‘Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.’ Blaise Pascal, French Mathematician and Physicist who lived some 400 years ago and died young (1623 to 1662 AD)
ग्राहम स्टेंस, जो ऑस्ट्रेलिया से भारत पहुंचे ईसाई पादरी थे और ओडिशा के बेहद पिछड़े आदिवासी बहुल इलाकों में गरीबों एवं कुष्ठरोगियों की सेवा में संलग्न थे, उन्हें और उनकी दो संतानों फिलिप और टिमोथी को कथित तौर पर हिंदुत्ववादी जमातों से जुड़े मानवद्रोहियों ने 22 जनवरी 1999 को जिंदा जलाया था.
22 जनवरी की तारीख की बीती तारीख को इस घटना की पच्चीसवीं सालगिरह थी.
राम मंदिर आयोजन की चकाचौंध में किसी ने इस बर्बर हत्या और उसके निहितार्थों को याद करना भी मुनासिब नहीं समझा, जबकि हम पाते हैं कि इस बर्बर हत्याकांड में वह तमाम संकेत मिलते हैं, जिन्हें 21वीं सदी की बहुसंख्यकवादी राजनीति में भरपूर प्रयोग में लाया गया.
The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living.
– Marcus Tullius Cicero
Politics is nothing but theology in action
– Ambedkar
Right-wing politics suffers from a common syndrome everywhere.
It never feels confident to project its own icons for the rest of the humanity, whatever might be their claims about their worldview, it knows that its own icons are detested by a wide spectrum of people.
The easiest way it finds to overcome this lacunae is to appropriate already established icons – who were even opposed to their world view as well and claim them their own. In fact, it does not have any qualms in utilising dates – bearing special significance for exploited and oppressed and marginalised of the world – to put their stamp on it.
The project of Hindutva Supremacism – which yearns / strives to transform a Secular, Socialist, Democratic and Sovereign Republic into a Hindu Rashtra has perhaps achieved near perfection in this kind of politics.
An excerpt from Sita’s Voice in the Assamese Ramayana: Selected Verses from the RAMAYANA of Madhava Kandali and UTTARAKANDA by Sankaradeva, Translated, with Introduction and commentary by TILOTTOMA MISRA (Zubaan: April 2024 Forthcoming)
The figure of Rāma has seldom attracted the Assamese vaiṣnava devotees as much as that of Kṛṣṇa. Rāma has been considered as an incarnation of Viṣṇu, while Kṛṣṇa has been worshipped as Viṣṇu himself. Significantly, there is also no known religious sect in Assam which claims to be “exclusively Ramaite”. While there are many references to Kṛṣṇa in the copper-plate inscriptions found in Assam which date back to the early seventh century, there is hardly any mention of Rāma in the early literary records of the region. Biswanarayan Shastri has observed that while a large number of temples dedicated to Rāma or Māruti exist all over India, there is no evidence of the existence of such a temple with the images of Rāma or Maruti, intact or in ruins, in Assam. According to him even in the architecture of ancient Assam, there is no known evidence of the Rāma legend being represented anywhere.
The Rāmāyaṇa of Mādhava Kandalī, therefore, as well as the two kāṇḍas prefixed and appended to it by Mādhavadeva and Śaṅkaradeva, have never held “that exalted position in popular estimation which the Rāmacarita-mānasa of Tulsidas has been occupying for the last few centuries in north India.” Rāma and Sītā seldom attained the stature of divinity in the imagination of the Assamese people although the heroic and miraculous elements in the Rāmāyaṇa and ‘Rāma-kathā’ have continued to be a lively ingredient of folk-drama and musical performances of the ojā-pāli. It is understandable therefore that for the common people of this region the Assamese Rāmāyaṇa is hardly the religious text that the Bhāgavata-purāṇa is. Continue reading Sita’s Voice in the Assamese Ramayana: Tilottoma Misra→
Prof Romila Thapar, great historian and public intellectual , will be delivering the 28 th Lecture in the Democracy Dialogues Series on Sunday 28 th January 2024 at 6 PM (IST).
