land-tenure-and-international-investments-in-agriculture-2011.pdf.

[4] See our written submission to the 19th regular session of the UN Human Rights Council, ‘Sri Lanka: Land-Grabbing and Development-Induced Displacement’, A/HRC/19/NGO/64, 22 February 2012, http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G12/107/18/PDF/G1210718.pdf?OpenElement.

[5] Rupesinghe, Kumar 1982. “Free Trade Zones to Agricultural Promotion Zones in Sri Lanka”, Social Science Review (Colombo), No. 4 (1982): 116-138.

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2. PAKISTAN: A CASE FOR BIPARTISANSHIP
by I.A Rehman 
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(Dawn, 5th April, 2012)

THE parliamentary debate on national security and the terms of engagement with the US has revealed both the highs and lows of Pakistan’s political culture.

The high point is of course the fact that parliament’s right to discuss national security and matters related to it, and to lay down the policy framework, has been established. The country’s foreign policy, or whatever goes under that label, has often been discussed in the legislature, but the circumstances and the hard choices Pakistan faces give the present exercise extraordinary significance.

Besides, the people’s right to know what is done supposedly in their interest also has been recognised to a greater extent than before. This development, if allowed to run its due course, will brighten the prospects for a transition to a genuinely democratic dispensation.

The low point is that the significance of the development is not fully realised by the various parliamentary groups and quite a few powerful lobbies have their eyes on the elections instead of their duty to strengthen democratic conventions.

The issues under debate are related to national security, the strategic understanding with the US and the war against terrorism. These matters have been considered the exclusive domain of the military establishment since 1979, if not earlier. Even when Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif were allowed to preside over the democratic façade, they had little authority or possibility of putting in a word with the decision-makers in command.

We also know that Pakistan’s honour was not compromised by receiving maintenance under the Kerry-Lugar Bill; it was compromised only by providing for civilian oversight of military spending. Thus, one might have expected some reservations on parliament’s assumption of the lead role from the military establishment but it has chosen to let the parliamentarians decide. Even if it is inspired by a desire to avoid responsibility for unpopular decisions, the shift deserves to be welcomed. One should like to hope that this decision will become a weighty precedent and nobody in the future will be allowed to deviate from it.

Surprisingly, parliament’s right to discuss foreign policy has been challenged by the defenders of the role of the Foreign Office. Their right to join the debate cannot be disputed. It is good that under the present government, which every bureaucrat finds weak, incompetent and corrupt, they can have their say, something that they could not do under the holy, efficient and incorruptible regimes of Ziaul Haq and Pervez Musharraf. Their experience commands respect and so does their opinion. Yet it is not impossible to defend the institution of parliament against their sniping.

The foreign office everywhere has two main functions. First, it serves as the government’s archives and reference department. It helps the government with background material on any foreign policy issue and lists the options before it, including an argument in favour of a particular option.

Second, the foreign office carries out the decisions of the government and keeps track of the country’s compliance with bilateral, regional and international treaties and compacts. The network of envoys a foreign office controls has duties in both areas. Nowhere in the world can a foreign office claim exclusive and unfettered right to frame the country’s foreign policy and any attempt on its part to deny parliamentary oversight is unthinkable. The US State Department may every now and then try to bypass, circumvent or obstruct the foreign policy decisions taken by the president and Congress but it will not challenge the latter’s prerogative. What are parliamentary debates on foreign policy meant for if parliaments do not have oversight rights?

Unfortunately, in Pakistan the Foreign Office has often been denied its due. It is said that strong political leaders generally followed their own counsel, and did not pay sufficient heed to the Foreign Office’s advice. Politicians did not enjoy much respect at the Foreign Office because they were considered inferior in terms of education and social status to the Foreign Service cadre.

Dictators Ayub, Zia and Musharraf apparently had better relations with the Foreign Office for, while they decided matters on their own, they made a great show of listening to the Foreign Service experts. Gen Zia in particular made them happy by sitting through long briefing sessions and taking copious notes that he rarely read again. Thus, there is need not only to increase the capacity of the Foreign Office in regard to both its functions but also to enable those working for it to think independently on foreign policy issues.

Within parliament, the role of anti-democratic factions, especially those who exploit religion for narrow personal/factional ends, offers little surprise. They are the permanent denigrators of any idea of parliamentary supremacy. They and their cohorts in the militant groups outside the legislature get emboldened when parties swearing by democracy fail to see the urgency of a rational consensus on the issues of security.

The opposition has every right to criticise the report prepared by the parliamentary committee and to suggest improvements but its insistence on receiving assurance of implementation from extra-democratic sources is difficult to condone. It is all right to ask for the establishment of democratic mechanisms to implement parliament’s decisions/resolutions but when it is said that only a guarantee by the military top brass will be acceptable, this amounts to a farewell to democratic principles.

The state of Pakistan has repeatedly suffered grievous harm by the tendency among political parties to summon extra-democratic actors to help them vanquish their opponents. It was a clear rejection of this path and a pledge by the leaders of the PPP and PML-N that they would never seek the military’s aid in dislodging each other’s regimes that made the Charter of Democracy of 2006 a document of historic importance. It seems Pakistan’s major political parties find it hard to liberate themselves from their past.

The future of the democratic experiment depends on establishing conventions about the limits to the ruling parties’ authority and to the opposition parties’ privileges. We do not have such conventions because the democratic interludes between authoritarian regimes were too brief to allow the development of codes of democratic behaviour. All models of good governance require a national accord on the fundamentals of the polity which no side is expected to breach. In the main this requires a degree of understanding between the ruling party and the main opposition, or bipartisanship in short.

In Pakistan’s case, bipartisanship is the only key to establish the post-18th Amendment democratic federation. Some of the most important constitutional offices can only be filled through bipartisan accord. The responsibility for working this system falls on both the ruling coalition and the main opposition party. If the government delays consultation with the opposition the latter may take the initiative instead of allowing matters to be delayed and then pouncing upon the government for not doing its job. And if a bipartisan approach to national security is not possible then neither any other democratic consensus nor consolidation of democracy should be expected.

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3. PAKISTAN: [ENGLISH URDU DICTIONARY] DELIBERATELY DISTORTING SECULARISM
by Arshad Mahmood 
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(Viewpoint, No 76, 2011)

In the “Qaumi English Urdu Dictionary” published by “The National Language Authority” a state-run institution, the term “secularism” has been translated as “Ladeeniat.”

