[sacw] sacw dispatch (12 May 00)

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Web - Dispatch
12 May 2000
________________________________
#1. Lahore Notes, March 2000 [by an Indian Academic]
#2. India: AG Noorani on the THE UP BILL Its Disreputable Ancestry
#3. India: Campaign Alert on Christian Marriage Bill
________________________________

#1.

EPW Commentary April 15-21, 2000

LAHORE NOTES, MARCH 2000

by Satish Saberwal

At the Sahmat Conference in early 1999 I ran into Anil Sethi who teaches
history at Deshbandhu College, Delhi, and who had recently completed a PhD
thesis on the making of religious boundaries in Punjab over the past two or
three centuries. It was more than a decade since we had met last, and we
agreed to meet again. To that meeting came with him Bilal Ahmed, an unusual
journalist from Lahore, who had come for the Sahmat Conference. I told him
of my unsuccessful attempts, since 1967, to visit Lahore. He offerred to
host me in Lahore any time I went there. In the next few months we
maintained contact by e-mail, and he put me on to his friends there.
Mubarak Ali sent me a formal invitation to lecture at his institute.
Getting visa took time, but in February 2000 I had it. We arranged for me
to go in mid-March for what turned out to be an exhilarating week.

I took the famous Bus to Lahore on the morning of March 18. Both Pakistan
and India run two trips a week on this route. I went by the Pakistani bus,
returned by the Indian. Such security! My suitcase was opened for
inspection three-four times each way. A police escort jeep went ahead of
the bus all the way, clearing the traffic in our lane, all cross traffic
held back. Several times it led the bus through red lights! Some weeks ago
there was some stone-throwing at the bus in Indian Punjab; so in Punjab the
escort consisted of two jeeps and a truckful of policemen! It gave me a
sense of what it feels to be a VIP! Refreshments and lunch came at stops
on the way. Indian and Pakistani currency can be exchanged at Attari in
India, Wagah in Pakistan, or any number of money changers in Lahore. Indian
currency fetches a premium of 15-20 per cent.

My friends in Lahore met me at the terminus there, and Bilal took me to
his home. For a week he hosted me most graciously, and every day drove me
around everywhere I had to go. Lahore is a lovely city, and its major roads
have faster traffic than nearly any major city in India; Karachi, I was
told, is even better. Quite a few tongas, along with lots of two-, three-,
and four-wheelers of all shapes and sizes, with plenty of new generation
large cars. My friends regretted my lack of interest either in Lahore=92s
historic sights or in the variety of the city=92s famous foods. New public
buildings have high architectural quality, and I had occasion also to
explore an architect=92s own modest but imaginatively designed home. I was
able to get a map of Lahore only towards the end of my stay, so my
orientation to the city remained vague throughout.

I had numerous no-holds-barred conversations in a variety of settings
which included:

=96 at my host=92s home with some of his numerous friends,
=96 an evening at Pak Tea House, off the Mall, attending a meeting of
>Hulk-e-arbab-e-zuke, the Circle for Critical Aesthetic Appreciation,
=96 a visit to the architect=92s home: there I talked to his mother, who ha=
d
come from Amritsar in 1947, his journalist brother who has been doing
research on the jehadis, a sister who has read English literature at
university, another brother who works in a bank, and this brother=92s wife
who is a journalist and will be studying in London later in the year;
=96 meeting several teachers in the faculty room of Forman Christian Colleg=
e,
=96 meeting with a group working in Aurat Foundation, a large, ambitious NG=
O
active especially on issues concerning women,
=96 a group at Mubarak Ali=92s home which included Khaled Ahmad, editor of =
The
=46riday Times, a highly respected independent newspaper,
=96 a visit to Punjab University which included a long informal discussion
with students in the department of philosophy,
=96 a wide-ranging interview with an Urdu newspaper, and
=96 a public lecture on =91What has happened to the caste system in India=
=92 at
the National College of Arts, arranged by Nadeem Omar Tarar, who teaches
anthropology and critical studies there.

Belying the tense atmospherics that dominate the media in the two
countries when referring to each other, my own experiences could not have
been more pleasant. A participant in the gathering at Pak Tea House
proposed that we exchange a Pakistani Rs 10 note with an Indian Rs 10 note
=96 as a remembrance. Later that evening, the man who connected me to Delhi
on STD proposed that we exchange the Indian ballpen in my hands with the
Pakistani pen in his hands =96 as a remembrance! I was able to indulge mysel=
f
in a mixture of Punjabi, Hindustani, and English without having to watch my
words, and everywhere I met a great deal of warmth =96 and insatiable
curiosity.

