[sacw] SACW | 24 Dec. 02
Harsh Kapoor
aiindex@mnet.fr
Tue, 24 Dec 2002 01:57:28 +0100
South Asia Citizens Wire | 24 December 2002
__________________________
#1. Pakistan / Bangladesh: Victims of history (Dr Moonis Ahmar)
#2. Bangladesh: Release Shahriar Kabir, Muntassir Mamoon and their
colleagues... (Civil Society SAARC)
#3. India: Identity politics (Shashi Tharoor)
#4. India: Lighting the fuse of hatred (Sidharth Bhatia)
#5. India: Gujarat: A call for Kristallnacht? (Angana Chatterji)
#6. India: Gujarat Results: Call Ohio (Dilip D'Souza)
#7. India: Never a Straight Answer (Mukul Dube)
#8. India: Buddhism, Bhakti and the VHP - I, II (Gail Omvedt)
#9. India: Updates on the Upcoming Conference For Communal Amity in
Bababudan Giri
__________________________
#1.
The News International (
24 December 2002
Op-ed.
Victims of history
Dr Moonis Ahmar
When December 16 comes every year a deep sense of grief and sorrow
grips some people of Pakistan. On that day, Jinnah's Pakistan was
disintegrated as a result of a shameful process of violence and
bloodshed. The legacy of 1971 still looms large both in Bangladesh
and Pakistan because still there are millions of people who had
suffered heavily on account of that great tragedy. [...].
http://www.jang.com.pk/thenews/dec2002-daily/24-12-2002/oped/o4.htm
_____
#2.
South Asian People's Union against Fundamentalism and Communalism
(Popularly Known as Civil Society SAARC)
Dr. U.V. Sambhu Prasad
Principal coordinator
Rakshiter More, Boral
Calcutta-743505
Tel: 91-033-24354551
Email: djf@c...
Press release (and also to the People of Bangladesh)
Why are Zias, Nazis and Idi Amins Afraid of Journalists and Intellectuals?
Release Shahriar Kabir, Muntassir Mamoon and their colleagues
immediately and render unconditional apology
In the developed world, one of the most respected and influential
persons are usually people from Media and the intellectual elite.
They are toasted by Presidents and their opinions sough even on very
serious and sensitive aspects of Nation' policy. Yet to day we see in
Bangladesh, the journalists are so feared by the State that they have
to be picked up at the dead on the night and moved randomly from
place to place to keep them out of reach of people or courts of
Justice. The fright is even clearer when they release two journalists
from the west who started it all. For after all, the fear of the
developed world supersedes their so called justice against anti-
national reporting Yet their supposed associates are not even
administer the justice, the courts have ordered, like division in
jail from the hard core criminals and medical treatment. The shifting
of Both Mr. Shahriar Kabir and Prof. Muntassir Mamoon to places all
over the country without prior information to their family or their
lawyers clearly shows that police and military which backs the
present regime has no regard for rule of law. They know that if true
justice is to prevail in Bangladesh most of them might face the
gravest of grave charges. I, with due respect pity the Honorable
judges who cannot make their orders implimentable. I hope they would
stand up in these dark hours of their country and take sue motto
action on the government.
In India we faced those dark days during 1970s When State of
Emergency was declared, but got over it soon. The Civil society had
the courage to throw away the then Government. India could do it
because it was a multi ethnic and multi religious country. The day it
looses this feature, it too world deteriorates to the Present State
of Bangladesh. What strikes a very disconcerting note is that,
Bangladesh, which fought against tyranny of Pakistan, has lost all
the values of its former struggle. The white Babus, then the bearded
babus and now the local babus. I ask of all the Bangladeshis this
question- is this why you fought with Pakistan in 1971 for? Have the
people left with no shame to see two of the most vocal Bangladeshi
Patriots tortured and humiliated? The Union condemns in no uncertain
terms the barbarity of the present Government in dealing with some of
its finest citizens. Let it be known that South Asian people will
look down upon the people of Bangladesh if they fail to raise their
voice in protest against these atrocities none different from those
that took place just before the surrender of Pakistan in 1971. I
request the Moulvis, the custodians of Islam, which essentially means
peace to stop praying till and start a movement for justice. If all
Mighty Allah is to appear today, I am certain will say the same
thing. 'Down with evil regimes, who use my name and defame me'.
The situation is Bangladesh can be best described in the
first part of famous words of .B. Yates from his poem The Second
Coming
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold
Mere anarchy is based upon the world,
The Blood-dimmed tine is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of the innocence is drowned;
The Best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
This what happens to a country the launches 'Operation Clean Heart'
with an evil mind.
.
U.V. Sambhu Prasad
_____
#3.
The Hindu (Madras)
Sunday, Dec 22, 2002
Magazine
Identity politics
by Shashi Tharoor
A NUMBER of readers have asked why I allowed the 10th anniversary of
the destruction of the Babri Masjid to pass unremarked in this
column. After all, one wrote, it was an episode that went to the
heart of the concerns I have repeatedly written about: how could I
neglect it at such a time? Well, I responded somewhat feebly, I had
an equally topical subject to address last time, the just-concluded
tour of France by 19 Indian writers. Having been one of them, I was
in a better position to write about it than on a subject from which I
had to admit I was geographically removed. And, let's face it, I had
written about the Babri Masjid tragedy at the time and afterward, and
I assumed the Indian papers would have said everything there was to
say.
But what about your personal thoughts? One of my correspondents
persisted. Surely you have your own recollections of 10 years ago?
