Sarcasm in the moment of death? For this you need to be evil. For, the first human reaction to death is silence. Even in the case of a normal death. It suddenly reminds us of our own mortality. Impermanence of our existence. When death is not normal, when it is an accident, a suicide or a murder, it shocks us. Or, it should. A life cut short unnaturally creates a void in us. A sense of unfulfillment. And our gaze turns inwards. We tend to become reflective. Words do not come easily to you. On most of the occasions they sound false, even obscene. Therefore, we console the grieving not though words but by touching them. It is not easy to make sense of death, in whichever form it strikes us. Continue reading An inability to grieve
Letter of Solidarity with Greenpeace India: A Statement
The move by the central government to freeze Greenpeace India’s bank accounts and block sources of funds, is a blatant violation of the constitutional rights to freedom of expression and association. It also seems to be an attempt to warn civil society that dissent regarding development policies and priorities will not be tolerated, even when these are proving to be ecologically unsustainable and socially unjust. These are dangerous signs for the future of democracy in India.
Specific allegations of legal violation contained in the Ministry of Home Affairs’ notice are aspects Greenpeace India needs to respond to. However, the notice also charges the organization with adversely affecting “public interest” and the “economic interest of the State”. These charges give the impression that Greenpeace India is indulging in anti-national activities, using foreign funds. However, dissenting from the government’s development policies, helping communities who are going to be displaced by these policies to mobilise themselves, and generating public opinion for the protection of the environment can by no stretch of imagination be considered anti-national, or against public interest. Quite the contrary, any reasonable policy of sustainable development (which the government claims to adhere to) will itself put into question quite a few of the mining, power, and other projects currently being promoted. ”
Civil society organisations in India have a long and credible history of standing up for social justice, ecological sustainability, and the rights of the poor. When certain government policies threaten these causes, civil society has a justified ground to resist, and help affected communities fight for their rights. This is in fact part of the fundamental duties enjoined upon citizens by the Constitution of India.
Continue reading Letter of Solidarity with Greenpeace India: A Statement
Bangladesh – Stifling A Country: Mahmud Rahman
Guest Post by MAHMUD RAHMAN
Mahmud Rahman is a writer and translator from Bangladesh who lives in California. He is one of 23 persons who are facing possible contempt of court charges from the International Crimes Tribunal 2 in Dhaka for having signed a statement expressing concern over the same tribunal’s contempt of court sentence on the journalist David Bergman for some of his blog posts.
When I think about the state of free speech in the land of my birth, my memories take me back to 1970-71 when I was a higher secondary student in Dhaka, a time of upheaval when East Pakistan was making its way towards independent Bangladesh. Officially we were still under martial law, Ayub’s decade-long dictatorship deposed in favor of Yahya’s rule that came with the promise of elections. Political parties could organize, detainees were set free, the press could publish with fewer restrictions, and people began to launch new magazines and newspapers.
Every stripe of opinion found expression in print. Pushing aside the go-slow conservatism of existing newspapers, new ones emerged. Bengali nationalism, socialism, communism of various hues – all found expression in print. The main Islamist party’s paper acquired a modern press. Books were not that widespread, but you could easily get your hands on Russell and English socialists, and Marx, Engels, Lenin, or Mao. I remember engaging in a mix of agnostic, atheist, socialist, and liberal discussions.
There is something in that sort of ‘spring’ that beckons the young to amplify their voice. Two friends and I wanted to publish a magazine. We came up with a name – The Rebel – and of course, a logo. We split the writing among us. I can’t remember much other than we were inclined towards independence for East Bengal. Our perspective was no doubt seditious but we couched our language with a bit of caution. Did we even know that British-era laws required that publications be registered? In that climate, we felt the state wasn’t looking all that carefully.
Continue reading Bangladesh – Stifling A Country: Mahmud Rahman
जनतंत्र में जन का अकेलापन
बाईस अप्रैल,2015 का दिन भारतीय संसदीय जनतांत्रिक राजनीति की पराजय के एक दिन के रूप में याद रखा जाएगा. और इसकी वजह यह है कि एक किसान उस वक्त ‘खुदकुशी’ कर लेता है जब उसी के सवाल पर एक जनतांत्रिक प्रतिरोध सभा हो रही होती है.वह उस सभा से ताकत नहीं महसूस करता, वहां इकट्ठा समुदाय को अपनी बिरादरी नहीं मान पाता, खुद को इस भीड़ के बीच इतना अकेला पाता है कि मंच से किसानों के हक में दिए जा रहे भाषणों और नारों से उसे यह आश्वासन नहीं मिलता कि उनमें उसकी आवाज़ शामिल है.अपनी आवाज़ उसे अकेले ही उठानी है. और अदाकारी पर टिके इस जनतंत्र में वह तभी सुनी जा सकती है जब खुद नाटक बन जाए.