An earlier version of these notes has been read by several friends in
Pakistan, and also by a wide circle in India, including research biologists
and retired army generals, and aroused much interest. Hence the decision to
put them in print.

Contemporary Lahore/Pakistan

Indian TV channels are easily available in Lahore =96 and viewed extensively=
=2E

I spent an evening at the Hulk-e-arbab-e-zuke gathering, above Pak Tea
House. This is a 61 years old, wholly independent, association. That
evening the fare covered: a 15-20 minutes=92 essay on kathak as a dance form
and its emergence in history. There was much debate on the presentation =96
though dancing is seen in Pakistan as un-Islamic, and therefore cannot be
presented at government-owned auditoria; there is no state patronage for
dancing. This ban was imposed under president Ziaul Haq =96 and no one has
mustered the courage to revoke it though it is seen as being silly. (The
objection would be to drawing attention to women=92s bodies; a man may dance
=96 and one participant was introduced as having learned kathak from a
teacher in Delhi.) The evening included presentations of a ghazal and two
poems too =96 and wide-ranging comments from the audience; some were very
hostile, ad hominim.

While I was too ignorant to respond to their request to appraise them
about the art scene in India, I spoke of the need to remove the iron
curtain between our countries =96 which leaves us all impoverished,
culturally.

Women: Women in Lahore seemed to use the burqa, or cover their heads, only
marginally more than in Delhi. However, their participation in public
activities may be somewhat less:

=96 at the gathering in Bilal=92s home, among about ten of his friends, onl=
y
one was a (young) woman; she participated in the discussion confidently.
=96 the literary gathering above Pak Tea House had at least two women (in a
gathering of more than 50) =96 and they were obviously used to public
participation. One, visiting Lahore from Rawalpindi, was invited to present
her poems.
=96 men were a large majority of the staff whom I met at Aurat Foundation,
which is oriented towards working with women;
=96 at my lecture, the only women were Mubarak Ali=92s wife and two daughte=
rs
(one of them teaches at the Law College in Lahore, the other studies
history at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi).
=96 the Punjab University MA Philosophy class that I met had very few boys =
=96
mostly young women students.

Pakistani History

A student in the department of philosophy at Punjab University asked me:
"We feel that there is a good deal common between India and Pakistan. Why
then did we have the partition?" I gave him a long answer which took quick
looks at the nature of the caste system and how Muslims had fitted into it,
the psychological effects of Saltanat and Mughal conquests, and the
processes of political competition in the 19th and 20th centuries. I
realise now that this explanation, drawing equally on the evidence of
sociology and history, is not widely known; and therefore one may work up a
booklet on this kind of social history, covering a thousand years. My host
in Lahore offered to translate it into Urdu.

Why the intense focus on Kashmir? Pakistan=92s intense preoccupation with
Kashmir today is palpable. In conversations with friends there I suggested
that if Kashmir occupies 50 per cent of public attention in Pakistan, it
gets only about 5 per cent in India. Wherever my discussions began, a
majority of them tended to drift towards Kashmir. In trying to figure out
why this was so, I came up with the following:

The tension along the pre-47 Hindu-Muslim interface, which had forced the
partition, flowed into the India-Pakistan interface subsequently. The
course taken by the integration of princely states left Pakistan feeling
cheated: what defensible principle, apart from India=92s superior force, can
there be for Junagarh, Hyderabad, and Kashmir, all three, to have been
incorporated in India? The war in 1967 ended in a draw; but Pakistan has
maintained a strong feeling that the split in 1971 was because of India=92s
hostile intervention; hence the obsessive desire for revenge. [I was told
that Zulfikar Bhutto had ordered an enquiry into the conduct of Pakistani
army in the eastern wing during 1971. The report would have led several
generals to the gallows; it was suppressed. No one was punished.]

Meanwhile, a pan-Islamic wave has long been building up in reaction to the
perceived humiliation of Islam by the west, on numerous fronts over the
past century and more. In Afghanistan, the United States weighed in =91for=
=92
Islamic Afghanistan, against the Soviet-sponsored regime, harnessing
religious passions for the cold war against the Soviets. Jehadis were
lionised. Islamist passions have remained active in the post-Soviet phase,
augmenting now the anti-India passions =96 with a fixation on Kashmir.
=46ighting against the Indian (Hindu) oppression of Kashmiris (Muslims) is
widely seen as a holy cause.

