Debates, Left watch, Politics

Soft Bhadralok Hindutva Under ‘Left’ Garb – VB Rawat

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[We have received this guest piece from Vidya Bhushan Rawat, which looks at another pathology behind the ‘Left’ Front and its entrenchment in West Bengal politics. We are pleased to present this as it underlines a point seldom registered by self-proclaimed ‘Leftists’ and ‘secularists’: the saffron under the red colour of Indian marxism in general but especially of the CPM. The Sachar committee had recently only revealed what many had always suspected with regard to Muslims. With regard to the Dalits, analysts have been at pains to point out that West Bengal ranks far below even UP, in terms of ownership of land by Dalits. So much for its much touted land reforms. While publishing this piece, let us also underline, with the author that when, in the height of the anti-Islam hysteria during NDA rule, LK Advani’s Home Ministry proposed ‘bio-metric identification cards’ – to check the problem of ‘infiltration’ (!?), then too, Buddhadeb was its most enthusiastic supporter. It is actually interesting that when the ruling classes and parties under Indira Gandhi used to see CIA everywhere, the CPM too saw CIA; and then when the NDA started seeing ISI ‘under every bed as it were, CPM followed suit. Curious, would you say? Read on, for the real debate on the ‘Left’ should be here, which is not to say that we agree with every thing said here. – AN]

By Vidya Bhushan Rawat

Nandigram is burning and the Neros of the left front governments are watching it with great patience. Those who are up in arms against any displacement elsewhere remain mute spectators at the butchering of people in this ‘war zone’, as the governor of the state Mr Gopal Krishna Gandhi mentioned in his statement. CPM and its leadership were prompt in condemning the governor for his remark as unconstitutional. If governor’s remark is out of the touch of Bengal’s reality then how can one justify the ‘call’ for ‘recapture’ of land by the top leadership of CPM? Continue reading Soft Bhadralok Hindutva Under ‘Left’ Garb – VB Rawat →

Ecology/Environment

Monkeys and other Primates from Delhi

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As children one was occasionally treated to a Bandar ka Tamasha and the antics of these distant cousins entertained us no end. The monkeys that one saw enacting the roles of a newly married couple, whose conjugal relationship deteriorated within 10 minutes to a life of dreary middle class existence, belonged invariably to the Rhesus (Macaca mulatto) family. We owe a lot to these distant cousins, including the discovery of the RH factor in our own blood. This 1940 discovery has probably saved millions of lives and whether one believes in their being closely related to lord Hanuman or not, we are indebted to these simians.

The joy of watching the Bandar ka Tamasha is now a thing of the past, thanks to the animal rights activists and a certain Gandhi, no longer part of the first family of Indian politics. The use of these monkeys for medical research was also stopped through the active interventions of the same agencies. As a result of these ‘animalitarian concerns’ the ‘poor multinational drug cartels’ are forced to test their new concoctions on black, brown and other coloured populations of higher primates living on the fringes of ‘civilization’ in the third world. I wonder why the animalists do not protests against this violation of human rights. After all humans are also animals, that, however, is another story; we plan to confine ourselves to monkey business as understood by their more evolved cousins.

When, as per the book of creation, God made this world, he created all manner of beasts and provided food for them through the agency of trees, grasses, fruits, nuts and seeds, some animals fed on this bounty while others ate up these lesser animals to develop a fairly organised food chain. The forests were populated with both kinds of animals and there was provision for food close at hand, no one worked for a living in those days and there was no need to travel long distances for work.

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Debates, Left watch

The Silence of the Lambs

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protest nandigram

It has happened many times in the past and it seems destined to happen again – thanks to the silence of the left-liberal intelligentsia and the opportunism of the political class. Soon Nandigram may be forgotten by the political class and CPM will be ‘forgiven’ its misdemeanour – all for the sake of some supposedly ‘larger cause’.

