SECULARISM, DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS AND SOCIAL JUSTICE

INSAF Bulletin 224 December 2020
Founding Editor: Daya Varma (1929-2015)
Editors: Vinod Mubayi (New York) and Raza Mir (New Jersey).
Editorial Board: Ram Puniyani and Irfan Engineer (Mumbai); Pervez Hoodbhoy (Islamabad); Dolores Chew (Montreal); Vamsi Vakulabharanam (Amherst); Ajay Bhardwaj (Vancouver).
Circulation/website: Feroz Mehdi (On behalf of Alternatives, Montreal).

HAS MODI FINALLY MET HIS MATCH IN INDIA’S FARMERS?

Ravinder Kaur

The government’s hopes of turning India into the world’s workshop for global corporations are being strongly resisted

FARM LAWS: PUBLIC PERCEPTION IS IN FAVOR OF FARMERS, CENTRE CANNOT BE IN DENIAL

The farmers’ movement has reached a stage where it no longer deals with the sectional interests of farmers alone but has deeply affected all sections of Indian society.

EDITORIAL 1: SUPREME JOKE

Vinod Mubayi

Medieval courts used to have a court jester who was allowed to lampoon the nobility or even poke fun at the ruling monarch as a way of blowing off steam; his antics were permitted ostensibly on the grounds that what he said was a joke and not to be taken seriously thereby allowing the targets of his barbs to save face. The Indian legal and judicial system does not seem to be able to display a comparable liberality towards comedians. The Attorney General has sanctioned prosecution of the comedian Kunal Kamra for daring to label the Supreme Court of India a Supreme Joke.

EDITORIAL 2: BIHAR ELECTION – LESSONS FOR THE LEFT

Vinod Mubayi

After disappointing performances in the past several years, the recently concluded state elections in Bihar provided a partial resurgence of the Left led by the CPI(ML) Liberation group that won 12 of the 19 seats it was allotted by the Mahagathbandhan (Grand Coalition or MGB) of the Rashtriya Janata Dal, Congress, and the Left.

ARTICLE 32: RIGHTS FOR ALL OR FOR A FAVOURED FEW?

M. Sridhar Acharyulu

When the law becomes a weapon of oppression rather than an equalising force, democracy is in danger. Article 32 deals with the ‘Right to Constitutional Remedies’, and affirms the right of an individual to move the Supreme Court (SC) by appropriate proceedings for the enforcement of the rights conferred in Part III of the constitution.

INDIA’S HUNGER PANGS

EPW Editorial

The Global Hunger Index (GHI) 2020, which ranks India 94 among 107 nations, has once again brought to the fore the government’s failure to provide adequate food to a substantial segment of the population despite rising stocks of cereals.

DILLI CHALO MARCH HAS SHATTERED THE MIASMA OF HINDUTVA’S POWER AND ARROGANCE

Amandeep Sandhu

THE PROTESTORS on the #DilliChalo march are motivated by Fundamental Rights as enshrined in the Constitution, Article 19. Namely, freedom of speech and expression; freedom to assemble peacefully and without arms; freedom to move freely throughout the territory of India. They sought to reach the capital of the nation.

THE ASSASSIN STATE KEEPS ON KILLING – DOES ANYONE CARE?

Vinod Mubayi

The latest victim of the Assassin State’s long list of terror killings stretching back many decades is an Iranian physicist, Dr Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.

SAFEGUARDING FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS

Madan Bhimrao Lokur

In recent times, the right to speech, expression and the right to protest have been constantly undermined. An attack on these rights runs contrary to the spirit of civilised democracy. We need to exercise these rights within the Constitution’s conditions and the government is duty-bound to provide these conditions.

CPI(M) DISAGREES WITH PROPOSAL TO GO SOFT ON TMC

Shubhadeep Choudhury

Left Front convener Biman Bose on Sunday said the CPI-ML (Liberation) stance of treating the BJP as enemy number one in West Bengal was not acceptable to CPI-M.

PAKISTAN: ANATOMY OF A POLITICAL MOMENT

Sarah Eleazar and Sher Ali Khan

What kind of freedom is this?

You are deaf to our voices.

What KIND of freedom IS this?

Our young men keep getting killed.

What KIND of freedom IS this?

– ‘Da Sang Azadi Da’ by Shaukat Aziz

EDITORIAL: PLUMBING THE MORAL DEPTHS

Vinod Mubayi

How low can the country go? To what moral depths can the “world’s largest democracy” descend? These questions emerge naturally in the aftermath of two horrific events: the rape and killing of a young Dalit woman in Hathras, UP and its cover up by the state police as well as the arrest of an 83-year old priest Father Stan Swamy on charges so preposterous they strain credulity.

BJP’S ‘FREE COVID VACCINE FOR VOTES’ OFFER FOR BIHAR RAISES CONCERNS OF HEALTH POLICY, ETHICS

Vasudevan Mukunth and Siddharth Varadarajan

The first item on the Bharatiya Janata Party’s manifesto in Bihar, ahead of the assembly polls set to kick off there next week, is that if the party is elected to power in the state, it will arrange for free COVID-19 vaccines. It is hard to overstate how appalling this promise is, assuming it will be fulfilled.

ADITYANATH ALWAYS FLAUNTED HIS BIGOTRY, NOW HIS WAR ON MINORITIES IS IN FULL SWING

Harsh Mander and Amitanshu Verma

What is going on in Uttar Pradesh? The constitution of India, at least in principle, still applies to the state. No emergency has been imposed.

MALNUTRITION AND FOOD SECURITY IN INDIA IN THE TIME OF COVID-19

Vasanthi Raman

The Prime Minister’s pronouncements on the occasion of World Food Day commemorated the setting up of the Food and Agricultural Organization on October 16, 1945 and hailed not only the achievements of the food agencies of the UN, but also India’s supposed role in its achievements.