Pakistani debate on Kashmir: Despite the high feelings on Kashmir, there
are certainly voices in Pakistan recognising contrary considerations which
have to be taken into account:

(A) Some people note that the force of the demand for self-determination
in (Indian) Kashmir is weakened when (1) the Constitution of Azad Kashmir
prohibits advocacy of the =91Independent Kashmir=92 option, though this is
canvassed in Pakistan publicly [it leaves Indian authorities cold]; and (2)
the career of democracy in Pakistan has been so unsteady.

(B) Pakistan=92s economic limitations can scarcely be slurred over. I heard
that 6 per cent of Pakistan=92s GDP goes into defence, against India=92s 3 p=
er
cent (after the leap in the 2000 budget =96 which left Pakistani observers
gasping); and, indeed, so large a part of Pakistan=92s revenues goes into
defence and debt servicing that little is left over for investment.
Economic =91growth=92 is said to be at zero level, though the markets are fu=
ll
of consumption goods. It is being suggested that rebuilding the economy
should have first priority now; challenging India may have to wait until
times are more propitious.

(C) International consensus favours freezing the established line of
control as an international border, and is equally opposed to changing
borders through the use of force in any form.

Emergence of jehadi groups: The above debate, however, is muted, for the
national mood is set by the jehadi groups. What Indira Gandhi did to Akali
Dal, which led to Bhindranwale, president Ziaul Haq did to the small
religious parties in Pakistan. These parties lost ground; but in a parallel
process, the breakaway militant groups have since been setting their own
agendas.

The leader of one of the religious parties triggered pressure on Shias and
Ahmadiyas. Shias being there in strength responded belligerantly. This
belligerance is repeated especially during Moharram processions =96 when the
administration, afraid of disorders, accepts every demand by the
processionists, however unreasonable. For the administration, that is an
ordeal.

The jehadis=92 concerns dominate the media in Pakistan. I found widespread
criticism in private; publicly, they have too many weapons for anyone to
question them. To contribute to their cause is widely seen as an act of
piety. These men are putting their lives on the line in the casue of Islam.
The least that the other faithful can do is to aid their cause materially.
This takes several forms:

=96 at Eid, it is customary to donate the skin of the goat or sheep
sacrificed, currently worth Rs 400 to 500 a piece, to a (religious)
charity. A large fraction of these skins these days comes to jehadi camps.
=96 the jehadis have put collection boxes in numerous shops all over Lahore=
=2E
I saw one in a bookshop. I heard someone ask the man at the counter why he
allows it to be kept in the shop. The man said the penalties for refusal
could be unacceptably high.

The relations between the jehadis and the armed forces are close, but it
is not a simple chain of command. Ultimately, if any agency in Pakistan can
control them, it would be the army =96 and the army would have a tough fight
on its hands, a much larger version of Operation Bluestar.

The lunatic fringes: While my Pakistani friends commented apprehensively
on Vajpayee=92s talk of Pakistan having to quit Azad Kashmir, and Advani=92s
chatter about undoing the partition, they reported too their own jehadis
speaking of hoisting their flag on the Red Fort in Delhi.

Books

Apart from the shop where I got some books on =91Pakistan Studies=92 for my
neighbour who wanted these for her students to content-analyse, the Book
Review Delhi had asked me to scout Lahore for books to be reviewed in their
forthcoming Pakistan supplement, and this took me to two publishers:
=46iction House, and Oxford University Press.

Fiction House publishes largely in Urdu and some in English. Its 1999 list
included 48 new titles, and some reprints. Fiction and poetry are
important, but also history, in both languages, and much else. Its standard
print run is 600, and the list price is four times the cost (Delhi=92s major
publishers use a factor of 5 or 6). Apart from the one shop, it markets
through the book trade. Its strength lies principally in reaching the
individual buyer =96 not institutional libraries.

In contrast to the modest location of Fiction House =96 it took some
searching by my host to locate it =96 Oxford University Press in Lahore is
up-market, in its location, in production values, and in prices. Samina
Choonara, herself well regarded as a poet (I presume in Urdu) and as
professional publisher, heads the Lahore operation. She told us that the
present government has directed them to import from India =96 even from OUP
India =96 only books on science and on Islam. Books on Islam from non-OUP
publishers in India too were displayed on their shelves.

