Statement by NATIONAL ALLIANCE OF PEOPLE’S MOVEMENTS demands principled investigation to establish command responsibility. It also demands that Govt review the unsustainable and unjust ‘development’ model fuelled by land mafias and casino interests in Goa .
National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) unequivocally condemns the heinous assault on adivasi youth leader, Rama Kankonkar on 18th September, the subsequent intimidation against another activist Swapnesh Sherlekar, and the alarming descent into lawlessness that these incidents in Goa exemplify. We extend unwavering solidarity to Rama Kankonkar, Swapnesh Sherlekar and the people of Goa who continue to fight for justice, environmental protection, and the preservation of their collective identity. We also demand adequate protection to these activists, principled investigation to establish command responsibility and a review of the current unsustainable, unjust and unsafe ‘development’ model; fuelled by land mafias and casino interests. Continue reading Protest Assault on Adivasi Youth Leader Rama Kankonkar, Lawless Casino-based Development in Goa: NAPM→
[This post is the fifth essay of the series in Kafila titled Decolonial Imaginations. Links to the previous essays are given at the end.
The terms ‘decolonization’ or ‘decolonial’ have become quite critical now, given that the impulse of justice lies at the core of these concepts. Neither postcolonial nor decolonial perspectives are compatible with right-wing ideologies but the fact that Hindutva ideologues in India and the rightwing globally are now trying to appropriate that language makes it seem to some that the very idea of the postcolonial or decolonial is suspect. We believe that this demonizing of decolonial theory from a position defensive of the European Enlightenment needs to be unpacked in the interests of a mutually productive debate. Kafila will be publishing a series of interventions on what the idea of the decolonial imagination involves, locating decolonial theory as speaking from the margins, drawing attention to identities which the orthodox Left subsumed under ‘class’ and which the rightwing in India seeks to assimilate into Brahminism. Additionally the orthodox left’s rejection of spiritual beliefs and inability to engage with them is also a factor that may have produced the space for right wing appropriations of a field marked “religion”.
We hope that these interventions will clear the ground for productive conversations on the left rather than polarised and accusatory claims.]
The excerpt published in TheWire of Meera Nanda’s “Decolonising Ourselves into a Hindu Rashtra” argues that postcolonial and decolonial theorists bear the blame, at least in part, for the rise of Hindu nationalism in India. In eschewing “Enlightenment Secular Humanism”, Nanda argues, these theorists have opened epistemic space for right wing ideologues to justify reactionary politics. Furthermore, she argues that the ideas of postcolonial theory have their roots in the “neo-Hindu revivalist strains of anti-colonial nationalism.”, who she identifies with “Gandhi, Vivekananda, Aurobindo, and even Tagore”. These thinkers were apparently seeking an escape from the idea of modernity present in the “legacy of the British Raj”. This, apparently against the “enlightenment thinkers” of India in which she presents a bizarre counter grouping of “Ambedkar, Periyar, Nehru, M.N. Roy, and Narendra Dabholkar”. This opposition that Nanda sets up is so ludicrous to someone who has even spent a minimal amount of time studying our freedom struggle or any of these thinkers that it requires little comment.
[This post by Nivedita Menon is the fourth essay of the series in Kafila titled Decolonial Imaginations. Links to the previous essays are given at the end.
The terms ‘decolonization’ or ‘decolonial’ have become quite critical now, given that the impulse of justice lies at the core of these concepts. Neither postcolonial nor decolonial perspectives are compatible with right-wing ideologies but the fact that Hindutva ideologues in India and the rightwing globally are now trying to appropriate that language makes it seem to some that the very idea of the postcolonial or decolonial is suspect. We believe that this demonizing of decolonial theory from a position defensive of the European Enlightenment needs to be unpacked in the interests of a mutually productive debate. Kafila will be publishing a series of interventions on what the idea of the decolonial imagination involves, locating decolonial theory as speaking from the margins, drawing attention to identities which the orthodox Left subsumed under ‘class’ and which the rightwing in India seeks to assimilate into Brahminism. Additionally the orthodox left’s rejection of spiritual beliefs and inability to engage with them is also a factor that may have produced the space for right wing appropriations of a field marked “religion”.
