This note comes from the CAMPAIGN FOR SURVIVAL AND DIGNITY
The last few weeks have seen struggles over forest rights and forest control intensifying across the country. On the one hand there are larger and larger protests taking place, and on the other, the continued use of force by Central and State governments is combined with total silence and apathy on protecting people’s rights. Continue reading ‘Protests and Repression: Struggles in the Forests of India’
Ours was the marsh country, down by the river, within, as the river wound, twenty miles of the sea. My first most vivid and broad impression of the identity of things, seems to me to have been gained on a memorable raw afternoon towards evening. At such a time I found out for certain, that this bleak place overgrown with nettles was the churchyard; and that Philip Pirrip, late of this parish, and also Georgiana wife of the above, were dead and buried; and that Alexander, Bartholomew, Abraham, Tobias, and Roger, infant children of the aforesaid, were also dead and buried; and that the dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, intersected with dykes and mounds and gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes; and that the low leaden line beyond, was the river; and that the distant savage lair from which the wind was rushing, was the sea; and that the small bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all and beginning to cry, was Pip. – Charles Dickens, Great Expectations
A for Apple and Z for Zebra. Children are taught the alphabet with the help of images. And the association of images with sound. It helps them associate the sound of A with the sound of Apple, and associate that in turn with the image of an apple. The alphabet book depends on images that may be familiar to children. The word Apple is a signifier, and the apple itself is the signified. This is, most simply, what semiotics or the study of signs and sign processes.
In a future world, if there are no zebras, alphabet books may have to replace the last entry with something else. What could it be? Zebra crossing? Zimbabwe?
Last week, the Jammu and Kashmir Police registered a case of sedition, defamation and criminal conspiracy against six officials of BoSE, the government’s very own Board of School Education, for this:
This is a page from a book called Baharistaan-e-Urdu. This attempt to teach Kashmiri children the Urdu alphabet (note to self: this is what I need to learn Nastaliq!) makes them say, “Zoi se Zalim,” Z for Zalim, meaning cruel. That is only one of four examples. The other two are: zaroof (utensils), zahir (visible) and zarf (ornamental cup holder).
Continue reading Z for Zalim: Semiotics and the Occupation of Kashmir
Over the last three months New York City has been electrified by the Occupy Wall Street movement. Prachi Patankar and I have been participating in some of the actions. We have also been part of a number of discussions within the South Asia Solidarity Initiative (SASI) on how an organisation like ours can bring an internationalist perspective to this movement. Prachi is also on the board of the War Resisters League (WRL). Through such discussions SASI and WRL organised Empire on Wall Street actions. With many of our comrades in India and Sri Lanka asking us about the impact of the Occupy Wall Street movement and its future, we decided to write this article. Continue reading Wither Wall Street: Challenge of the Occupy Movement
The Delhi media celebrated on 11 December the above event, which took place on 11 December 1911. The Delhi media will celebrate anything that is worth celebrating, and everything that is not worth celebrating. Someone just has to set the alarm bells and hours of programming, reams of newsprint will be dedicated to an orgy of unthinking celebration. The only thing other than Celebration that sells is Outrage.
Sohail Hashmi has written on Kafila about why 11 December could not be the centennial of “New Delhi” but only the Delhi Durbar. That was only one problem with the Celebrations; here are some more.
Amidst the cacophony of celebrating 100 years of Delhi, several details seem to have escaped the attention of our ever vigilant media, both print and electronic. This post is to draw your attention to a few of these ‘details’ in an attempt to place the celebrations in what appears to this author to be the correct perspective.
The 12th of December, 2011, can not by any stretch of imagination be described the centenary of Delhi, because there were at least 7 Dehlis before New Delhi came up, in fact 9 Dehlis if one were to add Kilokhri and Kotla Mubarakpurpur, Dehlis in their own right, to the generally accepted list of Qila Rai Pithora, Siri, Tughlaqabad, Jahan Panah, Firozeshah Kotla, Din Panah or Sher Garh or Purana Qila and Shahjahanabad. All of these came up at different times from the 11th century to the 17th century and all of these were more than a 100 years ago.
All that the 12th of December 2011 can claim to be the centenary of, therefore, is New Delhi. Let us look at even that claim a little more closely. What exactly transpired on the 12th of December 1911 that is causing so much excitement a 100 years later? Continue reading From Dehli to New Delhi, it wasn’t 1911
Guest post by RAZA RUMI
As a Pakistani it is difficult for me to talk about the ghastly attacks on Mumbai three years ago and the response of its vibrant citizens. This is not simply due to the nationality of Ajmal Kasab, the lone terrorist captured after the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks. What happened in Mumbai was a sad reminder of how easy it has become for a handful of militants to wreak havoc, to hold an entire city hostage and undermine humanity. A vast majority of Pakistanis felt the pain and condemned the Mumbai attacks; targeting innocent civilians is heinous and unacceptable.
