SACW | June 25-26, 2007

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire | June 25-26, 2007 | Dispatch No. 2424 - Year 9

[1]  Sri Lanka:  As Violence Rises, Media Climate Declines (Amantha Perera)
[2]  Bangladesh pressed over UN expert (BBC)
     + Details on Sigma Huda by Coalition Against 
Trafficking in Women International
[3]  Television Interview with Nepal's Maoist leader Prachanda  (Karan Thapar)
[4]  India - The Emergency of June 26, 1975: The 
Unkindest Cut (Rajindar Sachar)
[5]  A comment re the film on Daniel Pearl: A Mighty Shame (Asra Q. Nomani)
[6]  An interview with the Bangladeshi writer Tahmima Anam (Emile Chabal)
[7]  Sri Lanka: 'The Month of October' - A documentary film on suicides
[8]  Book Review: Democracy In Practice (K. N. Panikkar)
[9]  India: Depicting divinity (Editorial, Hindustan Times)
[10] Announcements:
Public Meeting Anti-Emergency Day : 'Emergency 
then and Now' (New Delhi, June 26, 2007)

______

[1]

Inter Press Service
June 25, 2007

SRI LANKA:  AS VIOLENCE RISES, MEDIA CLIMATE DECLINES
by Amantha Perera

Colombo, Jun 25 (IPS) - The overhead projector 
cast a ghastly glow on the larger- than-life 
picture of Darmarathnam Sivaram, the Sri Lankan 
Tamil journalist abducted and killed in April 
2005.

Colleagues had gathered for his commemorative 
lecture and the ghostly atmosphere fit right into 
place. "On the day we remember Siva, his website 
has been blocked by authorities here," Sunanda 
Deshapriya, the convener of the Free Media 
Movement (FMM), wondered aloud just before the 
lecture.

Two days before the lecture, the popular website 
tamilnet (www.tamilnet.com) was rendered 
inaccessible from Sri Lankan servers.

The FMM, the foremost media group in this South 
Asian nation, charged that the government was 
behind the move that it called cyber terrorism. 
Information Minister Anura Priyadarshana Yapa 
denied any government involvement, but none of 
the local Internet service providers could give a 
clear answer to why the site was blocked.

Despite the perception that it slants toward the 
Tamil Tigers, the rebels that have for decades 
been fighting for a Tamil homeland, the website 
is widely accessed in Sri Lanka.

The blocking of the site, though, appeared to be 
a minor distraction compared to events that 
followed.

Nadesapillai Vidyatharan, editor of the Tamil 
daily 'Sudar Oli', complained that he feared for 
his life after unknown persons had come looking 
for him at his new residence in downtown Colombo, 
the capital.

"We had written an editorial criticising the 
recent eviction of Tamils from Colombo and 
supporting court action against the move. Maybe 
that was the cause," he later said.

Vincent Jeyam, a Tamil journalist working in the 
volatile Jaffna Peninsula in the north, had to 
flee to Colombo after he received death threats 
via mobile text messaging. He had acted as the 
local guide for an international media monitoring 
team that toured Jaffna, just before the threat 
came.

The mission's findings were bleak but not 
surprising. "Pressures on the media have 
multiplied over the recent months with increasing 
fears for the safety of journalists, especially 
those operating in the embattled North and East. 
In Jaffna peninsula, dozens of journalists have 
been forced to stop working for fear of their 
safety," it said.

"Jaffna is one of the most dangerous places in 
the world to be a journalist," Jacqueline Park of 
the International Federation of Journalists 
remarked.

IFJ, together with International Media Support, 
International Press Institute, Reporters Without 
Borders and the South Asia Media Commission, 
formed the mission that had also published a 
report on the Sri Lankan press in October, titled 
'Struggle for Survival'.

During the visit by the mission, government 
authorities had nevertheless pledged to enhance 
the climate for media freedom.

"In October, we received a commitment from the 
Government that cases of murdered media workers 
would be properly investigated with the intention 
of clearly demonstrating that there is no 
impunity. However, we saw little to demonstrate 
that action has been taken," the mission said at 
the conclusion of its mission.

Since December 2005, 11 media workers have been 
killed and none of the perpetrators have been 
found guilty. The mission also blamed the Tamil 
Tigers and other armed groups for stifling media 
freedom, but the onus fell on the government.

Journalists and activists have long felt that the 
environment for independent reporting was 
declining as ethnic violence once again increased 
from December 2005. "On either side of this war, 
we see those in power pressuring the media to 
fall in line with them. It is the us-and-them 
mentality -- legitimate dissent is made to appear 
traitorous," Deshapriya told IPS.

The FMM, along with several other organisations, 
has been in dialogue with the government to push 
for change, but remains pessimistic about a quick 
recovery.

During the week when Vidyatharan and Jeyam came 
under threat, they met with Yapa and other 
officials from the Ministry of Media. "The 
government is defending its actions. It does not 
acknowledge that there is something terribly 
wrong. The last time also we had officials 
defending that there was press freedom in the 
country, but no one could answer why Tamilnet 
remained blocked," Poddala Jayantha of the 
Working Journalists Association said in an 
interview.

The international mission came up with the same 
findings. "The increasing hostility of the 
authorities toward the media and the willingness 
of individual ministers to verbally attack 
journalists for their perceived failings are 
encouraging a climate of self-censorship, which 
is damaging the free flow of information," it 
said.

Observers see the menacing attitude toward the 
media as part of the changing political climate 
since violence reared its head. Despite a 
Norwegian-brokered, five-year-old ceasefire, in 
the last 18 months more than 4,500 have died in 
the fighting, including at least 1,500 civilians, 
according to the truce monitoring group, the Sri 
Lanka Monitoring Mission.