We hope that these interventions will clear the ground for productive conversations on the left rather than polarised and accusatory claims.]
Introduction
As Hindutva ideologues and the rightwing globally, appropriate the idea of “decolonising”, it seems to many opposed to these trends, that scholarship around decoloniality is itself the problem. Such arguments tie in with earlier ongoing attacks on postcolonial scholarship since the 1990s that virtually accuse it of directly contributing to the rise of the right. Decolonial scholarship is relatively a new arrival in the Anglophone world (since the 2000s), and ever since the rightwing started using that language, the same charges are laid at its door as well. Indeed, the implication (and sometimes outright allegation) is that decolonial/postcolonial scholars were secretly rightwing all along.
This charge I will address in a somewhat different way in the first section, by way of analogies with other bodies of knowledge.
The second section will address another related critique of decolonial thought, that it is “merely epistemic” and does not consider the materiality of structures of power
The road to hell is paved with good intentions. That’s the first, visceral reaction that many passionate wildlife conservationists have, when you utter the 3 letters: FRA. The Forest Rights Act (2006) aims to give native tribal and forest dwelling populations ownership of, and decision-making rights over what happens in the wildlife areas that they are residents of. But many conservationists see it as a gateway for rampant encroachment into protected areas.
I was initially a bit more circumspect, having been a longtime advocate for community-based conservation. Having always believed that ivory tower conservation can never work, without putting the people involved at the center of it. But I have also had to temper my position over time, as I witnessed the complexities of how it was playing out on the ground. (ref- https://india.mongabay.com/2020/07/commentary-making-communities-central-to-conservation/ )
[This post is the third essay of the series in Kafila titled Decolonial Imaginations. Links to the previous essays are given at the end.
The terms ‘decolonization’ or ‘decolonial’ have become quite critical now, given that the impulse of justice lies at the core of these concepts. Neither postcolonial nor decolonial perspectives are compatible with right-wing ideologies but the fact that Hindutva ideologues in India and the rightwing globally are now trying to appropriate that language makes it seem to some that the very idea of the postcolonial or decolonial is suspect. We believe that this demonizing of decolonial theory from a position defensive of the European Enlightenment needs to be unpacked in the interests of a mutually productive debate. Kafila will be publishing a series of interventions on what the idea of the decolonial imagination involves, locating decolonial theory as speaking from the margins, drawing attention to identities which the orthodox Left subsumed under ‘class’ and which the rightwing in India seeks to assimilate into Brahminism. Additionally the orthodox left’s rejection of spiritual beliefs and inability to engage with them is also a factor that may have produced the space for right wing appropriations of a field marked “religion”.
We hope that these interventions will clear the ground for productive conversations on the left rather than polarised and accusatory claims.]
Introduction
Anti-colonial thought is under attack. Some scholars have accused decolonial and postcolonial theories of nativism. Interestingly, the phenomenon that provoked this accusation is stranger than the accusation itself. The global North and the global South have witnessed an unlikely alliance of anti-colonial rhetoric and right-wing discourse. While the Hindu Right in India deems Muslims to be colonial invaders, the Right Wing in Europe constructs the influx of refugees as a colonial invasion, which will lead to a ‘great replacement’ of White Europeans by West Asian and African refugees. The solution – ‘decolonise’ by expelling the colonisers and reviving the ‘glorious’ ‘indigenous’ past. This invokes several questions: How do European right-wing groups lay claims on decolonisation? Are there common links between these right-wing ‘decolonisation’ projects? More importantly, does the presence of anti-colonial language in right-wing discourse automatically translate to the conclusion that postcolonial and decolonial theories are inherently nativist?
I undertake two broad tasks. First, I lay forth the ‘anti-colonial’ rhetoric of these right-wing projects. Secondly, I condense their similarities and use them to show why anti-colonial thought should not be seen to be irredeemably polluted by this misappropriation.
