Desicritics Section: Politics

Poem For Barack, Michelle, Sasha, and Melia Obama

temporal — Wed, 7 Jan 2009 09:54:02 EST

CALLIE SHELL/AP

barak and michelle
m and i share your concern
for the privacy
and well being
of sasha and melia
may your children
get good education
and medical care
and grow up
balanced individuals
ready to take their place
in the affairs of our world
unlike the children in gaza

ASHRAF AMRA/AP

let me add briefly
am disappointed
at your silence
you did speak out
as president elect
on other issues
is apartheid,
ghettoisation
ethnic cleansing
and loss of civilian lives
not important for you?

Israel's Gaza Offensive

Vinod Joseph — Tue, 6 Jan 2009 12:18:10 EST

I believe that the air attacks being carried out by Israel on various targets in the Gaza Strip and the incursion by the Israeli army into the Gaza Strip are justified. I also believe that these air attacks and land offensive will serve no purpose at all, other than help Ehud Barak and the Labour Party in the forthcoming Israeli elections.

Ever since the cease fire between Hamas and Israel came to an end on 19 December 2008, Israel has been targeted by Hamas which started to fire around 80 rockets per day into Israel. Most of the rockets did not cause much damage and so far, only a handful of Israelis have died as a result. However, the number of people killed in Gaza has exceeded five hundred. Clearly the Israeli response to the rocket attacks is not proportionate. Why then do I say that Israeli is justified in its actions?

Imagine for a moment that you own a fertile piece of land in a desolate part of the world. You land adjoins a barren piece of land. A tall barbed wire fence separates your land and the barren land. The people who own the barren land don’t like your presence in the neighbourhood. They have a nasty habit of throwing stones into your land, a few stones every day. Mostly they don’t do any damage, but once a month or so, a worker in your land gets hit by a stone. Once in a while, your neighbours cut through the barbed wire fence and creep into your land at night and uproot a few fruit trees before returning to their barren land, all this in order to make you abandon your fertile property. How should you respond? If your response has to be strictly proportionate, you can only throw stones into your neighbour’s barren land, something which will distress your neighbour a lot less than you are distressed by the stones thrown into your land. You can also creep into your neighbour’s land at night and uproot his fruit trees, except that your neighbour does not have any fruit trees! So, you post guards on the periphery of your land, mount powerful search lights at certain vantage points and instruct your guards to shoot dead anyone caught in the act of throwing stones into your land. Intruders who enter your fertile land are also to be locked up for a year before they are released. Once this new policy comes into effect, your guards do manage to kill a few stone throwers and catch a few intruders, but the stone throwing and intrusions don’t cease. This is mainly because there is a total difference in values between you and your neighbour and your neighbour is willing to sacrifice the lives of his people in order to cause trouble for you. He just does not want you in the neighbourhood, though you have every right to be there. Soon the number of fruit trees you lose to your neighbour’s men goes up. Your workers start to quit. You start making a loss. Unless you manage to stop the stone throwing and the uprooting of fruit trees, you will have to vacate the neighbourhood. What do you do then? There is no police force worth the name in your part of the world. You have no choice but to send a team of armed men into your neighbour’s land and capture or kill everyone who has thrown stones or intruded into your land and teach your neighbour such a lesson that he does not try to harm your property ever again.

Now imagine for a moment that you acquired your fertile piece of land after a prolonged litigation. You won the legal dispute and the loser was your neighbour who owns the adjacent barren piece of land. They are many in your town who say that the court ruling was unfair, though the bulk of the local residents support the judicial ruling and are happy for you to occupy your piece of land. Does this additional piece of information make you change your mind? Do you now think that the neighbour has the right to throw stones into your land or intrude into your land and uproot your fruit trees? The answer is a clear No. Instead, what your neighbour ought to do if unhappy with the court ruling is appeal to a higher court. If further appeal is not possible, your neighbour ought to get public opinion on his side and in the meantime, try and make his barren piece of land as fertile as possible.

Israel is in the position of the owner of the fertile land. Its neighbour is Hamas, an organisation whose charter calls for the destruction of the State of Israel and its replacement with a Palestinian Islamic State. I have always believed that the creation of Israel through an UN resolution was absolutely fair. If you believe that the creation of Israel by the UN in 1948 was correct, it naturally follows that Israel has the right to defend its territory and pre-empt any possible attack that may pose an existential threat to Israel. I have many good friends who ardently believe that the creation of Israel was unfair. All those friends tell me that Israel’s Gaza offensive is totally unjustified.

It must be admitted, most of what followed after the fair and legal creation of Israel was neither fair nor legal. Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians and its Arab minority has almost always been very, very unjust. In particular, I don’t think that Israel was justified in placing an economic blockade on the Gaza Strip in reaction to Hamas’s election victory. Though no one likes the idea of fundamentalists of the Hamas variety on their door step, Israel had no right to make life unbearable for the people in the Gaza Strip. Also, it must not be forgotten that Hamas is largely a creation of Israel. If Israel were not so desperate to undermine the secular Palestine Liberation Organisation and the Fatah, fundamentalist Hamas would not have come into existence.

The Gaza Strip is not a sovereign state, but Hamas runs it as if it is. As per the UN resolution which created Israel, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and East Jerusalem ought to form an independent Palestinian state. However, East Jerusalem is illegally occupied by Israel and the West Bank is under the control of the Fatah. Hamas won the Palestinian Parliamentary Elections in January 2006 and came to power. After infighting broke out between Hamas and Fatah, Hamas was evicted from the West Bank in mid 2007. For good measure, the Palestinian President Mahmud Abbas declared Hamas to be an illegal force. I don’t think Mahmud Abbas was right in doing so and I do think that Hamas got a raw deal in being evicted from the West Bank, considering the fact that they won 74 seats to the ruling-Fatah's 45 in the Parliamentary elections in January 2006. Most probably Israel played a key behind-the-scenes role in all this.