That got me thinking about December 6, 1992. I remember vividly an
American friend at a function in New York that day telling me he had
seen on the news that the Babri Masjid had been destroyed, and my
simply refusing to believe it. "You must have heard it wrong," I
asserted confidently. "That sort of thing simply wouldn't happen in
India. And if some mob had actually tried to attack it, the police
would have stopped them well before they destroyed the mosque. Maybe
the TV reported it was damaged?" "It was destroyed," the American
retorted. "I didn't just hear it on TV. I saw it. It was destroyed in
full view of the cameras." It took a while for my initial disbelief
to dissipate. This couldn't have happened, I agonised, in the India I
had grown up in. Of course there had been riots in my youth, but they
were spontaneous eruptions, and for the most part had been quickly
brought under control. But an organised effort to pull down a mosque?
The very thought was appalling - something I did not believe Indians,
as a collectivity, were capable of contemplating.
And if they were, surely they wouldn't be allowed to complete the
task? The destruction of a substantial building takes time, and I
couldn't believe the authorities would have let the mob have the
hours they needed to fulfil their malign intent. The India in which
this could happen was an India that had changed immeasureably from
the country in which I had reached adulthood. It was from a profound
sense of loss and betrayal that I wrote, and spoke, of my anguish at
the time.
Indians in New York were just as exercised as Indians in India. I
recall two events in particular. I was invited, along with others, to
speak at an event at Columbia University one Sunday that December at
which artists and writers responded to the tragedy. In the time
allotted to me I chose to read three extracts from other writers -
Tagore's immortal "Let my Country Awake", from his Gitanjali; a
poignant short story by Saadat Hasan Manto about looters at the time
of Partition who are helped and encouraged by a kind man who turns
out to be the owner of the house being looted; and a brief passage
from Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses, in which he talks about the
Indian "overpainter", using art as a metaphor for the palimpsest that
is the Indian identity. To my astonishment the organisers, an
anti-communal group, came to me afterward to say that a number of
Muslims in the audience had been outraged by my choice of the last
passage. Did I not know that Rushdie was anathema to them? Could I
disavow him and apologise? It was my turn to be outraged. I had not
come to lend my voice to a denunciation of Hindu intolerance in order
to condone Muslim intolerance.
There was nothing remotely offensive to anybody about the passage I
had read; its content, its evocation of Hindu and Muslim artists
painting over each other's work, was precisely what I had come to
affirm. In choosing this passage by a great Indian Muslim writer I
was seeking to uphold the idea of the pluralist, tolerant India that
had been attacked along with the Masjid. I refused to apologise, let
alone disavow what I had read. But it was a sobering reminder that
intolerance comes in many shades.
The second episode at the time was an address I was invited to make
to the Indian community at the Consulate in New York. A number of
Hindutva sympathisers turned up for the question-and- answer session
that was to follow, prepared to denounce the "pseudo-secularism" that
they would underlie my critique.
Instead I spoke as a believing Hindu - and I spoke passionately of my
shame that this could have been done by people claiming to be acting
in the name of my faith. I had prided myself on belonging to a
religion of astonishing breadth and range of belief; a religion that
acknowledged all ways of worshipping God as equally valid - indeed,
the only major religion in the world that did not claim to be the
only true religion. Hindu fundamentalism was a contradiction in
terms, since Hinduism is a religion without fundamentals; there is no
such thing as a Hindu heresy. How dare goondas of Ayodhya reduce the
soaring majesty of the Vedas and the Upanishads to the petty bigotry
of their brand of identity politics? Why should any Hindu allow them
to diminish Hinduism to the raucous self-glorification of the
football hooligan, to take a religion of awe-inspiring tolerance and
shrink it into a chauvinist slogan? My speech startled both the
secular leftists in the audience and the acolytes of Hindutva. Some
of the latter who had come to protest were chastened into silence;
only one rose to question me, saying that he agreed with my vision of
Hinduism but that such a faith could have only one logical outcome -
support for the positions taken by Hindu political leaders. To which
my response was simple: I was brought up by a strongly devout father
in the Hindu belief that each of us had to find his own Truth. No
true Hindu, I averred, would allow a politician to define his dharma
for him.
That's where I rested my case. Ten years later, it seems the right
place to rest these reflections.
Shashi Tharoor is the author of India: From Midnight to the
Millennium, The Great Indian Novel and other books. Visit him on the
web at www.shashitharoor.com.
_____
#4.
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Thursday, December 19, 2002 - Page A23
Lighting the fuse of hatred
The Hindu nationalists' victory in Gujarat could start
the world's largest democracy tumbling away
from tolerance and secularism, says journalist SIDHARTH BHATIA
By SIDHARTH BHATIA
Provincial elections in India rarely have an impact outside their
borders, fought as they are on mainly local issues. But last week's
elections in the western state of Gujarat were seen as being of
national importance.
Gujarat, the land where Mahatma Gandhi was born, was in the news
earlier this year for a brutal genocide in which hundreds -- nearly
2,000 according to some estimates -- of Muslims were killed by
marauding Hindu mobs in just over a week. It was not the fact of the
killings itself, but the complicity of the state and its instruments
that was shocking. Newspaper reports and more studied documentation
of the pogrom by international agencies, as well as Indian citizen's
groups, have, in no uncertain manner, laid bare the role played by
the state's law-and-order machinery and senior elected officials, who
held back police action and encouraged Hindu groups that were on a
killing spree.
The ostensible reason for this dance macabre was the burning of a
train car carrying Hindus in a small Gujarat town by a mob said to
consist of Muslims. But there has been sufficient evidence to show
that the avengers went about their task with clinical precision,
targeting Muslim homes and shops in a manner that would have required
much advance planning.
