Category Archives: Right watch

Bad ideas, Centre watch, Identities, Law, Mirror Worlds, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

PUCL condemns those opposing Salman Rushdie’s visit to Jaipur

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This release comes from the PEOPLE’ S UNION FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES, RAJASTHAN

16 January 2012, Jaipur: PUCL strongly condemns Muslim organisations, the Congress and the BJP for opposing Salman Rushdie’s proposed visit to Jaipur

Some Muslim organisations have opposed Salman Rusdie’s participation in the Jaipur Literature Festival. Leaders of the Congress and the Bhartiya Janta Party have also come out strongly in opposition to Rushdie’s visit. Some newspaper reports have carried announcements that Rushdie could be forcibly prevented from coming and attending the literary event.

The opposition is not merely ideological but is also by threatening to disturb law and order. The Rajasthan unit of the PUCL expresses deep concern at such announcements. Such regressive threats are not only an attack on the individual’s right to freedom of speech and expression and a violation of rights granted by the Constitution of India. Such threats also promote communal disharmony, if not deliberately seek to widen communal rifts.  Continue reading PUCL condemns those opposing Salman Rushdie’s visit to Jaipur →

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

Partition Revisited: 2 October 2011, Rudrapur

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This is a film by RAJEEV YADAV and SHAHNAWAZ ALAM of the Uttar Pradesh unit of the PEOPLE’S UNION FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES

This is to introduce our documentary film ‘PARTITION REVISITED’ on the Rudrapur riot of 2nd October 2011, where four persons were killed. Policemen and mobs led by leaders of the Bhartiya Janta Party, the Congress and the Bahujan Samaj Party had ransacked shops and settlements of Muslims in their third successful attempt within two years to stoke communal violence. The riot, which took place on Gandhi Jayanti, led to a massive outmigration of the victimised community, reminding one of the days of the 1947 Partition. This film focuses on precisely this yet unnoticed phenomenon that we could trace out in this first-ever state-sponsored communal riot since the formation of the hill state of Uttarakhand, engineered by the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh, which has been working for a long time in this area to arouse anti-Muslim sentiments in the Bengalis, Sikhs & Panjabi Hindus who settled in Rudrapur after the Partition to India. At a time when the state is going to polls this riot assumes an electoral importance.

Bad ideas, Identities, Mirror Worlds, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

On the Srinagar Sharia court’s statement against Christian pastors: AICC

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This release comes from ALL INDIA CHRISTIAN COUNCIL comes to us via John Dayal

All India Christian Council concern at Srinagar Sharia court statement against Christian pastors

New Delhi, 13 January 2012

The All India Christian Council is deeply disturbed at the Srinagar based Sharia Court issuing a statement against Christian pastors Jim Borst and C M Khanna Srinagar, Jan 11: Supreme Court of Islamic Sharia Wednesday indicted Christian Pastor C M Khanna and Dutch national, Jim Borst for their involvement in luring people to convert their religion. The Sharia court has threatened it will issue a sentence shortly. Such statements can encourage extremist elements to indulge in violence, the Council fears. Continue reading On the Srinagar Sharia court’s statement against Christian pastors: AICC →

Bad ideas, Centre watch, Identities, Politics, Right watch

Demanding a ban on visit of Salman Rushdie to India is outrageous: PUCL

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This release comes from the PEOPLE”S UNION FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES

The People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) views it with deep concern that some organizations have demanded ban on entry of Salman Rushdie in the country. The present call is illogical, preposterous and untenable as the writer has visited the country for several times after the Satanic Verses book controversy. Continue reading Demanding a ban on visit of Salman Rushdie to India is outrageous: PUCL →

Bad ideas, Frontiers, Law, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

The inter-connected destinies of strangers across an international border

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Gopal Das at Wagah border. AFP photo

The central government wants him to do it, the Rajasthan government wants him to do it, but Rajasthan’s acting Governor Shivraj Patil wouldn’t sign on a file for several months now. His obstinacy could become a major hurdle for many Indians and Pakistanis lodged in each others’ prisons.