It appears quite intriguing as to why the term ‘secularism’ was translated as “Ladeeniat” after the creation of Pakistan and by whom. Perhaps those who invented the Urdu equivalent wanted to transform Pakistan into an Islamist/Jihadist state. Dominating sections of Urdu-speaking Mohajirs were the forerunners of this intellectual feat. They considered themselves educated vis-à-vis the original inhabitants of the lands which constituted Pakistan. For them Punjabis, Bengalis, Sindhis, Balochs and Pakhtoons were all ill-mannered, less educated and least patriotic. They came to Pakistan following the footsteps of Liaqat Ali Khan as if they had conquered Pakistan.

To take charge of the administration and get hold of the resources, it was imperative to delink the locals’ natural affinity with the soil to which they belonged. Hence abstract and artificial crutches were invented to install national unity. One language and one religion were declared as the foundations of national cohesion. To achieve this end, the so-called educated Mohajir class, feudal lords and civil/military bureaucracy joined hands.

In theory and in practice it was not possible to convert Pakistan into an Islamist state until the term secularism was metamorphosed with repulsive connotations. In the “Qaumi English Urdu Dictionary” published by “The National Language Authority” a state-run institution, the term “secularism” has been translated as “Ladeeninat.”On the basis of such distortions, rampant in our texts, the Urdu press has associated the term “Secularism” with being anti-religious and atheistic. Despite such a glaring intellectual dishonesty of far-reaching consequences the editor of the book Dr. Jamil Jalibi, himself a Mohajir, wrote in its preface: “This National Urdu-English dictionary of ours fulfills all requirements of the present age and encompasses meanings of words both ancient and most modern.”

This is a stark example of “linguistic deceit” perpetrated by our scholars of which we as a nation have been a victim. The act of distorting the meaningof the term triumphed and its fallout proliferated.

To be honest, secularism is neither the opposition nor the negation of religion. On the contrary it acknowledges every human beings’ right to adhere to his or her religious belief. It also promotes mutual respect for all faith-based systems. In simple words it says, let me practice what my faith says and feel free to practice what your faith demands. And let us not question each other’s faith. Consequently in matters of state and society, faith systems cannot be held controversial. Whose faith is right and who is in the wrong cannot be decided objectively. The only impact of such a debate is friction and violence in the society. Civilized cultures,therefore, have found a way out. “Respect each other’s faith” as it is purely a personal matter and has nothing to do with logic and reasoning. We generally hold on to our beliefs first and then invent arguments in support thereof. This is precisely the reason why nobody wins in religious debates. So much blood has been shed in human history in the name of religion, yet people hold on to their beliefs. However, people do embrace other religions due to personal or historical reasons; particularly when the “invaded” convert to the faith exercised by the invaders. In some cases conversions are also forced upon in our holy land particularly in Sindh province, by hook or by crook.

As humans matured intellectually and adopted scientific means to achieve economic self-sufficiency, a new social contract and a different value system came into being with the core value of “live and let live.” The new value system also regarded religion and faith as one’s personal matter and nobody was granted the right to force anybody or target someone else’s faith. It also advocated that matters of this world be handled rationally in accordance with the spirit of the times. Jingoism and militancy in the name of religion was considered an uncivilized and inhuman act causing nothing but large scale bloodshed.

And if we believe that Muslims in a majority maybe allowed exercising the right to target minorities, the same practice should also be granted to all those nations where Muslims are in a minority. Nonetheless the authoritarian Muslims stick to a strange logic. They demand every conceivable right for themselves but are never prepared to sanction the same privileges to followers of other religions. This is sheer fascism.

The fact remains that in today’s civilized world the Muslims cannot have the cake and eat it too, especially when they are completely dependent on the “non-believers.” Today’s world is a global village where Muslims are in a minority while followers of other religions constitute the majority, andany one-sided act of violence against the technologically superior nations is nothing but madness.

It is unfortunate that matters of faith can only be decided through application of violence and armed conflict. They have nothing to do with logic and reasoning. A war fought for the sake of one’s faith has no substance and leads to nothing but mutual death and destruction. The common man must understand that all previous wars in history,ironically,were fought for economic and political dominance in the name of faith.

By rejecting secularism the majority of Muslims have become part of an unending conflict with the West. Pakistan, known to be a country where Muslims constitute more than 95% of the population is now-a-days desperately vying for internal peace. Most sects and sub-sects are engaged in a tug of war firmly holding thebelief that their faith is the true faith.

The aim of life is to live and not to kill and get killed. Secularism ensures mutual coexistence, peace and a civilized way of life. The earlier the Muslims learn this basic principle the better it is for them and their future generations.
	Arshad Mahmood is a columnist,freelance writer and a social activist.

[The above is also available at: http://www.sacw.net/article2622.html ]

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4. India: Assault on freedom
by Praful Bidwai
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(Frontline, AprIL 07-20, 2012)

When universities start censoring speech and banning books, and permission is needed to hold conferences, we risk becoming a hollow, illiberal democracy.

Do you need the administration's prior permission to hold a meeting, seminar, symposium or conference at a university? Most academics in liberal democracies would either be astounded by the question or feel compelled to answer it with an emphatic, if not vehement, no. The administration, they would argue, should facilitate open debate and free exchange of ideas. But Calicut University Vice-Chancellor M. Abdul Salam evidently differs. He has imposed an unwritten rule which mandates that prior permission be obtained before any meeting can be held on the university campus.

Calicut University teachers and researchers organised under the All-Kerala Research Scholars' Association and the Campus Cultural Forum planned to host, on March 23, a lecture by K.N. Panikkar, an eminent historian and former Chairman of the Kerala Higher Education Council, as part of a series of talks on “Campus Culture” launched by Rajan Gurukkal, another well-known historian. They applied for permission three days earlier but never got it. They were also reportedly barred from erecting a shamiana to hold the event.

Panikkar nevertheless delivered his talk and sharply criticised the practice of censorship, pointing out that the academic community did not have to face such “undemocratic and repressive measures” even during the Emergency. The meeting soon turned into a protest. Sensing that the media would pursue the story, the Vice-Chancellor's office said permission had indeed been granted orally although not in writing.

