SACW - 30 May 2016 | Bangladesh: Fuss about ISIS / Pakistan: Anti-women Maulana's of CII / India - Pakistan: Fishermen in troubled waters / India: Banaji interview; Pseudo-Science; Racism / Burma: rising nationalism

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire - 30 May 2016 - No. 2897 
[since 1996]

Contents:
1. Pakistan: Conservative nuts of the Council of Islamic Ideology and their recipe to cage women - Who will bring their house down ?
2. India - Pakistan: Fishermen in troubled waters | Jatin Desai
3. India: Tariq Ali Interview’s Jairus Banaji on Telesur TV [Part 1]
4. Use (and abuse) of law for criminalisation of peaceful expression in India: A report by Human Rights Watch
5. Punish Racism - Protect African Nationals in India - select commentary in Indian Media and a press release by Africa group head of missions in Delhi
6. India: Remembering Trupti Shah - Tributes from Sahiyar (Stree Sangathan), Paryavaran Suraksha Samiti (PSS) and Narmada Bachao Andolan
7. Petition to the Whitethouse: Stop Shielding Dow Chemical from Accountability for Corporate Crimes in Bhopal, India 
8. Pakistan: Informality, Violence and Istability in Karachi | Asad Sayeed, Khurram Husain, Syed Salim Raza
9. Recent On Communalism Watch:
    India: Announced - Peaceful protest march by African students against racism and violent attacks in India (31st May, 2016, New Delhi)
    India: General V K Singh - Watch out this man
    India: Attacks on Jawaharlal Nehru's legacy will only strengthen his legacy (Apoorvanand)
    India: RSS considering Gorakhpur MP Yogi Adityanath who represents hardline hindutva as the party’s chief ministerial face.
    Gutsy and brave Rana Ayyub blows the whistle with her under cover investigation on Gujarat - her book 'Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover-Up' released in Delhi to a packed audience
    India: Painting himself as a victim Vanzara Gujarat's dirty harry launches himself into public life at a felicitation rally in Baroda
    India: Saffron swing in Kerala (Ajith Pillai)
    India - Punjab: Politics over murderous attack on Sikh preacher (Editorial, The Tribune)
    African diplomatic community to boycott Africa Day celebrations due to everyday racism and afro-phobia in India - Killing Of Student In Delhi's Vasant Vihar
    India: Excerpts from Rana Ayyub's 'Gujarat Files: Anatomy Of A Cover Up' (via scroll.in)
    India: WIth Modi in Power What the RSS gained - Excerpts from Panini Anand's article in Catch News
    India - Dilemma of Assam's Muslims: Neither Assamese nor Muslim enough (Satyen K. Bordoloi)
    India - Muzaffarnagar riots: Judicial panel fails to hold up the light to truth (Harsh Mander)
    India: List of sins cartoon by Sandeep Adhwaryu in The Times of India (2 Feb 2016)
    India: Urdu cleansing in Delhi - artists face ire while painting on the wall
    India: Re-Naming Akbar Road Is About Politics and Hindutva (Gopalkrishna Gandhi in The Wire)

::: URLs & FULL TEXT :::
10. 'No Muslims allowed': how nationalism is rising in Aung San Suu Kyi's Myanmar | Poppy McPherson
11. Bangladesh: The fuss about ISIS and what we need to do | Muhammad Nurul Huda
12. India: The Infiltration of Pseudo-Science in Science Through Myths and Miracles | Amitabha Basu
13. Ode to a nameless friend | Shiv Visvanathan

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1. PAKISTAN: CONSERVATIVE NUTS OF THE COUNCIL OF ISLAMIC IDEOLOGY AND THEIR RECIPE TO CAGE WOMEN - WHO WILL BRING THEIR HOUSE DOWN ?
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The Council of Islamic Ideology (CII) seems to be working in an overdrive to make its presence felt. The council has issued fatwas and given proposals, mainly targeting women on the issue of DNA testing in rape cases, child marriages and polygamy among others. Recent among these, though not binding on the government, is a proposed ‘model' of the women protection bill passed by the Punjab government a few months ago, which CII and other Islamic parties had firmly rejected declaring it “un-Islamic.” The ‘highlight' of amendments proposed by the body is it that it recommends allowing a husband to beat his wife ‘gently if she needs to be disciplined', in addition to prohibition on mixing of genders in schools, hospitals and offices.
http://www.sacw.net/article12785.html

