Category Archives: Politics

Capitalism, Culture, Ecology/Environment, Everyday Life, Movements, Politics, Right watch

Everyday Tips for Surviving Tyranny: Anonymous

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Guest Post by ANONYMOUS

Suspected Banksy mural in London in support of environmentalist protest. 

As authoritarian right-wing populist leaders across the world unleash a reign of tyranny and hate, there is a need to think together about everyday strategies of survival. As an individual, it can get a bit overwhelming. Everything could look pointless. Many friends talk about how they find it impossible to write or work in an atmosphere of hate and violence. However, it is important to remember that what might look invincible today may not last for even half a decade. But while it lasts, how does one live under tyranny and what are the ways of building non-violent resistance? Continue reading Everyday Tips for Surviving Tyranny: Anonymous →

Bad ideas, Culture, Debates, Government, Law, Politics, Right watch

Lynchistan

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Southern trees bear a strange fruit,

Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,

Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,

Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

The word lynching conjures up images of a dark period in the history of the United States of America. Between 1877 and 1950, white supremacist gangs murdered 4,000 African Americans, while the government and the police looked the other way. James Baldwin, whose essays Dark Days captures the unfolding violence, wrote, ‘A mob is not autonomous. It executes the real will of the people who rule the State’. In 1888, white supremacists lynched seven African American men for drinking from a well – which they had said was for ‘white’s only’. Baldwin recounts that story and writes, ‘The blood is on the hands of the state of Alabama which sent those mobs into the street to execute the will of the State’.

The lyrics quoted above are from the iconic song – Strange Fruit – written by the communist artist Abel Meeropol and sung by Billie Holiday. Continue reading Lynchistan →

Bad ideas, Culture, Debates, Government, Politics, Right watch

A War For Scientists to Join

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Scientists have barely offered resistance to pseudoscience. This must change—IIT students show how.

Ramesh Pokhriyal

Surely India’s scientific community must be waking up to the realisation that their silence is detrimental to scientific development and allows many varieties of mischief to breed. In a rare show of gumption, students of the elite engineering institute, IIT Bombay, have slammed the recent decision to invite the Human Resources Development (HRD) Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal ‘Nishank’ to chair their graduation ceremony.

For too long India’s scientists have remained silent—even the credulous claims by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a speech at the Ambani hospital in November 2014 was not challenged by them for a long time. A key role has to be played by the scientific community in the ongoing battle of ideas. Perhaps students of IIT Bombay show the way.

They have said in their in-house publication, Insight IIT Bombay, that a guest who “recognised, embodied and endorsed the scientific and moral values” of their institute should have been invited instead of the minister. Their problem is with Pokhriyal’s speech, pervaded by unscientific claims and “twisted facts”. They are under no illusion the speech tried to stoke “patriotic feelings”. To the IIT students, the speech was a “mild form of scientific blasphemy”.

( Read the full article here : https://www.newsclick.in/war-scientists-join)

Politics, Right watch

Protest Prime Minister Modi’s visit to the United Nations: Coalition Against Fascism in India

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Statement by the US-based COALITION AGAINST FASCISM IN INDIA

cafiusa2019@gmail.com Twitter @Hum_CAFI_hai)

Protest on Friday, September 27th at 10:30 am

United Nations Plaza, New York City

India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit the United States at the end of September. He will attend the United Nations General Assembly Session on September 28.  Please join us to protest Modi’s visit. Modi’s government has been orchestrating a pogrom of hate and violence against Muslims and Dalits in India. His government has been cracking down on all forms of dissent and all those who question its politics of hate. Its economic policies have resulted in escalating poverty and thehighest unemployment rate in half a century. We call upon all anti-fascist, anti-racist,secular, and environmentalist groups in the United States to join us in protesting his visit and exposing the retrograde, near-fascist politics of Modi’s government.

