SECULARISM, DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS AND SOCIAL JUSTICE

INSAF Bulletin 236 December 2021
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).

EDITORIAL: MODI BLINKS, VOWS REPEAL OF BLACK LAWS; FARMERS STAND FIRM, WANT ALL DEMANDS MET

Vinod Mubayi

After an entire year of demonizing, disparaging and denigrating the year-long farmers’ struggle, the largest non-violent mass movement in world history, Modi finally blinked on November 19 and announced the government would repeal the three ‘black’ pro-corporate farm laws in the forthcoming winter session of the Indian Parliament. It is useful to recall that these laws were passed by Parliament without any consultation or debate in September last year.

AFTER REPEALING FARM LAWS, GOVT SHOULD PLAN REFORMS WHICH ACTUALLY BENEFIT FARMERS

Balsher Singh Sidhu, The Wire

On the morning of Friday, November 19, Prime Minister Modi made a surprise announcement about his government’s decision to repeal the three controversial farm laws which have been at the heart of the biggest protest India has witnessed in many decades.

FARMERS WIN ON MANY FRONTS, MEDIA FAILS ON ALL

P. Sainath, Peoples Archive of Rural India, Nov 20, 2021

What the media can never openly admit is that the largest peaceful democratic protest the world has seen in years – certainly the greatest organised at the height of the pandemic – has won a mighty victory.

AFTER VICTORY, THE FARMERS MUST NOT LOSE SIGHT OF THE BIG PICTURE

Avinash Mohananey, The India Cable Nov 26, 2021

Credit should be given to the agitating farmers for taking the bull of neoliberal policy by the horns and blunting its debilitating impact. They have also unmasked the backers of big corporates in the political leadership, bureaucracy and media, not to speak of the agricultural “experts” and “economists”, of dubious competence and credentials, who support corporate agendas.

CONSTITUTION DAY: WHAT NINE PENDING CASES SAY ABOUT THE RIGHTS INDIA’S CITIZENS ENJOY

Jahnavi Sen, The Wire

New Delhi: Seventy-two years ago on this day, the Constituent Assembly adopted the Constitution of India. Two months after that, on January 26, 1950, the country’s Constitution came into effect. But how has the implementation of our constitutional rights and safeguards been going?

SLAM CAMPAIGNS, WATER CANNON, LATHICHARGE AND OTHER ELEMENTS OF PM MODI’S ‘TAPASYA’

Ismat Ara, The Wire

New Delhi: While announcing the repeal of the three contested farm laws, Prime Minister Narendra Modi made no attempt to hide his emotions. In his characteristic style, he spoke about his tapasya to improve the lives of farmers but regretted how, despite all his efforts to convince them of the benefits of the laws, he could not get “a few farmers” on board.

FRONTIER FANTASIES: ENCOUNTERS WITH XINJIANG IN GILGIT-BALTISTAN

Rana Saadullah Khan

The Karakoram Highway, completed in 1979, expanded China’s trade opportunities in Pakistan and made the remote Gilgit-Baltistan region more penetrable for the Pakistani state and military.

NAPM APPEAL:APPEAL TO JOIN PHASE-III OF THE JAN AZADI 75 CAMPAIGN

25th Nov to 10th Dec, 2021

Dear Saathis,

We join the nation in saluting the farmers’ movement, which has brought the Central Government to its knees, forcing it to retreat on the three Farm Laws, with the Prime Minister assuring a repeal in the Parliament soon.

SWEAR NOT BY THE MOON: THE CONTENTIOUS POLITICS OF LUNAR SIGHTING IN PAKISTAN

Shehroze Ahmed Shaikh

It is nearing sunset in Karachi on the hot and humid evening of Wednesday, 12 May 2021. The weather, however, has nothing to do with the residents of the city’s Gulistan-e-Jouhar neighbourhood congregating on their roofs and balconies. It is not fresh air they are looking for with their eyes peering towards the horizon, but the sleek crescent of the Shawwal moon (the new moon). The city’s polluted air, however, denies them a chance at seeing either of them.

EDITORIAL: FARMERS’ MOVEMENT INAUGURATES A TRADITION OF DEMOCRATIC FUNCTIONING AGAINST THE CENTRALIZED FASCISM OF MODI’S REGIME

Vinod Mubayi

A lot of praise has been bestowed on the farmers’ struggle against the black farm laws for its historic achievement of being the longest, most sustained non-violent mass civil disobedience movement in history far surpassing in duration, mobilization and intensity earlier historic movements such as Gandhi’s Dandi salt march almost a century ago. What has been less noticed or commented on but is now becoming more evident is the striking contrast between the nature and character of how the farmers’ movement functions in all aspects compared to the way the Indian government operates under the Modi-Shah duo.

CHRISTIAN MINORITIES AND INDIAN DEMOCRACY!

Ram Puniyani

As sectarian nationalism is becoming more assertive and strong, the religious minorities are being subjected to intimidation and violence on regular basis. As such there is an increase the frequency of this phenomenon during last decade in an alarming way.

RETALIATION FOR BANGLADESH VIOLENCE IN TRIPURA: CONDEMNATION AND LESSON FOR CITIZENS – STATEMENT BY CONCERNED CITIZENS

It is with great concern and anguish we note that mosques and members of the Muslim community and their houses were attacked in different areas in Tripura. This is said to be retaliation for the unfortunate attacks on the Puja Pandals and on members of Hindu Community in Bangladesh during the recent Durga Puja festival.