गजेन्द्र सिंह ने यही किया.भारतीय किसान के अकेलेपन को और कैसे जाहिर किया जा सकता था? इसे लेकर हम निश्चित नहीं कि यह खुदकुशी ही थी. कतई मुमकिन है कि यह दुर्घटना हो.कि गजेन्द्र सिंह का पाँव फिसल गया और उसके गले पर फन्दा कस गया. कि उसने जंतर मंतर पर एक पीपली लाइव का प्रभाव लाने की कोशिश की जिसका त्रासद अंत हुआ. Continue reading जनतंत्र में जन का अकेलापन
All that is solid melts into air – the hologram protests in Spain: Geeta Seshu
Guest post by GEETA SESHU
The recent hologram protest projected on the street before Spain’s Parliament is an innovative attempt to subvert the country’s ‘citizen security’ provisions that criminalises public protest.
The video of the hologram protest is riveting and surreal, as ghostly figures of women and men march shouting slogans amidst night-time traffic. The figures are clearly distinguishable, the faces discernible. This isn’t computer-aided animation. It’s the real thing.
Or as close to real as a virtual thing can be.
The website ‘hologramasporlalibertad’ (Holograms for Freedom) provides for the subscriber to record her own message and, with a click, a hologram is created. An online petition explains that the ‘citizen security laws’, which obtained final assent in Spain in March, will ‘repress the freedom of peaceful assembly’.
Continue reading All that is solid melts into air – the hologram protests in Spain: Geeta Seshu
Building Solidarities: Harsh Mander
Guest Post by Harsh mander
Indifference is primarily born out of the failure and the fatigue of empathy. Empathy requires both a leap of imagination—to imaginehow the other feels—and solidarities of feeling—to feel the sufferingand humiliation of the other as though they were one’s own. In otherwords, empathy has both a cognitive and affective element: it engagesboth the mind and the heart. Empathy tends to flow more naturallywhen the suffering person is someone I can relate to and understand,someone whom I feel is similar to me in some essential, relatable way,because I can then better imagine what the other person is feeling.
Empathy breaks down when I can persuade myself that the ‘other’ is, in some ways, not like me, not fully human in the way Iand the people of my family, my community, my caste, my gender,my race and, indeed, my sexual preferences are. I can do so when Irefuse to see or acknowledge that people who are of a differentgender, caste, class, religion, sexuality or culture from me are essentiallyhuman in the same way as I am, when I am in the sway of normativeframeworks and politics which cultivate difference and fosterindifference. Continue reading Building Solidarities: Harsh Mander
Are We Legit? Roanna Gonsalves
ROANNA GONSALVES writes in Southern Crossings, a new blog run by a writers’ collective based in Australia, which aims “to reimagine Australia, South Asia, and the world, through South Asian bodies and minds.”
One rainy Mumbai day, sitting in an Udipi restaurant, chai cup in hand, I told a dear friend I would soon leave for Australia.
“I’ll never leave India and be a second class citizen in another country”, my friend said. My chai turned colder and a crinkly skin formed on its surface.
Seventeen years later, I realise that in perceiving a hierarchy of citizens in Australia, my friend was right, but in a manner that he did not intend…
…[T]here were certain fundamental truths that I did not grasp before I got here: Indigenous people i.e. Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders, are the First Peoples of this land and the waters that surround it; they formed the First Nations of this continent; this always was and always will be Aboriginal land.
We are not the perpetrators, the ones who wielded the guns in the forgotten wars between invading white settlers and Indigenous Peoples. We are not the victims. However, as mainly economic migrants from South Asia (I acknowledge the many South Asian refugees from the conflict zones of Afghanistan and Sri Lanka), we are not absolved of complicity.
We are beneficiaries of the genocide of Aboriginal people, the dispossession of their land, the loss of their homes, their families, their cultural values, their tongues, their songs. It is such soil that we step on when we first step into Australia, soaked not just with the promise of a ‘first world lifestyle’, but squelchy with the memory of massacre.