However, despite all these drawbacks on the part of Israel, the random launching of rockets into Israel with the intention of killing civilians cannot be justified. Hamas’s attacks on Israel are not just a reaction to the economic blockade. Instead, it arises out of Hamas’s determination that Israel should not exist as a state. The range of Hamas’s rockets has been increasing in range and accuracy by the month and soon there may be a day when Hamas is able to target any part of Israel at its will. When faced with such a situation, Israel is perfectly entitled to defend itself against such attacks and do all that is necessary to prevent such attacks in future.

The forthcoming elections in Israel and the need for the ruling Labour Party to show itself to be as tough on Hamas as the Likud Party, has definitely influenced Israel’s decision to attack the Hamas in Gaza. Nevertheless, Israel’s right to defend itself is so fundamental that it is entitled to do so even on election’s eve.

All of what I have stated above begs the question whether India is entitled to respond against Pakistan in a similar fashion in response to the Mumbai attacks. The answer is yes, though, considering the fact that Pakistan is not the Gaza Strip and it possesses nuclear weapons, India would be foolhardy to do so.

Israeli air strikes have led to heavy civilian casualties. It is not easy to watch visuals of civilians, including young children being killed, and say with a straight face the Israel’s actions are justified. However, Israel’s actions are indeed justified. Hamas has intentionally mixed up its military infrastructure with civilian infrastructure in Gaza. Hamas seems to enjoy a high degree of civilian support in Gaza. If a near-sovereign state supported by its population launches attacks on another sovereign state using equipment and men who are mixed up with civilians, the ensuing retribution will cause civilian causalities. Hamas is as much to blame for the civilians killed in the air strikes as are the people of Gaza who voted for an organisation whole sole objective is to remove Israel from the face of this earth.

Will Israel succeed in its objective? In 2006, Israel launched an offensive against the Hezbollah in Lebanon and was fought to a standstill. Hezbollah’s survival made it a lot more popular and Israel’s aura of invincibility was badly dented. Hamas is no Hezbollah. It is not as tough or as capable as Hassan Nazarallah’s organisation. Also, unlike in 2006, this time Israel seems to be successfully avoiding battles in dense population centres where die-hard Hamas fighters could take a heavy toll of its fighters. If Israel’s only objective is to stop the rocket attacks altogether, it will not succeed. If its aim is to only make Hamas pay a price for the rocket attacks, it may succeed. However, Hamas will continue to exist as an organisation even after this offensive is over. It will also retain its ability to launch attacks on Israel, as before. Its popularity in Gaza Strip and the rest of the Arab world may even go up. In short, the Israeli offensive will most probably do nothing other than help the Labour Party and Ehud Barak win the next elections.

LTTE-China or LTTE-Pakistan Partnership Possible?

Kalugu — Mon, 5 Jan 2009 06:42:11 EST

Your enemy's enemy is your friend is a popular saying. The recent setback the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka have been facing is largely credited to the clandestine support extended to the Sri Lankan government by India much against popular public opinion of India's citizens from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Tamil Nadu is home to 80 million ethnic Tamils who have integrated very well with India and have a thriving economy.

Results of recent surveys conducted in Tamil Nadu - India by two different press groups Indian Express and Kumudam have revealed very interesting opinions. "Majority Tamil Nadu is pro-LTTE" : 81 percent said that LTTE is good for India's security. Over 55 per cent favoured a separate Tamil homeland for Sri Lankan Tamils as the only solution for the conflict in the island.

A student group belonging to Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, demanded unconditional declaration of ceasefire from the Sri Lanka government and a stop to the genocide of Tamils. Based on Marxist-Leninist principles of self-determination, it called for support to the Eezham Tamil independence.

The Tamil Tigers were banned in India 17 years ago and despite several protests from various political and non political groups, the Congress government of Indian headed by Mr. Manmohan Singh has refused to lift the ban on the Tamil Rebels. Several politicians from the Tamil Nadu state are questioning the validity of this ban and are quoting the removal of ban on RSS - a Hindu group that assassinated Mahatma Gandhi and was subsequently banned for only two years since the assassination.

In recent times, the Sri Lankan military has made very impressive progress, including the capture of Kilinochchi - the symbolic capital of the Tamil Eelam territory. However, Sri Lanka scored several negative points with respect to Human Rights.

A 400+ page model indictment charging Sri Lanka officials for genocide against Tamils has been prepared by a US based Tamil group. This group is represented by Mr. Bruce Fein, a lawyer in the United States who specializes in constitutional and international law. Under President Ronald Reagan, Fein served as an associate deputy attorney general and as general counsel to the Federal Communications Commission. The indictment will be ready to be submitted to the U.S. Justice Department first week of January, With the new President elect Barack Obama assuming office in January the case is being closely monitored by Sri Lankans worldwide.

The genocidal acts Bruce Fein have chronicled in the draft indictment surpasses by far the genocidal evidence in the charges against former Bosnian leader Radovan Karadzic.

Further, this week New York-based Genocide Prevention Project has included Sri Lanka as one of the eight "red alert" countries where genocide and other mass atrocities are underway or risk breaking out.

While the Tamil Rebels have made several attempts to establish a friendly relationship with India, the calls have been rejected or rather neglected by India. While the Tigers were solely relying on India alone for strategic partnership, Sri Lanka went ahead and established relationship with China, Pakistan and also Iran.

