I am not surprised that neither the LDF nor the UDF both of which had endorsed the reservation of fifty percent seats in the panchayats for women, have not fielded a significantly higher number of women in the forthcoming elections to the Kerala State Assembly. Anyone who has observed the shaping and widening of the division between ‘high politics’ and ‘local governance’ in Kerala since the mid-1990s can well see that the rules of the game remain totally unchanged in ‘high politics’ and it will stay so even if ‘local governance’ is entrusted completely to women’s love and care. None of the women leaders who entered public life through the panchayats and have by now completely got beyond the loving-caring-maternal stereotype are in, of course. At least one of them,Latika Subhash, who had indeed been a successful leader in local governance, saw the writing on the wall well in advance. I had a chance to listen to an interview she gave a researcher from our team studying gender and governance a few years back, in which she clearly indicated that in order to move up the political ladder, it was necessary to move into high politics. This is how she justified her decision to get back into politics despite being quite popular as a leader of the panchayat.Not surprisingly, most of the women who have indeed become candidates are well-versed with the ways of high politics and possess the necessary connections. Continue reading Enter the Paavam: Women Candidates in Kerala’s Elections
हिरोशिमा से फ़ुकुशिमा: अनिल मिश्र
Guest post by ANIL MISHRA
पिछले सप्ताह जापान में सुनामी के साथ आए भूकंप ने समूची दुनिया को दहला कर रख दिया है. इस विभीषिका से होने वाले नुक़सानों का वास्तविक आकलन, एड़ी चोटी के प्रयासों के बावजूद, अभी तक नहीं हो पाया है. सब कुछ धरती के नीचे दफ़्न हो जाने की सैकड़ों ख़बरें अभी तक आ रही हैं. रही सही कसर परमाणु संयंत्रों में विस्फ़ोट के बाद विकिरण के ख़तरे ने पूरी कर दी है जिसके असर कई कई सालों और पीढ़ियों तक मारक होते हैं.
जापान के प्रधानमंत्री नाओतो कान के बयान कि ’दूसरे विश्वयुद्ध के बाद यह उनके देश में सबसे भयानक तबाही है, और कुछ मायनों में उससे भी ज़्यादा विनाशकारी’, के कई पहलू हैं. इसे प्राकृतिक आपदा में नष्ट हो चुके एक देश द्वारा महज वैश्विक मानवीय सहायता और सहानुभूति की अपील की तरह देखना पर्याप्त नहीं होगा. प्रधानमंत्री का बयान परमाणु ऊर्जा के ख़तरनाक पहलुओं की भी एक स्वीकारोक्ति है. मानवतावादी संकटों से निपटना निश्चित ही एक अहम और तात्कालिक चुनौती है. लेकिन परमाणु संयंत्रों में विस्फ़ोट और विकिरण के जो खतरे पैदा हो रहे हैं उनसे निपटना आने वाले दिनों में बेहद कठिन होगा. साथ ही, ऊर्जा के लिए परमाणु ईंधन को प्रोत्साहन देने वाले अन्य देशों की योजनाओं के लिए इससे कई महत्वपूर्ण सबक़ मिले हैं.
Continue reading हिरोशिमा से फ़ुकुशिमा: अनिल मिश्र
I Wish You Egypt: An open letter to people of conscience in the West. Omar Barghouti
Guest post by OMAR BARGHOUTI
I wish you Egypt!
I wish you empowerment to resist; to fight for social and economic justice; to win your real freedom and equal rights.
I wish you the will and skill to break out of your carefully concealed prison walls. See, in our part of the world, prison walls and thick inviolable doors are all too overt, obvious, over-bearing, choking; this is why we remain restive, rebellious, agitated, and always in preparation for our day of freedom, of light, when we gather a critical mass of people power enough to cross all the hitherto categorical red lines. We can then smash the thick, cold ugly, rusty chains that have incarcerated our minds and bodies for all our lives like the overpowering stench of a rotting corpse in our claustrophobic prison cell.
Your prison cells, however, are quite different. The walls are well hidden lest they evoke your will to resist. There is no door to your prison cell — you may roam about “freely,” never recognizing the much larger prison you are still confined to. Continue reading I Wish You Egypt: An open letter to people of conscience in the West. Omar Barghouti
Anti-Nuclear Parliament March on 25th March, 2011
Organized by Anti-Nuclear Struggles Solidarity Forum
Mandi House to Parliament. Assemble in front of the Sahitya Academy Lawns at 12.00 noon.
This protest march is to state our stand that we oppose all forms of nuclearisation of India, including nuclear (fission) power and weaponisation plans and programmes.
