In the past few weeks, I have been asked over and over again, not always in jest, if I had joined the Popular Front. I am not surprised. The police investigation around the violence against the college teacher at Muvattupuzha has broken all previous records in not only the violation of human and civil rights, but also in the silence of Kerala’s enlightened intellectuals. If I recall right, only Nandigram evoked such a dense and deliberate silence from them. No wonder, anyone who speaks up against the manner in which the police is being armed and authorized against ‘bad muslims’ is immediately dubbed a supporter of the Popular Front. But I am intrigued by this simple question, by which the entire history of that person’s engagement with discussions around religion and the state is erased. Continue reading Have I Joined the Popular Front?
Category Archives: Debates
What Went Wrong in Kashmir? Rekha Chowdhary
Guest post by REKHA CHOWDHARY
This article was also published in Kashmir Times
What went wrong in Kashmir? This is one pertinent question that needs to be addressed seriously before any corrective measures can be applied. Situation would certainly normalise after some time, but apparently ‘normal’ situation in case of Kashmir does not indicate anything. The vibrancy of ordinary life and the day-to-day routine followed for days and even months, takes only moments to break. Underneath the normalcy, the turbulence is ever present and can surface at any point of time. Every turbulent period however provides clues to the real problem, and one should hold on to these clues, if one really wants to do something about it.
So what do we see in the present turbulence? Firstly, though the crisis revolves around the stone-pelting youth, one can clearly say that the real problem is not that of the stone-pelters. Neither the theory of LeT being responsible for it, nor the issue of money being paid to stone pelters, nor the vested interests making the most of the situation explains the crisis.
The Great Incendiary Hunt Takes Off in Kerala
I have been watching the whole drama that has been unfolding after the unspeakable and utterly condemnable act of violence at Muvattupuzha in central Kerala early this month, which has been widely interpreted as the first instance of ‘Talibanist’ violence here, with a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. A whole manhunt has followed it and this continues to be front-page news in many Malayalam newspapers, especially the Mathrubhumi. Continue reading The Great Incendiary Hunt Takes Off in Kerala
Forest Areas, Political Economy and the “Left-Progressive Line” on Operation Green Hunt: Shankar Gopalakrishnan
Guest post by SHANKAR GOPALAKRISHNAN. This piece also appeared in Radical Notes earlier.
As central India’s forest belts are swept into an ever-intensifying state offensive and resulting civil war, there has been a strong convergence of left, liberal and progressive arguments on Operation Green Hunt. This note argues that this ‘basic line’ is problematic. The line can be summarised as: The conflict is rooted in resource grabbing by corporate capital, in the form of large projects, SEZs, mining, etc. Such resource grabbing leads people to take up arms to defend themselves, resulting in the ongoing conflict. The conflict thus consists of a state drive to grab people’s homes and resources, with people resisting by taking to arms as self-defence.
Supporters of the Maoists’ positions now often conflate these points with the more orthodox positions on the necessity for “protracted people’s war” in a ‘semi-feudal semi-colonial’ state. Liberals in turn tend to deny these orthodox positions and instead advocate the resource grab – displacement – corporate attack issue as the “real” explanation. Both, however, accept this as the predominant dynamic at the heart of the current conflict. But at the heart of this line lies an unstated question: why are forest areas the main battleground in this war? While the conflict is not coterminous with the forests – most of India’s forest areas are not part of this war, and the conflict extends outside the forest areas in some regions – forests are both politically and
geographically at its heart.
Courage Craft and Contention: Human Rights and the Judicial Imagination
On the 12th of June, the Alternative Law Forum (ALF) celebrated its tenth anniversary with a public lecture by Justice A P Shah and Prof. Upendra Baxi on the topic Courage Craft and Contention: Human Rights and the Judicial Imagination.
We are happy to share the transcript of the lectures.
“Caste census will increase incidence of Japanese encephalitis”: Sociologist
Just four years ago, during “Mandal II”, everyone opposing the extension of OBC reservations to central educational institutions were saying we don’t even know how many OBCs there are. Now, when there is a proposal to count the OBCs, these voices are not to be heard. Just like “Mandal II”, a new term, “caste census” has been invented, as if the census already does not count the Scheduled Castes. The term “caste census” is used repeatedly in a way that suggests that a secular, progressive pro-development exercise is being sullied, polluted, by this monster of caste because of those uncouth cow belt politicians. Chee chee!