In an unusual order, the Supreme Court of India quoted William Shakespeare and Faiz Ahmed ‘Faiz’ to directly appeal to the government of Pakistan to pardon and release Indian prisoner Gopal Das. Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari signed the papers within 16 days, ahead of Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani’s visit to Mohali to witness the cricket world cup semi-final with his Indian counterpart. On 7 April, Gopal Das crossed into India. There were those in Pakistan who had opposed his release, arguing he had a few months left to complete his sentence, and that he should not be shown mercy because he had been found guilty in 1984 by a Pakistani military court on charges of being a an Indian spy. He and his family claimed this was not true, and wanted him pardoned because now 52, he had spent the last 27 years in several Pakistani prisons. Continue reading The inter-connected destinies of strangers across an international border →

Culture, Debates, Politics, Right watch

New friends of ISKCON? On the Gita controversy

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The Parliament which has remained rather dysfunctional for different reasons all the year witnessed a strange bonhomie few days back. It was difficult to believe that they are the same representatives of people who could not see eye to eye on various issues of concern and were always keen to score their point over their political adversaries. Led by the likes of Laloo Prasad Yadav – interspersed with slogans of ‘Jai Krishna’ –  the government’s alleged silence on the developments in a faraway court in Russia was called into question.

Interestingly, BJP the party which happens to be the chief opposition party, found itself playing second fiddle to the troika of Laloo, Mulayam and Sharad Yadav on this matter. The issue related to proceedings in a court in Tomsk which supposedly had found portions of ‘Gita’ objectionable and ‘extremist’ and was contemplating to ban it.

Continue reading New friends of ISKCON? On the Gita controversy →

Bad ideas, Debates, Identities, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Merry Christmas, Rev. Khanna: Thinking about Freedom and Intolerance in Kashmir

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I want to begin writing this by wishing a very happy Christmas to Reverend C.M. Khanna, a Protestant presbyter in the All Saint’s Church, Srinagar, Indian held Jammu & Kashmir, who has been facing a situation that no free man should ever have to countenance. He has had to face an arrest (though, thankfully now he is out on bail) and social ostracism for doing nothing that can be construed as criminal or harmful to any individual or society at large. I write this in solidarity with him and his family, and with all those who have been harassed for their faith, or for their lack of faith, anywhere.

(Please follow this link for a comprehensive report on Rev. Khanna’s situation, in the form of a press note submitted by John Dayal)

I know that many people in Kashmir continue to be in prison for reasons of conscience, because they want to be free of the occupation. And this Christmas, my greetings are to them and to their families too. I know that Reverend Khanna is out on bail now, and that many others are not. And I hope that they too will see freedom soon. I am writing about Reverend Khanna not because I value his freedom more than that of others incarcerated in Kashmir, but because if we value freedom, we should not have to measure its value, or calculate its worth depending on who happens to get bail, and who happens to rot in jail. Continue reading Merry Christmas, Rev. Khanna: Thinking about Freedom and Intolerance in Kashmir →

Centre watch, Identities, Politics, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Jagdish Tytler will not attend the Maulana Mohd. Ali Jauhar Award ceremony

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M. Saleem addressing the Maulana Jauhar Award ceremony at IICC in Delhi on 10 December 2011

Update on 11 December:

Twocircles.net reports:

“Zafar Agha was replaced by ex-MP and senior Journalist Santosh Bharatiya. However, M Saleem claimed that Sanjeev Bhatt could not attend the programme due to time constraint and the award may be given to him some other time. While referring to Santosh Bhartiya, being awarded in place of Zafar Agha, M. Saleem said that he has been nominated for the award and nobody has been replaced for the same. The organizer kept totally mum about both Zafar Agha and Jagdish Tytler. ” [Link]

*

On 3 December, an open letter signed by some of us, and posted here on Kafila, had appealed to seven distinguished individuals to not accept the Maulana Mohd. Ali Johar Award, to be given on 10 December at the India Islamic Cultural Centre. We had reasoned that since the eighth awardee was Jagdish Tytler, they should not share an award and a platform with someone accused of organising mass murder of Sikhs in Delhi in 1984.

Yesterday evening, the general secretary of the Maulana Jauhar Academy, M. Saleem, emailed one of the signatories, Mahtab Alam. The email contained a scanned copy of a letter sent by Jagdish Tytler to M Saleem, which said that Tytler would not attend the award ceremony so as to not embarrass the the other awardees and the organisers, because of this boycott campaign. He, however, stressed on his innocence in the 1984 anti-Sikh pogrom, and, notably, did not say that he would not accept the award. He would only not attend the ceremony. M. Saleem has also not announced whether he is withdrawing his decision to give the award to Mr Tytler. For more details on what has transpired in the last few days, please see Mahtab Alam’s article, Beware of the Sarkari Musalmaan.