We further demand an immediate moratorium on all new projects, and a stringent review of existing plants by independent experts.
We demand investment in exploring sustainable alternative forms of energy.
Continue reading Anti-Nuclear Parliament March on 25th March, 2011
Bhagat Singh and the Hindu Rashtra: Mahtab Alam
Guest post by MAHTAB ALAM
“The communists’ ideologues conveniently ignore the truth that the roots of Bhagat Singh’s ideology lie in the very concept of Hindu Rashtra,” claims an article by Dipin Damodharan, published on this day last year. Damodharan, as introduced at the end of the article, is a student pursuing Masters in Communication and Journalism (MCJ) at the Calicut University of Kerala. He argues: “To my knowledge, he sacrificed his precious life for a noble cause, for the liberation of Bharat from the invaders, for nationalism. Undoubtedly Bhagat’s legacy belongs to every Bharati. But for the communists (experts in transforming sheep to dog), he died for communism and not for nationalism. They are incessantly advocating Bhagat as their poster boy, for several years they have been using Goebalsian tricks to claim Bhagat’s legacy.” The author further argues, “They are injecting fake stories about Bhagat into the blood of youth who are ignorant about Bharat’s history. Discarding the historical facts, the communists become angry with the Sangh inspired organizations for propagating Bhagat’s ideals”. Continue reading Bhagat Singh and the Hindu Rashtra: Mahtab Alam
The evidence from Fukushima: nuclear power means nuclear catastrophe – Daniel Tanuro
Excerpts from an article by Daniel Tanuro, an eco-socialist environmentalist
What has happened is entirely predictable: yet another major nuclear “accident”. At the time of writing, it is not yet certain that it will take on the dimensions of a disaster similar to Chernobyl, but that is the direction in which things, alas, look set to evolve. But whether it develops into a major disaster or not, we are once again faced with evidence that the technology can never be 100% secure. The risks are so frightening that the conclusion is obvious: it is imperative to abandon nuclear energy, and to do so as quickly as possible. This is the first lesson of Fukushima, one which raises absolutely fundamental social and political questions, requiring a real debate throughout society about an alternative to the capitalist model of infinite growth…
Praful Bidwai on Lessons for India from Fukushima
Excerpts from a recent article by Praful Bidwai, journalist, social science researcher and activist on issues of human rights, the environment, global justice and peace.
The crisis holds a number of lessons for India as it embarks on a massive nuclear power expansion programme, which will double and then further triple India’s nuclear power capacity.
First, nuclear power generation is inherently hazardous. It is the only form of energy production that can lead to a catastrophic accident with long-time health damage and environmental contamination. Human error or a natural calamity can trigger a catastrophe—but only because reactors are themselves vulnerable.
Reactors are high-pressure high-temperature systems in which a high-energy fission chain-reaction is only just controlled. Nuclear reactors are both systemically complex, and internally, tightly coupled. A fault or malfunction in one sub-system gets quickly transmitted to others and gets magnified till the whole system goes into crisis mode.
Continue reading Praful Bidwai on Lessons for India from Fukushima
Compromise in Rape Cases: Whither Constitutional Morality?: Kalpana Kannabiran
Guest post by KALPANA KANNABIRAN
The Supreme Court judgement reported in some newspapers on 24 February 2011, legitimizing compromise in rape cases, is cause for serious concern. For thirty years now human rights groups and women’s groups have fought difficult battles to have rape recognised as a serious offence both in communities and by courts. Rights advocates have been concerned by the fact that all too often the view of the judiciary converges with the view of the community in seeing women’s sexuality as communally owned property, thus removing any articulation of violence from the crime of rape.
Some years ago, at a workshop of judicial officers, we had one senior officer arguing that if a man found guilty of raping a woman offered to marry her, this offer should be considered as a “mitigating circumstance,” and his sentence reduced to the bare minimum. That done, since his continuing in jail will be detrimental to his new family life, he should be set at liberty under the provisions of the Probation of Offenders Act. Fortunately in that gathering, the majority of officers, most of them junior to the officer concerned, felt strongly that this is a gross misapplication of the law. But the existence of the possibility that a judge might actually rationalize the gross misinterpretation of a law as critical to women as this, has far reaching consequences.