The enormous bookshop, Vanguard Books, on the Mall, may well be the most
substantial bookshop in this sub-continent. I have seen nothing else quite
like it. It is owned by the gutsy Najam Sethi who outraged the Pakistani
establishment by criticising Pakistan severely in a lecture in Delhi last
year. He owns too The Friday Times, a liberal (I think weekly) newspaper. I
had the pleasure of meeting The Friday Times editor, Khaled Ahmad, at
dinner at Mubarak Ali=92s home. The paper and its owner as well as editor
have running problems with the Pakistani establishment.

Ideas

It should be obvious by now that I encountered in Lahore a great deal of
very active, friendly curiosity about India. Part of their difficulty, I
think, is this: they get fleeting impressions about India on TV channels,
both Pakistani and Indian, and in other media, now including the internet;
but they have not built the kind of scholarly, or even informed,
interpretative, journalistic, resources that would locate those fleeting
impressions for them into frameworks for understanding in much depth. The
difficulty is not merely with India; there has been a more general
impoverishment of the mind =96 and of collective vision.

Conversations turned repeatedly towards the BJP-Hindutva tendencies. Why
has BJP grown so speedily? How far will the Hindutva pressure go? I pointed
out (1) that political mobilisation in terms of caste, language/ region,
and religious symbols has turned out to be cost-effective; but since the
system is effectively open, we have a staggering multiplicity of players
competing with BJP, who know how to give it a run for its money; and (2)
the widespread resistance, in parliament and on the streets, when the
saffron brigade tries to cross certain limits.

My friends recognised, wistfully, the strength of the civil society in
India. After the Babri demolition, they had noticed that public
demonstrations had been widespread in India. Immediately after a Jain
temple, a well known landmark in Lahore, had been demolished in
retaliation, razed by government bulldozers. The event elicited no public
protests. The Indian culture of public protests has built both on the
Gandhian legacy and on the Left=92s predeliction for the politics of the
street. Its conspicuous absence in Pakistan persuaded me that we have here
something to cherish.

I had a feeling that many Pakistanis have recently come to be persuaded
that Indian society and polity have certain strengths which they had not
previously suspected. I was often asked what accounts for that strength. I
drew on a paper, on the Indian Constitution, which Granville Austin had
presented at a conference in Delhi in late-January 2000. There he had
spoken of its seamless web, woven out of democracy, country=92s integrity,
and the need for a social transformation, and how these principles had held
course, despite all the buffeting through the past five decades.

The foregoing came up during a long conversation with Asif Sultan, who
writes for an Urdu newspaper in Lahore. Sultan asked me, too, what the
threat from the west portends for us. I pointed out that the west=92s
pressure today arises in good part from the intellectual power of their
general concepts =96 especially in science and technology =96 not from their
arsenal. I mentioned my own agenda: to try to grasp the principal processes
in European history so we may see the key linkages there =96 and then
consider what we need to do. Otherwise we would be easy targets for
McDonaldisation.

One feeling that remained at the end of the day =96 or the week =96 was the
relative thinness of the idea of the =91renouncer=92 in Pakistani public lif=
e.
A significant stream in the voluntary action sector of Indian society draws
inspiration from Gandhi=92s example; but there are no Pakistani equivalents
of Baba Amte, Anna Hazare, Medha Patkar, Aruna and Bunker Roy, or Mihir
Shah. Gandhi re-oriented the idea of the sadhu, so that one forsakes
personal aggrandisement while remaining committed to ambitious public
purposes. In India, the Amtes, the Hazares, the Patkars, the Roys, and the
Shahs provide public counter-weights to the Laloo Yadavs, the Bal
Thackerays, and the Jayalalithas. Pakistan has yet to create this category
of public counter-weights.

The single most interesting idea I heard during my week in Lahore came
>from Khaled Ahmad, editor of The Friday Times: the vision of a
confederation of south Asian states whose constituent units would be the
various states of India =96 entering the confederation individually rather
than as one India =96 the provinces of Pakistan, and no-doubt Bangladesh too=
=2E
It seemed to me to be an eminently sensible vision, say for the year 2050.
If Europe could move towards political integration 50 years after a world
war, why can we in south Asia not do better? The future is always open, and
I think the next few years are going to be an exciting time in our part of
the world.
________

#2.

