SACW #1 | Nov. 27-28, 2006
Harsh Kapoor
aiindex at mnet.fr
Mon Nov 27 23:24:08 CST 2006
South Asia Citizens Wire - Pack 1 | November
27-28, 2006 | Dispatch No. 2326 - Year 8
[1] Pakistan: Protection at the cost of freedom (Saad Sayeed)
[2] India: Don't forget Gujarat 2006 (Editorial, Hindustan Times)
[3] India on 20 cents a day (Aseem Shrivastava)
[4] [Tahmima Anam] New fiction star taps
Bangladeshi roots (Vanessa Thorpe and Mahtab
Haider)
[5] India - Book Review: Hindutva Nationalism and Agenda of RSS (Ram Puniyani)
[6] India - Obscurantism: MP Assembly has Vaastu problem? (Milind Ghatwai)
[7] UK: Dawkins takes fight against religion
into the classroom (Sarah Cassidy)
[8] Upcoming Events:
(i) Forum on Historic Developments in Nepal (Vancouver, 10 December 2006)
(ii) Fourth International Rationalist Conference
(New Delhi, 26-29 December 2006)
____
[1]
The News International
November 28, 2006
PROTECTION AT THE COST OF FREEDOM
by Saad Sayeed
Finally, seven years into his rule, General
Musharraf has changed one of the most repulsive
laws enacted by Ziaul Haq. Women no longer need
to produce four witnesses when filing rape
charges or fear they might in turn be convicted
of adultery. However, the Women's Protection Bill
(WPB) has been accompanied by an anti-lewdness
clause and there is the small matter of the
Hudood Ordinance operating alongside the civil
procedure.
Despite the minimal changes, the MMA has been
enraged by the immorality of the whole procedure,
with Maulana Fazlur Rehman asserting that
Pakistan will now be turned into a 'free-sex
zone'. What a shame that we can no longer rape
women and accuse them of adultery. Not in
Pakistan! Don't worry, the MMA is here to
safeguard our morality. They will tell us what to
do, how to wear our trousers, trim our beards,
and go after the infidels.
The Bill that was passed by the Senate on
November 24 is no more than a symbol of the lost
freedoms that might be achieved and regained.
Everything Pakistan lost in 1977 is still buried
deep beneath the sand. Voices muted for over a
decade have lost the ability to speak out, to
reason, and are still recovering after being
mentally crippled by General Ziaul Haq and his
equally hegemonic legacy.
It is obvious that people should not be subjected
to religious law -- as it is civil law does not
treat us equally. But when religion is
interpreted by manipulative bigots such as the
MMA and laws are enacted under regimes such as
that of Ziaul Haq, his eerie chuckle still
resonating throughout the corridors of power in
this country, then the result will most certainly
be the suppression of freedom and our private
rights as human beings. The MMA want to enforce,
not promote morality, there is a difference. As
it is, universal judgements of morality are
problematic. Who is to judge what version is
correct. By enacting morality, we are subjecting
ourselves to constant policing and scrutiny.
This is why the WPB is little more than a farce.
Musharraf could have repealed the Hudood
Ordinance once and for all. But instead, through
the anti-lewdness and remaining Hudood clauses,
the law, alongside the military, will still
govern our private lives. The question that needs
to be asked if that why does the ruling party
seem to be so earnest in wanting to meet the
demands of the MMA? Is it because not doing so
would further erode the government's write in
Balochistan and the NWFP?
We all know that this law was not passed to
protect the women of Pakistan. Instead, it was a
convenient way of propping up the country's
international image. Nations are judged by the
way they treat their women and Pakistan has long
found itself at the bottom of the barrel. This
scale has been produced through history and every
eastern society has been hypocritically subjected
to it. If the establishment really cared about
the plight of Pakistan's women, or the people in
general, symbolic laws such as these would not be
the way to correct past mistakes. It is obvious
that women are regarded as no more than property
by the religious zealots that comprise the MMA
and as political mileage by the military
establishment.
For its part, the MMA has succeeded in ensuring
that it passed the Hasba Bill in the NWFP, which
allows it to unleash the moral police on the
residents of that province. How long before that
moral police comes knocking on your door? Who
needs freedom anyway, at least our GDP is rising.
The writer has worked at the Herald previously.
Currently he is a student based in Toronto.
______
[2]
Hindustan Times
November 27, 2006
EDITORIAL
DON'T FORGET GUJARAT 2006
If the Gujarat government had its way, we should
have forgotten about Gujarat 2002. Even if we
discount the shameful role that the local
administration played during the post-Godhra
massacres and the fact that the culprits are yet
to be brought to justice, we could argue the need
to not dwell forever on the horrific events for
the sake of Gujarat's future. But how can one
'move on' when there is the unfinished business
of rehabilitating thousands of riot victims? Any
talk of closure becomes absurd when these
thousands continue to languish almost five years
after the 'incident'. Following a report of the
National Commission for Minorities (NCM) that
focused on the failure of existing rehabilitation
policies in Gujarat, the central government has
decided to review the policies determining the
compensation and rehabilitation packages provided
to massacre victims and their families.
