Centre watch, Debates, Excavation, Law, Violence/Conflict

A Political Hanging: Nirmalangshu Mukherji

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Guest Post by Nirmalangshu Mukherji

Since the secret hanging and burial of Afzal Guru in Tihar jail, many writers have justly condemned the manner in which the government conducted the execution . However, once the state decides to hang a person, the issue of whether the killing took place in a ‘transparent’ and ‘dignified’ manner is a largely aesthetic one. The process that initiated the killing continues to be of primary epistemic concern.

No doubt the manner and timing of the hanging clearly indicates that the government had ulterior political motives in mind. Yet, these motives are better understood in terms of the political considerations that guided the case of Afzal Guru from his arrest to the rejection of his mercy petition. His hanging within a few days of the presidential rejection was just the inevitable culmination of this political process.

Continue reading A Political Hanging: Nirmalangshu Mukherji →

Culture, Frontiers, Identities, Mirror Worlds

Carpets and kebabs in Isfahan: Marryam H Reshii

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Guest post by MARRYAM H RESHII

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I could write a book about my week in Iran, but will restrict myself to captioning these photographs I took.

The only two cities I visited were Mashad and Isfahan. Mashad is famous for two things. The shrine of the Eighth Imam of the Shia sect of Islam, Imam Reza, the only one out of all twelve Imams to actually be buried in Iran (all the others are buried in Saudi Arabia and Iraq) and saffron that grows far, far more plentifully than it does in Kashmir.

Mashad sells carpets woven/produced elsewhere. While the large carpets are traditionally Iranian, the small ones in frames are too suspiciously perfect to be made with human hand. Most of them have a plethora of shades of white in them, making the weaver something of a genius! Continue reading Carpets and kebabs in Isfahan: Marryam H Reshii →

Bad ideas, Everyday Life, Identities, Images, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Modi and me: Sharad Mathur

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This is a guest post by SHARAD MATHUR

1999

In the summer of 1999, practising our family tradition, we were availing a government LTC that my father was entitled to, being a senior central government officer.  Since we could travel by air, we decided to take a trip to Darjeeling, while halting at Allahabad, Varanasi, Lucknow, and Calcutta for some sight-seeing. Those were the days when flying was an experience for most Indians; yet the emotional memory of this trip did not record much of the excitement induced by flying, but took vivid account of disappointment – with a chance conversation and of missing another.

It was on our flight from Lucknow to Calcutta, I was sitting with my younger brother while my parents were sitting together in a row behind us. I was on the window seat and was too occupied with the process of luggage sliding inside the plane, to notice two gentlemen who came and sat next to my parents and my brother respectively. My gawking was however interrupted by my father excitedly introducing me to one Devi Singh ji, who I was told happened to be Personal Assistant to Shri Bhairon Singh Shekhawat. Being a big BJP enthusiast, partly because of their mesmerizingly bright coloured flags, I looked up to this BJP heavyweight and was elated to meet his personal assistant. My excitement was doubled when Devi Singh ji introduced us to a gentleman sitting next to my brother, on the aisle seat, as Modi ji who was accompanying Bhairon Singh ji to the Bihar convention of BJP. However, this excitement remained short lived.

Continue reading Modi and me: Sharad Mathur →

Debates, Law, Sex, Violence/Conflict

Myths and Facts About the Criminal Law (Amendment) Bill, 2013

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This document has been put together by the group pursuing advocacy related to CLRB 2013, in Delhi. It addresses several myths about the new Criminal Law Amendment Bill that are circulating in the media. The note also explains the one change feminists  continue to push for and did not get – to make the victim of rape a person, that is to say, gender neutral. The new law must be expanded to protect all persons, and not be limited to women – because all persons/ anyone can be raped.

