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| Wednesday,
September 12, 2001, Chandigarh, India    |
Behind the burqa in Kashmir Labour reforms pain Ominous signals from Durban |
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Why Indira was different from others
Murder or mercy
killing?
Extremism is self-defeating
Waterbirds hit by wetland neglect
Honour for a film on Punjabi wedding
Multan Arya Samajists
and Sanatanists
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Behind the burqa in Kashmir THE threat issued by the Lashkar-e-Jabbar, a little known terrorist outfit, has had its impact in the Kashmir valley, particularly in Srinagar, with most Muslim women donning the burqa or the abaya while moving out of their homes. But this is no victory for the elements terrorising the innocent. Taking to the safest course by ordinary people is obvious in an extraordinary situation that prevails in Kashmir. Terrorists can always spring a surprise and, therefore, very few people prefer to defy their diktat. But Kashmir Range police chief Ashok Bhan's assertion that all this is because of the "excessive" media attention to the burqa campaign amounts to
trivialising the issue. Incidents of throwing acid on the faces of three women teachers by members of the Lashkar-e-Jabbar last month did create a new kind of terror in the valley, and the media only did its duty by focusing on the coercive tactics of the militants. And these anti-national elements have shown that a frightened people do not take seriously any claim about tight security arrangements as made by Mr Bhan. This is, however, a serious matter. The situation must change irrespective of the cost the nation has to pay for it. The security forces must instil among the people the confidence that it is their writ that runs in the valley, and not that of the enemies of peace. The Lashkar's burqa drive has also brought into the open a comforting factor — that the Talibanisation of Kashmir is not possible. Except for the Dukhtaran-e-Millat, a fundamentalist organisation of Muslim women, most militant outfits operating in the valley — the Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Jaish-e-Mohammed, etc — have denounced the forcible imposition of the Islamic dress code as the Hurriyat Conference did before them. There is already great revulsion among the public against forcing women to dress against their wishes. The security forces should make use of the opportunity to convince the frightened people to cooperate with the guardians of law to take on the purveyors of terrorism. Militants will run for cover once they realise that they have few sympathisers among the valley's populace. This is what happened in Punjab a few years ago. The opportunity available in Kashmir today was never there in the past. During the 1990s when Allah's Tigers had launched a campaign on the lines of the one by the Lashkar-e-Jabbar, most militant leaders had expressed their support for it. Yet the Tigers abandoned the idea, realising that they could not succeed in their forcible implementation of a retrograde code. This time two prominent Muslim organisations with their headquarters in Delhi — the Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Hind and the Jamaat-e-Islami Hind — have also come down heavily on the elements represented by the Lashkar-e-Jabbar, as their activities are bringing a bad name to Islam and Muslims. These organisations will be doing a great service to the nation if they use their influence in the valley to educate people to launch a powerful movement against those destroying not only the economy but also the pacifist and secular culture of Kashmir. |
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Labour reforms pain ANOTHER ambitious reform vehicle of the BJP-led alliance government – labour law reforms — has hit an insurmountable roadblock. It is not because of the opposition of the Congress or the “compulsions” of Mrs Sonia Gandhi, as Prime Minister Vajpayee told a newspaper. It is actually because the BJP failed to cover its planks. The government proposes to drastically amend the Industrial Disputes Act, the Contract Labour Act and the Factories Act to strip workers off security of service. The other side of the same coin is to vest employers with the right to hire and fire workers. The Centre knew all along that all central trade unions are opposed to these sweeping changes since there is no safety net for the jobless and Indian industry is notorious for not motivating the workers with frequent retraining and rewarding the efficient. Among the no-sayers is the BMS (Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh, a Sangh Parivar outfit). It is bitterly against lifting the cover of security of service and making employment insecure. Even the BJP is not fully supportive of the proposed move. Its recent national executive meeting merely hoped that liberalised labour laws would get workers more wages and create new jobs. This is based on the assumption that foreign