This totally misses the point. No permission of any kind should at all be necessary to host an academic event or, for that matter, a discussion on any subject of public importance at a university. Universities are quintessentially a forum which engages with and inquires into all manner of ideas and where debate must be free in order to be productive of yet more ideas. The university's very rationale is to encourage critical and independent thinking and help students, teachers and researchers to look at many different ways of understanding a subject, not one narrow view of it.

Alas, many Indian universities do nothing of the sort. Some, like Banaras Hindu University, have banned public meetings for years despite protests from (former) Executive Council members, including myself. Many have cynically used the Lyngdoh Committee report on student union elections to impose a blanket ban on all political seminars and debates.

Teachers and researchers of Calicut University were refused permission by the Vice-Chancellor to host a lecture by the eminent historian as part of a series of talks on "campus culture". Panikkar nevertheless delivered his talk and said the academic community did not have to face such "undemocratic and repressive measures" even during the Emergency.

Even some of our better universities impose restrictions on debate or outlaw and censor books and readings. An odious recent example is the Delhi University Academic Council's decision last October to withdraw from the list of readings for an undergraduate course an essay by the outstanding poet and scholar A.K. Ramanujan entitled “Three Hundred Ramayanas: Five Examples and Three Thoughts on Translation”, extracted from The Collected Essays of A.K. Ramanujan (edited by Vinay Dharwadker; Oxford University Press (OUP), New Delhi, 1999). This was done under pressure from the Hindu Right.

The essay was introduced with due process and after approval by the university's Academic Council in 2006. It describes different versions or “tellings” of the Ramayana from divergent traditions, including Valmiki's, Jaina, Kamban and Thai. In 2008, the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) launched a rabble-rousing campaign and vandalised the building of the history department of Delhi University and manhandled its head.

The Hindu Right contended that its “sentiments” were hurt because Ramanujan presented a “distorted” version of the Ramayana which is different from the “original” or “true” version, presumably written by Valmiki. Ramanujan's whole point was that the multiple “tellings” of the epic have a “relational structure” that claims the name of Rama, but are dissimilar.

In the same year, another Hindu fundamentalist right-wing group, the Shiksha Bachao Andolan Samiti, also demanded that OUP India stop printing the essay. OUP India abjectly capitulated, saying: “We feel deeply concerned to learn that Ramanujan's essay has the potential to hurt Hindu religious sentiments and we thank you for pointing this out. ...we very much regret that the essay has inadvertently caused you distress and concern. We also wish to inform you that neither are we selling the book nor are there plans to reissue it.”

Worse was yet to come. On October 9 last, Delhi University's Academic Council decided to withdraw the essay, violating the recommendation of a four-member expert committee that it be retained. (Apparently, only one of the four had recommended its withdrawal, not on the grounds of scholarly merit or academic considerations but on the spurious plea that the university community might not be mature or tolerant enough to stomach unorthodox “tellings” of the Ramayana.)

Many teachers suspect the decision was pushed through in a manipulated fashion at the end of a long meeting. They launched a vigorous protest. As many as 4,000 scholars from all over the world, including every Sanskritist, Indologist and historian worth the name, also wrote a strong letter of protest. Ignoring their plea, the minutes of the October meeting were confirmed by the Academic Council on March 20 and ratified the following day by the Executive Council. However, Delhi University teachers did not give up. On the very day the Executive Council was meeting, they organised the first A.K. Ramanujan Lecture at Ramjas College, delivered by playwright and public intellectual Girish Karnad, who captioned it “Speaking with Ramanujan”. The lecture was attended by hundreds of teachers and students.

The actor-director Girish Karnad delivering the first A.K. Ramanujan lecture organised by Delhi University teachers, at Ramjas College in New Delhi on March 21, as a counter to the anti-Ramanujan campaign.

The anti-Ramanujan campaign is reminiscent of the attack by the Hindu Right in 1993 on an exhibition mounted by SAHMAT in Delhi on multiple versions of the Ramayana. The then Central government became complicit in the attack by banning the exhibition. This set a terrible precedent, which was used by Hindutva groups to secure bans against works such as James Laine's book on Shivaji, vandalise the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute in Pune, and physically raid M.F. Husain's works in Ahmedabad, and so on.

None of this would have become possible had the government not repeatedly caved in to right-wing pressure and sanctified the notion of “hurt sentiments” advanced by extremely intolerant groups driven by crass prejudice, which claim to speak on behalf of particular religious communities. Indeed, the government has itself internalised such intolerance by cavalierly banning or extraditing dissident scholars and activists and making the holding of international conferences on academic, social and environmental issues conditional upon its prior approval.
NGOs on watch list

Recent examples are the summary deportation last September of United States-based public-service broadcaster David Barsamian; the more recent refusal of a visa to Maya Kobayashi, a Fukushima survivor; and the expulsion from Nagercoil of Rainer Hermann Sonntag on the charge that he was the “mastermind” behind the “foreign funding” of the anti-Kudankulam nuclear plant protests. The government has also put more than 70 non-governmental organisations (NGOs) such as Greenpeace, lawfully registered in India, on a “watch list”.

Now, Barsamian is famous for his long interviews with Noam Chomsky, Edward Said, Eqbal Ahmad, Howard Zinn, Arundhati Roy, Shirin Ebadi and many others. He has been visiting India since the 1960s, is an inveterate India-lover, plays the sitar, and is a scholar of Urdu and Hindi. Like Maya Kobayashi, many Fukushima residents have visited more than 10 countries to tell their people about the effects of the nuclear accident, but not India. And Sonntag is a former German computer programmer who survives on his modest savings while visiting India as a tourist.

This is part of an unhealthy pattern of vilifying NGOs such as Amnesty International, which did much to expose human rights abuses in Kashmir, Bhopal and the north-eastern region, and had to face a barrage of intelligence agency-inspired attacks mediated through the press in the 1990s.

Then, there is control exercised by other means. Many scholars, activists and NGOs who organise international conferences on subjects as varied as disarmament, peace, Palestine, India-Pakistan reconciliation, the global economic and climate crises, the trade union movement, women's studies, and publishing find it a nightmare to apply for clearances from the government and secure visas for their foreign participants. Often, even the better-connected organisers have to approach high functionaries. Frequently, visas are delayed until the last day or two before the conference.

By contrast, members of right-wing think tanks, conservative foundations, openly pro-U.S. strategic analysts, shady businessmen from polluting or hazardous industries, and all manner of corporate lobbyists and arms peddlers are allowed free entry and can interact with high officials in India.

