Capitalism, Left watch, Movements, Politics, Violence/Conflict

The End or Future of Capitalism and Ending Obama’s War

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Last night I heard a public conversation between the Marxist Geographer David Harvey and Alexander Cockburn the editor of CounterPunch and columnist with The Nation.  The conversation titled, ‘The End or Future of Capitalism’ was hosted by The Center for Place, Culture & Politics.  Cockburn opened the conversation by speaking about the lack of vision in the Left.  Harvey argued that the capitalist system was facing tremendous stress and that a different path of economic development had to be envisioned.  Harvey continued on the end of capitalism as one needing analysis in terms of how this crisis arose with the problem of accumulation and realization of surplus, and poses the question of what is to be done?  Central to Harvey’s argument is that the mounting stress seen at the centre of the capitalist system in the last three decades is the culmination of the inability to sustain the two and a half percent compounded accumulation that has been a characteristic of global capital over the last couple hundred years.  That the capitalist system is unable to find productive investments for the two and a half percent accumulation rate leading to repetitious and aggravating crises in the unproductive bubbles in financial assets.

I stood in line when the floor was open, but much to my disappointment the moderator had brought the conversation to an end before I could ask my question, and so I am going to ask it here.  Both Harvey and Cockburn talked about the urgency of the moment and the need for provocative questions from the Left.  But what is the more urgent question to ask at this moment?  Is it the end or future of capitalism? Or is it the end or future of the American Empire?  The two may well be related and even two sides of the same coin, but the question for me is influenced by the urgency of the situation in our region; the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan.  The relatedness of the two questions also leads me to ask what would be the consequence of the tremendous stress at the centre of the capitalist system on the wars fought at the periphery of Empire?  And in turn, what is the impact of the tremendous stress of the wars on the periphery for the hegemonic centre of the capitalist system?

Continue reading The End or Future of Capitalism and Ending Obama’s War →

Bad ideas, Government, Law, Violence/Conflict

Do prisoners’ human rights stand suspended?

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“What a state of society is that which knows of no better instrument for its own defense than the hangman, and which proclaims . . . its own brutality as eternal law? . . . Is there not a necessity for deeply reflecting upon an alteration of the system that breeds these crimes, instead of glorifying the hangman who executes a lot of criminals to make room only for the supply of new ones?”– Karl Marx, 1853

The letter sent by an undertrial Mukesh Kumar, as present lodged in Karnal Jail (Haryana) through his counsel to the Chief Justice of India makes depressing reading. The letter talks about the manner in which he was brutalised by the Jail staff for disobeying their orders. It is learnt that the Jail wardens compelled him to clean the toilets calling him names and ‘reminding’ him of his ‘caste profession’. His refusal to continue the dehumanising work led to his public thrashing and tonsuring/shaving of his head and moustache.

According to the administration, Mukesh Kumar is one of those persons who were arrested from different parts of Haryana from April to June 2009 as part of the state campaign ‘to curb Maoist activity’. Continue reading Do prisoners’ human rights stand suspended? →

Debates, Politics

Divide in higher education in India: Vrijendra

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This guest post has been sent to us by VRIJENDRA, who teaches at a college affiliated to Bombay University

I

Of late, higher education in India has been in the news for many reasons. The new HRD Minister Kapil Sibal has been busy drafting new bills and formulating new policies to give a big push to higher education and to open up the higher education sector to foreign universities and their affiliates. In this scenario, two issues have been the major focus:

(a) The need to improve the enrolment ratio from the present, dismal ratio of about 10 percent – that is, only 10 percent of eligible young students enrol in colleges in India – to about 15/20 per cent in the next decade to catch up with the rest of the world in some ways. (Though the official enrolment ratio in India is about 11 per cent, if we go by how many of these students are really learning anything in reasonably well–equipped colleges, my guess is that the ratio will be down to alarmingly low level of about 5 per cent.)  For example, in the US and Europe, the enrolment ratio is more than 60 percent. Even in China, our favourite competitor these days, the ratio is about 19 percent.

(b) The need to urgently improve the quality of higher education in the country to make it more competitive globally and to emerge ‘global knowledge hub’ in the near future.

However, any meaningful discussion on these two issues has to recognize two alarming features of higher education system in the country.

