Culture and Open Defecation

A couple of weeks ago The New York Times ran a front-page story on the widespread prevalence of open defecation and malnutrition in India. This bit caught a lot of attention:

Open defecation has long been an issue in India. Some ancient Hindu texts advised people to relieve themselves far from home, a practice that Gandhi sought to curb.

You can read rebuttals here and here.

This is the author himself defending the story on twitter.

Finally, “Hindu-phobia” allegations here and here. (I have a feeling we’ll see much more of these in the future)

I suppose it is too much to ask people to focus on the fact that:

A child raised in India is far more likely to be malnourished than one from the Democratic Republic of Congo, Zimbabwe or Somalia, the planet’s poorest countries. Stunting affects 65 million Indian children under the age of 5, including a third of children from the country’s richest families…

Half of India’s population, or at least 620 million people, defecate outdoors. And while this share has declined slightly in the past decade, an analysis of census data shows that rapid population growth has meant that most Indians are being exposed to more human waste than ever before.

Communalism pays in votes [Data Stories Update]

The previous elections were highly polarized in riot-hit Muzzaffarnagar and Western Uttar Pradesh in general:

What was apparent was that many,many booths across the constituency essentially turned into winner-take-all contests. In these booths, the largest party ended up with a very high vote share – often in excess of 90%. Whole villages or areas under a single booth chose to vote sharply one way or the other. This was in contrast to 2009, where the average booth saw a much more diverse pattern of voting behaviour.

The map below essentially extends that analysis to the whole of UP. The darker areas saw more polarised voting, and the lighter areas saw less. What we see is a sharp difference between Western UP (where Muzaffarnagar is located), and the rest of the state. Voting in both central and Eastern UP was far less polarised than it was in the West.


Plus, a toilet map of different social groups:

*Four regions – Maharashtra, Kerala, Gujarat and North East states stand out from the rest of the country, in having generally lower disparity measures than elsewhere, for dalits. In addition, Punjab and Himachal Pradesh seem to be relatively better off than other areas as well.
* The southern states of Karnataka, Andhra and Tamil Nadu are interesting. All three are relatively higher income states – yet on the disparity measure for dalits, their performance is spotty at best.
* For most districts, tribal households are even worse off than dalit households when it comes to access to toilets. The disparity measure for the country as a whole, for dalits, is about 0.61. For tribals, it is 0.43. Again, the North-East states stands out when it comes to access to toilets for tribal households vis-a-vis non-tribal households.

Also, interestingly, the Tribal disparity in use of toilets does not seem to track the Dalit disparity i.e there are states where Tribals fare better than Dalits.

Nepal Left Behind

Energy use per Capita (kg of oil equivalent per capita) in 1971:

    China             465.52
    Nepal            309.81
    Sri Lanka       299.28
    Pakistan        280.04
    India              275.56
    Bangladesh   84.08

 

Energy use per Capita (kg of oil equivalent per capita) in 2011:

    China             2029.36
    India               613.72
    Sri Lanka        499.34
    Pakistan         481.62
    Nepal             382.64
    Bangladesh    204.72

 
An under-reported story seems to be that of Nepal which has stagnated for some 20 years according to energy use statistics (1970-1990) and exchanged places with India in South Asian Rankings in the mean time.
Also, India is one of those places that has experienced a decrease in subjective well being and sense of free choice. (Post-independence Fabianism?)

More at Our World in Data

Lokayata as a “primitive” Indian folk belief?!

The masses have always been suspicious of Brahminical mambo-jumbo but this might be taking it too far:

Lokayata is a school of ancient Indian philosophy and one of three non-orthodox schools of thought. It is popular mainly among lower classes. In ancient Chinese text, it is also known as Lokaayatika, Carapace and the like. It has a very old origin and began to exert an important influence around the 6th century BCE.
Evolution and Relevant Literature – Lokayata dates back at least to the Vedic Age or earlier. Some scholars think it is associated with the earliest Ganges civilisation and primitive Indian folk beliefs.