Please reserve the time and date for the lecture. Details are given below
Democracy Dialogues – 28 th Lecture
Organised by
New Socialist Initiative (NSI)
Theme : Our History, Their History, Whose History?
The zoom invite will be shared closer to the date.
Abstract: My purpose in this talk would be to examine the link between history and particular kinds of nationalism. I hope to show that nationalism can be a process, bringing together and uniting all the communities that inhabit a particular territory in support of a change in society or opposing a target common to all. This earlier form is what I would like to call a unitary, integrative nationalism that cut across communities and drew them together in a particular country to support a single purpose. This I would differentiate from the latter forms in some countries which identified with units of society or communities according to certain common features, such as a particular religion or language, or caste or ethnicity. I would call it segregated nationalism, where each community is segregated and treated as having a distinctly different identity and its own separate goal. History is brought in when the community that gives an identity to its nationalism insists on tracing its origins to a historical past. This pattern of integrated and segregated nationalisms would seem to apply to India of the twentieth century. There was the all-inclusive national movement whose participants were from every community; its objectives were to maintain the unity of the Indian people and overthrow colonial rule. The other nationalism, segregated nationalism, was seeded in the 1920s and assumed the existence of two nations – the Hindu and the Muslim – which, it was argued, go back to earlier times. Integrated nationalism succeeded in 1947 in bringing about independence, but its foundations needed strengthening, for we are now witnessing the strong presence of religious nationalism in the attempt to inaugurate a Hindu Rashtra in India.
– Romila Thapar
About the Speaker:
Internationally renowned scholar of Ancient History, Prof Thapar was elected General President of the Indian History Congress in 1983 and a Fellow of the British Academy in 1999. In 2008, she was awarded the prestigious Kluge Prize of the US Library of Congress which complements the Nobel, in honouring lifetime achievement in disciplines not covered by the latter. Prof Thapar has been a visiting professor at Cornell University, the University of Pennysylvania, and the College de France in Paris and holds honorary doctorates from the University of Chicago, the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales in Paris, the University of Oxford, the University of Edinburgh (2004), the University of Calcutta and from the University of Hyderabad
Here is a select list of Prof Thapar’s publications Ashoka and the Decline of the Mauryas, 1961 ( Oxford University Press) ; A History of India : Volume 1, 1966 ( Penguin) ; The Past and Prejudice, NBT ( 1975) ; Ancient Indian Social History : Some Interpretations, 1978 ( Orient Blackswan) ; From Lineages to State 1985 : Social Formations of the Mid-First Millenium B.C. in the Ganges Valley, 1985 ( Oxford University Press) ; Interpreting Early India, 1992 ( Oxford University Press) ; Sakuntala : Text, Reading, Historie, 2002 ( Anthem) . Somanatha : The Many Voices of History, Verso ( 2005) ; The Aryan : Recasting Constructs, Three Essays ( 2008) ; The Past As Present: Forging Contemporary Identities Through History, (2014) ;Voices of Dissent: An Essay, (2020); The Future in the Past: Essay ( 2023)
This guest post was written by HASINA, with co-authorship contributions from Sanjhana and Mridul from Bebaak Collective, ‘Voices of the Fearless,’ a collective dedicated to addressing the citizenship rights of marginalized communities.
A thread of commonality that ties together Indian society – from familial space to the entertainment industry, from the personal sphere to the political sphere – is the oppression of gender minorities under patriarchy. The longstanding structures of patriarchy and misogyny subject women to various forms of violence and abuse within and outside the household. Such a harsh reality of society is reflected by the popular media and film industry very promptly. The new movies that are being directed and the new music that’s being produced are a great reflection of how we, as a society, have failed women and queer communities. The peppy lyrics that objectify and hyper-sexualise women’s bodies and the movies that glorify toxic masculinity do nothing but perpetuate and normalise gendered violence. As we step into the New Year, we must ask ourselves if we can leave these outdated notions behind and step into a society that fosters peace, equality, and love amongst all.