Continue reading Protest Prime Minister Modi’s visit to the United Nations: Coalition Against Fascism in India →

Bad ideas, Government, Movements, Politics, Right watch

Wishful visions, dishonest tales and bitter fruit

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Review of ‘Malevolent Republic : A Short History of New India’ by K. S. Komireddi

Image result for malevolent republic

‘The idea of a peace-loving, nonviolent India exists, persists, as part of a selectively constructed and assiduously cultivated national self-image in the midst of a society pervaded by social and political violence…’ argued Prof Upinder Singh, in her well-researched voluminous book ‘ Political Violence in Ancient India’ which had appeared around two years back. She had also added that pioneers of independence struggle were instrumental in creating this ‘[m]yth of non-violence in ancient India which obscures a troubled, complex heritage.’

‘Malevolent Republic’ – A Short Hisotry of New India’ by K. S. Komireddi – a commentator, critic and journalist who has written for leading western publications, reminds one of this debate. The book tries to chronicle the trajectory of post-independence India from Nehru to Modi – and does not shy away from raising uncomfortable questions which demand broader contemplation as well as deep soul searching.

( Read the full story here : https://epaper.telegraphindia.com/calcutta/2019-09-06/71/Page-11.html)

Bad ideas, Debates, Education, Government, Politics, Right watch

Who Needs Romila Thapar’s CV?

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Thapar questioned imperialist versions of Indian history, which the Hindutva Brigade still goes by.

Romila Thapar

..an historian who is indefatigable in the pursuit of knowledge and prolific in its publication, and who is above all a devoted partisan of the truth. … The early history of the country has been illuminated by Professor Thapar, whom I now present, more than by almost any other scholar. An historian of that period who seriously wishes to refute accepted fictions and dispel the general darkness will need several high qualities. (From a citation presented by Oxford University to Romila Thapar while conferring on her an honorary Doctorate of Letters in 2002.)

It was 1960, when Romila Thapar, a young historian at the time, wrote a 400 plus-page monograph on Asoka and the Decline of the Mauryas. According to Oxford University Press, which published it in 2017, it tried to “trace virtually the entire span of Indian history.” The monograph is considered a classic today.

Thapar’s scholarly journey continues unabated at the age of 88. She is among the world’s foremost intellectuals, known for path-breaking work on Indian ancient history, as this interview acknowledges. Undoubtedly, her work has informed and inspired at least three generations of history students.

It hardly needs mention that Thapar has prestigious prizes to her credit for the scores of books and academic papers she has published. Twice, she declined the Padma Bhushan, the third highest civilian award granted by the government.

Now Thapar is in the news because of a strange query from the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) administration, where she has held teaching and administrative positions for roughly three decades.

( Read the full article here : https://www.newsclick.in/Romila-Thapar-CV-JNU-Historian-Hindutva-Brigade-Indian-History)

 

Bad ideas, Culture, Debates, Government, Law, Literature, Politics

Books About Wars in Your Country

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A brief history of books, resistance, the police and politicians.

War and Peace

It is humanly impossible for even the most learned judge to have read every book referred to in their court. For a brief while this week, the judge conducting the trial of activist Vernon Gonsalves, an accused in the Bhima Koregaon incident of 2018, became an example of this. That was until the judge clarified that he is, in fact, aware of the Russian writer Leo Tolstoy and his epical novel War and Peace.

His response when the Bhima Koregaon charge sheet was placed before his court proves he knew of the provenance and contents of War and Peace. The confusion, it now appears, arose because the charge sheet had mentioned another book with a similar title. That is how the judge had ended up asking Gonsalves’ lawyers why their client possessed a book about wars in “other countries.”

It is not the judge’s knowledge of great literature but his belief that books about wars in other countries should not be owned (or read) by Indians that is a bigger surprise. Of course, since that remark, many commentators have pointed out that Tolstoy’s writings supported peace and not war. Accordingly, Mahatma Gandhi’s long correspondence with the literary legend is being highlighted afresh.

That said, this is not the first time that judges have expressed a curious indifference to the value of the written word, whether fictional or literary. The question arises, how can we tell if this incident is an aberration or the tip of an iceberg of flimsy excuses to keep people behind bars.