Continue reading Compromise in Rape Cases: Whither Constitutional Morality?: Kalpana Kannabiran
The Hindu, WikiLeaks and Me: Malarvizhi Jayanth
Guest post by MALARVIZHI JAYANTH
Once upon an election, the ruling party was bullying and booth-capturing recklessly. I was there. I saw it. Outside one booth, three Tata Sumos drove away at mad speeds, their screeching, spinning wheels blowing dust into my eyes in a scene straight out of the Tamil movies. I walked into the booth to find it had been ransacked minutes earlier. I saw weeping government officials and ballots with the stamp over the rising sun scattered everywhere. Other reporters saw similar scenes. Reporters received complaints of cash and biriyani(!) being distributed to voters.The management of the newspaper I worked for chose to run the Election Commission’s claims that the elections had been without incident, rather than accounts from several reporters who had seen the captured booths and heard from voters who had been offered bribes. Two days later, when almost all other media (barring the usual suspects) had run outraged stories about the brazenness of the booth capturing, hesitantly, The Hindu followed suit. Today, they announce to us that cash for votes is a way of political life in Tamil Nadu. Yeah, thanks, we know that already. Too bad you couldn’t believe your lowly brown-skinned reporters who told you all about it. A white man sends off a cable about it to his masters and then it becomes news? Really? Continue reading The Hindu, WikiLeaks and Me: Malarvizhi Jayanth
Emboldening Khap Panchayats?
It’s Here, The Privatisation of Higher Education In India
I do not exaggerate. I am not being hasty. The writing is on the wall. What started as a glimmer in the eyes of the IIC-frequenting bureaucrat, the industrialist with profit-making dreams and the politician with an obscenely large government house in Lutyens’ Delhi is now a raging reality. Pick up any newspaper or magazine and check out the number of advertisements for private universities. Do a google search for the latest news reports on committees on higher education. If you have the time and patience, go through all the government documents on higher education in the past five years, almost neatly coinciding with the exit of Arjun Singh as Human Resources Minister and the entry of Kapil Sibal. Speaking of Mr. Sibal, if his cheerfully unapologetic blundering on the 2G scam is anything to go by, we should have an idea of the kind of subtle and layered approach he has in mind when he speaks of ‘reforming the education system.’
Continue reading It’s Here, The Privatisation of Higher Education In India
Ghettoes of the Mind: Khalid Anis Ansari on ‘minority status’ for Jamia Milia Islamia
Guest post by KHALID ANIS ANSARI
Teri azaān mein nahin meri sahar ka payām. [Your call to prayer heralds not my dawn] – Allama Iqbal
The recent judgment of the National Commission for Minority Educational Institutions (NCMEI), favoring ‘minority status’ for Jamia Millia Islamia University, has generated vigorous debate. While it seems to me that most of the articulations have probably been reluctant in staging the immanent logics governing the entire controversy, I see this debate as offering yet another opening for democratic transformation within the Muslim community. While I will resist from taking a straightforward for/against position on the issue, it would be my endeavor to trace the discursive ruptures that instantiated the articulation around the ‘minority status’ for Jamia, and to indicate at the need to frame the Muslim ‘community’ now as a contested terrain with multiple sites of negotiations, cleavages and transformations.
What does it mean to be a Muslim in India today?: Mahtab Alam
Guest post by MAHTAB ALAM
Recently, Shanina K K, a journalist from Kerala, who worked with Tehelka news weekly and now works with Open magazine, received the Chameli Devi Award for being an outstanding woman journalist. While receiving the award she said, “See, I happen to be a Muslim, but I am not a terrorist.” What made her say that and what was she trying to convey or explain? It means, as she explains, “If you belong to the minority community, they will also profile you. It is very difficult to prove that you are not a terrorist. It is equally difficult to prove that you are not a Maoist in our life and times.” Continue reading What does it mean to be a Muslim in India today?: Mahtab Alam
India’s ‘Lawless Law’ that Keeps Dissidents ‘Out of Circulation’
Amnesty International has released a report calling on India to repeal the Jammu & Kashmir Public Safety Act. The report, called A ‘Lawless Law’: Detentions Under the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act, can be downloaded here. Given below is the text of the Introduction and Summary of the report.
‘We have to keep some people out of circulation…’ – Samuel Verghese, (then) Financial Commissioner – Home, Jammu and Kashmir in a meeting with Amnesty International, Srinagar, 20 May 2010 Continue reading India’s ‘Lawless Law’ that Keeps Dissidents ‘Out of Circulation’
Nukes, Wikileaks and Corruption: National Alliance of People’s Movements
Press Release by NAPM
PM Must Reveal Truth to Nation
Cancel all the Proposed Nuclear Power Plants and Related Facilities
Moratorium on Dams in High Seismic Zones
New Delhi Delhi, March 18 : Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s statement after the nuclear disaster in Japan that there is no need to be panicky as India will take all safety measures is not only amateurish but also lacks wisdom.