The Mumbai attacks changed the atmosphere created by President Asif Ali Zardari’s unprecedented offers of peace and cooperation. A few weeks before the carnage in Mumbai, Mr Zardari made historic remarks in a conclave organised by an Indian newspaper, which represented a consensus within Pakistan’s political class: “I do not feel threatened by India and India should not feel threatened from us… today we have a Parliament which is already pre-agreed upon a friendly relationship with India. In spite of our disputes, we have a great future together.” Mr Zardari also declared that Pakistan will not be the first country to use its nuclear weapons, thus altering a carefully constructed Pakistani nuclear doctrine of first-use. Continue reading Three Years After 26/11: Raza Rumi
Guest post by ARIF AYAZ PARREY
I must go back briefly to a place I have loved
to tell you those you will efface I have loved [i]
Exactly ten years after he left us, Aga Shahid Ali returned to his Kashmir. A couple of days earlier, many parts of the valley were blessed with the season’s first snowfall, signalling an end to Harud, the autumn season in Kashmir, and ushering in Wande, the winter. The sky over Srinagar was overcast too, as it has been for the past few days, maybe because this year Moharram has been particularly demanding, with mourners not being allowed to mourn because “the processions might be used by separatists to whip up anti-India sentiments”. The reason for the ban is announced from the same bureaucratic offices which, during the summer, employ the entire state machinery to ensure that people from the plains can climb up the mountains into a cave where Amarnath wants to spend some private time with Parvati so that he can explain to her the mysteries of immortality (Which must include, one would like to presume, the secrets of the longevity of a fragile mountain ecology.) Some like to define this variance in state policy and practice as “secularism”. The connection between the tyranny of Karbala and the present-day Kashmir is firmly established, once again. Continue reading Shahid in Srinagar: Arif Ayaz Parrey
Press release issued today by the NATIONAL ALLIANCE FOR PEOPLE’S MOVEMENTS
New Delhi, December 10 : For some months now, Save Sharmila Solidarity Campaign (SSSC) has been spreading the word about Irom Sharmila and her struggle across the nation and beyond.
Started only by few organizations, campaign has now received support over more than 80 organizations and movements and thousands of supporters. Campaign has reached in almost every state of India and even outside. Campaign has organized various programs including its famous Nationwide Signature Campaign, Sri Nagar- Imphal Save Sharmila Jan Karwan in October and Ahemdabad- Srinagar Jattha in November this year. Continue reading Nationwide opposition to the government’s refusal to a peaceful fast in support of Irom Sharmila: NAPM
There are few books as exhilarating as one by a comrade that is intellectually engaging and speaks to the current context. I was invited by 3rd i NY to a Conversation titled ‘Torturing Democracies: Past and Present’, where Jinee and I discussed her new book at Alwan for the Arts. The conversation came to life with the audience which included many of our comrades from the South Asia Solidarity Initiative (SASI) including Prachi. After that wonderful conversation, Prachi and I decided to delve further into the book and write a review. This was an exercise very different from what we normally engage with in SASI around our solidarity campaigns, but it was also a wonderful way to see another side of Jinee. That is the theoretically rich research of someone whom we relied on as a solid activist. I feel we should be doing more of reading, writing about and debating the work of our activist friends. A shorter version of this review has been published by Himal. Perhaps some of the themes in the book can be debated here with this longer review. Continue reading Transnational Torture by Jinee Lokaneeta reviewed with Prachi Patankar
This press release comes from the PEOPLE’S UNION FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES
Bhubhaneshwar / Delhi
5th December, 2011
PRESS RELEASE
• Appeal to the Odisha Government to withdraw the frivolous cases and RELEASE ABHAY SAHOO NOW!
• WITHDRAW ALL THE CRIMINAL CASES LODGED AGAINST THE ANTI POSCO ACTIVISTS and put a stop to repressive measures.
• PUCL APPEALS TO OTHER ORGANISATIONS TO COME TO TOGETHER AND INITIATE A NATIONAL CAMPAIGN FOR THE RELEASE OF ABHAY SAHOO AND SUPPORT OF THE POSCO PRATIRODH SANGRAM SAMITI.