investors will come in droves, relieved that their hands are not tied, and generate a booming labour market as it has happened in China. This may not materialise if the experience of the special economic zones (SEZ) is anything to go by. The stringent labour laws do not apply to SEZs and yet there has been no enquiry from any foreign investor. Within the BJP itself there is no consensus on effecting radical changes. Many feel that the government should wait for the recommendations of the second Labour Commission led by Mr Ravindra Verma, Labour Minister in the Morarji Desai government in the late seventies. Its report should come by the end of the year and the suggestions could be used to build a wide-ranging agreement on all core issues. Actually convention demands that the report should be placed in Parliament and discussed. Differences of opinion can be sorted out at a series of all-party meeting or discussion between the leaders of the NDA and the Congress. As of now, the move is a dead duck. The BJP-led alliance government has to do two things. One, set up a machinery to provide help to those thousands who will lose their jobs once the amendments take effect. Two, constitute a consultative mechanism to have all political parties on board on sensitive issues. In other words, extend the coalition dharma to the opposition benches as well. |
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Ominous signals from Durban EVEN before the UN World Conference Against Racism began in Durban, fear was expressed that it would be overshadowed by politics. The prediction has come true, not only in the overall deliberations, but also in the case of India-specific matters. Dalits can exult that they managed to bring the problems of the "untouchables" on to the global stage. The International Dalit Solidarity Network succeeded in getting at least nine governments to raise questions on caste-based discrimination. But this "achievement" came at a heavy price to the nation. The NGO forum's declaration went to the extent of describing the whole of northeast India as "occupied territory". While speaker after speaker from India was busy alleging that 160 million Dalits in our country "are living in conditions worse than those in the apartheid era in South Africa", none bothered to protest against paragraph 97 of the declaration under the sub-section titled "Colonialism and Foreign Occupation" that states: "We extend our solidarity to the struggles for self-determination for the people of Palestine, West Sumatra, Aceh-Sumatra, Bougainville, Nagaland, Assam, Meghalaya, Manipur, Tripura, North Cyprus, and other States and indigenous communities, including the Kurdish people, the indigenous people in the northeast of India and in the northeast of Sri Lanka, in Tibet, Kashmir, Bhutan, Mindanao and the non-independent countries of the Caribbean, like Puerto Rico, and recognise the situation of other people living under foreign occupation in different parts of the world". The large number of delegates from India must consider the price that the country will have to pay for this kind of bad publicity. Who prompted the forum to include the names of all these Indian states is also worth enquiring. That does not mean that India should lose sleep over the censure. The unwieldy conference had lost much of its focus even before the boycott by the USA and Israel. Most of the 19,000 participants were determined to make their own voice heard and none wanted to concentrate on the overall situation. The result was that many vital issues were trivialised. The only subjects on which some kind of consensus could be developed were the injustice of slavery and colonialism and the plight of Palestinians. Most negotiators agree that the agreement was terribly imperfect, but provided a basis to build on. As everyone knows, it is not easy to build on a contentious blueprint. |
Why Indira was different from others ACCORDING to an ORG-Marg opinion poll (published in India Today, Aug. 26), 41 per cent of the respondents thought Indira Gandhi was the best Prime Minister India has ever had. She even beat her father, popularly thought to be the best Prime Minister of the country. Jawaharlal Nehru and Atal Behari Vajpayee were rated as the best Prime Ministers by 13 per cent and 11 per cent respectively. The poll results reflect the voters’ present mood rather than their reasoned choice. There is no doubt the voters, particularly those in the BJP camp, are outraged by the party’s conduct in power. The Tehelka tapes, the UTI scandal and the Agra failure represent to the voter a depraved, shameless and incompetent leadership. It is this mood of the voter that is reflected in the rating of the Prime Minister in the ORG-Marg poll. Perhaps, Mr Vajpayee would not have polled as low as he did had his government’s performance been even average. Let us leave out the depressing state of affairs today and return to the question: what makes a good Prime Minister? First, we must accept a fact, however unpalatable, that