( Read the full article here : https://www.newsclick.in/books-about-wars-your-country)

Politics, Right watch

The RSS coup d’etat in India, and a collage of solidarity actions for Kashmir

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Protest in Philadephia on abrogation of Article 370

Since the 5th of August, the now abolished state of Kashmir has been under de facto military rule, as shown both by news reports of the numbers of troops stationed there currently, as well as by a fact-finding report released after a visit to Kashmir by Jean Dreze, Kavita  Krishnan, Maimoona Mollah and Vimal Bhai, which begins:

When we arrived in Srinagar on 9 August, we found the city silenced and desolated by curfew, and bristling with Indian military and paramilitary presence. The curfew was total, as it had been since 5th August.

The intention of this post was initially only to put together a quick collage of some news items and statements of solidarity and protests across India and the world, on the abolition of the state of Jammu & Kashmir, bringing the two newly formed Union Territories directly under the rule of the Hindutva formation currently in power at the centre.

However, this move can only be understood in the context of the fact that since May 23, 2019, India is barely any longer even the formal democracy it claimed to be.  Effectively, a coup d’etat was carried out on that date by the RSS (now under the complete control of Modi-Shah), through the extremely dubious “sweeping victory” of the BJP.  We begin therefore with a section on RSS and The Lie as Political Strategy.

The second section is the compilation and in the third, some reflections on democracy in India today. Continue reading The RSS coup d’etat in India, and a collage of solidarity actions for Kashmir →

Bad ideas, Debates, Government, Movements, Politics

Arvind Kejriwal, Article 370 and a Blind Alley

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(Photo Courtesy : http://www.newslaundry.com)

“He came, he saw and he concurred“

– Caption of a RK Laxman cartoon in early 90 s

 

AAP’s stand on article 370 has confused and disheartened many.

For its workers the party has opened itself to attacks by its adversaries because of its support to stripping of statehood for Jammu and Kashmir and thus weakening its own plank for full statehood for Delhi which was its key slogan during the 2019 Lok Sabha campaign.

A section of its fellow-travelers who had high hopes of the experiment, activists/scholars – who were rather enthused with its ‘participatory’ approach – also feel betrayed or disheartened now.

It is a different matter that not many have made their displeasure known.

May be it is a sign of their increasing fatigue or possible cynicism with politics in general, they have preferred to share their frustrations at private levels only. Continue reading Arvind Kejriwal, Article 370 and a Blind Alley →

Bad ideas, Centre watch, Debates, Politics, Right watch

In Kashmir Health Professionals Speak Truth to Power

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It’s an outrage to dismiss valid concerns that doctors and medical journals are raising.

Kashmir Article 370

Representational image. | Image Courtesy: Indian Express

These are strange times. A state can just get ‘obliterated’ from the map of the nation. Constitutional propriety is set aside to deprive millions of citizens of their basic human rights while a significant section of the rest of the country ‘rejoices’ over it all.

A large section of the media has abandoned its role as watchdog of democracy but health professionals are coming forward to speak truth to power.

Reports have appeared that eighteen doctors from across India, including Dr Ramani Atkuri, a public health professional, have written to the BMJ, a prominent medical journal, urging the central government to “ease restrictions on communication and travel at the earliest [in Kashmir] and undertake any other measures that are required to allow patients to access health care without hindrance.”

This group of doctors has thrown crucial light on the humanitarian crisis unfolding in the Valley. One consequence of the crisis is “violation of the right to life and to health care.”

( Read the full article here : https://www.newsclick.in/Kashmir%27s-Future-Mental-Health-Article-370-Lancet-Journal)

Debates, Identities, Politics, Violence/Conflict

Nationalism and Politics – An Open Letter to Arvind Kejriwal

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I write this open letter to you as a well wisher, and someone who has been seriously supportive of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) through all the ups and downs in the years since its formation.  Perhaps like many others, I too have high expectations of the experiment that AAP is and the new ground it has tried to break in terms of providing a government that has steadfastly kept the interests of the common person in mind while taking decisions.

But I also write this letter because I, like many others, have been perturbed by some developments which do not augur well for the future either of your party or of the country. The latter in any case, is set on a disastrous course, thanks to the current dispensation at the Centre. Let me also make it clear right away that I am not one of those who criticize AAP for ‘lacking a clear ideology’ and I in fact value the fact that on many critical issues, AAP has been able to resist the pressure to step into well trodden, familiar responses to specific situations and issues – especially well trodden among Leftists. But I do think that AAP needs to think a bit more seriously  about politics – which is not the same thing as ideology.