The Justice Verma Committee (JVC) report was a landmark statement, applauded by all citizens, welcomed by all Political Parties. JVC was significant because it showed a mirror to the Constitution of India, and reflected its wise and just guarantees of women’s equality. Today the women and youth of India are looking with hope and expectation towards Parliament, and towards all Political Parties. We urge all Members of Parliament to pass a law upholding the spirit and letter of the Justice Verma Committee; to pass a law that makes a step forward in our collective struggle to end sexual violence in India.

Myth 1: The Criminal Law (Amendment) Bill 2013 is against men

Fact: The new anti-sexual violence Bill is NOT against men. For our fathers, brothers, husbands, partners, neighbours and colleagues are men too. Are these Men in our lives not committed to seeking an end to the constant threat of sexual violence lurking around every corner? Continue reading Myths and Facts About the Criminal Law (Amendment) Bill, 2013 →

Images, Language, Mirror Worlds, Movements

चे का चेहरा: ओम थानवी

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ओम थानवी का यह लेख जनसत्ता अखबार में 23 सितंबर 2007 को प्रकाशित हुआ था। ओम थानवी जनसत्ता के संपादक हैं।

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वह तस्वीर चे ने खुद कभी नहीं देखी। उस तस्वीर से उसके छविकार ने कभी एक पैसा नहीं कमाया। मगर दुनिया के हर कोने में आज वह छवि मौजूद है। विद्रोह और क्रांति के एक सशक्त प्रतीक के रूप में। ‘टाइम’ पत्रिका द्वारा चे गेवारा को पिछली सदी की सौ हस्तियों में शरीक करने से बहुत पहले वह छवि दुनिया में सबसे ज्यादा छपी तस्वीर घोषित हो गई थी। Continue reading चे का चेहरा: ओम थानवी →

Bad ideas, Centre watch, Genders, Government, Law, Violence/Conflict

When rape survivor becomes victim: Sherin B.S.

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SHERIN B.S. writes from Hyderabad: There is a constant demand for a change in the terminology from ‘rape victim’ to ‘rape survivor’ in the agenda of feminist concerns in discourses related to rape. But beyond the feminist investment on surviving rape, a systematic reading of public discourses presents the traumatic sustenance of layers of violence that follows rape. The Suryanelli girl has survived rape, but the violent experience of life after rape perpetrated by systemic structures of patriarchy places her at the receiving end of a system that consciously alienates, humiliates and hunts her down.

While referring to the Suryanelli rape case there are two kinds of discourses circulated widely. One is the question of legality of the crime involved, with a heavily prejudiced and unsympathetic legal frame work attempting to frame the girl as an eternal victim subject for whom justice is almost impossible, mediated through parallel machinery of the state, including law enforcement. The impossibility of justice is not the intention of the legal machinery but it comes through the operating forces of judgments, prosecution stands, law enforcing offices like police stations and officers, and questions of evidence, alibis and so on. Continue reading When rape survivor becomes victim: Sherin B.S. →

Frontiers, Identities, Mirror Worlds

Pakistan ka Jugraafiya: Kyunki Patras

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This guest post by KYUNKI PATRAS is in Roman Urdu.
KYUNKI PATRAS ka yeh mazmoon Roman Urdu mein hain.

Pakistan samundr-e-kufr mein aik roshan jazeera hai. Continue reading Pakistan ka Jugraafiya: Kyunki Patras →

Empire/ Imperialism, Frontiers, Identities, Mirror Worlds, Violence/Conflict

An undivided history of Punjab’s Partition: Ajay Bharadwaj

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This is a book review by AJAY BHARADWAJ of an authoritative new book on the Punjab’s Partition by Prof Ishtiaq Ahmed. If you have any questions about the book or about the Partition in general, please leave them in the comments section and we will soon put them to Prof Ahmed.