Before I trace the right-wing appropriation of anti-colonial language, a caveat about the usage of the terms anti-colonial, postcolonial and decolonial is in order. I use anti-colonial thought to broadly bundle postcolonial and decolonial theories. The reason being that both theoretical schools present varying critiques of the socio-cultural and intellectual legacies of colonialism. The difference in the kind of critique separates postcolonialism from decolonial theory. Continue reading Anti-colonial Thought and the Global Right – An untenable alliance: Ishan Fouzdar→
A ‘unity of purpose’ has been witnessed between Hindu and Muslim supremacists, who consider themselves the sole spokespersons of ‘their community’.
There are rare occasions when literary academies associated with governments wilt under mob pressure.
Rarer are occasions when they even cancel the very programme they had organised with much fanfare.
It has been more than 10 days that West Bengal witnessed such a spectacle, when the West Bengal Urdu Academy suddenly postponed a programme where it intended to discuss ‘Urdu in Indian Cinema’ for four consecutive. Javed Akhtar — one of the foremost living Urdu poets — was also invited as a key speaker in the programme.
Two prominent Islamist organisations in Kolkata, Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind and the Wahyahin Foundation, had protested the invitation, as they considered Akhtar’s views on religion problematic, labelling him as someone who “speaks against religion and God”.
Akhtar is a declared atheist and openly talks about it on public fora, and that had irked these people.
The organisations even threatened to launch a state wide agitation — much on the lines of their agitation against Bangladeshi author Taslima Nasreen which as everyone knows had forced her to leave the state (2007) — if the government did not heed their demand.
Mamata Banerjee, the West Bengal Chief Minister, did not want to take any risk as elections to the state Assembly are not too far.
[This post by Aditya Nigam is the second essay of the series in Kafila, titled Decolonial Imaginations. The first essay can be read here.
The terms ‘decolonization’ or ‘decolonial’ have become quite critical now, given that the impulse of justice lies at the core of these concepts. Neither postcolonial nor decolonial perspectives are compatible with right-wing ideologies but the fact that Hindutva ideologues in India and the rightwing globally are now trying to appropriate that language makes it seem to some that the very idea of the postcolonial or decolonial is suspect. We believe that this demonizing of decolonial theory from a position defensive of the European Enlightenment needs to be unpacked in the interests of a mutually productive debate. Kafila will be publishing a series of interventions on what the idea of the decolonial imagination involves, locating decolonial theory as speaking from the margins, drawing attention to identities which the orthodox Left subsumed under ‘class’ and which the rightwing in India seeks to assimilate into Brahminism. Additionally the orthodox left’s rejection of spiritual beliefs and inability to engage with them is also a factor that may have produced the space for right wing appropriations of a field marked “religion”.
We hope that these interventions will clear the ground for productive conversations on the left rather than polarised and accusatory claims.]
The question of decolonization/ decoloniality keeps surfacing periodically in ill-informed writings and tracts. The target may be postcolonial studies or more recently, decolonial theory, but the attack is always launched in the name of “the Enlightenment” (notice the definite article). The idea behind making what was the European Enlightenment into “the Enlightenment” for the whole world is to claim – as has been done for a couple of centuries since – that the world was lying in “darkness” and “superstition” before the dazzling light of the Enlightenment rescued the inhabitants of the different continents. What were Latin Christendom’s (Europe) “dark middle ages” became the convenient and imagined dark ages of all societies in the world.
[Centenary celebrations of RSS – the biggest ‘self-proclaimed’ cultural organisation in the world — comprising of Hindus are on.
Much is being said about its longevity etc., and much will be said about it in coming days, it remains to be seen if it is ready to take a fresh look at some discomforting aspects of its own history when it is embarking on a journey towardswhat it calls as ‘new horizons’]
Ram Lila, the dramatic folk re-enactment of the life of Rama is still popular in Northern India.
Anyone who has watched this programme — especially in villages or towns — might have noticed a particular scene where god curses a sage for his misdemeanour that he will get a donkey’s face for his actions and will not even realise that he has got this new face.
One is reminded of this story — which tells us the great hiatus between claims and reality — whenever an individual or a formation starts bragging about its achievements that have no basis in reality.