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2. INDIA - PAKISTAN: FISHERMEN IN TROUBLED WATERS | Jatin Desai
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To be in prison in one's own country is itself a nerve-wracking ordeal. But imagine how much more agonising it must be to languish in another country's prison, often endlessly, and for no fault or for minor transgressions, especially if the two countries in question happen to be India and Pakistan?
http://www.sacw.net/article12778.html

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3. INDIA: TARIQ ALI INTERVIEW’S JAIRUS BANAJI ON TELESUR TV [PART 1]
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Global Empire: India. Past and Present (Part 1) Telesur TV, May 24, 2016 ’India The World Today’ In part one of Tariq Ali and professor Jairus Banaji’s discussion, they look at the recent student dispute at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, and what it has revealed about the BJP government. They discuss how the world’s largest democracy has struggled with authoritarianism and even fascism in the past, the relationship between caste and capitalism in India, and how the country’s judiciary is being compromised by the politicians.
http://www.sacw.net/article12783.html

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4. USE (AND ABUSE) OF LAW FOR CRIMINALISATION OF PEACEFUL EXPRESSION IN INDIA: A REPORT BY HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
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This report details how the criminal law is used to limit peaceful expression in India. It documents examples of the ways in which vague or overbroad laws are used to stifle political dissent, harass journalists, restrict activities by nongovernmental organizations, arbitrarily block Internet sites or take down content, and target religious minorities and marginalized communities, such as Dalits.
http://www.sacw.net/article12780.html

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5. PUNISH RACISM - PROTECT AFRICAN NATIONALS IN INDIA - SELECT COMMENTARY IN INDIAN MEDIA AND A PRESS RELEASE BY AFRICA GROUP HEAD OF MISSIONS IN DELHI
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Editorials from some Indian newspapers following racist attacks against African nationals in India and a release by Africa group head of missions in Delhi and urls for reports in Africa
http://www.sacw.net/article12787.html

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6. INDIA: REMEMBERING TRUPTI SHAH - TRIBUTES FROM SAHIYAR (STREE SANGATHAN), PARYAVARAN SURAKSHA SAMITI (PSS) AND NARMADA BACHAO ANDOLAN
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 The women's movement, the environmental cause, the struggle for justice has lost a voice that never flinched from standing up for victims of exploitation, injustice and violence. Trupti Shah (54) left us on May 26, 2016 in Vadodara after a valiant battle against lung cancer.
http://www.sacw.net/article12789.html

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7. PETITION TO THE WHITEHOUSE: STOP SHIELDING DOW CHEMICAL FROM ACCOUNTABILITY FOR CORPORATE CRIMES IN BHOPAL, INDIA
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Greed, carelessness, and callous disregard for human life sum up the causes of the 1984 Bhopal gas disaster - Request for Assistance for Bhopal Survivors' Petition
http://www.sacw.net/article12790.html

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8. PAKISTAN: INFORMALITY, VIOLENCE AND ISTABILITY IN KARACHI | Asad Sayeed, Khurram Husain, Syed Salim Raza
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Informal manufacturing is more prevalent than formal manufacturing in terms of the number of people employed, land area covered by informal enterprises, and number of enterprises.
http://www.sacw.net/article12713.html

