SACW | 7 July 2006 | Sri Lanka: End the killings; Pakistan in a bind; UK: bargain in the mosque; India: Politics of Minorities and learning; Say No to Modi visiting the US

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | 7 July, 2006 | Dispatch No. 2269

[1]  Sri Lanka: Call For An End To Killings and A 
Return To Negotiations (Peace Support Group)
[2]  Pakistan: Hobson's choice for Pak (M B Naqvi)
[3]  UK: Bad bargain made in the mosque (Kenan Malik)
[4]  India: Minority Appeasement! (Ram Puniyani)
[5]  India: Dark side of learning (Shiv Visvanathan)
[6]  USA: Protest against the invitation to 
Narendra Modi (Action Alert by Friends of South 
Asia)

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[1]

PEACE SUPPORT GROUP
PRESS RELEASE

CALL FOR AN END TO KILLINGS AND A RETURN TO NEGOTIATION FOR PEACE IN SRI
LANKA

The Peace Support Group, Sri Lanka, is outraged and saddened by the
increasing violence in the country and the deaths of civilians caught up
in the conflict.

In April, according to available records, 191 persons including 90
civilians were killed as a direct result of the conflict. In May 2006,
that figures stands at 171 deaths, with 83 of those being civilian and 8
being of children. These figures make it clear that civilians have become
the primary targets of the conflict in its present phase.

The most recent incidents in this tragic saga are the attack on a bus
carrying civilians in Kebitigollewa on June 15 in which 64 persons died,
and the concerted land and air attacks on Vavunativu in Batticaloa, in
Sampur and Mutur in Trincomalee and in Kilinochchi and Mullaitivu in the
Vanni District on the same date. The indiscriminate killings of civilians
in Mannar on June 17, which has also led to largescale displacement, only
reaffirms our concerns.

We particularly condemn the indiscriminate use of claymore mines by the
LTTE and by other paramilitary groups.  Through placing mines on roads and
in public places, not only do you heighten the vulnerability of civilians,
the principles of international humanitarian law are flagrantly violated,
as are the principles of  Security Council Resolution 1674 on the
protection of civilians in wartime and in armed conflict situations.

The status quo at present remains that acts of indiscriminate violence are
committed and that accountability is denied. There is also a trend of
retaliatory killings and attacks which pave the way for a cycle of
violence in which each act is justified by claiming the commission of a
similar act by the 'other' party.

The rising number of disappearances and extra-judicial killings is also a
matter of grave concern to us, as is the seemingly random distribution of
guns to villagers by the Police in areas such as Gomarankadawela and
Welikanda, in the aftermath of civilian killings that have taken place
there. In April 2006, 18 bodies of young men were found; many had been
gagged and bound before killing; some of them had been decapitated. In May
the number of bodies found in public places in the North and East is 14.
In June, there has been a sharp increase in the abduction/recruitment of
children in the Eastern province in areas under government control,
particularly in the Eravur Valaichchenai area,

In addition, there is concern regarding the potential militarization of
civilian administration, which is demonstrated for example, by the
appointment of a retired army officer as the District Secretary – the
seniormost administrative official -  of Trincomalee District at the end
of May 2006.

The violence is also creating a steady and increasing flow of civilians
out of the areas of the North and East to other parts of the island, and
to other countries including southern India. Much of this displacement
remains invisible and therefore unaccounted for. The sense of insecurity
that prevails throughout the country in general makes the displacement
particularly problematic for Tamils, and to a lesser degree for Muslims,
who are viewed as a security threat by any host community.

The anxiety of those living in these conditions day after day is
compounded by the impunity that prevails with regard to gross violations
of human rights. The investigations into many extra-judicial killings are
slow and seem designed to exhaust the survivors and witnesses of these
acts of violence, even in cases in which testimonies and other evidence
have enabled the identification of perpetrators.

Among the key cases for the period from November 1 2005 to May 31, 2006
that we wish to cite are:

-	the rape and murder of Ilayathamby Tharshini (20) of Punguduthivu in
Jaffna on November 17 2005;
-	the disappearance of four Tamils,  two women, one man and a child, from
the 100 Houses resettlement Scheme in Pesalai and the discovery of burned
human remains in a house that had been set on fire in the Scheme on
December 23;
-	the assassination of five Tamil  school 
boys in Trincomalee on January 2
2006;
-	the assassination of six young Sinhala men, farmers, in Kalyanapura,
Gomarankadawela on April 22, 2006;
-	the killings of 7 young Tamil men in Nelliady junction on May 5, 2006;
-	the disappearance of 8 Tamil men from a 
kovil in Manduvil, Jaffna on May
6, 2006;
-	the murder of 13 persons including 2 
children in 3 separate incidents on
Kayts island in Jaffna on May 13, 2006;
-	the killing of eight Sri Lankan visitors to the Wilpattu National Park
on May 27, 2006;
-	the murder of 12 Sinhala persons including 10 villagers working as
labourers on a construction site in Omadiyamadu, Welikanda on May 29,
2006;

While we in no way make a distinction of violations on ethnic grounds,
there is also no denying that the impunity we are referring to in the
context of the on-gong conflict has a very sharp and specific impact on
the Tamil community living in the North and East of Sri Lanka.