Leaders of the Hindutva Supremacist movement in this part of South Asia look no different when they declare from the rooftops the “great role their political ancestors have played during the freedom movement”. It is a different matter that any objective student of India’s history — especially of the Independence struggle — is conversant with hundreds or thousands of pages, books, monographs written or documented to underline the contrary, their meek behaviour and compromising role during the very struggle. [https://www.newsclick.in/rss-centenary-search-icon]
The CCG’s concern that the proposed PPOHS Act is ‘unconstitutional’ and is an ‘open invitation to ‘oppressive misuse’ needs to be heeded.
Image : Courtesy Fiickr
Whether history will repeat itself, that is the question being asked about Punjab government’s renewed attempt to enact a law supposedly against ‘sacrilege’?
Anyone who is a keen observer of the social-political developments in the state knows very well that it has a history of such efforts (2015 and 2018) where similar attempts were made to amend laws related to sacrilege, and both attempts proved unsuccessful as they failed on the yardstick of constitutionality.
As per reports, the proposed Punjab Prevention of Offences against Holy Scriptures Bill, 2025 (PPOHS Act), which was recently referred by the state legislature to a committee for further discussion, has come under the scanner of experts of the Constitution and concerned citizens.
A leading voice among them, namely the Constitutional Conduct Group (CCG) — a platform of retired civil servants and diplomats– has in an open communication underlined how Punjab government’s proposed ‘PPOHS Act’ is ‘unconstitutional’ and is an ‘open invitation to oppressive misuse’ .
[This post is the first of a series in Kafila, titled Decolonial Imaginations.
The terms ‘decolonization’ or ‘decolonial’ have become quite critical now, given that the impulse of justice lies at the core of these concepts. Neither postcolonial nor decolonial perspectives are compatible with right-wing ideologies but the fact that Hindutva ideologues in India and the rightwing globally are now trying to appropriate that language makes it seem to some that the very idea of the postcolonial or decolonial is suspect. We believe that this demonizing of decolonial theory from a position defensive of the European Enlightenment needs to be unpacked in the interests of a mutually productive debate. Kafila will be publishing a series of interventions on what the idea of the decolonial imagination involves, locating decolonial theory as speaking from the margins, drawing attention to identities which the orthodox Left subsumed under ‘class’ and which the rightwing in India seeks to assimilate into Brahminism. Additionally the orthodox left’s rejection of spiritual beliefs and inability to engage with them is also a factor that may have produced the space for right wing appropriations of a field marked “religion”.
We hope that these interventions will clear the ground for productive conversations on the left rather than polarised and accusatory claims.]
This article comes as a response born from a deep sense of intellectual anguish and frustration. It is a rebuttal to a YouTube video titled The Left’s Accidental Gift to Hindu Nationalism posted by one of India’s leading independent news portals, The Wire on 14th August 2025. The video attempts to summarize Meera Nanda’s critique of Postcolonial Left as elaborated in her latest treatise, Postcolonial Theory and the Making of Hindu Nationalism: The Wages of Unreason (2025). While I have read the newly published work, including the excerpt published in The Wire which have been shared widely in popular social media platforms, this piece restricts itself to the Video which comprehensively outlines Nanda’s arguments. An extensive engagement with the critique that Nanda mounts is reserved for some other time.
I did not come to the village to do research. I came to farm for the market—and to do it without breaking the village’s social and ecological ledger. I returned as a nephew and a neighbour. For six years I have lived inside this world of muddy fields, failed pumps, anxious harvests, and commonsense wisdom passed across haat stalls. Six years on, I am only now seeing a glimmer of hope for a workable path.
Photograph by Bonojit Hussain of his own farm
What I write here is not sociology in the professional sense, but a testimony from within the living contradictions. My focus is on the choices and constraints of the khilonjiya peasant household—native, often subsistence-oriented communities whose economic logic is deeply tied to ecological and social reproduction. This is a distinct reality from the highly commercialized production systems found in some other parts of the state.
How saffron forces weaponise ignorance and stigmatise intellectauls
Silence gives consent
[Qui tacet consentire videtur – In Latin]
“Intellectual terrorists” are “more dangerous than cross-border terrorists”
These were the pearls of wisdom of the then Human Resource Development minister, who was addressing a conference of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (December 19, 2001). Murli Manohar Joshi had even asked the ‘nationalist youths’ to counter ‘both types of terrorism effectively.’