All this shows an insecure, paranoid and unaccountable government at work, which uses the bluntest possible weapons in its armoury to avert, suppress and censor criticism, and abuses its “sovereignty” to prevent interaction between Indian and foreign scholars, activists and human rights and environmental defence campaigners, to obliterate inconvenient truths, and threatens to criminalise independent inquiry and a search for emancipatory, humane solutions to our problems.

But true sovereignty is not about the right to refuse visas, discourage dialogue and ban books. Sovereignty rests in and derives from the people and from defence and advancement of their fundamental rights, including the right to think and express themselves freely.

At the end of the day, we must conclude that our rulers, including parastatal authorities, have failed to understand and internalise the vital idea that the freedom of expression is foundational to democracy, and that India can only impoverish itself and become an intellectual backwater if it clamps down on debate and free inquiry.

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5. India - Assam: Intellectuals decry Govt move against play under pressure from Hindu Far Right
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http://communalism.blogspot.in/2012/04/india-intellectuals-in-assam-decry-govt.html

GUWAHATI, April 4 – Literary and intellectual circles of the State have expressed indignation and resentment at the ultimatum issued by Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and Sattra Mahasabha against the staging of the play, Mahabharatar Bhul at the Rabindra Bhawan.

Following vehement opposition by the VHP and after a meeting between the VHP, Rang Mahal and the Rabindra Bhawan authorities, the name of the play by Tarun Saikia was changed to Bholanathar Sapon for allowing it to be staged.

“Regrettably, even this decision was undermined by the Sattra Mahasabha which in a most undemocratic manner pressurised the Government to cancel the staging of the play under the pretext of maintaining law and order. This is nothing but kneeling down before forces of communalism,” a statement issued by a number of distinguished citizens and leading socio-cultural organisations said.

Terming the conduct of the Government as setting a bad precedent which would only bolster the communal forces, the statement said that the Mahabharata had been a time-tested epic whose appeal and acceptability across the globe was only increasing following newer and different interpretations all over the world.

“Through the ages, the Mahabharata has elicited diverse critical interpretation and all this has only enhanced the epic’s universality and added to its glory. If a playwright names a play as Mahabharatar Bhul (The Blunder of the Mahabharata), it in no way diminishes the magnificence or lowers the dignity of the epic,” it said.

The statement further said that the move by the Government against the staging of the play by toeing the lines of organisations such as VHP or Sattra Mahasabha was an attack on the fundamental right of the people to express their opinion freely.

“The developments are also vitiating the creative and cultural atmosphere of the State. Rather than banning the play, the Government ought to have ensured its staging by deploying adequate security, if necessary. We demand that the play is staged at the Rabindra Bhawan,” it added.

The signatories included Nalinidhar Bhattacharya, Dr Hiren Gohain, Arun Sharma, Anima Guha, Nirupoma Bargohain, Sudakshina Sarma, Kulada Kumar Bhattacharya, Hiren Bhattacharya, Udayaditya Bharali, Apurba Sharma, Dr Sitanath Lahkar, Nipon Goswami, Moloya Goswami, Kapil Bora, Zerifa Wahid, Champak Borbora, Bhagirathi, Pakiza Begum, Gunakar Deva Goswami, Gangapada Choudhury, Bibhuranjan Choudhury, Pranjal Saikia, Bani Das, Maini Mahanta, Nitya Bora, Sukracharya Rabha, among others, besides organisations like Bharatiya Gana Natya Sangha, Seagull, Surya, Baan, Anubhav, Samahar Natya Gosthi, Theartres Guild Guwahati, and Ajai Rai Memorial Society.

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6. REPORT OF THE PEOPLE’S MOVEMENT AGAINST NUCLEAR ENERGY (PMANE) EXPERT COMMITTEE ON SAFETY, FEASIBILITY AND ALTERNATIVES TO KUDANKULAM NUCLEAR POWER PLANT (KKNPP)
=======================================

12th December 2011

The Committee appointed by the Peoples Movement Against Nuclear Energy studied various reports, documents and papers on KKNPP in particular and nuclear energy and ionizing radiation in general. A 38 page report by the Central Expert Group (CEG) was made available to us. Besides responding to the assertions of the CEG report, we are also bringing forward our own studies that are relevant to the reactor safety.. Most of the documents that were asked by PMANE were not shared to the technical committee including the site evaluation study and other documents. Despite this handicap the committee has gone in depth and analysed various issues.
 
http://www.sacw.net/article2621.html

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7. MYANMAR: RANGOON GOONS
by Bachi Karkaria
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(The Times of India, 4 April 2012)

The events in Myanmar stir up memories of another day

Aung San Suu Kyi's victory is as goosebump-raising as her struggle. She is fashioned for iconography. Her porcelain bone structure and the spray of jasmine flowers are cliches of femininity, but for 23 years she has defied the testosterone-riddled junta. More important, she has always been not martyr but victor. The exultant images of the past week were almost a 21st century avatar of mythology's triumph of good over evil.

We had all lapped up every bit of news that hiccupped out over the decades from behind Burma's bamboo curtain. The 8888 Uprising - when General Ne Win stepped down after 26 years on the seemingly auspicious 8.8.88 - and its violent crushing; the emergence of a pretty, young woman who seized the mantle of her revolutionary father and diplomat mother; her personal sacrifices; Cyclone Nargis tearing off the roof - and the power - in her dilapidated lakeside home, forcing her to live in candlelight; her rusty, trusty piano. And her resonating Freedom from Fear speech which began: "It is not power that corrupts, but fear..."

More morbidly fascinating were the 'yadaya' or black magic obsession of Burma's generals. Ne Win smashing his own reflection in a mirror to ward off a predicted assassination. Gen Than Shwe and his top brass appearing at a Union Day ceremony in women's style longyis, supposedly to put a hex on Suu Kyi.

But i had a more personal Burmese connection. Capt Jal Nalladaroo had held me in thrall long before the legendary Lady. He was my uncle's neighbour and brother-in-law. He never said a word, but we could see him going through a punishing, daily regimen on the roman rings hung from his ceiling, his bare chest a battlefield of scars. It had been shattered during World War II. Pesi-fua would tell us dramatically about the exploits of 'apro Jal' against the 'Japs' in the hostile Burmese jungles. So when David Lean's classic hit Calcutta's Lighthouse cinema, we almost saw our blister-chested hero blowing up the bridge on the River Kwai. None of us knew then that the film was only artistic licence. Nor did we want to.