With government forces and Tamil Tigers now 
engaged in full frontal confrontations, access to 
conflict areas have been severely restricted not 
only to journalists, but members of the 
monitoring staff and relief agencies as well. The 
monitoring mission only secured access to 
Sampoor, close to the eastern harbour town of 
Trincomalee, in early June after a six- month 
wait. Government forces had wrested control of 
the coastal town in late 2006.

"The pressure on the media is part of a wider 
psychological culture where objective reporting 
has to be subject to the political or military 
agenda of those in power," Deshapriya explained.

"The significant erosion of media freedom 
contributes to and is a result of the marked 
deterioration of human rights in Sri Lanka 
today," said Sanjana Hattotuwa, author of a 
recent report by the Colombo-based think tank, 
the Centre for Policy Alternatives.

Hattotuwa said that all parties in the conflict 
were blatantly abusing civic rights. "The LTTE 
(Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, the formal 
name of the Tigers), the Karuna faction (led by a 
breakaway Tiger leader) and distressingly, the 
Government itself, are serious violators of media 
rights and have all repeatedly and severely 
undermined media freedom."

"The situation is getting worse and now that the 
Government's censorship of media extends to the 
web, it shows no signs of improvement in the near 
future," Hattotuwa said. (END/2007)

______


[2]

BBC News
June 7, 2007

BANGLADESH PRESSED OVER UN EXPERT

UN officials are urging the authorities in 
Bangladesh to clarify the fate of a UN human 
rights expert prevented from leaving the country 
since mid-May.

Sigma Huda, a UN special rapporteur on people 
trafficking, faces charges under the 
military-backed caretaker government's 
anti-corruption drive.

Mrs Huda said the Supreme Court had withdrawn her 
permission to travel because she was a "security 
threat".

She was due to address the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva next week.

'Immunities'

"We have been advised that Sigma Huda has been 
prevented from leaving Bangladesh, where she has 
reportedly been charged under provisions of 
anti-corruption legislation in that country," the 
Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human 
Rights spokesman Jose Luis Diaz told the Reuters 
news agency.


There is a court case involved and that's why she'll not be leaving the country
Bangladesh government

He said his office had requested clarification 
from the Bangladeshi authorities on the legal 
proceedings and charges against her.

The Bangladesh government had also been asked 
"how, in light of the convention on privileges 
and immunities of the UN... such proceedings 
allow for keeping her from attending to her 
duties as special rapporteur," he added.

Bangladesh's acting foreign secretary, Zahid 
Hussein, confirmed to the BBC that Mrs Huda would 
not be joining delegates in Switzerland next 
week, where she had been due to address the fifth 
session of the UN Human Rights Council.

"We'll be telling the United Nations there is a 
court case involved and that's why she'll not be 
leaving the country," he said.

Correspondents say Mrs Huda is accused of having 
wealth disproportionate with her income. She is 
on bail and denies the charges.

'Security threat'

In an interview with the BBC, Mrs Huda said 
Bangladesh's High Court had granted her 
permission to travel earlier this year and that 
she had been able to travel on three occasions 
"under different excuses", including once in her 
capacity as a UN special rapporteur.

After not being allowed to leave Bangladesh on 14 
May, Mrs Huda was told the country's Supreme 
Court had rescinded the permission.

Mrs Huda said she doubted it had simply been a legal decision.

"It's not a matter of the court," she said. "The 
court had already given me permission to travel."

"It's the government which went to the Supreme 
Court and termed me a security threat to 
Bangladesh."

Mrs Huda said the authorities would not say what 
kind of security threat she posed.

"Am I the security threat, or is the government itself the threat?" she asked.

Her husband, Nazmul Huda, was communications 
minister in the government of Bangladesh 
Nationalist Party leader Khaleda Zia, which left 
power in October.

He is among scores of senior politicians and 
business leaders rounded up in the 
anti-corruption drive. He also denies wrong-doing.

Bangladesh's caretaker administration declared a 
state of emergency in January and postponed 
elections after months of political violence.

It says it will hold polls by late 2008, giving 
it time to deal with Bangladesh's endemic 
corruption.

o o o

Details on Sigma Huda by Coalition Against Trafficking in Women International

UN Watch is releasing the following new details 
as provided by a fellow NGO that has been in 
close contact with Ms. Huda.

The following statement is by Janice Raymond:

"Janice Raymond, Co-Executive Director of the 
Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, has been 
in constant contact with UN Special Rapporteur on 
Trafficking, Sigma Huda. Raymond states that the 
government of Bangladesh has recently issued a 
restraining order preventing Sigma Huda from 
leaving the country to fulfill her duties as 
Special Rapporteur and to deliver a key report on 
trafficking before the Human Rights Council in 
Geneva on June 11, 2007. She alleges that the 
government fears that Special Rapporteur Huda 
will discredit the military-backed government and 
spotlight its recent human rights abuses in 
detaining and torturing over 95,000 Bangladeshis. 
We join UN Watch and other NGOs in calling upon 
governments and UN Secretary-General, Ban 
Ki-moon, to take action against the Bangladeshi 
government's harassment of human rights expert 
Sigma Huda and the illegal detention, torture and 
harassment of her family members."

"The more recent prohibitions against Sigma Huda, 
including the restraining order against her 
leaving the country to perform her UN duties, is 
an outrage and a violation of her right to 
freedom of movement and freedom of speech. The 
government's illegal actions are now being 
imposed on more and more members of Sigma's 
family, including her older daughter."

