Over the top

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Cosmos was brought out of chaos, darkness was turned into light. In the end, everything walks backward, perhaps to reiterate  and re-establish the original position.  And so we see how civilization is regressing in a police state that has rendered all constitutional values redundant. The big media doesn’t care much about Salwa Judum or draconian legislations like Chhattisgarh Special Public Security Act (CSPSA) or the resultant chilling tales of slaughter of man and his rights. The art of not writing (to borrow this phrase from Shubhranshu Chaudhury) has set in firmly. Chhattisgarh is the new Pandora and you would know what I mean if you have seen Cameron’s latest.

80% of Chhattisgarh’s population lives in rural areas. Majority are adivasis or tribals. Almost 80% of the working population is dependant on agro-based industry. The state is rich in mineral resources, forests, fertile farmlands. And hence the most ideal target for frankensteinian neo-liberalization. Land, which is understandably so important for people who are dependant on land for their survival have been plundered by a greedy state machinery backed by Indian and multinational corporations gulping down natural resources. Hundreds of MoUs have been signed by the State and the Central government to exploit natural resources at the expense of the already marginalized people sitting on the brink of destruction of life and livelihood so ominously upheld by the country’s apex court so many times.

Okay let us not digress to justice and rights.  The last time someone raised his voice, CSPSA came to the rescue of the state and the world witnessed the assault on the values, the fathers of the Indian Constitution so tenderly tried to protect. Binayak Sen happened. Next in line is perhaps a Gandhian activist called Himanshu Kumar, who did the silly thing to question the authority of the state to kill people. Himanshu’s Vanvasi Chetna Ashram (VCA) filed at least 600 complaints against human rights violations by the state and fake encounters by the uniquely immune Chhattisgarh police. Now the target is everyone who dares to question the infallible state. Taking a stock of voices raised last year, it can be pretty neatly surmised. Kopa Kunjum of VCA underwent arbitrary, unjust and illegal detention. A lawyer Alban Topo who was  accompanying Kopa was also taken, beaten up brutally in custody and kept in 18 hours of illegal detention. The two were not informed where they were being taken or why they were being taken in gross violation of Supreme Court’s guidelines in D.K. Basu case.

Sometime around December 2009 approximately 120 people from numerous organizations representing 10 states participated in a Campaign against Sexual Violence and State Repression meeting at Raipur in Chhattisgarh. A representative group of 39 members had set out from Raipur to Dantewada to extend support and solidarity to the tribal women who had filed complaints before the National Human Rights Commission. The team was stopped at least thrice, interrogated, threatened and finally not allowed to enter Dantewada. Such incident has been replicated with different sets of people countless times. A professor of sociology’s note after her visit to the state was on similar lines.

The SPOs in their jeeps followed us some way from Jagdalpur to Raipur, even when we were on the bus. In addition, two armed constables and an SI were sent on the bus to ensure we got to Raipur. We overheard the SI telling the armed constables to “take us down at Dhamtari” but fortunately this plan was abandoned. Poor man, he narrowly missed getting a medal for bravery, and as the good DGP tells the readers of the Indian Express, it would have been passed off as an attack by Naxalites. On reaching Raipur, the SI was confused. Shouting loudly and forgetting himself, as bad cell connections are wont to make us all do, he said “The IG and SP had told me to follow them, but now what do I do with them.”? The voice on the other end told him to go home. We flew out of Raipur the next morning. In real terms, this was a rather pointless exercise for the CG govt, since we were scheduled to come home the following day anyway. But symbolically, it allowed the SPOs to gloat that they had driven us out.

Again, Sodi Sambo, one of the witnesses and victims of the horrific killings at Gompad village in Dantewada (described as an ‘encounter’) was taken away by the police when she was on her way to Delhi for her treatment. Responding to a subsequent petition filed, the last torch-bearer of justice, the Supreme Court ordered the Chhattisgarh state not to interfere in Sambo’s journey to Delhi.

The most amusing part, if any in the entire chaos is the systematic, unbiased categorization of anyone who questions the authority or doubts the good intentions of the state as ‘Naxalite supporters’. Such christening however is unavailable to the ones at the bottom of the state’s priorities; so let them be called  ’Maoists‘. It is a remarkable phenomenon that a two year old’s fingers were chopped off on the suspicion that the child was a suspected Maoist.

Far away in the comfort of the capital, as I furiously type away, Chhattisgarh seems as unreal as a dystopia. It is a journey backwards, to a state of chaos.

—Jhuma Sen

In today’s Nepali Times, Rabi Thapa wrote:

From 1950 to 1990, 13 countries in Latin America, Africa and the former Soviet Union moved their capitals. Even the Indian capital moved from Calcutta to Delhi in 1911. Why not Nepal?”