The chief minister of the state, Narendra Modi, who has drawn most of
the ire of human-rights groups, was quoted as saying that "every
action has an equal an opposite reaction," which he later denied. But
his subsequent actions showed that he had singularly failed to
fulfill his duty to protect the lives of hundreds of men, women and
children.
Mr. Modi's immediate reaction a few weeks after the riots was to call
for elections before they were officially due. The objective was
clear: The deep religious polarization and the fear among the Muslim
section of the population would ensure the success of his party, the
Bharatiya Janata Party, giving it one more five-year term.
The BJP rules India as the head of a 20-party coalition and has
successfully used Hindutva (Hinduness), a political expression of
Hindu resurgence, as a plank to win power. From a pariah party with
no friends, it became the single-largest party at the centre four
years ago, largely appealing to Hindu chauvinistic sentiments in a
land where secularism is enshrined in the constitution. For the BJP,
secularism as it has been practised has been little more than
appeasement of minorities (mainly of the 140 million Muslims in the
country) and it wants the feelings of the over 80-per-cent majority
Hindu population taken into account.
This formula worked for a short time, but soon after, in province
after province, the BJP's state units have lost power, mainly to the
opposition Congress Party. The more moderate elements in the party
acknowledge that the people are looking for good governance and are
fed up with divisive issues.
For the hard-liners in the organization however, the party's failures
were precisely because it had forsaken its Hindutva platform. And
Gujarat provided a good experiment to see if hard-line Hinduism
retained its potency.
Mr. Modi's campaign focused on Islamic terrorism, which he blamed on
neighbouring Pakistan and then warned the populace that they would
not be secure if they voted for any other party. The implication was
clear: The state's half-million Muslims were the fifth column of
Islamic terrorists who were not to be trusted and would spread terror
among the Hindus unless kept down by a strong hand.
The message went over hugely and the BJP has returned with a
two-thirds majority, trouncing the Congress and other parties. It has
done its best in the areas were the riots were at their worst. In its
campaign, the BJP got a lot of help from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad
(World Hindu Council), a well-funded international body (it has
branches in Canada, too) whose sole aim is to make India a Hindu
state and which has also been indicted for the role it played in the
rioting.
Mr. Modi's performance has impressed party elders, and with a handful
of other provincial elections next year and the general elections the
year after, the BJP, whose popularity has been slipping, is again
rejuvenated. The moderate elements in the party, including perhaps
Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who have pleaded in the past for
national harmony, may well be swept aside by the next generation,
which is impatient with old notions of secularism or even
constitutional niceties. A new, more virulent form of majoritarianism
and ubernationalism may now be seen in India.
It is not merely the BJP that could undergo an upheaval; it could
mean bad news for the country's minorities, too, who have long been
taunted for their alleged extraterritorial loyalties. But most of
all, if this means tampering with secularism, the Gujarat results
could end up changing the destiny of India.
Sidharth Bhatia is a Toronto-based commentator on South Asia and an
associate press fellow of Woflson College, Cambridge University.
_____
#5.
The Daily Times (Lahore)
December 22, 2002
Op-ed.
Gujarat: A call for Kristallnacht?
By Angana Chatterji
The tyranny of dogmatic Hinduism and Islam promotes and sustains
cycles of violence in South Asia. The crusade of Islamic
fundamentalism in the region is a recognized fact in response to
which there is an increasing, and often strategically ineffectual,
assemblage of force and political will. Hindu militancy in India is
yet to receive similar scrutiny. Its rampage on secular India has
been growing, with devastating consequences. The current elections in
Gujarat are testimony to this.
In Gujarat, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won 127 of 181 seats.
The BJP, compliant in the post-Godhra slaughter of Muslims in
Gujarat, has been exonerated. The judge and jury have been the
electorate, organized and delivered by the Hindu supremacist
movement. In Gujarat, the party has rewarded the Hindutva movement's
use of hate and terror to divide and conquer. In return the BJP has
been repaid with votes. What does this mean for India?
The BJP heads a 20 party coalition at the center. It has instigated
and utilized Ayodhya and Gujarat for considerable electoral gains. It
is aided by, among others, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP). The VHP
(World Hindu Council) is Hindutva's ideological platform, intent on
consolidating its singular and violent mission to pulverize India
into a Hindu extremist state. It is rallying to slay the opponents of
Hindutva, and those committed to a secular India tolerant of the
faithful and irreligious that inhabit its reality. Hindutva is well
mobilized, well funded and well armed. Its ideology is venomous, its
propaganda effective. Most Indians are watching their ascent in
horror. The international community is silent. The conditions for a
Kristallnacht are in place.
In a recent press conference, the VHP has declared that Muslims and
other minorities will be subordinate citizens in India. In a
democracy, the majority community has an ethical responsibility to
enable affirmative action so disenfranchised minority class and
ethnic groups can overcome institutionalized injustices. While the
disbursement of affirmative action has been less than ideal, the
Hindutva movement interprets its very existence as an absurd
'accommodation' of minority demands.
Indian nationalism has been built at the prerogative of the Hindu
elite, even while the Indian state confers rights to diverse
individuals and communities within its borders. This has made India a
vibrant democracy and a difficult country to govern. The disempowered
have organized to demand that the state grant them their rights.
India is a nation where 350 million live in conditions of poverty.
Poor rural women labor 1.5 workdays. The police are often complicit
in perpetrating social violence. Gay, lesbian and transgender
communities, the elderly and disabled, have few rights. Educational
opportunities for adivasis (tribals) are appalling. Irresponsible
development displaces the poor without any refuge. Sikhs have faced
persecution, Muslims, dalits and other minorities are often
ostracized, and Christians have been forcibly converted to Hinduism.
