All posts by subhash gatade

Debates, Empire/ Imperialism, Left watch

Praful Bidwai Is No More

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Praful Bidwai is no more. He died in Amsterdam on Tuesday evening due to a cardiac arrest, With his death we have lost the ‘best left-wing journalist’ in this part of South Asia whose articles appeared in many newspapers and magazines in the subcontinent and in the middle east and was frequently published by The Guardian, Le Monde Diplomatique as well. Praful will be missed by thousands and thousands of his readers (this pen pusher included) who were ‘groomed’ by him in a career spanning more than four decades. For them he was one such voice who remained uncompromising in his strident criticism of communal fundamentalisms of various kinds and the crony capitalism which is having a field day these days. He was a leading voice for nuclear disarmament and peace as well and had written extensively on it. It was a strange coincidence that we met last in the capital when a memorial meeting was organised by Communist Party of India to remember the legendary Comrade Govind Pansare who was assassinated few days back. He was to speak in the meeting. The meeting was yet to start and I could steal some time to talk to him. He told he is working on a book – which was near completion – on the left movement in the country and had interviewed many activists associated with the movement to listen to their understanding of challenges before the left. And in that connection he had long meeting with Com Pansare – once in Kolhapur and one possibly in Mumbai. He shared his fascination about the energies he still had at that age for ‘the cause’. Few days after the meeting, there was a call from him asking for a phone number of a dalit activist which incidentally I did not have. Yes, that was the last time I spoke to him.

Continue reading Praful Bidwai Is No More →

Debates, Everyday Life, Government

Hey Ram ! Madhav

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(Picture : Courtesy ‘Youth ki Awaaz)

Ram Madhav, the first official spokesperson of RSS (later removed or discharged from this role) and these days ‘loaned’ to BJP as a ‘senior leader’ engaged in what an analyst called double delete asana on International Yoga Day. The first of this kind of ‘asana’ – unheard before – was rather necessitated by the impetuosity with which the net savvy leader twitted about ‘absence of Vice President Hamid Ansari’ from the celebrations and the ‘blackout of the programme by Rajya Sabha TV which is chaired by him’ and later twitted ‘an apology about the confusion’ and within no time deleted both the twits.

By evening it was clear that not only the Rajya Sabha TV had provided a live coverage of the programme but also provided clarifications about honourable Vice President’s absence. It was revealed that he was not invited for the programme by the concerned minister. In fact his office had to issue a press release to the effect because of the insinuations which were being spread targeting him and perhaps also tell the likes of Ram Madhav that there is something called protocol which the Vice President has to follow.

One does not know whether it would be possible for Mr Ram Madhav to comprehend such nuances of democratic procedures because for him such details are of no consequence. In fact if he was really concerned about absence of Vice President of India in the said programme, he could have easily phoned his office and made further enquiries. But as we know he just wanted to underline his absence from such a programme of ‘national glory’ when India was supposedly ‘leading the world’. It was an indirect way to further the illiberal and exclusivist agenda he has been exposed to since younger days. Continue reading Hey Ram ! Madhav →

Culture, Debates, Education, Media politics

An Open Letter to Mr Gajendra Chauhan by FTII Student

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Guest Post by FTII student

As protests against the appointment of Mr Gajendra Chauhan as new chairman of the Institute gather steam, with students on an indefinite strike since 12th June and a joint protest being organised in Delhi on Tuesday at 11 am in front of I&B ministry in solidarity with the strike, here is an open letter written to the newly appointed Chairman by a FTII student.

Facts are also coming to the fore that not only Mr Chauhan but four of the eight members nominated under ‘Persons of Eminence’ category to the society also have saffron connections, further demonstrating how the Sangh Parivar is keen to change the very ethos and nature of these institutions and establish its regressive agenda.