I have been a big critic (like many) of the highly-centralized governance in Nepal. The result? We aren’t any better than we should have been, and the problems are plenty. The levels of disconnect and disparity between Kathmandu and the rest of the country are so high that they are like two different countries in themselves. People talk of marginalization of the Madheshi, of the Sherpas, of the Dalits, and so on. In my opinion, Nepal’s problems are not as much on ethnic grounds, as they are on regional differences. The Human Development Index (published by the UNDP) of Kathmandu district is comparable to that of South Africa, while that of Far-Western Nepal is comparable to that of Sierra-Leone. You call this class-difference or whatever, but a century of wrongs by the Bahuns and Chhetris in Kathmandu should not be the reason for the Bahuns or Chhetris in Jajarkot to be wronged for another century. Ask a Madheshi and an uneducated Chhetri from outside Kathmandu- the level of discrimination and the treatment of second-grade citizen offered by the residents of Kathmandu are more or less similar for both of them.

The fact that Kathmandu is the most developed city in Nepal is both both the cause and effect of the city being the capital of Nepal. Hence, blaming outsiders for the disorder in Kathmandu and not thanking them for the development of the city at the the cost of their own native cities and villages is a very uncivilized thing to do.

Some in today’s meeting of high level Maoist leadership have proposed Chitwan as the new capital of the country. Many think such talks by leaders are more related to influencing the land-prices than addressing real problems. Despite that, I support the proposal. Many years ago, (in the 50s or the 60s) somebody had proposed (in Nepal’s parliament) moving the capital to Pokhara. That was an idea whose time had come. Rapidly decentralizing Nepal has no substitute, especially if we keep talking of democracy and inclusiveness.

In today’s Maoist meeting itself, some leaders reportedly opposed the choice of Chitwan because of it being a district near to India. Now, can there be a comment more naive than that? Will Nepal be able to defend the supposed Indian attack if it ever takes place? And has India been unable to do so because of Kathmandu being surrounding by hills and a little (some 40-50 km air distance from Chitwan) far off from India ?

Or have we not been able to accelerate our development because of that highly-protective and defensive mentality (read inferior-complex) of ours? I think Nepal owes that mentality to the city of Kathmandu. It’s time for us to get rid of that.

As I had mentioned in yesterday’s post, I was eagerly awaiting this evening’s live broadcast of the Intelligence Squared debate on Pakistan. You would be forgiven if you’re not especially enamoured of such events because they have become something of a dreary staple in Western policy circles. People who had never heard of Pakistan before confidently make policy pronouncements on “Af-Pak”, Swat, the “tribal areas” and rattle off a gaggle of Muslim names all in a misplaced effort to garner some form of intellectual capital.

Although this particular panel discussion suffered from some of those traits it was sufficiently stimulating for the most part. I was particularly impressed with Dr. Farzana Shaikh’s deposition. Dr Shaikh, a fellow with the Asia Programme at Chatham House put forth a thesis that seeks to view Pakistani affairs from the old-fashioned prism of Indo-Pak relations and Pakistan’s testy relationship with its founding faith. Her basic contention was that the Pakistani quagmire is a direct result of the attempt to gain strategic parity with India. There were audible gasps of discomfort from (presumably) the Pakistani members of the audience as Shaikh implied that it is time that Pakistan abandons this attempt. A gentleman in the Q&A session afterwards even questioned her “representativeness” as she wrote in English and worked for a Western organisation. Evidently, the irony of speaking in the English language escaped him.

Shaikh then, if I may be permitted the usage of the term falls in the camp of the old school pragmatic secularists who wish to see Pakistan emerge as a developed member of international civil society. I would argue that the time for this Jinnahesque political project has passed and a radical re-imagination is required to foster a new and more sustainable political order on the Subcontinent for the benefit of all the populations involved.

One panelist whose speech I was eager to hear before the debate began was William Dalrymple. Dalrymple’s deposition convinced me that although he might have talents as a travel writer and as a chronicler of Mughal history he has serious deficiencies as an analyst of politics. His speech was a collection of clichés that seemed to have been gleaned from the pulp fiction that passes for political opinion in some newspapers. His basic aim seemed to be to reassure the audience that Pakistan hasn’t lagged behind India to the extent that the Western press made it out to be even attesting to the superiority of Pakistani roads and the high penetration of mobile phones. While no doubt true, it didn’t add much insight to the proceedings.

All in all though, it was a stimulating affair. I even had the opportunity to pose a question to Farzana Shaikh via Twitter that went something like this:

Re-integration with India is a utopian notion but is it not the most rational course forward?

This question simply aimed to take Dr Shaikh’s line of thought one step further. If Pakistan is to be a secular state in the classical Western sense as she envisions it then what is the rationale for its existence as a separate Islamic Republic? This of course draws attention to that rather large gorilla in the room that everybody would rather leave alone – the botched Partition of India.

Shaikh dismissed the proposition but to do so is understandable. Talking of Indo-Pak reunification or indulging in revisionist historical scholarship is to commit professional and political suicide as Mr Jaswant Singh, her fellow panellist knows well. He was quick to offer a palatable and politically correct response when the moderator posed my question to him.