Obfuscation and intellectual dishonesty are in order. So, a lot of bullshit is being written about “caste census” to prevent us from knowing just how many of us are OBCs, to prevent the Other Backward Classes from entering the privileged spaces of the upper castes. This one takes the cake: Continue reading “Caste census will increase incidence of Japanese encephalitis”: Sociologist
The Desertification of Punjab and the Liability of Opinion Makers
In August last year, we had drawn attention to a piece by Indian Express editor Shekhar Gupta on the remarkable edit page piece he had penned on what he claimed was the ‘absence of drought’, in the Green Revolution region and provided his ‘explanation’ of why it had been possible. It had been possible, Gupta had opined, because all the great things had been accomplished in decades when the most retrograde environmental and jholawala movements in the history of mankind had not yet arrived on the scene. And with no evidence whatsoever and with nothing but his blind ideological faith, Gupta had even misled his readers that ‘underground aquifers were being constantly recharged’. This when just a few days ago, NASA satellite pictures had shown the extent of groundwater depletion in this region. Continue reading The Desertification of Punjab and the Liability of Opinion Makers
Social Profiling – Indian Style
“The Muslim is not wanted in the armed forces because he is always suspect – whether we want to admit it or not, most Indians consider Muslims a fifth column for Pakistan” [Vengeance! India after the assassination of Indira Gandhi (New Delhi, Norton, 1985), pp. 1995-96]
-George Fernandes
Amnesty International defines racial profiling as the targeting of individuals and groups by law enforcement officials, even partially, on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion, except when there is trustworthy information, relevant to the locality and timeframe, that links persons belonging to one of the aforementioned groups to an identified criminal incident or scheme.
I
Is racial/social profiling practised in India? Continue reading Social Profiling – Indian Style
Mohamad Junaid: What Does the Chatham House Poll in Kashmir Tell Us?
Guest post by MOHAMAD JUNAID
The Chatham House poll conducted in the autumn of 2009 in Jammu, Ladakh, Kashmir and Azad Kashmir has revealed an interesting pattern of opinions held across these regions on issues ranging from the perception of major problems people face to effective solutions to the Kashmir issue and the best means to achieve them. Robert Bradnock, under whose supervision the poll was conducted, however presented the results somewhat shoddily leading to confusion over the real import of the opinion poll. This confusion has prompted media in India and Pakistan to portray the polls selectively or in a self-serving manner, largely reflecting their nationalist stances on the Kashmir question. The poll, in reality, points to some interesting developments in Kashmir and indicates a way toward an eventual, mutually agreeable solution.
Consistent with every other poll on the issue, Chatham House poll has shown again that an overwhelming number of people (74—95 percent) in Kashmir region demand independence. This figure comes as no surprise because the support for independence for Kashmir over accession to Pakistan has been steadily growing over the last 20 years. This feeling is more concretely reflected in the fact that most Kashmiris (more than 90 percent) support withdrawal of Indian troops from Kashmir, while a similar figure (around 80 percent) want Pakistan to withdraw its troops from Azad Kashmir. Along with demilitarization, there is a clear demand for de-weaponization (more than 80 percent) and an end to militant violence (around 90 percent) in the Kashmir region. The Line of Control in its present form is uniformly rejected in both Kashmir and Azad Kashmir. Continue reading Mohamad Junaid: What Does the Chatham House Poll in Kashmir Tell Us?