STAN SWAMY HAS STOOD WITH THE OPPRESSED. THE STATE CONSIDERS HIM AN ENEMY

Harsh Mander

The true character of a state is perhaps best exposed by its choice of enemies. In its latest strike, the entire might of the state has converged on an 83-year-old Jesuit priest, who has devoted his life to struggling with the most oppressed among the Indian people — the Adivasis — against corporate and state power. The government leaves no doubt about who it despises and fears. And who it stands with.

BECOMING KAMALA DEVI HARRIS: WHEN BRAHMIN AND BLACK IDENTITIES CONVERGE

Radhika Parameswaran and Pallavi Rao

Democratic Party presidential candidate Joe Biden’s nomination of Kamala Devi Harris for vice president has brought international attention to a political figure fusing Indian American and African American identities.

TIME TO STAND UP AGAINST FASCISM IS NOW

Arundhati Roy

The most rotten part of this country is the mainstream media. This is the most tragic part of this country, the most shameful part of this country.

INDIA’S HUNGER PANGS

EPW Editorial

The NDA government’s record in controlling hunger is dismal despite rising stocks of cereal.

BASMATI BATTLE: PAKISTAN FIGHTS INDIAN BID FOR EU RECOGNITION OF RICE

Daniel Boffey

A new ingredient has been added to the boiling pot that is the relationship between India and Pakistan: basmati rice. Pakistan’s government has vowed to “vehemently” oppose an application by India for the long-grain aromatic rice to be recognised by the EU as being grown exclusively in specific regions of the Indian subcontinent.

THE DISCOLOURATION OF “GREEN GROWTH” IN PAKISTAN

Sara Abraham

Pakistan’s weakened Left discourse over the last few decades has meant that numerous areas of social and ecological life, such as the life of women, or the natural environment, have fallen into the hands of well-heeled members of civil society.

BOOK REVIEW: PIONEER OF MARXIST SOCIAL HISTORY

Pavel Tomar

Eric Hobsbawm: A Life in History by Richard J Evans, London: Little Brown, 2019; pp xiii + 785, ?954 (hardcover).

EDITORIAL: INDIA’S MARCH TO A POLICE STATE INTENSIFIES

Vinod Mubayi

Last month’s editorial focused on how India, often billed as the world’s largest democracy, was marching towards an authoritarian police state. It was argued that while the formal institutions of democracy such as the constitution, the courts and the legislature remain, their content is being systematically hollowed out to make them mere shells without substance.

DELHI POLICE

Pratap Bhanu Mehta

Delhi’s Police’s investigation against students and activists in connection with the Delhi riots is pushing the Indian state into a long dark night of tyranny. The riots are a serious matter. All perpetrators must be credibly identified and subject to the law. But instead, we are witnessing a project designed to crush civil society. If our freedom is to be saved, we need to understand what is at stake in what is happening in Delhi.

HOW POLITICAL MASTERS ARE ORCHESTRATING DELHI POLICE IN RIOTS CASE

Julio Ribeiro

I wrote a letter to the Delhi Police Commissioner that went ‘viral’ — a term my grand-children and their friends often use. I write letters at the drop of a hat but none turned ‘viral’. This one, obviously because it touched raw nerves, did! Since a leading daily wrote an editorial on what I said in the letter, my grandchildren have started reading editorials, an advice of an old man that they had ignored earlier.

MY ENCOUNTERS WITH SWAMI AGNIVESH

Irfan Engineer

It is very saddening news that Swami Agnivesh is no more amongst us. Swamiji enriched our understanding of Hindu Vedic religion in particular and all religions in general. He remained a critic of all religions and advocated for spirituality.

REST IN POWER, JEAN CHAPMAN

It is with deep sadness and a sense of loss that we at SAWCC (South Asian Women’s Community Centre) mourn the death of Jean Chapman, our sister in struggle. Jean passed away peacefully on September 21, 2020 at home in the arms of her husband Paul Wilkinson and with her beloved poodle, Noah, by her side. Jean joined SAWCC in 1985 and was a life member.

PAKISTAN’S FIRST CLIMATE PRISONERS: BABA JAN AND AFFECTEES OF THE ATTABAD DISASTER

Tabitha Spence

Baba Jan has spent years of his life in prison, framed along with Iftikhar Karbalayi and 10 others, for terrorism and the murder of a young man and his father. Eyewitnesses say that Afzal and Sher Ullah Baig were shot and killed by police while demonstrating for unpaid compensation promised to victims of the landslide and floods that destroyed villages in the Gojal Valley in January 2010.

SILENCE IN SWAT: MEMORY, MILITANCY AND THE MILITARY IN SWAT VALLEY

Hurmat Ali Shah

Swat Valley used to be green. Now the green looks dull and grey. The people living here are tired. They forget. And when personal histories, and personal and collective geographies are marred with memories of violence, isn’t short-term memory loss the natural answer? Who has the courage to confront memory amidst the rhythm of the everyday, lay it to rest, and more painfully, make sense of all the killings and the aftermath – that is, a military regimenting a whole population for the crime of being conquered by a militant group?

NO TYRANT CAN ENDURE: ON THE ARREST OF UMAR KHALID

Shuddhabrata Sengupta

On the night of 13 September, as the calendar turned, news came in that Umar Khalid, an activist, had been arrested after several hours of interrogation at the office of the Special Cell of the Delhi Police, in Lodhi Colony. Khalid, a PhD scholar in the Adivasi history of Jharkhand from the Jawaharlal Nehru University, was detained for his alleged role in a conspiracy, which the Delhi Police claimed instigated the violence that ripped through northeast Delhi in the last week of February.

INDIANS GET JUST ONE WEEK TO REVIEW CRUCIAL HEALTH DATA POLICY. THE CENTRE’S RUSH IS UNDEMOCRATIC

Ipsita Chakravarty & Vijayta Lalwani

The policy covers the collection and storage of data on an individual’s medical history, finances, genetics, sex life, caste, religion and political beliefs.