Dear Mr Chauhan,

I am choosing to address you personally after listening to you respond on several TV news debates about the recent opposition against your appointment as Chairman at FTII. I am a student of FTII and part of the protest. Continue reading An Open Letter to Mr Gajendra Chauhan by FTII Student →

Culture, Genders, Language

प्रचारक का स्त्री चिन्तन

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जुबां फिसलती है और शायद बहुत अनर्थ करा देती है।

बांगलादेश की जनाब मोदी की ‘सफल यात्रा’ के बाद उनके हिमायती शायद यही सोचते हैं। यह अकारण नहीं कि ‘स्त्री होने के बावजूद शेख हसीना द्वारा किए गए कामों की तारीफ कर’ बुरी तरह आलोचना का शिकार हुए प्रधानमंत्री मोदी के चीअरलीडर्स का कहना रहा है कि यह जुबां फिसलने का मामला है और उसकी इतनी आलोचना ठीक नहीं है।

अगर सन्देह का लाभ देकर इस मसले पर बात न भी की जाए, मगर आप इस मौन की किस तरह व्याख्या करेंगे कि उन छत्तीस घंटों में उन्होंने एक बार भी सुश्री इंदिरा गांधी का नाम नहीं लिया, जो बांगलादेश की मुक्ति के वक्त भारत की प्रधानमंत्री थीं । अटल बिहारी वाजपेयी के नाम बांगलादेश सरकार द्वारा दिया गया पुरस्कार स्वीकार किया, मगर बांगलादेश की मुक्ति के बाद जिन वाजपेयी ने उन्हीं इंदिरा गांधी को ‘दुर्गा’ के तौर पर सम्बोधित किया था, उनका एक बार नामोल्लेख तक नहीं किया।

यह निश्चित ही भुलने का मामला नहीं था, अगर ऐसा होता तो उनके साथ इतना बड़ा दल गया था, वह उन्हें अवश्य याद दिलाता। दरअसल यह उपरोक्त नाम को लेकर जुबां को सिल देने का मामला था। पूछा जाना चाहिए कि क्या होठों पर कायम चुप्पी क्या राजनीतिक क्षुद्रता का प्रतिबिम्बन था ? या उसके कुछ और मायने थे। Continue reading प्रचारक का स्त्री चिन्तन →

Culture, Debates, Government

Withdraw police case against Prof Kancha Ilaiah and revoke the ban on Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle : People’s Alliance for Democracy and Secularism

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Public Statement issued by People’s Alliance for Democracy and Secularism (PADS) on 6 June, 2015

A case has been filed by the Hyderabad police against well known Dalit writer and academic Kancha Ilaiah on a complaint by Vishwa Hindu Parishad members for hurting their religious sentiments. The complaint was filed on the basis of Ilaiah’s article Devudu Prajasamya Vada Kada? (Is God a democrat?) published in a Telugu daily on May 9. In the said article Ilaiah had argued that the possibility of democracy, or its lack inside different religious groups depend on the conception of their God(s). The VHP activists have accused Prof Ilaiah of comparing Hindu gods with God in Christianity and Islam, and of ridiculing their worship. Police have filed a case under sections 153A and 295A which prescribe imprisonment upto three years for spreading enmity among groups of people and outraging religious feelings. The police action against Ilaiah has come around the same time that the IIT Madras has derecognised a student group Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle that organises discussions around socio-cultural and political issues. The group was derecognised after an anonymous complaint against it was filed with the central HRD ministry. While many political parties and groups have justifiably come out in support of the APSC, it is surprising that Prof Ilaiah has received little solidarity. Both these incidences are a proof of the aggressive intent of Hindutva forces to attack any discourse which publicly questions their castiest, Brahminical and majoritarian understanding of Indian society. Successes of Mr Narendra Modi in the recent elections have emboldened them further . Continue reading Withdraw police case against Prof Kancha Ilaiah and revoke the ban on Ambedkar Periyar Study Circle : People’s Alliance for Democracy and Secularism →

Culture, Debates, Everyday Life, Government

No To Ambedkar-Periyar in ‘Modern Day Agraharam’?

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Whether discussing issues of contemporary concern among students, raising debates around them on the campus – taking inspiration from the ideas of leading social revolutionaries of 20th century – should be construed as an act of creating ‘social disharmony’ or ‘spreading hatred’ ?