The Centre will pay Rs 7 lakh as compensation to
the families of over 2,000 victims killed during
the 2002 pogrom. Putting a price tag to human
lives is incredibly difficult. But it is a much
less philosophical exercise - and a much more
urgent one - to provide monetary relief so that
enforced hardships can be made to disappear. Over
5,000 families displaced by the 2002 riots
continue to live in camps in 'sub-human
conditions' that lack basic facilities like
water, sewage, health and schools, approachable
roads and streetlights. In the words of the NCM
report prepared after a five-day visit to 16 of
the 17 aid camps in October, these refugees,
overwhelmingly Muslim, are 'marooned' from the
rest of society. The Gujarat government insists
that these families refuse to leave these camps
and 'return home'. Unfortunately, the fact that
only 7 per cent of compensation has been
disbursed by the local authorities tell a
different story. Till date, the state government
has paid only Rs 41 crore in compensation, and
actually returned Rs 19 crore to the Centre
unspent.
Local authorities cite problems in the
implementation procedure (lack of ration cards,
etc.). To ensure that the same 'implementational
failure' does not recur with the central package,
a monitoring mechanism to check rehabilitation
measures should be immediately set up.
Compensation schemes amount to nothing if the
money does not reach its intended destination.
And we must not forget that there are real people
who continue to suffer every day even as we are
tempted to treat Gujarat 2002 only as a mad, bad
and dangerous memory.
______
[3]
http://www.sacw.net/free/aseem25nov2006.html
www.sacw.net | 25 November 2006
INDIA ON 20 CENTS A DAY
The fine print in the reporting of global poverty estimates
by Aseem Shrivastava
The World Bank - which has to be applauded for
having made the first such attempt -
started making international comparisons of
poverty only about two decades back. For obvious
reasons of convenience it developed two simple
notions of poverty. The US Treasury being the
power behind the institution, and the dollar
being the reserve currency by design, the lower
poverty line was set at $1 a day per capita.
Those below it were considered to be "the poorest
of the poor". The upper poverty line was set at
$2 a day. Those living on $1-2 a day were still
poor, but not as badly off. The updated numbers
today, corrected for inflation, are $1.08 and
$2.15.
The vagaries of purchasing power (dis)parities
However, there was a problem. It was realized
that $1 goes much farther in purchasing necessary
items of consumption in a poor country compared
to a rich one. (Moreover, exchange rates do not
take into account non-traded goods.) Using
prevailing exchange rates, Rs.45 can buy more in
India than $1 can in America. So unless it was
corrected for the lower cost of living in poor
countries - enabling access to a bigger amount of
real goods for the same amount of money - this
measure of poverty was likely to give an
overestimate of the number of poor people living
in absolute poverty. To make purchasing power
across countries comparable, economists developed
what is known as the PPP (purchasing power
parity) index. Taking into account the lower cost
of living in impoverished countries, a conversion
factor is now applied to market exchange rates to
calculate what is minimally necessary to survive
there.
Using widely quoted World Bank numbers on GDP,
this conversion factor for a country like India
(2005) can be computed to be approximately 5.3.
This means that $1.08 a day in India should
effectively imply a purchasing power of about 20
cents a day to an American - or indeed anyone -
unacquainted with the nuances of PPP
calculations. However, given how the numbers are
quoted everywhere, the dominant impression that
is conveyed is that the poor are living on less
than $1 or $2 a day when, in fact, it would be
enormously more accurate, as far as everyday
English is concerned, to say that the poor are
living on less than $0.20 or $0.40 a day. The
reason why this is not done is obvious: it would
give an even more alarming picture of the scale
and depth of poverty across this enormously
wealthy world. Most decent people are shocked
enough by the understated numbers in the form
they are widely quoted. More reality would numb
and paralyze even the grittiest of activists.
"Humanity", T.S.Eliot wrote, "cannot bear much
reality." He had the privileged in mind.
The most recent World Bank estimates for India
are based on household surveys carried out in
1999-2000. It was found that almost 80% of
purported superpower India's population was
surviving on less than $2.15 a day (in PPP
terms). That is, about 800 million people were
living on $0.40 a day or less. Nearly 35% (350
million) were found to be living on $0.20 a day
or less. Even if the proportion of poor people
has fallen somewhat during the past 5-6 years,
the absolute numbers would not look too different
today.
I have asked several non-experts abroad who have
traveled to India, and are thus somewhat familiar
with market exchange rates, how they interpret
the $1 a day or $2 a day figure. The answer is:
literally. In other words, they think that really
poor Indians (35% of the population) live on less
than Rs.45 and less poor Indians (another 45% of
the population) live on between Rs.45-90 a day.
In their imagination that is bad enough for
Western countries to send aid to poor countries.
However, if their belief was in fact correct then
(assuming Rs.20 a day to be the minimum needed to
supply the 2200 calories of food intake - and
minimal nutrition - that agricultural economists
and the UN take to be the survival norm
appropriately averaged across age groups,
locations and kinds of labor) at least the
additional 450-500 million who would be living in
the Rs.45-90 a day range would be well out of
poverty. In fact, a substantial proportion of the
people living under the lower poverty line would
be out of poverty too. There might perhaps remain
some 50 to 100 million poor, malnourished Indians
whose long-term welfare could easily be looked
after by the prosperity all around.