THE WORLD’S “LARGEST DEMOCRACY” MARCHING TO A POLICE STATE

Vinod Mubayi

Evidence keeps mounting daily of India’s descent into a police state where the freedoms guaranteed in the Constitution: free speech, freedom to express opinions against the policies of the government, are being honored more in the breach than in the observance. Two examples of this suffice.

A PASSIONATE TEACHER AND ACTIVIST: ILINA SEN (1951–2020)

Gabriele Dietrich

Ilina Sen, teacher, author and activist has left behind a rich legacy of work and warmth that will continue to inspire women’s and human rights activists and students.

THE SHADOW OF HAREN PANDYA’S CASE LIES LONG OVER JUSTICE ARUN MISHRA

Prem Shankar Jha

To say that the Supreme Court’s verdict of contempt of court against Prashant Bhushan has shocked civil society in India would be an understatement. There has been an outpouring of dismay and anger in which even attorney general K.K. Venugopal has joined. Most of the protest has focussed on the blow that punishing Bhushan will deal to civil liberties, notably the freedom to express an opinion, the freedom to differ and the freedom to criticise – without which democracy cannot survive.

ILINA AS WE KNEW HER: A TRIBUTE FROM WSS

Women against Sexual Violence and State Repression (WSS) deeply mourns the passing away of Ilina Sen on August 9 in Kolkata. Ilina, 69, was a feminist activist, teacher, researcher and writer passionately involved with the women’s movement in India.

INDIA’S COVID DEATHS COULD BE AMONG THE HIGHEST IN THE WORLD

(The Wire, August 25, 2020)

Two community physicians with a deep interest in public health, who have earlier published their findings in The Hindu, have said India could be under-reporting its COVID-19 death toll by a factor of 5.29.

HOW KAMALA HARRIS’S FAMILY IN INDIA HELPED SHAPE HER VALUES

Jeffrey Gettleman and Suhasini Raj

CHENNAI, India — One of Senator Kamala Harris’s brightest childhood memories was walking down the beach hand in hand with her Indian grandfather.

THE MYTH OF MAINSTREAM

Chhetria Patrakar

Every other day or so, it seems, news from India confirms our worst fears about the state of journalism and free speech in the country.

CISCO CASE SHOWS INDIANS STILL TAKE CASTE WHERE THEY GO

Subhash Gatade

What happens to caste when Indians migrate to Western countries? Do their feelings of being born superior or inferior, their belief in the purity-pollution ethic, just melt away? The “model minority” has tried to avoid a conversation on this issue but it returns to haunt them time and again. Now the American state of California is at the centre of yet another caste controversy.

‘LET NOT DESPAIR IMPRISON OUR WORDS’: REMEMBERING ALI SARDAR JAFRI, 20 YEARS ON

Raza Naeem

Har cheez bhula di jaayegi

Yaadon ke haseen butkhane se

Har cheez utha di jaayegi

Phir koi nahin yeh poochhega

Sardar kahan hai mehfil mein

SATIRE: THERE IS INDEED A JIHADI CONSPIRACY AND THE NATION WANTS TO KNOW WHAT MODI WILL DO ABOUT IT

Harish Khare

It is indeed baffling that so many democratic, liberal, progressive, or just plain decent, voices should be upset over a ‘nationalist’ news channel wanting to air an exposé about an unholy conspiracy to “infiltrate Muslims” into government services.

EDITORIAL: TRUMP, BOLSONARO, MODI: THREE HORSEMEN OF THE COVID PANDEMIC APOCALYPSE

Vinod Mubayi

The countries that Trump, Bolsonaro and Modi, respectively, rule, are currently #1, 2, and 3 in the total number of coronavirus infections. Credible projections by some scientists suggest that India is poised to become #1 within a few months. Whether that happens or not, it is more than likely the US, Brazil, and India will continue to remain on the equivalent of the Olympic medal stand with respect to the ranking for the worst performance in controlling the pandemic for the foreseeable future.

A STRONG VOICE AGAINST HINDUTVA IN GREATER VANCOUVER LOST

Gurpreet Singh

The news of Chinmoy Banerjee’s death has greatly saddened the South Asian community in BC.

80-year-old scholar and activist of Indian heritage, Chin Daa, as we affectionately called him, was not keeping well for the past several days.

GLOBAL DIALOGUE FOR SYSTEMIC CHANGE

We are living in an unprecedented global crisis that requires a deep reflection, rethinking and dialogue among activists, organizations and social movements around the world. Critical strategies are essential, to deal with the current crises and to shape what comes next.

TAGORE STREET, TEL AVIV: AGAINST NORMALIZING BANGLADESHI—ISRAELI RELATIONS

Kamal M. Ali

The normalization of the Israeli apartheid-state by liberal Bangladeshis calls for a revival of revolutionary solidarities and a South Asian politics that champions the Palestinian cause.

UP POLICE AFFIDAVIT ON VIKAS DUBEY ENCOUNTER PUTS SUPREME COURT BETWEEN ROCK AND HARD PLACE

Siddharth Varadarajan

In an interview to The Wire, Justice Deepak Gupta – who retired as a judge of the Supreme Court in May this year – had this to say about the killing of the gangster Vikas Dubey by the Uttar Pradesh police: “indications are that this was not an encounter, he did not run away, he was killed… But police made up such a shoddy story, it seems they don’t even give a damn whether people think that we killed him or not.”

US CITIES OPPOSE INDIA’S DISCRIMINATORY CITIZENSHIP ACT

The Alliance for Justice and Accountability (AJA), an umbrella organization of progressive South Asian groups across the United States, in coordination with the local San Francisco community, today welcomed the resolution passed by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors denouncing India’s draconian Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), the National Register of Citizens (NRC) and the National Population Register (NPR).