Any sane person would rather reject this weird proposal but it appears that the bureaucrats in the Ministry of Human Resources Development (MHRD) think otherwise. It was evident in the way they acted on an anonymous complaint regarding the activities of a group of students in IIT Madras which calls itself ‘Ambedkar-Periyar Study Circle’ (APSC) – which comprises mainly of dalit, bahujan and adivasi students. Perhaps they were worried that the particular students group, has been critical about PM Modi’s policies and has been raising issues of caste, communalism as well as corporate loot of resources and challenging the ‘development’ narrative which is popular these days among a section of people. The impetuosity with which they acted when they wrote to the management of the Institute can also be gauged from the fact that in this process they violated the recommendations of the CVC (Central Vigilance Commission) itself which has ‘barred’ organisations from taking action on such (anonymous) complaints.

As of now the issue of ‘derecognition’ of APSC by the IITM management, has snowballed into a major controversy, with issues of curtailment of freedom of expression, infringement of autonomy of educational institutions and dominance of caste in higher education all coming to the fore. Continue reading No To Ambedkar-Periyar in ‘Modern Day Agraharam’? →

Capitalism, Debates, Education

बाल श्रम कानून में बदलाव का औचित्य :किशोर

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Guest Post by Kishore

Photo courtesy : newznew.com

संसदीय कैबिनेट ने १३ मई को बाल श्रम प्रतिबंधन एवं नियमन कानून (CLPRA act) में संशोधन को मंजूरी दे दी. मुख्य सकारात्मक बदलावों में १४ वर्ष की आयु तक किसी भी व्यवसाय अथवा प्रक्रिया में बाल श्रम पर पूर्ण प्रतिबन्ध का प्रावधान किया गया है जो स्वागत योग्य है. साथ ही ज्यादा कठोर सजा एवं जुर्माने का प्रावधान भी किया गया है जो कि सकारात्मक है. हालाँकि अभी भी यह बाल अधिकार समझौते की कसौटी पर खरा नहीं उतरता क्योंकि इसमें १४ से १८ साल के बच्चों को गैर खतरनाक उद्योगों में काम करने की अनुमति दी है पर फिर भी चौदह वर्ष तक पूर्ण प्रतिबन्ध एक प्रगतिशील कदम है.

चौदह वर्ष तक पूर्ण प्रतिबन्ध के बावजूद पारिवारिक व्यवसायों में बच्चों के काम करने को छूट दी गयी है .बच्चे पारिवारिक व्यवसायों में काम कर सकते हैं बशर्ते यह काम बच्चे स्कूल जाने के बाद करते हों. सरकार इस छूट का मुख्य कारण यह बता रही है कि इससे बच्चों को अपने पारंपरिक काम सीखने का मौके मिलेगा.

आइये इस बात की समीक्षा की जाये कि यह कारण कहाँ तक तार्किक है. सरकार पारंपरिक कौशल को लेकर कितनी चिंतित है यह तो पिछले बीस साल में हथकरघा और अन्य पारम्परिक पेशों के लिए बनाई गई नीतियों से स्पष्ट है. कोई उनसे पूछे की पिछले बीस सालो में घरेलू उत्पाद में पारंपरिक व्यवसायों का योगदान किस दर से बड़ा है? अगर सरकार को पारंपरिक कौशल के लुप्त होने का इतना ही डर है तो क्यों नहीं इसे स्कूली पाठ्यक्रम में शामिल करती ? अगर इसे पाठ्यक्रम में शामिल किया जाये तो बच्चे पढाई के साथ साथ व्यावसायिक कौशल भी सीखेंगे जो उनके जीवन में काम आयेगा. साथ ही पढाई के साथ काम सीखने से पढ़े लिखे लोगों में श्रम को नीची नज़र से देखने के नज़रिए पर भी लगाम लगेगी और शिक्षा और शारीरिक श्रम के बीच का फासला घटेगा. Continue reading बाल श्रम कानून में बदलाव का औचित्य :किशोर →

Capitalism, Culture, Debates, Government

Bombay Pavement Dwellers and Olga Tellis – A Quiet Verdict in Ahmedabad: N. Jayaram

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Guest Post by N. Jayaram

After the order in the case of film star Salman Khan over a 2002 hit-and-run case was delivered by Sessions Court Judge D.W. Deshpande on Wednesday, 6 May 2015, there understandably were divided opinions on whether he deserved to be handed five years in jail.