Source: UN Watch


______


[3]

TELEVISION INTERVIEW WITH NEPAL'S MAOIST LEADER PRACHANDA
24 June 2007

As Nepal goes through a difficult transition, 
what is the stand of the country's Maoists on the 
important issues that will determine the future? 
Nepal's Maoist leader Prachanda spoke exclusively 
to CNN-IBN on those issues in an interview on 
Devil's Advocate.

Video 1
http://www.ibnlive.com/videos/43520/devils-advocate-prachanda.html

Video 2
http://www.ibnlive.com/videos/43520/06_2007/devils_prachanda_2/devils-advocate-prachanda.html

Video 3
http://www.ibnlive.com/videos/43520/06_2007/devils_prachanda_3/deluge-nightmare-haunts-mumbai.html

______


[4]

Times of India
26 June, 2007

THE UNKINDEST CUT

by Rajindar Sachar

Today happens to be the 32nd anniversary of the 
proclamation of the Emergency - an occasion to 
hang our heads in shame over the violation of 
human rights during that 19-month period. June 26 
is an embarrassment to India for another reason.

The UN Convention against Torture and Other 
Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or 
Punishment (UNCAT) came into force on June 26, 
1987, but India is yet to ratify it.

The fact that various political forces have come 
to power at the Centre over this period shows the 
general unconcern for human rights.

Torture is defined under Article 1 of UNCAT to 
mean any act by which severe pain or suffering, 
whether physical or mental, is intentionally 
inflicted on a person with a view to obtaining 
information or a confession.

Article 2 (2), of UNCAT mandates that "No 
exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a 
state of war or a threat of war, internal 
political instability or any other public 
emergency, may be invoked as a justification of 
torture".

Article 17 provides for the establishment of a committee against torture.

Each ratifying state is to submit its report to 
the committee, which is authorised to make any 
comments in its annual report and give 
suggestions.

The Supreme Court said in D K Basu (1997) that 
custodial violence, including torture and death 
in the lock-ups, strikes a blow at the rule of 
law. "Custodial torture" is a naked violation of 
human dignity.

How do we explain the indifference of Indian 
political parties to human rights? The police and 
security forces have convinced their political 
masters that if UNCAT were to be ratified, they 
cannot resort to torture, which would impede 
crime detection.

This approach is seriously flawed. Torture and 
death in custody have assumed alarming 
proportions as to affect credibility of the rule 
of law and the administration of the criminal 
justice system.

While ratification of UNCAT will not 
automatically abolish the use of torture, a 
machinery that oversees the infractions of law 
will have an impact.

In 1976, at the height of terrorism in Northern 
Ireland, the European Commission of Human Rights 
ruled that the practice of depriving suspects of 
sleep constituted torture and inhuman treatment. 
UK ratified the treaty in 1988.

In 1996, the European Court of Human Rights was 
confronted with a situation of whether an alleged 
criminal should be returned by a foreign country 
to the criminal's own country if he was likely to 
be tortured as a result. It responded: "The Court 
is well aware of the immense difficulties faced 
by states in modern times in protecting their 
communities from terrorist violence.

However, even in these circumstances, the 
convention prohibits in absolute terms torture or 
inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, 
irrespective of the victim's conduct..."

In 2005, the House of Lords (UK) in a judgment 
has taken the view that UNCAT represented a 
universal consensus on international law.

In the context of inhuman treatment at Abu Ghraib 
prison and Guantanamo Bay, the US could not 
justify its behaviour by invoking the post 9/11 
situation and conceded that the detenus will be 
governed by the Geneva Convention.

The US had ratified the Convention in 1994.

According to the National Human Rights 
Commission's 2004-05 annual report, there were 
1,493 custodial deaths including 136 deaths in 
police custody and 1,357 deaths in judicial 
custody during 2004-05.

In 2005, the Union government established an 
inter-ministerial group consisting of the 
Ministry of External Affairs, Ministry of Home 
affairs and the Ministry of Law and Justice on 
the question of early ratification of the UNCAT.

It has not made any recommendations so far. The 
Centre has reportedly drafted a Bill and views of 
the NHRC have been sought. But nothing has been 
made public.

India has also refused to extend an invitation to 
the special rapporteur on torture who applied for 
an invitation in 1993. In the neighbourhood, 
Pakistan, Nepal, China and Sri Lanka had invited 
the special rapporteur.

Will India change by June 26 next year?

The writer is former Chief Justice, Delhi High Court.


______


[5]

Washington Post
  June 24, 2007; Page B01

A MIGHTY SHAME
It's the Story of Our Search for Danny Pearl. But 
in This Movie, He's Nowhere to Be Found.

by Asra Q. Nomani

O n Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2002, I stood at the gate 
of my rented house in Karachi, watching my friend 
Danny Pearl juggle a notebook, cellphone and 
earpiece as he bounded over to a taxicab idling 
in the street. He was off to try to find the 
alleged al-Qaeda handler of "shoe bomber" Richard 
Reid in Pakistan. "Good luck, dude," I called, 
waving cheerfully as he strode off, a lopsided 
grin on his face. His pregnant wife, Mariane, 
stood smiling and waving beside me as the taxi 
pulled away. A gaggle of parrots swooped through 
the trees above, squawking in the late afternoon 
sun.

That was the last image I had of Danny until late 
last month, when a PR executive for Paramount 
Vantage pulled up to my house in Morgantown, 
W.Va., in a black Lincoln Town Car. She was 
carrying a DVD of "A Mighty Heart," the 
just-released movie, based on the book by Mariane 
Pearl, about the staggering events that unfolded 
after that innocuous moment in Pakistan: Danny's 
kidnapping and eventual beheading.