INDIA HAS A SERIOUS HUNGER PROBLEM AND IT NEEDS URGENT POLICY INTERVENTION

Utsav Kumar Singh

According to a 2015 World Bank report, malnutrition in India is two to seven times higher than other BRICS member countries. The same result was indicated in the 2021 report of Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations. Further adding that with the current rate of decline, India will not be able t0 achieve the target of ‘zero hunger by 2030’ given by the United Nations.

REMEMBERING A SOUTHASIAN FEMINIST: ON THE LIFE AND TIMES OF KAMLA BHASIN

Radhika Coomaraswamy

Kamla Bhasin always called herself one of India’s ‘Midnight Generation’, a reference to those born at the time of India’s Independence. Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s invocation of freedom at midnight later found its way into Salman Rushdie’s award-winning novel Midnight’s Children.

MUSLIM IS A DIRTY WORD

Alina Gufran

When the violence first breaks out, I see it in the videos. Blood-curdling screams, tweets about charred bodies floating up with the muck in naalas or sewage channels, women hiding behind doorframes in balconies while they attempt to film the carnage, quietly whispering “la ilaha illallah” (there is no God but God) under their breath.

GENDER EQUITY AND COVID-19: DALIT STANDPOINTS

Smita M Patil

This paper attempts to understand the larger meanings that interlink social spaces of Dalits women and COVID-19. It tries to foreground the following questions.

IN INDIA, FACEBOOK GRAPPLES WITH AN AMPLIFIED VERSION OF ITS PROBLEMS

Sheera Frenkel and Davey Alba

On Feb. 4, 2019, a Facebook researcher created a new user account to see what it was like to experience the social media site as a person living in Kerala, India.

GANDHI AND SAVARKAR: FALSIFYING HISTORY

Mridula Mukherjee, Aditya Mukherjee and Sucheta Mahajan

THE Indian Express, October 13, 2021, tells us that Rajnath Singh, the Indian defence minister, has claimed that “A lot of falsehood was spread against Savarkar. It was repeatedly said that he filed multiple mercy petitions before the British government.

EDITORIAL: FARMERS MOVEMENT GETTING STRONGER; WORKERS, UNIONS, PROGRESSIVE GROUPS INTENSIFY SUPPORT

Vinod Mubayi

The Mahapanchayat on Sept 5 in Muzaffarnagar, UP, and the Bharat Bandh of September 27 have given decisive proof of the strength, cohesion and staying power of the farmers movement and their determination to overturn the black laws passed in stealthy and undemocratic fashion by the Modi regime a year ago. The farmers’ movement is already the longest and largest non-violent protest movement in history; over 700 farmers have perished in the last 10 months fighting for their rights while the Modi regime, in thrall to the corporate lobby, refuses to even talk to the farmers let alone meet their just demands.

WHERE IS INDIA HEADED? A HISTORICAL CRITIQUE BY DR. VINOD MUBAYI

The INSAF Collective is proud to present a book published by our own beloved editor!

The mainstream media in India is the biggest fan club of the current Hindutva regime in India and the regime provides them with many Bollywood style shows ranging from the “Howdy Modi” nautanki in Texas, USA in September 2019 to “Namaste Trump” tamasha in Gujarat, India in February 2020. All the road shows, in India or abroad, are designed in a way that Modi the ‘tamashagar (performer) becomes the tamasha (performance) himself.

MODI’S MONETIZATION MANTRA IS A BLOW WORSE THAN DEMONETIZATION

Dipankar Bhattacharya

The Modi government is known for its penchant for springing periodic shocks and desperate measures. In economics we have been familiar with the demonetization disaster and GST, in politics with the sudden stripping of Jammu and Kashmir of its constitutional status and statehood or the passage of the Citizenship Amendment Act or more recently the farms laws. The latest shock inflicted by the government has a strange name – National Monetization Pipeline or NMP. True to the Modi government’s habit of bypassing parliament and not holding any prior public discussion with concerned stakeholders, the government announced this sweeping grand plan on 23 August, soon after the monsoon session of Parliament.

HINDU MOBS, ANTI-MUSLIM BOYCOTTS: IN MODI’S INDIA, THE ECHOES OF 1930S GERMANY ARE GROWING LOUDER

Debasish Roy Chowdhury

Taking part in the nine-member Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit just over a week ago, India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi voiced a familiar concern in the region following the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan: the heightened risk of Islamist fundamentalism.

SAMYUKTA KISAN MORCHA PRESS RELEASE

283rd day, 5th September 2021

Historic Kisan Mazdoor Mahapanchayat held at GIC ground in Muzaffarnagar — The entire Muzaffarnagar city turned into a rally ground — A sea of people gathered across the city — Over 10 lakh farmers from across the nation came together in a show of solidarity and strength — Huge enthusiasm among the supporters to carry the movement further.

TRIBUTE TO KAMALA BHASIN

Kavita Nandini Ramdas

Editors’ Note: The Wikipedia entry on Kamla Bhasin, who passed away on September 25, begins thus: Kamla Bhasin (24 April 1946 – 25 September 2021) was an Indian developmental feminist activist, poet, author and social scientist. Bhasin’s work, that began in 1970, focused on gender, education, human development and the media. She lived in New Delhi, India.She was best known for her work with Sangat – A Feminist Network and for her poem Kyunki main ladki hoon, mujhe padhna hai. In 1995, she recited a refurbished, feminist version of the popular poem Azadi (Freedom) in a conference. She was also the South Asia coordinator of One Billion Rising.

