Capitalism, Left watch

Medha Patkar on Civil War in Nandigram

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[We received this report by NAPM leader Medha Patkar two days ago. Written sometime before the second round of massacre in Nandigram on 14 March, it will show how the build had been in fact taking place. That the CPM ‘cadre’ had continuously been keeping the situation at boiling point and not allowing political activists and leaders to even enter the area without heavy police protection, is of course evident from this report. Not too forget of course, what Medha Patkar calls the ‘CPM Buttock Show’ that greeted her there.- AN]

Indomitable Struggle is on at Singur & Nandigram

The repressive state and vulgar politics continues to be challenged

Singur has not given up. Nor has Tata started its work. A wall that is being built and is already upto 2 to 3 kms in length and 10 feet in height does not seem to be of Tatas. The Tata officials and employees don’t seem to be present. People in whose name this well known conflict has been raised are not aware of either who is building the wall or where are Tata’s men. The only outsider force that is in and around is still of policemen and women.

Hundreds of the police may be tired of being on the land in the open but they are not timid. They may not have section 144 to support but the State is with them. Even without CPM cadres now entering Singur to harass and pressurize the farmers, bargadars and labourers there, the State’s presence is felt and faced by those whose land is being encroached upon, who are brutally beaten, who are trying to be lured and scared to give away their land.

Continue reading Medha Patkar on Civil War in Nandigram →

Debates, Left watch

Monobina Gupta on Nandigram and the CPM Whitewash

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[As reports started coming in on Wednesday of wanton killings of the local population by a combination of the state’s police forces and that dreaded being called ‘cadre’ in today’s West Bengal, the CPM lie-machine in New Delhi swung into action. Monobina Gupta, a senior journalist who has been covering the Left for almost two decades now, reports on both the press conference and the incidents that brought it forth. Our further information is that two days ago the chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya had called a meeting in Writers’ Building to plan out the offensive. As the report below shows, the Bengali daily, Bartaman had already predicted today’s action almost to the detail – obviously based on information that the CPM finds uncomfortable. We have also been informed that the call went out from the state CPM leadership of “Occupy and Liberate” Nandigram shortly before the cadres swung into action along with the police force. Thirty years of unbroken rule has made the state leadership belief that they can get away with anything. This time they may have miscalculated. It is also worth bearing in mind that faced with feisty women leaders like Medha Patkar and Mamata Banerjee the most disgusting colours of the CPM leadership are coming out. So if Biman Basu had gone on record saying that Mamata is behaving like a spoilt little girl (in Singur), then his comrade-in-arms Benoy Konar had done far better. He announced that women from his party’s women’s wing would “display their buttocks if Medha visited Nandigram”. We will soon be publishing Medha’s recent report after her return from Nandigram where she was actually greeted by a demonstration of buttocks – of about a hundred and fifty little Benoy Konars. Only, the women – even from his party seem to have politely refused. Some hope here – even though the top leadership of the Mahila Samity has been completely silent. Is comrade Brinda Karat listening? – AN]

For the CPM central leadership in Delhi defending police actions in Singur and Nandigram has now become a routine matter. It is left usually to Sitaram Yechury – second in command in the CPM politburo (and Rajya Sabha member) to address the media in Parliament and whitewash the whole incident.

Today was just one more of such press conferences. The CPM politburo member condemned the killings at the same time made it clear that the police had no choice other than to do what they did. “The kiilings are unfortunate. But we condemn such activities that took place even after
the West Bengal state government assured that no land will be acquired without the consent of the people.”

Continue reading Monobina Gupta on Nandigram and the CPM Whitewash →

Media politics

The Relief of Blogistan

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For those of you who read Hindi, there is a feast waiting to be devoured. Over the last couple of years, the world of Hindi blogs has witnessed a mini revolution. The quality of writing, the variety of fare and the freshness of the style has left the world of traditional Hindi letters far behind. This page lists a total of over 300 blogs and it is by no means exhaustive.