With my parents and a friend beside me, I pressed 
"play" on my DVD player and settled in to watch. 
Slowly, as the scenes ticked by, my heart sank. I 
could live with having been reduced from a 
colleague of Danny's to a "charming assistant" to 
Mariane, as one review put it, and even with 
having been cut out of the scene in front of my 
house in Pakistan. That's the creative license 
Hollywood takes. What I couldn't accept was that 
Danny himself had been cut from his own story.

The character I saw on the screen was flat -- 
nerdy, bland and boring. He's not at all like 
Danny, who wrote "ditties" about Osama bin Laden 
while he was investigating Pakistan's nuclear 
secrets and jihadist groups as a reporter for the 
Wall Street Journal. On screen, he's warned three 
times to meet with Sheik Mubarik Ali Gilani -- 
the man with whom he thought he had an interview 
-- only in public. But off he goes, ignoring the 
warnings. The message: Reckless journalist.

That was nothing like the Danny I knew. As the 
credits rolled, I murmured to my mother, "Danny 
had a cameo in his own murder."

For me, watching the movie was like having people 
enter my home, rearrange the furniture and 
reprogram my memory. I'd known it was a gamble 
when I agreed to help with a Hollywood version of 
Danny's kidnapping, but I'd done it because I 
thought the movie had the potential to be 
meaningful. I'd hoped it could honor the man I'd 
worked alongside for nine years at the Journal by 
explaining why he was so passionate about his 
work as a reporter. I'd hoped that it would tell 
the story of the unique team of law enforcement 
agents, government officials and journalists -- 
of varying religions, nationalities and cultures 
-- that had searched for him. And I hoped it 
could spark a search for the truth behind Danny's 
death.

But the moviemakers and their PR machine seemed 
intent on two very different and much shallower 
goals: creating a mega-star vehicle for Angelina 
Jolie, who plays Mariane, and promoting the glib 
and cliched idea that both Danny and Mariane were 
"ordinary heroes."

I think Danny would have rolled his eyes at that.

In the prologue to her book, Mariane wrote to her 
son: "I write this book for you, Adam, so you 
know that your father was not a hero but an 
ordinary man." In a movie voiceover, that 
dedication becomes: "This film is for our son so 
he knows that his father was an ordinary man. An 
ordinary hero."

But there weren't any real heroes in the story of 
Danny's tragedy. Danny would have said he was 
just doing his job. When he went off that day in 
Karachi, he didn't give any impression that he 
thought what he was doing was especially 
dangerous. He just had a story he wanted to 
pursue and an interview he thought would help 
him. After he vanished, I don't think any of us, 
not even Mariane, did anything particularly 
courageous, either. We each had a duty to try to 
find him -- either as professionals or because of 
the bonds of friendship or family.

I know that movies need a dramatic arc and that 
there has to be room for artistic license in the 
telling of a true story, because reality is often 
so chaotic. I know that it's natural to search 
for a compelling narrative structure to make 
sense of tragedy and pointlessness. And I do 
believe that Danny's last moments, as he declared 
his Jewishness for his kidnappers' video camera, 
showed his strength of character.

But recasting a story just so we can tell 
ourselves that we've found a hero is too easy. 
It's the quickest way to convince ourselves that 
what happened wasn't such a bad thing, that it 
had redeeming value, that we can close the book 
on it and move on with our lives. We do it too 
often -- with television shows about ordinary 
people with extraordinary powers, with magazine 
features that extol the "heroes among us" and 
with our impulse to elevate every story -- think 
Jessica Lynch, ambushed and wounded in Iraq -- to 
one of heroism.

For me, "A Mighty Heart" and all the hype 
surrounding it have only underscored how cheap 
and manufactured our quest for heroism has 
become. Paramount even launched an "ordinary 
hero" contest to promote the movie. "Nominate the 
most inspiring ordinary hero," its Web site 
shouts. "Win a trip to the Bahamas!"

Lost in the PR machine and the heroism hoopla is 
Danny, whose death is at the center of the story. 
After all, as one person involved in the 
production candidly told me: Danny can't do 
interviews. So in the Associated Press review, he 
amounts to nothing more than a parenthetical 
phrase.

But Danny was not parenthetical. He deserves to 
be remembered fully. He was charming and 
charismatic. He was an outstanding investigative 
reporter with an irreverent streak. The year 
before he died, I'd taken a leave from the 
Journal to work on a book, and he faxed me an 
article from an Indian magazine that he thought 
would help with my research. "From your 
assistant, Danny," he scrawled across the cover 
sheet, in his self-deprecating style.

He observed the media machine with a contrarian, 
skeptical eye. In November 2001, after the war in 
Afghanistan had begun, he wrote to me: "I'm 
getting to Pakistan just in time for the lull 
between 'well, more bombings, more deaths -- who 
cares now?' and 'shit, it's December, we have to 
round out our prize packages' " with big articles 
for awards such as the Pulitzers. "Okay, no more 
cynicism from here," he signed off. "I'm going to 
be a father and must maintain an idyllic view of 
the world."

Danny had me teach him how to say "Do I look like 
a fool?" in Urdu so he could tell off Mumbai taxi 
drivers who tried to overcharge him. Once, 
shortly after arriving in Peshawar on an 
assignment, he wrote me: "I'm at the Pearl 
Continental, wasn't able to get a free room 
despite my argument that I was the owner."

Don't look for that personality in the movie. You won't find it.