The continuing violation of the Constitution by the Government of Sri
Lanka by the non-implementation of the Seventeenth Amendment to the
Constitution thereby preventing the establishment of an independent Human
Rights Commission and independent Commissions for the police and the
public service, apart from undermining the Rule of Law, suggest that the
culture of impunity will increase.

In the above context, the country and the people of Sri Lanka as a whole
face perhaps the biggest challenge in our post-independence history. A
slide back to war and the collapse of the Ceasefire will mark the
beginning of an era of destruction and deprivation in which every Sri
Lankan will suffer. It is the primary responsibility of our political
leaders as well as of leaders of our communities and of the international
community to work together to devise means of preventing a return to war
and of returning to the path of negotiation for a just and sustainable
peace.

We call on the government and the LTTE, as parties to the Ceasefire
Agreement, to return to the substance of that Agreement and ensure that
the commitment to civilian protection is guaranteed. We also call on them
to publicly reaffirm their commitment to the principles of international
humanitarian law.

We call on the international community to explore the possibility of
creating a mechanism for the monitoring and protection of the human rights
of civilians in the face of the increasing number of violations that are
occurring in the context of the conflict.

Among the modalities that could be provided for in the creation of such a
mechanism would be:

-	the establishment of an expert panel of investigators, including
forensic expertise;
-	the creation of witness protection measures that would enable survivors
of violations to give testimony in security; and
-	the establishment of guidelines for the work of the mechanism through a
broad process of consultation with all constituencies.;
-	the provision of technical support and assistance to national and
international HR agencies in Sri Lanka.

The mechanism and functional framework for these interventions could be in
the form of the proposed Emergency Human Rights Committee which could be
convened by the Co-chairs with the collaboration of other countries which
are also committed to the reinforcing of the peace process in Sri Lanka.

The international community has issued strong statements to the LTTE,
through the banning of the organization within the EU, and to both the
LTTE and the government at the conclusion of the Co-Chairs meeting in
Tokyo in May 2006. The protection of civilians and respect for established
and universally accepted norms and standards of human rights and
humanitarian law have been at the forefront of their concerns. We now call
on the international community to exercise all its powers to prevail on
the LTTE and the government to maintain the ceasefire and to enter into
negotiations that will break the present stalemate.


Signatories:
Sunila Abeysekera
Rohan Edrisinha
Jehan Perera
Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu
Joe William

22nd June 2006


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[2]

Deccan Herald
July 7, 2006

Rice's visit
HOBSON'S CHOICE FOR PAK
by M B Naqvi
Pakistan has performed yeoman's service to America vis-a-vis al-Qaeda threat

US Secretary of State suddenly appeared in 
Islamabad on June 27 on her way to Kabul. It was 
several days ago. But its impact continues to be 
discussed. She was here in Islamabad only in 
March along with President George W Bush. US 
Sectaries of State do not travel to countries 
like Pakistan so many times in a year. The 
visit's context and purpose is anyhow significant.

Obvious context was Afghanistan. NATO military 
commanders, Americans and Afghan President have 
long complained that Pakistan is not stopping the 
Taliban, who, having regrouped and re-equipped 
inside Pakistan with official assistance, are 
raiding Afghanistan. Taliban's recent offensive 
is notably large in size. Both sides have 
suffered heavy casualties. Even so the casualties 
of the newly created Afghan Army may prove 
crippling.

Pakistan has been under this pressure for long to 
be more cooperative with Afghans and NATO forces. 
What Pakistan can do on the subject is not 
obvious. After all the Taliban are rising like a 
political Tsunami in the tribal areas of NWFP and 
parts of Balochistan. The governments of the two 
provinces largely comprise religious clerics that 
were Taliban's progenitors. Under their benign 
neglect, if not support, the Taliban have 
prospered and expanded their activities in areas 
that abut on Afghanistan.

Indeed Taliban have begun performing some of the 
functions of state: maintaining peace and order 
while the Pak Army remains confined to its 
encampments. They administer rough and ready 
justice against alleged criminals, usually 
hanging them up. Pakistan Army has deployed 
nearly 90 thousand troops alongside the Afghan 
border. But the border remains porous and no 
authority has ever been able to seal it off.