Continue reading Nationalism and Politics – An Open Letter to Arvind Kejriwal →

Culture, Government, Politics, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Mujh se integration karogi? Sanghvaad and its war on women

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Determined, defiant – not the Kashmiri women of Sanghi fantasies

Protest in Srinagar against the abrogation of Article 370 on August 11, 2019, despite the clampdown by the Indian government. Image courtesy The Wall Street Journal.

When trolls on social media started circulating photographs of young Kashmiri girls, gloating, “now we can marry them”, it was only the overt manifestation by Sanghis of the real spirit behind abrogating Article 370. While Prime Minister Narendra Modi held forth at length on development, rights to education, rights for women and for Dalits, all of which the people of J&K were deprived of because of Article 370, the truth of course, is that J&K stands in the top 10 to 15 states on  different indicators ranging from life expectancy, people served per government doctor, poverty rate and infant mortality rate, to human development index.

Or as Haseeb Drabu puts it:

The level of economic empowerment is evident from the fact that more than 25% of the household earnings in J&K are from own cultivation. In “prosperous” Punjab, it is only 18%, in “vibrant” Gujarat, it is less than 16% and in “terrific” Tamil Nadu, it is only 3%. And yet, J&K is being portrayed as a “sick” state.

Continue reading Mujh se integration karogi? Sanghvaad and its war on women →

Government, Politics, Right watch

On Eid, two stories in Times of India June 28, 1958: Ayesha Kidwai

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Guest post by AYESHA KIDWAI

 

On the same page of the Times of India of June 28, 1958 are two news items. The one on the left is a report of how Bakrid was celebrated the day before in various cities, including Jammu, where Hindus and Sikhs offered namaz along with their Muslim brethren. On the right  is another story that reports the expulsion of Ms. Mridula Sarabhai from the Congress party for her ‘anti-party activities’ in opposing the arrest of Sheikh Abdullah in 1953 and the muzzling of democratic rights in Kashmir.

Continue reading On Eid, two stories in Times of India June 28, 1958: Ayesha Kidwai →

Bad ideas, Debates, Government, Identities, Politics, Right watch

Shyama Prasad Mukherjee’s Role: Official Myths on J&K Busted

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Dear Prime Minister, nothing about Jammu & Kashmir is as your party sees it

Syama Prasad

Economist and activist Jean Dreze, who has co-authored books with Nobel laureates, such as Amartya Sen and Angus Deaton, was in the headlines for a placard he carried to a protest rally in Delhi earlier this week. His placard challenged the government’s most critical justification for its controversial move to scrap Article 35A and read down Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). The placard displayed statistics that compare J&K with Gujarat, which is Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah’s home state. Dreze clearly showed how Gujarat lags behind J&K on a raft of development indices.

Although Dreze’s data beautifully punctures the government’s claim that J&K’s special status was a hindrance to its progress, Modi in his address to the nation on Wednesday night repeated the same argument, based on dubious claims. For instance, his claim that J&K lags behind other Indian states in matters of health services, education and so on, is patently incorrect.

Figures recorded in the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) has extended the debate further and shown that J&K already excels many other Indian states on several human development counts. Once again, this underlines that all talk about how “development” will reach J&K after Article 370 is made redundant is sheer humbug.

The propagation of false information brings home the fact that the government has gone very far to generate legitimacy for its decisions in J&K. In his address to the nation, Modi also said that his government had “fulfilled the dreams of [BR] Ambedkar as well as [the then Home Minister Vallabhbahi] Patel”.

( Read the full article here : https://www.newsclick.in/index.php/shyama-prasad-mukherjees-role-official-myths-jk-busted)

Culture, Education, Politics, Right watch

83 Delhi University English Teachers’ Statement against Politically Motivated Attacks on Syllabus

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The following is the full text of the statement issued by 83 English teachers of Delhi University against the attack on the syllabus:

We, the teachers of English across Delhi University are shocked and appalled at the unacademic, politically motivated attack on our syllabus. This is a democratically drafted syllabus, which involved faculty participation from around 40 colleges; over 2 years, and more than 3000 working hours have been spent on it. It is a matter of sorrow and deep academic concern that the syllabus is now being maligned, and is sought to be scuttled, by certain political groups at the University.