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The Punjab Bloodied, Partitioned and Cleansed
By Ishtiaq Ahmed
Rupa Publishers, Delhi; 2011, 754 pp., Rs 995

Ishtiaq Ahmed claims that his work is “the first holistic and comprehensive case study of the partition of Punjab” (p.xlv); he has lived up to it admirably.  A study of rigorous scholarship, with painstaking fieldwork on both sides of the divide, The Punjab Bloodied, Partitioned and Cleansed’ offers unbiased insights into a minefield called the Partition of Punjab. As the title itself suggests, the book delves deep into the most difficult aspect of Partition history which has come to define it — the scale and magnitude of the killings at that juncture.

The primary sources that Ahmed has accessed in his endeavour are equally interesting for a number of reasons. While the historian draws extensively from the classified fortnightly reports (FRs) of the Punjab governors and chief secretaries to the viceroys, he simultaneously pays heed to oral history or the personal narratives of individuals — “witness to or victim of traumatic events” — that he has recorded over a decade and a half. The coming together of the two strands creates an intricate web of high politics and everyday life, which contributes to a layered, richly detailed and immensely moving account of the partition of Punjab — leaving a permanent imprint on the mind of the reader. Continue reading An undivided history of Punjab’s Partition: Ajay Bharadwaj →

Capitalism, Centre watch, Countryside, Movements, Violence/Conflict

Dhinkia and Govindpur Mothers go Naked to Protest against Forcible Land Acquisition for POSCO: Minati Dash

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Guest post by MINATI DASH

On 7th March 2013, at least two mothers of Dhinkia and Govindpur (Patna village in this panchayat) villages in Jagatsinghpur went naked before the paramilitary station in Mangalpada near Govindpur village. In a rally led by mothers, hundreds of women and children went to the temporary paramilitary station that has more than 5 platoons of forces at the moment. While taking off their clothes, they constantly shouted, ‘why have you come here?, what do you want to see?’.

What must be the extent of desperation and provocation that our mothers decide to become naked before outside men?  In such a site (Eastern Odisha), where women bodies are constructed dominantly as private objects to hide, what does it mean to dare to bare? It is important to read this shocking act as an act of mediation of their political voices. It is in a desperate bid to express their furore, frustration & anger over intrusive presence of police & paramilitary in the area that they bared their bodies to shame them.

But shockingly, instead of recoiling with shame in response to such an act, the paramilitary chose to strike physically. They did not spare even these protesting women and brutally lathicharged them. Continue reading Dhinkia and Govindpur Mothers go Naked to Protest against Forcible Land Acquisition for POSCO: Minati Dash →

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

Ilyas Masih wants to stay in the dustbin: Saad Sarfraz Sheikh

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SAAD SARFRAZ SHEIKH sends us this photo essay from Lahore: On 9th March, 2013, I saw an entire neighborhood burn right in front of my eyes. All I could do was watch, as the houses fell and their residents watched in vain.

And now, there are burnt teddy bears and dolls, broken doors and melted buckets stuck on the floor. It seems I am on fire.

Nasreen’s defunct washing machine is now as black as the night. Her child sits on it and weeps. Like a surgeon, she salvages the motor and tells me that it could still work. But her microwave, she tells me, is a painful puddle on the floor. Continue reading Ilyas Masih wants to stay in the dustbin: Saad Sarfraz Sheikh →

Culture, Debates, Identities

Sahibs, Pandits and the Scholarship on Caste: Manish Thakur and Nabanipa Bhattacharjee

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Guest post by MANISH THAKUR and NABANIPA BHATTACHARJEE

Scholarship on caste has always been much more than merely about caste. At stake has been the very idea of India, and the production of knowledge about it. Expectedly, whenever academic knowledge on caste spills over in the public domain (and it does so often, as in the recent Ashis Nandy case), politically charged contestations about the idea of India inevitably follow. In the academy, the privileging of Brahmanical worldview in sociological discourses on India continues to be a source of deep-seated resentment. ‘Indian Critiques of Louis Dumont’s Contributions’ (Khare 2006) notwithstanding, the figure of ‘the learned Brahman’ (Alamgir 2006) looms large in the voluminous corpus of anthropological knowledge about India. So much so that Richard Burghart(1990) views modern anthropological knowledge primarily as a function of multiple dialogues between modern day anthropologists and the Brahmanical tradition of knowledge.