The response by the state and its citizens has been inadequate, at
best.
Forces of resistance continue to challenge the dominance of the Hindu
elite and middle class. In response, Hindutva revivalism seeks to
consolidate the power of the majority through militant reform that
defines Hindu majoritarianism as Indian nationalism. This
majoritarianism makes secularism subservient to Hindu nationalism.
Such an agenda requires that Hindutva assimilate the plural
traditions within Hinduism to create a narrow centralized code that
promises to unite Hindus. These principles are philosophically
Brahmanical and universalistic, in action segregationist. This
strategy thwarts the complex search for cultural identity that
confronts the vast diversity of Indians living at the intersections
of pre and post modernity, inequitable modernization and globalism.
To realize its mission, Hindutva defines minority interests as
oppositional to Hindu, and therefore national, interest. The
struggles for justice of groups organized around ethnicity, religion,
class, caste, tribe, gender, or culture become hostile to national
unity. Hindutva is anathema to democracy.
Hindu militancy is on the rise, and minority groups are the major
victims of this sectarian violence. Delhi, 1984, Gujarat, 2002,
Ahmedabad, 1969. Hyderabad, 1981, Bhiwandi, 1984, Moradabad, 1980,
Assam, 1983, Aligarh, 1978, Ayodhya, 1992. On and on. Muslim
minorities in India are a primary target of Hindutva's wrath, whose
master narrative de-emphasizes Hindu-Muslim coexistence, and creates
grievous misrepresentations of Indian Muslims as monolithic,
anti-national, violent, and without exception allied with Islamic
fundamentalism. In the Hindutva imagination, the village Muslim whose
identity is shaped by kinship, region, language, and culture becomes
synonymous with the Taliban.
It is terrifying that so many have responded with such vigor to the
call of Hindutva. What counter movements, what capacity building, are
necessary to disrupt this campaign of hate and genocide? How can the
agenda for a tolerant and democratic India be made central to all
action at the grassroots level, within institutions, political
parties, trade unions, social movements, schools and universities,
non governmental organizations, families and neighborhoods, public
and private life?
Secularism in India has been fraught with contention. Secularism as a
strategy to oppose communalism is increasingly defunct. Critics of
the modern nation state and purists dispute secularism as impossible
and imposed. Hindutva argues that secularism will destroy Hindu
India. With increased communalization, secularism has become a
bargaining tool in national politics, used to deceitful advantage by
most political parties, a pretense useful in appeasing minority
groups. Secular reform with a conscience has been marginalized within
the Indian polity to accommodate Hindu hegemony. It limits necessary
conversations regarding religious reform or a meaningful role for
faith in our times.
If India is to endure, it is crucial that we conceive a nation where
a profusion of cultures and histories coexist with equal rights,
weaving a script for citizenship and change that is multicultural,
hopeful, and pregnant with possibility. Inclusive and respectful of
all.
[Kristallnacht, or "the Night of Broken Glass" is the pogrom carried
out against the Jewish people in Germany and in the acquired
territories of Austria and Sudetenland in 1938. The Nazi Regime
orchestrated the pogrom.]
Angana Chatterji is a professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology
at the California Institute of Integral Studies.
_____
#6.
Rediff.com (Bombay)
December 23, 2002
COLUMNISTS
Dilip D'Souza
Gujarat Results: Call Ohio
I'm starting to feel like I ran, and lost, in Gujarat. Yes, me.
What's more, I lost because guys as far away as Ohio and Germany
voted against me. Can it be true? Have I been dreaming I'm a writer
when in truth I'm a politician who's just been hammered in the
Gujarat polls?
Must be the getting hammered bit, if I go by the weight of mail to me
from guys gloating about the BJP victory in Gujarat. The tone all of
them sport is as if the loss is mine, entirely and solely mine. The
tone also is as if the victory belongs to these writers, also
entirely and solely. As if they personally cast votes to personally
defeat me. Which must have been a little hard for at least some of
them -- unless, that is, Ohio and Germany are newly appropriated
districts in Gujarat.
But, of course, the truth is that I remain what I've been for years:
an obscure writer. And if you wonder, like I do, why some people feel
the need to pretend the Gujarat results amounted to my defeat --
well, I suppose you'll have to ask that question in Ohio.
As for me, I'll applaud the victory of an astute political animal and
his just as astute political machinery; of these men who knew
precisely what knobs to twist to get votes at a time when they didn't
deserve any. So well did they know, in fact, that some of the
gloaters and voters announced to me that the BJP win made them "proud
to be Hindus."
Not only did the political animal get his votes, not only did he give
his ecstatic supporters a spectacular victory; he went beyond that
and managed to pump them up about their faith.
A politician does what he must, and superbly -- and suddenly, his
supporters are "proud to be Hindus." Yes, a remarkable feat that
deserves only applause.
For think, first, of the ground his campaign covered. It was under
Narendra Modi and his BJP government that Gujarat suffered three
major attacks of terror in 2002: the murders in Godhra, the weeks of
killing across the state that followed, the assault on a temple in
Gandhinagar. A government that presided over three such outrages in
half a year is a government that doesn't give a damn for the security
of its citizens and therefore has no business ruling.
In fact, if it had been any other political party ruling Gujarat
through this year's terror, the BJP itself would have loudly made
just this point. As it did, for example, after riots and bomb blasts
in Bombay a decade ago, when the Congress ruled Maharashtra. As it
used to with its frequent claim that BJP-ruled states are free of
religious riots: a claim that, if it ever held any truth, lies
utterly demolished.