Many of these blogs are run by television journalists. Those of us who have ranted endlessly about the degeneration of Hindi TV news would be surprised by this. While TV news seems to have left no space for serious analysis or comment, the world of Hindi blogs is awash with biting pieces about news as well as the production of news. The viewers loss has been the readers’ gain. Continue reading The Relief of Blogistan →

Right watch

2 top cops had faked ‘Modi plot’ killing of ‘LeT man’

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…says the Asian Age.

The interim report submitted to the Supreme Court, a copy of which is with this newspaper, states that top ATS (anti-terrorist squad) officers, including senior IPS officer Rajkumar Pandian, had gone to Hyderabad and spent a couple of days interacting with the local police there. Two fake numberplates starting with the series AP-11 were made in Hyderabad by the Gujarat police. The Gujarat and Andhra police personnel then travelled in private cars with fake numberplates. Sohrabuddin and Kausar Bibi were travelling in a M.J. Travels bus (# KA05 AF5051) from Hyderabad to Sangli on November 23, 2005 The bus was intercepted at Tandola village at around 1.30 am. At least six bus passengers as well as the driver have testified, on the basis of pictures shown to them, that Sohrabuddin and Kausar Bibi were co-travellers and had been picked up by the policemen. All the passengers, however, said that three people were picked up from the bus.

One down, dozens more to go. Every now and then, India’s otherwise inefficient police arrest or ‘encounter’ terrorists of the Lashkar. Who will uncover all their stories, who will remove the curtain from this stage of lies?

Law, Theory

The Judge, he holds that grudge

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He’s gonna call on you.
But he’s badly built
And he walks on stilts,
Watch out he don’t fall on you.”

Bob Dylan.

[Am posting this as an add on to Nivi’s excellent piece on Judicial despotism. It was written at the height of Delhi’s sealing drive, and was first posted in Frontline.]

Lord Krishna stared at Maya Danav – the demon of illusions and the greatest architect on earth- and asked him to design an imperial court that would “excel all those on earth”. Then, according to the Mahabharata, Maya Danav planned out a 90,000 square foot plot of land and so was built Indraprastha – the first mythical city of Delhi and earliest illusion of the “world class city”. Centuries later, Delhi’s most recent attempt at planning has proved to be less poetic to the point of bluntness. In its most recent ruling on 28 April 2006, the Supreme Court observed that the sealing of commercial properties in residential areas must go on, and that “a policy of appeasement” had lead to “systemic failure” of planning in the city.

Continue reading The Judge, he holds that grudge →

Identities, Language

The Visible and The Invisible – Abhay Dube

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Modes of Representation in Hindi Fiction

I must confess at the outset that I was a bit afraid when I begin to look for the literary representations of Ambedkar in Hindi creative writing. I thought that I am in for a business fraught with a kind of ‘political correctness’ not known for its introspective qualities. And, I had sound reasons to think so. In the world of Hindi speakers the impact of Ambedkar and his discourse is being felt lately both as a source of literary imagination as well as a potent force in politics. Therefore, a possibility of a linear narrative for and against the formation of dalit political community can easily have diminishing effect on the power of literary expression. While surfing for evidence, to my pleasant surprise, what I encountered was far more complex world of themes, situations, tropes, images and opinions. Another gratification I enjoyed from the fiction of last ten years, published or otherwise, belongs to the nuances of the inner voice echoed by the restless self of literary artist on the both sides of the fence, dalit and the non-dalit. Going by the traditions of cultural materialism I venture to say that in the dalit/non-dalit interface of Hindi literature, the power structure created by the dalit political practices is being subjected to a stern critique. Instead of providing the comfort zone it always looks for assuring its legitimacy, existing dalit political community finds a virtual battleground full of constant skirmishes on the pages of literature. A dialectic is already there to be seen as emerging. Contrary to the experience of Maharashtra, where a rich legacy of dalit literature never found a commensurate political success, it seems that North Indian shenanigans of dalit political power have of late created cultural conditions that leave the whole process open to the counter-narratives. In fact, I consider it as a classical situation producing the counter-narratives of emancipation suggesting different social possibilities within a discursive terrain of Ambedkar.

Continue reading The Visible and The Invisible – Abhay Dube →

Language

Macaulay’s sissies

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People who speak English fear taking on powerful people.