Notes on the Jaffna Economy
One of my friends in a discussion group in Colombo on ‘Democratising State and Society’ put forward the following challenge couple weeks ago. He said, a year after the end of the war, many of us who had been following the situation of the displaced people in the North, including the lack of freedom of movement and the militarization of the North have done little to engage the oppressive economic conditions of those affected by the war and now being resettled. That challenge was in the back of my mind as I visited Jaffna for ten days over the last two weeks. I tried to grasp what one could on a short visit. The following are very preliminary notes on the Jaffna economy, with a particular emphasis on agriculture and fisheries which ¬- despite technocratic and diasporic dreams of an information economy – continue to determine the economic life of the larger Jaffna population. These tentative notes I hope will stimulate some interest towards much needed research on the economy of the Jaffna District and the war affected Northern and Eastern Provinces. Continue reading Notes on the Jaffna Economy
Beware Bigotry – Free Speech and the Zapiro Cartoons: Mahmood Mamdani
Text of talk on receiving an honorary doctorate at the University of Johannesburg, 25 May, 2010
MAHMOOD MAMDANI, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda
This text was sent to us by Sujata Patel
It warms my heart to see these flowing gowns. I congratulate you on work accomplished! For over a millennium, these gowns have been a symbol of high learning from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic. Should anyone ask you where they came from, tell them that the early universities of Europe – Oxford, Cambridge, le Sorbonne – borrowed them from the Islamic madressa of the Middle East. If they should seem incredulous, tell them that the gown did not come by itself: because medieval European scholars borrowed from the madressa much of the curriculum, from Greek philosophy to Iranian astronomy to Arab medicine and Indian mathematics, they had little difficulty in accepting this flowing gown, modeled after the dress of the desert nomad, as the symbol of high learning. Should they still express surprise, ask them to take a second look at the gowns of the ayatollahs in Iran and Iraq and elsewhere and they will see the resemblance. Education has no boundaries. Neither does it have an end. As the Waswahili in East Africa, which is where I come from, say: elimu haina muisho. Continue reading Beware Bigotry – Free Speech and the Zapiro Cartoons: Mahmood Mamdani
The New ‘Bush’ Doctrine: Nirmalangshu Mukherjee
Guest post by NIRMALANGSHU MUKHERJEE
A well-known left intellectual in Delhi, belonging to one of the naxalite “splinter groups”–the term is Arundhati Roy’s to distinguish the maoists from everyone else in the naxalite movement–recently advised me that, whatever be the objections to the CPI (Maoist), we must side with them in their struggle against the state. The argument obviously is that the historical choice is binary is character: either you are with the state or against it. And the underlying assumption is that those who are against the state are somehow “with” the people. Since the maoists are (apparently) against the state, they must be viewed as “with” the people, warts and all. In not siding with the maoists then, intellectuals like Apoorvanand and others in the Kafila forum are actually siding with the state, according to the doctrine.
Continue reading The New ‘Bush’ Doctrine: Nirmalangshu Mukherjee
युद्ध के रूपक का जाल
अपने नए बंद के दौरान सी.पी.आई.( माओवादी) ने छत्तीसगढ़ और बंगाल में अर्ध-सैन्य बल के सदस्यों के साथ बस में सफ़र कर रहे साधारण ग्रामीणों की हत्या करने के बाद जो बयान दिया है उससे यह साफ़ है कि अभी शायद इससे भी क्रूरतापूर्ण कार्रवाइयां देखने को मिल सकती हैं. उनके प्रवक्ता ने कहा कि उन्होंने पहले ही छतीसगढ़ के ग्रामीणों को यह बता दिया था कि उन्हें इस युद्ध की विशेष परिस्थिति में क्या करना है और क्या नहीं करना है. मसलन, पुलिस या सैन्य बल के लोगों के साथ किसी भी तरह का कारोबार या सामजिक व्यवहार प्रतिबंधित है, उनके साथ किसी सवारी गाडी में सफ़र नहीं करना है. इसके आगे उनसे यह भी कहा गया है कि उन्हें पुलिस या सैन्य बल की गतिविधियों पर नज़र रखनी है, उनके पास हथियारों का अंदाज़ करना है और इसकी खबर जनता सरकार को देते रहना है. इस दल के प्रवक्ता ने कहा कि साधारण लोगों का मारा जाना अफसोसनाक है लेकिन एक तरह से वे खुद इसके लिए जिम्मेदार थे क्योंकि उन्होंने चेतावनी का उल्लंघन किया था. Continue reading युद्ध के रूपक का जाल
To P Chidambaram: Response from a member of civil society, by AK Agrawal
By ARUN K AGRAWAL
Dear Shri Chidambaram,
This is in response to your repeated taunts on NDTV that the civil society must respond to the wanton killing by the Naxals. It appears that the interview was tailor made for getting the consent of the Cabinet for more firepower and airpower to combat the Maoist. The diabolic support of Arun Jaitly, be it by describing you an injured martyr, was designed to achieve his ambition through the support of the mining barons of the BJP ruled states.
As a member of society I hope I am being civil in disagreeing with you on your hard line approach against the innocent tribal. I also hope you will not find it too shocking for being accused of being largely responsible for the rise and growth of Naxalism, as the following happened on your watch as Finance minister.
Continue reading To P Chidambaram: Response from a member of civil society, by AK Agrawal
The Maoist Killings Once Again
The news of killing of more than 40 people travelling in a bus blown by a blast in Dantewada is only a new chapter in the book of brutalities that is being scripted in Chhatisgarh and other parts of India in the name of ‘the People’. Six people were found slain in Rajnandgaon just a day before this blast. A day before that four villagers were killed in Bengal because they were thought be close to the CPM and were labeled as informers. Two days before these killings in Bengal, two villagers who were Gram Rakhis were killed in Orissa. This list does not include the death of 6 Para Military persons in Chhatisgarh who were killed a land mine detonated by the Maoists in Chhatisgarh.
