SECULARISM, DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS AND SOCIAL JUSTICE

INSAF Bulletin 233 September 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).

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?

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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.

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

Don’t expect revolution from those living corpses,

comrade.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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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:

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