Continue reading Sahibs, Pandits and the Scholarship on Caste: Manish Thakur and Nabanipa Bhattacharjee →

Capitalism, Countryside, Ecology/Environment, Everyday Life, Media politics, Movements, Violence/Conflict

Crude Questions about Crude Bombs: Biju Mathew

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This is a guest post by BIJU MATHEW

Tarun Mandal, Narahari Sahu and Manas Jena are dead, blown up by what the media has described as a “crude” bomb. All bombs are crude. They kill. They are meant to destroy flesh and bone. They are aimed at sucking out life. Lakshman Mandal battles for his life in a Cuttack hospital. He knows how crude a bomb is. Hopefully he will live to tell the tale of its crudeness.

This is a partisan piece. But it aims to produce balance. Almost all media reports so far have had a strong spin that the three – Narahari, Tarun and Manas – were killed while making a crude bomb. So says Mr. Satyabrata Bhoi, Jagatsinghpur SP. Nobody has bothered to ask him any further questions. It’s quite understandable. Asking any more questions might make the entire spin untenable. For instance, they could have asked: why is it that something illegal, such as crude bomb making, was being done out in the open and not within the confines of a house? Especially given that for the last month, the police have been constantly in and out of the village? Especially because there are at least a few dozen pro-POSCO folks in the village? Why would three leaders of an oppositional movement sit outside on the porch of a house that is fully identified with POSCO Pratirodh Sangran Samiti (PPSS) and make bombs – openly, for all to see – at 6.30 PM when there is enough light for anybody to see them? Isn’t crude bomb making normally confined to the indoors? How many incidents do we know of where crude bomb making was happening outside in broad daylight? Isn’t the RSS, the most famous outfit that makes crude bombs and occasionally manages to blow up its own, always known to make its bombs indoors? Continue reading Crude Questions about Crude Bombs: Biju Mathew →

Bad ideas, Identities, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

The Jamaat factor in Bangladesh politics: Jyoti Rehman

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jamaat-train
A train in Bangladesh set on fire by activists of the Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh

This is a guest post by Bangladeshi commentator JYOTI REHMAN: Delwar Hossain Sayedee, an Islamic preacher and a senior leader of Jamaat-e-Islami Bangladesh, the country’s largest Islam-pasand party, was sentenced to death on 28 February for war crimes committed during the 1971 Liberation War. Within hours, Jamaat cadres and activists clashed violently with police and law enforcement agencies. Scores have been killed in some of the worst political violence the country has experienced in recent years.

Five other senior Jamaat leaders, including its current and former chiefs, are being prosecuted for war crimes committed in 1971. Another leader was sentenced to life imprisonment on 5 February. That sentence triggered what has come to be called the Shahbag Awakening—a month of largely peaceful gathering of tens of thousands of people in the middle of Dhaka. A key demand of the largely government-supported Awakening is to ban Jamaat. Continue reading The Jamaat factor in Bangladesh politics: Jyoti Rehman →

Culture, Debates, Law, Sex, Violence/Conflict

Why was Ram Singh killed in Tihar jail?

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The chief accused in the Delhi gang rape “found dead” in his cell? Killed with his own shirt? Hanging from a grill, with his three cell mates sound asleep all the while? The moment I heard the news  on Monday, every conspiracy theory-oriented cell in my body did a quick cartwheel. Promptly I sent out a mail to the sisterhood on the Feminists India e-list:

I’m wondering whether there is something more than police negligence involved here. I have always felt that the role of the police on that night was more than simply their usual laparwahi – that bus may have been used often in the past for such activities, remember they didn’t follow up the complaint of the man who had been earlier that night robbed by the same guys? And how they located the bus from their hafta diaries? I’m wondering – and going to sound paranoid and like a loony conspiracy theorist – whether the key accused in court would have revealed more about police complicity in rapes and other activities on buses like Yadav’s than we imagine. Prisoners in jail often carry out attacks on other prisoners on the orders of the police themselves.