China and Pakistan have a strategic interest in Sri Lanka as a presence here allows them unprecedented geographic advatage over reaching very strategic and economic centers of India. Both LTTE and Sri Lanka can be valuable partners to China and Pakistan. More than Sri Lanka which has very less influence over India, LTTE can be a more attractive and valuable partner due to its strong ethnic and religious ties with India. A strong relation with the Tamil Tigers will give these countries unprecedented inroads into southern India. How ever the Tamil Tigers do not seem to have taken benefit of this unique advantage they posses.

Several analysts do not understand the reason behind LTTE's un-staunched alignment and dependence on India and the reason behind ignoring China or Pakistan as strategic partners. LTTE for some reason has ignored the safety of its very own people it represents over a friendly relation with India.

Will the Tamil Tigers realign and save themselves from further humiliation by the Sri Lankan army?

Aamchi Sarkar Raj

thedeskjockey — Sun, 4 Jan 2009 04:53:17 EST

There is something uniquely mystifying about visionaries. They think on a level we take years, decades, perhaps even generations to understand. But when we do, we are awestruck with the grandness of their plan. Which is why you should all think twice before dissing one of the grandest visionaries of our time – Raj Thackerey.

Seriously, who thinks of a party name which includes the word “Navnirman” whose prime motto is to drive out anybody who can do “nirman” but cannot speak Marathi? Who can think of doing something more symbolic than digging up cricket pitches just because they hate Pakistan and hence Pakistani cricketers? Who dares to dream beyond the unscrupulous secularism of our country that forces us to live with those geeky Madrasis, loud Sardarjis and unintelligible Bengalis? It requires a special kind of visionary and orator to feed such grand plans down the throats of people who call themselves soldiers or “sainiks” but yet resemble the neighborhood gang who breaks windows and vandalizes walls just because they believe in their brand of coolness.

Other such visionaries that come to mind are Osama Bin Laden, Pol Pot, Benito Mussolini and of course Hitler, who the venerable Balasaheb, Raj’s uncle and one time mentor, admires to such an extent that he made statements to the effect "I am (the Hitler) of the whole of Maharashtra and want to be of whole of India." and my personal favorite, "If the Muslims of India behave as the Jews in Germany did, they will deserve the same treatment". Priceless wisdom!

To understand Raj, you would have to understand his grand visions right from his younger days when he wanted to take his skills as a cartoonist and film maker to Walt Disney Studios. However, his love for the Marathi Manoos kept him within the confines of Maharashtra. The world’s loss of Walt Disney Marathi themed cartoons was the average Marathi Joe’s (lets call him “Joe-kar”) gain. The sacrifices the man and his family have made! Think of a conversation his little son Amit might have with him

Amit: Dad, I want to have a birthday party for all my friends!
Raj: Sure buddy, now who do you want to call?
Amit: The Khans?
Raj: Nope, we hate them. None of them speak Marathi.
Amit: The Bachchans?
Raj: Are you kidding? After we threw bottles at their house and called Jaya an old witch?
Amit: Sigh. How about the Tendulkars?
Raj: Dude, unfortunately we don’t like Gujjus either! You know, Anjali is one. I mean really, those fat businessmen eat undiyo-jalebi-fafda and fart all day in an AC train compartment with no outlet for all that smell.
Amit: Never mind dad! Let’s just do a family thing.
Raj: Now that’s my boy. See you are picking up on our family motto already…”All in the family”.

Shame on all the political commentators, media persons and so called experts who claim that the man is a divisive force in a united India. Really? Come on here to the US in any university and you’ll see the Tamilian share a 2 bedroom apartment with 10 other Tamilians but won’t live with the 2 Delhi-waalas across the street. The Mumbaikar prefers to live with his fellow denizens ‘coz he can’t quite understand the frugality fuss of the Andhra dudes. And the Gujarati Patel won’t even live with the Shahs ‘coz his daddy told him they are not nice people. So if people naturally confirm to the people within the people theory, why decry a man who calls it like it is and encourages other people to do the same? You can imagine my angst at all this when I’ve used the word "people" 4 times in the last sentence.

So what if he encourages taking out anything and everything related to Pakistan? For e.g., nobody seems to like Atif Aslam’s quivering voice [video link 1][video link 2]. And how many books from famous Pakistani authors can you name anyway?

So what if he wants migrants from UP and Bihar to leave the state? Isn’t the average gunda in the movies always portrayed from these states?

It’s about time we got a guy named Raj who has some balls and breaks the unfortunate image we have associated with that name. It’s about time we got someone who cared enough to bring the plight of his people out in the open. And it’s about time that people get past the violent demonstrations, the jingoistic speeches and the lack of any contribution from him. For the true genius of a vision lies in the patience of the people to wait a reeeeeeeally long time for it.

While the tone of this post may be satirical, my heart remains firmly on his side. And being a non-marathi, I pledge my support to his cause by staying far far away from his beloved state.

LTTE End-Game - Sri Lankan Army Wins Battle of Kilinochchi

Aaman Lamba — Sat, 3 Jan 2009 01:07:50 EST

The island of blood might be coming to the end of its military stasis with the reported fall of the LTTE stronghold of Kilinochchi, in the Northern Province of Sri Lanka. This was the administrative center of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) over the parts of Sri Lanka controlled by the group. The LTTE had gained control of the town, first in 1990 and then again in 1998.

The Sri Lankan army embarked on a Northern Offensive, following the breaching of the ceasefire between the government and the LTTE, and Sri Lankan President Rajapaksha had promised to end the threat to Sri Lankan sovereignty posed by the LTTE once and for all. The bloody offensive claimed many lives but saw the LTTE progressively pushed back from their secure zones and into a narrow pocket in the northeast of Sri Lanka.