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9. RECENT ON COMMUNALISM WATCH:
======================================== 
    India: Announced - Peaceful protest march by African students against racism and violent attacks in India (31st May, 2016, New Delhi)
    India: General V K Singh - Watch out this man
    India: Attacks on Jawaharlal Nehru's legacy will only strengthen his legacy (Apoorvanand)
    India: RSS considering Gorakhpur MP Yogi Adityanath who represents hardline hindutva as the party’s chief ministerial face.
    Gutsy and brave Rana Ayyub blows the whistle with her under cover investigation on Gujarat - her book 'Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover-Up' released in Delhi to a packed audience
    Announcement: 'Aryan Invasion Theory and Dr. B.R. Ambedkar' upcoming seminar at Nehru Memorial in Delhi (30 May 2016)
    India: Painting himself as a victim Vanzara Gujarat's dirty harry launches himself into public life at a felicitation rally in Baroda
    Book launch announcement: Rana Ayyub's Gujarat Files (27 May New Delhi)
    India: Saffron swing in Kerala (Ajith Pillai)
    India - Punjab: Politics over murderous attack on Sikh preacher (Editorial, The Tribune)
    African diplomatic community to boycott Africa Day celebrations due to everyday racism and afro-phobia in India - Killing Of Student In Delhi's Vasant Vihar
    India: Excerpts from Rana Ayyub's 'Gujarat Files: Anatomy Of A Cover Up' (via scroll.in)
    India: Why are the right-wing vigilante group Bajrang Dal organising commando-style training camps in UP?
    India: WIth Modi in Power What the RSS gained - Excerpts from Panini Anand's article in Catch News
    India: Withdraw 'divyang' for 'viklang' for Peoples with Disabilities (PWD) - Petition to the Prime Minister
    India - Dilemma of Assam's Muslims: Neither Assamese nor Muslim enough (Satyen K. Bordoloi)
    India - Muzaffarnagar riots: Judicial panel fails to hold up the light to truth (Harsh Mander)
    See You Again - Ajit Ninan and Jug Suraiya cartoon (The Times of India, 23 May 2016)
    India: List of sins cartoon by Sandeep Adhwaryu in The Times of India (2 Feb 2016)
    Cartoon by Satish Acharya on The Liberhan Commission that spent 17 years to produce a report on the Babari Mosque demolition of 1992
    India: Urdu cleansing in Delhi - artists face ire while painting on the wall
    India: Re-Naming Akbar Road Is About Politics and Hindutva (Gopalkrishna Gandhi in The Wire)
    The Real Source of Terror in Bangladesh by Willam B. Milam (The New York Times)
    Narendra Modi govt's new move on education: Coming soon a Vedic and Sanskrit education board 

 -> available via: http://communalism.blogspot.com/
 
::: URLs & FULL TEXT :::
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10. 'NO MUSLIMS ALLOWED': HOW NATIONALISM IS RISING IN AUNG SAN SUU KYI'S MYANMAR
by Poppy McPherson
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(The Guardian - 23 May 2016)

Concerns grow that Buddhist extremism may flourish unless country’s new democratic leaders counter discrimination against minorities

At the entrance to Thaungtan village there’s a brand-new sign, bright yellow, that bears the message: “No Muslims allowed to stay overnight. No Muslims allowed to rent houses. No marriage with Muslims.”

The post was erected in late March by Buddhist residents of the village in Myanmar’s lush Irrawaddy delta region who signed, or were strong-armed into signing, a document asserting that they wanted to live separately.

Since then a couple of other villages across the country have followed suit. Small but viciously insular, these “Buddhist-only” outposts serve as microcosms of the festering religious tensions that threaten Myanmar’s nascent experiment with democracy.
A sign barring Muslims from staying overnight, doing commerce, or marrying in Thaungtan village, in Myanmar’s Irrawaddy Delta Region.

A sign barring Muslims from staying overnight, doing commerce, or marrying in Thaungtan village, in Myanmar’s Irrawaddy delta region. Photograph: Poppy McPherson for the Guardian

After decades of military rule, Myanmar has entered a new era. As state counsellor, Aung San Suu Kyi is in charge, though key institutions remain under the army’s control.

Recent weeks, however, have brought a surge in nationalist activity. Scores rallied outside the US embassy in Yangon last month to demand diplomats stop using the word Rohingya to describe millions of Muslims confined to internal displacement camps and villages in western Myanmar. Nationalists insist the group are illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

The few public comments Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) has given on the issue have not been encouraging.


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11. BANGLADESH: THE FUSS ABOUT ISIS AND WHAT WE NEED TO DO
by Muhammad Nurul Huda
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(The Daily Star - May 28, 2016)

The murders of bloggers, intellectuals, priests, academicians, rights activists, and also persons of ordinary vocations committed by allegedly extremist groups owing allegiance to ISIS have given rise to a heated controversy regarding the organisational existence of such an outfit in Bangladesh. Every time an incident even remotely carrying the hallmarks of religiously motivated extremist groups occurs, there is instant attribution by some western quarters to ISIS.  The government, on the other hand, loses no time in firmly denying its existence in Bangladesh.

The denial mode about the organisational existence of ISIS gives rise to uneasiness. In the past, it was the persistent denial of the then establishment of there being any JMB or its Bangla Bhai and his depredations in northern areas of the country. The then authorities grappled with the reality only when the ground conditions and mounting international pressure compelled them to confront the religious extremists. As a result, extremist dens were busted, criminal cases were registered and finally capital punishment was handed down to at least six notorious terrorists.