There is a history: Taliban used to be valuable 
assets of ISI and Pakistan's other intelligence 
agencies. They were sent to Afghanistan to 
conquer it and they did (except the Northern 
Alliance dominated northern strip). Northern 
Alliance was supported by India, Iran and other 
countries. These old links seem to have survived. 
But can they be suddenly snapped? That is not the 
nature of the beast.

For Pakistan these are abnormal times, being a 
partner of the Americans in the War on Terror. It 
has performed yeoman's service to America 
vis-à-vis al-Qaeda threat and Americans are quite 
happy. But Americans also want the war enemies to 
include Taliban.

Pakistan Army began to fight them and has so far 
lost 600 soldiers in three years. This war could 
not go on because of Taliban's political rise. 
Public support for Taliban in the heavily 
affected FATA Agencies means their influence is 
now spreading to NWFP's settled districts, 
especially Kohat, Dera Ismail Khan and DG Khan. 
Both sides could see the futility of this war.

Pakistan's hardline not producing results except 
its Army's casualties plus needless collateral 
damage on the civilian population. How much did 
the Taliban suffer remained uncertain. The 
Americans could not be unaware of the recent 
approaches being made by both sides to end this 
war. Only recently did the so-called 'militants' 
(read Taliban) have offered a month's ceasefire 
which is holding since June 25, except for one 
incident in which several soldiers died.

Pakistan has replaced the Governor of the NWFP 
(who directly governs Tribal Areas on behalf of 
the President of Pakistan) and the Corps 
Commander of the Army. The new incumbents want to 
form a Grand Jirga and have promised to 
strengthen the old offices of the Political 
Agents and revert to old methods of settling 
disputes through jirgas. All ideas of 
modernisation of FATA seem to have been buried 
and the quest is now to go back to the methods 
that the British had perfected.

Fact is that the Taliban are also proving an ever 
harder nut to crack by both western armies and 
Afghan troops inside Afghanistan. Not that 
dealing with them in Pakistan is any easier.

Pakistan has apparently no further stomach to 
sink deeper into a quagmire. Even the whole Army 
can get bogged down and not conquer Tribal Areas, 
armed to a man. Inside Afghanistan, Mullah Umar 
has just proclaimed through Al-Jazeera that he is 
still in Afghanistan and is controlling fairly 
large areas in that country. It is hard to 
conquer a political force by military means.

The NATO, US and Kabul government have to sort 
our their Taliban problem inside Afghanistan 
themselves - most probably the way Pakistan is 
attempting.

In Pakistan's case, the pressure from the 
Americans to persist can be seen in various 
contexts. Rice did not fail to publicly impress 
on President Musharraf that the upcoming 2007 
elections should be free and fair. This was 
clearly unwelcome to Islamabad and it has taken 
umbrage and protested loudly that it is no 
business of Rice as to how Pakistan conducts its 
elections.

The fear is widespread that Rice may also have 
requested some support vis-à-vis Iran which is 
obsessing American Administration. Pakistan is 
Iran's neighbour and its ability to side with the 
US is limited thanks to political and sectarian 
make up of Pakistanis.

Americans cannot but require from Pakistan some 
cooperation in their envisioned military 
operations. Pakistan's ability to provide open 
support is strictly limited. Pakistan can be 
embarrassed no end on the subject. If this 
creates some more distance between Islamabad and 
White House, few would be surprised.

Taliban are rising like a political tsunami in the tribal areas of Balochistan


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[3]

The Times 
July 06, 2006

BAD BARGAIN MADE IN THE MOSQUE
by Kenan Malik

Government has conceded responsibility for its 
Muslim citizens to unelected clerics

ARE MODERATE MUSLIMS refusing to take 
responsibility for rooting out extremists within 
their communities? Or is the Government ignoring 
the advice of Muslim leaders about how to deal 
with extremists and assuage alienation? It was 
unfortunate for both sides that this week's spat 
between Tony Blair and Muslim leaders should 
break out on the same day as the publication of 
the Times/Populus poll on Muslims in Britain. For 
the poll reveals how out of touch with reality 
are both sides in the debate - and how dangerous 
are the assumptions common to both sides.

The starting point in any discussion about 
terrorism and extremism seems to be that Muslims 
constitute a community with a distinct set of 
views and beliefs, and that, for them, real 
political authority must come from within their 
community. Mainstream politicians, so the 
argument goes, are incapable of engaging with 
them; only authentic Muslim leaders can. So there 
has to be a bargain: the Government acknowledges 
Muslim leaders as crucial partners in the task of 
rooting out terrorism and building a fairer 
society; in return Muslim leaders agree to keep 
their own house in order. The argument this week 
was really about who was, or was not, keeping 
their side of the bargain.