HAGIA SOPHIA: HERITAGE OF ENTIRE HUMANITY

Irfan Engineer

The re-conversion of Hagia Sophia from a patriarchal cathedral built by Justinian I in 537 CE to Hagia Sophia Grand Mosque in 1453 after the conquest of Constantinople by Sultan Mehmet II and into a museum of the same name by Kemal Ataturk in 1934 and again into a mosque of the same name on 24th July 2020 has thrown up quite a controversy. The reconversion of the Christian-Muslim monument in 21st Century that was a museum for nearly a century signifies the global rise and growing strength of the right wing politicians from all religions that misuse religion for their political ends and stoke religio-cultural wars. The conversion should be condemned in the strongest possible words. The Museum was a great tourist attraction.

CONDEMN THE ARBITRARY ARREST OF PROF. HANY BABU!

The Campaign Against State Repression (CASR) condemns the arrest of Professor Hany Babu MT at Mumbai by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) in connection with the Bhima Koregaon-Elgaar Parishad case.

CASTE ON THE STREETS: DHAKA’S STREET CLEANERS, MANY OF THEM DALITS, FACED A GRIM FUTURE EVEN BEFORE THE PANDEMIC

Shah Tazrian Ashrafi

Bangladesh confirmed its first case of COVID-19 on 8 March 2020. In the span of a little over a hundred days, the number of positive cases crossed the 100,000 mark with more than 1300 dead. The country imposed a nationwide lockdown on 26 March and extended it several times. As the lockdown was lifted on 31 May, the number of cases began to surge.

IMPACTS OF COVID-19 ON LABOUR

EPW Editorial

The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and ensuing lockdowns have severely affected the labour market. In India, the pandemic and the prolonged lockdowns have led to a reduction or complete loss of their livelihoods, which has disproportionately affected the migrants and the working poor. Others, such as health workers and those in essential services, have experienced a huge increase in workloads and schedules amidst the onslaught of the pandemic.

EDITORIAL: BLACK LIVES MATTER IN THE US: DO MUSLIM/DALIT/MIGRANT WORKER/DISSIDENT LIVES MATTER IN INDIA?

Vinod Mubayi

The unprecedented outrage spurred by the murder of George Floyd by a racist policeman in Minneapolis has led to a situation where systemic change in the way state oppression of the minorities operates in the US is on the agenda. Battered by the pandemic, African-Americans finally revolted at yet another murder of a black man by a white cop and the familiar, despicably brutal manner in which it was carried out: strangulation.

REVOKE THE AUCTION OF 41 COAL BLOCKS FOR COMMERCIAL MINING

National Alliance of People’s Movements

24th June, 2020: National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) condemns the diabolical design of the current regime, led by the Prime Minister to ‘virtually auction’ 41 coal blocks for commercial mining in the bio-diverse rich, adivasi heartlands of Central and Eastern India. Opening up of these areas to profit-making domestic and foreign corporate mining entities will irreversibly jeopardize the pristine forest lands, increase environmental pollution and public health risk in Covid times and destroy the habitats of a major chunk of the adivasi population and wild-life.

NEPAL FAMILIES FACE HUNGER, SKIP MEALS AS PANDEMIC HITS REMITTANCES

Gopal Sharma

Shiba Kala Limbu grimaced as she recalled how she went hungry in order to feed her five-year-old daughter after the coronavirus pandemic cost her husband his job as a mason in the Gulf state of Qatar.

STAY HOME, STAY SAFE: INTERROGATING VIOLENCE IN THE DOMESTIC SPHERE

Rukmini Sen

The first social distancing advisory, which was released by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare on 16 March 2020, advised students to stay at home and laid down guidelines for instituting work-from-home wherever feasible. With the exception of essential travel, movement for everything else was stopped. However, while India was getting ready to prepare for a lockdown wherein all members of the household would be locked inside their respective homes for most of the time, there was no discussion on the implications this would have on the well-being of the everyday lives of women.

WITH INDIA’S TIKTOK BAN, THE WORLD’S DIGITAL WALLS GROW HIGHER

Raymond Zhong and Kai Schultz

The global internet is fracturing. And people like Anusmita Dutta are paying the price.

Ms. Dutta, 24, joined TikTok three years ago and now has more than 350,000 followers on the video app. From her home in Kolkata, in eastern India, she records funny skits, monologues, slice-of-life sketches — all stuff, she says, that people can easily relate to. She also finds videos from every corner of the earth using the app’s Discover feature.

PAKISTAN’S LOCKDOWN ENDED A MONTH AGO. NOW HOSPITAL SIGNS READ ‘FULL.’

Zia ur-Rehman, Salman Masood and Maria Abi-Habib

Pakistanis stricken by the coronavirus are being turned away from hospitals that have simply closed their gates and put up signs reading “full house.” Doctors and nurses are falling ill at alarming rates, and are also coming under physical assault from desperate and angry families.

DELHI RIOTS NEITHER DESIGNED BY MODI GOVT, NOR ISLAMIC CONSPIRACY. IT IS FAR MORE DANGEROUS

Yogendra Yadav

Has the Narendra Modi regime normalised violence in a way that could hurt the Prime Minister himself? Has he created a Frankenstein monster that he cannot destroy?

IS THIS THE THEATRE OF THE ABSURD? INDIA NEEDS A PARADIGM SHIFT TOWARDS CHINA

KP Fabian

It is obvious, painfully obvious that India’s policy towards its big neighbor China has not been much of a success. Before we figure out a new policy frame work, we need to bear in mind that in the ongoing stand-off at the border, India has faulted diplomatically and militarily apart from permitting China to control, or almost control, the narrative as far as the international public is concerned.

LAWLESS LAWMAKING IN A COVID-19 WORLD

Alok Prasanna Kumar

India’s management of the COVID-19 global pandemic has been marked by excessive centralisation, lawless lawmaking and non-consultative decision-making processes at the union government level. This has created an atmosphere of confusion in the management of the disease, leading to India becoming one of the global hotspots and cases fast spiralling out of the control of local authorities.