MIND MIGRATION: ASSAM’S EASY TRANSITION FROM ETHNONATIONALISM TO HINDUTVA

Praveen Donthi

[Editors’ Note: The deadly eviction drive by Indian police forces in Assam on September 24, 2021 left 1300 families displaced, and led to the heinous public execution of an Indian citizen Moinul Haque, which was captured on video. In this prescient article from the May 2021 issue of the Caravan magazine, Praveen Donthi chronicles perhaps a genocide foretold.]

IS A LEFT-WING NATIONALISM POSSIBLE IN BANGLADESH?

Mushahid Hussain

Commemorating victims in lieu of remembering revolutionaries, seeking retribution and reconciliation rather than redistribution, writing histories of wars and genocides rather than mass struggles – such projects have become dominant in organizing the historical memory of the political left.

INSAF Bulletin conveys its heartfelt condolences to Com Bharat Patankar and Prachi Patankar on the passing of Gail Omvedt whose scholarship and activism greatly enriched our understanding of Dalit-Bahujan and gender issues in India.

EDITORIAL-HYPOCRISY AND LIES: THE CHIEF ATTRIBUTES OF THE MODI REGIME

Vinod Mubayi

The image of Narendra Modi on the ramparts of the Lal Qila, the most visible symbol of the power of the Mughal rulers of India whose reign along with that of other Muslim kings is dubbed by the Sangh Parivar as a “thousand years of slavery”, is a bizarre hypocrisy in itself. Does Modi willfully forget on August 15 each year what he and his herd keep bleating about the rest of the year so that he can strut on the ramparts of emperor Shahjehan’s iconic structure?

WANTING UTOPIA: GAIL OMVEDT’S JOURNEY

V Geetha

[In Maharashtra in the early 1970s, Bharat Patankar and I along with many other young people were comrades in the Magowa Mandal, a left progressive formation active in struggles of peasants, toilers and students. Gail Omvedt had come to Maharashtra to carry out her pioneering doctoral work on Mahatma Phule and the anti-caste struggles of the 19th century.

COMRADE – 1978 POEM BY PRABHAKAR GANGURDE ASTITVA: TRANSLATED BY GAIL OMVEDT AND BHARAT PATANKAR

Don’t expect revolution from those living corpses,

comrade.

INDIAN MUSLIMS MUST REJECT THE ˜ISLAMIC EMIRATE IN AFGHANISTAN: IMSD

Indian Muslims for Secular Democracy (IMSD) rejects the very idea of a theocratic state anywhere in the world. It therefore questions the legitimacy of the Islamic Emirate the Taliban seek to impose on the war-torn, war-weary people of Afghanistan who are yearning for peace.

PEGASUS AND THE BOGEY OF NATIONAL SECURITY

Siddharth Varadarajan

During arguments in the Supreme Court earlier this week, solicitor general Tushar Mehta said that the government cannot be made to answer whether or not it uses Pegasus spyware, for this would alert terrorists and compromise national security.

GURUJI’S LIE: THE RSS AND MS GOLWALKAR’S UNDENIABLE LINKS TO NAZISM

Dhirendra K Jha

It has remained a long-standing puzzle whether the controversial book We or Our Nationhood Defined was authored by MS Golwalkar or was just his translation of a Marathi book written by Ganesh Damodar Savarkar, the elder brother of the famous Hindutva ideologue Vinayak Damodar Savarkar.

WILL THE VOICES OF THOSE WHO WERE ALWAYS RIGHT ON AFGHANISTAN STILL BE IGNORED?

Medea Benjamin & Nicolas J.S. Davies

America’s corporate media are ringing with recriminations over the humiliating U.S. military defeat in Afghanistan. But very little of the criticism goes to the root of the problem, which was the original decision to militarily invade and occupy Afghanistan in the first place.

JUSTICE FOR FATHER STAN: ORGANIZATIONS IN TORONTO DEMAND ACCOUNTABILITY FROM THE INDIAN STATE

Divyani Motla

Toronto’s Indian diaspora recently protested against the custodial murder of Father Stan Swamy and demanded an immediate release of all political prisoners.

NATIONAL CONVENTION OF SANYUKT KISAN MORCHA

Here are the resolutions passed at the National Convention of Sanyukt Kisan Morcha, held at Singhu Border Stage on 26 and 27 August, 2021:

EDITORIAL: EVERY INSTITUTION OF THE INDIAN STATE IS COMPLICIT IN THE JUDICIAL MURDER OF FATHER STAN SWAMY – PEGASUS GATE CONFIRMS STATE’S CRIMINALITY

Vinod Mubayi

The heartbreaking details of the arrest, hounding in custody and eventual death of Father Stan Swamy who had spent most of his life fighting for the rights of the poorest and most marginalized sections of Indian society -the tribals and Adivasis of mineral-rich Jharkhand- have been extensively reported in the media. The lawless and criminal behavior of various agencies of the Indian police: the Pune police, the Maharashtra police, and the National Investigation Agency (NIA), who arrested Father Swamy on what have now emerged as utterly false and fabricated charges was matched by the callous and disgusting actions of the Taloja prison staff who denied an 84-year-old man with advanced Parkinson’s disease a sipper-straw to enable him to drink water. This behavior of the police is perhaps to be expected—their chief at the level of the Central government, the Union home minister, is a man who was in jail himself on charges of murder a few years ago and was acquitted only after Modi became the Prime Minister under circumstances that could be described in polite language as highly dubious.