But the rather more shockingly breath-taking comments from some of his friends in the industry and his fans were to do with pavement dwellers, such as the victim Nurullah Mahboob Sharif.

“Kutta rd pe soyega kutte ki maut marega, roads garib ke baap ki nahi hai (If a dog sleeps on the road, he’ll die a dog’s death. Roads are not poor people’s property)…,” singer Abhijeet Bhattacharya tweeted. “Roads are meant for cars and dogs not for people sleeping on them…,” he said, appealing to the film industry to back the star, whose sentence has now been suspended by the High Court.

Designer Farah Khan Ali chipped in with this:  “No one should be sleeping on the road or footpath. It is dangerous to do that just like it is dangerous to cross tracks.” She quite rightly laid the blame on the state: “The govt should be responsible for housing ppl. If no1 was sleeping on d road in any other country Salman wuld not have driven over anybody.”

Perhaps she had read the International Covenant on Economic Social and Cultural Rights, to which India is a state party. Article 11.1 of the Covenant says: “The States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to an adequate standard of living for himself and his family, including adequate food, clothing and housing, and to the continuous improvement of living conditions. The States Parties will take appropriate steps to ensure the realization of this right…” Continue reading Bombay Pavement Dwellers and Olga Tellis – A Quiet Verdict in Ahmedabad: N. Jayaram →

Debates, Government, Law

Media Studies Group’s Statement on Internet Neutrality

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Media Studies Group demands that TRAI place Consultation document in Indian languages and extend deadline for feedback on Net Neutrality. 

New Delhi: April 20, 2015: Media Studies Group, a Delhi based think tank on communication studies, held a marathon meeting on Sunday on internet neutrality in the light of TRAI’s consultation paper on over-the-top (OTT) services. The meeting discussed various technical, legal and social aspects emerging out of Airtel’s Plan Zero and the internet.org venture of Facebook.

There was complete unanimity that the issue of net neutrality is complex in nature and that the masses need to be educated in simple and non-technical language so that a fair opinion can be generated on the functioning of the internet as the present move, if successful, will pose a serious challenge to the principle of equality and democratic character of the internet.

The meeting took a critical view of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) for its failure to present the consultation document in Indian languages. To have chosen to make the document available only in English is a move which has the potential of altering the fair access to internet by large numbers of users of Hindi and other regional languages. Media Studies Group also felt that the deadline of April 24 is unreasonable and should be extended.

It has been decided that a representation will be given to TRAI to demand presentation of the consultation document in Indian languages in easy to understand language and to set a new reasonable deadline for feedback . Media Studies Group has also decided to give a detailed representation to TRAI on the issue of Net Neutrality with a holistic view seeking protection of fundamental principles and rights enshrined in the Constitution of India.

On behalf of MSG,

Anil Chamadia, Chairman, Media Studies Group.

Email – msgroup.india@gmail.com

Capitalism, Government, Left watch

The Sin and the Error : Ravi Sinha

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Guest Post by RAVI SINHA

…it takes an error to father a sin. ─ J. Robert Oppenheimer[1]

Future historians of India may well describe the past year as a year of political sin. This was the year in which the man who had earlier presided over the Gujarat Carnage was awarded the ultimate prize. The year saw an election that touched a new low marked by shallowness, vulgarities and lies – in no small measure by the labors of the man himself. Equally appalling have been the exertions of a large class of literati and glitterati to portray philistinism and inanities spouted by the most powerful mouth as wisdom of a visionary leader.