The People’s Union for Civil Liberties, represented by its National Secretary Kavita Srivastava and Odisha Convenor, Pramodini Pradhan visited the area in and around Dhinkia Panchayat in Jagatsinghpur district on 1st December, 2011, where the struggle against the proposed POSCO steel plant is taking place for the last seven years. We also went to Choudwar Jail in Cuttack District on 2nd December, 2011 to meet Mr Abhay Sahoo the leader of the POSCO Pratirodh Sangharsh Samiti, who has been arrested against FIRs motivated by the administration under sections causing sexual assault, wrongfully confining somebody and causing atrocities under the SC & ST Act. Continue reading Release Abhay Sahoo Now: People’s Union for Civil Liberties
(नई दिल्ली का सौवां साल शुरू होने पर हिंदी साप्ताहिक आऊटलुक में यह लेख पहली बार प्रकाशित हुआ था.)
अब जबके हर तरफ यह एलान हो चुका है के दिल्ली १०० बरस की हो गयी है और चारों ओर नई दिल्ली के कुछ पुराने होने का ज़िक्र भी होने लगा है, इन दावों के साथ साथ के दिल्ली तो सदा जवान रहती है और देखिये ना अभी कामन वेल्थ खेलों के दौरान यह एक बार फिर दुल्हन बनी थी वगेरह वगेरह तो हमने सोचा के क्यों न इन सभी एलान नामों की सत्यता पर एक नजर डाल ली जाए, और इसी बहाने उस दिल्ली वाले से भी मिल लिया जाए जो इस अति प्राचीन/ मध्य कालीन/ आधनिक नगरी का नागरिक होते हुए भी वैशवीकरण के झांसे में इतना आ चुका है के वो अपने आप को २१वीं शताब्दी के पूर्वार्द्ध में आने वाले आर्थिक संकट को पछाड देने वाले चमचमाते भारत देश की राजधानी का शहरी होने का भरम पाले हुए है. Continue reading यहाँ से शहर को देखो…
Guest post by RUCHI GUPTA
The Arab Spring demonstrations in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain, Yemen, Syria, Jordan, Morocco were hailed in much of the democratic world. However the Occupy Wall Street protests, which till date have spread to 100 cities in the United States and 1500 globally have met with mixed response.
The Arab people are fighting for democracy, and thus their resistance must be respected and supported. But the OWS folks, proudly leaderless and having framed no concrete demands are vulnerable to all manner of criticism, even from those expected to be supportive. Bill Keller, the former editor of arguably one of the most influential newspapers in the world, the ostensibly liberal, New York Times derides, “the Occupiers have been pandered to (“Love your energy!”); patronized (“Here, I’ve drafted you a list of demands …”); co-opted by unions, celebrities and activists for various causes; demonized by the right; arrested and tear-gassed in some cities; and taken lightly by the likes of me”.
However the uprisings in the Arab nations, the OWS demonstrations and even the wave of anti-corruption protests that swept India this year are all ultimately an expression of people’s resistance to disenfranchisement. Whether it’s those fighting for democracy or those who find themselves powerless in face of a system that’s been hijacked by the illegitimate nexus between the financial and political elite (the metaphorical 1%), the underlying sentiment is a demand for fair play and the right of self-determination. Continue reading The need to influence the trajectory of one’s own life: Ruchi Gupta
This statement, signed by many individuals and organisations, was released on 29 November by the CAMPAIGN FOR SURVIVAL AND DIGNITY
CONDEMN THE REPRESSION ON POSCO PRATIRODH SANGRAM SAMITI AND THE LIKELY IMMINENT ATTACK ON THE PEACEFUL PROTESTERS OF THE AREA
The undersigned condemn the growing brutality of the state repression being unleashed against the peaceful, democratic protesters of the POSCO project area, who are only fighting for their legal and fundamental rights. This repression has reached a peak with the arrest yesterday (Friday) of POSCO Pratirodh Sangram Samiti leader Abhay Sahoo. The government’s constant announcements of its intention to start construction in the area lead us to apprehend that there will be more violence and brutality against the movement. Continue reading Statement Condemning the Repression of the POSCO Pratirodh Sangram Samiti
Guest post by YAWAR KABLI
All freedoms enshrined in the Constitution of India are being violated or altogether thrown away by the Jammu and Kashmir Police. One could substantiate that with any number of examples. We were not the first pressmen to be thrashed by the police while covering the stone-hurling protests in the Kashmir. On Friday, 25 November 2011, without any rhyme or reason policemen along with the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) thrashed four of us, including me, and snatched away our expensive cameras. They did not even hesitate to bundle us into police vehicles while taking us to the Khanyar police station.
This guest post by ALIA ALLANA, a despatch for Kafila from Cairo, is the tenth in a series of ground reports from the Arab Spring. Photos by Alia Allana
A week into protesting, the revolution became about preservation lest someone forgets.