INDIAN ACTIVISTS JAILED ON TERRORISM CHARGES WERE ON LIST WITH SURVEILLANCE TARGETS

Joanna Slater and Niha Masih, Washington Post

When the Indian authorities began arresting lawyers and human rights activists in 2018, Sudha Bharadwaj did what she had done for more than three decades wherever she saw injustice. She organized. She spoke out. She asked courts to uphold the law.

AFTER PEGASUS AND ARSENAL REPORTS, CAN BHIMA KOREGAON CASE STILL STAND?

Anand Venkatanarayanan, The Quint, 21 Jul 2021.

In the light of Pegasus leaks, suggesting that Indian government used a spyware to snoop on politicians, constitutional appointees, journalists, and activists, the Bhima Koregaon case deserves fresh and sharp attention.

FOR UAPA, STATE MUST PAY: IT’S TIME VICTIMS OF UAPA DEMANDED RESTITUTION, JUSTICE

Chander Uday Singh, Indian Express, July 14, 2021

On March 6, 2021, 127 Indian Muslims charged with “terror” for attending a seminar at Surat were acquitted as there was no “cogent, reliable and satisfactory evidence” to show that they were members of a banned outfit.

DARKNESS AT NOON: STAN SWAMY’S DEATH IS TESTIMONY TO THE JUDICIARY’S DECLINE

A P Shah, The Wire, 8 JULY, 2021

It has been 81 years since Arthur Koestler’s Darkness at Noon was first published. The novel is set in the backdrop of the Great Purge of the late 1930s in the Soviet Union under Stalin. This period was marked by, among other things, political repression, police surveillance, general suspicion of the opposition, imprisonment, and executions.

PRESS RELEASE OF TODAY’S NATIONWIDE PROTEST BY TRADE UNIONS, FEDERATIONS/ASSOCIATIONS

INTUC, AITUC, HMS, CITU, AIUTUC, TUCC, SEWA, AICCTU, LPF, UTUC and Independent Sectoral Federations/Associations, 23rd July 2021

Lakhs of Workers on the call of Joint Platform of CTUs, Federations and Associations Observed Countrywide Protest Day on 23rd July Against Draconian Essential Defence Services Ordinance and the Rampant Drive of Privatisation of Defence Production Sector.

FROM THE ARCHIVES: LOSING A HOME IN COLOMBO AND LAHORE

Asha L Abeyasekera, Ammara Maqsood, Iromi Perera, Fizzah Sajjad Feb 03, 2020

The Orange Line Metro Train Project – a 27-kilometre rapid transport line running through the heart of Lahore, being built at an estimated cost of USD 1.6 billion – is still to be completed. As one of eight mass transit lines proposed for the rapidly expanding city of over 11 million people, the project aims to improve public transport provision in the city, particularly as the existing network frequently suffers from overcrowding, delays and breakdowns.

HERE’S HOW ISRAEL IS HELPING MODI UNDERMINE INDIA’S DEMOCRACY

Swati Chaturvedi

India loves to describe herself as the world’s largest democracy, and Israel as the only democracy in the Middle East. Yet opaque officials and executives in both countries have come together in a dark dance against democracy.

INDIA’S WATERGATE MOMENT

Sushant Singh

“Congratulations!” That was the most common message of support I received from friends and well-wishers after the July 18 news that my name was featured in a list of journalists whose cellphones had been targeted by the Israeli military-grade spyware Pegasus. I had known since June that I was on the list. My friend and colleague Siddharth Varadarajan, co-founder of India’s independent news portal The Wire—one of the 17 global media partners of this worldwide investigation—was somber when he first informed me. After I agreed to cooperate with the investigation, my device was checked by Amnesty International in early July. They found that my cellphone had been infiltrated by Pegasus as recently as a couple of days earlier.

EDITORIAL: IS PROTEST TERRORISM? MODI REGIME THINKS IT IS BUT DELHI HC DISAGREES

Vinod Mubayi

India, which boasts of being the “world’s largest democracy”, has a peculiar legal system for addressing protest or dissent against the regime in power. Despite a liberal secular constitution that guarantees freedom of speech and assembly, in practice people can, have been, and are being arrested for criticizing public officials or their policies under laws dating back to the colonial era such as the law on sedition.

FIVE QUESTIONS ON THE SHAMEFUL PROCEEDINGS AGAINST NATASHA NARWAL, DEVANGANA KALITA, ASIF IQBAL

Madan B. Lokur

Appalling. That’s the only way to describe the manner in which the proceedings against Devangana Kalita, Natasha Narwal and Asif Iqbal Tanha have been conducted and are being conducted by the police and prosecution till now.

KASHMIR MEET AFTER TWO YEARS OF RUIN: A RECKONING OR A NEW TACK?

Muzamil Jaleel

Is New Delhi’s outreach to pro-India parties a tactical step to normalise the devastating changes introduced in J&K since August 5, 2019? Has the Sangh Parivar’s Kashmir project run up against a roadblock or has it been compelled by international players to change course?