Read the rest of this uncompromising and challenging set of reflections here.
Media Studies Group’s Statement on Internet Neutrality
Media Studies Group demands that TRAI place Consultation document in Indian languages and extend deadline for feedback on Net Neutrality.
New Delhi: April 20, 2015: Media Studies Group, a Delhi based think tank on communication studies, held a marathon meeting on Sunday on internet neutrality in the light of TRAI’s consultation paper on over-the-top (OTT) services. The meeting discussed various technical, legal and social aspects emerging out of Airtel’s Plan Zero and the internet.org venture of Facebook.
There was complete unanimity that the issue of net neutrality is complex in nature and that the masses need to be educated in simple and non-technical language so that a fair opinion can be generated on the functioning of the internet as the present move, if successful, will pose a serious challenge to the principle of equality and democratic character of the internet.
The meeting took a critical view of Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) for its failure to present the consultation document in Indian languages. To have chosen to make the document available only in English is a move which has the potential of altering the fair access to internet by large numbers of users of Hindi and other regional languages. Media Studies Group also felt that the deadline of April 24 is unreasonable and should be extended.
It has been decided that a representation will be given to TRAI to demand presentation of the consultation document in Indian languages in easy to understand language and to set a new reasonable deadline for feedback . Media Studies Group has also decided to give a detailed representation to TRAI on the issue of Net Neutrality with a holistic view seeking protection of fundamental principles and rights enshrined in the Constitution of India.
On behalf of MSG,
Anil Chamadia, Chairman, Media Studies Group.
Email – msgroup.india@gmail.com
My Name is Suzette Jordan
Our panel was a queer one in all the wonderful senses of that word. At trainings with lower court judges on sexual violence laws in the Saket District Courts in Delhi, the five of us would find ourselves next to each other every few months. On a dais surrounded by that distinctly sarkari flower arrangement, first sat Suzette, a survivor of a brutal rape in a moving car in Park Street in Kolkata. Then in line: a survivor of an acid attack; a representative of a sex workers union; a well known hijra activist and I, speaking as a gay man. We were usually on the third day, right after lunch, when we would face nearly a hundred slightly sleepy judges from the region. They had been updated on new sexual violence laws, gone through a case exercise on how to apply them, been given a CD, a folder, the requisite handouts. The boxes were ticked. Technically, they were up to date. Ours was a different job: to animate, if such a thing is possible, a sense of empathy in the judges, to shift even slightly the way they thought of the rainbow of dubious morality that we represented.
South Africa in the Twilight of Liberalism: Richard Pithouse
[Note: Recent events in South Africa – from raging student movements across university campuses to xenophobic violence in the streets of Durban – seem to echo so many struggles both inside and outside the university “here.” This is the first of hopefully several posts from South Africa, that seek to listen and travel across.]
Guest Post by RICHARD PITHOUSE
South Africa was supposed to be different. We attained our freedom, such as these things are, after everyone else but Palestine. It was late in the day but the afternoon sun was glorious and the best people, people who had passed through the long passage of struggle, told us that we would be able to avoid the mistakes made everywhere else.
There was a mass movement that, whatever its limits, had won tremendous popular support and carried some noble ideals through its travails. Its leaders cast long shadows. Our Constitution, we were always told, was as good as they get. Liberalism, apparently vindicated by history, had its evident limits but there was, it was said, lots of room for deft manoeuvre within those constraints. We were assured that there was room for everyone at what Aimé Césaire had called the ‘rendezvous of victory’.
For a long time the presence of all kinds of features of the past in the present was widely understood as something that would be resolved in time. Land would be redistributed, schools would flourish, houses would be built, there would be jobs – the kind of jobs that reward hard work – and universities would emerge, bright and bold, from their cocoons spun by settler culture. Time, it was generally believed, was on the side of justice and the eventual redemption of the suffering, striving and struggles of the past.
Continue reading South Africa in the Twilight of Liberalism: Richard Pithouse
Media and the Death of Democracy: Nissim Mannathukkaren
Guest Post by NISSIM MANNATHUKKAREN
We live in a world where there is more and more information, and less and less meaning—Jean Baudrillard
Recently, there has been an outpouring of scathing critique against Arnab Goswami and his television programme, The Newshour in some sections of the English-language Press. One magazine cover story called him, “The Man Who Killed TV News.” The immediate context of this critique is Goswami’s branding of some prominent ecological and political activists as “anti-national” and his calling for a ban on the Nirbahaya documentary and legal action against a competing channel which was supposed to be air the documentary. This unprecedented and shockingly ironic position against free speech by a leading media personality was rightfully termed by a critic “as low as a journalist can sink.”