An entire country seems to have gone blind – unable to see that the emperor has no clothes. In this age of incessant television it should be obvious to anyone that the supreme leader does not carry conviction even when enunciating relatively higher banalities. He is at his natural best only when he mocks someone as a shehzada or slanders and vilifies an entire community through phrases such as ame paanch, amara pachees. It is an irony of history that the republic which had Nehru as its first prime minister has one now for whom even common mythology is too cerebral. He must vulgarize Pushpak Viman and Ganesha and reduce them to quackeries of aviation and surgery.

Misfortune of the nation goes beyond the man. Forces of the diabolic housed in the hydra-headed Parivaar can now accomplish the impossible. They can now occupy the political center stage without leaving off the lunatic fringe. They can adopt Gandhi without renouncing Godse; erect world’s tallest statue of a leader who had punished their forefathers for assassinating Gandhi; even co-opt Bhagat Singh without batting an eyelid about what he stood for and what he had to say about ideologies like theirs. They can further refine the art of doublespeak. Their “statesmen” can pave the way for corporate plunder and call it sab ka vikas (development for all). Their “ideologues” can advocate sab ka saath (inclusion of all) by exhorting Hindu women to give birth to a minimum of four children each, lest Hindus are reduced to a minority “in their own country”. Continue reading The Sin and the Error : Ravi Sinha →

Bad ideas, Debates, Identities

And then they came for Oyasiqur Rahman Babu !

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Courtesy : m.bangladeshtime.com

….It is not the young who are writing obituaries for the old,…I have seen the blood shed by so many young people steadily mounting up until now I am submerged and cannot breathe. All I can do is take up my pen and write a few articles, as if to make a small hole in the mud through which I can draw a few more wretched breaths. What sort of world is this ? The night is so long, the way so long….

( Lu Xun, Written for the Sake of Forgetting, P 234, Selected Works of Lu Xun, Vol III, Beijing)

Md Oyasiqur Rahman Babu , aged 27 years is dead. A travel agency executive by profession and a secular blogger by passion he was killed by radical Islamists in Tejgaon, Dhaka when he was going to office in Motijheel. The three assailants – who did not personally know each other – met just for planning the murder and then executed it with military precision.

Thanks to the courage exhibited by trans genders living nearby who caught hold of these murderers while the locals who watched the act before their eyes just dithered to move. Zikrullah, a student of Hefazat-e-Islam’s Hathazari Madrasa in Chittagong, and Ariful, student of Mirpur Darul Uloom Madrasa – were caught while the third member of the team, Abu Taher of Mirpur Darul Uloom, managed to flee the spot. The arrestees said they had killed Oyasiqur for writing on religious issues. It is a different matter that none of them had read his blog, they even did not know what blogging is, they  just executed the order issued by some mastermind. Continue reading And then they came for Oyasiqur Rahman Babu ! →

Bad ideas, Capitalism, Government

Acche Din Are Here Again!

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U Turn on Pictorial Warning on Tobacco Products

picture courtesy : WHO

 ..Government is set to defer indefinitely the implementation of notification for increasing the size of pictorial warning on tobacco products beyond April one, when it was to come into force. ..The notification regarding amendment to the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Packaging and Labelling) Rules, 2008 sought increase in the size of specified health warning from the current 40 per cent to 85 per cent of the principal display area of the package of tobacco products.

(http://zeenews.india.com/news/health/health-news/govt-set-to-defer-tobacco-pictorial-warning-notification_1568427.html)

The week gone by has brought back smiles on the face of Tobacco Corporates.

Thanks to the latest U turn by the Modi government, Acche Din would continue unabated for them. The non-transparent manner in which the decision was taken and the media was kept in the dark has raised further eyebrows. It was only on the evening of 24 th March that while talking to the media, the health minister J P Nadda had assured them that there is no rethink in the government on introducing pictorial warnings covering 85 per cent of packaging for tobacco products from April 1 and within few hours of this interaction he left for Beijing. Continue reading Acche Din Are Here Again! →

Empire/ Imperialism

Communist, Scientist, Activist and Dreamer Daya Varma (August 23, 1929 – March 22, 2015) : Harsh Kapoor