So the conundrum the BJP faced in Gujarat was this: given our
colossal failure to govern the state, what do we do to attract votes
in the election? After all, under BJP rule, there's been terrorism in
more than just Gujarat. Under BJP rule in Delhi, we've had terror
attacks on an army camp, temples, an assembly, pilgrims, an Indian
Airlines jet and our Parliament itself, besides other assaults every
day on soldiers and civilians. How do you defend such a pathetic
record of ensuring the safety of ordinary Indian lives, and then even
ask for votes?
The answer lay in two political masterstrokes we saw in Gujarat.
The first: simply claim, loud and long, to be severe on terror. The
BJP knew if it just shouted enough that it was fighting terrorism,
the pathetic record would count for nothing. Which is what happened.
The party managed to make out that it was actually fighting the very
atrocities it, as the ruling party in Gujarat, had presided over.
Votes flowed in.
The second: Modi's constant refrain that people had "defamed"
Gujarat. Smooth and easy, a bankrupt administration painted criticism
of its own failures as a massive conspiracy to denigrate 55 million
people. (Which equation of a failed government to an entire state, if
anything, was the real defamation of Gujarat). Therefore, the refrain
went, voting for this bankrupt administration, instead of booting it
out as it deserved, was a matter of Gujarati pride. The appeal to
this mystical "pride" worked as it had to, as Modi knew it would.
Votes flowed in again.
Think next of the reactions we have seen to this victory. Major BJP
figures -- LK Advani, Arun Jaitley and Modi himself -- hailed it as a
victory for "nationalism." "Yeh rashtravad ki jeet hai," Smita Gupta
quotes them saying "repeatedly" in response to the results (The Times
of India, December 17).
Murderers wander Gujarat unpunished, but "nationalism" has won.
If you wonder what sort of nationalism allows killers to roam free,
you may find yourself remembering other events from our history: The
massacre of 3,000 Indians in Delhi, 1984; the killing of over
1,000 Indians in Bombay a decade ago; the killing and looting that
drove Pandits out of Kashmir after 1989. In each case, criminals roam
free to this day.
But more than that, each case was followed by elections in which
tainted parties won, as has just happened in Gujarat: the Congress in
Delhi, the Sena/BJP in Maharashtra; the National Conference in
Kashmir. Were those also "victories for nationalism"? Would 350,000
Kashmiri Pandits forced to flee their homes, taking just one of these
three examples, describe any election in Kashmir as a "victory for
nationalism"? Please ask them.
What this was, really, was one more chapter in a lesson political
parties are learning to expert levels: drive people to hatred and
violence, and the polarisation you get gives you massive election
victories. They call this "nationalism."
There was another reaction too, and this from our respected Prime
Minister Vajpayee. On December 17, he told his partymen that Muslims
had not condemned the Godhra massacre "enough" ("Jitna Godhra kand ke
baad musalman samaj se virodh hona chahiye, nahin hua", The Times of
India quoted him saying, December 18), and "even today, there is no
repentance that we [the Muslims] committed a mistake" (rediff.com,
December 17).
Leave aside the little fact that, as The Times itself commented,
'many Muslim organisations and personalities had immediately issued
statements strongly condemning Godhra, and these were carried
prominently in the press.' Leave aside, too, the deliberate vagueness
of that 'enough;' because whatever the condemnation, respectable men
can always say it wasn't 'enough.' Digest instead what our honorable
PM is really saying: that all 120 million Muslims in India are
responsible for what 2,000 depraved Muslims did in Godhra.
When caste murders happen in Bihar, or when 3,000 Sikhs were
slaughtered in Delhi, or even when a Harshad Mehta perpetrates
enormous stock market thefts, we don't hear our honorable PM saying
Hindus didn't condemn those crimes 'enough.' You will agree that the
thought itself is obscene, that you can hold all Hindus responsible
for the crimes of a few. (Must all Hindus 'repent' for 'committing a
mistake' in the stock scam?) Yet our respected PM makes precisely
this obscene implication about Muslims.
Who is the 'we' who 'committed a mistake,' dear PM? Were all 120
million Indian Muslims present in Godhra on February 27, committing
'the mistake'? How is my friend Altaf who runs the corner convenience
store more responsible for the Godhra murders -- to the extent that
you say he is not "repentant" for his "mistake" -- than you? Or
Narendra Modi? Or me?
Of course, we do know why Vajpayee said what he did: because he and
his party know as well as anyone the value of polarising the
electorate, of harvesting votes in fields of hatred.
Which brings me, finally, to his party's Hindutva. What happened in
Gujarat, we are told, was a historic victory for Hindutva, and the
BJP's brand of it. When I hear talk like this, I can only wonder:
what precisely is this Hindutva? In Gujarat, it amounted to these
things: a clever politician and his political ways. A claim to be
tough on terror which had no connection to the reality of months of
terror. Appeals to some ephemeral 'pride.' Mention of 'nationalism'
that does not venture beyond just mention. A suave attribution of
guilt to an entire community for a horrible crime, thus justifying
other horrible crimes committed against them. (You guys in Germany,
did I miss anything?)
This is Hindutva? But wait a minute, this is stuff we've lived with
for decades, carried out to varying degrees of finesse by Indiras and
Rajivs in the Congress party. Their very emptiness, their failure at
anything you might call governance, is the reason a nation turned
away from the Congress and to the BJP. And now we know, if we didn't
earlier: the BJP is a mere Congress clone.
Yes, this is what the Gujarat result amounts to: a thunderous
announcement that the BJP is no different, does not aspire to be
different, from the Congress.