While these criticisms of the “murderous rage” evoked by Goswami draped in the nationalist tri-colour every night and the punishment he metes out to his opponents in a “medieval-style kangaroo court,” also known as an “open debate,” are entirely apt and necessary, they also miss the forest for the trees. Goswami is only a symptom of the post-liberalization corporatized and privatized media landscape of India. If Goswami did not exist, he would have been created. It is not Goswami alone who has killed news, it is the vast majority of the media, especially, television that has done so. What is more obscene than Goswami’s execrable theatrics is how he is deeply enmeshed in the structures of capital and power that he seemingly rails against every night. These structures have not just enmeshed him, but the others as well who are aghast at his aesthetics (or the lack of it). Continue reading Media and the Death of Democracy: Nissim Mannathukkaren
Why are we always Encroachers? Tribal farmers in Khammam District, Telangana: Vasudha Nagaraj
Guest Post by VASUDHA NAGARAJ
Korsa Subba Rao, a man from Koya tribe, cultivates about three acres of forest land in a village in Khammam district. His family has been doing so for several generations. Subba Rao has a ration card, voter identity card, Aadhar Card and a NREGA job card. However, for the land that he tills, he has no papers whatsoever. Ironically the only evidence he has is an FIR issued by the Forest department. For committing a forest offence of encroaching into the forest – cutting down trees and putting it to podu cultivation.
Like Korsa Subba Rao, in Khammam district, there are thousands of farmers belonging to Koya, Konda Reddis and Lambadi tribal communities cultivating one to four acres in forest lands. Most of them have been cultivating since the times of their forefathers. Often this is their only income. However, factors such as scanty rain, untimely rain or pest can drastically reduce this income. The prevalence of malaria and other mosquito borne diseases also adds to the toll.
Here, it needs to be understood that forest lands do not always imply green forests. A forest land can be dense forest, moderate forest, shrub growth and also barren land. In Khammam district, thousands of acres of forest lands have been put to cultivation since several decades. But any cultivation of forest land is considered to be illegal, as it is an offence as per the AP Forest Act, 1967. In this scheme of things, the tribal farmers are seen as “encroachers”. The irony is that they are encroachers inspite of being the original inhabitants of the land. Because of this illegality and because of the power of the Forest Department to register criminal cases, the tribal farmers live in a constant fear of eviction from their lands. Continue reading Why are we always Encroachers? Tribal farmers in Khammam District, Telangana: Vasudha Nagaraj
Ambedkar’s Ideology – Religious Nationalism and Indian Constitution: Ram Puniyani
Guest Post by RAM PUNYANI
In order to gain larger legitimacy, RSS has been making claims of sorts. One of that which was made few months back was that Gandhi was impressed by functioning of RSS. Now on the heels of that comes another distortion that Ambedkar believed in Sangh ideology (Feb 15, 2015). This was stated recently by RSS Sarsanghchalak, Mohan Bhagwat. There cannot be bigger contrasts between the ideology of Ambedkar and RSS. Ambedkar was for Indian Nationalism, Secularism and social justice while the RSS ideology is based on two major pillars. One is the Brahmanic interpretation of Hinduism and second is the concept of Hindu nationalism, Hindu Rashtra.
Where does Ambedkar stand as for as ideology of Hinduism is concerned? He called Hinduism as Brahminic theology. We also understand that Brahmanism has been the dominant tendency within Hinduism. He realized that this prevalent version of Hinduism is essentially a caste system, which is the biggest tormentor of untouchables-dalits.
Continue reading Ambedkar’s Ideology – Religious Nationalism and Indian Constitution: Ram Puniyani
Frontline’s Calculus of Caste: C. K. Raju
Guest post by C. K. RAJU
[Frontline carried a historically ill-informed article on Indian calculus which also had mathematical and casteist errors. When the errors were pointed out, the magazine ignored it, contrary to journalistic ethics. Here is Prof Raju’s response to that article.]