From a profile of a man who filed a PIL against Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mulayam Singh Yadav’s ‘disproportionate assets’. Here.

Everyday Life, Identities, Violence/Conflict

Mortuary Blues

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Post-Gujarat riot people asked me have you written anything – a poem, an essay, a short story, anything? It is strange. Every time a cataclysmic event takes place, there is pressure on a creative person to respond to it. As if it is proper to respond to a catastrophe. As if it is an obligation if you are creative. As if art must serve a purpose in the end. As if underneath every creative urge there is a political undercurrent. As if there is a subtle politics that must consume every art form in the end. As if every expression of art is a grand statement redeeming a belief. But unfortunately creativity is not subservient to anything. It has its own mysterious, enigmatic, whimsical way of manifesting.

I read about the riots like million others as a news item. I had a vague confusion within, mixed with rage and a sense of injustice. (This does not mean I feel less enraged hearing a non-Muslim’s death. Normally, I don’t need to qualify a statement like the one above but I have heard such retarded inane counter-remarks that I think I need to clarify it.) And in spite of trying hard my pen spluttered nothing. Then seven months later, one August afternoon, as I was rehearsing for a play (George Bernard Shaw’s Arms and The Man – Why that play I wonder?) it all came to me. I do not know how I should categorize this poem. This was neither a response nor a rant. I wasn’t trying to make any statement. I just wrote a poem. And I know Gujarat was on my mind when I wrote this.

Mortuary Blues

Slithering
through her soul
are few uneasy thoughts.
A blob in her throat,
her voice choked,
she stretches her hand,
as if a magic wand
will bring it all back –
the dreamful of sack
bit-by-bit stacked
in afternoons doing nothing.
Her son, perhaps, lies dead here
(She doesn’t even know it!)
amidst the decomposed heap.
She stretches her hand
to reach out for what,
I don’t know.

She may be a Muslim
or a Hindu, who cares
in this urban milieu.
Haven’t we all died
in our own mother’s eyes
so many times, whenever she wished
for a son or a daughter
to hold her if she falters.
But we all had our reasons,
perfectly justified reasons.
It’s no different here;
She only looks for a son
who is not there.

She wades through
her resolve, her stubbornness.
It has acquired
a macabre face now.
She stumbles,
gets up, only to stare
at a charred face.
Maybe he’s her son,
maybe he’s not.
She lost her reason
long before she lost her son.

I stand quietly
with a list in my hand
I don’t know who’s who,
all I have here are few names.
A stink greets us.
My soul silently pleads,
silently pleads to her
to quickly confirm
that this room
does not have her son.

I am just a municipal clerk,
doing an honest work,
diligently counting the dead
to earn my humble bread.
Arrey! This is just a mortuary!
I’ve seen worst crimes
at a spin of a coin –
the crime where one kills
one’s own conscience.
In this age of karseva and jehad,
wonder anyone heard a word called ittehad?

She straightens up, sighs,
looks at me with moist eyes.
Her face though sad
is at peace. She says
does it matter? Does it matter this room
has her son or not?
Even if this room had her son,
it means nothing.
I quickly extend my hand
expecting her to grease it.
See, I’ve been kind enough
to let you in, to let you
search for your son.
She smiles sadly
they took it all away in the riot.
I shrug my shoulders,
Ok! For once I shall be magnanimous!

© Dan Husain
August 26, 2002

Law, Theory

Contempt of Democracy: Time for Judicial Reform

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What would you call an institution that can overturn any policy adopted by democratically accountable governments; whose decisions are final, and cannot be reconsidered in any other forum; and which can throw into prison anybody who criticizes it? What would you call this institution accountable to nobody but itself, which has the sole power to appoint its own members and the sole power to decide if one of its own is guilty of a misdemeanour?