यह पोस्ट सोशल मीडिया पर कई लोगों ने साझा की थी । बताया जा रहा था कि इसके लेखक सरोज मिश्र हैं। इस बीच इसके असल लेखक से हमारा संपर्क हुआ है जिनका नाम विवेक कुमार उर्फ़ विवेक असरी है। मूल लेख 2010 में छपा था जिसे यहाँ पढ़ा का सकता है।
अयोध्या का यह 300 साल पुराना जन्मस्थान मंदिर था जिसके लिए ज़मीन एक मुसलमान ज़मींदार के दान की थी। नए राम मंदिर के विस्तार के लिए अगस्त 2020 में इसे ढहा दिया गया। (छवि साभार द वायर)
कहते हैं अयोध्या में राम जन्मे, वहीं खेले-कूदे, बड़े हुए, बनवास भेजे गये, लौटकर आये तो वहाँ राज भी किया। उनकी ज़िंदगी के हर पल को याद करने के लिए एक मंदिर बनाया गया। जहाँ खेले, वहाँ गुलेला मंदिर है। जहाँ पढ़ाई की, वहाँ वशिष्ठ मंदिर हैं। जहाँ बैठकर राज किया, वहाँ मंदिर है। जहाँ खाना खाया, वहाँ सीता रसोई है। जहाँ भरत रहे, वहाँ मंदिर है। हनुमान मंदिर है, कोप भवन है। सुमित्रा मंदिर है, दशरथ भवन है। ऐसे बीसियों मंदिर हैं, और इन सबकी उम्र 400-500 साल है। यानी ये मंदिर तब बने, जब हिंदुस्तान पर मुगल या मुसलमानों का राज रहा।
(Translated by Nivedita Menon from a widely circulating post earlier attributed to Saroj Mishra, on social media, originally in Hindi.
UPDATE: We have since heard from the author himself. This post was written in 2010 by VIVEK KUMAR (Vivek Asri) and so we have made the necessary changes. Here is the link to VIVEK KUMAR’s original post.
This 300 year old Janmasthan temple in Ayodhya, built on land donated by a Muslim zamindar, was demolished in August 2020 to accommodate an expanded vision of the new Ram Mandir. Image courtesy The Wire
They say Ram was born in Ayodhya; in Ayodhya he played and roamed around as a youth, grew into adulthood, was sent from there into exile in the forest, and then returned to rule there. There are temples in Ayodhya to commemorate every moment of his life. Where he played, there is Gulela Mandir. Where he studied there is Vashishta Mandir. Where he sat and ruled, there is a mandir. Where he ate his meals, there is Sita Rasoi. Where Bharat stayed, there is a mandir. There’s Hanuman Mandir, Kop Bhavan. There’s Sumitra Mandir, Dashrath Bhavan. There are many many such temples and all of them are about 400 to 500 years old. That is to say, these temples were built when Hindustan was ruled by the Mughals, by Muslims.
Jorg Haider, a far-right Austrian politician who died in 2008, is largely forgotten. It is also forgotten that merely two decades ago, he was considered a very dangerous man in Europe, whose ascent to power had prompted rare European Union unity aimed to thwart his ambitions.
Twice elected as governor of the southern state of Carinthia, Haider—who opposed immigration and was critical of Islam and Muslims—once praised the Nazi regime’s “employment policies”.
His Freedom Party of Austria allied with another party, the OVP, which allowed Haider to become the country’s chancellor. But the possibility of a ‘right-wing extremist’ ruling a European Union member country prompted the other 14 members to join hands punitively against Australia, putting Haider out of the chancellorship race.
The European Union stuck by the 1997 Treaty of Amsterdam principles and emphasised that nobody would be allowed to “breach them”.
Many European countries threatened to recall envoys from Austria, and some said that Austria could be shunted out of the union if the need arose. The Belgian foreign minister at the time said, “Europe can very well do without Austria. We don’t need it.
After much water has flown down the Thames, the Rheins, the Danubes and all other rivers of Europe, the world has Geert Wilders in the Netherlands, a “political earthquake”, whom some consider more extreme and fanatical than Haider. But Wilders’ views on immigration and Islam cause no similar outrage in European capitals today.
Wilders’s party, which promised to ban mosques and compared the Quran with the infamous Mein Kampf, has won 37 seats in a 150-member Parliament. It is now the number one party in the country’s parliament.