Not only would Indian politicians, government
officials, businessmen and heir consultants be
jumping out of their seats in sheer disbelief
that their superpower fantasies may actually be
realized, but if this state of affairs was
representative of the impoverished world as a
whole, the World Bank would be out of business,
their achieved goal of a "world free of poverty"
having ironically led them there!
Sadly, the reality is closer to "a world free of
the poor". Thanks to the subtleties of PPP
calculations it may quite possibly be the case
that the number of people across the world who
are not able to meet the minimum standards for
adequate nutrition is anywhere from 3 to 4
billion, rather than the officially estimated 2.7
billion who are estimated to be living under $2 a
day. No one really knows. In other words, we
could all be off by a whole continent!
Some experts in the field, such as Sanjay Reddy
of Columbia University or Robert Wade of the
London School of Economics advise deep skepticism
about prevailing official estimates, especially
of alleged changes thereof on account of
globalization. Wade advocates that "the political
economy of statistics" is crucial and argues for
greater competition in the market for the
generation of international poverty data, so far
a de facto monopoly of the World Bank. No free
market there! There is intense debate among
economists and policy-makers as to just how much
poverty there is in the world and whether it is
going up or down with globalization. According to
one expert Angus Deaton, "it seems impossible to
make statements about changes in world poverty
when the ground underneath one's feet is changing
in this way."
Where do the World Bank experts go wrong? A few
of them are even known to this writer, and are
reliable people of otherwise unimpeachable
integrity. Being a drop-out economist myself I
appreciate the trials and tribulations of the
economists and statisticians at the World Bank
who compute the numbers on poverty. It is a
harrowing mine-field of data they must negotiate
on a daily basis in order to arrive at the sort
of numbers the world and its policy-makers are
interested in. The challenge of measuring poverty
and the (changes thereof) accurately, in a world
as diverse, complex and dynamic as ours, is
immense. But after decades of effort by trained
statisticians it should have become possible by
now to arrive at somewhat reliable numbers.
The problem is, at bottom, be political, rather
than one of expertise. The very fact that when
making comparisons between enriched and
impoverished countries, all monetary magnitudes
have to be inflated significantly to get a sense
of real values in the poor world should have been
a matter of great ethical concern to economists,
something to make them wonder as to how things
got to this point. In a world of markets
stretched across mountainously uneven playing
fields, pricing is determined not so much by the
real costs (to human labor and to nature)
incurred but by historically determined economic
forces like the willingness and ability to pay.
Typically, the latter are shaped in profound ways
by legacies of inequalities in wealth and power
which mainstream economists are trained to avoid
taking into account while preparing their
advocacy of "free" markets. In the real world, as
against the general equilibrium models
microeconomists are schooled in, few things are
as politically shaped and formed as the structure
of relative prices. In particular, the price of
labor - wages - is almost entirely a matter of
bargaining, as also, we are realizing, the price
of utilizing nature.
Moreover, in our increasingly packaged
consumerist world even global poverty figures
must ultimately arrive in a wrapping that is not
unpalatably unattractive to the public.
Trickle-down will ultimately work, we are
repeatedly assured by growth economists. But like
the late John Kenneth Galbraith is said to have
remarked acerbically, faith in trickle-down is a
bit like feeding race horses superior oats so
that starving sparrows can forage in their dung.
All indications, especially in parts of the world
like rural India, are that a decade and a half of
corporate globalization has left undernutrition
and malnutrition all but intact, and might quite
possibly have worsened the predicament for many
millions.
Numbed (by the numbers)
In a world which has been brought up to regard
numerical precision as a sign of scientific
rigor, it easily gets forgotten (especially by
mainstream economists) that poverty is not merely
a matter of numbers. Numbers can only tell us
about what the experts call "income poverty".
Modern standards of living involve large amounts
of intangibles and social consumption, known to
economists as "public goods": drinking water,
public sanitation, health and education are only
some of the services which people in rich
countries take for granted because they have been
traditionally guaranteed by the state (though in
recent years private corporations have queued up,
often successfully - especially in impoverished
countries - to take control and possession of
these services). When these are taken into
account it becomes clear that what the experts
call the "poverty line" is actually more
accurately labeled "starvation line", as some
people will have it. Many Indian economists have
been advocating a serious upward revision of the
poverty line in order to get a better grasp of
the economic reality.