Continue reading Divide in higher education in India: Vrijendra →

Bad ideas, Debates, Everyday Life, Government, Language, Politics

On Austerity

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In the 1990s, when I first understood economics, austerity was a word that scared me. It represented a paradigm that I associated with the story of Zambia in the late 1980s. Zambia had one of the more functional public health systems in Africa in the late 70s and early 80s. It then became IMF’s test case for user fees in health care and the rest of the story is familiar one of user fees, loss of access and a systemic worsening of care in an already incredibly poor country. “Austerity” was [and is] in economics of a certain tune, not about economy class travel and eliminating excess photocopying. It was about tightening state expenditure, usually to pay off large scale debts. It was part of Structural Adjustment and the attack on “big” African government, part of the shock transitions of Eastern Europe.

In one of its shades, then, austerity is the slow dismantling of the welfare state. It is not the stance — as the UPA would have you believe — that one takes in some notion of deference to the reality of poverty, it is the cause of some of that poverty in the first place. Every time one government or any other calls for “austerity drives” of any kind, the shadow of this austerity still haunts them. The austerity that causes poverty is also rooted within these calls, though more quietly.

Continue reading On Austerity →

Identities, Law, Right watch

Right to Read Campaign

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Right to Read Campaign – Problem Statement

Millions of Indians are unable to read printed material due to disabilities.
There are technologies available which can help them read print if the
material is converted into an alternate format such as large print, audio,
Braille or any electronic format. While the Indian constitution guarantees
the “right to read” as a fundamental right, the copyright regime does not
permit the conversion of books into accessible formats for the benefit of
persons with print impairment, as a result of which a “book famine” is
created. International conventions that India is a party to specifically
require India to amend its copyright laws for the benefit of persons with
disabilities and to make available information and material to persons with
disabilities on an equal basis as others. Publishers also do not make books
available in accessible formats as a result of which less than 0.5% of books
are available in accessible formats in India. As a result persons with print
impairments get excluded from the education system and it impacts their
career choices. In addition to this, there are no national Policies or
action plan to ensure that publications in accessible formats in all Indian
languages are available to persons with print disabilities all over the
country.

Objectives of the Right to Read Campaign

·    To accelerate change in copyright law
·    To raise public awareness on the issue
·    To gather Indian support for the Treaty for the Blind proposed by
the World Blind Union at the World Intellectual Property Organisation
(WIPO).

This campaign is part of the global Right to Read Campaign of the World
Blind Union.

As part of the campaign we are creating audio visual clips of eminent
persons, celebrities etc. supporting the Campaign. If you know any eminent
persons, celebrities etc. who are willing to support the campaign do mail me
(rahul.cherian@inclusiveplanet.com) so that we can arrange for their
testimony to be recorded. Your support is vital for the success of this
campaign. More details will follow.

Bad ideas, Capitalism

This Whole Business of Childhood

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“To all who come to this happy place – welcome. Disneyland is your land. Here age relives fond memories of the past and here youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future. Disneyland is dedicated to the ideals, the dreams, and the hard facts that have created America … with the hope that it will be a source of joy and inspiration to all the world. Thank you.”

Walt Disney’s father helped build the grounds of the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893 in Chicago. In the 1950s as the population of America for the first time shifted West into desert climes on a mass scale, Walt Disney started receiving letters from people about visiting the Disney Studio, located in Los Angeles. Walt realized that a functional movie studio had little to offer to visiting fans. He began to dream about a site near the studios for tourists to visit; ideas that evolved into the first Disneyland Park located in Anaheim, California. The first Disneyland opened to the public on Monday, July 18, 1955 and crowds started to gather in line to enter as early as 2 a.m. Walt’s brother Roy O’Disney had arranged to pre-purchase ticket number 1, so an adult named David MacPherson became the first official visitor to Disneyland, with ticket number 2. For a park that had to become iconic with children all over the world, MacPherson’s historic ticket was potentially disastrous from a marketing point of view, and recognised as such by the ever-alert Mr. Disney. In a masterstroke of foresight and damage control, he had an official photo taken with two children instead, Christine Vess Watkins (age 5 in 1955) and Michael Schwartner (age 7 in 1955). The photo was captioned, “Walt Disney with the first two guests of Disneyland.” Continue reading This Whole Business of Childhood →

Bad ideas, Excavation

The Khirki and the Begumpur Mosques

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This is to be read as a sequel to my earlier post, A Tale of Two Mosques.