Frontline (23 Jan 2015) published an excessively ill-informed article by Biman Nath on “Calculus & India”. The article suppressed the existence of my 500 page tome on Cultural Foundations of Mathematics: the Nature of Mathematical Proof and the Transmission of Calculus from India to Europe in the 16th c. (Pearson Longman, 2007). This suppression was deliberate, for Nath and Frontline ignored it even after it was pointed out to them. They also refused to correct serious mathematical and casteist errors in the article. That is contrary to journalistic ethics. To understand my response, some background is needed.
According to my above book and various related articles, the calculus developed in India and was transmitted to Europe. The second part of the story is lesser known. As often happens with imported knowledge, calculus was misunderstood in Europe. Later that inferior misunderstanding was given back to India through colonial education, and continues to be taught to this day just by declaring it as “superior”. That claim of superiority was never cross-checked to see if it is any different from the other flimsy claims of superiority earlier made by the West, for centuries, for example the racist claim that white-skinned people are “superior”. Continue reading Frontline’s Calculus of Caste: C. K. Raju
Loot in the name of Cholera: Sabareesh Gopala Pillai
This is a guest post by SABAREESH GOPALA PILLAI
The meaning of “health is wealth” is changing. Health — the lack of it in fact — is a gold mine today. India’s health industry is almost growing at twenty per cent year-on-year, and is estimated to reach probably about Rs 1.3 trillion by 2020. While many would attribute this to the increase in life expectancy, higher income levels, greater reach of health insurance and growing lifestyle-related diseases, the story is not so straight or simple. Continue reading Loot in the name of Cholera: Sabareesh Gopala Pillai
सलाम, एदुआर्दो गालियानो , अलविदा !!
ऐसी कलम सदियों में एक होती है जिसमें इंसानी खून की धमक और दमक साथ हो.ऐसी ही एक कलम , इंसानी दर्दमंदी से लबरेज़ आज रुक गई है. वह किसी एक जुबान की कैदी न थी. पूरी कायनात उसकी नोक पर रक्स करती थी. एदुआर्दो गालियानो , सलाम,अलविदा!!
जूता
1919 को इंकलाबी रोज़ा लक्समबर्ग का बर्लिन में क़त्ल कर दिया गया.
कातिलों ने उसे राइफल से कुचल-कुचल मारा और एक नहर के पानी में फेंक दिया.
बीच में, उसका एक जूता निकल गया .
किसी ने उसे उठा लिया, कीचड़ में पड़े उस जूते को .
रोज़ा एक ऐसी दुनिया की तमन्ना करती थी जहां इन्साफ को आज़ादी के नाम पर निछावर नहीं कर दिया जाएगा और न आज़ादी इन्साफ के नाम पर तर्क कर दी जाएगी .
हर रोज़ कोई हाथ उस बैनर को उठा लेता है.
कीचड़ से, उस जूते की तरह .
आजादों का राज
यह पूरी सत्रहवीं सदी में होता है.
भाग निकले गुलामों की बस्तियां कुकुरमुत्तों की तरह उग आती हैं. ब्राज़ील में उन्हें क्विलोम्बो कहते हैं.यह एक अफ्रीकी लफ्ज है जिसके मायने हैं समुदाय हालांकि नस्लवादियों ने इसका अनुवाद किया चंडूखाना या वेश्यालय .
पल्मारेस के क्विलोम्बो में, पूर्व गुलाम अपने मालिकों से आज़ाद रहे और चीनी की तानाशाही से भी जो और कुछ भी उगने नहीं देती.वे हर तरह के बीज रोपते हैं और सब कुछ खाते हैं.उनके पूर्व-मालिकों का भोजन जहाज़ों से पहुँचता है. उनका मिट्टी से.अफ्रीकी तर्ज पर बने उनके लुहारखाने उन्हें कुदाल, खुरपी, फावड़े देते हैं जिससे वे धरती पर काम कर सकें और छुरे,कुल्हाड़ी और भाले कि वे उसकी हिफाजत कर सकें.