Economists have tried to remedy the situation by
evolving during the last few decades the Human
Development Index (HDI), calculated and issued by
the UNDP every year. It tries to take into
account life expectancy (as an indicator of
health) and levels of adult literacy and
enrolment (as indicators of education), apart
from considering per capita incomes. It is
certainly an improvement over raw numbers for
poverty. And yet, if India's HDI is 0.63 and
Norway's is 0.96, busy eyes will be tempted to
conclude that Norwegians live only one and a half
times as well as Indians! The crushing quality of
human poverty in a cruel world simply cannot be
captured by numbers like this. Nor can the
enormity of the environmental damage from
deregulated industrial growth be captured, as the
World Bank tries to do, in its Little Green Data
Book, by just offering estimates of greenhouse
gas emissions, depletion of forest cover and a
few other measurable magnitudes. The ecosystemic
effects of runaway industrial growth - the damage
done to climatic balances for instance - are
possible to observe now, but not as easily
quantified. There are exponential and synergetic
changes taking place - for the worse - which
might take the best informed experts by surprise.
Perhaps, we would do well to remember Einstein's
counsel: "Everything that can be counted does not
necessarily count; everything that counts cannot
necessarily be counted." The poverty measurement
industry loses much sleep and sweat over details
that do not matter much. The big picture, perhaps
unsurprisingly, is inaccurately reported. The
propaganda efforts of governments and
corporations succeed in the end in keeping some
of the more terrible effects of prevailing
economic policies from clear public view,
undermining democratic transparency and potential
accountability.
Rather than get drowned in swirling oceans of
data, we might look for the prominent ridges on
the gyrating currents of the monetized economy.
However, it is then important to locate them
precisely and, crucially, label and flag them
accurately. Busy readers don't have time to
interpret the fine print. And public patience
with economists wears thin.
We only count and measure what is useful,
important or interesting. By measuring we
indicate that we care about what is measured. The
score on poverty, especially if it is shameful,
is worth keeping, if only to remind us of the
extent of the failure of globalization not merely
to change the lives of the poor but perhaps in
turning them for the worse. (If China has lifted
tens of millions of families out of poverty, the
secret of their success lies in the years and
decades preceding globalization - in the early
1980s rural reforms were carried out, among other
things, granting access to land to the rural
poor. Besides, the strong foundations of the
social infrastructure - education and health -
were laid down in the era of communism.
Globalization has only allowed the country to
reap the harvest of pre-existing investments
better.)
If global poverty statistics are not disseminated
accurately, the facts on the ground will only get
worse - thanks to misinformed policy-making among
other things - and will one day command dreadful
obedience from one and all. The rulers of the day
risk the implications of Colin Powell's faux pas
a few years back - of boasting that the number of
dead Iraqi civilians did not interest him very
much. And the potential consequences across the
globe could be as catastrophic as what Iraq is
experiencing today.
Aseem Shrivastava is an independent writer. He
can be reached at aseem62 at yahoo.com
______
[4]
The Observer
November 26, 2006
NEW FICTION STAR TAPS BANGLADESHI ROOTS
Novelist hailed as the next Monica Ali recalls the horrors of warfare
Vanessa Thorpe and Mahtab Haider in Dhaka
Great writing may be in the blood, but having a
window seat on remarkable historical events can
help to shape an author. A major new talent,
Tahmima Anam, has the advantage of coming from a
line of gifted Bangladeshi writers and thinkers,
yet it is the damaging experience her family
shared with thousands of others living around
them that is to see her launched in Britain.
Anam, a 31-year-old Londoner born in Bangladesh,
is the author of a book that charts the personal
impact of the violent upheaval which split a
continent and drove a wedge between close
relatives in the 1970s. The Golden Age, her debut
novel, to be published early next year, has been
hailed as a work to rival Brick Lane by Monica
Ali and White Teeth by Zadie Smith. But, unlike
both these award-winning novels, the author says
that her story is not a saga of immigrant life in
Britain. Instead she returns to the horror of the
war in her homeland, formerly East Pakistan. 'As
a child I was told many stories about the war
that were all so interesting,' she said. Anam's
father is Mahfuz Anam, the editor of the
country's largest independent broadsheet, the
Daily Star, while her paternal grandfather, Abul
Mansur Ahmed, was a political figure in East
Pakistan and a satirist widely read today.
Anam now lives in West Hampstead, London, 5,000
miles from her parents. But this year, with
literary guidance from Andrew Motion, the Poet
Laureate, and inspiration from South Asian
writers such as Arundhati Roy and Vikram Seth,
her talent is set to be unveiled.
The story of personal loss she tells in The
Golden Age also draws on memories from her
mother. 'Both of my parents were involved. Their
entire generation was,' she said. Speaking in her
Bangladesh home this weekend, Anam's mother,
Shaheen, recalled: 'We often had freedom fighters
stay the night at our place or bury weapons in
our front yard. One night the army came to the
house with a young freedom fighter they had
tortured into giving away where the weapons were
stored. They wanted to take away my younger
brother, who was only 12. I think these stories
made a strong impression on Tahmima.'
Anam was tutored and encouraged by Motion when
she took up a place as a student on his
university creative writing course in London. 'I
remember the first week on the course he told me
I "didn't have to be so dutiful", and the phrase
stuck in my mind. I had been feeling I had to
tell the truth, and hearing that from him kind of
liberated me,' she said. Anam's talent was
spotted by the publishers John Murray when they
came across her piece in a published anthology of
the course work and she won an Arts Council
grant. An extract from her novel will appear in
the January edition of Granta, the literary
magazine.