Yes, Indian prisons are violent and brutal, and the police callous and vicious. Yes, there should be an enquiry to assign responsibility. But I’m pretty certain I know who killed Ram Singh – some other prisoners. And I think that they did it on orders from the police. Continue reading Why was Ram Singh killed in Tihar jail? →

Bad ideas, Empire/ Imperialism, Frontiers, Identities, Violence/Conflict

A Curfew in Spring: Rich Autumns

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Photograph by Rich Autumns

RICH AUTUMNS writes from Srinagar: The capital of Kashmir is under tight curfew. Tight does not qualify curfew. It qualifies Srinagar. Srinagar is tight under curfew. The city has stopped breathing. It is an enforced exercise that the Valley undergoes regularly for the sake of law and order. On the deserted streets of Srinagar, Indian Army men stand in army issued jackets nursing rifles under the fresh green leaves of the Chinar. Occasionally a milk man cycles by. Sometimes, he is stopped and turned back. Sometimes he is allowed to pass, after an identity check. Continue reading A Curfew in Spring: Rich Autumns →

Bad ideas, Centre watch, Debates, Media politics, Politics

Pot calling the dynasty black: Ajaz Ashraf

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gandhi-family

AJAZ ASHRAF writes: It is time we examined the society we have created before we invoke the rather trite argument of dynastic rule to stridently criticise the Gandhis and the Congress. No doubt, dynasty is antithetical to democratic politics. Yet, it is also true that dynastic succession is the norm outside the Indian political realm as well. Its sheer pervasiveness explains why people dismiss outright the hypocritical media outcry against dynastic succession to routinely vote pater familias to power, in state as well at the Centre. Continue reading Pot calling the dynasty black: Ajaz Ashraf →

Media politics, Right watch, Violence/Conflict

राज्‍य हिंसा का एक और नमूना – धुले

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(An edited version of this Fact-Finding Report appeared in February issue of Samayantar)

गुजरात और मध्यप्रदेश की सीमा से लगे हुए महाराष्ट्र के धुले जिले में 6 जनवरी को होटल में पैसे के लेन-देन के आपसी विवाद को लेकर शुरू हुआ झगड़ा जल्द ही हिन्दू एवं मुस्लिम समुदाय के बीच पत्थर बाजी में तब्दील हो गया। इस हिंसा की परिणति पुलिस की गोली से मारे गए छः मुस्लिम नौजवानों (1) इमरान अली कमर अली (25) (2) असीम शेख नासिर  (21) (3) सउद अहमद रईस पटेल (18) (4) हाफिज मो. आसीफ अब्दुल हलीम (22) (5) रिजवान हसन शाह (24) (6) युनुस अब्बास शाह (20) के रूप में हुई। लगभग 55 मुस्लिम नौजवानों, जिनमें से लगभग 40कोगोली लगी, पुलिस की हिंसा के शिकार हुए। 58ऐसे लोग हैं जिनके घर,वाहन, दुकान, ठेलागाड़ी को क्षतिग्रस्त किया गया। धुले में हुई इस साम्प्रदायिक हिंसा की खासियत यह है कि न तो पुलिस और न ही कोई साम्प्रदायिक संगठन झूठ बोल सकता है, क्योंकि धुले में लगभग 3 बजे के आसपास जब विवाद ने पत्थरबाजी का रूप ले लिया तब उसके बाद के ज्यादातर फुटेज वीडियोक्लिपिंग अथवा फोटोग्राफ के रूप में मौजूद हैं। धुले में हुई इस हिंसा की हकीकत जानने के लिए वर्धा के हिंदी विश्‍वविद्यालय के अध्‍यापक, छात्र, सामाजिक कार्यकर्ता एवं पुणे के स्‍वतंत्र पत्रकार ने 19-20 जनवरी को धुले जिले का दौरा किया। Continue reading राज्‍य हिंसा का एक और नमूना – धुले →

Bad ideas, Debates, Identities, Politics, Right watch

Should Narendra Modi be India’s next Prime Minister?