On the face of it, we are an on-going democracy. We have a Constitution which has been honoured by the present government declaring 26 November as Constitution Day. We have regular elections at national, State and panchayat levels. We have the various institutions of democracy in place: an elected Parliament; an independent judiciary; an accountable executive; and a functioning, non-governmental media. Yet, there is fear all around. a new fear, a fear not seen since the Emergency, that has been spreading over the past decade. Why? Is it perhaps because the “spirit of constitutionalism”, as Fali Nariman has put it in his latest work, missing? Can we continue to be the nation envisaged by Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore: “Where the mind is without fear/And the head is held high”? Are we progressing towards or in retreat from that “Heaven of Freedom” of which Tagore sang?. Are the institutions of democracy functioning? Is the Preamble being venerated or violated? Are our civil servants really free? Is our civil society being muzzled? Is the media glowing in the light of freedom of expression? Is the investigative and judicial process being made the punishment? Is the economy in any meaningful sense “socialist” as enjoined by the Preamble? Is the Constitution being reduced in practice to a non-justiciable set of Directive Principles of State Policy? Above all, are we as a nation still ‘secular” – again as enjoined by the Preamble? Is Hindutva compatible with the basics and parameters of the Constitution? Is our ‘unity in diversity” threatened or is it being revered?What are the challenges ahead that need to be addressed before we cease being the world’s largest democracy?
Speaker :
Mani Shankar Aiyar
Author of many books and a regular social commentator, Mani Shankar Aiyar, has had a distinguished foreign service career , he was Union Ministers during Congress led government (2004 till 2009) and has handled different ministries. Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, ( 2004-06) Youth Affairs and Sports (2006-08), and Development of North Eastern Region ( 2008-09).
Here is a list of few of his publications :Memoirs of a Maverick Juggernaut, 2023 ; A Time of Transition: Rajiv Gandhi to the 21st Century, Penguin, 2009 ; Confessions of a Secular Fundamentalist, Penguin, 2004; Rajiv Gandhi’s India, 4 vols. (General Editor), UBSPD New Delhi, 1997, Knickerwallahs, Silly-Billies and Other Curious Creatures, UBS Publishers, 1995 . Pakistan Papers, UBSPD, New Delhi, 1994 ; One Year in Parliament, Konark, New Delhi, 1993 ; Remembering Rajiv, Rupa & Co., New Delhi, 1992 ; Rajiv Gandhi: The Great Computer Scientist of India, Mughal Publishers, New Delhi, 1991 ; How To Be A Sycophant, NBS, New Delhi, 1990
Professor Mridula Mukherjee, Professor of Modern Indian History ( Retd), Centre for Historical Studies, JNU, will be delivering the 26 th Democracy Dialogues Series lecture on Sunday, 19 th November 2023 at 6 PM (IST).
Theme : Who’s Afraid of Jawaharlal Nehru? Time: Nov 19, 2023 06:00 PM India
Summary : In his lifetime, Jawaharlal Nehru was recognized the world over as a statesman and an Indian leader second only to Gandhiji. A foremost leader of the freedom struggle, who gave it a decided socialist orientation, he remained unrivaled as Prime Minister after independence and built the solid foundations of a sovereign, secular, democratic, and egalitarian republic. He evolved the concept of non-alignment which enabled many ex-colonial countries to avoid becoming a part of the two power blocs engaged in the Cold War.
However, he is today the favourite whipping boy of the establishment. We are told he was responsible for the partition, for the mess in Kashmir, for the death of Subhash Bose, for delaying the integration of Hyderabad, and of Goa, for the defeat at the hands of China in 1962, for neglecting agriculture, and primary education, and much else. The reason for the defamation is of course that he stood for the exact opposite of what is valued today. His life and work present a continuous question mark to the regressive trends in fashion.
This will become evident as we focus in the talk especially on two areas of great relevance today in which we are facing a grave crisis: Democracy and Civil liberties, and Communalism/Secularism. We will also focus attention on Nehru’s evolving understanding of Mahatma Gandhi’s vision and method of non-violent struggle, of which he became the most ardent advocate after his death.