The opening of The Golden Age
Dear Husband, I lost our children today.
Outside the courthouse Rehana bought two kites,
one red and one blue, from Khan Brothers Variety
Store and Confectioners. The man behind the
counter wrapped them up in brown paper and jute
ribbon. Rehana tucked the packets under her arm
and hailed a rickshaw. As she was climbing in,
she saw the lawyer running towards her.
'Mrs Haque, I am very sorry.' He sounded sincere.
Rehana couldn't bring herself to say it was all
right.
'You must find some money. That is the only way.
Find some money, and then we will try again.
These bastards don't move without a little
grease.'
Money. Rehana stepped into the rickshaw and
lifted the hood over her head. 'Dhanmondi,' she
said, her voice in a thin quiver. 'Road Number 5.'
When she got home, the children were sitting
together on the sofa with their knees lined up.
Maya's feet hovered above the floor.
Sohail was looking down at his palms and counting
the very small lines. He saw Rehana and smiled,
but did not rise from his chair, or call out, as
Maya did, 'Ammoo! Why were you so long?'
Rehana had decided it would not be wise to cry in
front of the children, so she had done her crying
in the rickshaw, in sobs that caused her to hold
on to the narrow frame of the seat and open her
mouth in a loud, wailing O.
______
[5]
Book Review
HINDUTVA NATIONALISM AND AGENDA OF RSS
by Ram Puniyani
(Book Reviewed: Shamsul Islam, 'Religious
Dimensions of Indian Nationalism': A Study of
RSS, Media House, Delhi 2006, Pages 383, Rs. 360)
The obstacles to the path of Indian democracy
look grave in their dimensions due to the slow
rise of the politics spearhead by RSS. While RSS
projects minorities as the major threat to Hindu
nation, it itself by positing the concept of
Hindu nation, poses serious threat to the values
of secularism, democratic nationalism and the
concepts of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity
(community). While putting forward the emotive
nationalism around Hindu religion it is not only
intimidating the religious minorities but as such
attacking the very process of caste and gender
transformation. Shamsul Islam hits the nail on
the head when he picks up nationalism as the
basic pivot of studying this organization, very
much in the center of Indian politics from last
two and half decades. The author's labor of
research is very obvious from the formulations
which he has been able to base on the original
papers and documents collected by him over a
period of last three decades. No mean job by any
standards, as the RSS is generally inconspicuous,
as it functions by resorting more to word of
mouth propaganda and less to the ideological
outpourings.
Richard Bonney, a scholar of Indo Pak
nationalisms, in his foreword takes the bull by
the horns when he points out that RSS cannot be
underestimated in the current times and that the
outcomes required to deal with RSS are mammoth,
either to ban it, or to drastically reform it
from inside, or to build an equally powerful
organization committed to the defense of Indian
constitution and its pluralistic ethos. The
obsession with the past glories is part of most
of the fascistic ideologies, and RSS 'excels' in
that by putting forward the ideal of greatness of
the past. Forgetting that that past was the era
of Manusmritit, the era of slavery of shudra and
women, it recommends the past as it was as the
future of the country. Last two decades has been
the period of massive growth of RSS, jumping from
7500-8500 shakhas in 1975 to 30000 shakhas in
1993, with the number of trained swayamsevaks,
running into millions.
RSS has been modeled on secret functioning, with
Sardar Patel, the first Home minister of India,
fondly remembered even by RSS combine, warning in
1948 that "the activities of RSS constituted a
clear threat to the existence of the Govt and the
state. It goes without saying that this
organization aiming at doing away with democratic
norms, does not have democratic functioning
itself. It abhors pluralism, federalism and
diversity, knowing well that these liberal values
are the sustaining ground for democracy. Richard
Bonney's introduction places this work in the
proper perspective. Bonney quotes extensively
from RSS ideologues to remind us that RSS opposed
the introduction of tricolor as national flag, as
'we' already have the saffron flag as our symbol,
and we are of course a Hindu Rashtra.
Islam makes a very important distinction between
the type of nationalism as propounded by RSS and
Congress, the former being aptly called as
exclusionary and the latter as inclusionary.
Muslim League's nationalism will fall in the type
of RSS propounded nationalism. Later the two
shared the same bracket in different
classifications like the social base, the social
and political agenda and the concepts of
nationhood, Islamic Nation or Hindu nation, their
role in freedom movement i.e. the absence of it
and their attitude to caste and gender questions.
Islam digs out a crucial reference from Organizer
30th Nov 1949, which says that "immediately after
the Constituent Assembly of India finally passed
the constitution of India on 26th Nov 1949, the
RSS demanded that it should be replaced by codes
of Manu. One of the strengths of the books is
that in analyzing the RSS, author has relied on
internal discourse of RSS itself.