Continue reading 83 Delhi University English Teachers’ Statement against Politically Motivated Attacks on Syllabus →

Government, Politics, Right watch

More lies from the Election Commission – good job, The Quint!

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Previous posts on the stealing of the 2019 Lok Sabha Elections on Kafila, which have links to many other substantiated stories in other journals and news portals:

The “massive mandate” of 2019 and the role of the Election Commission  – Nivedita Menon

Update On “Tally Mismatch” In 2019 Lok Sabha Elections: Ravi Nair

Lok Sabha Elections 2019 – Calling The Election Commission To Account: Statement By Retired Civil Servants, Veterans, Academics And Concerned Citizens

EC Misleads Public With Bogus RTI Reply On VVPAT Count: Poonam Agarwal

RTI Reveals Pvt Consultants Have EVM Access, Why is EC Denying It? POONAM AGARWAL in The Quint.

The Election Commission of India has always maintained that no private company or outsourcing in any form is involved in the election process. But The Quint’s investigation has found this to not be true.

An RTI in The Quint’s possession shows that the Electronics Corporation of India Limited (ECIL), a PSU that manufactures EVMs and VVPAT machines, engaged private engineers as “consultants” and that these private engineers have worked with the Election Commission in Assembly Elections since 2017 and even in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.

Their job was extremely sensitive – to check and maintain EVMs and VVPATs, starting from First level Checking (FLC) right up till and including the Counting Day, which means they had easy access to EVMs through the course of the elections.

Read the full article here.

Feminism, Government, Politics

From revered icon to unruly subject – Irom Sharmila and the politics of gender: Panchali Ray

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Guest Post by PANCHALI RAY

In the month of August, 2016, Irom Sharmila Chanu, also known as the ‘Iron Lady’ and ‘Mengoubi’ (the fair one) announced that she would break her 16 year long hunger fast, which she commenced  as a protest against the imposition of AFSPA (Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act) by the Indian state on the tiny hilly state of Manipur. While some cheered, others were curious, and many shocked and angry at what they perceived as her betrayal of the Manipuri cause. The backlash from her community was quick and ferocious, and newspaper headlines carried titillating stories of how she was rejected by her ‘own’.[1]

While much has been written on Sharmila’s hunger strike, her breaking of the fast, and entry into electoral politics, there has not been an equal amount of discussion on the politics of gender. For instance, the fact that Sharmila’s location in the North-Eastern part of the country has been central to her marginalization and non-acknowledgement[2], or that the mainstream media’s highlighting of her predicament, post-hunger strike, reinforced stereotypes of Manipur as the ‘wild’ and ‘savage’ North East[3] has received considerable attention.

Continue reading From revered icon to unruly subject – Irom Sharmila and the politics of gender: Panchali Ray →

Culture, Debates, Government, Identities, Politics, Religion, Right watch

Return of Hindutva: A Challenge for Secularism

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Guest Post by Gargi Chakravartty

BOOK REVIEW

Hindutva’s Second Coming by Subhash Gatade; published by Media House, Delhi; 2019; pages: 272; Rs 395 (US $ 18).

The return of Modi to power with a huge margin in this 2019 election is a clear verdict for the Hindutva plank. Why and how it happened leave us, the secular billions, to ponder about the reality and its aftermath. And at that juncture Subhas Gatade’s 272-page analysis titled ‘Hindutva’s Second Coming’ gives us something concrete to think over once again. This in-depth study with rich academic perception is a commendable work, bereft of jargons and convoluted expressions, often found in books written from a high pedestal which goes beyond the mental reach of lay readers. Precisely for this reason the author needs to be specially acclaimed for bringing out facts at one place based on notes and references which are so far scattered in divergent historical materials. It serves as a Reader for millions who are combating communalism and distortion of history at the grassroot level.

( Read the full text here : http://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article8847.html)

Government, Politics, Right watch

EC Misleads Public With Bogus RTI Reply on VVPAT Count: Poonam Agarwal

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Evidence mounts of something extremely rotten in the state of India and the recent Lok Sabha elections.