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Guest Post by Harsh Kapoor

Dr. Daya Varma, life-long communist, scientist, activist, dreamer, pharmacologist, professor emeritus at McGill University, Montreal, passed away on 22 March 2015 in St. John’s Newfoundland, Canada. Former member of the undivided Communist Party of India, founder of Indian People’s Association in North America (IPANA) and the International South Asia Forum, founding member of CERAS (Centre d’Étude et Ressources d’Asie Sud) and was on the board of of Alternatives, a progressive think tank in Canada, He also founded and edited the INSAF bulletin. Many in India remember how when the 1984 Bhopal Union Carbide industrial disaster struck,where thousands died, Dr. Varma spearheaded a study to monitor the effects of MIC on pregnant women whilst participating in activities aimed at supporting their compensation claims.

(Read the complete text here : http://www.sacw.net/article10894.html)

Bad ideas, Countryside, Culture

Hashimpura : Who will Guard the Guards Themselves ?

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India lost, not victims, in Hashimpura massacre case: Victims' lawyer

Picture : Courtesy http://www.indiatomorrow.net

Wait for justice to victims of Hashimpura has become much longer.

After around 28 years of the gruesome massacre allegedly by the personnel of the much feared PAC ( Provincial Armed Constabulary) for its biased approach , the Delhi court acquitted all 16 accused on ‘benefit of doubt due to insufficient evidence, particularly on the identification of the accused’.

There have been very few massacres in post-independent India which have shaken the civil society to the core and have propelled it to come forward and raise its voice. And the Hashimpura killings happen to be one such episode. One still remembers the words of the well-known journalist Nikhil Chakravarty who had visited the place along with few likeminded individuals and in his scathing write-up condemning the incident had compared the event with

“Nazi Pogrom against the Jews, to strike terror and nothing but terror in a whole minority Community”.

Continue reading Hashimpura : Who will Guard the Guards Themselves ? →

Bad ideas, Culture, Debates, Everyday Life

On The Interrelationship between Bovine and Human Beings

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”in our religious scriptures ( Puranas) life of a cow is more important than any number of people” ( Puranon me insaan se jyada gay ko mahtv diya jata hai)

– Giriraj Kishore, Vice President of VHP,

On the public lynching of five dalits, October 2002

BJP Haryana chief Ram Bilas Sharma has promised to treat cow slaughter as a crime as heinous as murder. If elected, he said at the manifesto release function…

 TNN | Oct 3, 2014, 05.06AM IST

There is a competition of sorts between BJP ruled states to fulfil what a Haryana leader said ‘ to fulfil Modiji’s dream’. Close on the heels of Maharashtra government’s getting clearance to ban cow slaughter, there is news in a section of the press that the government in Haryana would table a similar bill in the assembly.

Sharing few snippets of the bill and comparing it with punishment of other offences, a newspaper report tells us that if the offence is insult to modesty of women the maximum jail sentence would be one year or fine, if it is molestation then it would be two years or fine, for theft the maximum jail term would be three years, for assault it would be 3 months or fine,  and for causing grievous hurt it would be maximum seven years. (Times of India, 14 th March 2015) and if it is beef in any form then it would be punishable by upto ten years in jail. Continue reading On The Interrelationship between Bovine and Human Beings →

Bad ideas, Culture, Debates, Government

Goodbye Secularism ! Enter Theocracy !!

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Understanding the yet unfolding ‘Dietary Fascism’

Image : Courtesy – bollypedia.in

To the question whether the Hindus ever ate beef, every Touchable Hindu, whether he is a Brahmin or a non-Brahmin, will say ‘no, never’. In a certain sense, he is right. From times no Hindu has eaten beef. If this is all that the Touchable Hindu wants to convey by his answer there need be no quarrel over it. But when the learned Brahmins argue that the Hindus not only never ate beef but they always held the cow to be sacred and were always opposed to the killing of the cow, it is impossible to accept their view…

B. R. Ambedkar 1

“Did the Hindus never eat Beef?” Dr Ambedkar has dealt with this specific issue holistically in his various writings and has also tried to link it with emergence of ‘untouchable’ castes.