I know I'm guilty of assisting in Hollywood's 
mythmaking. In the fall of 2003, I went with 
Mariane to the Los Angeles home of Brad Pitt and 
Jennifer Aniston, where we ate bagels and drank 
coffee by the pool while listening to their pitch 
for buying the movie rights to her book. When 
Mariane decided to sell, Warner Bros. Pictures 
sought my "life rights," too. I agreed to sell 
them, even though a friend told me that making a 
movie about Danny's death seemed exploitative.

A year passed. Pitt and Aniston got a divorce. 
Pitt and Jolie got together. The movie rights 
passed to Paramount Vantage. Paramount hired 
British director Michael Winterbottom. And a 
script emerged.

When I read it last summer, I felt as though I'd 
been punched in the gut. I sat across from 
British actress Archie Panjabi, who had been 
dispatched to my home in Morgantown to learn to 
play me. I lamented that none of the characters 
were fully developed, least of all Danny.

When I watched the movie last month, I was 
relieved that I wasn't a servant girl, as I felt 
an early script had it. So I wrote to a producer, 
"Thumbs up okay on my end." But I wasn't being 
true to myself. I was reacting to the power and 
seduction of Hollywood.

A few days later, when I saw the photos of stars 
in evening gowns and tuxedos floating down the 
red carpet for the Cannes premiere of "A Mighty 
Heart," Danny's not-quite-5-year-old son among 
them, I had that sinking feeling again. Other 
friends of Danny's said they did, too. It was so 
not Danny.

Worst of all, the pomp came at the same time as a 
chilling reminder of his death. On the night of 
the Cannes premiere, the Daily Times, a Pakistani 
newspaper, ran a photo of an emaciated man said 
to have been the owner of the plot of land where 
Danny had been held and where his remains had 
been buried. The accompanying story alleged that 
the man had been held in the U.S. naval prison at 
Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, then released to Pakistani 
intelligence authorities, who had recently dumped 
him at his family's home. The headline: "Most 
wanted man in Daniel Pearl case: Saud Memon dies."

On the eve of the movie's New York premiere 
earlier this month, I was in Phoenix at the 
Investigative Reporters and Editors conference. I 
was there to announce the establishment of the 
Pearl Project, a joint faculty-student 
investigative reporting project at Georgetown 
University that will aim to find out who really 
killed Danny and why. It's my own way of honoring 
him. His story isn't over for me. I set up the 
project because -- despite a confession from 
Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of 
9/11 and of Richard Reid's failed shoe-bombing, 
that he killed Danny -- I believe we still don't 
know the real truth behind what happened to him.

After the conference, I had to decide whether to 
go to New York for the premiere or head back 
home. I went home. In my home office, I stood in 
front of a copy of the chart I had started in 
Karachi to make sense of everything that happened 
after that January day in 2002. At the center is 
a single name: Danny.

pearlproject at georgetown.edu

Asra Q. Nomani teaches journalism in Georgetown 
University's School of Continuing Studies.


______


[6]

[Tehmina Anam is the author of the important novel 'A Golden Age']

o o o

  Newsline
June 2007

"WRITING THIS NOVEL WAS A WAY OF TRYING TO BELONG"

- Tahmima Anam


Curious to know some of the experiences that went 
into the making of A Golden Age, Emile Chabal 
decided to meet Tahmima Anam in Cambridge. She 
came to read excerpts from her book for 
'Wordfest,' Cambridge's annual literary festival, 
alongside debut authors Paul Torday and Jeremy 
Page. It was an unusually warm spring day and the 
discussion ranged far and wide - from the 
intricacies of contemporary Bangladeshi politics 
to the meaning of intellectual engagement. 
Excerpts from the interviewŠ          

           Q: What is the relationship between 
your Ph.D on the Bangladeshi freedom fighters' 
movement and the novel?

             A:I was already an undercover writer 
in the guise of being a doctoral student, but I 
wasn't one of those people in their 20s who could 
just write. I felt I needed to build up my 
confidence. It's proven very useful because the 
book is political in Bangladesh, and having a 
Ph.D allows me to reply to those who would doubt 
my legitimacy because I've grown up abroad and 
not lived through the war.

           Q:One thing people are unlikely to 
grasp fully outside Bangladesh are the political 
ramifications of the book. Do you feel like 
you've written a political book?

             A: Mostly what I wanted to do is take 
that historical moment away from politics and 
talk about how ordinary people lived through the 
war. Whether this is political or not, I'm not 
sure. How, say a widow, a housewife or a refugee 
survived the war and how it changed their lives. 
Whenever people in Bangladesh ask me, 'What's 
your national aim?' I reply that I want people to 
be able to own this part of history and remember 
it as theirs.

           Q: Do you feel that you are doing 
something new? Because of the relative lack of 
literature in English surrounding 1971, who did 
you take as your inspiration?

            A: My Bangla is poor and much of the 
literature I've read about 1971 has been in 
translation, but I know there is a lot of 
literature on the subject - in fact, all 
Bangladeshi literature is about 1971 in some way, 
so it is not so much writing an unwritten history 
as translating it for a wider audience. In terms 
of inspiration, however, I admire not only the 
'greats,' like Rushdie or García-Márquez, but 
younger authors as well, among them Chimamanda 
Ngozi Adichie, whose latest book Half of A Yellow 
Sun also deals with a war from the perspective of 
characters who were not major players.

           Q: How did your status as an outsider 
affect your perceptions of the 'national goal' of 
1971?

             A: I feel very implicated in 
Bangladesh. I don't have an immigrant's viewpoint 
and therefore don't have stakes in a place other 
than Bangladesh. Nevertheless, I definitely wrote 
the book from an outsider's perspective and 
that's why the novel is told from Rehana's point 
of view and not that of her children since she, 
too, is an outsider. Part of the book is about 
Rehana discovering where her loyalties really 
lie. And for me too, I think, writing the novel 
was a way of trying to belong to a place that I 
don't always belong to - sometimes I feel I 
belong and sometimes I don't. Now that I've 
written this book, I feel I belong so much more; 
people come up to me and say, 'Now that you've 
written this about your country, we embrace you 
as a citizen.'