First published in Landmark. Photographs by DEVNDRA CHAUHAN. Credit for the map drawings: NITIN SAINI.

The east gate of the Begumpur mosque
The east gate of the Begumpur mosque

With the exception of Humayun’s tomb, and it is an exceptional structure, I have up to now stuck to my brief of talking about lesser known monuments of Delhi and will hopefully continue doing so as long as some monuments continue to exist incognito or till I am told to layoff. Considering that some of the readers have reacted favourably to my output I hope to continue to tread on what used to be a lonely trail.

Of late I have discovered fellow travellers on my jaunts, this path is no longer as lonely as it was when I began to see them in my teens in the company of my father who had strayed into archaeology from furniture designing, interior decoration and draughtsmanship. Continue reading The Khirki and the Begumpur Mosques →

Frontiers, Government, Identities

Engaging Nepal: some difficult questions

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India can continue to let its suspicion of the Maoists be the over-riding objective of its Nepal policy or seek to play a pro-active role in engineering the kind of consensus it has done since 2005.

First published in The Hindu yesterday.

Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao arrives in Kathmandu on her maiden visit today, at a time when Nepal is grappling with its most serious and prolonged political crisis since the peace process began. India has to make certain difficult policy choices, reconcile the contradictions between its stated aims and actions, determine whether it remains committed to the process it helped facilitate, and use its leverage accordingly.

The fragile Madhav Nepal-led ruling coalition faces a severe crisis of legitimacy and a belligerent Maoist opposition. The Maoists have boycotted the legislature-parliament, paralysing government business to the extent that the budget has not yet been passed. They have demanded a house discussion on President Ram Baran Yadav’s “unconstitutional action” over-riding the Maoist government’s decision to sack the then Army Chief General Rukmangad Katawal in early May — a demand rejected by the other parties in government who see no wrong in what the President did. The Maoists have also launched a street movement, with the slogan of instituting “civilian supremacy” and a “Maoist-led national government.” Continue reading Engaging Nepal: some difficult questions →

Capitalism, Law, Politics

Company Secretary to Replace Inspector

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New Delhi: While the Manmohan Singh government’s Left-free second innings is expected to usher in changes to India’s archaic labour laws, the labour ministry is working on a quick-fix solution to help drop the country’s notorious ‘inspector raj’ tag.
If all goes to plan, India Inc would no longer have to deal with labour inspectors turning up at their premises to check compliance with 43 central and myriad state labour legislations. Instead, firms can submit a certificate from a company secretary that validates their compliance with the numerous employment laws.
( The Indian Express, Vikas Dhoot, Posted: Wednesday, Aug 05, 2009 at 0137 hrs IST)

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh led government’s ‘left free second innings’ seems to be taking the battle against ‘archaic labour laws’ full steam ahead. The outgoing Union Labour Secretary, Ms Sudha Pillai, some time back shared with the media about the draft which is being prepared in the labour ministry to this effect.
The proposal, which would be shortly submitted in the form of a cabinet note, seeks to ‘permit company secretaries to file compliance reports for labour laws, just like they give compliance reports for other laws.’ As of now the role of the company secretary is limited to certifying the said firm’s compliance with various statues, which includes the companies act, 1956 and also the listing agreement with stock exchanges and the issue of compliance with labour laws is handled by the labour inspectors.
Continue reading Company Secretary to Replace Inspector →

Left watch, Politics, Theory

And this song is dedicated to Buddhababu

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“CM Buddhadeb back, denies quit rumours”

sar par paaon rakh kar bhaago
sar par paaon rakh kar bhaago
katne waala patta hai
suno ji ye kalkatta hai
hurr..

Government, Law, Politics, Right watch

Magistrate Tamang, a hero: Vasudha Nagaraj

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By VASUDHA NAGARAJ via FeministsIndia List

You can download here the report by Magistrate Tamang.

I cannot resist but recount this account of exemplary courage and commitment of a Magistrate working in the Metropolitan Courts of Ahmedabad. He is none other than Magistrate Tamang who has been in the news for the past few days.