WHEN INDIA PUT INDIANS IN CAMPS

Uttaran Das Gupta

Review of ‘The Deoliwallahs: The True Story of the 1962 Chinese-Indian Internment ‘ by Joy Ma and Dilip D’Souza. Pan Macmillan India, January 2020.

EDITORIAL: CRIMINALIZING DISSENT, THROWING MIGRANT WORKERS TO THE DOGS AND ABOLISHING DECADES OLD LABOR LAWS: WHERE IS INDIA HEADED?

Vinod Mubayi

At a time when the pandemic infection in India seems to be rising rapidly, the regime’s acts of cruelty, there is simply no other word for them, that consist of acts of both commission and omission, seem bewildering. Are they the expressions of a government that is both uncaring and incompetent, whose minions are content with projecting the image of an omnipotent, omniscient leader, a divine guru beyond human criticism? Or are they instead the actions of a would-be dictatorial government bent on crushing any manifestation of opposition in its march to Hindu Rashtra? Considering both the utterances and silences of the government’s spokespersons on various issues, it appears to be a combination of both, depending on the issue.

LETTER TO THE ILO ON THE UNILATERAL SUSPENSION OF LABOUR LAWS BY THE GOVERNMENT IN INDIA

25.05.2020

Mr Guy Ryder

Director General, International Labour Organisation

Geneva

Dear Sir,

This joint representation is the follow up with more concrete details on our complaint / representation to you dated 14th May 2020.

AS THE FIRST YEAR OF MODI 2.0 ENDS, IT’S CLEAR THAT DEMOCRACY HAS BEEN QUARANTINED

Siddharth Varadarajan

To understand what Narendra Modi has done to India in the first year of his second term as prime minister, I want you to consider the contrasting fate of two young people, Amulya Leona and Anurag Thakur.

ON THE CORONAVIRUS, PAKISTAN’S GOVERNMENT IS MISSING IN ACTION

Neha Maqsood

During a televised broadcast on March 22, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan expressed his hesitancy in imposing a nationwide lockdown in response to the coronavirus pandemic, explaining that such a move would have devastating economic consequences for the poor.

A PANDEMIC OF PERSECUTION IN BANGLADESH

Ali Riaz

Workers from the garment sector block a road as they protest to demand the payment of due wages during a government-imposed nationwide lockdown as a preventive measure against the COVID-19 coronavirus, in Dhaka, Bangladesh on April 24, 2020.

WHY ACTIVISTS WANT PRISONS DECONGESTED

Subhash Gatade

Late in March, Sirous Asgari, a materials science and engineering professor from Iran, who is at present detained by the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), had warned about the “inhumane” conditions at the ICE facility that could turn it into a hot spot of Covid-19 fatalities.

SEWER CLEANERS WANTED IN PAKISTAN: ONLY CHRISTIANS NEED APPLY

Zia ur-Rehman and Maria Abi-Habib

Before Jamshed Eric plunges deep below Karachi’s streets to clean out clogged sewers with his bare hands, he says a little prayer to Jesus to keep him safe.

HOW MODI FAILED THE PANDEMIC TEST

Hartosh Singh Bal

India has been under a lockdown to stem the spread of the coronavirus for two months. On March 25, the first day of the lockdown, India had 618 confirmed cases and 13 deaths.

A HISTORY OF POLITICAL PARTIES IN INDIA

Mahendra Prasad Singh

(Review of Political Parties, Party Manifestos and Elections in India, 1909–2014 edited by R K Tiwari, Oxon and New York: Routledge, 2019; pp xxi + 309, ?1,495).

CHINA-INDIA BORDER: WHY TENSIONS ARE RISING BETWEEN THE NEIGHBOURS

Anbarasan Ethirajan and Vikas Pandey

The armies of the world’s two most populous nations are locked in a tense face-off high in the Himalayas, which has the potential to escalate as they seek to further their strategic goals.

THE KALAPANI IMBROGLIO: HAS INDIA PUSHED NEPAL TOO FAR?

Tapan Bose

Popular sentiment against what is viewed as Indian encroachment in Kalapani and Susta has led to recurrent protests in Nepal which have largely been ignored by the Indian media.

EDITORIAL: CLASS, CASTE AND COMMUNAL VIRUS AND THE DEMONIZATION OF DISSENT IN THE AGE OF CORONA

Vinod Mubayi

As the novel coronavirus started to ravage through India, specific acts of the Modi-Shah regime ruling the country unleashed and intensified other socio-political viruses that are decidedly not novel. In fact, one may claim with confidence that these old viruses have been omnipresent in the minds of the actors, agents, and facilitators of the BJP regime, lurking in the background waiting to be uncovered when opportunity presents itself.

WHAT THE WORLD CAN LEARN FROM KERALA ABOUT HOW TO FIGHT COVID-19

Sonia Faleiro

The sun had already set on March 7 when Nooh Pullichalil Bava received the call. “I have bad news,” his boss warned. On February 29, a family of three had arrived in the Indian state of Kerala from Italy, where they lived. The trio skipped a voluntary screening for covid-19 at the airport and took a taxi 125 miles (200 kilometers) to their home in the town of Ranni. When they started developing symptoms soon afterward, they didn’t alert the hospital. Now, a whole week after taking off from Venice, all three—a middle-aged man and woman and their adult son—had tested positive for the virus, and so had two of their elderly relatives.

AMARTYA SEN ON THE WIRE, THE POLICE AND BEYOND

Amartya Sen

Steps to undermine democracy in India are becoming increasingly common. The police action by the Uttar Pradesh government – ruled by the same political party that runs the Central government – against The Wire and its founding editor, Siddharth Varadarajan, shows how far-reaching the destructive stabs at democracy have become in India.

CORONAVIRUS LOCKDOWN: THE SEVEN AND A HALF THINGS THAT MODI SAID AND DID NOT SAY

Shuddhabrata Sengupta

A terse but timely message to stop indulging in profiling Muslims as ‘carriers’ of COVID-19 or as ‘bio-terrorists’ from the prime minister could have gone a long way in controlling the baser instincts of his followers.