a majority of Indians see in the Prime Minister a monarch. No doubt, we see ourselves as democratic, but a majority of us also regard the Prime Minister as the nation’s guardian, a moral exemplar, a supreme leader. He/she is above all. He or she is wildly applauded for an achievement but loudly jeered for a failure. For example, Indira Gandhi was hailed as a victor of the 1971 war but denounced as a grubby power-seeker for declaring the Emergency. The Prime Minister is seen by a majority of us as a monarch. For us monarchy is simply not symbolic, as it is for the Britons or the Norwegians. It is also substantive. Indira Gandhi could declare Sanjay and Rajiv as her successor. Jawaharlal Nehur did the same thing when he indicated, albeit subtly, that Indira Gandhi was his successor. Our political culture is basically authoritarian. By political culture we mean the collective attitude of people towards authority, the government or the state. Political culture is also about what people think of such issues as public propriety, public conduct, accountability, transparency, etc. India political culture greatly values authority, particularly, the authority as represented by a person rather than an institution. An Indian readily submits to a person in authority. This has been his distinguishing trait throughout the centuries. However, for him the authority has to be dharmic. An adharmic persons in power loses legitimacy in the eyes of an Indian, though he may not revolt against such a leader. Our political culture respects, even worships, a person in power. Mr Narasimha Rao, who certainly understood well our political culture and was, therefore, able to hang on to the Prime Ministership against many odds, notes in his memoirs the monarchical underplay of our democracy. B.R. Ambedkar said “democracy in India is only a top dressing on Indian soil, which is essentially undemocratic”. In the ORG-Marg poll 42 per cent of the respondents voted Indira Gandhi as the best Prime Minister we have had. But is this because she was perceived by people to be a supreme leader and a ruthless wielder of power? If these were the qualities people most admired in her and, therefore, judged her to be the best leader, then why did the same people hoot her out of power in 1977? If a public opinion poll had been conducted in 1974-75 her rating as the Prime Minister would have been very low. She was removed from power by a decisive electoral verdict because the imposition of the Emergency was seen by people as an adharmic act. Dharma and adharma stand for more than simply democratic and undemocratic conduct. Dharma in the context of our present political system has come to mean to an Indian voter a combination of values, behaviour and policy. A dharmic person is modest, austere and egalitarian. Of course, such a leader has to be a firm, decisive and effective power wielder. Many saw Indira Gandhi, as a leader exemplifying these qualities. Apart from the imposition of the Emergency, her policies on the socio-economic front were well received by people. In fact, numerous surveys show that the poor, the socially backward, the victims of caste oppression, the Muslems and those left out of the development process saw her as their saviour. When asked why they thought she was their saviour, they would invariable say that she “understood our sorrow”. She displayed, what the French call, nobless oblige, that concern of a noble person for the downtrodden. How indicative of her personality that she would take up the cause of the killings of Harijans in 1978 in Belchhi to stage a comeback ? What a comeback ! If she was a good Prime Minister it was because she appealed to all the people : the Dalits, the OBCs and religious minorities, as well as to the upper and middle castes and classes. Certainly Jawaharlal Nehru also appealed to a wide section of people, though why he ranks below her daughter in the ORG-Marg poll is inexplicable. Perhaps, Indira Gandhi’s appeal to the people was more direct ad dramatic (Gharibi Hatao, Belchhi, etc) than her father’s. In a sense a good Prime Minister must also be a charismatic leader. It is not enough to be just intelligent and competent. Mr Narasimha Rao in this sense was a good Prime Minister, but he singularly lacked an appeal to the people. A Prime Minister in this country must be a symbol of national unity. The country is too diverse, linguistically, socially, culturally and religiously, to be governed by a Prime Minister of average ability. Morarji Desai was one such Prime Minister, but he never had the appeal of his predecessor. Even a person of outstanding intelligence and competence won’t qualify to be a good Prime Minister in the sense in which I am using the word. Take Mr Tony Blair, who is very able yet he would never make a good Prime Minister in our country. His appeal is confined to the labour and the middle classes. Here to be a good Prime Minister you have to appeal to all. Perhaps, a good Prime Minister is now an impossibility. The mandir-Madal