            Q: Your book ends on a note of 
defiance and hope. To me, that seems peculiar 
since the story of 1971 is both tragic and full 
of unresolved contradictions.

             A:It's funny you say that because 
when I talk to people about the war, they never 
think of it as a tragedy, though, to be fair, 
there is a big difference between the way the 
rich and the poor talk about 1971. The poor 
generally talk about 1971 and their feeling of 
being betrayed: they thought they were getting 
something but materially their lives didn't 
change at all. When you talk, on the other hand, 
to the elite or those who were student 
revolutionaries, they very rarely think of it as 
a tragedy, even if terrible things happened to 
those they knew. For them, it's a moment of hope, 
the 'best time of their lives', and I borrowed 
that for the book. That's also why I wrote about 
1971: I wanted to say something uncomplicatedly 
positive.

             Q: Why were you not pushed to write a 
counter-voice to this nostalgic story?

             A: There is a dissenting voice in the 
form of Silvi, who doesn't believe in the premise 
of the war, but if you're talking about the story 
of the violence committed by the Mukti Bahini 
then, yes, that is absent from the novel.

             Q: Is this something you have been thinking of writing about?

             A: I think the Pakistani side is 
completely different; it is the army's side. I 
think there is a big difference between Pakistan 
and the Pakistan Army. It is a distinction I only 
recently learned to make when I went to Pakistan 
this year and met people who had protested 
against the war; this was a transformative 
experience for me. As for the Bihari story, I 
think it is one that really needs to be told. I 
didn't put it in the novel by choice - partly a 
narrative choice.

            Q: Was that the first time you'd visited Pakistan?

             A:No, some of my family moved to 
Karachi in 1947, so I used to visit as a child. 
Then, when I developed a sense of history, I no 
longer wanted to and refused to go for 15 years. 
I finally went back when I organised this 
conference on 1971 in January, which was a very 
moving experience as I got the chance to meet 
people who had left the army or had gone to jail 
for opposing the war. It made me realise that, 
much as it is difficult for us to imagine having 
a foreign force committing atrocities on us, 
imagine what it would feel like to live in a 
country that was capable of such a thing. Who 
knows in future who the army might turn on?

            Q: 1971 is certainly one of Pakistan's great silences.

             A: Yes, having said that, I feel 
things are changing: 1971 has finally been 
introduced into school curricula and there is now 
a university course on the subject at Karachi 
University. In terms of acknowledgement, I think 
the problem is not just with Pakistan; 
Bangladesh, too, was very quick to let go of the 
past. While I don't think being litigious is 
necessarily a good thing for a national wound, if 
you think about South Africa's Truth and 
Reconciliation Commission, it seems as if 
Bangladesh has skipped a step. I think Bangladesh 
has not only 'forgiven' Pakistan but, in some 
ways, has a longing to be more Pakistani, more 
Islamic.

            Q: How do you feel perceptions of 
Pakistan are changing in Bangladesh?

             A: I know some people who refuse to 
go to Pakistan and have a lot of anger towards 
Pakistan. But you'd be surprised at how few they 
are. There is so much fighting about what 
happened in 1971 that it is hard for those locked 
in the debate to focus their energies outwards.

            Q: Did you consciously try and 
incorporate some of the big themes - rape, 
refugees, guerrilla fighting?

             A: Most of these things did happen, 
certainly if you take the perspective of a 
middle-class woman from Dhaka like Rehana. But 
there are also a lot of things that do not appear 
in the book: for instance, there are no battle 
scenes, no politicians and the peasant story is 
not told. With Rehana, I wanted us to be able to 
see the war through a mother's eyes; this seemed 
to me the most authentic way of telling the story.

            Q: As an author, are you comfortable in the role of 'spokesperson'?

            A: If I were English, or from 
somewhere else, I could simply say that I only 
write fiction, but I have real stakes in the 
future of Bangladesh and I can't retreat behind 
the mask of an artist. Being an artist in a 
country like Bangladesh means you have to have 
opinions. In the subcontinent, being a writer has 
always been a political act; this idea that the 
novel is 'outside' the workings of the world is 
very European - and, even then, it is inaccurate.

            Q: And what's next?

            A: I'm writing the story of Rehana's 
father - a Muslim zamindar in Calcutta at the 
turn of the century - and it ends in 1947. It's 
actually part of a trilogy. A Golden Age is the 
second book. The first will deal with the 
Partition of Bengal and the last will focus on 
modern-day Bangladesh.


______


[7]  Sri Lanka: A Note worthy Documentary film

THE MONTH OF OCTOBER

Brief synopsis:

The separatist war in Sri Lanka is responsible 
for over 60,000 deaths. In that same period of 
time almost twice as many people committed 
suicide in Sri Lanka.
This documentary describes the high rate of 
suicides in rural Sri Lanka and shows that often 
people harm themselves to communicate their 
feelings. It looks into the social cultural and 
religious reasons for this act of self harm

Photo: Heshani Edward


Format: Beta, DVD
Year of Production: 2005- 2006
Running Time: 56 mins
Director: Heshani Edward
Producer: Heshani Edward
Editor: Umesh Fernando
Screenwriter: Heshani Edward, Chandi Jayawickrama
Director of Photography: C Athukorala
Sound: Ruwan Prasad
Music: PAK Ruwan


Production Company:
heshanie at gmail.com

______


[8]

Book Review / The Hindu
June 19, 2007

DEMOCRACY IN PRACTICE

by K. N. Panikkar

A tribute to Indian democracy capturing the pain 
and the struggle, the humiliations and the glories


INDIA AFTER GANDHI - The History of the World's 
Largest Democracy: Ramachandra Guha; Pan 
Macmillan, Picador India, 5A/12, Ansari Road, 
Daryaganj, New Delhi-110002. Rs. 695.