One may feel that Hindutva might have been the
backbone of RSS ideologues like Golwalkar, the
major RSS contributor to its ideology. But
surprisingly one does not find the mention of
this word in Golwalkars' writings. As such this
word came to the fore in the aftermath of Babri
demolition. The construction of Nationalism by
Hindutva elements, not only excluded the Yavan
Mlechhchas (a derogatory term for Muslims), but
also picked up exclusive Brahiminical values as
its base. While in this construction of selfhood
history is selectively projected as ancient
Golden Hindu period, irrespective of the fact the
earlier rulers like Indo-Greeks, Shakas, Maurayas
were not Hindus and the very word Hindus was also
coined by Arabs to geographically describe the
people living on the east of river Sindhu. The
initial nationalism, which developed here in the
aftermath of changes introduced by British, was
Indian nationalism and the divisive, exclusionary
nationalisms around Islamic or Hindu identity
developed as a reaction to the inclusionary
nationalism of Indian National Congress. Communal
nationalism started constructing their self hoods
around imagined medieval or ancient histories. It
is from here that a section of Hindu elite, and
later the ideologues started identifying Hindu
nationalism with Indian nationalism, the whole
notion being a modern one. Anandmath, which
contains the controversial song Vande Matram, did
reflect Hindu nationalism, most of the elements
of this nationalism are contained in this novel,
essentially opposing Muslims and eulogizing
British. Aurobindo Ghose took this further and
stood for essentially Hindu identity of Indian
nationalism. Vivekanand, contributed to this
concept further by projecting Hinduism as 'mother
of religions', Hinduism being tutor and all other
faiths as tutees. Madan Mohan Malaviya defined
nationalism as Hindi, Hindu, and Hindustan, which
also provided the material for cultural
nationalism propounded by RSS.
Today when the Christian Missionaries are being
hauled to the coals on the grounds that they are
proselytizing, when it is being said that
Hinduism is superior since it does not
proselytize, it will be interesting to note the
glee of Hindutva ideologues during shuddhi
movement, "Because of the foresight of Swami
Dayanand and zeal of Shraddhanand, Hinduism is
now full-fledged proselytizing religionŠthe
conversion or the re-conversion of non Hindus has
become a normal phase of Hindu life." ( p.129)
Lajpat Rai, Bal Gangadhar Tilak also were
contributors to Hindu nationalism. Myth making is
an essential part of imagined pasts and
nationalisms, more so the exclusionary
nationalism, "The Aryan myth, which was a copy of
Teutonic and Anglo-Saxon myths, and was the
Indian response to White racialist doctrines.
This was the myth that Indian people were
'Aryans', and that 'pure' Indian culture and
society were those of the Aryans, Vedic period
[Š] interestingly, all three of them were
borrowed from the west in spite of their claims
of 'real' Indian ness". ( p.137) Growth of Muslim
nationalism ran parallel to this, an ideal foil
to the Hindu nationalism.
Hindu nationalism resorted to four pillars,
Golden past of Vedic period where Brahminical
texts ruled, birth based hierarchical structure,
anti-Muslim projection, non antagonistic
relations with British rulers and the concept
that Hindus form a separate nation. In this
background of competing communal nationalistic
ideologies and politics, RSS begins with the goal
of Hindu Rashtra.
British, very aware of the rising Nationalism,
were quick to realize the need for divide and
rule policy. Apart from subtly encouraging or at
least tolerating the exclusionary nationalisms,
they so planned the educational text books that
the difference between religious communities
should be further strengthened. While Gandhi's
central dictum was Hindu Muslim unity, RSS
founder Hedgewar disliked this and saw dangers in
this unity so when he was asked by a prominent
Congress leader as to why he left Congress, he
answered in a forthright manner that, 'because
Congress believed in Hindu Muslim unity'. While
Hindu Mahasabha and RSS remained separate
organizations there was good deal of
collaboration and support to each other. Their
ideas of nationalism totally matched; rather
Golwalkar took it from where Savarkar left.
The role of or the absence of, Hindutva in
freedom struggles is well known by now. While
Savarkar sent multiple mercy petitions to get
released from Andmans, and promising that he will
cooperate with the British, other RSS stalwarts
not only kept aloof from national movement, they
also discouraged others from participating in the
same, Golwalkar explains the absence of RSS from
freedom struggle, "We should remember that in our
pledge we have talked of freedom of the country
through defending religion and culture. There is
no mention of departure of British in that." (p.
191) it is in keeping with the same ideology that
RSS staunchly supported Hindu Princes.
Islam's focus and concern has been the place of
caste in the newly developing nationalism of RSS.
Its not only today that RSS chief Sudarshan
praises varna system and its role in preserving
'Hindu society', Savarkar already put this in his
book Hindutva, the book which in a way is the
Gita of RSS nationalism. As per this Hindu nation
grew out of a superior race, it survived due to
system of four varnas and was poised to rule over
the World. Similarly Manusmriti, was eulogized by
Savarkar, while Ambedkar chose to burn it. How
the word Fundamental is uniformly used by a set
of politics is well defined again by Savarkar,
'MausmiritiŠfor centuries has codified the
spiritual and divine march of our nation. Even
today the rules which are followed by crores of
Hindus in their lives and practice are based on
Manusmiriti. Today Manusmiriti is Hindu Law. That
is Fundamental.' ( p.217) Golwalkar adds the five
components of Hindutva, Country, race, religion,
culture and language.