divide has so affected the Hindi belt that it is impossible to think of a single individual having his appeal to all. Each person — Mr Mulayam Singh, Mr Laloo Yadav, Ms Mayawati, Mr Kalyan Singh, et al — has now created his own electoral terrain. The kind of electoral sweep that Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi had in the seventies and the eighties is now a thing of the past. In the South it is the regional leaders who have commanded power since the mid-eighties — NTR’s Telugu Desam and the regional Janata Party in Karnataka. In Tamil Nadu and Kerala, the regional leadership has been in power for much longer. Indira Gandhi was the first and perhaps the last good Prime Minister India had, cutting across the religious, regional, caste and class divide in the country. |
Murder or mercy
killing? I
admire my wife for her intelligent reaction to social news. The latest proof of her intelligence came the other day when we were watching
Doordarshan Hindi news. It was shown that the leaders of different religious groups were eloquently speaking against the heinous practice of pre-natal sex determination tests and the subsequent destruction of the foetus if it happened to be a female. The religious men invariably described the phenomenon as murder of the unborn. A few minutes after this piece of news, there was the programme “Surkhion mein” which further condemned the inhuman practice in unequivocal terms. Nothing had ever pleased me, a staunch champion of women’s rights, than this news. And I made no secret of my pleasure. But mysteriously enough, my wife gave me a disapproving look. The mystery deepened when instead of agreeing with the description of the destruction of female foetus as a shockingly shameful act, she described it as a mercy killing. “What makes you think like that?” I said. “The birth of a girl,” she said”, is considered to be a curse in the Indian society. So why not nip the evil in the bud?” “But don’t you see the change that has taken place in the outlook of the people during the past few decades? People have started bringing up their daughters in the same way and with the same enthusiasm as they bring up their sons. The result is that girls have entered all the professions which were hitherto considered to be the citadels of boys. Not only that. Women are occupying positions of trust and responsibility in all walks of life. And do you know that there is a serious move to reserve 33 per cent seats for women in the legislatures of the land?” I said all this almost in one breath to forestall any counter argument by my wife. But quite contrary to my expectations, she shot back an arrow: “Do you mean to suggest that the nominal figure of women enjoying equal status with men can compensate for the grave injustice being done to lakh Bharat ki betis?” “What injustice are you referring to”? I asked. She had a derisive laugh and said: “If you are that ignorant, let me give you two examples. First, take the notorious dowry system. Before Independence, if a bride brought insufficient dowry, she was let off with a few words of taunting by the mother-in-law or the sister-in-law. But today she has to pay with her life, mostly under very tragic circumstances. And even if she brings a rich dowry, there is no guarantee that her peace of mind or life would be safe in case her in-laws have an insatiable thirst for material things. Who bothers that the bride has the virtues of a deity? “Second, the greatest danger to women is the incidence of rapes in which not only their honour but also their life is at stake. And the nation is talking of women empowerment!” I felt shaken. But swinging back to the original theme, I said: Female foeticide is a crime.” “Yet, but who is caught in the net?” said my wife. “Female foeticide is a sin,” I said, resorting to spirituality. “What an orthodox statement!” said my wife. I stood badly beaten. |
Extremism is self-defeating EXTREME values may appeal at first, but have never made living easy and that’s why have mostly lost out over a period. Till now what was going on in Jammu and Kashmir was terrorism, jehad or geopolitics, depending on the perch you looked at it from; but now with a code for women on their dress a new “reformist” concept has been introduced. This is how they often begin/start with a move to remove the “ills of society.” Follow that with the evolution of an independent authority that has its own laws and tells people how to conduct their lives. That’s when movements begin to fail, for people, expectedly, cannot understand the merit of a way that makes their lives miserable. The motives of the leaders of such movements are obvious, but are usually not realised by society that is already ridden with other genuine ills that these extremists first propose to cure. Punjab realised this painfully over more than a decade. When the extremists first stopped large “barats” or actually enforced a ban on dowry, people cheered, lending a kind of moral authority to the extremists. Soon they were