The town of Kilinochchi was surrounded from three directions by the Army and after they secured a crucial crossroads, they entered the by-now ghost town, with all civilian and LTTE political infrastructure having shifted further north-east.

The President once again called for a ceasefire and for the LTTE to lay down arms and surrender. The Colombo stock exchange rallied on the news, and in close succession, a motorcycle-riding suicide bomber blew himself up outside Sri Lankan Air Force headquarters, killing two additional people.

The loss of the de facto LTTE capital will make the continued military campaign difficult to sustain for the rebels. At the same time, a political solution is necessary with expanded rights for Sri Lankan Tamils to be acceptable to the minority community and bring lasting peace to the fragile democracy. A true test of democracy is the creation of political space for all its constituents. "Most importantly," asked Paikiasothy Saravanamuttu, head of the nonpartisan Center for Policy Alternatives, "will there be a political package or will the regime treat this as a victory for majoritarianism?"

Book Review: Vishnu's Crowded Temple: India Since the Great Rebellion by Maria Misra

Vinod Joseph — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 12:18:15 EST

Having liked Maria Misra’s first book on managing agencies so much, I got hold of her second and much more recent one, a couple of weeks ago. In Vishnu’s Crowded Temple, Misra undertakes the challenging task of analysing India’s history from the time immediately after the mutiny (1857) till the present. Misra proves herself equal to the challenge. Her 450 odd page tome is not only a very thorough examination of India’s history during this period, it is also crammed with Misra’s analysis of the prominent events and personalities. Irrespective of whether you agree or disagree with Misra’s various assessments, you can’t help appreciating that Misra knows her history very well and has all relevant facts at her finger tips.

Misra’s stand out achievement in this book is in examining every issue from multiple points of view. For example, when discussing partition, she explains how each of the actors, the Congress, the Muslim League and the British, performed their roles and did what they did in a manner that is entirely comprehensible, though with the benefit of hindsight, many serious mistakes were made. Equally brilliant are Misra’s description of the Emergency and the raise of Hindu nationalism in the 1990s. The personalities of Gandhi, Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Laloo Prasad Yadav, V.P. Singh and Mayawati are dispassionately analysed and laid bare. Their contributions to India are examined ruthlessly without any drama. Also of great interest (to me at least) was Misra’s examination of the (failed) attempts to have a Uniform Civil Code for India and to make Hindi India’s national language.

Misra’s language is simple, to the point, non-melodramatic, slightly sarcastic at times and in short, it’s just right for a book of this sort. For example, while describing the Congress’s (unsuccessful) attempt to remain uncorrupted and keep India unified as it neared the goal of Independence, she says, ‘By the end of the 1930s, it was clear that much of Congress politics was fast degenerating in an unedifying scramble for the spoils of office. Gandhi had not woven the tough, rough-textured and inclusive fabric he had originally designed. Rather, the Congress nation was silk not khadi. Threads from the prosperous peasantry, urban petty bourgeoisie, the progressive intelligentsia and big business had somehow been woven into a single cloth. But it was distinctly frayed at the edges. Skeins of regional, Muslim and low caste politics hung loose and it would prove difficult, if not impossible, to weave these back into a united and independent Indian nation.

Cricket does not find a mention in the post-independence part of this book and neither does Bollywood, though Sholay is discussed as are film actors turned politicians MGR and NT Rama Rao. The implied assessment here, I assume, is that neither Bollywood nor cricket has influenced post-independence India. In a sense, I would agree with Misra that Bollywood is not as much of a nation unifier as it is hyped out to be. For example, people in Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh enjoy Bollywood movies though anti-India feeling runs high in these countries. Cricket does bring Indians together and alleged Muslim support for the Pakistani team is the cause of much tension and quarrel. I do wish Misra had commented on the impact of cricket on Indian society.

Misra makes a few minor mistakes which do not have any impact on the overall quality of this book. She says that A.O. Hume, the founder of the Indian National Congress was an Englishman (when he was actually Scottish). The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) is translated as “Dravidian Forward Federation”, something which will bring a smile to any Tamil speaker. In my opinion, it ought to be the “Dravidian Upliftment Party”.

Misra’s book has a very detailed bibliography. Since I am not a qualified historian, I am not going to comment on it.

Misra ends her book with the story of how Laloo Yadav, long considered a maverick and joker, reformed the Indian railways and made it profitable. However, Laloo has no qualms about having his in-laws travel ticketless in a first class railway compartment. Misra tells us in the epilogue that her objective was to explain India’s peculiar form of modernity, one which is a mix of so many contradictions. I would say that Misra has admirably succeeded in her endeavour.

I am setting out here a few of Misra’s theories and assessments which I found to be interesting and a few facts I ‘discovered’ from this book, which the average desi doesn’t easily get to read elsewhere.

Impact of British Rule: The role of the British on the subcontinent should not be exaggerated. According to Misra, the subcontinent is too vast and too ancient and the British presence too brief and microscopic to be seen as a leading player. Initially I shook my head in disbelief, but then as I thought about this, I started to feel that Misra might have a point. However, this is a very moot point on which it will be possible to canvass a variety of views.

Caste: Till the British arrived, Indian society was very fluid. Castes were not frozen. However, the British found it easy to understand the Varna system as hard and fast. Also, the educated Brahmins were the ones the British turned to for tutorials on India. It made sense for the Brahmins to explain the caste system in such a way that they were on top, though in reality, the intermediate castes were the property owners and the generally, especially in southern India, the most powerful. Misra says that there’s a great deal to be said for the view that untouchability was an institution initially confined to some locations. As India industrialised, the poorest and lowest castes migrated to the cities where they did the dirtiest jobs and the stigma of untouchability grew.