And for that reason, this victory leaves me neither dejected nor
proud. Once the euphoria settles, even people in Gujarat will see
Modi and his party for the hollow rhetoric-mongers they are, the
failures at running a government they are, the extra-smooth
Congress-clones they are. Because every emphatic electoral victory
has led to such disillusionment. And so from that grows opportunity
that we will all have to seize some day -- to get these two parties
to concentrate not on hate and emptiness, but on ordinary governance.
As for Hindutva, its vendors could do much worse than visit the lady
in whose house I have spent the last several Ganesh Chaturthis. Every
time, I feel a tingling in my spine as I watch her and her jaunty
elephant-headed idol. It's from her quiet yet clear-eyed devotion,
from her deep understanding of the spirit of her culture and faith,
that I know she gets her confidence, compassion, strength and
humanity. That's why I know -- without her having to write it at the
bottom of letters or shout it from her balcony or feel it after a
politician wins or see only ogres across religious lines -- that she
is proud to belong to a great and wise tradition.
Proud to be Hindu.
_____
#7.
Never a Straight Answer
Mukul Dube
On a television programme some weeks back, there was mention of Shri
Ashok Singhal's well publicised statement that Gujarat had been a
successful experiment for Hindutva, one which would be repeated
elsewhere in the country. The Parivar's male member present responded
with alacrity. "You said that first" he burst out. Those were your
words. His finger was pointed at the press, specifically the channel
on which the programme was being broadcast. He then proceeded to give
the date and other details.
What could be more absurd? The point was that Singhal had made a
boast and a threat. That someone had earlier accused his crowd of
doing precisely what he boasted about, merely went to show that
people had seen through the game. Attempting to start a ridiculous
argument on whether the accusation came first or the confession (in
effect seeking to transfer the guilt of the act on to the accuser),
was a diversionary tactic which Sangh Hindutva habitually uses. The
real issue is drowned in showers and splatters of irrelevant words.
If I admit to being an ass, then my being an ass is important not
the fact that someone else called me an ass before I admitted to
being one. The Parivar's people, though, are compulsive
finger-pointers, forever seeking to divert attention away from
themselves and their sacks full of idiocies. They just cannot rise
above their infantile tu-tu-main-main level. They are pettiness
personified.
Throw a pinch of potassium permanganate into glycerine, dish up a red
herring, filibuster, foam at the mouth, lead people up the garden
path in short, at all costs do whatever might keep the real issue
from showing through, because that is where the danger of exposure
lies.
The people of the Sangh Parivar are masters of double-talk, diversion
and evasion. I have yet to hear one of them give a straight answer to
a straight question. In interviews to newspapers and on the
electronic media, and on talk shows, their routine response to every
question begins with That is not the point or That is not what you
should ask . They then proceed to deliver their prepared speeches.
It does not matter to these worthies what the other person is asking
or saying. All that is important to them is mouthing their set
pieces. It happens every time, without exception. I have seen it
often enough to become convinced that it is no coincidence: these
people have clearly been trained in the use of the tactic. In my own
few encounters with the species, I have learnt that even the small
fry are no less intellectually crooked than their leaders. This
crookedness evidently forms the core of the shakha syllabus.
Reasoned discussion or argument requires that two people communicate,
listen to each other, respect each other. These things are all
possible even when there is profound disagreement: indeed, among
civilised people they are essentials. It is not possible to have a
rational or any other discussion or argument with one who pays no
attention whatsoever to what you say but only takes off at a tangent
of his own at every opportunity, a joker who does not build upon what
you say, who does not even contradict your words before offering his
alternative.
These people can only deliver monologues. An even simpler tactic is
to merely shout down the opposition. They are unable to see that even
the most heated arguments are in one sense co-operative ventures
the participants, or combatants, accept that they are talking about
the same things. The Sangh Parivar's rewritten social contract
presupposes that they themselves are the only contracting party.
Intellectual opportunism casting about to left and right and
grabbing whatever seems likely to help is one of the clearest marks
of the absence of real convictions, real ideology. This magpie
approach is how the Sangh ideologues cobble together their arguments.
Each individual element is generally accurate, but the combination is
a weird creature indeed: skull of raccoon, neck vertebrae of giraffe,
chest of parakeet, belly of mongoose, rear end of hippopotamus....
But even such grotesque assemblages cannot be demolished, because a
major weapon in the Parivar ideologue's armoury is stone-walling.
Many questioners have discovered that if a haywire construction is
challenged, if its internal contradictions are clearly shown, the
Parivar ideologue has a stock response: he will simply repeat, word
for word, precisely what he said before. It is as if the other person
had not spoken, did not exist. One can but give up in despair.
Firm. Unshakeable. Like a rock. Or, as a young friend said with
biting accuracy, like a giant fossilised brontosaurus turd.
_____
#8.
The Hindu
Monday, Dec 23, 2002
Buddhism, Bhakti and the VHP - I
By Gail Omvedt
It is not simply a question of the VHP's problem with Buddhism.
Hindutva's supporters today have to falsify even the bhakti movement.
http://www.thehindu.com/2002/12/23/stories/2002122300421000.htm
o o o
The Hindu
Tuesday, Dec 24, 2002
Buddhism, Bhakti and the VHP - II
By Gail Omvedt
Much of the radicalism of the sants of the bhakti movement has been
masked by the fact that the history, interpretation and
institutionalisation of the movement has been in upper-caste hands.
http://www.thehindu.com/2002/12/24/stories/2002122400951000.htm
---
_____
#9.