CULPABLE CARNAGE: HOW THE MODI GOVERNMENT’S FAILURE TO ACT LED TO INDIA’S COVID-19 CATASTROPHE

Chahat Rana

ON THE MORNING OF 17 APRIL, amidst a chorus of loud cheers, Narendra Modi walked across a stage to stand at a podium, all set to address an election rally in the city of Asansol, in West Bengal. As the prime minister found his place at the podium, he promptly removed his snugly-fit white mask, rubbed his face and stroked his flowing white beard. For a few seconds, Modi took in the cheering crowd through impassive eyes, before raising his hands in a namaskar above his head. The rally had begun.

NARRATIVES OF SACRIFICE IN THE PAK ARMY

Asma Faiz

[A review of the book Dying to Serve: Militarism, Affect and the Politics of Sacrifice in the Pakistan Army by Maria Rashid, Stanford University Press, USA].

THE ‘HINDUTVA ECOSYSTEM’ HAS A NEW ANTI-MUSLIM NARRATIVE. THIS TIME STREET VENDORS ARE THE TARGET

Alishan Jafri

After floating “land jihad”, “love jihad”, “corona jihad” and “civil services jihad”, a new kind of ‘conspiracy’ called “redi jihad” (street vendor jihad) has been ‘unearthed’ by Hindutva activists intent on targeting Muslims in the national capital and elsewhere.

THE KISAN COMMUNE IN INDIA

Vijay Prashad

On 26 June 2021, tens of thousands of Indian farmers will gather in front of the government offices in India’s twenty-eight states. They will come to commemorate the completion of seven months of their nation-wide protest against the extreme right Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

EDITORIAL: THE ARROGANCE OF ISRAELI SETTLER-COLONIALISM THAT MODI WANTS TO COPY SEEN IN THE LIGHT OF GANDHI’S VIEWS ON PALESTINE

Vinod Mubayi

Nothing demonstrates the arrogance of Zionist settler colonialism more than the periodic extermination every few years of hundreds of Palestinians in Gaza by Israeli bombs and missiles. Leading Israeli politicians and military leaders are fond of describing this brutal violence as “mowing the lawn” as if the Palestinian people are nothing more than noxious weeds that need to be cut every so often. “Mowing the lawn” is a nakedly political act meant to repress and suppress if not exterminate the non-Jewish population of the territories like Gaza or the West Bank that are under de facto Israeli control.

COVID’S BITTER PILL: INDIA’S GDP CONTRACTS 7.3% IN FY’21

The Wire Staff

New Delhi: India’s economy contracted by 7.3% for the fiscal year 2021 (FY’21), according to new government data released on Monday evening, in what is the latest sign of the economic toll that the coronavirus pandemic and subsequent lockdowns have taken.

A TALE OF TWO SOUTH ASIAN AMERICAS

Sharmin Hossain

An exploration of the Bangladeshi American activism scene provides a glimpse into how the South Asian American political landscape continues to expand and change.

TARUN TEJPAL VERDICT: EVIDENCE OF HOW LITTLE THE JUDICIARY HAS LEARNT

Brinda Karat

[Contextual note by editors: A court in India acquitted a prominent journalist of charges that he raped a junior colleague, bringing an end to a politically charged case that had been closely watched as a test of a new sexual assault law.]

PAKISTAN’S PRIVATE VACCINE SALES HIGHLIGHT RICH-POOR DIVIDE

Salman Masood

An inoculation push, plagued with limited supplies and red tape, makes doses available to those who can pay for them. In a country with a struggling economy, most can’t.

THE BELLY OF THE BEAST: INSIDE INDIA’S HINDU CATTLE-SMUGGLING NETWORKS

Ajay Prakash

Police officers are usually happy to be interviewed about successful operations. They might narrate the details with great flair, while juniors who are around may chip in now and then with additional bits of information.

THE GHOSTS OF HARLEM PAST: THE HISTORY OF SOUTHASIANS IN AMERICA IS RICHER THAN THE DISCOURSE SUGGESTS

Krishnendu Ray

(Review From the Archives: Bengali Harlem and the Lost Histories of South Asian America by Vivek Bald. Harvard University Press, 2015)

On the 150th anniversary of the Paris Commune, INSAF Bulletin pays homage to the memory of the working women and men of Paris whose epic struggle pointed the way to a better and more just world.

EDITORIAL: AS DISASTER STRIKES, INDIA TEETERS ON THE BRINK

Vinod Mubayi

In the internet age, news of disasters is difficult to hide even for authoritarian regimes that try to stifle dissent or conceal images that show them in a bad light. The videos from India freely available on YouTube and Facebook are full of the most gruesome scenes of corpses piling up at crematoria, Shamshan ghats and graveyards, patients gasping for lack of oxygen on hospital beds, and people wailing and screaming in hospital parking lots for their near and dear ones to get medical attention. International and national newspapers and agencies are documenting in excruciating detail the disaster overtaking India that is now at such a scale that is impossible for the Modi regime to hide.

HOW RSS LAY THE GROUNDWORK FOR THE “TSUNAMI” THAT BJP IS EXPECTING IN WEST BENGAL

Amit Bhardwaj

In April 2017, West Bengal stood witness to scenes like never before. Districts after districts were taken over by men wearing saffron bandanas. They chanted “Jai Shree Ram,” and wielded swords and trishuls—tridents. Cities and townships such as Asansol and Birbhum had thousands of men thronging the streets. The saffron flags were mounted on vehicles, on houses and on shops. In Kolkata, tableaus featuring Hindu gods were taken out from different locations. In a state where Durga Puja is considered to be the biggest cultural-religious function, such gigantic fanfare around Ramnavami—a festival marking the birth of the Hindu deity Ram—was unprecedented. But as state leaders of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh told me, it was not unexpected. This transformation was by design, a result of years of groundwork by the RSS. In the 2021 assembly elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party is hoping to reap the benefits of this labour.