*
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But the trouble is the bargain itself. Not only 
is it rooted in a picture of the Muslim community 
and its relationship with the wider British 
society that is false, but also the cosy 
relationship between the Government and Muslim 
leaders exacerbates the problem it was meant to 
solve.

At first sight the results of the poll may seem 
to confirm the picture of a Muslim community set 
apart from the rest of society: 7 per cent of 
Muslims approve of suicide bombings in Britain; 2 
per cent would be proud if a family member joined 
al-Qaeda; more than one in ten believes that the 
cause, if not the actions, of the 7/7 bombers was 
legitimate.

A more careful reading of the poll, however, 
tells a different story. For a start, it reveals 
that Muslims and non-Muslims share a surprising 
number of attitudes. Three quarters of 
non-Muslims think Muslims should do more to 
integrate; so do two thirds of Muslims. Virtually 
the same proportion of Muslims and non-Muslims 
are offended by public drunkenness and by women 
wearing revealing clothes. A third of the general 
population has close friends who are Muslims - a 
high figure given that they make up less than 4 
per cent of the population. Nearly nine out of 
ten Muslims have close non-Muslim personal 
friends.

The poll suggests that both Muslims and 
non-Muslims believe that Britain is a deeply 
Islamophobic society, but it also suggests that 
this perception is unwarranted. More than half 
the general population understands why Muslims 
might feel offended by people getting anxious 
about Muslims carrying large bags on the Tube or 
the buses -- a higher figure than the proportion 
of Muslims who feel offended by this. Almost a 
third of non-Muslims object to the police 
monitoring imams. Nearly 60 per cent think that 
Muslims have made a valuable contribution to 
British life.

This is not a picture of a nation in thrall to 
Islamophobia. Nor is it a picture of a uniform 
Muslim population that responds in the same way 
to all questions and whose primary, or only, 
loyalty is to Islam. Few policy-makers have, I 
suspect, an image of Muslim communities as 
identical but the stereotype of homogeneity is 
what animates current policy towards Muslims.

The Government has long since abandoned its 
responsibility for engaging directly with Muslim 
communities. Instead it has effectively 
subcontracted its responsibilities to so-called 
community leaders. When the Prime Minister wants 
to find out what Muslims think about a particular 
issue he invites the Muslim Council of Britain to 
No 10. When the Home Secretary wants to get a 
message out to the Muslim community, he visits a 
mosque. Rather than appealing to Muslims as 
British citizens and attempting to draw them into 
the mainstream political process, politicians of 
all hues prefer to see them as people whose 
primarily loyalty is to their faith and who can 
be politically engaged only by other Muslims.

The consequences of this approach are hugely 
damaging. "Why should a British citizen who 
happens to be Muslim have to rely on clerics and 
other leaders of the religious community to 
communicate with the Prime Minister?", asks 
Amartya Sen, the Nobel prize-winning economist, 
in his new book Identity and Violence. Far from 
promoting integration, government policy 
encourages Muslims to see themselves as 
semi-detached Britons. After all, if the Prime 
Minister believes that he can engage with them 
only by appealing to their faith, rather than 
their wider political or national affiliations, 
who are Muslims to disagree? If politicians 
abdicate their responsibility for engaging with 
ordinary Muslims, is it surprising that those 
Muslims should feel disenchanted with the 
political process? Or that disenchantment should 
take a radical religious form?

The policy of subcontracting political 
responsibility allows politicians to wash their 
hands of the alienation of sections of the Muslim 
community. And it allows self-appointed community 
leaders with no democratic mandate to gain power 
both within Muslim communities and the wider 
society. But it does the rest of us -- Muslim and 
non-Muslim -- no favours. It is time that 
politicians dropped the pretence that there is a 
single Muslim community and started taking 
seriously the issue of political engagement with 
their constituents, whatever their religious 
faith.