Brief facts: We all know about the encounter of Ishrat Jehan and three others in the outskirts of the city of Ahmedabad which took place in June, 2004. Soon after the encounter there were enquiries by human rights groups which declared that it was a cold blooded killing and not an encounter. To counter the demands the Crime Branch ordered a Magistrate to enquire into the matter. It has been reported that no Magistrate was willing to stick his neck into this issue. Finally on 12 August, 2009 the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (CMM) ordered Magistrate Tamang to conduct the inquiry. The latter was supposed to conduct this inquiry under S 176 CrPC. This is the section of law in which a Magistrate is empowered to hold an inquiry into the cause of death whenever a person dies while in police custody or when it is a death in doubtful circumstances. Generally, under this section of law,  Magistrates record dying declarations of women who are dying and lying in the hospitals.

Continue reading Magistrate Tamang, a hero: Vasudha Nagaraj →

Bad ideas, Debates, Everyday Life

Breaking Rules: Reflections on Knowledge

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This story of the birth of a new language raises some significant questions for our understanding of how bodies of knowledge are transformed. After the Sandinista revolution in 1979, for the first time in the history of Nicaragua, a huge nation-wide effort was made to educate deaf children. Hundreds of deaf students were enrolled in two schools. They had never been introduced to any of the world’s existing sign language systems, and came to the schools with only the simplest kind of gestural signs they had developed within their families.   Their teachers were new and inexperienced, and found it difficult to communicate with their students, but the students themselves had no problem at all in “talking” to one another. With great rapidity they began to build on the common pool of signs, and a complex new language began to emerge, which has come now to be called Nicaraguan Sign Language (NSL).  Some years down the line, an even more interesting development is noticed. As younger children enter the school system, they not only pick up the language their seniors had developed, but they confidently break the existing language rules. They invent new signs and deform old ones, and these new signs that do not obey the old rules filter back into the language, making it more complex, richer and more varied.

Continue reading Breaking Rules: Reflections on Knowledge →

Media politics, Violence/Conflict

Beaten, tortured, forced to do drugs, wrists slashed with razors

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There have been so many ragging incidents coming out in the news, but the media is done with ragging and there’s no hype beyond the singular news report. It would be a mistake to presume that there’s been a spurt in ragging incidents; the spurt has instead been in the reporting of incidents, in punishment and implementation of the law.

A student in Howrah was subjected to the things mentioned in the headline of this post, but it became a news story when the fresher tried to commit sucide by consuming poison. So the headline in the Times of India goes, “Howrah student attempts suicide after ragging“. A reader flipping through news reports could well think, another loser, another victim, another case. The attention is not on the victimiser, the perpetrator.

On Friday, Nayan was waiting at Uluberia station to catch a train home when four seniors grabbed him and took him to a house in the locality, says his uncle. Once inside, the door was barred and the torture began. Nayan was beaten and forced to smoke a cigarette. Then an unknown drug was forced down his throat. When he lay delirious, his wrists were slashed with a razor. Then, one of the seniors asked another to fetch an empty syringe, the FIR says. As Nayan desperately struggled, he was held down and air injected into his left hand.

Surely, the FIR named the four seniors? Why could they not be named in this news report?

The Times report also misses the point, mentioned in the Telegraph report, that the wrist slashing happened because Nayan Adak refused to obey orders to undress and dance. Ragging always does boil down to the fresher’s body, doesn’t it? The Telegraph and Express reports don’t mention names of the four accused either.

Law, Media politics

Watching Films Blindfolded

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(Published in Himal, September 2009)

Sometime in 1996, the High Court of Andhra Pradesh received an anonymous letter informing the court that pornographic films were being shown in a cinema hall called Ramakrishna 70MM. The court proceeded to send two ‘lady advocates’ to ascertain the facts. In their subsequent affidavit, the advocates informed the court that they had gone to watch a film in the theatre and, after repeated obstacles – the ticket seller refusing to sell them tickets, the doorman asking them to go home, etc – they finally managed to find a seat inside the theatre. There, they were promptly informed by the manager that the film that was to be screened could not be seen by ladies, and they were ordered to leave. Following the report by the advocates, the court proceeded to have all the prints seized, and arranged for a screening for various officers of the court. The officers found the films to be a hodgepodge of short films, films-division features, advertisement films, political-party propaganda films, Hindi and Telugu feature-film bits and, of course, lots of porn clips thrown in for good measure. The court then ordered the closure of the theatre.