After making some noises for public consumption, the Left Front partners have eventually decided, or so it seems, to make peace with the CPM. What else can they do if they have to remain in power? Remember the NDA allies – including the heroine of today, Mamata Banerjee and her Trinamool Congress, the TDP and others? Did they squeak, when Gujarat burned? AB Bardhan, the CPI General Secretary is of course, knows full well, which side his toast is buttered and is known to be inside his own party a CPM mole (he has been advocating the merger of the CPI into the CPM.) So we can let Bardhan be. But what are the other LF partners in West Bengal thinking? They can choose to sink with the CPM – as and when it happens (like the TMC and TDP sank with the NDA) or they can help the formation of an alternative platform with other smaller parties. The CPM, after all, was not always a big party. It became big in the process of presenting an alternative to decades of Congress rule.

Continue reading The Silence of the Lambs →

Left watch, Movements

Time for Alternative Left Platform in W Bengal

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The CPM mask is off. Beneath it you can see the face of the totalitarian face of the Biman Boses, Benoy Konars and Brinda Karats. Much more is to come in coming days but one thing seems to be becoming clearer with each passing day: it will be wrong now on, to count the CPM as a Left wing force (at least in West Bengal). Unless we are able to shed this misleading idea, we are likely to misread the situation in the state completely.

The situation in Nandigram is developing rapidly. The area has been ‘liberated’ – which is to say brought under CPM control. Nobody, including journalists and political and civil rights activitsts can enter the area. All you have are marauding criminal gangs of AK 47 (and other assorted weapon) wielding ‘cadres’. They roam about with the red flag and have no compunction in attacking the likes of Medha Patkar and Anuradha Talwar, punching them in the face and tearing at their clothes. This is a political style and culture that we have so far only associated with the fascist right. We have seen glimpses of it in the recent past in the state but now it has assumed a generalized form. And while the armed gangs are at work in Nandigram, the state’s police has started targetting protestors in Kolkata.

Continue reading Time for Alternative Left Platform in W Bengal →

Bad ideas, Countryside, Media politics

Enough is Enough: Stop CPM’s Criminal Campaign

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West Bengal governor Gopal Krishna Gandhi, has termed  the ‘recapture’ mission launched  by the CPM to regain its hold over areas of Nandigram  which had slipped out of its control after March 14, 2007, ‘unlawful and unacceptable’ . The ardour of Deepavali has been dampened in the whole state by the events in Nandigram. Several villages in Nandigram are oscillating from the deepest gloom to panic, Gandhi said on the evening of 9 October. He said that he had been receiving phone calls from responsible people in Nandigram   telling him that several huts were ablaze and people were forced to flee their home and take shelter elsewhere.. He said that the most appropriate description of the situation  in Nandigram  came from the Home Secretary who called Nandigram a WAR ZONE. The Governor said that no government or society can allow such war zones to exist without ‘immediate and effective action’.  Gopal Kirshna Gandhi made it clear that he did not trust the political leadership of the state when he directly asked the administration to remove ‘new unauthorized man made blocks’at the four entry points in Nandigram. The governor also expressed his displeasure over the manner in which Medha Patkar and her colleagues were prevented from entering Nandigram when the CPM activists pulled and pushed her, tried to drag her out of her car by punching her on her face.. He said,’The treatment meted to Smt Medha Patkar and other associates of hers last evening was against all norms of civilised political behavior’.

Newspapers have reported the governor carefully listing all the 13 villages which have now been recaptured by the CPM. It has been reported that the statement came hours after the request by a team of the CPM members of the parliament to see that his sympathy and concern are meant for ‘sufferers on both sides’. The CPM state secretariat member Benoy Konar promptly condemned the governor for being partial . He said that he had insulted his post. ‘When our supporters were out of their homes during Durga Puja, his festive spirit was not dampened. He has insulted his post’, Konar added.

Continue reading Enough is Enough: Stop CPM’s Criminal Campaign →

Countryside, Debates, Left watch, Violence/Conflict

Nandigram Burning: Thousands forced to flee, situation worsening

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[We publish below a joint statement on the Nandigram situation, issued by different organizations and individuals, including Medha Patkar, who was manhandled by CPM goons – AN]

* Thousands Forced to Flee from Nandigram, Activists Under Arrest

* Memorandum Submitted to Governor of West Bengal

* Dharna begins in Kolkata, Two Day Protest Fast to Commence Tomorrow

Nandigram is under fire and scare. On the festive days of Kalipuja, the light emerging from the land of Martyrdom is not of the lamps women would light in their ‘badis’ (houses) but from the burning houses, put on fire by cadres entering village after village and occupying land forcibly.