One could reasonably ask as to what is significant in the continuous attribution to ISIS hands behind every suspected extremist attack. The government of the day, despite its denial of the organisational existence of ISIS, has commenced appropriate legal actions. That is only desirable because in the penal lexicon all the suspected extremist attacks constitute criminal offenses and as such statutory actions have to follow.

Are some quarters venturing to make us and the world at large believe that the Bangladeshi polity is prone to extremist ideas and that the bigoted elements can have a field day on account of slack governance? How does the admission of the organisational existence of an extra-territorial network help us in adequately confronting the menace? The blunt reality may be that misguided elements in our midst stand ready to carry out the implementation of ISIS objectives for their so-called religious beliefs. However, that cannot detract the resolve of the mainstream to confront such religious extremism. 

ISIS would naturally prefer to work through secretive or banned organisations. Such organisations cannot operate openly and thus one may not be definitive about their organisational existence. In Bangladesh, banned organisations like JMB or HUJI or the relatively recent Ansarullah Bangla Team have suspected elements within its fold who are ready to work as foot soldiers of ISIS without any extra-territorial promptings.

The presence of operatives of international terrorist groups is not an essential precondition for terrorist occurrences within the country. Ideas of extremism to identification of targets can well be coordinated from distant lands. External connections of militants in Bangladesh cannot be viewed as an entirely new development. Given the history, effective links would require very little effort. Individual acquaintances may not take much time to turn into organisational ties. Therefore, denial of external connections should not be a strategy. It is time to act proactively.

What needs to be done is to note that the militant's focus is on the use of power in pursuit of policy. Some sections of the public have been converted to this approach. Incidentally, the liberal current of opinion was significantly de-legitimised. The goal, therefore, should be denial of space for the radicalised and the militant. The extremists shall not be allowed to develop vital stakes in the political system.

While eradicating or controlling militancy it should occur to us that in Bangladesh the advocates of the extreme path are more determined than the liberals. Liberal forces hardly work with intense dedication, much less with a sense of mission. One has to remember that in Bangladesh secularism as state ideology finds it difficult to compete with a language of belonging saturated with religion.

One has to recognise the socio-economic reality of Bangladesh where gross poverty co-exists with democracy, a liberal constitution and disorder with functioning polity; the religious and traditional beliefs are far more tenacious than the liberals imagine. The State has, at times, been involved in the business of defining religion. Significantly, the compulsions of the traditional obligations of the ruler to protect State religion have to be kept in view.

The militants' strategy consists of efforts to win the trust and confidence of the majority population based on the role of extremists serving as arbitrators of individual and community disputes and financiers of education and livelihoods. Therefore, specific economic issues should be addressed on an urgent basis.

The area of action to counter militancy is a battle of ideas, challenging the ideological motivations that extremists believe justify the use of violence. Successful prosecution in the courts, based on gathering of necessary evidence and apprehending those involved in planning acts of terrorism before committing of mischief should be one of the principal approaches of countering militant activity.

The inescapable fact is that the ultimate responsibility of breeding a violent culture and its multiple social ramifications shall fall on state agencies that fail to see the ominous signals of religious extremism and perhaps willy-nilly nurture and protect the so-called Jihadi groups.

There is a causal relationship between policy and violence on the social level within the country and on the personal level within the household. The state has to accept responsibility for the overall propensity for violence in the public and private places. Respect for religious difference, and racial, sexual and ethnic freedom needs to be recognised by the state first before it is recognised by everyone else. 

The writer is a columnist of The Daily Star.


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12. INDIA: THE INFILTRATION OF PSEUDO -SCIENCE IN SCIENCE THROUGH MYTHS AND MIRACLES
by Amitabha Basu
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(The Citizen, May 29, 2016  | https://tinyurl.com/hk67yb5)

NEW DELHI: The Sangh Parivar has always tried to project a revival of the ‘glorious ancient Hindu past’ as the way forward for our country.

For them, to wax eloquent about Hindu India’s past scientific achievements is the hallmark of true nationalism. At the same time, they talk about development and economic growth, aided by modern science and technology, for India to become a great and powerful nation. “The most crucial components of a modern worldview – rationality and the practice of critique – are ignored and rejected in favour of blind faith in Sanatana Dharma and a revival of a supposedly Vedic past.”

The ball was set rolling in late 2014 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi himself who declared at the opening ceremony of a hospital in Mumbai that modern medical achievements – plastic surgery, cloning and in-vitro fertilisation – were all practised in India’s ancient past, that Lord Ganesha’s elephant head is proof that advanced transplant surgery existed, and that the way Kunti conceived in the Mahabharata was evidence of the practice of in-vitro fertilisation.