In India you would call it the Judiciary.
Cheered on vociferously by the freedom-loving media and its viewers/readers, the judiciary for about a decade, has been taking over more and more functions of government, until finally on January 11, 2007, the decisive judicial coup d’etat took place. By a judgement delivered on this day, the Supreme Court gave itself the power to strike down any law if it violates fundamental rights, resulting in the violation of the basic features of the Constitution. It is important to remember that constitutionally, no fundamental right is unconstrained, ‘reasonable restrictions’ being necessary to ensure that every citizen can enjoy these rights. Further, no right is beyond interpretation – does ‘right to equality’ entail affirmative action, for instance? There may be contradictions between fundamental rights; say between the right to equality of individual citizens and cultural rights of minorities. What exactly are the features that constitute the ‘basic features of the constitution’?

Continue reading Contempt of Democracy: Time for Judicial Reform →

Ecology/Environment, Left watch

NAPM Report: To Nandigram via Singur

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A Preliminary Report on the Struggle and Violence in Nandigram

[Sometime ago (28 January 2007), CPM general secretary, Prakash Karat, had written in People’s Democracy against ‘the likes of Medha Patkar’ and those whom he called ‘modern day Narodniks’, for opposing the industrialization of West Bengal. The burden of Karat’s song in that piece was that what he called ‘the single-issue crowd’, was unbale to see the big picture – the Totality, as his marxist faith would have it. It is interesting that this point has never been responded to though it continues to be part of marxist understanding for a very long time. It might be worth keeping this in mind while reading the following report. The questions raised by it link up the immediate question of land acquisition with the question of ecological impact of making a chemical hub on the rivers Haldi and Hooghly; the question of livelihoods linked to fisheries with those of a larger development paradigm. Clearly, when the impact of global warming is beginning to be seen right here, this looks certainly like a much more holistic view, in comparison to that which can see nothing but industrialization and capitalism as the only reference point. – AN]

Nandigram has come on to the country’s map within a few months old struggle as also killing and atrocities during last few days of this New Year. The people’s determination not to give away their lands full of paddy, coconut and palm trees, ponds and fisheries for the two SEZs upcoming in Midnapore was expressed through many a demonstration including the Mahasabha on December 8th 2006. The Ganaunnayan Janadhikar Sangram Committee, an alliance of 22 peoples’ organizations including Jamat–e-Ulema–Hind, National Alliance of People’s Movements, Hindu Muslim Friendship and others, was formed in 2004 when 5000 acres of land, mostly of Muslim farmers, was to be acquired for the same Salim Industries in ‘Bhangad’, on the outskirts of Kolkata. The struggle is still on. The same committee, with statewide coverage took up the issue of Nandigram, about three months back, and the struggle began. A peaceful struggle in this region known for the historical contribution to the freedom movement and Tebhaga movement, picked up quite fast and with a clear perspective.

The people’s viewpoint is: ‘No destruction of agriculture based livelihoods and communities is necessary and inevitable for industrialization’; ‘no justification to set up a chemical hub on the banks of two rivers Hugli and Haldi’ and ‘no consent’ to a project undemocratically planned with impending forcible acquisition of 38,873 acres of prime land and habitats on the same’. It has helped convey the strength and unity as also a challenge to the state government of West Bengal and the SEZ approving authorities at the Center.

Continue reading NAPM Report: To Nandigram via Singur →

Capitalism

Mashelkar, The Indian Express and me

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I guess like many in this blog, I have a sadomasochistic relationship to the Indian Express. I hate the neo-liberal campaign strategy of the Express and cannot stand its crass advocacy of a bizarre ‘let the market decide’ logic, but, and this is important – secretly enjoy its city reporting. Its strange coverage on the Mashelkar report falls squarely in the first – neo-liberal advocacy.  A quick recap.

Some days ago activists Chan Park and Achal Prabhala ‘outed’ the report of the Mashelkar committee. Essentially the report gave a thumbs up to the international pharma industry in its recommendations. Not surprising – given the current climate, the power of lobbyists, and rule by ‘expert’ committee. (Though neo-liberal rhetoric targets the state, it works perfectly through it). Anyway Park and Prabhala showed that so eager was the committee to please the international industry that it copied verbatim a part of the submission made by Shamnad Basheer, whose own research had been supported by a consortium of multinational firms. This is what Park and Prabhala write about the Mashlekar innovations:

Continue reading Mashelkar, The Indian Express and me →

Right watch, Violence/Conflict

Powerful Bomb Explosion in Nanded : Milli Gazette

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One person was killed on the spot and another severely injured when a powerful explosion took place in the house of Shivram Manganarikar at Shastri Nagar, Nanded. The explosion is suspected to be caused by the accidental blast of a bomb that was either stored or was being manufactured.According to reports, the explosion took place at around 12:30 on Friday night. Shivram Mangnarikar is a retired school teacher whose house was severely damaged due to the explosion. One youth called Pandurang Bhagwan Anilkandwar, aged 30 years, was killed on the spot. Another youth, Gyaneshwar Manikwar, was severely injured with 70 percent burns. The explosion was so powerful that the shutter of the front-side shop was thrown off to a distance of 40 feet. The windows were burnt and glass cracked. The household belongings were scattered everywhere with blood and flesh. Walls were cracked and the site is in total disarray.

Continue reading Powerful Bomb Explosion in Nanded : Milli Gazette →

Right watch

Golwalkar Guruji : Super Human Or Less Than Human

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He was known as ‘guruji’ (revered teacher). I find that at least in some vernacular papers he is being referred to as ‘shreeguruji’. The addition of shree to his title guruji makes him nearly sacred, an avatar of sorts. Within the Maharashtrian context this has an additional meaning or signification. Mystic gurus are often referred to as ‘shreeguruji’. You can see thus that there has been rather subtle glorification of Golwalkar, the new appellation making him stand a little above the human level.

GPD (March 25, 2006, EPW GPD, An Occasion for RSS)

I
It is said that masses have very short memories. For them it is easy to send today’s icon into oblivion without much hair splitting or it is still easier for them to hail yesterday’s monster as today’s development man.
But do classes or their intellectuals also suffer from similar amnesia? Looking at the important role played by them in the running of the society/state it is expected that they appear different. A recent writeup by one of the think-tanks of the right (Sudhindra Kulkarni, who also happened to be a ‘ghost writer’ for the ex deputy PM and was supposedly responsible for the ‘iron leaders’ speech at Jinnah Mausoleum) in the Sunday Express (11 th Feb 20007) belies this expectation. One could also decipher that it is a deliberate ploy by the writer to obfuscate things. It is equally possible that he is trying to present his wishful thinking as in-depth analysis before the masses.

Continue reading Golwalkar Guruji : Super Human Or Less Than Human →

Media politics

The Indian blogosphere and the Indian media

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Since they didn’t find Bush or bin Laden newsworthy enough to put on their year-end cover, Time magazine decided to name “You” the person of the year. “You” is anyone using Web 2.0 technologies – web platforms that allow for ordinary individuals to be both creators and consumers of media, thus empowering anyone and everyone. The Indian media jumped on this bandwagon, including “You” in a number of their own year-end lists. This could have been an opportunity to look into issues such as the digital divide, Jurassic-era e-governance in the time of Web 2.0, or even what Web 3.0 would entail. But the overarching concern in the mainstream papers and online was that “bloggers can write anything they want without fear of law”. Also ubiquitous were reminders of cases such as that of the social networking site Orkut, which has been getting in trouble for its ‘Dawood Ibrahim fan club’.

Some of this bitterness against new media, especially on news channels, perhaps came from the experience of being at the receiving end of unflattering if not sometimes slanderous comments on a blog called War for News. This blog is almost dead now, as the journalist who runs it is rumoured to have been found out and threatened into a retreat. War for News would pronounce regular judgements on the coverage of events on TV news and make comments about the capabilities of a reporter or the pronunciation of an anchor that were not taken kindly. What was worse, the blog would refuse to censor objectionable anonymous comments on its posts that often had to do with who was sleeping with whom. The blog claimed to be committed to free speech, but it left a bad taste in the mouths of those at the receiving end. Continue reading The Indian blogosphere and the Indian media →

Everyday Life

Spectre of sameness

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I always find it slightly odd that those among us who read and write for newspapers, or for blogs, for that matter, there is such a great identity of lifestyles.