…It would be 25 years soon since these objectionable remarks were targeted at India’s topmost historians, scholars, public intellectuals, even provoking followers to deal with them effectively’ like the way they deal with ‘cross border terrorists.’
Later commenting on these controversial remarks, the legendary historian Romila Thapar had famously said: ‘And then the government fell. But the books continued!”
Time for Thought Police?
As everybody can see, there is a sea change in the situation since the past more than a decade in this part of South Asia…
…..The target of attacks has now become broader, more expansive and more unpredictable. It is no longer restricted to ‘leftist’ ‘progressive’ writers, historians.
The recent move to ban 25 books on Kashmir history at a single go ‘for propagating false narrative and secessionism‘ — written by a spectrum of national and international scholars — which even do not share a similar world view, books which had been in circulation for years, even decades together is a case in point.
I will share what I have learned about the process of transforming complex systems, the changes necessary in ideologies, and in the way in which public policies are being made, for India to progress towards its vision of poorna swaraj. The following points indicate an outline of the argument I plan to make in the talk:
• Global governance has broken down. The world is in disorder.
• India is strategically vulnerable. It is a long way off from its ‘tryst with destiny’ of poorna swaraj.
• India must become much more self-reliant, and less dependent on the US and China to protect its strategic autonomy. It must find its own democratic path to strengthen its society and economy. The US (and the West) cannot provide a blueprint.
• Development and progress are processes of learning.
• Nations are complex ‘self-adaptive’ systems.
• Power and wealth in a system accumulate by a process of cumulative causation.
• The process of change must be democratic for new ideas to emerge.
I have explained such ideas in my book, Reimagining India’s Economy: The Road to a More Equitable Society,published this year, and in some previous books.
About the Speaker:
Arun Maira is an eminent author, a strategic thinker and a former member of the Planning Commission of India. He had joined the Commission at the invitation of then Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh himself. Mr. Maira has had a distinguished career as an enlightened business leader and management consultant. He worked as Executive Director on the Board of Tata Motors and later as the Chairman of Boston Consulting Group. He has authored many books including Transforming Systems: Why the World Needs an Ethical Toolkit; Transforming Capitalism: Improving the World for Everyone; Redesigning the Aeroplane While Flying: Reforming Institutions; Shaping the Future: A Guide for Systems leaders; and most recently, Reimagining India’s Economy: The Road to a More Equitable Society, published in June 2025.
Could it be argued that Bombay HC’s highly debatable decision on a peaceful rally against Gaza genocide is an attempt not to inconvenience the ruling dispensation?
It was the year 1763, when Genevaís ecclesiastical assembly ordered one Robert Covelle to genuflect and listen to a reprimand for having fathered an illegitimate child. Covelle refused to kneel and turned to Voltaire for help.
Voltaire, a leading light of enlightenment, outraged at the very idea that religious authorities daring to make a citizen kneel, wrote a pamphlet against genuflection comparing the act with a tyrant punishing slaves or pedant correcting children. The rest of the philosophes rallied behind Voltaire and after six years of agitation, the Genevaís ecclesiastical assembly was forced to abolish genuflection from its code
Meera Nanda, writer and historian of science discusses, this episode in one of her monographs
Rereading this episode and seeing if around two-and-half centuries ago, the Church could be compelled to see incongruence, injustice and unreason in its own ruling, can a a similar thing be possible vis-à-vis the judiciary in the 21st century in the ‘biggest democracy in the world’?
This poser is related to a recent debatable decision of the Bombay High Court, which has rightly received enough opprobrium.
Is a resistance of some kind slowly emerging from the teaching community to save the secular character of education and foil Supremacist designs?
Representational Image. Image Courtesy: Pexels
“To learn to read is to light a fire.
Every syllable that is spelled out is a spark.” –
– Victor Hugo
Victor Hugo, (1802- 1885), the great French poet, novelist, and dramatist, once considered a national hero and a living symbol of republicanism in France, would not have imagined in his wildest dreams that a day would arrive where one of his famous quotes ‘“There is in every village a torch – the teacher; and an extinguisher – the priest”, would suddenly start reverberating across a section of learned people engaged in educating future generations in far away India, rather discreetly.