MONTREAL TEACH-IN: COMMUNITIES OF STRUGGLE DURING COVID-19 LOCKDOWN — ORGANIZED BY FEMMES DE DIVERSES ORIGINES/WOMEN OF DIVERSE ORIGINS

On Saturday 18th April 2020 at 11am the Montreal-based organization Femmes de diverses origines/Women of Diverse Origins which includes among its members the South Asian Women’s Community Centre, organized the first of a series of teach-in.

26TH APRIL, 2020 PUCL STATEMENT – LIFT TOTAL LOCKDOWN AND CONTINUE ONLY IN SELECT PLACES

April 25^th, 2020 marks the end of the first month of India’s gigantic, country-wide lockdown to counter and check the spread of the COVID -19 – Corona virus. As the Prime Minister gets down to discuss on 27^th April, 2020, with the CMs of all the states of India, about whether to continue fully or partially with the biggest ever global shutdown of this size, it is an apt occasion for citizen’s to review progress and point out key concerns, to both the Prime Minister of India, as also all the Chief Ministers.

GENDERING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC: WOMEN LOCKED AND DOWN

Madhuri Dixit and Dilip Chavan

The COVID-19 crisis has affected Indian women differently. Due to the lack of autonomy and gender insensitive nature of the state’s response to the corona crisis, women are perceived as second class citizens. While the lockdown is not qualitatively a new experience for the women, even in critical times as it does not change boundaries or the nature of the public and the private spheres for them. Rather, it overburdens them, bereaves them of agency, and compromises their safety.

IN KASHMIR, RESISTANCE IS MAINSTREAM

Samreen Mushtaq and Mudasir Amin

“I am free today,” claimed Farooq Abdullah, former chief minister of Jammu & Kashmir and a prominent ‘pro-India’ politician from the valley, addressing reporters outside his Gupkar residence in Srinagar on 13 March 2020. This was over seven months after he was placed under house arrest following the de-operationalisation of Article 370 by India on 5 August 2019. Abdullah, an octogenarian, was later formally arrested and booked under the Public Safety Act (PSA), often referred to as a ‘lawless law’, which allows for up to two years of detention without trial.

REDEFINING CITIZENSHIP IN PAKISTAN

Hurmat Ali Shah

Over the past two years, the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM) has defined an alternative future for Pakistan. It has also contributed to the state’s anxiety about its own discursive and political power. The Pakistani state has used all the tools in its arsenal, ranging from censorship to arrests and intimidation. The country’s military in particular has been accused by the PTM of abductions and extrajudicial killings, and has opened fire on the peaceful PTM protesters.

RELIGIOUS FREEDOM: USCIRF REPORT DOWNGRADES INDIA FOR ‘VIOLATIONS’

Shubhajit Roy

This is the first time since 2004 — which was in the backdrop of the Gujarat riots of 2002 — that USCIRF has recommended that India be designated as a “Country of Particular Concern”.

EDITORIAL: FORCED EXODUS: THOUSANDS LIKELY TO DIE FROM STARVATION RATHER THAN THE VIRUS

Vinod Mubayi

Prime Minister Modi is fond of claiming to have executed surgical strikes against the enemies of the country, viz. Pakistan. Whatever damage they may have done to the enemy is unclear, but his strikes on the Indian population disguised as moral lectures have inflicted more significant damage. While they were applauded as masterstrokes by the lapdog media, their consequences for the country have been considerably less pleasant. In December 2016, he suddenly demonetized the currency, rendering 86% of Indian banknotes worthless overnight. He justified this by claiming it would curb the twin evils of black money and terrorism and usher in a virtuous digital age of cashless transactions. There seems to have been no planning in advance for this momentous act and little thought given to what would happen. Three and a half years later, the economy is still trying to recover from the consequences of this disastrous action.

GROUND REPORT: CHAOS AT ANAND VIHAR AS BUSES PREPARE TO TAKE MIGRANT WORKERS HOME

Ajoy Ashirwad Mahaprashasta and Anuj Srivas

New Delhi: At the Anand Vihar Bus Terminal and its immediate surrounding areas on the Delhi-Uttar Pradesh border, the mass evacuation of thousands of daily-wage labourers and migrant workers is underway.

CAN INDIANS TRUST THEIR JUDGES AND LAWS?

Sumanta Banerjee

The two common utterances regularly heard during arguments in Indian courts are – “I have faith in the judicial process” (by the prosecuted), and “The law will take its own course” (by the prosecution). But both these two assertions need to be questioned, given the experiences of Indian citizens in their confrontation with certain types of judges on the one hand, and sufferance from laws on the other, like oppressive colonial Acts from the British era which are still on our statute book, and newer draconian Acts that continue to be promulgated in today’s India.

PETITION REQUEST

Dear friends,

Please sign the Global Solidarity Statement for Dr. Anand Teltumbde and Gautam Navlakha by clicking here: https://indiacivilwatch.org/petitions/global-solidarity-statement-for-dr-anand-teltumbde-and-gautam-navlakha/

HOW THE CORPORATE-HINDUTVA AXIS IS ASSAULTING INDIA’S FEDERALISM

Prabhat Patnaik

The anti-colonial struggle saw the emergence of a pan-Indian national consciousness that was superimposed upon a pre-existing “nationality” consciousness based on linguistic regions. The pan-Indian national consciousness, in other words, was superimposed upon a Bengali or Gujarati or Tamil or Odiya consciousness; and the anti-colonial struggle saw the flourishing of both kinds of consciousness.

‘OUR SITUATION IS APOCALYPTIC’: BANGLADESH GARMENT WORKERS FACE RUIN

Elizabeth Paton

The empty, echoing shopping malls of Western cities are a testament to the biggest crisis borne by global clothing and retail industries in over a generation. But the impact of the coronavirus on retail is a two-part devastation, as the daily flow of thousands of orders placed by Western retailers to supplier factories in South Asia has suddenly slammed to a halt.