At a time when the saffrons are keen to appropriate Ambedkar  – who had time and again cautioned his followers about the dangers of Hindu Raj 2 and appealed to them to fight the twin enemies of  Brahminism and Capitalism – and present him as someone who not only endorsed the Hindutva project but also opposed beef eating as cow was sacred to Hinduism, it would be opportune to pose this question afresh before them. Continue reading Goodbye Secularism ! Enter Theocracy !! →

Bad ideas, Culture, Debates, Government, Identities

Nation’s Honour, ‘IBIs’ and the Dimapur lynching : Bonojit Hussain

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Guest Post by BONOJIT HUSSAIN

naga

Photo courtesy: ABPLive

On 5th of March a mob of few thousands stormed the Dimapur central jail and after having dragged jail inmate Syed Sarif Uddin Khan, brutally lynched him while a gleeful lot clicked photographs of the lynching with mobile phone cameras.

Since the night of 5th March photographs of the brutalized dead body and a video of the lynching has gone viral on social media and activists across the country has rightfully condemned this horrific act of mob lynching. But most activists are under the impression that the outrage and subsequent lynching was because a Sumi Naga woman was allegedly raped by Syed Sarif Uddin Khan on the night of 23rd February. But one needs to understand that the outrage and the lynching of Khan wasn’t primarily about rape of a woman, it was more about how an outsider, more so a ‘lowly’ IBI (a very popular acronym for Illegal Bangladeshi Immigrant), has violated  the Naga nation’s honour reposited in the bodies of its women by raping one of its ‘daughters’. Continue reading Nation’s Honour, ‘IBIs’ and the Dimapur lynching : Bonojit Hussain →

Bad ideas, Debates, Identities

We are all Mukto-Mona

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 ‘Our aim is to build a society which will not be bound by the dictates of arbitrary authority, comfortable superstition, stifling tradition, or suffocating orthodoxy but would rather be based on reason, compassion, humanity, equality and science’.

– Avijit Roy

 “Dr Dabholkar who was fighting against superstition was assasinated because he was a rationalist. All such people who have embarked upon a path of reason and rationalism, propagated these ideas, had to make tremendous sacrifices. Dr Dabholkar was not the first and would not be the last person who sacrificed himself on the altar of rationalism. This unending struggle between rationalism and irrationalism is going on since ages and it is for you to decide whether it needs change or not.”

– Comrade Pansare

Words, ideas scare fundoos rather fundamentalists of every kind, colour and stripe.

The mere possibility that a free mind can question, challenge and ultimately upturn the ‘ultimate truth’ the faithful  have received through their ‘holy books’ rather unnerves them and they react in the only way they are familiar with. Resort to machetes to take on ideas or use meat cleavers to deal with unchained minds, quoting sanction from the same ‘books of wisdom’. Continue reading We are all Mukto-Mona →

Bad ideas, Culture, Government

हम सब पानसरे

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अभी पिछले साल की बात है जब जनवरी के मध्य में महाराष्ट्र के कोल्हापुर में ‘डा दाभोलकर की हत्या और तर्कशीलता/विवेकवाद’ विषय पर बोलते हुए कामरेड गोविन्द पानसरे, ने एक अहम बात कही थी कि अंधश्रद्धा के खिलाफ संघर्षरत रहे डा दाभोलकर की हत्या इसी वजह से हुई क्योंकि वह विवेकवादी थे। उनका कहना था कि

‘ऐसे सभी लोग जिन्होंने तर्कशीलता का रास्ता अपनाया, उसका प्रचार किया, उन तमाम लोगों को कुर्बानी देनी पड़ी है। तर्कशीलता की बलिवेदी पर अपने आप को न्यौछावर करनेवाले डा दाभोलकर न पहले शख्स हैं और न आखरी। तर्कशीलता और तर्कशीलता विरोध का यह संघर्ष आदिम काल से चल रहा है और उसमें बदल करना है या नहीं इसके बारे में आप को फैसला लेना होगा।’