The reports coming from the land and the citizens as members of the Bhumi Ucched Protirodh Committee indicate that  at least 20,000 families are made to flee from their houses in Satangabari, Samsabad, and other villages which are either demolished or looted. We met Taslimadi in Kapasberia with Minudi, who have taken shelter in their relatives’ houses. But the tears in their eyes and choked voices brought to us the pain and anguish for being made destitute and homeless which could not be hidden. While thousands of families and more than a lakh people have shifted either to the schools and other public buildings, or to the open grounds where huge camps are set up by the committee where most of the people are being fed, if not left hungry.

Continue reading Nandigram Burning: Thousands forced to flee, situation worsening →

Government, Politics

Pakistan – Day two of underground life: Farooq Tariq

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[We present below this first hand account from the leader of the Labour Party of Pakistan, on the morrow of the emergency proclaimed by Musharraf, that gives a sense of the situation on the  ground.]

By: Farooq Tariq, General Secretary, Labour Party Pakistan

lawyers protest
Today is my second day in underground life. On 3rd November 2007, when General Musharaf declared an emergency and suspended the constitution, I was in Toba Tek Singh, a city around four hours from Lahore. This was to attend a meeting for the preparations of the Labour Party of Pakistan fourth national conference. The conference was scheduled to be held on 9,10,11 November in the city. Posters for the welcome of the delegates were printed and an invitation card to invite supporters for the open session of the conference was ready as well.

The meeting was nearly ending when I heard the news that emergency is been declared. I decided immediately to travel to ahore. I was in contact with other party comrades on telephone and every one advised me not to go to my home. This was in the background of my three arrests in three months where I spent 23 days in jails and police stations. The Labour Party Pakistan has become a target for the military regime because of active participation in the advocate movement. Several comrades had been arrested during the movement.

Continue reading Pakistan – Day two of underground life: Farooq Tariq →

Left watch, Politics, Violence/Conflict

Nandigram Tribute to the October Revolution – CPM style

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When a people lose the confidence of the government, it is time to dissolve the people and elect a new one. Thus spake Brecht and this is exactly what the Indian heirs of Stalin are doing in West Bengal. On the day of the 90th anniversary of the October Revolution the armed gangs of the CPM launched another bloody attack on the people of Nandigram who had committed the crime of refusing to be its Praja anymore. The Home secretary of the West Bengal who is supposed to know what is happening in the state said that it is a war like situation in Nandigram and the CPM is leading the attack. He was promptly censured by the patriarch Jyoti Babu and the hawk Biman Bose. They castigated him for his ‘lack of understanding’ of the ground situation which, they claimed was based on misinformation. Who has the ‘Right’ information, pray? Who, but the Party! The Party is all pervasive in the state of WB and the Home Secretary was trying to commit the greatest blasphemy questioning it.

How many people have been killed and how many displaced? You would never know the exact figure and extent as the area is under seige and the CPM would never allow ‘outsiders’ to meddle into their affairs. They are sorting it out and the state government of the West Bengal has given them a free run. This is one reason why the party has asked Buddhadeb to wait a little till they have finished their business of cleansing Nandigram of the undesirable elements.

Continue reading Nandigram Tribute to the October Revolution – CPM style →

Government, Politics, Violence/Conflict

Myanmar: India’s Escalating Security Response and Denial of Rights

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Reality has an incurable habit of striking back at rhetoric. The Indian government’s support for the demand to release Aung San Suu Kyi in the UN, and a few statements in favour of democracy in Myanmar, might be effective in hiding the larger foreign policy issues for a while for a few; but it cannot make the foundational structural and political issues disappear in their entirety, or for long, or for the majority. The government, with scant concern for the democratic and peaceful movements of the Myanmar people, continues to compromise at the level of discourse and direct action.