A NEW BORDER IN THE OLD REPUBLIC: THE CLASS AND CASTE-BASED CONTRADICTIONS WITHIN INDIA’S FARMERS’ PROTEST

Aditya Bahl

For the first time in the history of postcolonial India, two different parades marked the Republic Day 2021 celebrations in New Delhi. At the Rashtrapati Bhavan, the president’s residence, the rightwing government organised a public spectacle of Hindu nationalism, parading tableaus of new temples and artilleries, and sanctifying them as emblems of the emergent ‘Hindu nation’. Meanwhile, on the outskirts of the country’s capital, thousands of farmers and agrarian workers took out a ‘tractor parade’, protesting the new farm bills passed by the ruling government.

BJP HAILS PM FOR “DEFEATING” COVID-19

[Lest we forget]

The BJP on Sunday hailed Prime Minister Narendra Modi for having “defeated” Covid-19 as also legislative reforms such as the three farm laws, labour codes, merger of Public Sector banks, New Education Policy.

INDIA IS COLLAPSING UNDER A SECOND WAVE OF CORONAVIRUS. CALLOUSNESS AND INCOMPETENCE ARE KILLING US

Barkha Dutt

In 2020, it was the sight of millions of daily-wage workers walking on the national highways of India, fleeing the cities for their villages, that defined the covid-19 crisis in the country. Now, in 2021, the country’s blundering, callous and shortsighted response to a second wave is chillingly captured at overrun graveyards and cremation grounds.

IT’S NOT ENOUGH TO SAY THE GOVT HAS FAILED. WE ARE WITNESSING A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY

Arundhati Roy

During a particularly polarising election campaign in the state of Uttar Pradesh in 2017, India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, waded into the fray to stir things up even further. From a public podium, he accused the state government – which was led by an opposition party – of pandering to the Muslim community by spending more on Muslim graveyards (kabristans) than on Hindu cremation grounds (shamshans). With his customary braying sneer, in which every taunt and barb rises to a high note mid-sentence before it falls away in a menacing echo, he stirred up the crowd. “If a kabristan is built in a village, a shamshan should also be constructed there,” he said.

PAKISTAN’S PRIME MINISTER LINKS RAPE TO ‘VULGARITY’ AND HOW WOMEN DRESS

Salman Masood

An outcry has erupted in Pakistan after Prime Minister Imran Khan blamed a rise in rape cases on how women dressed, remarks that activists denounced as perpetuating a culture of victim blaming.

EDITORIAL: INDIA’S FARMERS VS. MODI REGIME: AN ANALYTICAL REVIEW OF THE ISSUES

Vinod Mubayi

As this issue of Insaf Bulletin is being published, millions of India’s farmers will have spent more than four months protesting continuously against the pro-free market and pro-corporate farm laws passed by the Modi government last year. It is widely acknowledged that this has become the largest and longest non-violent protest movement in world history. The sacrifices made by the farmers and their persistence in the face of violence by the police – tear gas, water cannon and lathi charges – is also unprecedented. Upwards of 300 people have died during the protests either from the rigors of the north Indian winter or from other causes but the farmers have remained steadfast and the scale of the protests and their magnitude have only grown over the last couple of months.

INDIA’S NEWS UPSTARTS CHALLENGED MODI. NEW RULES COULD TAME THEM

Mujib Mashal and Hari Kumar

Narendra Modi, India’s prime minister, has cultivated and cowed large parts of the country’s normally raucous news media in recent years as part of a broader campaign against dissent.

FROM LIBERALISM TO SECULARISM, THE BATTLE FOR BENGAL HAS JUST BEGUN

Jawhar Sircar

Voters in Bengal feel quite amused when told that the next assembly elections are all done and dusted. But it is rather distressing to see how personal biases or received wisdom (tonnes of which is freely offloaded in the national capital) masquerading as profound political analysis. Despite what poll surveys tell us, a very tough battle lies ahead, not only for Mamata Banerjee but also for the liberal principles and secular ideologies that the people of the state have prided in.

DELHI VIOLENCE UNMASKED: HOW RSS, BJP MEMBERS INVOKED HINDU IDENTITY TO MOBILISE HINDUTVA MOBS AT MAUJPUR

Sagar

In a six-month-long investigation, Sagar, a staff writer at The Caravan, scrutinised Facebook live broadcasts by members affiliated to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the Bharatiya Janata Party ahead of the Delhi violence of February 2020. In this series based on the investigation, The Caravan reports on the Hindutva mobilisation that preceded the violence, its political and communal nature, and the role played by the RSS, BJP and affiliated organisations such as the Bajrang Dal in fomenting hate against those protesting the Citizenship (Amendment) Act of 2019.

PAKISTAN: MANUFACTURING SOLDIERS

Mahvish Ahmad

In a book that breaks new ground in scholarship on Pakistani militarism, Maria Rashid explores how the Pakistan Army manages emotions like grief, pride and fear among foot soldiers and their families.