Mohammed Mahmoud Street, the sight of intense fighting was officially off-limits for protestors. A concrete wall separated the protestors and police. Atop the wall army soldiers kept guard. The aim was simple: to keep protestors from barging past and facing-off with the authorities, like they had done for the past few days. But sometime in the night, a maverick with a graffiti can had his way and the beige concrete wall now read, “Change is coming soon.” Continue reading ‘Did the generals think we were fools?’ Alia Allana reports from Cairo
No tears will be shed for press freedom for attacks on journalists in Srinagar by the Central Reserve Police Force and the Jammu and Kashmir Police. Fahad Shah reports what happened in Srinagar yesterday:
Journalists were beaten up and one of them detained, today, when they were covering the post-Friday prayers protests in the Old City, here at Srinagar. Umar Mehraj, who works as video journalist for Associated Press says he, along with other journalists, was covering protests when Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and local policemen start beating. He said while beating, the forces were shouting, “Uthao, uthao video ab (Shoot, shoot the video now.).” Umar says his camera was broken and they were abused too.
Continue reading Uthao, uthao video ab, won’t you make the video now?
Guest post by SAMEER BHAT
A fine rain was falling as I disembarked the aircraft. Srinagar was shivering at 7 degrees centigrade. Rams and ewes, all set for slaughter on Eid, looked forlorn. Meat-market persons in untidy pherans haggled with locals for rates. Half the male population, I noticed, had not seen a shaving blade for weeks, a very Kashmiri trait most noticeable in winters. While it continued to drizzle, queues outside ATM machines got fretful. At least three people entered the cashpoint at one time to witness your transaction. The invasion of financial privacy has a very harmless ring to it, which is very indigenous. Continue reading Rain, Eid and Geelani: Sameer Bhat
Guest post by ARIF AYAZ PARREY
The Indian army in Kashmir must be reading a lot of Manto these days. Or Borges. Or Kundera. Or –and this is most likely, given the approaching winter season and their ‘hearts and minds’ programme– Kashmiri folklore.
Not three months have passed since they made a highly publicized acknowledgement of “mistaken identity” after they had killed a mentally “challenged” “Hindu” youth in Poonch and declared that he was a “fierce” “Pakistani terrorist Abu-Usman killed after a 12-hour long gunbattle” (such valour exhibited by the Indian security forces is the stuff of legends in Kashmir) that they have followed it with another announcement of a (dis)similar “mistaken indentity”.
This time, like always, the culprits are the Kashmiri people (whose synonym in the Indian army’s dictionary is “miscreants”) Apparently, people beat to pulp a “member of a covert team of the army and J&K police” who were “sent to Sopore Town on getting info of presence of terrorists in the public rally addressed by SA Geelani”. The person was carrying a camcorder and his service pistol. The people thought he was the terrorist.
Democracy? History? Or “mishtake”? Choose your option.
Kundera writes, “When the institutions of a state no longer feel the need to make sense or to give plausible explanations, the state can only survive as long as people allow it to lie shamelessly.”
See also:
This guest post by ALIA ALLANA is part of a Kafila series of despatches from the Arab Spring
When does a boy become a shabaab?
Literally, in Arabic, shabaab means young men. Before the fever of the Arab Spring raged in the minds of the youth, back when boys used to gather in squares aimlessly, girls eyeing them would call them shabaab.
But that was then; before the political architecture of the Arab world was reconstructed.
Today the shabaab are the disenchanted youth, the angry boys of Benghazi with deathly toys devoid of opportunity, angry at their condition, aware of the world through the Internet and their mobiles, acting out their rebellion. Today the shabaab, the rebels of Libya, want what they think is theirs: the right to self-determination, a say in politics and freedom.
Guest post by ANKUR TAMULI PHUKAN
Many of us who have been studying the political process in Assam were surprised when we received the news in December 2009 that Chairman Arabindo Rajkhowa and some of his colleagues of United Liberation Front of Asom (ULFA) had been arrested in Bangladesh. This moment had to come some day, but we were not prepared to face it. We were familiar with the brave and somewhat legendary image they had created for themselves and needed time to believe that they could be defeated. Continue reading My Days with Nationalism in Assam: Ankur Tamuli Phukan
Guest post by SAMEER BHAT
Hectic parleys are on at the moment to jettison the dreaded AFSPA in the valley. By conservative estimates the army must have beaten about one in every five Kashmiris at one point or the other since this piece of horrible legislation was slapped on us. An unjust law, is no law at all, Martin Luther, the symbol of protestant reformation, verbalized the sentiment of St Augustine in the 15th century. Rings true to this day.
For more than twenty years people have been punched, thrown in the back of military trucks, knocked down by gun-butts, given kicks, pushed around as they got off a bus or simply slapped around for no apparent reason. Just for being themselves, perhaps. No you could not question the moral turpitude of a military-walla from Madras if he clubbed your aging father. Continue reading Kashmir’s Horcrux: Sameer Bhat
KAFILA - COLLECTIVE EXPLORATIONS SINCE 2006 