The difficulty of explaining the rise of Buddhism
and its being wiped out is justified on the basis
of Buddhism's opposition to caste. They explain
that wherever Buddhism survived the invaders
succeeded in those areas. The obsession to Golden
past is pathological with RSS. When Nehru said
that RSS wants to take the country two hundred
years back, RSS mouth piece Organizer, commented,
'we actually want to take he nation back, a
thousand years back.' Golwalkar's upholding of
Hitler's methods in building German nation, his
treatment of minorities finds approval in
Golwalkar who threatens that if minorities don't
follow the Hindu dictates they will not deserve
even citizenship rights. It is no wonder that
this upholding of Nazism finds its echoes in the
Hindu Rashtra (state) of Gujarat, where the
school text books appreciate the role of Nazis in
defending the country. The race pride and keeping
the purity of race are serious concerns of
Hindutva ideologues.
Golwalkar's mantle as the theoretician of RSS is
carried further by Deendayal Upadhyay, who upheld
the caste system in the cloak of integral
humanism. He describes caste system as the
integral part of Hindu society, not only natural
but also practical. Furthering the anti-minority
ideas Madhok of Jan Sangh the progeny of RSS,
went on to recommend the parishkar, change of
Muslims into Hindu culture. Islam does well in
providing a comprehensive list of RSS combine,
different progenies of RSS, working in diverse
walks of life, in carrying out the RSS agenda.
Also the letter of a RSS swaymasevak, Nanaji
Deshmukh, 'Moments of Soul searching', which was
written in 1984, in the wake of Anti Sikh pogrom.
in which Deshmukh blames the Sikh community for
the murder of Indira Gandhi and advices Sikhs to
keep patience and tolerance while they were being
butchered.
The book has strong merit in that it goes beyond
the anti Muslim project of RSS to show that the
core agenda of Hindutva and RSS is to uphold
caste system in the newer language. One can infer
from this that the basic target of Hindutva, and
similar such ideologies, is to suppress the low
caste, class and women. While the caste angel is
brilliantly brought out by Islam, he does not
much delve on the gender aspect. The social
transformation process revolves around the
equality of dalits and women in Indian context.
The worth of the book would have been infinitely
enhanced by bringing this out thread bear. Surely
the gender angel is more subtle and hidden but it
is equally important.
Overall this is a valuable addition to the
already existing work on Hindutva and RSS. The
scholarship and painstaking labor of the author
will definitively broaden the understanding of
this major threat to Indian Democracy.
_____
[6]
['India the super bazar of superstition, black
magic, miracle peddlers': What has happened with
ideal of promoting a 'scientific temper' in
India's obscurantist society. It is a shame that
elected legislators give credence to Astrologers,
Fortune tellers or to Vaastu nonsense, choose
dates of important public events on the basis of
a certain religious calender or organise
religious ritual on public space (see news report
below on Madhya Pradesh). Secular activists need
to actively expose pseudo scientific claim makers
and god men - fraud men who are fanning the
flames of the irrational; they need to also take
on elected representatives and politicians who
have made it perfectly 'normal' to go with all
kinds of obscurantist practices to 'ward of evil'.
Speak up for science, reason and secularism.
Towards the end of the year, on 26-29 December
2006, fourth International Rationalist Conference
is going to be held in New Delhi. Those
interested may contact:
<Conference at rationalistinternational.net> ]
o o o
Indian Express
November 28, 2006
Front Page
MP ASSEMBLY HAS VAASTU PROBLEM?
Milind Ghatwai
http://www.indianexpress.com/story/17448.html
_____
[7]
The Independent
27 November 2006
DAWKINS TAKES FIGHT AGAINST RELIGION INTO THE CLASSROOM
by Sarah Cassidy
Richard Dawkins, the Oxford geneticist,
best-selling author and campaigning atheist, is
to take his battle against God into Britain's
schools after setting up a foundation to counter
the religious indoctrination of young people.
The Richard Dawkins Foundation for Science and
Reason will subsidise books, pamphlets and DVDs
for teachers to fight the "educational scandal"
that has seen the growth in popularity of "pseudo
science" and "irrational" ideas.
The foundation will also conduct research into
what makes some people more susceptible to
religious ideas than others and whether young
people are particularly vulnerable. And it will
aim to "raise public consciousness" to make it
unacceptable to refer to a "Catholic child" or a
"Muslim child"; Professor Dawkins believes that
"it is immoral to brand young children with the
religion of their parents".
The campaign comes after an increasingly bitter
battle about the role of religion in public life.
Controversial religious groups have also stepped
up their efforts to spread their message to more
young people.
Truth in Science, a Christian group campaigning
to have "intelligent design" - the belief that
the universe was created by an intelligent
designer rather than natural selection - included
in science lessons recently sent DVDs and
materials to every secondary school in the
country. And earlier this month the leaders of
the Anglican and Roman Catholic churches in the
UK attacked people who campaign for the removal
of religion from public life - such as Professor
Dawkins - arguing they are guilty of an
"intolerant faith position". Dr Rowan Williams,
the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Cardinal Cormac
Murphy-O'Connor, leader of Catholics in England
and Wales, believe that religiously inspired
activity in public life can be "radically
inclusive".