Given below is the final list of 150 names who signed the original appeal.  Continue reading Jagdish Tytler will not attend the Maulana Mohd. Ali Jauhar Award ceremony →

Identities, Mirror Worlds, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Harvard does the right thing: drops Subramanian Swamy

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The Harvard Crimson reports:

Faculty members chose to remove two summer economics courses at the Summer School taught by Subramanian Swamy, a controversial Indian political figure. Over the summer, Swamy published an op-ed that advocated for the destruction of hundreds of Indian mosques and the disenfranchisement of non-Hindus in India.

Chief Information Officer for the University Anne H. Margulies concluded the meeting by updating faculty on the newly-created Harvard University Information Technology system and its future vision, which included greater collaboration with the library and further digital pedagogy. [Link]

Although DNA never apologised for publishing “How to wipe out Islamic terror,” Swamy’s hate-filled column, (and Kapil Sibal thinks Facebook will cause riots), Harvard University has done the right thing. Continue reading Harvard does the right thing: drops Subramanian Swamy →

Centre watch, Identities, Politics, Right watch

Beware of the Sarkari Musalmaan: Mahtab Alam

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Guest post by MAHTAB ALAM

In the current issue of the English fortnightly, Milli Gazette (1-15 December), it is reported that on 10 December 2011, former union minister Jagdish Tytler will be awarded with seven others in a function at India Islamic Culture Centre, Delhi, by Maulana Mohammad Jauhar Ali Academy. The other names were those of Dr. S Y Quraishi, Chief Election Commissioner of India; Sanjeev Bhat, Indian Police Service officer (Gujarat); senior journalist Zafar Agha; Mohd. Najeeb Ashraf Chaudhri, chief income tax commissioner; Maulana Mohd. Haseeb Siddiqui, chairman of the Deoband Nagar Palika Parishad; Nusrat Gwalliori, a Delhi-based Urdu poet, and  Begum Rehana AR Andre, a social activist and educationist based in Mumbai.

The award has been named after Maulana Mohammad Ali Jauhar, a key figure of the Indian freedom movement, a leader of the Khilafat movement and one of the founders of Jamia Millia Islamia, a prestigious central university in Delhi. The award is given on his birth anniversary every year. Though the reasons for honouring these people were not mentioned in the Milli Gazette report, the Academy’s general secretary explained that every year, the academy honours individuals in recognition of their extra-ordinary contribution in the field of journalism, politics, social service and so on. This year they  chose Jagdish Tytler for his contribution to politics! Continue reading Beware of the Sarkari Musalmaan: Mahtab Alam →

Bad ideas, Identities, Right watch

Oxford University Members Demand that OUP-India Stand by Ramanujan Essay

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Shahid Amin has earlier written about the role of the Oxford University Press (India) in the censorship of AK Ramanjuan’s essay on the Ramayana. This press release, signed by a group of Indian scholars at Oxford University, comes to us via Agrima Bhasin.

Press Statement
Oxford, England
Date: 30 November 2011

A petition by members of Oxford University has condemned Oxford University Press (OUP) India’s unflattering role and its deafening silence on the controversy surrounding Delhi University’s recent decision to drop A.K. Ramanujan’s essay (Three Hundred Ramayanas: Five Examples and Three Thoughts on Translation). This petition has gained the abounding support of Oxford intelligentsia across 15 departments and 20 constituent colleges. Signatories include distinguished faculty members, senior academics and students.

In 2008 OUP India unceremoniously decided to stop publication of the only two books (Paula Richman’s Many Ramayanas and Vinay Dharwadker’s The Collected Essays of A.K. Ramanujan) containing Ramanujan’s essay. This happened to coincide with legal proceedings instituted inter alia against OUP India by fringe religious and cultural groups. OUP India’s prolonged subsequent silence on this matter lent widespread credence to the contention that OUP India caved in to external pressure thereby compromising its stated goals of “…[furthering] excellence in research, scholarship… by publishing worldwide.”

Continue reading Oxford University Members Demand that OUP-India Stand by Ramanujan Essay →

Government, Language, Politics, Right watch, Scams

When Media is Nuked!: PK Sundaram

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Guest post by PK SUNDARAM

After armed forces, nuclear establishment is another holy cow in the post-independence India. Our media does not only outsources all final judgements on nuclear issues to the nucleocrats, but has also happily joined them in slanders against the grassroots anti-nuclear movements.