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MODI-HITLER

Sheela Bhatt writes: Continue reading Should Narendra Modi be India’s next Prime Minister? →

Politics

The Irony of Iconhood – The life and times of Bhanwari Devi: Laxmi Murthy

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Bhanwari Devi (right) with her daughter Rameshwari, in Mangalore 

This is a guest post by LAXMI MURTHY: “Only justice can fill my belly, not awards,” says Bhanwari Devi in response to a question from the audience about whether or not she had been recognised by international awards. She was speaking at a meeting organised by the Alternative Law Forum, Bangalore. The previous day, along with other leaders, Bhanwari had roused a massive rally in Mangalore with her fiery calls for solidarity and action against violence against women. The Mangalore March 8th program itself was phenomenal, from all accounts The unprecedented coalition of women’s and progressive groups (almost a hundred groups) to raise a voice against the saffronization of Karnataka’s coastal belt and increasing attacks on women, has been the outcome of dedicated work by the Forum Against Atrocities on Women (the Mahila Dourjnya Virodi Vedike, Karnataka). With delicious irony, Bhanwari, Urmila Pawar and other invited activists were accommodated at “Morning Mist’, the homestay that was ransacked by right-wing goons who broke up a private celebration there last June. That none of the events, which saw the mobilization of more than 5000 women, made it to even the Bangalore editions of the dailies (can’t even dream of the national media bothering!) is a matter of dismay, but won’t go into that right now. Continue reading The Irony of Iconhood – The life and times of Bhanwari Devi: Laxmi Murthy →

Bad ideas, Culture, Genders, Images, Left watch

Class Feminism vs. Classy Feminism … Or, Everybody Loves the Governable Woman!

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A few weeks ago, I mentioned on Kafila a certain gentleman who delivered a memorable address in Government Women’s College, Thiruvananthapuram, which contained sage advice on how to bring under control the unruly bodies of ungovernable women.  After that I have been receiving unsigned letters from his admirers who feel that their innocent hero has been most unfairly criticized. Like the grumpy ground-lubber types who are either incapable of ascending or simply unable to climb coconut trees and do not appreciate the free services rendered by the chivalrous heroes high above, I have erred in judgment, they claim. Continue reading Class Feminism vs. Classy Feminism … Or, Everybody Loves the Governable Woman! →

Bad ideas, Capitalism, Everyday Life, Language, Mirror Worlds

India’s other education crisis: The English Teacher

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This is a guest post by ‘The English Teacher’
Here are some statistics detailing the current state of education in India. 4% of Indian children – eight million – never start school. 57%, 74 million, don’t complete primary school. 90% – 172 million children – don’t complete secondary school. To call the situation alarming is an understatement; we have in our country a full-blown disaster. 90% of our nation’s children are victims of this disaster, with barely 10% emerging as survivors. But how fortunate are the 10% really?I’ve been a teacher since 2010, a year after I graduated from university. I taught social studies for a while, pottered a bit in the areas of curriculum and school policy development for a while longer, and have, for the past two years, taught English to middle school students. If these terms – middle school, curriculum and school policy development seem a bit foreign to you, it’s because they are. I happen to work – or happened to, until very recently – in an international school.

When you hear “international school” you may imagine any number of a range of things  – let me tell you right off, though, that we aren’t talking top range international school here. As far as school infrastructure goes, my former place of work is a damned sight better than any of the schools the 90% go to in our country, but as far as international schools go, mine lay in the majority of them that are just coming up in the country, especially in Mumbai. The sort that’s less than ten years old and an educational disaster zone of its own kind.

DISSENT, DEBATE, CREATE