See the actions of our government along the Indo-Myanmar border in Manipur and in other north-eastern states, to prevent the influx of individuals who are fleeing the ongoing crackdown in Myanmar. Take the cases of several other Myanmar nationals who are now at risk of being forcibly returned to Myanmar. After the crackdown on peaceful protests, along with searches, surveillance and harassment of individuals who took part in these protests, numerous Myanmar people have had to go in hiding. They are also fleeing to neighboring India and Thailand. The state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper warned that ‘anyone who is detained for his violation of law must be charged and serve prison terms if he is found guilty.’

Continue reading Myanmar: India’s Escalating Security Response and Denial of Rights →

Culture, Excavation, Metropolis

The Lives And Times Of The Asokan Pillar At The Delhi Ridge

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Tourists are people in a hurry; they want to pack-in a city in two days, even a city that has taken more than a thousand years to grow. Tourists see buildings as structures, frozen in time, standing aloof, without being part of the ebb and flow of life. Travellers on the other hand come searching for the feel and the spirit of the city. Looking for the lesser known the less explored and the uncelebrated, for it is here that one may find untold histories that lie sheltered under each stone that awaits the explorer.

Beginning with the story of a large piece of rock we launch into an exploration, or shall we say recapitulation, of the almost forgotten stories connected with the less touristy structures and ruins that have been witness to the unfolding of the many histories of Delhi. We begin this series with one of the Two Asokan Pillars erected at Delhi. The pillars were erected at Delhi, not by Asoka who commissioned them in 3rd Century B.C, but by a king who ruled Delhi in the 14th century.

Continue reading The Lives And Times Of The Asokan Pillar At The Delhi Ridge →

Culture, Debates, Identities

The Lal Masjid Syndrome

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[We are pleased to present here two pieces by way of reflection on the state of the Muslims in India and Pakistan. These two pieces together constitute an acute and critical reflection on the general crisis of the community: in one instance, as a consequence of the emergence of a clergy in a religion that prided itself on its ‘unmediated’ relation between the believer and the Creator; in the other instance as a result of the social and political discrimination directed at it by ‘secular’ governments in India. Ekram Khawar’s is a voice of internal critique – as ruthless about its own leaders as it is of the supposed secular dispensation of Independent India.]

By Ekram Khawar

There is an eerie silence after Pakistan army’s operation in the Lal Masjid premises; a silence dour and dark, in all immanence. It is got to be since the message, however, delayed is loud and clear, a warning to the zealots not to mess around with the state and not to impose their notion of Islam on others, and with such disdain.

But, in all fairness, it must be said that it was coming to this all along and only the blissfully innocent, if any still left in an otherwise cynical age, would have been surprised by the turn of events. The discerning ones could see it coming all along; in fact, as early as 1949, Chowdhary Mohammad Ali Rudawlwi, not a rabid “secularist” of today’s crusading mould, but a devout Sunni Muslim (married to a Shia woman), a perfectly honourable and practicing, believing Muslim and a “Haji” to boot, while writing to his friend in Pakistan, in 1949, cautioned that the ever increasing influence of the “mullahs” did not bode well for Pakistan. Perhaps, the malaise lay somewhere else; probably in the very ideology and genesis of Pakistan, whether Jinnah intended it or not and irrespective of whether the great visionary poet Iqbal would have approved it or not. In fact there are enough materials on record to suggest that both the poet and the Qaid would have disapproved of the events as they unfolded and determined the broad contours of both the Pakistani establishment and its ruling mindset. I tend to believe that, as far as Pakistan was concerned, the seeds of its “kharabi” were inherently built-in in its creation, to borrow a word from Ghalib. No wonder the votaries christened the new state as “Pakistan” – land of the pure, implicitly in the back drop of an impure world. And almost logically, the mullahs, much to the detriment of the new nation increasingly occupied the centre stage, of course aided and abetted in their efforts at nation building as a necessary justification and as a counter poise to the presence of a predominantly Hindu India masquerading as a secular state. And so a proxy war of jihad, always underlined the onward march of the competitive existence of both the newly liberated states, compounded with a vengeance apparently on an apple of discord called Kashmir.