His Sangh Parivar colleagues followed with a slew of similar claims about ancient Indian science.

The Indian Science Congress held in early 2015 saw several such instances:
     An IAS officer started his presentation by blowing a conch shell for 2 minutes and claimed that the sound could cure many human disorders.
      An invited lecture sought to project Lord Shiva as the ‘greatest environmentalist in the world’.
      At the symposium on Ancient Sciences through Sanskrit, ‘evidence’ was laid out that sophisticated flying vehicles existed in Vedic times : as large as modern-day jumbo jets, with radar and advanced guidance and tracking systems; their pilots wore magic suits and they were capable of interplanetary travel. The authors claimed that their work is based on the Maharshi Bhardwaj Vaimanika Sastra, a text they say was written around 400 BC. But scholars at the IISc in Bangalore say it was actually written between 1900 and 1922.
 It is therefore not surprising that 2009 Chemistry Nobel laureate V Ramakrishnan described the Congress as a ‘circus’ and vowed never to attend one again.

Noted biologist P M Bhargava, founder of CCMB, Hyderabad, also exasperatedly said that the event had deteriorated over the years and was now ‘an absolute waste of money’.

The claims of interplanetary spaceships so incensed Dr. R P Gandhiraman, a NASA scientist, that he collected hundreds of signatures from other scientists around the world on a petition demanding that the session be cancelled. "We as a scientific community should be seriously concerned about the infiltration of pseudo-science in science curricula with the backing of influential political parties …Giving a scientific platform for a pseudo-science talk is worse than a systematic attack that has been carried out by politically powerful pseudo-science propagandists in the recent past. If we scientists remain passive, we are betraying not only the science, but also our children."

An exhibit was inaugurated by the Minister of Culture, Mahesh Sharma, in Delhi’s Rabindra Bhavan, entitled Cultural Continuity from Rig Veda to Robotics.

Here was a display of plastic placards decorated with calendar art and tele-serial imaginings of the Mahabharata, coupled with crude info-graphics informing us that by correlating references to the planets and stars in the Sanskrit epics with astronomy software, the historicity of Lord Ram, and the narratives of the Ramayana and Mahabharata had now been firmly established. To wit: the “fall of Duryodhan in mace battle” occurred at 06:50 on November 14, 3139 BC. Ram himself was born on January 10, 5014 BC. “Around 12 to 1 noontime.”

We do not by any means wish to imply that glorifying the scientific achievements of ancient India is simply communal Hindu propaganda, to be disdainfully dismissed. On the contrary, we should be proud of our ancient scientific heritage.

However, we have to carefully sift genuine and legitimate science from mythology and imaginative speculation. ”There is no doubt that an ancient tradition of excellence in science existed in India. Scholars believe that the Indus Valley Civilisation, that flourished 2,500 years before the Christian era, used a system of weights and measures based on an awareness of the decimal system. It is clear too that the cities of this civilisation could not have been built without knowledge of simple geometry….”

“There is a conflation of myth and superstition with the scientific advances of the past; and then a spurious equivalence is sought to be created between ancient myths and modern science. The technological products of the Enlightenment are eagerly sought, while the critical methods of science, which lead us to question every assumption and belief, are firmly shut out. Science as a vehicle for rationality and as an expression of reason is something that Hindutva strongly opposes, even as it seeks the credibility of science for its myths. This explains why the Hindu nationalists ruling India today celebrate technology while constantly seeking to undermine scientific methods.”

Why did the great scientific achievements of ancient India not advance further through succeeding centuries? The cheerleaders of Hindutva give a simplistic and historically wrong argument is that invasions by Muslims and later the British wiped out these glorious achievements, and they have now set forth to revive them.

Historian Romila Thapar has argued that early achievements in ancient and medieval science, such as astronomy and mathematics, were never consolidated in India because of opposition from religious orthodoxy; and philosophers who believed in reason and science had to encounter opposition from dominant religious authorities. “It is an irony that the upholders of a monistic version of Brahminical Hinduism are today claiming the achievements in ancient Indian science for a political project whose lineage can only be linked to those who opposed that very scientific endeavour.”

The Modi government has shown scant regard for the development of a scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform [Article 51A(h) of the constitution].