There was also the exotic and equally mysterious sarong-ed lady marshalling the two little Parsi children who had suddenly appeared at community events. The Little-Miss Know-All of our gang whispered that they had fled from Burma, where their mother had been killed before their very eyes. We also overheard snide adult remarks about the kindly nanny ministering as much to the needs of the bereft father.

For all of us growing up in Calcutta, Burma was a presence, both inclusive and intrusive. We had Anglo-Burmese teachers, and none left as lasting an impression as Miss Tresham. We never forgot her geography lessons, or the mark of the ruler she wielded with equal passion. It was an easier age when schoolkids didn't hang themselves because they were punished.

Thanks to her and her fellow exiles, we had drooled over khao swe at school fetes long before it became a trendy party affectation. In between, I serendi-pitously encountered it during a holiday in sleepy Panchgani. Warming to my memories, it was rustled up by the Anglo-Burmese wife of the Parsi owner of our guesthouse. It didn't meet the approval of her 80-year-old mother, a feisty woman who used to make bamboo pickle back home under the trade name of 'Madame X'. Now, at four every afternoon, she'd dress up to the hilt, and stride across the hill to the Panchgani club for a game of bridge. Or, as she put it, "For a flutter."

This past week in Myanmar, a doughtier lady has provided a similar elation. Universally.

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8. INDIA: VICTIMS OF HATE AND DIVISION NOT BROKEN IN SPIRIT
by Harsh Mander
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http://communalism.blogspot.in/2012/04/victims-of-hate-and-division-not-yet.html

During the 1989 communal carnage in Bhagalpur, 65 people in Chanderi village were murdered by their neighbours. Having promised them safe passage, they suddenly fell upon them and hacked them to death. Mallika Begum, then 16, is the sole survivor and witness to the slaughter. The killers sliced off her leg, and thinking she was dead, threw her with the bodies of all her loved ones into a pond, and covered her with weeds. She survived, rescued by an army convoy. Over the years, she withstood repeated threats to her life to bring the killers to justice. Steadfast in her statements before the judges, her testimony ensured that 16 people are today serving a life sentence.

Aman Biradari, a collective devoted to secularism, justice and peace, recently invited women and men who had lived through pogroms that targeted persons because of their religious identity in the last three decades. Survivors were invited from the forgotten massacre of Bengali Muslims in Nellie in Assam in 1983, the Sikh widows of Tilak Vihar, Delhi of 1984, Bhagalpur in 1989 and Gujarat in 2002, and the Christian minorities of Kandhamal, Odisha of 2008.

In their moving dialogues in Delhi and Ahmedabad, they shared their pain, struggles and hopes. The occasion was the tenth anniversary of the carnage in Gujarat. The blood-letting and hate unleashed at that time - of women, men and children killed because of their religious faith, abetted by state authorities — continue to raise painful questions about the perilous breaches in our collective defence of secular democracy, and the threats to India’s pluralist legacy. The most important voices to hear and heed were those of the survivors of targeted hate violence, from far corners of this land.

Their stories, recounted with dignity and restraint, showed that the suffering of survivors does not abate or pass, even after decades have elapsed and the rest of us have forgotten and moved on. Time freezes for those who lost their loved ones, were sexually humiliated, or watched their homes and livelihoods destroyed, betrayed and assaulted often by their neighbours. Many spoke as though what they suffered happened just yesterday, not years or decades earlier. Their suffering is a legacy passed across generations. The widows of Tilak Vihar, Delhi talked of sons raised without fathers, now battling drug addiction and the demons in their minds. Young men and women from every site of carnage described how hard it was to grow up without parents, with only memories of their gruesome slaying.

Ruptures persist in the social fabric of communities long after the violence has ended. People in Nellie feel devalued and secluded in a homeland that labels them as foreigners. The Tilak Vihar widows are isolated from their own community in their suffering and struggles. In Gujarat, and even Bhagalpur, survivors continue to live in fear and segregation. In Kandhamal, few victims can return to their villages without trepidation. 

Only in Nellie has not a single person even been tried for the 1983 massacre, because the State itself has withdrawn all criminal charges against every person charged with the mass crimes. In every other site of massacre, broken people soldier on for justice against colossal odds. They explained why justice is precious to them. It is not revenge that they seek. If this was what they wanted, there were easier, more direct ways to extract vengeance. Many explained that the fight for justice in courts was their duty to their children, and their country. Unpunished, the hate rioters would be emboldened to repeat the slaughter. It was only if people are punished for their crimes that they will learn never to target innocents.       

They talked to us of partisan State authorities who failed to quell the rioting, revenue officials who paid them a pittance as compensation, policemen who refused to record the names and investigate those who led the butchery and arson, and magistrates who allowed their tormentors to walk free with impunity. And yet, even as they spoke of the many ways the people and institutions charged with protecting them and securing justice had let them down, it was extraordinary how each of them insisted that they had not lost faith in India’s secular democracy. They derived solace and hope from the people of other faiths who saved their lives, shared their pain, and helped them in their battles for justice. They believed that however grave are the assaults mounted on secular India, the ancient traditions of people of different faiths living together with peace and respect would endure. They were convinced that the institutions of our democracy would in the end prevail over campaigns of hate and division.

Harsh Mander is a member of the National Advisory Council

The views expressed by the author are personal

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9. ‘We can’t rid India of the tyranny of the poverty line without a struggle’: interview with Biraj Patnaik
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http://sacip.blogspot.in/2012/04/we-cant-rid-india-of-tyranny-of-poverty.html

Biraj Patnaik, a right to food activist and principal adviser, Office of Commissioners to the Supreme Court in the right to food case, tells Mukesh Ranjan that the government should avoid being distracted by the concept of the poverty line

How do you view the Planning Commission’s new definition of the poverty line, namely, daily per capita expenditure of Rs. 28 in urban areas and Rs. 22 in rural areas?