RESISTING A COUP: HOW CIVIL SOCIETY IS RESPONDING IN THE FACE OF ESCALATING VIOLENCE IN MYANMAR

On 1 February, the military seized control of Myanmar after detaining National League for Democracy (NLD) leader Aung San Suu Kyi and other elected leaders, claiming that recently held elections were neither free nor fair.

EDITORIAL: IMPACT OF THE FARMERS AGITATION ON INDIA’S INTERNATIONAL IMAGE

Vinod Mubayi

India’s current image in most of the mainstream western media is that of an authoritarian state: a state unwilling to tolerate any dissent or criticism of its actions and policies; a state that harasses, persecutes, and imprisons critics who voice opinions or sentiments the government dubs as “sedition” – under a century-old law left over from the British colonial regime.

STATEMENT OF SOLIDARITY WITH FARMERS OF INDIA

Centre d’études et de ressources sur l’Asie du Sud (CERAS) and South Asian Network for Secularism and Democracy (SANSAD)

PAKISTAN INDIA PEOPLE’S FORUM FOR PEACE AND DEMOCRACY WELCOMES DGMOS CEASEFIRE AGREEMENT

Joint Statement released on 27th February 2021, New Delhi and Islamabad

INDIA: DISASTER IN UTTARAKHAND IN THE HIMALAYAS – STATEMENT BY VIKALP SANGAM

South Asia Citizens Web, February 25, 2021

We, the Core Group members of the Vikalp Sangam, are completely shocked and anguished by the recent Uttarakhand tragedy. We do consider that the events of 7th February 2021 in the Rishi Ganga and Dhauli Ganga valleys in Uttarakhand are yet another grim reminder of the fact that Himalayas as an ecosystem are getting stressed and sick by the day. Climate Change and its impacts are no longer a matter of debate or contestations. It is here to stay.

FIXING THE GAZE: THE MADAM CHIEF MINISTER POSTER AND THE GENEALOGY OF A NEW DALIT ASSERTION

Praveen Donthi

The month of January is marked by the birth and death anniversaries of Rohith Vemula. Five years ago, after he was pushed to take his own life at the University of Hyderabad—in what Dalits aptly described as an institutional murder—I reported on the defiant politics of Vemula and the Ambedkar Students’ Association that he was part of, and how they were trying to create a “universal language of discrimination” for the country’s marginalised.

LIVING IN KARACHI’S KATCHI ABADIS

Muhammad Aqeel Awan

Wandering outside the Bengali Para, Karachi-Malir, trying to find a street that would take us inside the Katchi Abadi (informal settlement), we met a young man in his early 20s, about 5.5 feet tall, of Bengali origin, standing still with his eyes stuck on a particular point in the sea.

DROUGHT IS NOT SIMPLY A NATURAL CALAMITY, IT IS ALSO DRIVEN BY COMMERCIAL GREED

P. Sainath

As India witnesses its largest-ever farmers’ agitation, Landscapes of Loss: The Story of an Indian Drought, a new book by Kavitha Iyer, takes a close look at several of the deeper issues that have been afflicting the country’s farming community for decades now and brought it to this desperate pass.

A PAKISTANI-AMERICAN TALE UPENDS EXPECTATIONS ONSCREEN AND IN LIFE

Sopan Deb

Iram Parveen Bilal’s newest feature, “I’ll Meet You There,” tells a novel story: A young Pakistani-American woman, Dua (played by Nikita Tewani), wants to pursue a career in dance, a path that would be frowned upon in Pakistan. Instead, her immigrant father, a Chicago police officer named Majeed, encourages her to follow her dream. At the same time, Majeed (Faran Tahir) is ordered to surveil a mosque — essentially to spy on his people, including his father, who has incidentally chosen now to visit from Pakistan.

AN EXEMPLARY PROGRESSIVE: THE AESTHETIC EXPERIMENT OF SAHIR LUDHIANVI

(Excerpted from Ali Mir and Raza Mir’s 2006 book Anthems of Resistance: A Celebration of Progressive Urdu Poetry to mark Sahir’s Birth Centenary coming up on March 8, 2021)

EDITORIAL: MOBOCRACY IN THE WORLD’S “OLDEST” AND “LARGEST” DEMOCRACIES

Vinod Mubayi

The invasion of the seat of government, the US Capitol, in the world’s oldest democracy on January 6, 2021 by violent, right-wing, white supremacist mobs owing allegiance to President Donald Trump, has focused attention on the role exercised by a democratically elected Leader who incites his followers to commit destructive acts. The proximate reason for the invasion was to stop the certification by Congress of the victory of Joe Biden over Trump in the November 2020 election.

BUDGET 2021 IS A CHANCE TO UNDO THE COVID-INDUCED INEQUALITY THAT HAS SURGED ACROSS INDIA

Nikhil Dey

Ideally, the government should increase the work entitlement for MGNREGA to at least 150 days, double the budget and put in place an urban employment guarantee act.

THE SEASON OF DISCONTENT: HOW HAS COVID-19 IMPACTED CIVIC MOBILISATION AND ORGANISING IN SOUTH ASIA?

Alizeh Kohari

The last public protest I attended was on 8 March 2020. Two weeks later, the world changed. It was already changing, of course – had already changed, perhaps – but we didn’t know yet how much or for how long.