Aryan Invasion Theory and Pre-Aryan Dravidian Utopia: The Aryan invasion theory came into vogue between 1901 and 1911. The proponents of this theory found it very convenient to explain the caste system and the hierarchy within. Soon census takers were carrying ‘nose callipers’ to measure the length of Indian noses and categorise people. The Theosophists propagated the Aryan invasion theory and the upper castes gratefully seized upon it to show that they were superior to other Indians and were linked to Europeans. Please note that Misra does not at any point express her own view on the Aryan invasion theory. I wish she had.

In the south, a British preacher Robert Caldwell pioneered the study of southern languages. Caldwell wanted to destroy the influence of corrupt priests and Brahmins in order to make conversions easy. For this, he propagated the view that the Aryan invasion had destroyed a pre-Aryan Dravidian utopia and that southern languages are totally autonomous from Sanskrit and Hindi. Tamil intellectuals accepted Caldwell’s theories, though they did not convert. They also took them further by saying that pre-Aryan Tamil possibly existed prior to the movement of the tectonic plates when Asia, Africa and Australasia was a unified landmass called ‘kumarikantam.’

Changing British attitudes to India and Indians: Prior to the mutiny, the British wanted to modernise and reform India. After the mutiny, the British only wanted to preserve the existing order, and use it to strengthen their own presence in India. The British set up a College of Arms which would produce for various Indian princes various assorted ensigns, emblems and other signs of power. The Statutory Civil Service was an attempt to make bureaucrats out of the scions of Indian aristocracy. Sons of Princes were enrolled in this service as a birth right and trained to be bureaucrats in order to avoid having middleclass Indians rule India through the Indian Civil Service. Colleges such as the Mayo College at Ajmer, modelled on Eton, were established. This attempt ended in a dismal failure since Indian princes were too much fun loving and lacked the necessary discipline to become mandarins.

British attitudes to different Indian ethnic groups is one of the topics covered in Misra’s first book. Misra takes up the same topic in this book as well. The Afridis, Dogras and Sikhs were believed to make good soldiers, since they physically resembled Europeans more than other Indians. Sikhs especially were the apples of the British eye. The British were so keen to keep the Sikhs pure that Sikh recruits to the army had to be baptised, have uncut hair, bangles, a dagger and have ‘Singh’ as the last name. The British maintained Sikhism in the army at a standard higher than it was elsewhere. Bengalis were considered effeminate and non-martial, though they had formed the bulk of the British Indian army prior to the mutiny. It was only during the Second World War that stereotypes such as these were abandoned.

The British also condemned many communities as criminal classes. In the south, the British started to prop up the Dravidian parties to fight the Brahmin dominated Congress. Reservations were made for non-Brahmin communities. British - Hindu – Muslim relations: Misra devotes a lot of time and space to explain how Hindu and Muslims came to be poles apart. Initially, the British were very tolerant of Hinduism. This morphed into contempt. With regard to Islam, the British were closer to the Muslims till the mutiny, after which there was a period of bitterness. Later, the British grew to develop cordial relations with a few select Muslims, like Syed Ahmed Khan, who benefitted a lot from their closeness to the British. Such select Muslims got British largesse and protection from Hindu domination, as the British played one community against the other. The bulk of the funding for the Aligarh University came from the British

Occasional Hindu-Muslim violence did take place in the 19th century, but such violence was local. In 1809, there were riots in Banares. British reports classified these as religious violence that erupted when a Muharram procession insulted Hindus, though in reality it was the result of a land dispute.

Till the early 19th century, Hindus and Sunnis celebrated Muharram along with the Shias. Similarly, Muslims participated in Ramlila celebrations. Towards the end of the 19th century, Tilak started to promote the Ganapati festival and made it a lavish and public affair. With that, Muharram processions and Ramlila festivities ceased to attract people from other faiths.

Regionalism among Indian leaders: At the Indian National Congress’s Lahore session in 1893, the great leader Bal Gangadhar Tilak boarded and lodged with his fellow Maharashtrians Gokhale and Ranade who were moderates and his ideological adversaries since he didn’t want to mix with Bengali leaders who subscribed to his own extremist views. South Indian leaders, almost entirely Brahmins, were fussy eaters and would not eat with others.

Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, a leader of Hindu renaissance in the 1870s, attracted the cream of Bengal’s intelligentsia and preached the rejection of western values and advocated a return to a rustic lifestyle. He was a gender bender who liked to dress as a woman and flirt with his largely male followers, at times sitting on their laps. Keshub Chandra Sen was a westernised Brahmo Samaj leader who reverted to Hinduism under Ramakrishna Paramahamsa’s influence. Ramakrishna Paramahamsa advocated child marriage and Keshub Chandra Sen gave his 9 year old daughter in marriage to the ruler of Cooch Behar

Fitness First

Since the British were busy portraying upper caste Hindus as non-martial and effeminate, the Hindu renaissance brought in its wake a great deal of interest in exercise and fitness. Various akharas were started. Wrestling became a favourite pastime for many Indians. The great Indian wrestler Gama was said to live entirely on milk, ghee and almonds which he consumed in vast quantities. These were supposed to be all that was needed to make a man strong.

Max Muller was a German orientalist who promoted the theory of the noble Aryan race which migrated to India and from whom the upper castes were said to have descended. The Aryans were said to have founded in India the greatest civilisation the world has ever known, though they weakened themselves by marriages with the lower castes. Muller opposed woman’s liberation which he said would weaken the fabric of Indian society.