Close on the heels of an intervention by concerned citizens/activists on education in Uttar Pradesh, to stop Ramayana and Vedic workshops in Schools, as it violates Article 28 of the Constitution that specifically enjoins the State not to use public funds for religious instruction, one has come across two important and bold interventions from honourable members of the teaching community themselves, especially in the Hindi belt.
FIR For Asking ‘Light the Lamp of Knowledge’?
The police case against a school teacher from Bareilly for a Kanwad song is a case in point. The ‘offence’ of the teacher, Rajneesh Gangwar, is that he was singing a song in front of students asking them “not to bring kanwars“, instead “go light the lamp of knowledge’. A purported video of the incident, has gone viral. [ Read the complete article here : https://www.newsclick.in/why-no-gita-recitation-schools]
The Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union are long behind us, and we’re now hurtling toward a tri-polar world dominated by America, Russia, and China. These three powers vy to shape global influence, often competing but sometimes colluding. As the saying goes, “When elephants fight, the grass gets trampled.” So, the central question for this lecture is: What path are the nations of South Asia—including Afghanistan and Iran—likely to take? What alternatives and tools do they possess to navigate this landscape? Most importantly, what vision of society and power should guide them toward a viable future?
Speaker :
Professor Pervez Hoodbhoy is a nuclear physicist, author, and a prominent activist who is particularly concerned with promotion of freedom of speech, secularism, scientific temper and education. He is the founder-director of The Black Hole in Islamabad and as the head of Mashal Books in Lahore, he leads a major translation effort to produce books in Urdu that promote modern thought, human rights, and emancipation of women.
Prof Hoodbhoy received his undergraduate and doctoral degrees from MIT and has taught physics and mathematics at Forman Christian College-University in Lahore, at the Quaid-e-Azam University (QAU) in Islamabad and later at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS).
He is a recipient of the Baker Award for Electronics and the Abdus Salam Prize for Mathematics. He was visiting professor at MIT, Carnegie Mellon University, and the University of Maryland. In 2003 he was awarded UNESCO’s Kalinga Prize for the popularization of science.
Here is a list of a few of his publications :
– Pakistan: Origins, Identity and Future, published by Routledge (London, New York), 2023. – Confronting the Bomb – Pakistani and Indian Scientists Speak Out, (edited) Oxford University Press, 2013. – Education and the State – Fifty Years of Pakistan, (edited) Oxford University Press, 1998. – Islam & Science: Religious Orthodoxy and the Battle for Rationality, published by ZED Books, London, in 1991 with translations in Turkish, Malaysian, Indonesian, Arabic, Spanish, Sindhi, and Urdu. – Proceedings of School on Fundamental Physics and Cosmology, co-edited with A. Ali, World Scientific, Singapore, 1991.
Is Bihar being turned into a test case of disenfranchising people?
Representational Image. Image Courtesy: Flickr
India pledged to usher in a democracy with universal adult franchise.
It was the late 1940s, when India, a newly independent nation, whose less than 10% population was then literate, embarked on this unique experiment, unheard of in those times.
The architects of Independence rejected all the Western prescriptions that openly said that .’.. India had no democratic future‘ (Winston Churchill) or ”monarchial arrangement best suited the Asian people‘ (British Prime Minister Clement Attlee to Nehru, 1949), and (to quote a student of history) ‘met the imperial argument on direct terms, firmly believing in the possibility of creating democratic citizens through democratic politics.’ (India’s Founding Moment: The Constitution of a Most Surprising Democracy by Madhav Khosla)
What is worth emphasising is that all those great leaders who shaped a forward-looking Constitution were on the same page when it came to granting the right to vote. For example, B.R Ambedkar, who was chairman of the Drafting Committee of the Constitution, firmly believed that ‘To limit the franchise, was to misunderstand the meaning of democracy ... ‘
None of them dithered over this provision despite knowing well that even the Western countries had not fully adopted universal adult franchise. Remember, Switzerland granted the right to vote to women only in 1971.
Much water has flown down the Ganges, the Jhelum, the Brahmaputra, the Godavari or the Kaveri.