WHY THE INCARCERATION OF MUNAWAR FARUQUI SHOULD WORRY US

Arshad Alam, Sabrang India

The show hasn’t started. A stand-up comic, Munawar Faruqui, is rehearsing his lines in a café in Indore. A couple of his associates are also with him. A shadowy figure suddenly enters the hall and starts yelling at Faruqui. He alleges that Faruqui has made fun of Hindu deities and thereby hurt the religious sentiments of Hindus.

THE NEW KHALISTAN CONSPIRACY: THE GOVERNMENT IS PLAYING THE SAME GAME THAT ONCE LED PUNJAB TO DISASTER

Hartosh Singh Bal

There is a familiar pattern to the right wing’s spin on the events of 26 January: condemning the farmers who reached the centre of Delhi, labeling them “extremists,” “Khalistani,” or simply “anti-national.”

LETTER TO CHIEF JUSTICE OF INDIA

20 January 2021

New Delhi,

To

The Honourable Chief Justice of India,

TIME FOR LEFT TO RE-IMAGINE CLASS, POPULISM

Subhoranjan Dasgupta

The Bengal elections are knocking at the door. How will the parties, the Trinamul Congress (TMC) and the CPM in particular, respond? Can they form a united front by combining the crucial populist currents in their favour? Eminent political scientist Ranabir Samaddar, founder of the Calcutta Research Group explores these questions in a dialogue.

PAKISTAN’S ONE-PERCENT

Shahrukh Khan

A review of Rosita Armytage’s Big Capital in an Unequal World: The Micropolitics of Wealth in Pakistan.

A REPUBLIC OF PROTEST

Mukulika Banerjee

The culture of the farmers’ protest is an extraordinary tableau that tells us what republican values look like.

INSAF BULLETIN WISHES ITS READERS A VERY HAPPY 2021!

EDITORIAL: LOVE JIHAD: ILLEGALITY DESCENDS INTO CRIMINALITY

Vinod Mubayi

The “love jihad” law passed by the UP legislature late November 2020 essentially criminalizes marriage between persons of different religious faiths, more specifically between Muslim men and Hindu women; the former are accused of luring the latter by false promises in to marriage and converting them to Islam. This piece of legislation, if it can at all be called a “law” is so blatantly unconstitutional that even the cowed courts of India’s current judicial system are likely to reject it. But what may have been regarded as another example of insanity perpetrated by the Yogi regime has swiftly morphed into outright criminality.

THE DISSENTING AND DEFIANT CITIZEN IS INDIAN OF THE YEAR

Sidharth Bhatia, The Wire

In an environment where dissidence is considered an act of rebellion, even sedition, where people are thrown into jail for standing up for rights, and where even a cartoon or a joke can get the politicians riled up, some Indians have let it be known that they will not get cowed down. Especially when it comes to matters of dignity and livelihood.

THE GLOBAL ANGLE TO THE FARMER PROTESTS

Utsa Patnaik

The farmers’ movement for the repeal of the three farm laws which affect them closely but have been rammed through without consulting them, has now entered its second month.

A MONTH ON, FARMERS REMAIN RESOLUTE OVER REPEAL OF FARM LAWS

Pawanjot Kaur

Mohali: The farmers’ ‘Dilli Chalo’ movement will complete a month on December 26, 2020. What started at the village block level, mainly in Punjab, has panned out across the country and Indian embassies, and foreign parliaments.

LOVE IN THE TIME OF LOCKDOWN: HOW PAKISTANI WOMEN CONTINUE TO CHALLENGE PATRIARCHAL NORMS

Sehyr Mirza

It’s the month of April during lockdown in Pakistan. The usually bustling Mall Road of Lahore is barren. On her way back from the office, Irum takes an Uber ride to the eerily quiet Pak Tea House. She waits outside the silent cafes and shops. Her eyes gaze upon an empty road: only a handful of commuters and a few passers-by are in sight. The liveliness of the city might have been a tale from another era.

J&K: HOW AND WHY THE DDC POLLS RESULTS ‘MARGINALISED’ THE BJP

Shakir Mir, The Wire

Srinagar: District Development Councils (DDCs) tend to have very little political power. Yet the BJP-ruled Centre conducted the recent DDC polls in Jammu and Kashmir on a scale quite out of proportion to their diminutive profile.

HOW CAN A GARMENT BE CHEAPER THAN A SANDWICH?

Imran Amed, The New York Times

This year the world has had to confront two monumental challenges: Covid-19 and the economic catastrophe the disease has caused. Both have taken a heavy toll on economically vulnerable workers, who already had to contend with low wages and few social protections. Their plight has exposed the rampant inequality pervading many corners of the globalized world, including the fashion industry.

THE EDIT WARS: HOW WIKIPEDIA EARNED THE IRE OF THE HINDU RIGHT

Nishant Kauntia, The Caravan Magazine

“It might be awkward, but please don’t scroll past this.” In July this year, the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation launched a donation campaign in India. A banner pinned at the top of every Wikipedia article noted that fewer than two percent of users made donations and that, if those who saw the banner would contribute Rs 150 each, the online encyclopedia “could keep thriving for years.”

BOOK REVIEW: A NEW SOCIOLOGY AWAITS US

Dipankar Gupta

Classes of Labour: Work and Life in a Central Indian Steel Town by Jonathan P Parry (in collaboration with Ajay T G), New Delhi: Social Science Press, 2019; pp xxx + 702 (biblio+index), ?1,850.

Top - Home

Archives

PAST YEARS

Related Links