GOD WILL PROTECT US’: CORONAVIRUS SPREADS THROUGH AN ALREADY STRUGGLING PAKISTAN

Zia ur-Rehman, Maria Abi-Habib and Ihsanullah Tipu Mehsud

KARACHI, Pakistan — Doctors are refusing to show up for work. Clerics are refusing to close their mosques. And despite orders to stay at home, children continue to pack streets across Pakistan to play cricket, their parents unwilling to quarantine them in crowded homes.

FOR INDIA’S LABORERS, CORONAVIRUS LOCKDOWN IS AN ORDER TO STARVE

Maria Abi-Habib and Sameer Yasir

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has ordered a lockdown of India’s 1.3 billion citizens to fight the spread of coronavirus, urging people to distance themselves socially and work from home.

[NON-SOUTH ASIA ANALYSIS]: SIX POINTS ON CLASS

Michael Zweig

1. We need to change the understanding of class in the United States, going from the division of “rich and poor” to the division of “worker and capitalist.”

EDITORIAL: AFTER LOSING DELHI ELECTION, BJP WREAKING VENGEANCE ON CITY’S MINORITIES: WHERE IS AAP?

Vinod Mubayi

The rout of the BJP in the Delhi election, while very welcome, should not blind one to the fact that the real political struggle is taking place in the streets not in the electoral arena. This struggle is directly related to the secular nature of the Indian state and the future existence of India’s minorities, especially Indian Muslims. Over the last few decades, and particularly the last six years, RSS/BJP propaganda has created a mindset among the Hindu majority, especially the politically influential upper classes/castes, that has put the secular character of the Indian state in severe doubt, despite all that is enshrined in the Constitution. Without this mindset, it is inconceivable that a blatantly majoritarian and unconstitutional law like the CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) would have cleared both houses of Parliament. But every action has its reaction and the public anger manifested in almost all parts of the country in the last two months is evidence of the fact that defeating the nefarious CAA/NRC (National Register of Citizens)/NPR (National Population Register) triad of the BJP is the most urgent political issue in India today.

THERE WILL BE NO SAFE ANCHOR UNTIL ‘WE, THE PEOPLE’ ARE ABLE TO DECISIVELY OVERTURN CURRENT PARLIAMENTARY MAJORITY

Sugata Bose

Homage has been paid to the chairman of the drafting committee of our Constitution by our political class in a plenitude of platitudes without applying the creative and critical faculties that were Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar’s hallmark. India was extremely fortunate that as stringent a critic of mainstream nationalism as Ambedkar placed his intellectual prowess at the service of the nation for five crucial years from December 9, 1946 to October 12, 1951.

INDIA IS STEADILY CREEPING FROM DEMOCRACY TO SOME FORM OF THUGOCRACY

Pranab Bardhan

Contrary to expectation in many quarters five years back, the current regime has proved itself rather inept and incompetent in economic policy matters, partly because of over-centralisation of power with dependence on loyal mediocrities for policy advice, and partly because for a long time, it believed in its own hype and was in denial.

THE DELHI RIOTS OF 2020: A DIRECT PRODUCT OF BJP RELIGIOUS POLARISATION

The Wire

More than 48 hours after violence broke out in parts of the national capital, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has finally broken his silence on the Delhi riots. At least 24 people have now lost their lives, with the latest reports saying that the body of a man who works with the Intelligence Bureau was found in a drain in North East Delhi’s Chandbagh.

“WHICH IS THAT APPROPRIATE STAGE? AFTER THE CITY HAS BURNT DOWN?” SAYS HIGH COURT JUDGE MURALIDHAR

The Delhi high court on Wednesday asked the Delhi Police to ‘take a conscious decision with respect to the registration of FIRs’ against BJP leaders Anurag Thakur, Parvesh Verma and Kapil Mishra, and others, who made alleged hate speeches that may have incited violence in the national capital.

THE BJP HAS WILFULLY LET DELHI BURN

For three days, northeast Delhi has been in the grip of armed vigilantes mobilised by Hindutva politicians to attack and terrorise those protesting the Citizenship (Amendment) Act. Given the nature of the mobs and their leaders, the violence quickly lost any pretence of a ‘political’ motive and descended into crude, generalised communal violence against Muslims.

LETTER FROM WORLD PARLIAMENTARIANS TO NARENDRA MODI

(Courtesy Irfan Engineer)

The Most Honorable Narendra Modi

Prime Minister of the Republic of India

Office of the Prime Minister

New Delhi, India

MOB LYNCHING IN 2019- CONTINUING EXPRESSION OF HEGEMONY

Irfan Engineer, Neha Dabhade, Suraj Nair

Tabrez Ansari, a 24 years old youth in Jharkhand, accused of a bike theft pleaded for his life even as he chanted “Jai Shri Ram” demanded by the mob that brutally lynched him. 25 years old Mohammad Barkat Aalam while returning home from namaz was assaulted and forced to chant “Jai Shri Ram” because he was wearing a skull cap.

GANDHI’S KILLER EVOKES ADMIRATION AS NEVER BEFORE

Sameer Yasin

MEERUT, India — Under the shade of a banyan tree, a group of worshipers recite Sanskrit mantras. A couple men step forward and light a fire. Then they start walking, hands folded, as if in a trance, toward a statue.

A BLOW TO THE HEAD MAKES AN INSTANT HERO IN INDIA

Jeffrey Gettleman and Hari Kumar

Aishe Ghosh, a young woman who was set upon at a campus demonstration, has become an icon in India’s growing protest movement.

WHO IS AFRAID OF PAKISTAN’S AURAT MARCH?

Afiya Shehrbano Zia

Pakistan’s women are marching against patriarchy, but what is their destination and who is standing in their way? The Aurat March of 2019 faced severe backlash from both conservative as well as like-minded quarters, on account of some hard-hitting slogans and jabs raised against prevalent masculinist social norms. These have brought to the fore some paradoxes within feminist politics, which merit resolution for the sake of the emergence of stronger feminist politics in Pakistan.