I have no problem with the Planning Commission or the government coming up with a definition of the poverty line. Unfortunately, the problem that we are facing now is that the poverty line is used (since 1996) as a cut-off in the estimation of the poor who will become eligible for government welfare schemes, and also for inter-state allocation of Central resources.
These new figures are not new but merely an adjustment of the “Tendulkar Committee line” for 2009-10 using the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) data. The Planning Commission has not gone ahead and further reduced the existing per capita per day consumption on the basis of a new formula, as is being made out in some sections of the media.
Of course, having a “minimalist starvation line”, like the one that the Planning Commission has come up with for targeting benefits to people, is outright perverse; hence the public outrage that was also reflected in Parliament. Unfortunately, the Planning Commission does not seem to have learnt a lesson from the public outrage in October last year when Rs. 32 per day was suggested.
It is the arrogance of a group of economists who think that public opinion, and indeed that of the courts, should be treated with contempt.

Contradictory statements have come from the deputy chairman of the plan body and the minister of state for planning on whether the new poverty estimate should be linked to welfare entitlements for the poor.

I am not very optimistic that this government will delink entitlements from the proposed poverty line, which people are mocking. This is born out of experience. Therefore, public pressure is necessary. When the National Food Security Bill was placed before Parliament, to our utter disappointment the same Tendulkar caps (plus 10 per cent) found their way into the bill. It was an outright betrayal that, sadly, continued the faulty thinking that the National Advisory Council had gifted this legislation with. This reflects the true intent of the present regime.
On policy flip-flop, and contradictory statements emanating from Yojana Bhavan, I don’t think we should attribute to malice what can so easily be attributable to sheer ineptitude. If truth be told, it is not that the Planning Commission is a body of complete idiots, as some members within it are striving to prove. Yet, they are collectively doing a great disservice to the institution. Never before has Yojana Bhavan been an object of such public derision. That saddens me immensely. 
Today, the Planning Commission is at war with itself. Institutional incoherence on critical issues is merely a symptom of a larger malaise. There is an urgent need for the plan panel to collectively reflect on its mistakes, learn lessons from them, fix accountability and try to re-establish its credibility in the public eye. It is way too important an institution to be
whittled down. It is our duty as citizens to reclaim it for the poor from the corporate interests it is now perceived to represent.

How do you see the government’s decision — announced recently following the ruckus on the new poverty line —to constitute a new expert group to look into the methodology of determining the number of poor people in the country?

If we move towards a system of universal state provisioning of basic rights (we have already done this for education and rural employment, and the same is under active consideration for universal healthcare), it should not matter what committee is set up and what the new estimates are going to be. But since ambiguity persists, this move to set up yet another committee can be easily interpreted as a cynical, ad hoc measure to bail the government out from the tight spot it finds itself in, in Parliament.

Do you think the government succumbed to popular pressure to junk the poverty estimates’ announcement by the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, which he had made just two days before the new expert group was constituted?

I suspect the last word has still not been said on this. I am not very hopeful at this stage that without sustained struggle politically, we can rid this country of the tyranny of the poverty line. Having said that, I am optimistic that sustained public opinion and efforts of the Supreme Court offer a very realistic chance of delinking entitlements from the official poverty line.

Are you satisfied with the data on poverty collected by the NSSO ? Even Dr Ahluwalia has acknowledged discrepancies in the consumer expenditure data shown in the NSSO’s National Accounts.

I don’t think that the deputy chairperson has questioned the quality of the NSSO data. It is a very robust set of data and I don’t see an alternative to it emerging in the near future. What he has indeed highlighted is the difference in some expenditure heads between the NSSO data and the National Accounts. This has been known for quite some time now. It is for economists and planners who work closely with these data sets to resolve this over time. I think by questioning the NSSO data we are doing the statistical machinery of India a great disservice. If we do not have faith in any institution, any data, any official body, then the roadmap ahead will only lead us to a fascist psyche, and that is something we must be cautious of.

What, according to you, would be the right approach or methodology to determine the number of poor people in the country?

In my view, whatever approach we follow, we should not use it for targeting the poor. If the government, for whatever reason, cannot move towards a regime of universal coverage for all rights (legal and extra legal entitlements), it should use an exclusion approach to identification. Rather than spending its energies on identifying the poor, it would be way easier for it to identify the “rich” and exclude them from the entitlements meant for the poor.
This approach was suggested by Kirit Parikh, a former member of the Planning Commission, in the context of the Food Security Bill. Subsequently, Jean Dreze and other eminent economists have also endorsed it. I think that would be a step forward in the right direction.


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10. India: In scarred country
by Chetan Chauhan
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(Hindustan Times)

Illegal mining in India could be a much bigger game than the headline-grabbing 2G scam. In just two states — Goa and Karnataka, the government lost about Rs 36,000 crore — money that could feed half the country's 400 million poor for a year — because of illegally extracted iron ore. "Annual
illegal mining should be worth over Rs 1 lakh crore," says a former mining secretary, on the condition of anonymity.

In 2010, the government constituted a commission under Justice (retired) MS Shah to investigate illegal mining and found it rampant in Goa and Karnataka. "Our report will be an eye opener," Justice Shah told HT. He has accused government officials of conniving with illegal miners, recently.

There's been a substantial increase in demand from China, accounting for 86 % of iron ore exported from India. A tonne of iron ore, which fetches $136 there, is bought for less than a dollar from the government. Other lucrative minerals include manganese, bauxite and cadmium. "For this exorbitant profit, miners extract much more than permitted," says Ramesh Gauns, who along with Claude Alvares of the Goa Foundation launched a campaign against illegal mining in the state. Former Lokayukta Justice Santosh Hedge found that iron ore excavated in Karnataka's Bellary district was five times the permitted limit.

Blatant disregard
In both Karnataka and Goa, the complicity of local officials and politicians has been established. "A fixed bribe is paid for each illegally mined truck leaving a mine," Hedge says. Once the mineral is out of the mining area, its export is extremely easy because ports are only concerned with payment of duty, not the mineral's source. "About 43 % of iron ore being exported from Goa was illegal," says a report of the Public Accounts Committee of Goa Assembly. Half of the ore exported from Karnataka was illegal, Hedge says. The menace is spread across India with 3.29 lakh cases of illegal mining reported between 2006 and 2011 from different states.