In 1977 after a spell of Emergency for two years 
Indira Gandhi had, to the surprise of many, 
including her influential son Sanjay Gandhi, 
dissolved the Parliament and ordered fresh 
elections. There was much speculation about the 
reasons for this momentous decision, which as it 
turned out, resurrected Indian democracy from the 
brink of doom. Several reasons have been 
attributed to the decision to revoke the 
Emergency, but it is difficult to be certain till 
Ms. Gandhi' s private papers are available for 
scrutiny. Whether she was lulled into a sense of 
safety by intelligence reports or was stung by 
the comments of those foreign observers 
impossible to dismiss as enemies of India remain 
in the realm of speculation. However, that the 
election was ordered and Ms. Gandhi and her party 
were defeated was essentially due to the strength 
of democratic ethos in society, to the making of 
which her father, Jawaharlal Nehru, and his 
generation had handsomely contributed.
Success story

The Emergency, though was the gravest, was not 
the only crisis that Indian democracy had to 
face. Linguistic conflicts, regional secessionist 
movements, communal tensions and riots and 
political violence had often made its existence 
rather precarious. On many an occasion, it so 
seemed that the existence of India as a nation 
was itself in danger. It not only survived all of 
them but also emerged from them much stronger, 
reinforcing in the process its commitment to 
democratic ideals. "The sapling (of democracy)," 
says Ramachandra Guha in the book under review, 
"was planted by the nation's founders, who lived 
long enough (and worked hard enough) to nurture 
it to adulthood. Those who came afterwards could 
disturb and degrade the tree of democracy but, 
try as they might, could not uproot or destroy 
it." The history of the world's largest democracy 
which Guha chronicles in this remarkably lucid 
and extensively researched account, (on private 
papers, newspapers and secondary sources), 
admirably captures the agony and ecstasy of the 
democratic practice in independent India.

Guha is quite obviously an admirer of the 
achievements Indian democracy has attained in a 
largely hostile environment, vitiated by 
religious superstitions, caste prejudices and 
acute economic disparities. He claims that the 
"real success story of modern India lies not in 
the domain of economics but in that of politics." 
The low levels of income and literacy, and high 
levels of social conflict have often led to the 
prediction that India might any day succumb to 
dictatorship. That India has managed to prove 
these predictions wrong and remained a democracy 
for 60 long years have surprised many political 
observers, particularly because democracy became 
a casualty in the neighbouring countries. How it 
managed to do that, both through the contribution 
of individuals and institutions, is the theme of 
this pioneering study which is by far the most 
comprehensive work on the contemporary history of 
India.
Internalisation

The first task that Indian democracy had to face 
was to establish and internalise what Sunil 
Khilnani has described as the idea of India. It 
was initially attempted through the adoption of a 
democratic constitution, integration of princely 
states and the linguistic reorganisation of 
states. In the conditions obtaining in India in 
the wake of Independence all the three were beset 
with considerable difficulties. The Constitution 
in which many heard the "music of an English 
band" rather than the "music of veena" laid down 
the principles and practices of a democratic 
state and society. The integration of princely 
states, which Vallabhai Patel accomplished with 
the assistance of V.P.Menon, was indeed a 
landmark in the political unification of the 
country. It is often overlooked that it initiated 
the process of the abolition of the feudal order. 
At the same time the linguistic reorganisation 
helped to underline the cultural diversity, which 
underlay the unity of the nation. The basic 
structure of the polity that evolved stood the 
test of time, withstanding the pressures, be they 
from the Northeast or the South or Kashmir.

The democratic practice in India is a highly 
contested terrain. Even during the anti-colonial 
struggle different political formations with 
widely different ideological persuasions and 
programmatic approaches were in existence. Yet, 
after Independence the Indian National Congress 
held the sway for quite some time under the 
leadership of Nehru. Soon after coalition 
governments came into existence which Guha 
contends is a "manifestation of the widening and 
deepening of democracy" as different regions and 
groups acquired a greater stake in the system.
Weaknesses

A result of the decline of the Congress party was 
the rise of the Hindu communal forces to 
political prominence, which led to the Bharatiya 
Janata Party wielding power at the Centre. Rising 
to power at the crest of popularity generated by 
the mobilisation of religious sentiments around 
the construction of the temple at Ayodhya, the 
BJP rule made serious inroads into the democratic 
and secular fabric of the society. The 
governments under its control, be it at the 
Centre or in the states, promoted the communal 
cause. Moreover, its cadres actively participated 
in violence against minorities and its leaders 
expounded the virtues of religious state in the 
name of cultural nationalism and positive 
secularism. These tendencies have led many to 
recognise the fascist character of the BJP. Guha, 
however, differs. To him, "to call BJP 'fascist' 
is to diminish the severity and seriousness of 
the murderous crimes committed by the original 
fascists in Italy and Germany...to see the party 
(BJP) as fascist would be both to overestimate 
its powers and to underestimate the democratic 
traditions of the Indian people." Whether such a 
reading of the character of BJP is tenable after 
the Gujarat carnage of 2002 is doubtful.