all over, apparently with masses’ support initially. It took a while before people realised this sword had two edges. The movement troubled the authorities as much as the man in a village or on the city street. Watering the fields was dangerous, marriages were no more an occasion for fun and frolic, schools were no more a place for learning and innocence; in short, living, which is not easy as it is, was becoming impossible because the common was not being allowed to breathe. No surprise then the movement died out. Credit for ending extremism in Punjab goes as much to the extremists themselves as to K. P. S. Gill and Beant Singh. The extremists ensured that people got fed up with them and stopped extending support to them, if not turned against. An extreme form of corruption in Pakistan had made the situation ripe for the kind of bloodless coup that was staged by Gen Pervez Musharraf. People welcomed it with sweets, hoping to get rid of corrupt officials. But it was not long before they realised that absolute authority was just another kind of extremism; in fact, worse because you can’t complain anywhere. Musharraf has lost out on support that he commanded initially precisely because people’s lives are becoming worse-while all earlier ills remain, liberty has been taken away too. Communism is yet another example of taking things to the extreme. While socialism sounds good, its extreme form, i.e. communism, failed, albeit after a long time, because it didn’t make living easy. Taliban, if they are challenged by any external force, can expect no support from the Afghan masses for their lives have been made miserable by the extremists. The latest diktats of Islamists in Jammu and Kashmir may well be their undoing if they press too hard or too far with the “cleansing of society.” They would lose mass support and only the battle of the gun would remain. (Security forces should be happy with the diktat on that count) In fact, given these examples of extremism being self-defeating, let Hindu masses, too, be warned of the nascent fundamentalism that is being introduced by saffron-eyed politicians who see opportunity in that colour. Their form of “Hindutva” may seem appealing and logical initially, but remember, no extreme path has ever made living easier. We should realise that before it happens. |
Waterbirds hit by wetland neglect A
large variety of waterbirds, many of whom are either rare or even extinct in some parts of the world, can be seen at the Asan reservoir in the Doon valley and the Kalagarh reservoir in the Corbett tiger reserve in Uttaranchal. However, non-stop anthropogenic pressure on wetlands such as demand for fuel and fodder far exceed their regenerative ability. The ever-increasing use of fertilisers, herbicides and pesticides is polluting wetlands such as these two beyond redemption and seriously affecting rich bird life, say scientists of the Zoological Survey of India here. In a volume titled Waterbirds of northern India brought out by the ZSI here, authors J.R.B. Alfred, Dr Arun Kumar, P.C. Tak and J.P. Sati say that bird life in all major wetlands in the country had shown a serious decline in the recent past. “The wetlands of the Indo-Gangetic plains and the Himalayan Terai region which provide a winter home to millions of waterfowl are being lost at an alarming rate due to neglect and lack of management”, says the book released in the Doon valley recently by Uttaranchal Governor Surjit Singh Barnala. Management of wetlands, especially for migratory waterfowl, requires a thorough knowledge not only of the ecology of that particular wetland but also the migration, feeding ecology and behaviour of the species that use the wetland. If managed with appropriate conservation measures, along with
sufficient public awareness, the wetlands can become very productive, say the authors of the book. A total of 767 kinds of waterbirds have been recorded globally, of which 328 are in Asia with 245 being in India. The book covers 180 of waterbirds from northern India including Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Chandigarh, Haryana, Uttaranchal, Delhi and Uttar Pradesh. These waterbirds and 36 wetland dependent birds are illustrated in 40 colour plates in the book. Precise information on diagnostics, habits, habitat, residential status, food, abundance and distributional range is provided by the authors, all senior scientists of ZSI. During the last three decades, increasing attention to the conservation of wetlands in India has resulted in immense research, especially on the ecology of the waterbirds — one of the best indicators of the health of a wetland
habitat. UNI |