The Statesmen
12 May 2000
Editorial and Perspective

THE UP BILL Its Disreputable Ancestry

By AG NOORANI

THE Uttar Pradesh Regu-lation of Public Religious Buildings and Places
Bill 2000, as passed by the state legislature is a scandalous piece of
legislation which bears on its person the tell-tale traces of two
disreputable an-cestors =97 the Rajasthan Reli-gious Buildings and Places
Act, 1954 and the Madhya Pradesh Sarvajanik Dharmik Bhawan Tatha Stan
Viniyaman Adhiniyam, 1984.
The Governor of Uttar Pradesh, Suraj Bhan, has reserved the Bill for the
consideration of the President on the ground that it conflicts with four
central laws. It provides, briefly, that hereafter no "building" or "place"
shall be used as, or for the construction of, a "public religious building"
or "public religious place" except under a permit granted under this law
(Clause 3). These expressions are very widely defined. Both, substantively
and procedurally, the Bill, if enacted into law by the grant of assent,
would be unconstitutional.
BUILDING
The word "building" is defined to include any structure or enclosure,
rooted or not and includes verandahs, a tent "or other like portable or
temporary structure". The expression "public religious building" means a
building "used or intended to be used or dedicated for being used,
generally by any religious denomination or section thereof as of right for
performing religious worship or for carrying on any activity pertaining to
the matter of religion or for the purpose of religious instructions or
offering prayers ... or performance of any religious rites".
Thus, if a man were to use his verandah or his garden for holding classes
for imparting religious instruction to children in the neighbourhood or for
discussing religious issues he would need prior permission. One can think
of several such instances. This is a brazen violation of two of the most
cherished fundamental rights; namely, the right to freedom of speech and
expression (Article 19(1)(a) and to freedom of religion. (Articles 25 and
26).
Substantively objectionable, procedurally the Bill is archaic to a
degree. Applications for the user or the construction will be made to the
district magistrate (Clause 4). He will make "such inquiry as he may deem
necessary". There is no provision for a hearing to the applicant. He may
grant the application conditionally or with such conditions "as he may
consider necessary" or refuse it altogether.
He is directed by the proviso to clause 5 to refuse permission in three
cases. Refusal of permission if the building would affect the rights of
other religious groups or if use is forbidden by any other law or defeats
its purpose might seem, at first blush, to be unexceptionable. But, surely,
both contingencies are well taken care of by existing laws. They can be
enforced by the state. The "other" religious denomination whose right
"freely to profess and practice religion or manage its own affairs in the
matter of religion" would be affected by the proposed new "public religious
building" can move the court for an injunction.
Both these contingencies, mentioned in sub-clauses (b) and (c) of the
proviso to clause 5, are superfluous. It is the first condition which
really matters. It gives the DM power to refuse =97 if he "is satisfied that
it is necessary to do so (refuse) in the interest of public order, morality
and health".
These three criteria govern the exercise of the fundamental right
embodied in Article 25: "freedom of conscience and the right freely to
profess, practise, and propagate religion". It is preposterous to suggest
that these would be attracted by allowing one's property to be used for
religious worship or instruction. Article 26 says that "subject to public
order, morality and health, every religious denomination or any section
thereof shall have the right:- (a) to establish and maintain institutions
for religious and charitable purposes; (b) to manage its own affairs in
matters of religion; (c) to own and acquire moveable and immovable property
and (d) to administer such property in accordance with law". These rights
are inter-related. Insti-tutions need premises and funds.
RIGHTS
However, while the proviso to clause 5 reckons with Article 26 in the
context of refusal of permission to the applicant on the ground that these
rights of the other community would be affected for the worse, there is no
directive in the Bill enjoining the DM to respect these very rights of the
applicant while considering his application. The intention is plain. It is
to confer on the DM a wide discretion for refusing the permit.
Substantively, this is violative of Articles 19, 25 and 26. Worse, it is
colourable.
As Justice Matthew of the US Supreme Court said: "Though the law itself
be fair on its face and impartial in appearance, yet, if it is applied and
administered by a public authority with an evil eye and an unequal hand, so
as to make unjust and illegal discriminations between persons in similar
circumstances, material to their rights, the denial of equal justice is
still within the prohibition of the Constitution."
The manner in which the Bill was rushed through, the clime and context in
which it was drawn up and the very language of clause 5, with its
conferment of arbitrary power on DMs, reek of a clear intent to
discriminate. The procedure it establishes suffices to establish its
unconstitutionality. Appeal from the DM=92s order lies only to another
executive authority =97 the commissioner. He is directed to hear, both, the
applicant and his own employers =97 "the state". Clause 8 completes the
farcical process by declaring that an "order made under this Act by the DM
or on appeal by the Commissioner shall be final and shall not be called in
question in any civil court". Let alone statutes, even constitutional
amendments have been struck down as invalid by the Supreme Court because
they barred judicial review. Other drastic provisions follow in their train
=97 power to remove unauthorised constructions and the like.
LEGISLATION
This is not a piece of municipal legislation. Even the benighted Shiv
Sena-BJP coalition in Maharashtra did not sponsor amendments on these lines
either in the Bombay Municipal Corporation Act or the Maharashtra Municipal
Councils, Nagar Panchayats and Industrial Townships Act. The onus is never
on those who wish to use their own property as public religious buildings
to establish their bona fides and seek the approval of the state. It is
always open to the state to enforce the law if the building or its use
violates the law. There are standard municipal laws and local police Acts
governing such cases. A central statute, the Religious Institu-tions
(Prevention of Misuse) Act, 1988, takes care of the problem.
Every single objectionable feature of the UP Bill has an ancestor in the
Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh Acts =97 the obnoxious basic principle of the
state=92s prior approval; the defective definition clause; application to an
executive officer and appeal to the commissioner revenue (MP Act) or to the
Revenue Appellate Autho-rity (Rajasthan Act).
The Government of India would do well to advise the President to refuse
assent to the UP Bill and, thus, to draw attention to the obnoxious Acts in
Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. Both are patently unconstitutional. So, would
be the UP Bill =97 if the President accords his assent to it.