Speaker :
Author of many books, Prof Mukherjee has been a visiting Scholar at Duke University, USA, and at the Institute of Oriental Culture, University of Tokyo and was also Director of Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, ( NMML), New Delhi. She has published widely in the areas of agrarian history, peasant movements, social movements and the Indian national movement.
Here is a list of a few of her publications : Colonializing Agriculture, The Myth of Punjab Exceptionalism Sage (2005) ; Peasants in India’s Non Violent Revolution : Practice and Theory (Sage 2004).
This list also includes India’s Struggle for Independence (1999) and India After Independence 1947–2000 (2000), RSS, School Texts and the Murder of Mahatma Gandhi The Hindu Communal Project (2008) co-authored with Prof Bipan Chandra and others.
Diwali, or Deepavali as it is called in the south, is a joyous occasion but this time it has brought only tears. What a bizarre Deepavali it is this year, with the awful blazing fires in the sky and the earth, with ear-splitting sound from non-stop bombing. I may not be in Gaza, but my mind refuses to leave the place and my very soul shudders each moment.
At a media interaction on 26 October, the Malayali actor-turned-politician tried to turn his reel-life into real life. Once known mainly for his cine-avatar as the perpetually-angry, elite-justice hungry, thoroughly-misogynist ‘hero’ characters (yes, despite some better roles), Mr Gopi behaved with unbelievable condescension towards a woman journalist who asked him a question. Instead of answering her in a meaningful and civil manner, he turned into one of his obnoxious on-screen avatars. He put his hand on her shoulder and addressed her as ‘mole’ (daughter, literally, but also a condescending reference used by male lovers/husbands to refer to their loves/wives). She was clearly unhappy with the gesture, and backed away. Probably because the man has now become actually indistinguishable from the rotten, stinking masculinity he represents on-screen — knowingly or otherwise — he put his hand right back on her shoulder.
This evening I walked in the gaudily-lit main streets of Thiruvananthapuram among the crowds gaping at the show that is on, under the name of Keraleeyam or the Essence of Kerala.
Democracy Dialogues Lecture Series (Online ) Organised by New Socialist Initiative
25th Lecture ( Sunday, 15 th October 2023)
Theme:India’s Democratic Longevity and its Hugely Troubled Trajectory
Speaker: Professor Ashutosh Varshney ( Sol Goldman Professor of International Studies and the Social Sciences at Brown University )
Theme :India’s Democratic Longevity and its Hugely Troubled Trajectory
Summary
India celebrated 75 years of its independence last year with a lot of enthusiasm.
Celebrations did not hide the fact it is also one of the leading countries which is passing through what is popularly known as ‘democratic backsliding’.
A country which, like many others, is using democratic processes to secure undemocratic outcomes, where freely contested elections are being deployed for the purpose of expressing, cultivating, or enhancing majoritarian prejudices—to target minorities and turn them into lesser citizens.
In this scenario, there is an urgent need to unpack this journey of democratic India further , there is a need to make a distinction between India as an electoral democracy and India as a liberal democracy.
Background Reading for the talk :
# India’s Democratic Longevity and its Hugely Troubled Trajectory ( Attached with this mail)
#. How India’s Ruling Party Erodes Democracy
Ashutosh Varshney
Journal of Democracy, Volume 33, Number 4, October 2022, pp. 104-118 (Article)
Prof Ashutosh Varshney is Sol Goldman Professor of International Studies and the Social Sciences and Professor of Political Science at Brown University, where he also directs the Center for Contemporary South Asia. Previously, he taught at Harvard (1989-98) and the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (2001-2008).
His books include Battles Half Won: India’s Improbable Democracy (2013), Collective Violence in Indonesia (2009), Ethnic Conflict and Civic Life: Hindus and Muslims in India (Yale 2002), India in the Era of Economic Reforms (1999), and Democracy, Development and the Countryside: Urban-Rural Struggles in India (Cambridge 1995)
[Democracy Dialogues Lecture by Professor Ashutosh Varshney scheduled for coming Sunday has to be rescheduled. New dates will be announced as soon as Professor Varshney is in a position to deliver the lecture. Apologies.]