This would seem like just another day at the office for someone interested in the relationship between law, cinema and sleaze. But let us pause and consider one moment in this narrative a bit longer, as it contains a key to understanding the secret relationship between law and cinema. Let us look more closely at the moment when the officers of the law are huddled together in a small dark room, with notepads and pens, watching a montage of images – what must that have been like? Was there a conspiratorial silence when the nude descended the stairs, or a nervous giggle when the camera lingered for a second too long on the French kiss?

Continue reading Watching Films Blindfolded →

Genders, Identities, Politics

Ultra Violet:A feminist blog

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I came across this blog a couple of months ago, and have been wanting to bring it to the attention of kafila-readers who may not have visited it yet. Always something interesting and provocative going on there.

Its self-definition:

Ultra Violet is a place for Indian feminists.
It’s a place for sharing stories and views and questions. It’s a place for exploration, opinion and information (not necessarily in the order). It’s a place where we can come together to understand what other feminists around the country–or around the world–are saying…
Ultra Violet does not represent any school, wave, organization, institution or categorization. We do not belong in a box. We do not huddle together in a tank. We do not fly in formation like a flock of geese. We are all free people, approaching feminism from different locations, backgrounds and personalities…

Capitalism, Debates, Empire/ Imperialism, Identities, Law, Movements, Politics, Violence/Conflict

Reading Land and Reform in Pakistan

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A number of activists from the South Asia Solidarity Initiative (SASI) in New York have initiated a reading group on South Asia.  The notes below are the first in a series of commentaries following reading discussions that some members of the reading group hope to post on Kafila.  This is an attempt to broaden the discussions and in the process make it a productive dialogue to understand developments in the region and deepen our solidarity.

Reading Land and Reform in Pakistan

— Svati Shah, Prachi Patankar and Ahilan Kadirgamar

“…any strategy to stem the tide of Taliban-Al Qaida led militancy cannot ignore the issue of land rights…. Any reforms that revalue and formally recognize the local management of common property resources, therefore, will elevate the authority of tribal leaders over religious clerics or TAQ militants.”
Haris Gazdar, ‘The Fourth Round, And Why They Fight On: An Essay on the History of Land and Reform in Pakistan’

Given the escalation of a multifaceted war in Pakistan, and given our own commitment to a peace with justice in South Asia, we have started reading and discussing issues of importance in Pakistan and South Asia more broadly.  This inquiry is informed by the alarming and rapidly changing situation in Pakistan, and by an interest in interrogating the category ‘South Asia’ itself.  While all are agreed that the term ‘South Asia’ is indispensable, we wonder how ‘South Asia’ could be used to describe more than a region or a set of places outlined by shared borders. We wonder how we can move beyond the limitations of finding historical unity in South Asia primarily through the lens of British colonialism?  We wonder how we could describe the political unities and potential solidarities of ‘South Asia’ in this moment?  We find it particularly helpful to approach these questions by seeing common issues in the region relating to labour, land and the role of the state in societies in South Asia.  At the same time, we want to move away from the received notions of South Asia, whether they be the statist conceptions of SAARC, South Asia as seen by the US State Department or, for that matter, as a region defined by area studies.

Continue reading Reading Land and Reform in Pakistan →

Debates, Politics, Right watch

Saffron Blunderland – Can the Saffrons bounce back?

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The BJP would bounce back in the near future much on the lines of a Shav (dead body) metamorphosing into Lord Shiva.
Mohan Bhagwat, RSS Supremo talking to media in Delhi

There are rare moments in the trajectory of a modern democracy where one is witness to the apparent implosion, albeit in a slow motion, of a political party. Today, the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the principal opposition party in India, which was yearning to reach the citadels of power just a few months back, presents such a spectacle. With two consecutive defeats, in the 2004 and 2009 parliamentary elections, followed by the factional bloodletting which is now reaching its pinnacle, the ‘Party With a Difference’, as it used to describe itself,  presents a pale shadow of its earlier self. It is a sign of the tremendous crisis faced by the party that for the first time in its 29-year old history, the top leadership of its parent organisation, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), recently had to intervene to put the house in order. Apart from newly-appointed RSS supremo Mohan Bhagwat, a number of other senior leaders literally landed in the capital to hold consultations with the top brass of the BJP to find a solution to its seemingly intractable problems. The latest news is that BJP President Rajnath Singh and leader of the opposition L K Advani have been ‘persuaded’ to relinquish their posts. A search is on for possible successors.