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[4] 

Issues in Secular Politics  
July 2006 I

MINORITY APPEASEMENT!
by Ram Puniyani

While the opposition to reservation is on its 
peak, another front has been opened by those 
opposed to affirmative action of any sort. It may 
be a common observation by now that the most 
'consistent' political and social force opposed 
to any sort of affirmative action is the communal 
politics, the politics of RSS affiliates. Surly 
there are other elite affluent sections who also 
are diehard opponents of affirmative action and 
reservation but for communalists, 
reservation/affirmative action is a red herring. 
So it was not much of a surprise when Rajnath 
Singh, the current BJP chief , came down heavily 
against the 15 point scheme for minorities, which 
aims at all round upliftment of the minorities, 
more so the economically deprived sections of 
minority. Mr Singh, (26th June 2006), went to 
label the cabinet decision to allocate 15% of the 
funds for social welfare schemes for minorities 
as the 'appeasement' of minorities, an oft 
repeated allegation of this political outfit.
The central cabinet in its meeting on 22nd June 
approved Dr. Manmohan Singh's new 15 point 
program for minority welfare, including ways to 
prevent communal riots. In a comprehensive 
proposal the prime minister has asked for 
introduction of ways to enhance the living 
conditions, and allocation of 15% of funds from 
welfare budget for minorities. The aim of the 
proposal is to upgrade the facilities for 
minority education, modernize madrassa education 
and to provide scholarships for meritorious 
students. The program lays emphasis on equitable 
share in economic activities and employment. It 
also touches on different facets of lives 
including the rural housing schemes.
Before we take up the issue whether all this is 
appeasement or is a much needed measure to ensure 
that minorities also are able to progress like 
any other community, it is imperative that we 
have a brief look at the implementation of 
National Rural Employment guarantee scheme (NRES) 
in Gujarat. Reports indicate that Muslim minority 
is not able to take the benefit of this scheme as 
the Sarpanchas and concerned officials have been 
preventing Muslims from registering for this 
scheme. They are sent back couple of times, after 
which they get a subtle message and keep away 
from approaching the authorities.
Currently Rajinder Sachchar committee is in the 
process of finalizing its report about the status 
of Muslim minorities in India. What ever one 
could glean from the parts of report, and from 
the document prepared by a voluntary organization 
for presenting to the Sachchar Committee, 
(National Study on Socio-Economic Condition of 
Muslims of India, Indian Social Institute, Delhi, 
May 2006) makes one sit up with deep sense of 
anguish. The current socio economic status of 
Muslim minorities in particular, has slipped down 
in the human development indices. Also their 
abysmal representation in jobs, the more of them 
living below poverty line and more of them being 
illiterate, leaves no doubt in one's mind that 
without serious affirmative action, this 
community will go on being deprived more and 
more. The additional problem of post communal 
violence ghettotization is adding salt to the 
wounds, as in the ghettoes the living conditions 
go down and threatened psyche, fuels the 
conservative ideology.
Earlier, Gopal Singh Commission report had also 
brought to our attention a similar fact in the 
decade of early 1980s. It showed that only 3.41% 
students in Engineering colleges are Muslims, 
only 6.77% of them are registered at the 
employment exchange, in private sector they are 
8.16%, borrowers under bank loan schemes-9.41% 
getting 3.37% of borrowings, poor representation 
in judiciary. No action was taken based on this 
report, which has been gathering dust since. 
Later data (Shariff, India Development Report, 
OUP 1999) also shows that Muslims continue to get 
their share from artisanship and petty trade as 
compared to other social groups; in contrast 
their income is far below the national average 
and less than that earned by Hindus from this 
source. NSS data (Rounds 50 and 55 for years 1993 
and 1999-2000) reveal the unsettling trend of 
increasing disparity between Hindus and Muslims 
during 1990s with respect to the consumption, 
education, employment and landholdings, though 
literacy rates of both communities showed gradual 
improvement.
While the charges of appeasement abound and have 
been made part of the social common sense the 
reality is the contrary. No doubt the earlier 
governments have appeased the Mullahs and 
conservative sections of society for electoral 
purpose; it is also true that the Muslim 
community has been getting marginalized by the 
day. Right after partition, the elite Muslims 
left for Pakistan and majority of the Muslims 
remaining here were the poorer one's, coming from 
Shudra background and now living as ajlafs with 
Islamic identity. They were bypassed in the 
social development process so the percentage of 
their representation in jobs, bank loans, higher 
education and other social benefits has been 
declining constantly. During last two decades 
when communal politics has been on the rise their 
situation is worse off, and without a determined 
effort they can in no way come close to the 
national averages of social and economic indices. 
The problem is not that, they are being appeased 
but that most of the development schemes for 
minorities have been too few and whatever were 
there, have not been implemented properly.
Communal outfits, irrespective of which religion 
they derive their identity from, generally stand 
for status quo, so any measures which can lead to 
social transformation are shirked and opposed, 
some times upfront, sometimes in a subtle way. 
Since the opposing to reservation for Dalit/OBC 
will be an electoral hara-kiri, so Mandal is not 
opposed directly, instead Kamandal (Rath yatra 
for Babri demolition) is engineered. To oppose 
the Mandal II, 'Youth for Equality' or some such 
forum is created. In case of Muslims where 
talking of reservation, barring at few places, is 
not a rewarding electoral strategy, the 
opposition to this can be upfront under the 
banner of Minority appeasement. As such, communal 
forces are opposed to minorities' welfare and 
have been opposing it right since the formation 
of Congress in 1885. At that time Congress was 
charged with appeasing Muslims as Congress 
regarded Muslims as a part of Indian nation. The 
most ghastly manifestation of this came up when a 
Hindutva trained volunteer, Nathuram Godse, 
killed the father of the Indian nation, Mahatma 
Gandhi on the same change of Muslim appeasement. 
And now we have Mr. Singh opposing the welfare 
measures and labeling these overdue measures as 
minority appeasement!