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Honour for a film on Punjabi wedding MONSOON Wedding, the story of an Indian bride who has second thoughts about an arranged marriage, won the coveted Golden Lion award for Best Picture at the 58th Venice Film Festival on Saturday. Directed by Mira Nair, maker of the 1988 Oscar-nominated Salaam Bombay, the film is part social documentary, part dramatic comedy, tackling sensitive issues such as incest as an extended Punjabi family reunites from around the world for the wedding. It was the first time India or a woman had won the top prize at the world’s oldest film festival. Recognised worldwide for provocative movies such as Mississippi Masala and Kamasutra: A Tale of Love, Nair was described as a “visionary” by the head of the jury, Cannes winner Nanni Moretti. But she played down the acclaim. “I just wanted to explore something very personal, about my family and families in general, in a free way,” she told reporters after the awards ceremony. “I didn’t expect anything from this film really. I wanted to make a small thing, but I am so very happy to say that it has become big,” she said. As for being the first female director to win in 58 festivals at Venice, she said: “I am not one to hold a flag. If we win and we happen to be women, then wonderful.” Nair, who was educated in New Delhi and went to the US on a theatre scholarship to Harvard, said the film was a “love song to Delhi” which sought to praise the Punjabi community while examining its dark side. Long suppressed revelations of incest in the family mar the build up to the exuberant wedding — but still Nair said she wanted to show that Punjabis are like the people of Naples in Italy — “loud, aggressive, individualistic and with a huge appetite for living.” “I have been fed on the cinema, but fuelled in the political street theatre of Delhi and Kolkata, and that is where I return,” she said at a news conference. “I like to push the envelop... I believe that movies are there to provoke and get under your skin.” The film shot on a hand-held camera to give it more of the feel of a documentary, received warm reviews from critics and audiences but was not one of the two films hotly tipped by a group of 15 newspaper and magazine critics to win. The 44-year-old daughter of a civil servant, Nair was born in Orissa and studied in Shimla and New Delhi. In 1976 she went to Harvard, where she graduated in sociology. Instant international success with “Salaam Bombay” goaded Nair to attempt a film on a grander canvas. A lot of analysts considered her next project “Mississippi Masala” a failed epic. Nair’s next film, “The Perez Family”, saw her getting into mainstream Hollywood. As the American Dream sucked Nair in, she plunged into her most self-defeating and pretentious effort. “Kamasutra” unabashedly tried to sell Indian erotica to the West. The film’s content, unredeemed by Rekha’s strong cameo, hurt Nair’s reputation considerably. On “Monsoon wedding” Nair says she wanted to turn the weddings seen in Hindi films like “Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge” and “Hum Aapke Hain Koun” on its head. Shot with a hand-camera, “Monsoon Wedding” featuring Naseeruddin Shah, Kulbhushan Kharbanda, Sonali Shetty, Shefali Shah and Lilette Dubey. Incidentally, though there are 68 characters in it, “Monsoon Wedding” was planned and executed as a small film.
Reuters, IANS |
Multan Arya Samajists and Sanatanists THIRTEEN respectable Hindu citizens of Multan, including well-known lawyers and others, have addressed a letter to the Secretaries of the Arya Samaj and S.D. Sabha, Multan City, expressing concern on the proposal to open Shastrarth (debate) and the spread of false rumours in the city, and requesting both the parties to divert their energies towards introducing reforms in the Hindu Society, and desist from such a course and try to live amicably with their brethren. |
The world is a great volume and man, the index of the book; even in the body of man you may turn to the whole world. — John Domne, Sermons *** Renounce wealth, wife, son and relations as fleeting and ephemeral. — Adi Shankaracharya
*** The world is ever up to lure us by appearing in variegated colours. It is full of the deadliest poison. He alone escapes it on whom the preceptor casts his glance of grace, So says Farid.
*** The beauty of the world is all vain. Its charms are all useless if through them the love of the Lord is not cherished, So says Farid. *** The day was passed in agony and the night in suffering pain. The boatman standing opposite remarked: “the boat is in a whirlpool”, So says Farid. — Couplets of Baba Farid *** With what anxious looks the pilgrim scanned and passed by the garden of the world. He plucked a few flowers, snatched a few thorns and crestfallen departed from the world. This world is a complete mystery, Pity the man who does not understand this secret. *** I tell thee grieve not in this world, Nor seek relief in hiding in mountains and wilderness. This world is but a mirage. Look carefully at it. It is mere froth of the bubble, a mere ripple in the sea. — Quartains of Sarmad. *** For in and out, above, about, below, It is nothing but a Magic Shadow-show, Played in a Box whose candle is the sun, Round which we Phantom figures come and go. — Omar Khayyam, Rubaiyat |
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