_________

#3.

Women's Centre, 104B Sunrise Apts; Nehru Road,
Vakola, Santacruz
(E), Mumbai - 400 055, India
tel: 6140403

CAMPAIGN ALERT ON CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE BILL

Women's Centre, Bombay
2nd May, 2000
As an organization that has involved itself for more than a decade in
the call for pro-women reforms in the personal laws in India, with
involvement of the communities concerned, the Women's Centre, Bombay,
condemns the move of the Law Ministry to arbitrarily add communally
inspired amendments to the Christian marriage Bill.

Both women's liberation organizations and Christian women's groups from
all denominations have been seeking changes in the Christian personal law
for well over a decade. While there have been objections and doubts from
religious leaders, even they have agreed to sweeping changes and a broad
consensus had been evolved. But the goal of reform was first of all to
give greater justice to Christian women within marriage, in the family
and in the community. This it seems, does not suit the Law ministry.

Christian personal law in India which was introduced in 1872 by the
British needs a lot of changes. However, the section on who can marry
under this law is not one of them. In fact, this is the only personal law
in India that allows a marriage to a member of another religion to be
solemnised without conversion. It is surprising therefore that this
liberal section is precisely what the Law Minister Mr. Ram Jethmalani has
sought to remove. We can think of only one possible explanation for this
move-that this section does not fit in with the recent propaganda by
certain groups about conspiracies of conversions.

Another reported amendment seeks to penalize Christian priests if the
marriage is not conducted within 30 days. The purpose of this addition is
beyond comprehension, especially when read with the previous one. Is this
supposed to empower the laity? Has the laity proposed it or did the Law
minister propose it?

These questions make us suspect that the intention behind the whole
exercise might also be to draw forth objections to the four bills so that
they do not after all have to be moved in Parliament or voted on. That it
might well be the clever creation of an excuse to prevent the Christian
Adoption Bill from ever being moved at all. We would expect nothing less
from Mr. Ram Jethmalani who has always been against women's rights, even
as he championed human rights; who as one of the best known criminal
lawyers in the country, instead of finding ways of improving collection
of evidence in cases of dowry-deaths and wife-murders, was famous for
evolving ways of establishing 'reasonable doubt' to set wife murderers
free; who thinks that section 498A is a violation of married men's
fundamental rights and has nothing positive to say about countering the
rampant attempts at the eradication of women going on in this country.

We demand that the Law minister withdraw his amendments immediately and
allow the four bills on Christian personal law to be moved in Parliament
unamended.

Write immediately to:

1. The President of India, Shri K.R. Narayanan Rashtrapati Bhawan New
Delhi-110 004 Fax: 91-11-3017290

2. The Prime Minister of India, Shri Atal Behari Bajpayee 7, Safdurjung
Road New Delhi-110 011

3. The Law Minister, Shri Ram Jethmalani

5. The Law Commission

6. The Leader of the Opposition

7. The National Commission of Women 4, Deendayal Upadhyaya Marg New
Delhi-110 002

>
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