INDIA TODAY: TEETERING BETWEEN DEMOCRACY AND FASCISM

Vinod Mubayi

EDITORAL

India today is poised precariously between democracy and fascism. While the formal institutions of democracy, elections, legislatures, courts and so on continue to function their core is being systematically hollowed out by the ruling BJP and fascist measures are being implemented assiduously in India’s largest state, UP, where cops are acting against the Muslim minority exactly like Nazi thugs did against German Jews in the 1930s.

CITIZENSHIP TANGLE

Shoaib Daniyal

Surveys for the National Population Register begin in two months. There is still no clarity on the final questions that will be asked as part of the exercise to draw up a list of all residents of India.

‘THIS POLITICAL REGIME IS DESTROYING THE UNIVERSITY’

Sucharita Sen

Professor Sucharita Sen, of the Centre for the Study of Regional Development, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), teaches geography and was one of the people involved in organising a peace assembly on January 5, the day masked intruders attacked teachers and students with lethal weapons like iron rods. While many faculty members were roughed up, she was the only one who sustained deep head injuries.

WHY THE CAA+NPR+NRC IS A TOXIC COCKTAIL FOR EVERYONE

CJP Team

The Citizenship Amendment Act, 2019 (CAA), combined with the proposed National Population Register (NPR), which is the first step to a nationwide NRC (National Register of Citizens), is likely to be disastrous, not just for Muslims, but also all other Indians as can be seen in the following point-wise analysis:

EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT RESOLUTION ON INDIA’S CITIZENSHIP (AMENDMENT) ACT, 2019

– having regard to the Charter of the United Nations,

KEEPING JOURNALISM ALIVE IN KASHMIR

Majid Maqbool

For over five months now, hundreds of journalists in Kashmir have had to wait in long queues every day in a couple of cramped rooms in Srinagar to get a few minutes of access to the internet. Reporters, newspaper designers, freelance journalists, photojournalists, and video journalists have had to stand in lines at the Media Facilitation Centre – set up by the central government in the premises of the Department of Information and Public Relations – and rely on a dozen computers with internet access to file their stories, make pages, and communicate with their editors.

CITIZENSHIP AS PARTICIPATION: MUSLIM WOMEN PROTESTORS OF SHAHEEN BAGH

The peaceful indefinite sit-in by Muslim women at Shaheen Bagh has become the epicentre of nationwide protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act–National Population Register–National Register of Citizens, as the protestors have brought to the fore a protest performative that is to be comprehended beyond the physical protest site.

BEHIND CAMPUS ATTACK IN INDIA, SOME SEE A FAR-RIGHT AGENDA

Kai Schultz and Suhasini Raj

NEW DELHI — For decades, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s party and its affiliates have struggled to control one of India’s most fertile ideological recruiting grounds: university campuses.

EDITORIALS: IS THE TIME FOR BJP’S FASCIST TAMASHAS OVER?

Vinod Mubayi

The unprecedented countrywide protests against the CAA and NRC are the opening salvos in what is bound to be a long struggle against BJP’s fascist governance over the last 5 years. It is encouraging that many of the protests are being led by students and youth, which augurs well for the vitality of the opposition to the Sangh Parivar’s agenda in the next few years. Read more…

INDIA NEEDS A PROPER REFUGEE LAW, NOT A CAA SUFFUSED WITH DISCRIMINATORY INTENT

Rajeev Dhawan

Perhaps, the most interesting comment on India’s Citizenship Amendment Act 2019 (CAA) was made by two Pakistani Hindus who protested that the CAA will worsen their lives instead of helping them. There are many minorities who prefer to live in Pakistan as their home and watan. Read more…

INDIA: INTIMATIONS OF AN ENDING

Arundhati Roy

While protest reverberates on the streets of Chile, Catalonia, Bolivia, Britain, France, Iraq, Lebanon, and Hong Kong, and a new generation rages against what has been done to their planet, I hope you will forgive me for speaking about a place where the street has been taken over by something quite different. Read more…

WHY I WILL NOT REGISTER WITH THE NRC

Sidharth Bhatia

This might be a futile act of personal defiance that could have perilous consequences, but think about it: what if millions of people stay out of the exercise? Read more…

BY PROTESTING A LAW THAT DIVIDES AND DISCRIMINATES, WE ARE FORGING NEW MAPS OF BELONGING

Chitra Padmanabhan

The CAA, which treats the modern-day equivalents of people like Badshah Khan as ‘illegal immigrants’, and the ‘all-India NRC’ which jeopardises the status of millions of Indians have energised a new moment of dissent. Read more…

THE RAM JANMABHOOMI-BABRI MASJID IMBROGLIO

Rakesh Shukla

On 9 November 2019, the Supreme Court of India held that the disputed Ayodhya site should be handed over to the Hindus in its entirety and directed the central government to construct a Ram temple on the site. The decision comes nearly 27 years after the destruction of the Babri Masjid on 6 December 1992 by karsevaks, and more than a century of contestation. Read more…

VIOLENCE AS PARENTHESIS

Gopal Guru

The response of the central government and its supporters to the protests that were organised against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) has brought into focus the complex nature of violence. In the current context of the protests, there seems to be a few points that we need to take into consideration. The government, in its attempts to underscore the social importance of peace, seeks to condemn the act of violence. Read more…

STATEMENT BY MONTREAL ACADEMIC COMMUNITY AGAINST POLICE BRUTALITY IN INDIA, CAA, NRC

We, the members of the Montreal academic community, stand in solidarity with students exercising their fundamental right to dissent and protest across India. Read more…

SOLIDARITY WITH PROTESTS IN INDIA FOR THE CONSTITUTION & FOR SECULARISM

Sunday 22nd December, Montreal

For a democratic, secular and inclusive India!! Read more…

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