Appointment of saffronised but otherwise incompetent persons to key posts of scientific and educational institutions, rewriting of school textbooks to inculcate unscientific, irrational and historically inaccurate knowledge in our younger generation, the ‘unsolved’ murders of rationalists Dabholkar, Pansare and Kalburgi … the list grows longer with each passing day.

Yoga has been promoted by Narendra Modi, and endorsed by his pet godmen Ramdev and Ravishankar, as the greatest gift of ancient India to humanity and the cure for the ills afflicting humankind. In his speech to the United Nations General Assembly, PM Modi had even suggested that climate change can be mitigated by the practice of yoga. International Yoga Day is coming soon and will be observed with enormous pomp and show. Yoga is being forced upon all religious and minority groups as a token of their ‘deshbhakti’.

Nobody says that Yoga is not beneficial. But there are many millions engaged in walking, running, cycling and weight training than those practising yoga and reaping equal or better benefits. But there is no brand that unifies them as yoga does, and there is no allure of spirituality and "5000 years” of heritage behind what they do.

A comprehensive study by a Karnataka-based researcher-consultant, Dr Srinivas Kakkilaya, has said that "all the available evidence as of now, and the systematic reviews and meta-analyses, indicate clearly that yoga does not cure or prevent, or significantly alleviate, any ailment, that affects humans.”

The study refutes the claim that yoga is the oldest contribution to the world from India, that it is the greatest contribution from Hinduism, that it has helped Indians with health and vitality for millennia.

Pointing out that yoga was "never a part of Indian systems of medicine", Kakkilaya says, "Indian medical texts such as Charaka Samhita or Ashtanga Hrudaya do not mention yoga as a method of prevention or treatment of any disease", adding, "The credit for entwining the so called yoga with health and fitness must go to Manibhai Haribhai Desai, also known as Shri Yogendra (1897-1989), and Jagannath Ganesh Gune, also known as Swami Kuvalayananda (1883-1966)."

Based on an analysis of more than 3000 papers over the last 100 years, the study concludes, "The proponents of yoga therapy have failed to find any conclusive evidence for the efficacy of yoga in treating any illness. They have not even been successful in standardizing the so called yoga therapy.”

Apprehensions have been raised that yoga being foisted upon the armed forces, with the chiefs meekly following the Modi government’s directives, may well lead to politicisation of the military.

How have the scientists of India reacted to this trend of growing irrationality and unscientific claims ? Sadly, by and large the ‘leaders’ of the scientific and technological establishments in India have a very poor record of rational and scientific thinking and attitude.

Take ISRO, perhaps the most successful Indian establishment in terms of its track record of raising Indian space science and technology to international levels.

For several decades, before any space launch from Sriharikotta the ISRO chief has taken a replica of the space launch vehicle to Sri Ventakeshwara temple in Tirupati to seek divine blessings for the success of the mission. Do they have more faith in divine guidance than in the scientific and technological prowess of their own scientists and engineers? It appears so.

As someone sarcastically asked the ISRO chief : “Have you ever considered blaming your gods (and claiming damage recovery from the temple trust authorities) when some of the earlier Indian rockets failed?” Dr. Radhakrishnan, the then chief of ISRO, carried out the same exercise in the case of the hugely successful Mangalyaan.

Dr. Madhavan Nair, former ISRO chief, has joined the ‘glorious ancient Indian science’ bandwagon. Some of his statements:
 Some sholkas in one of the Vedas say that there is water on the moon but no one believed it. Through our Chandrayaan mission, we could establish that and we were the first ones to find that out," Nair said, adding that everything in Vedas could not be understood as they were in chaste Sanskrit.
      "We are really proud that Aryabhatta and Bhaskara have done extensive work on planetary work and exploration of outer planets….Even for Chandrayaan, the equation of Aryabhatta was used. Even the (knowledge of) gravitational field... Newton found it some 1500 years later... The knowledge existing (in our scriptures).”
      "The Vedas had a lot of information in the field of space and atomic energy. We were fine until 600 BC. Then came the time of invasions till the independence. Since then we are growing. We deciphered the atoms for peaceful use."
 DRDO, which has the responsibility of developing state-of-the-art arms and ammunition systems for the Indian armed forces, has not been far behind. The director of the Research and Development Establishment, Pune, has allegedly spent over Rs 5 crores of its funds and energies in developing a pure silver hi-tech chariot and ‘donated’ it to Alandi Temple in June after a bullock was killed during the 21-day annual palki yatra to Pandharpur.