Continue reading Saffron Blunderland – Can the Saffrons bounce back? →

Culture, Debates, Government

Yashpal Committee and The Future of Ideas:

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The Yash Pal report argues for autonomy in higher education, both from the state and from private commercial interests.

It is only appropriate that the report of the Yash Pal Committee on higher education is being discussed by the Central  Advisory Board On education ( CABE) before being implemented. The Yash Pal Committee makes a very bold appeal for the revival of the state universities and asks the planners to bridge the huge gap that exists between them and the centrally created universities. One can only hope that the state ministers are not daunted by the report’s call to grant real and substantive autonomy to the centres of higher learning. Such autonomy would effectively mean leaving educational matters to  academics and cessation of interference by the ruling party or ideology of the day, not only in matters like selection of vice-chancellors and faculty  but also curriculum and syllabi.
Continue reading Yashpal Committee and The Future of Ideas: →

Debates, Left watch, Politics, Violence/Conflict

बेलगाम हिंसा और मानवाधिकार आंदोलन का ज़मीर

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1 सितंबर:31 अगस्त की रात पुरुलिया की अयोध्या पहाडियों में नौदुली गाँव में तीस हथियारबंद लोग घुसे , गांववालों को घर से न निकलने का हुक्म पुकार कर सुनाया, फिर वे लतिका हेम्ब्रम के घर में घुसे  जहां वह अपने पति गोपाल के साथ सोई थी. राइफल के कुन्दों से  लतिका को पीटते हुए उन्होने धमकी दी  कि उसे उन्होंने एक साल पहले ही सी.पी.एम. छोड देने को कहा था पर उसने अब तक यह किया नहीं और अगर वह अभी भई यह नहीं करती तो वे उसे जान से मार डालेंगे.  लतिका स्त्री है, ग्राम पंचायत की प्रमुख है, पर उसकी उसके पति के साथ जम कर पिटाई की गई. हवा में गोलियां दागते हुए वे  दस किलोमीटर दूर एक दूसरे गांव जितिंग्लहर पहुंचे और देबिप्रसाद के घर पहुंचे. देबीप्रसाद के मां-बाप इनके पैरों पर गिर पडे और अपने बेटे के प्राणों की भीख मंगने लगे. पर उसे ठोकर मार कर जगाया गया और छाती में दो गोलियां मारी गईं. देबी प्रसाद की मौत हो गई. देबीप्रसाद सी.पी.एम. का सदस्य था.
Continue reading बेलगाम हिंसा और मानवाधिकार आंदोलन का ज़मीर →

Bad ideas, Media politics

Search No More

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A new search engine ImHalal.com promises a more spiritually cleansed experience of the internet (“Search Halal, I am Halal!”). With three levels of Haram content defined, the search engine either throws up no results or warns you that a particular search  term is rated at  2 and could  and have potentially haram content before you proceed at your own moral peril

Debates, Government, Media politics, Politics

Jailing Journalists: Pradeep Jeganathan

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This is a guest post by PRADEEP JEGANATHAN from Colombo.

The sentencing of J.S. Tissainayagam is deeply distressing.

While I’m neither a attorney, nor conversant with the details of the evidence presented by the prosecution, nor the text of the judgment delivered — and so can not comment on those areas, it seems clear that this judgment and sentence was only possible given the Prevention of Terrorism Act, of 1979. Two features stand out, given the PTA– the narrow bounds allowed for freedom of expression, on certain themes, and the admissibility of a ‘confession’ as ‘evidence,’ which is not allowable under the penal code. Taken together they make for a curtailing of freedom which is telling. There is an appeal pending, I understand, and there may be a possibility of a pardon, if that process is exhausted to no avail.

Continue reading Jailing Journalists: Pradeep Jeganathan →

DISSENT, DEBATE, CREATE