We have seen the media discourse on nuclear weapons being shadowed almost entirely by national security and nuclear deterrence arguments. On the recent upsurge of mass protests against nuclear energy projects across the country, media is playing the official tune where people challenging these projects are reduced to illiterate crowd, foreign-funded groups, religious identities and even anti-nationals. On 24th this month, the Tamil newspaper Dinamalar published a story titled Truth and hype behind the Koodankulam row. This report is nothing but an utterly malicious piece of journalistic writing with ugly slanders against the leading activists of the ongoing anti-nuclear movement in Koodankulam – S P Udayakumar, M Pushparayan and M P Jesuraj.

Continue reading When Media is Nuked!: PK Sundaram →

Frontiers, Government, Mirror Worlds, Movements, Politics, Right watch

Apples and Oranges in Egypt’s Historic Election: Alia Allana

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This guest post by ALIA ALLANA, a despatch for Kafila from Cairo, is the eleventh in a series of ground reports from the Arab Spring. Photos by Alia Allana

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“Votes and rocks: just two ways to get heard,” said Salma.

Continue reading Apples and Oranges in Egypt’s Historic Election: Alia Allana →

Countryside, Ecology/Environment, Movements, Right watch

Green and Saffron: Hindu Nationalism and Indian Environmental Politics

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Cover - Green and Saffron

My book Green and Saffron is just out. The book details and an interview  are on the blog of Permanent Black. From the publishers’ notice:

This book examines contemporary environmental issues and movements in independent India on the one hand, and the development of Hindu conservative ideology and politics on the other. It includes the first thorough investigation of Anna Hazare’s movement in Maharashtra.

Mukul Sharma argues that these two social currents—environmental conservation and Hindu politics—have forged bonds which reveal the hijacking of environmentalism by conservative and retrograde worldviews. This, he says, constitutes a major aspect of hinterland political life which neither academics nor journalists have seriously analysed. Environmentalism and politics cannot be seen as separate from each other, for environmental issues are being defined in new ways by an anti-secular form of Hinduism. In turn, Hindu ideologues are gaining mileage for their ideology by espousing major environmental projects. Continue reading Green and Saffron: Hindu Nationalism and Indian Environmental Politics →

Centre watch, Genders, Law, Right watch

Shame on G.K. Pillai: Women demand an apology for his sexist comments

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Released by JAMIA TEACHERS’ SOLIDARITY ASSOCIATION

24 November 2011

Stung by the SIT report which concluded that Ishrat Jahan was executed in cold blood, former Union Home Secretary G.K. Pillai—hard-pressed to defend his affidavit to the Supreme Court that Ishrat was a Lashkar operative—has stooped to now slandering the girl’s personal life suggesting that her checking into different hotels with “another man” was definitely suspicious. Perhaps, Mr. Pillai wishes us to believe that all those young women who travel and work independently are ‘suspicious’ and could have terrorist links. Continue reading Shame on G.K. Pillai: Women demand an apology for his sexist comments →

Debates, Government, Identities, Images, Law, Left watch, Politics, Right watch

Mobpublic vs. Counterpublic in Kerala

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[with inputs from Baiju John]

Recent events in Kerala convince me that we need to think more closely about the ways in which our political public life is being slowly overwhelmed by something that is profoundly anti-public but somehow manages to resemble it — I’m tempted to call it the Mobpublic. I’m of course not referring to formal politics, where political parties and powerful communities continue to squabble without any serious difference in their programmes. Very little of either the political or the public survives in them; all one hears for most of the time are the tales of internal squabbling which is neither political (yes, despite all of V S Achuthanandan’s efforts to coopt oppositional civil social struggles) nor public. Perhaps the decline of the political is a condition for the rise of the mobpublic.