Continue reading The Lal Masjid Syndrome →

Debates, Identities, Politics

Reflections on a thing called ‘Sachchar’

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By Ekram Khawar

Rubbishing the Left’s belief to the contrary, The Indian Express, in a front page piece by Amitav Ranjan, reports on October 6, 2007, that the UPA Govt. ‘is rushing through a developmental scheme to improve the lot of minority communities’. It goes on to elaborate that “the Centrally-sponsored scheme with an initial grant of Rs. 120 crore in the current fiscal would try to fill identified development deficits through better infrastructure for schools, sanitation, housing, drinking water and electricity supply besides beneficiary oriented schemes for income generating opportunities”. One can not help but thank the Govt for its newfound concern for the Muslims, amidst the growing talk of mid term polls, even though the grotesqueness of the figure flies in your face; the paltry Rs. 120 crore meant for 90 high concentration districts towards attainment of the avowed objectives i.e. roughly Rs. 1.33 crore per district for schools, sanitation, housing, drinking water and electricity supply besides beneficiary oriented schemes for income generating opportunities; all rolled into one extended noisy fart called ‘concern for Muslims’. And that too coming as it does post “Sachchar Report” and in the 60th year of independence.

Continue reading Reflections on a thing called ‘Sachchar’ →

Capitalism, Countryside, Ecology/Environment, Government

Two ‘Nations’ At War: The Struggle Over Forest Rights

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The process towards the implementation of ‘The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006’ is entering its crucial stage. In the present political environment, charged with an electoral context, the government is bound to notify the draft rules. The original co-sponsors – majority of tribal organisations and rights groups, and left and progressive political parties – are in agreement about mobilising support for its implementation. However, similar to the time of declaration and implementation of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), the apathy and the opposition towards these rights and entitlements of the poor, is becoming shrill and shady. Special Economic Zones (SEZs) can be notified in no time in this country, but the millions of tribals and forest dwellers have to wait endlessly for anything that goes in their favour. There is a cost of action and there is a cost of inaction. The coalition government has to decide which is more expensive!

It is ironical that since the time of the discussion and the passing of the Forest Rights Act, conflicts in the forest areas have not subsided, and forced evictions and displacements continue to be a regular occurring. And this is unfolding at a time when after more than two decades of work within the UN system, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was adopted in September 2007, with India speaking in favour of it. The declaration was adopted by a vote of 143 to four with 11 abstentions. The vote was called by Australia, New Zealand and the US. Only Canada joined these three states in voting against it. The declaration recognizes the rights of indigenous people to the land, territories and natural resources that are critical to their way of life. It affirms that the rights of indigenous people are not separate from, or less than, the rights of others; they are an integral and indispensable part of a human rights system, dedicated to the rights of all. The declaration presents the Indian central and state governments a historic opportunity, which they must seize by adopting it, and entering into a new relationship with the tribal people, based on a principled commitment to the protection of their human rights. Through the Forest Rights Act, the government can work in good faith to implement their domestic law, and practice this vitally important, and long overdue, human rights instrument.

Continue reading Two ‘Nations’ At War: The Struggle Over Forest Rights →

Left watch, Politics

West Bengal State Women’s Commission Condemned

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[We are publishing below a statement released by a number of intellectuals and concerned citizens, regarding the openly partisan role played by the West Bengal State Women’s Commission in the Rizwanur Rehman case.]

We are distressed to read the statement of the West Bengal State women’s Commission after its visit to Priyanka Todi whose husband Rizwanur Rahman was found dead on the railway track after he had fixed an appointment with the APDR friends regarding his harassment at the hands of the Kolkata Police who were acting in blatant violation of all legal and civil norms at the behest of Priyanka’s father Ashok Todi . Todi wanted her daughter to walk out of the marriage and had mobilized Kolkata police to terrorize Rizwan and his friend Sadiq who was witness to their marriage. The couple was called to the Lal bazaar Thana and was told by the police that Priyanka should go to her parents and they would ensure that she returned after a week. This was not to happen. She was forced to go her father but all efforts of Rizwan to talk to her after this period failed. Desperate, he contacted the APDR .