Bankim Chandra used to be a proponent of women’s rights, till he took a sharp U turn. After his change of mind, he went about advocating that women should not behave like babus. He advised such women to rid the earth of their useless weight by applying ropes to their necks.

The Age of Consent Bill: In 1891, the Age of Consent Bill was proposed after many child brides died after sex with their husbands. This bill made intercourse with a child below the age of 12 years statutory rape even if the girl was married to the accused. Bankim Chandra opposed this bill tooth and nail. He said that if this bill was passed “Bengal would be plagued with females in groups hanging from door to door, begging men to gratify their lust”. Many Indian dailies opposed the Bill. Anand Baraz Patrika changed from a weekly to a daily to meet increased subscriber demand. The Bangabani saw its subscription soar to 20,000, whilst Sanjivani which supported the bill had only 4,000 readers. Bal Gangadhar Tilak too opposed the Age of Consent Bill.

Aurobindo Ghose was a Hindu revivalist and Swaraj advocate who studied at St. Paul’s and Cambridge. He advocated revolutionary violence though his goals were quite vague. He talked about the golden age of the Vedas and declared that his ultimate objective was the ‘Aryanisation’ of the world

Annie Besant was a Theosophist who believed that high caste Hindus were Aryans who ought to be given the power to unify India as they had done earlier. She had a controversial attitude to non-Brahmins. She wanted to “humanise them because, as in Britain, the lower classes are a menace to civilisation and undermine the fabric of society.”

The Gurgaon experiment: Frank Bryne was a civil servant who carried out an experiment in Gurgaon to change the ‘bad’ habits of the Indian peasantry who were given to idleness and filth. To fight idleness, he made them give up canal irrigation and switch to inefficient Persian wheels. To make them conserve fuel, he promoted a magic ‘Bhoosa’ box. For disciplined defecation and fighting filth, he got them to dig latrines, though the latrines became traps for mosquitoes. Though none of his experiments really worked, a few successful monsoons meant that Gurgaon showed progress. Bryne’s books became standard texts for Indian bureaucrats.

Bombay Pentangular: So named for the five religious communities who took part, namely the Parsis, Hindus, Muslims, Europeans and the rest. In the initial days of this tournament, the Parsis refused to play the Hindus since they thought only the British were their equals. In 1939 the Hindus won the tournament and their supporters sang the Bande Mataram, which the Muslims found offensive.

Congress’s Hindu tilt and rift with the Muslim League: On many occasions Misra says that, at its lower echelons, the Congress was very much Hindu nationalist. Membership of the RSS and Congress overlapped to a considerable degree. Hedgewar, the founder of the RSS was a disciple of the Congress leader Tilak. From the 1920s , there was practically no Muslim participation in Congress led agitations. The 1930 civil disobedience movement which led to a sharp fall in the demand for imported fabrics, disproportionately affected Muslims, since most importers of foreign cloth were Muslims. Misra blames the Congress for breaching its relations with the Muslim League. Jinnah was willing to renounce his demand for separate Muslim electorates if the Congress would agree to more Muslim majority provinces in Sindh and the North West Frontier Province. The Congress refused. In the 1937 provincial elections, the Muslim League cooperated with the Congress, but the Congress reneged on a deal to share ministerial posts.

Frontier Gandhi: Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan and his Khudai Khidmatgars followed Gandhian principles when fighting the British. However, their fight was mainly for the reunification of the North West Frontier Province with Afghanistan and had little to do with the national movement.

Subhash Chandra Bose and the INA: Subhash Chandra Bose established contact with Nazi Germany through the Kabul office of Siemens Company. He did not really get along with Hitler who refused to delete a few bits from his Mein Kampf which Bose considered insulting to Indians. Bose then went to Japan and Singapore and took over leadership of the INA. “Relations between the INA and the Japanese were appalling. The Japanese regarded the INA troops as turncoats, inherently untrustworthy and cowardly. At best they were a propaganda unit for spreading pro-Japanese stories among Indians and at worst as coolie corps.” The INA was not particularly effective and Subhash Chandra Bose himself was regarded by the Japanese as “incompetent and stubborn”. Misra says that this view was not totally unjustified since Bose kept insisting that a march on Delhi was possible in the midst of a catastrophic retreat.

Allied Army atrocities: During the Second World War, the enormous allied army in Eastern India misbehaved. There were many cases of rape, arson and looting.

Gandhi’s approval for Indira Gandhi’s marriage: Indira Gandhi’s marriage to the Parsi Feroze Gandhi was controversial. Mahatma Gandhi gave his approval, but said that the marriage should be celibate.

Awaking a Sleeping Man

BangaloreGuy — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 13:41:25 EST

<i>You can only awake a sleeping man, and not one who pretends to sleep.</i>

-Mahatma Gandhi

In a pointed response to how good this government, the Prime Minister and the new Home Minister are at securing us, is the information that the expanded NSG is to expand to 4 more (metro) cities Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai & Hyderabad. That the "metros" definition needs a big lookover aside, it underscores the fact that these bozos do not have their head over anything that relates to governance, or security.

When was the last time Kolkata even had a terrorist attack - yeah, that is the kind of question that keeps the mind ticking, doesnt it?(2003, American Embassy) How about Chennai. Umm, the closest, is attacks in 98 at Coimbatore and in Bangalore. But, in their infinite wisdom they've a hub in Chennai too.