Singh is infamous for his book on Jinnah that sought to emancipate the Quaid-e-Azam’s legacy and establish his secular credentials. However, Singh, now a full-time public intellectual free from the exigencies of Indian party politics seems unwilling to embrace the logical corollary of his thesis – If Partition was a bad idea to begin with, why shirk from advocating its reversal now?

- Vijay Vikram

It’s interesting how the recent Fox News footage (of Glenn Beck) created a furor about insulting India. Nobody should feel insulted by Fox, but if they should, I think it’s an insult to the whole developing world, of which rising powers like Brazil, China and India are the new strong voices. Over the top has already seen a very good post by Vijay Vikram on this topic.

I am most interested in the response of New Delhi and Bombay’s well-informed and critical middle class. The kind whose progeny slobber at the mention of American higher education and Subway. Remember, this is a class that lethally combines a post-colonial hunger for Western approval with an almost unmatched intolerance for irony and sarcasm in the English language…
There has never been any doubt that the social base of the Republican Party comprises of moose-hunting neo-Palinites whose primary political impulse is centered around childbirth and gun control rather than relations with rising Asia.

Personally, I think that Fox News should be ignored and if possible ridiculed. Not only Fox, but there many other (some say almost all, and I happen to agree partially) American media beat around the bush in order in order to keep the audience from concentrating on “the issues.” Some sections of the American liberals have expressed worry about the situation and guessed that without proactive actions, soon there would be no mainstream liberal media outlet left in the States.

Back to the topic. This piece of video raises many questions.

• Notice the tone, laugh, and facial expression of the anchor as he uses certain words, like “India.” He calls Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Zimbabwe (and Copenhagen, if I heard correctly, though it’s not a country) “stupid countries.” He even says that the river Ganges sounds like a disease.
• For such a great country and people like America, I wish they had something/someone better to represent them in front of the International audience. With a decreasing American might, un-winnable wars and economic crisis, Beck and Fox certainly don’t help change the rest of the world’s perception of Americans as stupid.
• Talking of stupidity, the most ridiculous part of the video is when Beck goes to the board to compare Indian and American income levels. He compares the income of just-out-of-college Indian doctor with a well earning American doctor. He’d better got back to school and understand that such comparisons based on USD or exchange rates are very inaccurate. Comparing in terms of Purchasing Power Parity, one can perhaps have a better quality of life in India with $5000 than with $150000.
• Becks suggests that the high cost of health care in America is because of its high-tech hospitals, good doctors and all. Sure they have excellent manpower and facilities, but is an analysis of US health-care system complete without mentioning how much the private insurance companies keep for themselves? He doesn’t fail to mention though that a reason for high costs in US is because of the payments for laborers. Instead of comparing with a developing economy like India, one can get a better perspective by comparing the costs with some countries with comparable level of technical and economic progress. These charts compare the costs of private health-care plans of the US with other industrial countries like France and Germany.
• Becks should probably be thankful to the goods and services he gets from the developing world including India and China that have helped his country cope with an economic crisis that was aggravated by the “best of managers” who went to Harvard and Yale.

Right wing American media’s similar derogatory depiction of South Asia, its heritages and culture isn’t new. India, China and other countries happen to be at the receiving end because of their rising stature. All of Southasia and the developing world share the brunt of such tactics.

How do you think the Southasians need to deal (or challenge) with it? Please let your views be known in the comments.

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Edited: The first few words of the second last paragraph were: “American (and Western in general) media’s… ” I edited after reading Joseph’s comment (2nd comment in this post).
Here is my response to his comment.

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The Nepali Dada Party believes that the people of the Newari community deserve their own autonomous region. The party cadres are fully behind the Newars in their claims. In fact, should the Kathmandu Valley wish to declare itself a sovereign  nation, independent from the rest of Nepal, the Dada Party Militia will immediately join the Newari nation’s army.

In lieu of several allegations made to the party regarding its over strong claims of support for Newars, the party pilot-bureau has decided to make its stance clear.

The Nepali Dada Party believes that the Newars are direct descendants of the Lord Krishna and his 78th fling. Thus being the case, all Newars are descendants of a very playful god. This naturally allows all Male members of the Newari family to participate in random acts of infidelity. The Newars are also a very progressive group of people that believe in the ideals of the revolution. Their behavior in controlling their woman folk like cheap labor and refusing inter-caste marriages is laying the foundations for the Dada Revolution. Their progressiveness is also clearly shown in their complete disregard for over 500 years of tradition and culture in the way they have completely defiled their once pristine cities. They are also very industrious as can be seen by how willingly they have allowed the most sacred of their rivers to become the industrial sewerage system of their massive production of shit. These reasons and many more are at stake when the Nepali Dada Party makes this affirmative stance for choela and kachila mixed with a hearty round of aila.

- Newari Dada, official party maker in the Nepali Dada Party