Guha further suggests that the threat of fascism 
has passed presumably because the BJP has lost 
the election of 2004. Such an analysis and 
conclusion tend to overlook the inherent 
character of Hindutva, the strength of which is 
not limited to its political work, but more in 
their influence in social and cultural domains. 
The defeat in the election does not mean the 
defeat of the fascist ideology of Hindutva, which 
continues to be active and influential in the 
cultural and social domains, even if its 
political arm is in disarray.

Guha has admirably captured the spirit of the 
struggling nation. However, at the end a doubt 
lingers in the mind: whether the author has 
overstated his case about the strength of Indian 
democracy, underplaying in the process some of 
its glaring weaknesses. A fairly large section of 
the population is deprived of the benefits of 
democracy, particularly their right to a share of 
the wealth of the nation. That they remain in the 
margins of the democratic process can hardly be 
wished away.


______


[9]

Hindustan Times
Editorial

Depicting divinity

June 22, 2007
First Published: 05:01 IST(23/6/2007)
Last Updated: 05:09 IST(23/6/2007)


In 1975, two films that went on to become 
mega-hits, Sholay and Deewar, were released. What 
stumped critics was the runaway success of 
another movie released the same year - Jai 
Santoshi Maa. The film, based on a vrat katha - a 
story narrated during a religious fast - that had 
become popular in North India in the 1960s, 
expanded on the basic pamphlets on a relatively 
unknown deity. Thanks to director Vijay Sharma 
and Anita Guha, the actress who played Santoshi 
Maa, the film earned cult status drawing crowds 
who conflated the identities of the character and 
the actress. Anita Guha quietly passed away 
earlier this week, ironically at a time when 
there is a ruckus about humans being depicted as 
gods - women depicted as goddesses, to be precise.

Unlike the late Anita Guha, neither Sonia Gandhi 
nor Vasundhara Raje is an actress. Thus, Ms 
Gandhi and Ms Raje don't seem to have the licence 
that a performer has to portray established 
deities. In the case of Ms Gandhi, some of her 
supporters have displayed posters of her as 
Goddess Durga (something the Congress Party has 
expressed strong disapproval of) while some of Ms 
Raje's supporters have shown their leader as 
Goddess Annapurna.

Visual representation of political leaders as 
deities is nothing new. But in an overwhelming 
number of cases, the leaders being depicted are 
given the paraphernalia of divinity - thus making 
them gods, rather than associating them directly 
with any existing gods. This seems to have been 
what has upset a few: the depictions of political 
leaders not as towering personalities in their 
own right (which would be perfectly all right, 
ask the supporters of Jayalalithaa, for instance) 
but as Durga and Annapurna.

Culturally, however, even this is not a 
blasphemous act in Hinduism. Durga idols in 
Calcutta, for instance, have for decades used the 
face of a favourite cinema star (Hema Malini, 
Aishwarya Rai, etc) as Durga's. There may have 
been aesthetic debates about this practice but 
certainly not cultural or religious ones. But 
politicians are a different lot when it comes to 
'photoshopping' their faces on to deities. Trying 
to usurp religious visual representation for 
political purposes can seem underhand - 
especially when politicians such as the late NT 
Rama Rao have reaped the benefits of playing Lord 
Krishna and other deities, both on and off screen.

As for Indira Gandhi and her supporters getting 
away with her being compared to Durga, smartly 
enough no one bothered putting that down on a 
poster. Perhaps, no one needed to forcefully make 
the connection anyway.


______



[10]  Announcements:

INVITE: ANTI-EMERGENCY DAY: 26 JUNE 2007
                          

Dear friends

We are all aware of developments in last few 
months how the government has progressively grown 
not only indifferent but pathetic to the idea of 
civil liberties and fundamental rights that we 
are guaranteed in our Constitution. As the 
economy is growing so are the woes of 
marginalized sections of people and subtle 
stranglehold on the rights and liberties of the 
people. Be it Nandigram, Dadri, Gurgaon, parts of 
Orissa, farmers are not only deprived of land but 
of the legitimate right to protest too.

There have been reports of "Encounter" killings 
on massive scale in different parts of the 
country that shakes one's belief whether we live 
in a civilized and rule of law governed society. 
We all are aware that these killings have been 
made possible because there exists no mechanism 
to ensure accountability in the functioning of 
the para-military and police forces.  Laws like 
Disturbed Areas Act and the Armed Forces (Jammu & 
Kashmir, Manipur) Special Powers Act, Unlawful 
Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) and Chattisgarh 
Special Power Security Act (CSPSA), MCOCA, have 
contributed to the functioning of the Army, 
paramilitary forces and police with impunity. 
And on top of it if one raises one's voice 
against these actions one is termed anti-national 
or maoist and is incarcerated. 

All this is reminiscent of a state no less 
dissimilar than that prevailed during the black 
days of Emergency during 1975-77. 

You are aware that June 25/26 is an important day 
in the movement for Civil Liberties and Human 
Rights of the country. Internal Emergency was 
imposed on this date in 1975 and it was the 
movements by JP to oppose the Emergency that gave 
birth to the PUCL. The Constitutional and 
technical contents apart, in practice it was 
nothing but an attack on the Rights and Liberties 
of the people to crush dissent.

On the occasion of commemorating anti-emergency 
day PUCL and Jan Hastakshep request you to join 
in a public meeting ` EMERGENCY THEN AND NOW’ at 
Gandhi Peace Foundation at 5 o’ clock on June 26. 

A large number of human rights activist, lawyers, 
journalists, intellectuals and people who have 
borne the brunt of emergency are expected to 
attend the meeting.  You are invited to come with 
friends.


With thanks

Pushkar Raj
Secretary PUCL


_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/

Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on
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