Attacks on Chennai may impact the Indian economy - but its not on the World radar, neither does it face a threat perception of that level (or impact the economy on a big enough scale). Attacks on Kolkata will not hurt the economy either - the last time West Bengal had a decent chance of impacting the Indian economy positively was with the Nano project, but that wasnt based in Kolkata either! (and the techs there are about the same as most Tier2 Indian cities)

No NSG for Guwahati which faces attacks here, there everywhere. No NSG for Bangalore which gives on an average 25 billion US$ to the government buckets, and has faced 2 terror attacks in the space of a year. 300,000 tech workers reside in bangalore - most employed in hubs around Electronic City or Whitefield areas. But nope, Bangalore doesnt get a NSG hub. Nearest will be in Chennai (and given the chaos in travel to the BIAL airport, travelling by road's faster - but the NSG might get Volvos if, god forbid, they'd need to be deployed in Bangalore)

Listen to this damning piece of Information (from the ToI link):

As soon as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had announced setting up regional NSG hubs in the wake of Mumbai attacks, chief ministers of several states including Andhra Pradesh, Assam and Maharashtra had met home minister P Chidambaram and pitched for setting up such units in their states.

Do Chief Ministers need to meet the Centre, towel-in-hand for an NSG hub to be there? What is the rationale for setting up a NSG hub? Prestige status for that state?

Or what this news report quotes:

The tech city was the favourite for stationing the elite anti-terror commando force, but it has now given way to the neighbouring Hyderabad and Chennai.

Under fire after the Mumbai terror attacks, the Centre had stressed its intention of creating more NSG hubs, and Bangalore —high on the terror radar for years—was billed as one. However, when it was announced early this week, the garden city was missing from the list. Those that bagged the NSG centres, apart from the two southern cities, were Mumbai and Kolkata.

When Deccan Herald sought to find out the reason, Home Ministry sources indicated it was mainly to deal with lobbying. “Karnataka failed in it both politically and bureaucratically. On top of it, Karnataka is an Opposition-ruled state, while Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh are not.

Is it little wonder that Pakistan repeatedly spouts its "Baseless" remarks, and runs hoops around our government, while asking for"evidence"?

Is Terrorism a Vice born out of Patriotic Virtues?

Suresh Naig — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 13:36:20 EST

Patriotism, as per the dictionary, conveys a person’s loyalty, devotion and readiness to defend and guard a country, to which one belongs. From time immemorial patriotism is extolled, as a supreme virtue. Since patriotism is more emotional than rational, the benignity of patriotism could easily be converted into malignant terrorism, by stoking emotions.

A nation or a country has different dimensions, other than its geographical boundaries. It has its economic, social, and cultural dimensions too. A country is united by its cohesive cultural identity, which supersedes every other factor – geographical, economical or political. When this cultural identity is uprooted, mere geographical intact-ness of a country loses its relevance. Or to put it the other way, a country cobbled up on apparent lines of similarity, other than cultural cohesiveness, cannot stay intact in the longer run.

Break-up of USSR into different fragments, could be attributed to different reasons and the major being cultural disconnect. The same cultural bondage saw unification of Germany, on the 3rd of October, 1990. Break-up of USSR into fragments and re-unification of East Germany and West Germany, were almost simultaneous. Communism as a philosophy lacked the cultural cohesiveness in neither uniting nor dividing countries.

In spite of different kingdoms existed in our mother land, due to geographical convenience, economic viability, territorial advantage and individual avarice, Bharat was united culturally. Adi Shankara in 5th Century BC (those of you who want to dispute the period of Adi Shankara to 6th Century AD, pl wait) could not have established his mutts in different directions, North, East, West and South, but for the cultural connectivity existed in our land.

This cultural connectivity of our great nation was beyond religions, for our cultural uniqueness, accepted every religion into its fold, without antagonising any religion or sect. In addition to Hinduism; Buddhism, Islam, Sikhism and Christianity continues to co-exist in our great land, since our culture is basically polytheist in nature. But for the cultural cohesiveness of our land, British would have failed to create a single political entity as India. Without understanding our basic strength, many attribute our sovereignty to English, whereas British were more known for their dividing capabilities than unifying credentials.

Many a time, religion and culture are misunderstood, to be overlapping to each other; experiments in that direction also failed; sterling example is the split of Pakistan into two. Pakistan was born out of apparent similarity of religion, but bereft of cultural cohesiveness and hence it was not able to stay as one political unit. Without proper understanding of this phenomenon, disgruntled elements in Pakistan are seeing a demon in India, which had engineered the split.

Patriotism is apparently misunderstood in Pakistan, by encompassing religion into its patriotic firmament, since the country originated on religious grounds. Because of this confused logic, select few inside Pakistan want to avenge India on religious lines, attributing assumed reasons of religious suppression in Kashmir and for causing the split of Bangladesh. However much diabolic or manic the design might be, because of its sanctification from the religious patriots, the feeble voices of reasonable persons in Pakistan have been dinned by the noises of radicals.

The radicals, however miniscule in number, wield enormous political and religious clout; they have absolute power of destruction. Political power centre in Pakistan had lost its control over these rogue elements since long and hence they continue to deny the presence of terror elements in their land.

Overt operations such as war or economic sanctions would hurt only the section in Pakistan which does not have anything to do with these terror elements and it is better for India to think of covert actions, aimed at hitting these modules beyond recovery.

Please let the Baath Party Survive

Vinod Joseph — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 08:29:53 EST

The Arab Socialist Baath Party, called the Ba'th party or the Baath party for short, was founded in Damascus by a group of secular Arabs in the middle of the 20th century when Syria and the rest of the Arab world were still under European rule.

The founders of the Baath party included Christians and Muslims. The most prominent of the founding members was Michel Aflaq, an Arab Christian. Baath means renaissance in Arabic and the Baath party was meant to herald a new dawn in Arab politics. Relatively secular by Arab standards, it stood for socialism, Arab nationalism and modernisation and encompassed Christians, Shias and Sunnis.