During a recent visit to a bookshop in London,
Professor Dawkins attacked what he saw as a
penchant for irrational beliefs. Professor
Dawkins, whose most recent book The God Delusion
has become a best seller, was horrified, although
not surprised, to find the shop's shelves packed
with books on fairies, crystals and fortune
telling - "pseudoscience" outnumbering science
books by at least three to one.
"The enlightenment is under threat," he said. "So
is reason. So is truth. So is science, especially
in the schools of America. I am one of those
scientists who feels that it is no longer enough
just to get on and do science. We have to devote
a significant proportion of our time and
resources to defending it from deliberate attack
from organised ignorance. We even have to go out
on the attack ourselves, for the sake of reason
and sanity. But it must be a positive attack, for
science and reason have so much to give."
Secular groups supported the move, arguing that
it was vital to counter the growing threat posed
by religious groups targeting schools.
Keith Porteous Wood, general secretary of the
National Secular Society, welcomed the Dawkins
foundation as an "absolutely wonderful idea" and
warned that secular groups were "under threat"
from religious groups in a way that was
unprecedented.
"I think people in science are getting very
worried about the intrusion into science of
fundamentally unscientific ideas," he said.
Andrew Copson, of the British Humanist
Association, said there was a dire shortage of
resources for teachers wanting to give lessons
about atheism. "As a high-profile humanist
Richard Dawkins is in an ideal position to do
something about this."
But John Hall, dean of Westminster and the Church
of England's head of education, said he was
concerned that the new foundation was simply a
new way for the outspoken atheist to "pick a
fight" with the churches.
"He is clearly looking for a fight," Mr Hall
said. "His clear intention is to push his view
that religion is dangerous and that to bring up a
child in their parents' beliefs is a form of
abuse. Obviously I am concerned about that. There
are good grounds for thinking that this would
just be a charitable vehicle for pushing Richard
Dawkins' views."
Richard Dawkins will be the subject of You Ask
the Questions next Monday. Email your questions
to: myquestion@ independent.co.uk
His foundation's aims
* The foundation will sponsor research into the
"psychological basis of unreason" that will
attempt to answer questions such as why people
find astrology more appealing than astronomy, at
what age young people are most vulnerable to
unreason and what are the correlations between
religiosity and superstition and intelligence and
educational level.
* It will support rational and scientific
education for all ages, and oppose the
"subversion of scientific education", for example
by efforts to teach creationism in science
classes. It will subsidise the publication of
books, DVDs and other educational materials.
* The foundation will keep a database of secular
lecturers willing to address schools and colleges.
* It will keep a list of secular charities.
* Professor Dawkins wants to raise public
consciousness to make it socially unacceptable to
label children by the religion of their parents.
_____
[8] Events:
(i)
Date: Sun, 26 Nov 2006 17:21:36 -0800
Subject: FORUM on Historic Developments in Nepal
Dear Friends
We in SANSAD proudly endorse and support the
Public Forum organized by Canadian Network for
Democratic Nepal, and urge our members and
friends to come there.
The Cafe has limited seating capacity. Kindly
phone in advance to book your seat.
SANSAD
**************************************************
CANADIAN NETWORK FOR DEMOCRACTIC NEPAL
639 Madame Street, Mississauga, ON, L5W 1G6, CANADA
A Public Forum
Comprehensive Peace Agreement:
Challenges and Possibilities in Nepal
Sunday, December 10, 2006
2-4:30PM
Cafe Kathmandu
2779 Commercial Drive ( corner of 12th Avenue), Vancouver, BC
On November 21, 2006 a Comprehensive Peace
Agreement was signed by the Nepal Communist Party
(Maoist) and the Government of Nepal bringing the
10 years old armed conflict to an end. This
historic and unique agreement in 238-years old
Nepali history presents a hope for social
justice, peace and republican democracy in Nepal.
In this changed context, Canadian Network for
Democratic Nepal (CNDN) organizing a panel
discussion to help understand the challenges and
possibilities presented by this agreement.
Please join us. Admission is free.
Due to limited seats, kindly book your seat in advance.
Panelists:
Ramjee Parajulee, Ph.D.
Faculty, Department of Political Science, University of British Columbia
Hari Sharma, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus, Simon Fraser University
Refreshments will be served
For booking and more information
please contact at (604)879-9909, (604)506-9259
***************************************
Program endorsed and Supported by
SANSAD
South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy
o o o
(ii)
Towards the end of the year, on 26-29 December
2006, fourth International Rationalist Conference
is going to be held in New Delhi. Those
interested may contact:
<Conference at rationalistinternational.net>
_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/
Buzz on the perils of fundamentalist politics, on
matters of peace and democratisation in South
Asia. SACW is an independent & non-profit
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Asia Citizens Web: www.sacw.net/
SACW archive is available at: bridget.jatol.com/pipermail/sacw_insaf.net/
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