A senior scientist, who rebelled against this ‘absurd’ venture and filed a complaint with the Central Vigilance Commission, had to pay for it. The DRDO not only stripped him off his ongoing projects, but also transferred him out of the Pune centre to a post where he was left to waste.

We all know about the Narendra Modi government’s order to DRDO to collaborate and assist the Patanjali Yogpeeth enterprise of Baba Ramdev, for manufacturing and marketing some of the herbal supplements and food products developed by DRDO. The defence minister, army chief and DRDO chief endorsed this collaboration. It is common knowledge that most of Ramdev’s products have not been certified by the national food safety authorities and their purity and efficacy are suspect.

India may be close to entering a phase of ideology-driven science. “Most important is creation of atmosphere in which rational scientists are being projected as agents of the West out to undermine the glory of ancient Indian past," said Mayank Vahia, an astrophysicist at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research. Eminent scientist P M Bhargava, agrees, "There is no doubt that with the present government at the centre which is the political front of the RSS, fringe elements have started squeezing Indian science including mainline science and science policies. 
This is clear from the appointments made to crucial scientific posts." Vahia says, “Rationalist Indian scientists are willing to study past achievements based on principles of logic and evidence, but the fringe nationalistic groups … try to forcefully occupy the mainstream dialogue on India's past and are not willing to accept limitations imposed by logic. The great seers of the past were supposed to be all-seeing and all-knowing, period." 
The consequence of such approach could be disastrous. "The rationalist scientists will find their own work space squeezed as they deal with a government that is influenced by parochial considerations. Pure excellence will give way to committed excellence … Most mainstream scientists get overwhelmed by the beauty and elegance of nature in a few years and a fair fraction of them have strongly religious backgrounds … they become convinced about the gods as entities who supervise our lives and give up the rationalist approach to life and existence. These scientists then become supporters of irrationality".

Vahia wants rationalist scientists to take on fringe elements by educating people about real achievements of the past. "Scientists will have to arm themselves with a better understanding of the true achievements of the past, and then step forward and take on the fringe groups who are well-organised, well-funded, shrill and increasingly tolerated, if not encouraged, by the powers that be …The battle is for the soul of the nation, no more, no less. A battle is not far, and it will be brutal, hard and long." However, given the fact that most Indian scientists are "career-conscious" and depend on government grants for research, it is doubtful if many would join Vahia in his campaign.

In conclusion, it is imperative for all democratic-minded, rational-thinking and freedom-loving people to close their ranks, irrespective of their political or ideological beliefs and inclinations, and oppose the increasing attempts of the saffron brigade to impose its narrow, communal and bigoted Hindutva agenda on the people of our country in the name of ‘nationalism’.

 (Dr Amitabha Basu is scientist, having worked with the Space Applications Centre (ISRO) and the National Physical Laboratory (CSIR)) 


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13. ODE TO A NAMELESS FRIEND
by Shiv Visvanathan
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(The Hindu - May 30, 2016)

Compassion: "Animals are part of the citizenry of a city. Our kindness to them is the beginning of the civics of a city.” File photo of a rainy day in Mumbai. — Photo: AP
‘Straydom’ is perhaps the metaphor for democracy: where there is vulnerability there is solidarity.

This is an age when we worship politicians like monuments and let monuments fall into decay. It has been described as VIP time, when power is basically impotent but pompous in its display. The marginal and the anonymous fade away, and there is no one to record them, mourn them, tell their stories. Important events in their lives are not seen as history.

A few days back, I saw a stray dog die. He was flung by the force of the truck that hit him. There was not even a yelp of protest as he was swept to the side of the road. He trembled for a minute and then lay silent. It was not as if life came to a standstill. The traffic stood in abeyance for a second and then accelerated in an act of forgetting. Only an old beggar ran up in dismay to the still creature.

I remember the dog, even as a pup. He claimed the road, protesting against every truck that went past. Like all strays he was a character, with a pinched tail and folded ears. He was master of all the dustbins in the area, the scavenger as hero. There is a touch of homelessness about the stray. He was desperate to be adopted, virtually beseeching to be taken home, and yet he had the dignity of homelessness, living ascetically of the little bits available.