Illegal mining of minor minerals, for which permission is given by state governments, is higher than it is for the major minerals. It has also claimed lives of people who tried to expose the nexus between the ruling class and the mafia. As recently as March 9, IPS official Narender Kumar was crushed to death when he tried to stop a lorry carrying illegally mined stones in Morena, Madhya Pradesh. Last year, Nigamanand was alleged poisoned for undertaking a fast in Haridwar, Uttarakhand, against illegal mining of stones in the river Ganga. In 2010, RTI activist Amit Jethwa was shot dead allegedly for exposing illegal sand mining in the Gir forests of Gujarat, the country's only haven for Asiatic lions.

Unabated and unchecked
Despite the deaths, nailing this nexus has not been easy. Meanwhile, the impact on the environment is evident. The Centre for Science and Environment reported an increase in cases of asthma near mining sites in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. The Damodar river in Jharkhand, a repository of 46% of India's coal, is highly contaminated with heavy metals, resulting in the average age of locals being 49 years (as compared for 65 for all of India).

Illegal mining has threatened the existence of a regenerated population of 12 tigers in the Panna reserve, which lost all tigers in 2009. Hedge says sloth bears and medicinal plants have vanished from Karnataka's mining districts.

This week, the Supreme Court tried to take a corrective step by disallowing mining without environment clearance in any mining sites smaller than five hectares. "Every mining permission will need an environment management plan," says apex court lawyer Ritwik Dutta, a specialist in green issues.

http://www.sacw.net/article2624.html


BOOKS:
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11. Hindu Mahasabha in Colonial North India, 1915-1930: Constructing Nation and History
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Published by Routledge
Author:   Bapu, Prabhu                   
ISBN: 978 0 415 67165 1
Format: Hardback
Pages: 256
List price(s):   140.00 USD 
Publication date: 27 July 2012

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12. Nothing he hasn’t done, nowhere he hasn’t been
by Adam Shatz
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London Review of Books
Vol. 34 No. 7 · 5 April 2012
pages 11-15 

The Patagonian Hare: A Memoir by Claude Lanzmann, translated by Frank Wynne
Atlantic, 528 pp, £25.00, March, ISBN 978 1 84887 360 5

The life of Claude Lanzmann, Claude Lanzmann declares at the beginning of his memoir, has been ‘a rich, multifaceted and unique story’. Self-flattery is characteristically Lanzmannian, but its truth in this case can hardly be denied. He has lived on a grand scale. A teenage fighter in the Resistance, he became Sartre’s protégé in the early 1950s as an editor at Les Temps modernes. He also became – with Sartre’s blessing – Beauvoir’s lover, ‘the only man with whom Simone de Beauvoir lived a quasi-marital existence’. He marched with the left against the wars in Algeria and Vietnam; moonlighted in Beijing as an unofficial conduit between Mao and de Gaulle; and fell under the spell of Frantz Fanon in Tunis. Writing for the glossies at the height of the Nouvelle Vague, he interviewed Bardot, Moreau, Deneuve, Belmondo and Gainsbourg: ‘I met them all … and, I can say without vanity, I helped some of them make a qualitative leap in their careers.’ He had a brief, stormy marriage to the actress Judith Magne, and was Michel Piccoli’s best man at his marriage to Juliette Gréco. He knew how to woo his subjects off and on the page. ‘You are the only one who talked about me as I would have wished,’ the novelist Albert Cohen told him.

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v34/n07/adam-shatz/nothing-he-hasnt-done-nowhere-he-hasnt-been


INTERNATIONAL
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13. USA: Tennessee bill protects teachers who challenge evolution and climate change
by Suzanne Goldenberg
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The Guardian, 21 March 2012

State legislature gives legal protection to teachers who do not believe in the science and want to debate alternate explanations

by Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment correspondent

Teaching climate change : Anti-Evolution League at the opening of biology teacher John Scopes trial
An anti-evolution league holds a book sale at the opening of the Scopes 'monkey' trial in 1925, when a Tennessee public school teacher was convicted and fined for teaching evolution. Photograph: Corbis

The state legislature of Tennessee has given legal cover to public school teachers to challenge the science of evolution and climate change, in a move that looks set to deepen a debate about politicisation of the classroom.

The bill passed in the Tennessee Senate this week provides legal protection to teachers who personally do not believe in evolution or the human causes of climate change, and instead want to teach the "scientific strengths and weaknesses of existing scientific theories".

It comes at a time when science associations are increasingly concerned by moves to inject religious or ideological beliefs into science teaching ahead of the release next month of a new set of education standards which give a central place to climate change.

The new standards, based on recommendations from the National Research Council, are not mandatory for all states. But they have already provoked a backlash from states, such as Utah, which have officially ruled climate change is not settled science. An unauthorised release of documents from the rightwing Heartland Institute last month revealed an ambitious plan in 2012 to discredit existing teaching on climate change.

The Tennessee measure, which passed by 24-8 votes, was strongly criticised by the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the National Centre for Science Education, who called it a step backward. The house approved a similar version of the measure last year.

Bloggers called the move a throwback to the Scopes monkey trial of the 1920s, when a Tennessee public school teacher was convicted and fined for teaching evolution.

Supporters of the measure said it would encourage critical thinking. "The idea behind this bill is that students should be encouraged to challenge current scientific thought and theory," Bo Watson, a Republican state senator and the bill's sponsor, told reporters.

But the National Association of Biology Teachers said the measure, would encourage non-scientific thinking – not critical thought.

"Concepts like evolution and climate change should not be misrepresented as controversial or needing of special evaluation. Instead, they should be presented as scientific explanations for events and processes that are supported by experimentation, logical analysis, and evidence-based revision based on detectable and measurable data," the organisation said.

The bill still has to be signed into law by the state's governor, Bill Haslam, who has said he will discuss it first with the board of education.

Texas and Louisiana have introduced education standards requiring teachers to describe climate change denial as a valid scientific position. A California school board last year instructed teachers to tell students that climate change was controversial, but later reversed the directive.

The National Centre for Science Education launched a project earlier this year to support science teachers coming under pressure from those who dismiss climate change.