Most of us not only lead similar lives but also live in similar conditions and do similar sort of jobs. I had written some weeks ago about the diversity a hospital waiting room can present. I had found that diversity is so striking in part because of the sameness I encounter when I go to a party in Delhi or Bombay. It is not merely a question of my profession, as a semi-journalist and stage performer that I am likely to meet similar people everywhere.

But even if I go to a place where lawyers predominate or where there are lots of bankers, our interests and pastimes would not be vastly different. We would have read the same books, seen the same films, would holiday in the same places and have more or less the same aspirations.

I have wondered whether my discontent has to do with the confinements of a bourgeois life. Continue reading Spectre of sameness →

Ecology/Environment, Left watch

Nagarik Mancha on West Bengal Land for Nuclear Plant

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[In the current issue (28 January 2007) of the central weekly ‘organ’ of the CPM, People’s Democracy, party general secretary, Prakash Karat takes ‘the modern-day Narodniks who claim to champion the cause of the peasantry’ to task for opposing the historic task of industrialization. Inculded among these ‘modern day narodniks’ are ‘the likes of Medha Patkar’ and many other ‘Left intellectuals and progressive personalities’ apart from the hated naxalites, of course – all of whom have ‘ganged up’ with the Trinamool Congress, BJP and the Congress. Mr Karat is saddened by the this development but nonetheless ends up admonishing these Left intellectuals and asking them to ‘ponder on the question of why they have placed themselves in the company of the virulent anti-Communist gang in West Bengal and CPI(M)-baiters in the big business-run media’.We will reserve a more detailed comment on the series of points – alibis, to be more precise – made by the CPM leader for a later occasion. For the present pardon us for simply asking whether Karat thinks his company – that of the Tatas, the Salim group, and indeed the Ananda Bazar/Telegraph, is that of some ‘pro-communist’ philanthropists? Indeed, the tone and tenor or Mr Karat’s piece is at once pathetic and arrogant. Witness his attempts to argue that West Bengal is caught in a strange predicament and “will have the basic features of a liberalised capitalist economy” and so, “Those who believe that it can be otherwise are only deluding themselves” he admonishes. Well, Mr Karat, it is not everybody else’s problem that the CPM in West Bengal (and indeed in Kerala, if the ADB loan story is anything to go by) has painted itself into a corner.

Be that as it may, many of Karat’s points call for a longer discussion, if not for his sake, at least for that of those who are still hoping to find a way out – and such people are there in his own party – of this delightful corner. For the present, we present without comment, Karat’s definition of ‘Narodniks’ that appears in a note at the end of the article, that will provide enough food for thought, along with Buddhadeb’s letter to Sumit Sarkar and other misled Left intellectuals regarding the ‘end of history’ – without Tatas and the bourgeoisie, that is. He says:

Narodniks in late 19th century Russia believed that with the overthrow of Tsarism, a traditional village based communal system could go towards socialism. Considering capitalism and industrialisation regressive, they idealised the old peasant-village economy. Ultimately they resorted to individual terrorist actions against the Tsar and lost the sympathy of the peasants who were horrified by their actions (emphasis ours).

In the meantime, we present another story on the industrialization saga presented by Nagarik Mancha – AN]

BACKGROUND
Even as the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal was ‘under-consideration’, the Government of India decided to set up five coastal nuclear power projects in the country. A 12-member Site Selection Panel, under the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), visited a number of coastal districts in India during November 2006. The Site Selection Panel is said to have zeroed in on sites in Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and West Bengal. Based on its final report to be submitted to the Atomic Energy Commission, the Government of India will finally decide on the sites. Only after that the Central Government-owned Public Sector Undertaking, Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd (NPCIL), ‘spearheading’ India’s nuclear power programme, will undertake the job.

The NPCIL, the sole nuclear utility implementing authority, has a total of 16 operational plants with a capacity to generate around 3,900 MW, which is about 2.8% of the total electricity generated in the country. Seven more plants with a combined capacity of 3,000 MW are in advanced stages of construction, the first of which is expected to be operational by March 2007.
Continue reading Nagarik Mancha on West Bengal Land for Nuclear Plant →

Bad ideas, Media politics, Theory

A cruel and unusual punishment

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(Or how I came to love the Press)
As I stepped out of B.’s house last night, I pulled my jacket close to ward of the cold and veered vaguely to the right as I looked for my car. I felt in the pocket for the car’s central-locking remote, and on finding it, pressed the un-lock button on the device. I heard my sister’s trusty Wagon-R tick-tock in recognition out on the left. On the left course! I had parked the car on left. I usually parked on the right under the streetlight, but this time my space had been taken. So I had parked on the left. I corrected course and lurched decisively to the left – the source of the sound, and the site of the parked car.