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[5] 

The Times of India
July 5, 2006

DARK SIDE OF LEARNING
by Shiv Visvanathan

One of the oddest things about the controversy 
around the Knowledge Commission is that everyone 
quizzed it about reservation and no one asked it 
about knowledge. What does knowledge mean for the 
new post-industrial societies we are dreaming of?

What makes this even odder is that it is the 
Indian national movement that created the idea of 
a post-industrial society. Ananda Coomaraswamy, 
geologist and art critic, coined the term during 
the debates of the swadesi movement.

We realise that knowledge is not a singular term. 
The history of knowledge is about how different 
knowledges interacted with or subjugated the 
other. Without Arabic knowledge, the modern West 
would not exist.

Alternately western science has often sought to 
museumise other forms of know-ledge. The first 
question we ask then is how we adjudicate between 
forms of knowledge. Does tribal knowledge yield 
to scientific knowledge about the forest?

Does OBC have many craft communities listed 
within? How do we respond to their knowledge in 
this process of change? It would be terribly 
parochial if the commission were to restrict 
itself to scientific knowledge.

India is a land proud of its diversity whether of 
the 1,000 varieties of mango, or 50,000 varieties 
of rice. Yet there is a correlation between 
poverty, or more accurately, subsistence and 
diversity.

The question the Knowledge Commission would face 
is do we sustain the sites of diversity or do we 
go for market choice?


  The battle between industrial choice and the 
cultural idea of alternatives will be a poignant 
one. Justice is about access, but what kind of 
access to diversity are we going to guarantee?

Any society that wants to be secular and is 
searching for a new locus of merit must 
adjudicate between fairness and justice.

The two have often been confused. When a Brahmin 
girl gets 98 per cent in school and fails to get 
admission in a Chennai medical college, we face a 
sense of unfairness.

How does one communicate to her what scheduled 
castes and tribes have undergone? One must 
realise that knowledge through the instrument of 
the census has a paradoxi-cal role to play the 
instrument designed to eliminate caste entrenched 
it further.

Can knowledge help create secular identities we 
are looking for, the sense of professionalism, 
the idea of citizenship? Can these provide an 
escape from the nested identities of caste and 
ethnicity or must we invest in caste as the 
identity kit of the 21st century?

Knowledge creates community but it can also 
threaten community. Knowledge also imposes a 
structure of deskilling.

  The question we will face in the future is how 
do we rework the idea of progress in a society 
caught in so many different time warps? Can 
justice to the Dalit be also justice to the 
tribe? Try answering it through the debate on the 
Narmada dam.

Do we recognise the diversity we are so fond of 
that the diversity of our agriculture and craft 
belongs to specific communities? Does the 
Knowledge Commission argue for their IPRs or does 
it go for the latest agricultural technologies 
which might create an enclosure movement in the 
countryside?

The crisis of agriculture is a double crisis of 
knowledge and inequality. Do we go for 
biotechnology or for a diversity of agricultural 
styles which maximises security?

One can't think of knowledge only around IT and 
e-governance. The questions have to be of a 
different kind. But it does emphasise one thing. 
If we start with reservation and knowledge as 
opposite poles, we lose our

creativity. Both economic growth and justice need 
a different idea of progress. Inequality cannot 
be understood through profit and GNP. One has to 
measure access to nutrition, information, 
community, water to understand inequality.

Ours has not been a know-ledge-centred debate. We 
are still relying on a colonial form of knowledge 
- the census and a colonial tactic, reservation. 
Both of these ideas see society as stock, when 
society should be seen as a set of flows.

Empha-sising reservation and neglecting 
atrocities will not do. This will help us evade 
the fact that often the worst caste atrocities 
are not the infliction of the Brahmin but of the 
new OBC classes.

The OBC is both the victim and perpe-trator. In 
fact, to ignore it creates new forms of identity 
politics which threaten the pursuit of justice. 
It would be paradoxical if a Knowledge Commission 
were to reorientalise India in the name of caste.