Fairy Tales and Feminist Theory in the Face of Fear: Indus Chadha
This is a guest post by INDUS CHADHA
For about a year now, I have been teaching 33 wide-eyed and wise middle schoolers. As we have read fiction, studied history, exchanged stories, and tried to understand the world together, I have found my students to be wonderfully curious and innately compassionate. As the school year drew to a close, I wondered how to conclude our time together. Because our parting at the end of a fulfilling year together was bittersweet, I was looking for something both lighthearted and meaningful. I settled on an old favorite of my own, The Paper Bag Princess, an unconventional fairy tale that turns the ‘prince saves princess from the dragon’ stereotype upside down. As always, I was amazed by my students’ heartfelt and fresh responses to the story. Continue reading Fairy Tales and Feminist Theory in the Face of Fear: Indus Chadha
हिन्दुत्व की प्रयोगशाला बनता दिल्ली विश्वविद्यालय: जीत सिंह सनवाल
Guest post by JEET SINGH SANWAL
केन्द्र में भाजपा के नेतृत्व में सरकार बनने के बाद से राष्ट्रीय स्वयं सेवक संघ का राजकीय शिक्षा नीतियों से लेकर शिक्षण संस्थाओं के क्रियाकलापों में बढ़ता हस्तक्षेप किसी से छुपा नहीं है। शिक्षा नीति में बदलाव लाने व इस बाबत मानव संसाधन विकास मंत्रालय को सुझाव व विश लिस्ट सौंपने में संघ ने काफी तत्परता दिखाई है। कई मीडिया रिपोर्टों के अनुसार संघ ने प्रत्यक्ष व अप्रत्यक्ष रूप से उनके लिए काम करने वाले तमाम लोगों की लिस्ट सरकार को भेजकर शैक्षिक व सांस्कृतिक संगठनों में उनकी नियुक्ति की मांग की। आशा के अनुरूप पिछले दस माह के भाजपा सरकार के कार्यकाल में विभिन्न संगठनों मेें कई सरकारी नियुक्तियां की गयी और संघ विचाराकों को अपेक्षा से अधिक सम्मान देकर ताजपोशी की गयी। नागपुर के एक प्रतिष्ठित संस्थान में डायरेक्टर पद पर नियुक्ति पाने के लिए तो एक व्यक्ति ने अपने संघ से जुड़े होने के प्रमाण प्रस्तुत करते हुए संबंधित मंत्री को नियुक्ति हेतु आवेदन किया। आशा के अनुरूप मंत्रालय ने भी उन्हीं की नियुक्ति की।
शैक्षिक व सांस्कृतिक संगठनों में इस प्रकार के हस्तक्षेप के पीछे संघ की बुनियादी रणनीति है। प्रख्यात मानवाधिकार कार्यकर्ता राम पुनियानी के अनुसार संघ पहले से ही प्रगतिशील शैक्षिक व सांस्कृतिक विमर्श को बदलकर अपना राजनैतिक आधार मजबूत करने में विश्वास रखता है। दिल्ली विश्वविद्यालय के प्रो0 अपूर्वानन्द के अनुसार संघ की यह रणनीति शिक्षा के अज्ञानीकरण की ओर जाता है। भा.ज.पा. को पूर्ण बहुमत मिलने व संघ के प्रचारक का प्रधानमंत्री बन जाना, उनकी इस रणनीति को आगे बढ़ाने के लिए मुफ़ीद है। विभिन्न शैक्षणिक व सांस्कृतिक संगठनों में पिछले कुछ महीनों से हो रहे इन बदलावों में दिल्ली विश्वविद्यालय का उदाहरण काफी अलग है। संघ दिल्ली विश्वविद्यालय में शोध, शिक्षण के साथ-साथ छात्रों के मोबिलाईजेशन के जरिये, अपने विवादास्पद एजेंडे को धार देने का प्रयास कर रहा है। संघ की विचारधारा व उनके कार्यक्रम पहले से ही विवादों में रहे हैं। उनके उग्र हिन्दुत्व व अल्पसंख्यकों से वैमनस्य किसी से छुपा नहीं है। ऐसे में दिल्ली विश्वविद्यालय में संघ की बढ़ती औपचारिक व अनौपचारिक सक्रियता, विश्वविद्यालय व बौद्विक जगत के लिए चिंता का विषय है। Continue reading हिन्दुत्व की प्रयोगशाला बनता दिल्ली विश्वविद्यालय: जीत सिंह सनवाल
Land Acquisition and Delays Over Democracy: Shubham Jain, Sarangan Rajeshkumar, Dhruva Gandhi
Guest post by SHUBHAM JAIN, SARANGAN RAJESHKUMAR and DHRUVA GANDHI
The Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Resettlement and Rehabilitation Act, 2013 was passed with Objective to promote transparency and participative governance in the acquisition of land for industrialisation and urbanisation and to, thereby, ensure overall socio-economic development. In the pursuit of this objective, the law introduced mechanisms as Social Impact Assessment, Consent, and Rehabilitation et al.