Hopeful, yet doomed

The stray dog becomes a metaphor for workers of the informal economy: at home in its homelessness, hopeful, inventive, and yet strangely doomed. At night time in Delhi, as the poor settle down to their scraps of pavement, one often sees a dog regal on a sack, watching traffic. The lazy curiosity of the dog is almost inimitable. He has a temporary home and a master, and he seems content. He knows that citizenship is temporary, which is what makes it precious. Stray dogs have an intelligence that pets lose. They have a galvanic alertness which pets can never rival.

There is something about stray dogs that always haunts me. Their faces are so expressive, almost an indictment of one’s presence and privilege. Yet they demand so little and live on even less. I sat saddened by the death of the dog. It will lie unattended on the road until crows summon a raucous feast on his insides. In a few days, even flies will be indifferent as car after car runs over his remains. There is almost something stark and unsentimental to his ending, as if indifference is the only tribute the city can pay its homeless.

A stray dog becomes as it were the signature of the city. I remember reading the records of the Shah Commission on the Emergency. There is a paragraph where the Commission talks of Sanjay Gandhi driving through the outskirts of Delhi. His car runs over a stray dog, and he is so incensed that he starts the demolition programme, widening the roads of the city the next day.

The stray marks urban space, its eyes provide the only sense of hope, as if only animality of the dog can mark the humanity of the city. A stray is that endearing, devastating combination of obsequiousness and an absent-minded demand for rights and recognition. A pet dog can never quite express it the same way. It takes its world for granted. It is bourgeois in its expectations, even finicky about food. A stray is incessantly grateful and can turn even a dry morsel of a chappati into a princely dish, licking its chops in remembrance. It is shameless in its gratitude.

The fact that it lives on little allows it to celebrate life in a different way. One should watch a stray dog in winter. By seven, the dog has finished its scavenging rounds. It is a fine-grained ritual and dogs almost seem puzzled by what humans leave in a dustbin. The other day I saw two strays pull a huge pizza out of the bin, take a bite, and look puzzled. They virtually abandoned it in embarrassment, nodding sadly as if Indians have forgotten what it means to eat good food. The meal abandoned, they rushed to a lawn and stretched out to capture the heat of the sun. The languorous ease is enviable. While the sun warmed them gently, the dogs stretched out, as if in a luxurious spa, one eye open as a concession to future events. That and an occasional wag of recognition to a familiar face was about all the sign of activity for a few hours. Their bodies heaved in gratitude and the dogs rested in peace, content with the moment. This was a celebration of life, a statement of the everyday affluence of time in the overall scarcity of the city.

A stray dog captures the poignancy of the city, of being and loss on the pavements, the voicelessness of the majority of the citizens, the desperate commitment to a little quilt patch of space which has neither a house nor even a sense of security.

‘Straydoms’ and kingdoms

A friend of mine, an ethologist of the city, told me something interesting. He said the West never thinks of animals in any other way in the city except as well-behaved pets. Our city is a place for some forms of wildlife. Stray dogs are an essential part of any city. In fact, he insisted on theorising about it, playfully comparing ‘straydom’ and kingdom. Kingdoms, he said, have absolute power. ‘Straydoms’ have little power, but each and every dog behaves for a few moments like a king. In a city where there is a large number of the homeless, ‘straydom’ is perhaps the metaphor for democracy: where there is vulnerability there is solidarity.

He added that nothing is as pompous and painful as a dog which has been adopted. It wears its collar like a bowtie, marches around as if it lives in paradise, gets conscious of its rights, and snaps at anyone who threatens to intrude its space. As a stray dog, it said hello to the world. As a newly converted pet, it is intolerably exclusive, unbearable, parading its pomposity in a new dance of steps, which is sheer promenade. Oddly, these pets, which at the most responded enthusiastically to the universally inclusive “Tommy!”, usually carry the most pompous of names, masquerading princely genealogies. The instant acquisition of imaginary pedigrees destabilises them. You wonder what happened to the earlier avatar, desperate to love and include all the world.

I still want to mourn the dog that died smashed by a truck. I can still see the reprimand in his eyes. It was a statement, a reminder that animals are part of the citizenry of a city. Our kindness to them is the beginning of the civics of a city. This much I know: it is the animal called the stray dog that humanises the city. No dhaba, no pavement, no procession would be complete without the comradeship of the stray dog. I am not a sentimental, ritualistic person but I went back to the street, put a little cross on the pavement, and stood in silence for a minute.

It felt I owed to my nameless brown friend.

Shiv Visvanathan is a Professor at Jindal Law School.


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South Asia Citizens Wire
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