One must remember that Sadiq, who was witness to their marriage, was threatened by police . He had to go into hiding. Priyanka had gone to her parents on 8 September. Rizwan wrote a detailed account of his harassments at the hands of the Kolkata Police and gave it to the APDR. On 21 September, he talked to the APDR people and it was decided that they would meet in the afternoon. This meting was also not to take place. He was found dead on the Railway tracks. Prasun Mukherji, the Kolkata police Chief declared immediately without waiting for the customary autopsy report that it was a transparent case of suicide. He blatantly justified the illegal intervention of the police in a perfectly legal marriage between tow adults Priyanka and Rizwan, claiming that it was natural for the father of the girl to get upset over such marriage, as it was a marriage between unequals. After all, Ashok Todi is a man of more the 200 crores and Rizwan was only a Muslim of modest earning!

Continue reading West Bengal State Women’s Commission Condemned →

Capitalism, Debates, Ecology/Environment

The ‘Solidarity Economy’ – Off the Beaten Track

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In the beginning of this year, Ecuador became one more of the South American countries to turn Left. The new Left-wing President, Rafael Correa called, soon thereafter, for a “new socialism of the twenty-first century”. The last few months have witnessed sharp conflcits between the President, backed by a popular struggle the corrupt right-wing oligarchy that pervaded the system. We reproduce below two recent articles, one by Roger Burbach and another, in the nature of a report by Kintto Lucas, which indicate some of the fascinating new directions that Ecuador is set to now move along.

Sometime ago we had posted in Kafila, an interview of Bolivian President Evo Morales, which was remarkable for two things: (1) Morales’ reference that when he met Cuba’s Fidel Castro, the latter told him to follow Hugo Chavez and not him; that is to say, adopt the democratic road to socialist transformation. This is a commitment that many of the new regimes in the South American continent, backed by powerful mass struggles, are now displaying. The Ecuadorean struggle for and the Leftist victory in, the new Constituent Assembly is a further indication of this new direction. The second important point was Morales’ insistence that ‘we’ (the indigenous people) live in an entirely different relationship with ‘Mother Earth’. Thus: “We say the “Mother Earth,” because the earth gives us life, and neither the Mother Earth nor life can be a commodity. So we’re talking about a profound change in the economic models and systems.” Of course, this is something that neither the Indian ruling elites nor their Leftist counterparts can ever understand, drunk as they are on the heady brew of Capital and Consumption – even if that will lead the world to its rapid end. The likes of the CPM leaders – the Buddhadebs and Bimans for example – would in the end like to claim that “see we reached the end before you”, rather than dare to chart out a different path. It takes real courage – and of course the existential perspective of an ‘indigenous’ leader – to say that we want a radical break form this destructive model.

The news from Ecuador is important in both these respects. It is a different vision of ‘socialism’ – not a vision that wants capitalism to first destroy the planet before socialism can begin its work (for what?!) So, the Ecuadorean government now talks of ‘socialism’ as a shared economy and one moreover, that will be based on the protection and preservation of the oil wealth and bio-diversity of the country rather than its sale for global consumption.

ECUADOR: Support Grows for Letting Sleeping Amazon Oil Lie
By Kintto Lucas

QUITO, Aug 23 (IPS) – The innovative offer by the government of Ecuador to refrain from exploiting its largest oil reserve, in exchange for international compensation for nature conservation, is attracting increasing support. While oil prices are soaring, Quito is adopting the civil society initiative calling for the Ishpingo-Tiputini-Tambococha (ITT) oil reserve, the country’s largest, to remain untapped. The ITT reserve is located in Yasuní National Park, one of the most biodiverse areas in the world, in the Amazon region provinces of Pastaza and Napo.

Continue reading The ‘Solidarity Economy’ – Off the Beaten Track →

Left watch, Politics

Class Struggles in West Bengal

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Slavoj Zizek mentions in one of his essays that the precise moment at which the Revolution in Iran against the Shah’s brutal regime began, can be traced back to one incident: The refusal of a lone pedestrian to obey the command of the policeman on a busy street. The moment at which this pedestrian refused to obey the command, the symbolic chain of impenetrability of the order was broken, and it suddenly became clear that commands could be disobeyed. More and more people joined in disobeying the command. Increasingly greater numbers joined in protests against the order. In another context, Louis Althusser would call such a situation ‘overdetermined’ – a situation where a whole range of different conflicts and discontents ‘merge’ or ‘fuse’ into an explosive situation. That is what determines, according to Althusser, a revolutionary or insurrectionary situation.