निश्चित ही उस वक्त़ किसे यह गुमान हो सकता था कि महज एक साल के अन्दर शहीदों की इस गौरवशाली परम्परा में उनका नाम भी जुड़ जाएगा।

20 फरवरी 2015 को मुंबई के ब्रीच कैण्डी अस्पताल में कम्युनिस्ट पार्टी के इस वरिष्ठ नेता ने अपनी अन्तिम सांस ली। 16 फरवरी को सुबह जब वह अपनी पत्नी उमा के साथ सुबह टहलते हुए लौट रहे थे, तब मोटरसाइकिल सवार युवकों ने उन पर गोलियां चलायी थी। अपनी लम्बी जिन्दगी लेखन से लेकर आन्दोलन, संगठन निर्माण से लेकर रचनात्मक काम आदि तमाम मोर्चों पर एक साथ सन्नद्ध रहा यह सेनानी, चार दिन जिन्दगी और मौत से संघर्ष कर, यह जंग हार गया। इसे विचित्र संयोग कहा जा सकता है कि डा दाभोलकर की मौत और उनकी मौत के तरीके में भी एक समानता थी, मोटरसाइकिल पर सवार युवकों ने दोनों पर तभी गोलियां चलायी गयीं जब वह सुबह टहल कर लौट रहे थे। Continue reading हम सब पानसरे →

Debates, Government, Law

Shahid Lives, Shahids Never Die

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Tafawut ast mun-I-shunidam-I-man-o-to, Tu bastan-dar, o, man fatahe-bab me shunidam

(What you and I hear are different : you hear the sound of closing doors, but I of doors that open)

– A Persian couplet that Maulana Abul Kalam Azad choose to use while addressing a gathering of Muslim Youth at the Aligarh Muslim University in 1949.

I

It was the mid of 2008 when I first heard about Shahid Azmi.

Friend/journalist Ajit Sahi had written a series of articles in ‘Tehelka’ about the fraudulence of the police in framing innocent Muslim men, which had caused enough consternation among the chattering classes. As Ajit had revealed Shahid had played an important role in making the story happen. Apart from facilitating meeting with victims of system, he had himself provided many facts relevant to the story.

And the name kept cropping in. I read an interview of Shahid where he discussed the challenges faced by lawyers like him who dared to take up inconvenient cases which at times put the police people on the defensive. I was still not aware of the many twists and turns in his life – his spending prime years of his youth behind bars as an innocent victim of TADA – or his classes at the prestigious TISS (Tata Institute of Social Sciences) where he use to enthuse students in magical ways. Continue reading Shahid Lives, Shahids Never Die →

Bad ideas, Culture, Government

Gandhi’s Assassins

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“It is far too early to dismiss the possibility of a future Hindu State in India. However, the possibility does not appear a strong one. The secular state has far more than an even chance of survival in India” (India as Secular State, 1963).

It was the early sixties when American political scientist Donald Eugene Smith commented about the “possibility of a Hindu state in India”. Today, even to a layperson, the secular state in India seems to be standing on very weak foundations, and the possibility of a Hindu State is far stronger than it was half a century ago, in 1963.

Perhaps, a pertinent expression of this transformation of India is the metamorphosis we witness in the image of Nathuram Godse – the assassin of Mahatma Gandhi, as part of a conspiracy which was hatched by many bigwigs of the Hindutva Supremacist movement. The makeover in the image is for eveyone to see: from a murderer, a conspirator, terrorist to a ‘martyr’ who supposedly ‘deserves’ a temple in his name everywhere. We also learn that after the ‘successful’ run of a drama in Marathi called Me Nathuram Boltoy (I Nathuram Speak) for the last few years, plans are afoot to have a movie made on him, supposedly to communicate his ‘viewpoint’. With the changed political situation, where even the censor board of the country is populated by rightwing people, one can guess that it won’t have any difficulty in release. And with an ambience which is more prone to illiberal ideas, one can as well prophesy that it will have a good run.

Read the full text here.