This law, however, attracted widespread criticism from the industry on account of the supposedly time consuming barriers created for the acquisition of land. Accordingly, the Ordinance of 2015 was promulgated as a measure to hasten the process of Land Acquisition and to, thereby, contribute towards the economic development of the country. Unfortunately, most of the debate on this Ordinance has barely focussed on the problems it sought to address and, consequentially, there has been a dearth of an analysis of solutions proposed therein in the backdrop of these problems. Let us, therefore, contextualise the debate on the Ordinance and, then, examine the merits of the same. Continue reading Land Acquisition and Delays Over Democracy: Shubham Jain, Sarangan Rajeshkumar, Dhruva Gandhi
An Interview on the Continuing Relevance of Marx
The following is an interview with PRADIP BAKSI, an independent Marx scholar based in Kolkata. He has translated and edited some of the notes and manuscripts of Karl Marx on mathematics and on the history of land relations in India. He has also written on Marx’s study of some of the natural sciences and technologies of his time. The interview was conducted by SANKAR RAY, a senior journalist based in Kolkata.
Sankar Ray [SR]: What are your views on the relevance of Marx for India today, in the context of the financial crisis continuing since 2008, a certain renewal of interest in Marx’s Capital and, of late in Piketty’s Capital for the 21st Century?
Pradip Baksi [PB]: Despite the echo of the title of Marx’s famous book in the title of Piketty’s bestseller, the latter is an exercise within one of the currently fashionable strands of Marx-innocent political economy. In contrast Marx’s Capital is a part of an unfinished and incomplete program of critique of political economy, proposing a continuous reconstruction of it as a science.
While marshalling a very large and interesting dataset on growing inequality within contemporary capitalism, Piketty proposes to make that inequality bearable through taxation within future capitalism, and thereby holds a brief for that very capitalism. Marx, it is true, left his critique of political economy incomplete and unfinished, but he never held any brief for capitalism.
The ongoing financial crisis has triggered some interest in these two books in some quarters. This financial crisis and this interest may or may not last long. I do not wish to speculate about that. The questions of relevance or otherwise of Marx for India, and for the rest of the world, however, are questions of a different order. Continue reading An Interview on the Continuing Relevance of Marx
The Sin and the Error : Ravi Sinha
Guest Post by RAVI SINHA
…it takes an error to father a sin. ─ J. Robert Oppenheimer[1]
Future historians of India may well describe the past year as a year of political sin. This was the year in which the man who had earlier presided over the Gujarat Carnage was awarded the ultimate prize. The year saw an election that touched a new low marked by shallowness, vulgarities and lies – in no small measure by the labors of the man himself. Equally appalling have been the exertions of a large class of literati and glitterati to portray philistinism and inanities spouted by the most powerful mouth as wisdom of a visionary leader.
An entire country seems to have gone blind – unable to see that the emperor has no clothes. In this age of incessant television it should be obvious to anyone that the supreme leader does not carry conviction even when enunciating relatively higher banalities. He is at his natural best only when he mocks someone as a shehzada or slanders and vilifies an entire community through phrases such as ame paanch, amara pachees. It is an irony of history that the republic which had Nehru as its first prime minister has one now for whom even common mythology is too cerebral. He must vulgarize Pushpak Viman and Ganesha and reduce them to quackeries of aviation and surgery.
Misfortune of the nation goes beyond the man. Forces of the diabolic housed in the hydra-headed Parivaar can now accomplish the impossible. They can now occupy the political center stage without leaving off the lunatic fringe. They can adopt Gandhi without renouncing Godse; erect world’s tallest statue of a leader who had punished their forefathers for assassinating Gandhi; even co-opt Bhagat Singh without batting an eyelid about what he stood for and what he had to say about ideologies like theirs. They can further refine the art of doublespeak. Their “statesmen” can pave the way for corporate plunder and call it sab ka vikas (development for all). Their “ideologues” can advocate sab ka saath (inclusion of all) by exhorting Hindu women to give birth to a minimum of four children each, lest Hindus are reduced to a minority “in their own country”. Continue reading The Sin and the Error : Ravi Sinha
KAFILA - COLLECTIVE EXPLORATIONS SINCE 2006 