A good 75 years after the adoption of the Constitution (1950), today we are faced with a challenge that at first looks unbelievable, the present ruling dispensation seems to have embarked on a journey in an exactly reverse direction. [Read the full article here : https://www.newsclick.in/democracy-few]
How they have become arsenal for the majoritarian Hindutva forces to convert the sovereign, independent, secular, socialist republic into a Hindu Rashtra.
25 th June 2025 happened to be the fiftieth year of the internal emergency imposed by the then Indira Gandhi regime. Much has changed during all these years but till date we are still far away from a balanced review of that period.
What really prompted Indira Gandhi to declare emergency , whether drive for personal power was the key factor, as has been reiterated multiple times…..
On the other hand, whether it could be said that she correctly perceived how sinister forces in the subcontinent were hell bent on sabotaging the democratic experiment at the behest of imperialist powers , who were even found to be provoking police and security forces to pursue their dubious agenda.
No doubt such a holistic review is a need of the hour but one thing cannot be denied that the biggest beneficiary of this whole exercise has been the Hindutva rightwing forces who are keen to transform India into a Hindu Rashtra
Conversations on Palestine with an activist, a poet, a scholar
Teredide Mane O Baa Athithi (Come in, I have opened my doors dear guest) is an offshoot of Mere Ghar Aakar Toh Dekho, a national campaign in India, in Karnataka. It aims to counter the forces of hate, bigotry and polarization that have gained ground in the country by redrawing boundaries and expanding notions of trust and community. The campaign involves participants from diverse backgrounds opening their own homes and hearts to guests from equally varied locations. Teredide Mane has grown as a community, learning and unlearning through practice the concepts of guest and host, home and house, consent and comfort, celebration and sharing, listening and observing—both commonalities and diversity. [Content and editing by Madhu Bhushan, Winnu and Anita Cheria. Illustrations and design by Winnu]
We invite you into this moving and powerful conversation that has been reproduced largely in the speakers’ own words, and hope that you will add to it and take it forward. Read the whole conversation here (https://shorturl.at/JzvI5). Or a shorter note on the conversation here (https://shorturl.at/NkLHz).
Over the past months, the genocide in Palestine has come up multiple times in our meetings. Apart from engaging in acts of protest and solidarity, there was a need to go beyond ‘news noise’, and meet people engaged with and from Palestine. We decided to create a virtual space, one that was safe and intimate, to be able listen deeply to friends we had connected with in the course of our work and life journeys. This conversation, with Lisa Suhair Majaj, Smadar Lavie and Issa Samander in October, 2024, came about as a result of this intention.
Lisa Suhair Majaj is a passionate Palestinian American poet whose writings and poetry echo with the spirit of the land and people that she was herself exiled and alienated from.
How saffrons are engaged in militarising Indian society not so surreptitiously.
Representational Image. Image Courtesy: Flickr
“…though this be madness, yet there is method in it“?
-Polonious, in ‘Hamlet’ by William Shakespeare
Pushback of ‘alleged foreigners’ It was May end, when the Assam government led by Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Himanta Biswa Sarma, was in the news for its policy of pushback where it was found literally pushing what it termed as ‘illegal foreigners’ into Bangladesh.
What was noticeable was that when its controversial pushback policy came under the scanner of national and international human rights organisations, the Assam government approved another scheme that has raised new questions?
This was a ‘special’ scheme to make the border areas, especially those inhabited by indigenous people living in “vulnerable and remote areas”, safe. ..
What image does one conjure up when Haryana finds mention anywhere ! It is the image of the millenium city Gurgaon – with offices of leading MNCs or neighbouring Nuh – the Muslim majority district with one of the lowest literacy rates in India or the dominant Jat peasantry, the growing gender imbalance in the society which even gets reflected in the phenomenon of purchasing of brides from Bihar or other areas, etc
Various cases of dalit oppression add another gloomy layer to the not so bright picture.
Rarely does one find voices of the ’other Haryana’ getting reflected in the public discourse.
….Writer, journalist, left activist Tarun Kanti Bose’s new book, ’ And Quietly Flows the Dawn : Haryana— Its Identity Issues, Grassroots Movements and Alternative Endeavours breaks a new ground in this dominant discourse and brings before us many such unheard voices.
KAFILA - COLLECTIVE EXPLORATIONS SINCE 2006 