Max Weber once hinted that democracy is a 
function of two vocations, science and politics. 
Just as politics challenges the hegemony of 
expertise, science questions the urge to 
populism. Democracy needs the tension between the 
two, the see-sawing battles between knowledge and 
politics.

But to create these battles we need institutions 
like the university which bracket knowledge 
without reducing it to an applied science, an 
ideology or a utopia. The university also has to 
think about new philosophies of justice, 
sustainability and vulnerability.

It cannot do so if it is not protected from the 
immediacy of politics. To deny it that 
possibility is to deny democracy new ways of 
dreaming and dreaming politics in particular.

The Knowledge Commission should dream of 
conditions beyond the immediacy of current 
politics.

The writer is a social scientist.


_____


[6]   [ACTION ALERT! - Protest Narendra 
Modi/Ashok Bhatt's invitation by FIA-GANA ]

Dear Friends,

As you might know, there are two Gujarati conferences in New Jersey this
summer, and they have both invited Narendra Modi, as per newspaper
sources (http://ia.rediff.com/news/2006/jun/20guj.htm?q=np&file=.htm ).
It is not certain whether or not Modi will be allowed to come this
time, but it is quite alarming that he has been invited in the first
place.

Please find below a letter that we and various allied organizations plan
to send the organizers of the Gujarati convention on July 7-9th,
organized by the FIA and GANA (www.fianynjct.org).  The letter is to
register protest at the invitation of Narendra Modi as well as Ashok
Bhatt, the main architects of the violence in Gujarat 2002.  We are
collecting both organizational endorsements as well as individual
signatures.

As time is of essence, please send in your signatures and endorsements
ASAP.  Email them to mail at friendsofsouthasia.org . Also, please
circulate this letter widely.

*  For organizational endorsements: please send in the full name of
the organization, city,state and also the webpage for the group (or a
one-line description of the group).

*  For individual signatures: please send in First and Last name,
city, state (and any relevant affiliation).

Thanks!

Campaign to Stop Funding Hate
===============================


To

Mr. Ramesh Patel, Mr. Rambhai Gadhvi, Dr Sudhir Parikh, Mr. Jayesh
Patel, Mr. Prakash Shah, Mr. Jagdish Patel, Mr. Magan Patel, Mr.
Jitendra Fadia, Mr. Naresh Bhadiadra, Mr. Mahesh Patel

Members of the Organizing Committee, First Gujarati Convention

Gujarati Associations of North America (GANA)
and Federation of Indian Associations-New York, New Jersey and Connecticut
355 Shawn Place
North Brunswick, NJ 08902

Dear GANA and FIA,

We, the undersigned organizations and individuals, who believe in a
secular, democratic and pluralistic Gujarat, write to you with deep
concern over reports that your organizations have extended invitations
to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and the Gujarat Health
Minister Ashok Bhatt to attend the GANA convention on July 7-9, 2006
September 2006.   FIA-GANA's invitation to Mr. Modi is being reported
by several news agencies [1], while Mr. Bhatt is listed as an "invited
dignatory" on the FIA poster for the conference [2].

If this is true, then we wish to register our strong protest at these
invitations.  We believe that GANA's slogan of " Gujarat ni asmita "
(Gujarat's dignity) is only undermined by honoring individuals such as
Mr. Modi and Mr. Bhatt, who have a long record of participating in
sectarian hatred and communalism, and does no justice to Gujarat's
long tradition of hospitality and tolerance.

As you are aware, Mr. Modi and Mr. Bhatt are both regarded as chief
architects of the carnage that engulfed Gujarat in 2002 in which more
than 2000 Muslims lost their lives and 200,000 more fled their homes,
and in which concerted sexual violence against women was employed to
an unprecedented degree.

*   Mr.  Modi has been charged in an Indian court of law with crimes
against humanity and genocide.   He is a member of the violent and
extremist communal organization, the Rashriya Swamsevak Sangh (RSS)
has never expressed regret for his failure to take preventative
measures to stop the violence, indeed took measures or made statements
to incite it, and punished conscientious police officials who did take
preventative measures by promptly transferring them out to
inconsequential postings/assignments. The policies of the State
Government of Gujarat, of which he is the chief executive, have been
and continue to be discriminatory toward Muslim and Christian
minorities; the law is applied and enforced in a discriminatory
manner, and those fighting for justice have been continually harassed
by the state machinery. The Human Rights Watch in its recent report
notes,