Something of this kind happened in West Bengal, sometime towards the end of 2006 when Singur erupted into a mass struggle. But the crucial turning point, of course, came with Nandigram. The ‘Nandigram effect’, which could not have been possible without Singur but which took the logic of Singur to an insurrectionary level, made one thing clear: The CPM-police-government-vested interest nexus could be broken; that it was not invincible. Almost within a few weeks of Nandigram, as Vaskar Nandy explained in a talk in Delhi University last April, the Nandigram effect had pervaded the tea gardens ruled by a powerful nexus of vested interests of the CITU, police and the industrialists. The virtually invisible local revolts against this cadre-raj drove away the self-appointed leaders breaking these nexuses irreparably.

Continue reading Class Struggles in West Bengal →

Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Saffron Terror

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Nanded, in Maharashtra, is a town with a significant population of different faiths – Hindu, Muslim, Sikh and Buddhist. Nanded could well have become a new metaphor for secularism as practised in the Subcontinent, but this was not to be. Instead, Nanded has come to represent the emergent danger of a violent new brand of Hindu militancy, with due support from a section of the state machinery. A place that was once witness to the final days of Guru Gobind Singh, Sikhism’s Tenth Guru, has today metamorphosed into an epicentre of violent Hindutva. Indeed, Nanded represents the build-up of the violent fundamentalist Hinduism of the past half-century. The town has been witness to a new spate of acts that can be inarguably dubbed ‘terrorism’.

The inner workings of this new form of Hindutva were on show recently in two, evidently accidental, explosions in Nanded within a span of nine months, in April 2006 and February 2007. These blasts, which killed four people, took place at the houses of activists from the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), Bajrang Dal and Shiv Sena. The arrival of Nanded on India’s ‘terror’ map was followed by media investigations into similar previous incidents, which also showed the involvement of Hindu youth in terrorist actions.

The new element here is the increasing similarity between Hindu militancy and ‘terrorism’ of other hues. Continue reading Saffron Terror →

Movements, Politics, Violence/Conflict

Suspend All Military Support to Myanmar Junta

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yangon demonstrations

There has been a flood of reports of alleged brutal killings, disappearances and arrests as the military in Myanmar stamped out the anti-government protests of the last week. At least 1,000 people have been arrested in Yangon alone, the majority of them monks. Arrests are also reported from towns and cities across the country. This is in addition to at least 150 other persons arrested in August at the onset of the protests. Numerous key figures in the National League for Democracy, the main opposition party, and other activists are among those arrested. However, it remains extremely difficult for anyone to confirm details about who has been arrested, where they are held, why and under what circumstances. This uncertainty is partly as a consequence of restrictions on internet and phone use.

Continue reading Suspend All Military Support to Myanmar Junta →

Debates, Politics, Theory

‘Secularism has become another religion’ – Etienne Balibar

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[French Marxist philosopher, Étienne Balibar was in Delhi recently, where he delivered a series of lectures. A former student of Louis Althusser, Balibar has over the last few decades, worked towards the articulation of a critical Marxism – one that is at once liberated from the shibboleths of old modernist certainties and yet does not give up on the idea of a possible emancipatory project of a world beyond capitalism. Balibar’ later philosophical work has been more and more engaged with the contemporary political problems of France and Europe.

Balibar is critical of hardline French secularists for their xenophobic intolerance of issues concerning French citizens of Arab and African descent. In the 2007 French presidential election, he was among the two hundred intellectuals who expressed support for the candidature of Marie-Ségolène Royal of the Socialist Party. Professor Emeritus of Moral and Political Philosophy at Université de Paris X – Nanterre, and Distinguished Professor of Humanities at the University of California, Irvine, Balibar gave a series of lectures in New Delhi last week. S. Anand of Tehelka joins Nivedita Menon, Reader in Political Science at the University of Delhi, and Aditya Nigam, Fellow at the Centre for Study of Developing Societies, in discussing with Balibar the overlap of racism, Islamophobia and secularism in a global context. The interview is published in the current issue of TEHELKA.]

etiennebalibar

Menon: You have written about the race riots in 2005 in the French banlieues, the suburbs, as a ‘revolt of the excluded’ and have linked it to the contradictions of globalisation. What were the dynamics of these riots?