Are these operations a response to the Operation Green hunt launched by the government? Or are they part of the Protracted People’s War that is being carried out by the purest revolutionaries of our earth who do not waver and shiver at the sight of blood? Or, as some friends caution us from rushing to any conclusion, as Shuddhabrata Sengupta has done, are they “ ‘ false flag operations’ conducted by some rogue elements of the state machinery” or directly endorsed by the state ? How are we to know who is the perpetrator of these crimes? Do we wait for a statement from the Maoists and if they deny their involvement, launch an investigation to find out the real culprit? It took nearly a month for the Maoists to officially own the attack which extinguished the lives of 76 CRPF men. The Maoist leadership congratulated the bravery of its combatants who had achieved the feat of eliminating a whole company of Indian para military force.
Continue reading The Maoist Killings Once Again
Ethical violations of HPV vaccination trials in India: SAMA
This guest post has been sent by the SAMA team
On July 9, 2009, the Andhra Pradesh Minister for Health and Family Welfare in association with the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and PATH (Programme for Appropriate Technology in Health) International a non-profit organization based in USA launched what it described as a ‘demonstration project’ for vaccination against cervical cancer. The vaccine, against the Human Papillomavirus (HPV), which is one of the most common families of viruses and the source of a common sexually transmitted infection, was administered to 14,000 girls between the ages of 10 and 14 in three mandals – Bhadrachalam, Kothagudem and Thirumalayapalem – of Khammam district in Andhra Pradesh. In Andhra Pradesh, the vaccine used was Gardasil, manufactured by Merck Sharpe and Dohme, the Indian subsidiary of Merck and Co. Inc., a US-based pharmaceutical company.
In a similar project, on August 13, 2009, the Gujarat government launched a two-year ‘Demonstration Project for Cancer of the Cervix Vaccine’ in three blocks of Vadodara District – Dabhoi, Kawant and Shinor – to administer three doses of the HPV vaccine to 16,000 girls between 10 and 14 years. There were reports of deaths of four girls from Andhra Pradesh and two girls from Gujarat following the administration of the vaccine.
Continue reading Ethical violations of HPV vaccination trials in India: SAMA
‘An acceptance of Israel’s legitimacy does not imply an acceptance of all that it does’: Amitav Ghosh
Given the long discussion on an earlier post on this subject, I think it is important to post here Amitav Ghosh’s long, persuasive response to the campaign that requested him not to accept the Dan David Prize. I’m taking the liberty of copying this response from here.
May 14, 2010
Dear Signatories to the letter of May 7:
I am sorry I have been slow to respond to your letter expressing disappointment in my decision to to accept the Dan David prize. I will attempt to do so now. Continue reading ‘An acceptance of Israel’s legitimacy does not imply an acceptance of all that it does’: Amitav Ghosh
From Murder Mystery to Spy Thriller: Raveena Hansa
THE CONTINUING SAGA OF THE MUMBAI TERRORIST ATTACKS
This is a guest post by RAVEENA HANSA.
A great deal of new evidence concerning the 26 November 2008 terrorist attacks in Bombay has emerged over the past year. This includes the book Who Killed Karkare: The Real Face of Terrorism in India by S.M.Mushrif, a former police officer with a distinguished record, who uses news reports during and just after the attacks to question the official story; the book To the Last Bullet by Vinita Kamte (the widow of Ashok Kamte) and Vinita Deshmukh; revelations concerning Hemant Karkare’s bullet-proof jacket and post-mortem report; the David Coleman Headley trial; and the trial of Ajmal Kasab, Fahim Ansari and Sabauddin Shaikh. I do not include the Ram Pradhan Commission report on police responses to the attack, for reasons I will explain.
The Headley Affair
The Headley affair has, predictably, grabbed a great deal of publicity. The fact that the FBI had been investigating the involvement of this American in conducting reconnaisance for the 26/11 attacks seems to have come as a revelation to the Indian investigators, who had a chance to apprehend him but instead chose to detain two Indian Muslims, Fahim Ansari and Sabauddin Shaikh, for preparing maps of 26/11 targets.