Continue reading Mobpublic vs. Counterpublic in Kerala →

Centre watch, Government, Law, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

JTSA welcomes the SIT report on Ishrat Jahan, demands free and fair probe into Batla House ‘Encounter’

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This release comes from the JAMIA TEACHERS’ SOLIDARITY ASSOCIATION

21 November 2011 

JTSA welcomes the SIT report which has concluded that the teenaged college girl Ishrat Jahan and her three companions were killed in cold blood—and were not terrorists on way to kill Narendra Modi. This has reinforced the findings of the Tamang Enquiry Report which had drawn similar conclusions in 2009, and which the Gujarat government had tried to suppress and discredit.  The SIT report has given credence to the allegation of civil rights activists that the officers in Gujarat police had executed several people through the last decade in collusion with the highest political authority in the state. The police officers gained medals and promotions and Modi built his image as the Hindutva hero by highlighting the alleged assassination attempts on him. Continue reading JTSA welcomes the SIT report on Ishrat Jahan, demands free and fair probe into Batla House ‘Encounter’ →

Bad ideas, Culture, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

A Curious Silence and an Un-Crossed Line: In the Wake of A Disbanded Exhibition

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A news item from some weeks ago, which has gone curiously unremarked and un-commented upon has made me think about the limits that the freedom of expression debate and the discourse on secularism in India unwittingly or knowingly does not seem to be able to cross, despite repeated provocation.

We all know that when the Hindu right comes to town –  declaring that this or that text should not be taught in the university, or this or that painting should not be seen, or this or that film should not be shown – the secular left-liberal intelligentsia in India automatically gets outraged, signs petitions, holds press conferences and generally vents it righteous anger. I know this because I do all these things, along with all my friends. I sign the online petitions, attend the demonstrations, express my anger and do some (or all) of that which needs to be done, that should be done. We should never give an inch to the hoodlums of Hindutva.

However, when it comes to responding to the equally aggressive, reactionary and utterly arbitrary actions of sections of the Muslim clergy and other self appointed leaders on the ‘Muslim Right’ a strange inertia seems to take hold of the best and boldest foot-soldiers of secularism in India.

Continue reading A Curious Silence and an Un-Crossed Line: In the Wake of A Disbanded Exhibition →

Bad ideas, Right watch

Hooligans of Bhagat Singh Kranti Sena strike again

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Maraa, a media and arts collective in Bangalore, has been organizing a monthly event called Pause: Creative Practice in Conflict.  This is a public event, inviting one speaker to present examples of creative practice in a conflict afflicted area. Previous events have showcased examples from Palestine and Afghanistan. In November, Maraa had planned a similar event on Kashmir, scheduled to be held on November 5th 2011.  

Bhagat Singh Kranti Sena (the same people who physically assaulted Prashant Bhushan recently for his statement on Kashmir), and its president, Mr. Tejinder Pal Singh Bagga, wrote a letter to the police alleging that the event which was to be held in the premises of a theatre organization, rafiki, was being organized by the Hurriyat Conference, at which Syed Shah Geelani or Mirwaiz Umar Farukh from the Hurriyat Conferece would speak. They warned the police that if they would not come to stop the event, their organization would make it a situation with unpleasant consequences.

Further, the Bhagat Singh Kranti Sena and Mr. Tejinder Pal Singh Bagga, posted online invitations on social networking site, Facebook, inviting people to come with stones, paint, eggs and tomatoes, to merge in with the audience, and then create chaos. There have been various comments responding to it, by promising violence to those who attend and organize such events.

The following statement has been issued by Maraa in this context:

Continue reading Hooligans of Bhagat Singh Kranti Sena strike again →

Everyday Life, Excavation, Frontiers, Politics, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

The Synagogue and the Jihadi: Alia Allana reports from Jerba

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This guest post by ALIA ALLANA is part of a Kafila series of ground reports from the Arab Spring

Inside the El Ghriba synagogue in Djerba, an island off the south coast of Tunisia

Out of all the outrageous questions I have asked in my life, this one has to be amongst the top ten:

“Are you a jihadi?” Continue reading The Synagogue and the Jihadi: Alia Allana reports from Jerba →

Capitalism, Media politics, Politics, Right watch

Small is Beautiful: Lushkary

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Guest post by LUSHKARY

Of all the things about my last workplace, being summoned by one of our editors to her cabin was one that I did not particularly like. The problem was that, unlike other parts of the office, in her cabin I could not even pretend to seem interested in what she had to say. My eyes would involuntarily travel to the soft-board above her desk and get fixated on a slightly hazy colour photograph of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi. And if I shifted focus a bit towards the left, then I could also see another familiar figure standing next to Mr. Modi. That of the cabin’s proud occupant.

Now, it is not a hidden secret that the Indian business news community admires Mr. Modi. His biennial Vibrant Gujarat Summits, desi version of international pseudo-events like the Davos World Economic Forum, are a definite hit among business news hacks. How can you not be at a place where deals upwards of $452 billion get signed over just a couple of days?

Continue reading Small is Beautiful: Lushkary →