CONFERENCE FOR COMMUNAL AMITY IN BABABUDAN GIRI
This is from and on behalf of the organisers of "Conference for
communal amity in Bababudan Giri" - a group of progressive
organisations, human right groups,
University and college teachers, writers, intellectuals of Karnataka,
aimed at protesting against the move of the Sangh parivar to create
communal tension in
Chikmagalur District of Karnataka.
Chikmagalur town is the district head quarters, about 200 km from
Bangalore. Chikmagalur is surrounded by a range of hills, which mark
the beginning of Western
Ghats in Karnataka. Bababudan shrine is atop one such hill, and was
established by a Sufi Saint named Dada Hiat Mir Kalandar, supposed to
be a direct disciple of
the Prophet. But the darga is revered by Hindus equally, as the abode
of Dattatreya, the configuration of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. The
Dattatreya tradition has a
long history in Karnataka, a part of the Awadhut tradition that
upholds a formless god and sternly condemns caste and the sacrificial
religious system of the Brahmin
priests. There is also a long tradition here of the Dattatreya and
Sufism going hand in hand as indicated by the fact that Dada Hayat
and Dattatreya have become
interchangeable. There are innumerable local stories that sing the
praise of both and express their admiration for Dada hayat and
Dattatreya. Over the centuries,
various Muslim as well as Hindu rulers patronised the dargah,
endowing it with wealth and land. Thus the Hindu or Muslim character
of the dargah was never an issue. In fact the
very name of the shrine bears witness to this: Sri Dattatreya swami
Baba Budhan Peetha. While Muslims saw Dada Hayat as a Muslim saint,
some Hindus saw him as an
incarnation of their god Dattatreya. But there is no record till
recently of this becoming a source of communal conflict.
It was only from 1980s, in the wake of the Hindutva agitation to
demolish the Babri Masjid; the Karnataka unit of VHP launched a
campaign for the 'liberation' of the
dargah of Dada Hayat. It set up a Datta Peetha Samrakshana Samiti and
in 1989 it conducted a puja to Dattatreya outside the cave (in which
Dada Hayat shrine is
located). Following the destruction of the Babri Masjid, the VHP got
further emboldened and since then it is trying to conduct Dattatreya
Jayanthi Utsav every year
in December. It even conducted a rath yatra by bringing thousands of
innocent Hindus as well as bajrang dal members raising Hindu passions
against Muslims in the
name of liberating the dargah from Muslim control. Pleas to ban the
rath yatra were turned down by the non-BJP state government. The
Bajrang Dal tore down the green
flags fluttering near the dargah and in their place hoisted saffron
Hindutva flags. The police and the local administration remained mute
spectators to this
vandalism. This year the VHP and other outfits of the Sangh Parivar
came with an ingenious idea: to convene a Datta Male programme
wherein the Hindus were told to wear saffron robes
and rosaries and march to the "Datta Peetha" as they do in case of
the Sabari malai. It was a clear imitation of the Sabari Malai
ritual. Thousands of Hindu youth,
including dalits and OBCs were involved in this programme. The
district administration of the present day Congress Govt officially
received the first batch of these
devotees. The protests went in vain. This is a clear case where in
the Datta Peetha is being used to test the political waters in
Karnataka and there are clear
indications that this place is becoming a testing ground for the BJP
to bring a Gujarat like situation by whipping up religious passions
for narrow political
gains. Chikmagalur and Baba Budan Hills are home to rich coffee
plantations (it is said that the Coffee seeds were brought for the
first time to this place by Baba
Hayat from Arabia). Because of steep fall in Coffee prices, there is
a lot of distress and unemployment in this area and the Sangh parivar
is using this crisis to its advantage.
Already two high level meetings, chaired by Union Minister Ananth
Kumar, have been convened at Chikmagalur to address the coffee
growers woes. Thus, politically,
socially and economically the situation in Chikmagalur has come handy
for the Sangh Parivar people to exploit the situation for their
advantage. They are planning to
hold 'Datta Jayanthi' on December 19 in a big way. Their demand is
complete control (liberation) of the datta peetha. They have
announced that if the government does
not hand over the shrine to them, they would resort to 'direct
confrontation' leading to a 'blood bath' (Asian Age, Bangalore, 27
November, 1998). The government of
Karnataka over the years has become a silent witness to these
activities by allowing it to take out the rath yatra and conduct puja
in the shrine. At best, it has,
as usual, looked at this as a mere law and order problem.
However, several secular and left groups have been raising their
voices of protest against the corruption of an ancient tradition,
which was known for its communal
amity. These and related issues were discussed recently in Shimoga on
November 24. The meeting was attended by the representatives of
several progressive and secular
organisations and individuals. Another meeting was held again on
December 8th to form the co-ordination committee of Bababudan Giri
harmony convention. The meeting
decided to observe December 29 as Baba Budan Giri Harmony Convention
and hold a massive public meeting of all the secular and
anti-communal forces/organisations.
This is going to be a historical event and a powerful statement
against the wicked moves of the Parivar to use Baba Budan Giri as its
launching pad for its political
game. We invite all of you and your friends to participate in this
Convention and join hands to prevent the Parivar from going about its
activities.
The present Convention is a major attempt by a large group of various
individuals and organisations to come together on a common platform
to expose the fascist and
communal agenda of the Sangh parivar. The convention, besides Swami
Agnivesh, will be attended by the pontiffs of two major communities
in Karnataka: the lingayats
and vokkaligas. The revolutionary poet, Gaddar from Andhra will also
be present.
The date chosen for the Convention is significant. It is the birthday
of one of Kannada's greatest poets, KUVEMPU, who gave the clarion
call for universal
brotherhood with his celebrated message of 'Universal Man'. His has
been the sharpest voice against the priestly class and hence it is
befitting that Dec. 29 is
observed as the day of Communal Harmony. Do come and participate.