His statement gives the impression that the Japanese have not taken adequate safety measures. What type of natural calamities or man made lapses are in store for us, no one can visualise or predict leave alone taking safety measures against them.
The Prime Minister who has no control over his own cabinet ministers and has unashamedly wailed in public that he was ineffective due to coalition government, and caused the nation unimaginable and unprecedented loss by allowing mind blowing scams, issuing such absurd statements like taking all safety measures- lacks any tangible weight. Continue reading Nukes, Wikileaks and Corruption: National Alliance of People’s Movements
A Million March in Kashmir?: Suvaid Yaseen
Guest post by SUVAID YASEEN
A ‘March of Million’ in Egypt’s Tahrir Square picked up the momentum of the people’s movement in Egypt, and finally led to the ouster of the dictator who had ruled Egypt with an iron fist for thirty years. Hosni Mubarak, the US backed Egyptian President, fled the country on 11th of February.
In Kashmir, 11th of February is an important day. It was on this day in 1984, that Maqbool Bhat, the founding member of the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), a militant group that started the armed struggle for Independence of Kashmir, was hanged at Delhi’s Tihar Jail. He is remembered every year on his death anniversary, which has been a day of strike and protest since then. His remains still lie in the premises of Tihar jail in Delhi, and Kashmiris every year ask for their return. An empty grave in Srinagar’s Martyrs’ graveyard waits with Maqbool’s name on the plaque. For Kashmiris, the date of the flight of the modern Pharoah of Egypt, with Maqbool’s date of martyrdom brought a melancholic delight to this date. Continue reading A Million March in Kashmir?: Suvaid Yaseen
Impose Immediate Moratorium on All Nuclear Activity in India: CNDP
As the Japanese nuclear disaster stares the world in its face, the unrepentant power elite and the nuclear elite in particular, is attempting to downplay the threats that are in store for us in future. An particularly belligerent representative of the Indian nuclear establishment recently attacked CNDP (Coalition for Nuclear Disarmament and Peace) activist Praful Bidwai on television, calling him a ‘nuclear illiterate’. While the world watches in horror, predators are active in stepping up their disinformation campaign. Given that India’s record of maintaining minimum safety standards on even the simplest of things is not a patch on the Japanese (leaving aside its world record in corruption!), there is no other way but to demand an immediate moratorium on all further nuclear activity in India. The anti-nuclear movement has raised this demand already in relation to Jaitapur and Haripur in West Bengal.
Meanwhile, here is Praful Bidwai on the Jaitapur project, after his return form a field investigation.
How is Savita Bhabhi a Threat to India’s National Security?
“Ask the Home Ministry, because this is a security issue.”
That is what India’s Minister for Communications and Information Technology said recently when asked about the lack of transparency in the blocking of websites in India.
Now, one of the websites blocked in India is Savita Bhabhi, as also several mirror websites of the same. Savita Bhabhi, as you doubtless know, was a soft-porn web comic. All I want to ask Kapil Sibal is: How is Savita Bhabhi a threat to India’s national security? Wait, I have another question: Continue reading How is Savita Bhabhi a Threat to India’s National Security?
The Day India Will Shut Down the Internet
Sounds alarmist? Perhaps. But under the IT Amnedment Act of 2008, the Government of India gave itself the power to do so. The Economic Times reports: Continue reading The Day India Will Shut Down the Internet
Wikileaks: The India Cables – At Long Last
Mr. [Murli] Deora’s “long-standing connection” to the Reliance industrial group, which includes significant energy equities, was described by the cable as his “only vulnerability.” Besides Mr. Deora, the new entrants with strong pro-U.S. credentials, according to the cable, included Mr. Saifuddin Soz, Mr. Anand Sharma, Mr. Ashwani Kumar, and Mr. Kapil Sibal. [Link]
Gems like the one above should keep readers of The Hindu entertained for days. Congratulations to them on getting the whole set of 5,100 India-related cables from WikiLeaks. They’ve created a sub-site for this. Here’s N. Ram on how they got the cables. Makes you wonder if others tried.
Here’s what India’s Communications and IT Minister thinks about online freedom
Kapil Sibal said the following at a conference on social media in Delhi recently:
We’ve seen the power of the medium in the last six months or so seeking to perform a transformational role, but in the absence of a balance… this is really the danger of sites like these. What happens in the process is that all kinds of opinion get both elicited and taken forward, without the necessary wherewithal, and there’s a great danger, because this, I believe, is a part of freedom of speech. Continue reading Here’s what India’s Communications and IT Minister thinks about online freedom