The Baath party had its offshoots in various parts of the Arab world, but it has traditionally been strongest in Iraq and Syria. The Iraqi and Syrian branches of the Baath party soon diverged ideologically, with the Syrian branch more socialist (and therefore closer to the Soviet Union) and the Iraqi offshoot much more to the centre. The Baath party came to power in both Iraq and Syria in 1963. In Syria, the Assad family came to control the Baath party which soon became indistinguishable from the Syrian state. The Assad family is Alawite, a Shia sect. In Iraq, Saddam Hussein took control of the Baath party and made it his personal instrument of power. Saddam being a Sunni Muslim, Sunnis came to dominate the Baath party in Iraq.

After the fall of Saddam, the Americans banned the Baath party. Members of the Baath party were even banned from holding any position in the new government. Very recently, the New York Times reported that over 35 in the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior, including some with ranks as high as general, have been arrested, after being accused of quietly working to reconstitute the Baath Party. Those arrested included Shias and Sunnis.

The Baath party is the only truly secular movement to have originated in the Arab world, which has had a pan-Arab appeal. The only other secular Arab movement is the Fatah Movement, which was formed by Yasser Arafat for the liberation of Palestine from Israel. In a region where there is a dearth of secular movements, the Baath Party stands out for having Shias, Sunnis and Christians under one roof. Saddam Hussein, for all his faults, was relatively secular and ensured that Christians and Shias had the freedom to practice their religion. In the West Bank which is controlled by the Fatah Movement, Arab Christians are similarly free to practice their faith, something they cannot do so easily in Hamas controlled Gaza strip, despite the fact that they have lived there for countless generations. Countries like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait which are supposed to be allies of the West have a horrible record of religious freedom compared to Baath party ruled Iraq and Syria.

There are many vested interests in the neighbourhood who do not want secular Arab nationalism to rise again. No, I am not talking of Israel. None of the monarchies in the Arab world, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait or Oman or Bahrain, want democracy in the region. Israel too would not be cheered by the rise of pan-Arab unity. Despite all that opposition, I believe that pan-Arab secular nationalism can purge the region of many of its ills and possibly help steer the Arabs to a decent settlement in Palestine.

I always thought that it was unbelievably stupid of the Americans to have banned the Baath party. In fact, they ought to have co-opted the Baath party, after purging it of Saddam loyalists, in the fight for democratising Iraq. Currently, Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is a Shi'ite who is propped up by two leading Shi'ite parties of Iraq, namely Moqtada al Sadr's party and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SICRI). SICRI is very much pro-Iranian and Maliki himself is very close to Iran. For this reason, the Sunnis of Iraq don't really trust him. For the moment, government armed Sunni militias are co-operating in the fight against the al-Qaeda. However, there is no guarantee that the Sunni-Shia unity will survive the departure of the Americans.

The only other secular Arab movement, the Fatah, has been totally discredited in the eyes of the common Arab on the street by its corruption and its close association with the US and Israel. It lost the Palestinian Authority parliamentary elections to fundamentalist Hamas in January 2006, though it has managed to hold on to power in the West Bank by means which are not really democratic.

There is still time to rectify the grave mistake of disbanding the Baath party, which despite the corruption and depravity foisted on it by Saddam, is still secular and is the only pan-Arab nationalist party in the world. I hope that once Obama is in office, the vilification of the Baath party will come to an end and it will be allowed to regain its rightful place in Iraq and the rest of the Arab world.

Skeletons in the Closet

Vinod Joseph — Mon, 29 Dec 2008 14:04:59 EST

This thought has been lingering in the back on my mind for a long time. The people who planned the Mumbai attacks must have had help from the local underworld, maybe the local representatives of Dawood Ibrahim’s gang.

It is well known that services offered by the underworld, especially money laundering services, are used by the rich and well-connected in India. If investigators are on the trail of Mr. X who provided credit cards or cash to the attackers, Mr. X might be able to call on someone high and mighty, say Mr. Y, to protect him. Mr. Y might be just a businessman with good connections who has nothing to do with terrorism. Mr. Y might or might not suspect what Mr. X is up to, but would protect him nevertheless, since Mr. X might otherwise spill the beans on him. In short, as long as India has such a vibrant parallel economy that puts the legit one in the shade, India will be vulnerable to terrorist attacks.

Jawed Naqvi, the Dawn’s correspondent in Delhi, one of the smartest Indian journalists today, has written a brilliant piece on this issue:

Here’s an interesting piece in the Independent which says India has not been passing on information to Interpol about the Mumbai attacks or the results of its investigation.

It makes sense for Indian investigators to want to keep their findings to themselves if sharing facts with Interpol or other foreign investigators will raise too many uncomfortable questions for India’s high and mighty, who might have had dealings with criminals and terrorists. Funnily, the Independent news report above does not say that India has been hiding its findings. Instead, it says Indian investigators have been regularly feeding the media, though not briefing Interpol

The Indian investigation into the Mumbai attacks now seems to bear a startling similarity with the way Pakistan has been investigating the Bhutto assassination. Even though Bhutto’s own party, the PPP, is in power, the investigation into the murder has made little headway. It’s been over a year since Bhutto was assassinated, but the truth behind who was responsible, is yet to emerge. Is this because if the truth were to be found, many respectable players will have to run for cover? Is this because the guilty are being shielded by those in power who have been hand-in-glove with them in various other nefarious activities?

Corruption, black money and a parallel economy are some of the things India and Pakistan have in common. Now it seems that both countries have too many similar skeletons in their closets.