Please disseminate this information among your friends and organisations.
Please convene meetings to discuss this issue in greater detail and
lend your support for the Dec 29 meeting.
Participate in the convention in big numbers.
As the convention requires more than 3 lakh rupees and the resources
for this convention will have to be mobilized from the public, we
request you to contribute as
much as you can. Crossed Cheques and DDs can be addressed 'Bababudan
Giri harmony convention co-ordination committee chikkamagalur'. You
can send the same to the
addresses mentioned below*.
We are trying to mobilise all progressive and secular forces in the
state. We had a meeting of the representatives of various dalit,
women and youth organisations
on 8th of this month. Their presence would send the right signals to
the people of our state. Please pass this information on to them and
request them on our behalf
to consider our invitation positively.
For further information, please contact Ahobalapathy-KVR (Chief
co-coordinator) souhardagiri2002@r... 0818-222770.
Dr. Vasu at: vasuhv@r...
Or Sreedhara, at 080-6507505 (sreedhara@v...) or Dr Rajendra
Chenni at: 08182-79370. (rajchenni@h...)
* Contact address: Ahobalapathy C/O K.L.Ashok-KVR behind
veerabhadreswara theatre. Loordu nagar, Shimoga, Karnataka.
With thanks and regards,
Presidential committee.(provisional)
Prof.G.K.Govidaral, Dr.G.Ramakrishna, Prof.K.Ramdas, Devanooru
Mahadeva, Prof. Hassan Mansoor, Kadidalu Shamanna, K.V.Subbanna,
Kalkuli Vittal Hegde, Prof. B.V.Veerabhadrappa.
Working committee.(provisional)
Ahobalapathy-KVR.---Chief convenor.
Prof.Rajendra Chenni, Prof. K.Phaniraj, Prof. Rahamth Tareekere,
Prof. J.Sadananada,Basavaraj Soolibavi, Vai.Ga. Jagadeesh, Nempe
Devaraj, Hoovappa, Ramu Kouli,
Hemakka, Siraj Ahmes, Sarja shankara Haraleematha, Abdul Wahab,
K.L.Ashok, Dr, Vasu, K.P.Sreepaala, Rudraiah, K.M. Gopal, Rajaratnam,
Parshuram Kalaal.K.Gireesh,Bhadravathi Manjunath, N.Manjula.
o o o
Dear friends,
The campaign for the 29th december souharda samavesha at chikmagalur has
started. It started simultaneously at various places in the state, like
Bangalore, Davangere, Chikmagalur. The response that we have getting from
various sections of the society has been very encouraging everywhere. In
fact, Janavahini, the kannada daily, has started a column which will carry
responses and articles in favour of the convention.
However, the response from the local administration has been very
alarming. In Chikmagalur, the local police initially refused to give
permission for the programme to launch the campaign in the district.
Also, they said that the covention will have to be postponed by 15 days as
the convention will be "provocative". After a lot of dialogue, the police
gave the permission for the inaugaration of the campaign in the district.
It was held on Monday, 23rd December.
Today, a senior police officer in the SP office at Chikmagalur said that
our procession will not be allowed on 29th December since some miscreants
may misuse this procession to create provocation. Later when our
delegation met the District Commissioner, he also reiterated the same
thing - only the convention will be allowed, no procession.
Compare this with the following -
The Sangh Parivar didn't follow any instructions of the police, district
administration or the administrative council of the babaubudangiri
dattatreya peetha, during the recent Datta Jayanti celebrations. They
conducted 'shobha yatra', used crackers during the procession, conducted a
public meeting at Bababudangiri on the Datta Jayanthi day in which many of
sangh parivar people spoke and all along used highly provocative slogans,
banners, statements. And all these were 'officially restricted'. In fact,
the local MLA & minister Sagir Ahmed gave a statement to the press
regarding the violation of law by the Sangh Parivar. On the day of Datta
Jayanthi, Praveen Togadia, VHP's international general secretary made the
statement "Datta Peetha is Karnataka's Ayodhya"(Times of India, Dec 20).
His speech at the public meeting was highly provocative. Pramod Mutalik
(South India Bajrang Dal chief) and Sunil Kumar (Karnataka Bajrang Dal
chief) made equally provocative speeches during the meeting. Although the
state government is currently saying that it is considering the ban of
Praveen Togadia's entry to the state, during his presence here, Togadia
was provided with VVIP security. Also, many members of the district
administration took part in the 'shobha yatra'.
The local administration today is trying to put all sorts of hurdles in
the way of a convention that wishes to keep intact the communal harmony.
On the contrary, it went all out to see that the Sangh Parivar drama went
on without a hitch. Is this what we expect from the administartion ?
The Sangh Parivar has already started to obstruct our campaign. On Monday,
in Mudigere, a taluk center in Chikmagalur, few young men in the leadrship
of local BJP leader Prashanth picked up a quarrel with our campaign team.
Their argument was 'you are blaming only Hindus and are in favour of
Muslims'. Our stand was clarified, but they continue to argue. A sub
inspector arrived there asked the 'campaign team' to report to the police
station and give their addresses. Just imagine ! Our team, howerver,
decided to continue their campaign and also decided that they will be
meeting the police later.
We request all of you to write to the Chief Minister of Karnataka,
(cm@k...) condemning the attitude of the state government and also
urging him to allow the convention & its campaign continue unhampered.
We will continue sending you the updates. Please pass this information to
all your friends.
====================================================================
Bababudangiri Souharda Samavesha Co-ordination Committee
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