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14. Sex and Sharia: Muslim women punished for failed marriages
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http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2012/04/02/sex-and-sharia-muslim-women-punished-for-failed-marriages/

Sex and Sharia: Muslim women punished for failed marriages
By Charlotte Rachael Proudman
    Notebook - A selection of Independent views -, Opinion
    Monday, 2 April 2012 at 4:02 pm

Today I received another telephone call from a young Muslim woman, Nasrin, who pleaded with me to help her obtain an Islamic divorce. After fleeing a forced marriage characterised by rape and physical violence, Nasrin applied for an Islamic divorce from a Sharia council; that was almost 10 years ago now. Despite countless emails, letters and telephone calls to the Sharia council as well as joint mediation and reconciliation meetings, the Sharia council refuse to provide Nasrin with an Islamic divorce. Why? Because of Nasrin’s sex. An Imam at the Sharia council told Nasrin that her gender prevents her from unilaterally divorcing her husband, instead the Imam told her to return to her husband, perform her wifely duties and maintain the abusive marriage that she was forced into.

Having represented Muslim women pro bono at Sharia law bodies across the UK to obtain Islamic divorces, I am all too aware of the gender discriminatory experience many Muslim women suffer at some Sharia councils and Muslim Arbitration Tribunals (‘Sharia law bodies’). Unfortunately their experiences have not been highlighted by the media. Instead some Sharia law bodies have been misrepresented by the media as being transparent, voluntary and operating in accordance with human rights and equality legislation. This is not the case.

Many Sharia law bodies rule on a range of disputes from domestic violence to child residence all of which should be dealt with by UK courts of law. Having observed Sharia law bodies ruling on legal disputes it is all too apparent that they operate within a misogynist and patriarchal framework which is incompatible with UK legislation. For instance, the cost of an Islamic divorce is £400 for a woman compared to £200 for a man at the Islamic Sharia Council in East London; this is an example of blatant gender discrimination which is incompatible with the Equality Act 2010.

With over 85 Sharia law bodies operating in the UK, the majority of which charge vulnerable and impoverished Muslim women astronomical fees, Sharia law bodies have become successful and lucrative businesses. For instance the Islamic Sharia Council rules on over 500 Islamic divorces per annum at a cost of £400 for every woman applicant, equating to an annual turnover of £200,000 for Islamic divorces only. If we consider the additional legal disputes they rule upon it is likely some Sharia law bodies have an annual turnover of over £500,000. The majority of women I represent can barely afford a £15 weekly shop let alone £400 for an Islamic divorce. These destitute women have been forced to pawn their jewellery and take out loans from dangerous loan sharks in order to pay for Islamic divorces that are not even guaranteed and ultimately to fund a service that is pricing women out of the Sharia law market.

Diana Nammi, founder of the Iranian and Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation explained that “Sharia law bodies are money-spinning businesses because they afford men more rights than women unlike UK law which is underpinned by a fundamental principle of ‘equality for all’. In most cases women do not receive any practical advice or assistance to help them exit abusive marriages, and instead face further discrimination perpetrated by Sharia ‘judges’”.

According to Anne-Marie Hutchinson OBE, partner of Dawson Cornwell a leading family law solicitors firm, “women are forced to apply for Islamic divorces from Sharia law bodies to end their marriages unlike men who are in a position of power as they only have to pronounce talaq (divorce) three times to end their marriages”. However, this is not a quick process, it is time consuming and emotionally draining for many women including Nasrin who applied for an Islamic divorce almost 10 years ago.

By protracting the time it takes for women to obtain Islamic divorces, Sharia law bodies are punishing women for their failure to maintain miserable marriages, and in Nasrin’s case an abusive forced marriage which was flawed from its incept. Rather than freeing Muslim women from the shackles of unhappy marriages they are kept in limbo and are expected to mourn their destructive marriages and to reflect on their failures as wives and mothers. Worryingly some Sharia law bodies are growing cynical business enterprises, which use their position of power to maintain unequal gender relations while profiteering on the misery of Muslim women.

Anne-Marie Waters, Spokesperson for One Law for All commented – “the very process employed by Sharia law bodies is gender discriminatory, flawed and incompatible with UK legislation”. For instance, unlike male divorce applicants, women are requested to bring along two Muslim, male witnesses to corroborate their testimony. I have yet to represent a Muslim woman who is able to comply with this gender discriminatory requirement that is contrary to the Equality Act 2010. Not only are such requirements near impossible to adhere to, but they also reflect Sharia law bodies’ ideology that women are second class citizens. A stark comparison can be drawn between the way in which women are perceived as lacking capacity to give evidence before Sharia law bodies and their inability to give evidence in court to substantiate their own cases in Dickensian times. Women were treated as criminals not citizens in Dickensian times; their belonging to society was rejected as they were portrayed as mad and bad because of their gender. Sharia law bodies are a 21st century example of the patriarchal Dickensian period that eventually prompted the early Suffragettes to engage in feminist activism to bring about gendered change.

Where are the Suffragettes now that we need them? Fortunately we have Baroness Cox’s Bill, which aims to prevent Sharia law bodies from ruling on family and criminal matters. With collective action from politicians, lawyers, human rights and women’s rights organisations it is hoped that Muslim women will be better informed of their right to seek legal remedies under UK law instead of submitting to Sharia law bodies that promote and subsist in a patriarchal framework that runs parallel to UK law.

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15. ANNOUNCEMENTS
==========================

(i)  Applications are invited for the Tenth Annual Orientation Course on Forced Migration to be held in Kolkata, India (1-15 October 2012).

The Course, certified by the UNHCR and Calcutta Research Group, will be preceded by a two and a half month long programme of distance education. It will consist of several workshops, lectures on selected themes, other interactive exercises and field visit. The workshops will be based on assignments sent to the selected participants two months prior to the programme for necessary preparation. The programme is intended for human rights activists, policy makers, academicians, refugee activists and others working in the field of human rights and humanitarian assistance for victims of forced migration. The curriculum deals with themes of nationalism, ethnicity, partition, and partition-refugees, national regimes and the international regime of protection, issues relating to regional patterns of forced migration in South Asia, internal displacement, the gendered nature of forced migration and protection framework, resource politics, climate change and environmental degradation, and several other themes related to the forced displacement of people. Selected candidates will have to complete assignments based on the workshop themes before they join the programme in Kolkata, India.

 Applications, addressed to the Course Coordinator, can be sent by e-mail to forcedmigrationdesk at mcrg.ac.in or by post to the following address and must reach us not later than April 10, 2012. Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group, GC 45 Sector 3, Salt Lake, Kolkata 700 106, West Bengal, India. Phone: +91 (33) 2337 0408

For Information on past courses please visit http://www.mcrg.ac.in/winter.htm 

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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. Newsletter 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.
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