Topic : India’s Democratic Longevity and its Hugely Troubled Trajectory
Speaker : Professor Ashutosh Varshney,
Theme :India’s Democratic Longevity and its Hugely Troubled Trajectory
An unlikely phantom seemed to hover over me as I hung around the Government Women’s College at Thiruvananthapuram where this year’s Annual Conference of Indian Association of Women’s Studies was on last week. ‘Unlikely’, because the conference is usually a platform in which this spectre is thoroughly examined, counted, listened upon, critiqued, reimagined etc etc — and therefore one would imagine that it would not dare to tread in in such spaces.
क्या बुद्धिजीवी वर्ग को पालतू बनाए रखने की सरकार की कोशिश या विश्वविद्यालयों में इंटेलिजेंस ब्यूरो को भेजने की उनकी हिमाक़त उसकी बढ़ती बदहवासी का सबूत है, या उसे यह एहसास हो गया है कि भारत एक व्यापक जनांदोलन की दहलीज़ पर बैठा है.
So you are the little woman who wrote the book that made this great (American) civil war’
( ‘‘‘तुम हो वह महिला जिसने उस किताब को रचा जिसने इस महान /अमेरिकी/ गृह युद्ध को मुमकिन बनाया)
[गुलामी प्रथा की समाप्ति के लिए छेड़े गए गृह युद्ध के खात्मे के बाद तत्कालीन अमेरिकी राष्टपति अब्राहम लिंकन द्वारा गुलामी प्रथा के खिलाफ लिखे गए उपन्यास ‘अंकल टाॅम्स केबिन’ / 1852/ की लेखिका हैरियट बीचर स्टोव Harriet Beecher Stowe से मिलने पर प्रगट उदगार]
लेखक, कलाकार, विद्वान आदि से हुक्मरान हमेशा ही चिंतित रहे हैं।
मिसाल के तौर पर क्रांतिपूर्व फ्रांस के बारे में यह बात मशहूर है कि वहां की राजशाही ने अपने पुलिस महकमे को अपने दौर के अहम लेखकों, कलाकारों की जासूसी करते रहने के निर्देश दिए थे। हम अठारहवीं सदी के पुलिस महकमे की मुलाजिमों की मुश्किलों को समझ सकते हैं जिन्हें ‘खंूखार अपराधियों और राजनीतिक व्यक्तियों’ के अलावा लेखकों, कलाकारों पर अपनी फाइल रखनी पड़ती थी। (द स्टेटसमैन, हिन्दुस्तान टाईम्स, नई दिल्ली, 26 सितम्बर 2006)
एक क्षेपक के तौर पर बता दें कि इस जासूसी का विधिवत विवरण जनाब ब्रूनो फुल्गिनी की किताब में मिलता है जिसका शीर्षक है ‘राइटर्स पुलिस’ – दरअसल फ्रेंच संसद के इस कर्मचारी को यह जिम्मेदारी मिली कि वह पार्लियामेंट लाइब्रेरी के पुराने दस्तावेजों को खंगाले और इस बेहद उबाउ काम के दौरान उसे यह ‘खजाना’ मिल गया था।
अगर हम अपने यहां निगाह दौड़ाएं तो मौजूदा हुक्मरानों का रूख इस मामले में कोई अलग नहीं दिखता, बल्कि वह ढाई सौ सदी पहले के फ्रांसिसी सम्राटों से कभी कभी एक कदम आगे ही दिखते हैं। ( Read the full text here)
Writers, scholars, artists have always worried the powers that be.
There was a time when the Parisian police had been given the onerous task of keeping the greatest writers of late 18 th Century who were living in Paris at that time under their watch. Poor fellows, one can imagine their difficulty in maintaining files on writers and artists and scholars ‘beyond criminals and political figures.’
The present dispensation at the centre is no different.
It could be said that it may be a step ahead.
The French Monarchs – who within few decades witnessed a mass upheaval which finally overthrew them – were wise enough to ask their minions to be rather discreet in their activities, not to offend the writers, scholars directly ; the harbingers of today’s ‘New India’ have even abandoned that discreetness for good.
KAFILA - COLLECTIVE EXPLORATIONS SINCE 2006 