Balibar: I am surprised these events provoke such curiosity in places as far away as Chicago and New Delhi since I think these riots were extremely banal in the sense that they are a type of urban disorder that has repeatedly taken place all over the world for a long period, owing to similar issues of “difference”. Perhaps the French were exceptional in thinking that the typical effects of the redistribution of populations created by globalisation, involving race and class factors, would not affect France. There’s also been extreme reluctance on the part of French commentators, not only of the Right but also the Left, to use race and racial categories.

Continue reading ‘Secularism has become another religion’ – Etienne Balibar →

Capitalism, Ecology/Environment, Empire/ Imperialism

Interview with Evo Morales

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Democracy Now!

By way of Liberation News Service

[Interview with Bolivian President Evo Morales. Here he talks about some interesting question relating to the new possibilities of democratic transformation, the problems of leadership, and global warming – among other things. Some Excerpts:]

AMY GOODMAN: The Bolivian Supreme Court recently asked the government to start extradition proceedings for the former Bolivian President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, who lives here in the United States in Miami. They also asked for an order for him not to be allowed to go to another country, but to be sent back to Bolivia. What is the former president guilty of and whether he thinks the United States will extradite him.

PRESIDENT EVO MORALES: First of all, the United States cannot, should not receive, protect delinquents from any part of the world. It is unconscionable that the United States, a democratic country, would be protecting international criminals like Posada Carriles. The process has to do with two issues: first of all, human rights, and second of all, for economic damages done to the state. So people who massacre peoples, that violate human rights and do economic damage to countries and their economies have to go to jail. The United States shouldn’t be sitting there waiting for a process to be put into motion, but rather should kick these people out so that they can be submitted to justice.

I hope the United States respects these norms and respects the decision of our Supreme Court. But here, we have an experience. The last military dictator was sent to jail. And since that time, in Bolivia, no member of the military dares to threaten a coup d’etat. Likewise, any democratic government that violates human rights, that massacres people or that does economic damage to the state should also be subject to these sorts of processes, and their leaders should be put in jail, so that they never dare to do it again either.

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Government, Law

The Righteous Anger of Our Hon’ble Lords

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A treat to the eyes and ears this! The screaming headlines in the newspapers today: “Angry SC talks of Prez Rule as DMK shuts TN” (The Times of India). “SCs new anger Benchmark: We can get the state government sacked” (The Indian Express).

Rewind to 1992. 6 December. A bewildered country watched aghast as a mob led by the soon-to-be Deputy Prime Minister, Home Minister and other important personages – including the chief minister of a certain state where an old monument was located, demolished the monument. This was done after the motely crowd of ministers-to-be and chief minister et al gave their commitment to the honourable Supreme Court that they will not demolish the monument. Remember. This was not a peaceful bandh but an act that changed the face of India forever and led to some of the worst carnages in our post-independence history. Were the hon’ble lordships angry? Did they demand the dismissal of the Kalyan Singh government – or threaten it? And did they decide to take any action against the Advanis and Joshis?

Fast forward a decade. Gujarat 2002. February 27-28 onwards – not one day but for months on end…a series of carnages that reduce December 1992 to child’s play. This is not so very long back But did the conscience of the judiciary lead it to demand – or simply threaten – the dismissal of the Narendra Modi government? The fact that the DMK is a strong ally of the UPA government has been invoked this time but at that time, the state government was led not by an ally but the leading party of the ruling NDA coalition.

I hold no brief for the DMK or any other party for that matter but am simply puzzled…and this could be a crime these days. But one word may not be out of place. The honourable judges may ban the written word and jail the Mid Day journalists or anybody else who dares to challenge the undemocratic writ of the courts, but who can jail those thousands and lakhs of spoken words that are being uttered daily about this same matter – undermining the authority of one of the most august institutions of our democracy. Who can jail that mall owner businessman in Vasant Vihar who recently told a friend of mine that he really was not worried about the judiciary because he knew that its judgement in a certain case would go in his favour?

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