" The Gujarat state government, led by Chief Minister Narandra Modi of
the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), not only failed to
take appropriate action to prevent the violence, but has since failed
to properly investigate the crimes committed.   It has consistently
sought to impede successful prosecutions of those allegedly involved
in the massacres, leading the Supreme Court and National Human Rights
Commission (NHRC) to intervene on several occasions ." [3]

Many other human rights organizations, including Amnesty
International, Human Rights Watch, Commonwealth Initiative for Human
Rights, Citizen's Initiative, People's Union for Civil Liberties
(PUCL), People's Union for Democratic Rights (PUDR) have documented
the extensive complicity of the state government, led by Mr Modi in
orchestrating the violence against Muslims in 2002.   It is for this
reason that the U.S. government decided to deny him a visa in 2005,
and some Congressmen introduced a resolution "condemning the conduct
of Chief Minister Narendra Modi for his actions to incite religious
persecution ." [4]

*  Mr Bhatt also took an active role in instigating and overseeing
planned violence against Muslims in the post-Godhra carnage in 2002,
according to several human rights reports.   The Concerned Citizen's
Tribunal Report notes that on 27th February, 2002,

"Shri Ashok Bhatt and Shri Pratap Singh Chauhan, met at Lunavada in
Panchmahal district along with others. In this meeting, the manner and
methods of unleashing violence on Muslims were planned in detail. "
[5]

Furthermore, several media reports have established that Mr. Ashok
Bhatt was present in the Police Control Rooms in Ahmedabad [6], where,
as Human Rights Watch report noted, "repeated pleas for help were
blatantly turned down. [7]" The National Human Rights Commission in
India also noted the participation of Mr. Ashok Bhatt in the riots,
saying "A number of persons holding responsible positions in public
life alleged involvement of some Ministers and MLAs in these riots.
They mentioned that Shri Gordhan Zadafia, Home Minister and Shri Ashok
Bhatt, Health Minister were monitoring the progress of riots from the
City Police control room. " [8]  Additionally, eye witness reports
collected by the Concerned Citizen's Tribunal suggest that Mr. Bhatt
was responsible for inciting arson and destruction in the Naroda Fruit
Market and the Paldi-Ellis Bridge in Ahmedabad. [9]

We find it shameful that organizations supposed to represent the
collective interests of Indians and Indian Americans in the United
States would choose to invite people such as Mr. Narendra Modi and Mr.
Ashok Bhatt to their conferences, and thus implicitly endorse and
promote their agenda of sectarian hatred and violence.

Yours sincerely,

________________________________

[1] Two Gujarati conventions vie for attention in US, Sheela Bhatt,
June 20 th 2006, Rediff India Abroad, available at
http://ia.rediff.com/news/2006/jun/20guj.htm?q=np&file=.htm , also see
Speculation rife over Modi's US visa, July 1, 2006, NDTV available at
http://tinyurl.com/o2nbd

[2] http://www.fianynjct.org/event.pdf

[3] DISCOURAGING DISSENT: Intimidation and Harassment of Witnesses,
Human Rights Activists, and Lawyers Pursuing Accountability for the
2002 Communal Violence in Gujarat, by the Human Rights Watch, 2006
http://hrw.org/backgrounder/asia/india/gujarat/

[4] H.Res. 160 in the 109th Congress, available at
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=hr109-160

[5] State Complicity, in Concerned Citizens Tribunal - Gujarat 2002 ,
Vol 2, available at http://www.sabrang.com/tribunal/vol2/compgovt.html

[6] Praveen Swami in Saffron Terror, Frontline Volume 19, Issue 06,
2002 writes "Health Minister Ashok Bhat sat in the Police Control Room
in Ahmedabad through the first two days of violence. Given his
portfolio, it was an odd place to be -but not given his past. Bhat,
along with Union Minister of State for Defence Harin Pathak, faces
charges of having incited a mob that murdered a police constable in
the course of communal violence on April 25, 1985"
http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl1906/19060080.htm

[7] Background to the Violence,   in Compounding Injustice: The
Government's Failure to Redress Massacres in Gujarat , 2003, Human
Rights Watch, NewYork, available at
http://hrw.org/reports/2003/india0703/

[8] Report on the visit of NHRC Team headed by Chairperson, NHRC to
Ahmedabad, Vadodra and Godhra from 19-22 March 2002, available at
http://nhrc.nic.in/guj_annex_1.htm

[9] The Accused, in Concerned Citizens Tribunal - Gujarat 2002 , Vol
2, available at http://www.sabrang.com/tribunal/vol2/accused2.html


--------------------------
http://stopfundinghate.org
© 2002-2003 THE CAMPAIGN TO STOP FUNDING HATE.


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Buzz on the perils of fundamentalist politics, on
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