It has been established that Headley was an agent of the US Drug Enforcement Administration, and his plea bargain leads us to conclude he was also a US intelligence agent: in other words, a spy. It is also known he was involved with the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), and supplied information to them about targets attacked on 26/11. There are three possible explanations that would fit these facts:
1) He started off as a US intelligence agent, but was won over by the LeT, and was acting on their behalf.
2) The US intelligence agency employing him was complicit in the 26/11 attacks. Since the most likely fallout of such attacks would be increased tension and even armed clashes on the Pakistan-India border, and since it appears to be a priority of US foreign policy to reduce such tension, this would suggest that Headley was being handled by a rogue element in US intelligence.
Nandini Sundar – Will counting caste reduce inequality?
Nandini Sundar’s recent Op-Ed for The Hindu on caste-enumeration in the latest round of the census. Read the entire article here.
But come back with your comments – what do you think about caste–enumeration?
Yesterday when the census enumerator visited, I asked him how he felt about the current debate on counting caste in the census: “Not comfortable at all”, he said, “I don’t even like asking whether someone is SC/ST or Other, leave alone what their caste is.” But, he added, “caste is an inescapable reality of Indian society.”
The debate on counting caste in the census has not moved on from 2001, when opinion was equally divided. Supporters of caste enumeration argue that census categories merely reflect existing classifications, and that only the census can provide the figures necessary to map inequality by caste. Opponents argue that the census does not mirror but actively produces social classifications and ways of thinking. They point to the history of mobilisation around caste in the census and the consequent dangers of both distorted data and increased social tensions. In neither case has much thought been given to how the data might be used, the different kinds of figures needed for different purposes, or alternative ways of collecting the required data. Read the rest of the article here
The ban on SIMI and Indian democracy
Dr Shahid Badar, national president of Students Islamic Movement of India, recently decided not to contest any more the ban on SIMI, his stated reason being:
“to put an end to this mindless, futile, unequal, unethical and unjust exercise in which the Government has shamelessly used the Judiciary to achieve its ends of casting a shadow of criminality on the entire muslim community. I have therefore chosen not to contest the declaration of the central govt.”
This is the full text of the affidavit filed by him before the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Tribunal.
Swami & Friends: JTSA’s response to Praveen Swami
The story so far…
Jamia Teachers Solidarity Association was formed after the so-called “encounter” at Batla House in 2008, in which two students of Jamia Millia Islamia were killed. You may remember posts on kafila at the time, questioning the credibility of police accounts of the “encounter” and criticizing the unethical nature of media coverage:
A little less melodrama, a lot more forensics;
The Jamia Nagar encounter: Curiouser and curiouser;
Shame is a revolutionary sentiment;
Some questions about the Delhi encounter.
In April this year, JTSA, which has been demanding an independent probe into the encounter, issued a statement after the post mortem reports of Atif Ameen and Md. Sajid were made public, revealing that the two boys were not killed in cross fire as Delhi Police claimed:
Batla House ‘Encounter’: Whom is the JP Trauma Centre Shielding?
On April 25, 2010, Countercurrents published another statement by JTSA, titled Praveen Swami’s Not so Fabulous Fables, which began thus:
“If there is one infallible indicator of what the top Indian Intelligence agencies are thinking or cooking up, it is this: Praveen Swami’s articles. Each time the security establishment wishes to push a certain angle to this bomb blast or that, Swami’s articles appear magically, faithfully reflecting the Intelligence reports. After the Batla House ‘encounter’, he launched a tirade against all those who were questioning the police account of the shootout labeling them all ‘Alices in wonderland’. He went so far as to identify ‘precisely’ how Inspector Sharma was shot by claiming that “abdomen wound was inflicted with [Atif] Amin’s weapon and the shoulder hit, by Mohammad Sajid”.
And no sir, Swami’s conclusion was not based on post mortem reports of the killed, fire arm examination report or ballistic report but on this innocent fact: “the investigators believe that…” He certainly brings in a whole new meaning to ‘investigative journalism’. Swami however felt no need to pen an article when the postmortem reports of Atif and Sajid revealed that they had been shot from close range and that neither of them sustained gunshot wounds in the frontal region of the body—an impossibility in the case of a genuine encounter. Was it because the police and the Home Ministry chose to remain quiet after the revelations—hoping that the storm would quietly blow over?“
Praveen Swami wrote an injured response via a letter to Annie Zaidi, which too was published on Countercurrents.
And now read on, as JTSA responds to Swami.
Continue reading Swami & Friends: JTSA’s response to Praveen Swami
KAFILA - COLLECTIVE EXPLORATIONS SINCE 2006 