My ear it seems, had picked up the sound – measured it in terms of intensity – and my brain had decoded it and accorded it a positional characteristic. So this car was approximately 20 degrees behind my left ear. I looked – there it was, I walked up to it and drove home.

“ Continue reading A cruel and unusual punishment →

Everyday Life

Patient India

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Other than trains, hospitals are the most secular spaces in contemporary India. This applies as much to upper-end luxury hospi-resorts such as — Apollo and Escorts — as it does to the lowliest nursing home in any corner of the country. However, even as I assert this, a caveat comes to mind — the aftermath of the Gujarat riots, which had hospitals and even doctors sharply divided along communal lines.

In itself, it may or may not be a picture post card communal harmony moment, but if you keep the Gujarat experience in mind, then this little incident certainly substantiates my assertion. Continue reading Patient India →

Debates

Humane slaughter?

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By a coincidence that is entirely explainable, the Arabic word Baqar, meaning cow or ox, gets fudged into the word Bakra, originating from the Sanskrit varkar.

Thus in India, Baqr Id, the festival commemorating Abraham’s sacrifice, quite often becomes Bakr Id. As I noticed this time round, even as Bakri Id, it makes absolute sense of course, since it is goats that are the primary object of sacrificial affection, and mutton is the prized meat anyway.

Through another onomatopoeic twist, in the purabiya region Baqr Id is also known as Barki Id — the big Id. People would sometimes enquire whether this is the big Id or the small Id or whether it is the sewain Id or the meat Id. For youngsters, though the fixating charm of watching animal slaughter is leavened by the disappointing fact that as far as Idee (or tyohari) — the money gift that is customarily doled out to them by seniors — is concerned, they come off much the worse on Baqr Id. Continue reading Humane slaughter? →

Identities, Politics

Touchable Crimes: Gohana Nay Kizzhevanamani

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Investigations by the police or the intelligence officials in highly contested cases have an uncanny ability of looking weird in an unabashed manner.

The recent chargesheet filed by the CBI, which had been asked to look into the attack, and arson, at a Dalit (Valmiki) basti in Gohana, once again vindicates this thesis. According to a newspaper report the chargesheet into the 2005 Gohana riots in Haryana has ‘..revealed that some people in Balmiki Basti had set their houses on fire themselves, allegedly for compensation.” The chargesheet talks of CBI’s observations that ” extensive burning was observed in 19 out of 28 houses. Of these, nine houses were inspected thoroughly and it appeared that in these houses the “simulated arsoning” was carried out, which are yet “to get compensation”. Continue reading Touchable Crimes: Gohana Nay Kizzhevanamani →

Language

Pal do pal ka shayar

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What exactly is the status of Sahir Ludhiyanvi, as a poet and as a film lyricist? A debate currently raging at Kafila pits two radically different views about Sahir against each other.

Against the conventional view, which sees him as a towering icon in the poetic movement of India as also in our cinema, Panini Pothoharvi maintains that Sahir was an ordinary versifier, who cannot even be placed along side Shailendra and Majrooh Sultanpuri, as a film lyricist.

Lest I do some injustice to Mr Panini’s views, I will quote the relevant paragraph in its entirety.

“It must be remembered that Sahir’s reputation rests largely — go around asking the cognescenti (and who care about them, anyway) what they think of Sahir’s poetry and you would know a thing or two you wouldn’t wish to hear in your adolescent exuberance — on his film songs. And I must say that I am not greatly enamoured of his Chin-o-Arab Hamara — the refrain may be catchy but the stanzas simply do not work. Continue reading Pal do pal ka shayar →

DISSENT, DEBATE, CREATE