We have raised this question on Kafila for a while now, see The Massive Mandate and Open Letter to Election Commission of India by civil servants, the serious charges in which have been met with total silence.

Now POONAM AGARWAL writes in The Quint, which has been investigating the issue for some time.

The current state of India’s Election Commission (EC) raises doubts about its transparency and fairness, especially when we find that it is misleading the public in its RTI replies.

The EC was constituted in 1950 to conduct free and fair elections, and was established as an autonomous body solely so that it can work independently. Is that what it’s doing?

The Quint filed an RTI seeking information and documents on the VVPAT count data during the Lok Sabha elections 2019. In reply, the EC refused to share the documents on the grounds that the VVPAT data is not available with the Commission (which means, at the EC headquarters in Delhi).

Here’s How the EC Is Misleading Citizens.

Read the full article at The Quint.

 

Debates, Government, Politics, Right watch

मोदीनामा : हिंदुत्व का उन्माद

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मई 2019 में नरेंद्र मोदी के नेतृत्व में हिंदुत्ववादी दक्षिणपंथी भारतीय जनता पार्टी ने शानदार चुनावी जीत हासिल की।

यह जीत सामान्य समझ को धता बताती है – जीवन और आजीविका जैसी आधारभूत बातें इस चुनाव का मुद्दा क्यों नहीं बन पाईं? ऐसा क्यों है कि सामान्य और सभ्य लोगों के लिए भी

हिंदुत्व के ठेकेदारों की गुंडागर्दी बेमानी हो गई? क्यों एक आक्रामक और मर्दवादी कट्टरवाद हमारे समाज के लिए सामान्य सी बात हो गई है? ऐसा क्यों है कि बेहद जरूरी मुद्दे आज गैरजरूरी हो गए हैं?

ये सवाल चुनावी समीकरणों और जोड़-तोड़ से कहीं आगे और गहरे हैं। असल में मोदी और भाजपा ने सिर्फ चुनावी नक्शों को ही नहीं बदला है बल्कि सामाजिकं मानदंडों के तोड़-फोड़ की भी शुरूआत कर दी है।

यह किताब प्रधानमंत्री के तौर पर मोदी के पिछले पांच वर्षों की यात्रा को देखते हुए आने वाले पांच वर्षों के लिए एक चेतावनी है।

978-81-940778-5-5

LeftWord Books, New Delhi, 2019

Language: Hindi, 131 pages, 5.5″ x 8.5″

Price INR 195.00 Book Club Price INR 137

(https://mayday.leftword.com/catalog/product/view/id/21471)

SUBHASH GATADE
Subhash Gatade is a left activist and author. He is the author of Charvak ke Vaaris (Hindi, 2018), Ambedkar ani Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (Marathi, 2016), Godse’s Children: Hindutva Terror in India (2011) and The Saffron Condition (2011). His writings for children include Pahad Se Uncha Aadmi (2010).

Feminism, Politics, Right watch

The Politics of Piety in Naya Pakistan: Afiya Zia

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Guest Post by AFIYA ZIA

A year ago, Pakistan’s national elections brought in a new government led by the Pakistan Tehreeq e Insaf (PTI) and headed by the former-cricketer-turned politician, Imran Khan. Khan had been drifting in the political wilderness for 22 years, waiting for providence to appoint him Prime Minister. As the 2018 elections loomed, this was not looking possible. However, a series of legal cases of corruption started being levelled against the serving PM, Nawaz Sharif, and efforts were made to atrophy others from the major parties of the PML-N and PPP (who had signed the ‘charter of democracy’ to prevent military intervention in civilian governance). The methods of these moves made it clear that the ‘establishment’ was betting on a new horse. Khan was not taking any risks though.

Six months before the national election, he entered marriage for the third time (with no less controversy than his previous marriages) to Bushra Maneka who was also his spiritual guide or pirni. A mother and a grandmother, there was speculation that Bushra divorced her husband for the higher cause of marrying the PM-in-waiting. In the days prior to the summer election, Khan performed Umrah in Mecca with Bushra, and was seen prostrating at a shrine in Pakistan and accessorised with rosaries and amulets in preparation for the polls.

Continue reading The Politics of Piety in Naya Pakistan: Afiya Zia →