This was astonishing as well:

In the latter 19th century CE, several thousand of a certain Sikh sect followed the same ideas with Lokayata.


Daoist-Buddhist debates- curiously, around the same time, Buddhism in India was also getting pummeled in “debates”:

However, during the period of Emperor Wuzong (reigned 840-846), Wuzong believed in Daoism, and ever called on Daoists and monks to carry out a debate on the question: “can we cultivate immorality?” “Governing a country is like a cooking” was taken as debated topic. Zhixuan said: “moralisation is the root of governing a country, while the so-called immorality cultivation is the career taken up by hermits lived in woods, and it, at the same time, requires natural gifts to some extent. So it is not suitable for the King.” At that time, Zhixuan was so eloquent in the debate and what he said shocked all the listeners, who thought that his words went against the Emperor’s order; and his neighbours, worried that he may be exiled and thought it was a pity that his talents in debate may be buried.

However, under the support of Emperor Wuzong, Daoists won in the debate, and from then on, “Exterminating Buddhism in Huichang” started. In August of the fifth year (845), the Emperor gave orders to officially exterminate Buddhism. Later, more than 4,600 temples were pulled down, 2,60,500 Buddhist monks and nuns resumed secular life, over 40,000 private temples and Buddhist monasteries were abolished, approximately 10 million qing of fertile farmland was confiscated, and 1,50,000 slaves and maid-servants were recorded to double-tax family. Li Deyu, the prime minister, offered his congratulations to the Emperor and criticised in Celebration on Demolishing Temples: “Buddhism poisons people’s mind, buries the principle taxes, and has degraded the country for more than a thousand years.”

Parsis in China:

The earliest Parsi merchant known to have sailed to China was Heerjee Jeevanjee Readymoney in 1756. In this period, as a by-product of the tea trade between China and Britain, raw cotton from western India began to be shipped to Canton (Guangzhou) to pay for the rapidly growing export of tea from China. Enterprising Parsi merchants were among the earliest to profit from the spurt in trade between Bombay and China from the last quarter of the 18th century CE. One of the earliest Parsi firms to be established at Canton was that of Cowasjee Pallanjee & Co (1794). The great Parsi merchant and benefactor Jamsetjee Jejeebhoy, who played a major role in the growth of Bombay in the first half of the 19th century CE, made his fortune in the trade with China. The raw cotton and opium trade and the shipping business with China contributed to the rise of many other prominent Parsi families as well, including the Banajis, Wadias, Petits, Tatas, Dadiseths, Camas and others. Later, when several leading Parsi businessmen ventured into the newly emerging cotton textile industry in India in the second half of the 19th century CE, they exported a significant portion of the cotton yarn produced in their factories to China.

The Parsi merchants showed a greater willingness to travel and reside in China than any other Indian merchants involved in the China trade. Jamsetjee Jejeebhoy himself travelled several times to China as a young man. As a result, hundreds of Parsi men in the 19th century CE were to be found in Canton, Macau and later Hong Kong, Shanghai and other Chinese ports. In the early years of the 19th century CE, at times there were more Parsis in Canton than there were British. They were often referred to by the Chinese as baitouren (whiteheads) on account of their distinctive white caps. Before the Opium War, Parsis lived in Macau and in the foreign factories on the Canton waterfront. One of these even came to be known as the ‘Parsi factory’. Parsi cemeteries in Canton and Macau have tombstones dating back to 1829. Parsis played a pioneering role in the early settlement and development of Hong Kong after 1842. Among those who purchased land on the Hong Kong waterfront in the first land auction conducted by the British authorities on the island in June 1841, were Dadabhoy Rustomjee, Heerjebhoy Rustomjee, Framjee Jamsetjee and Pestonjee Cowasjee. Starting out initially in the import-export trade from Hong Kong, the Parsis soon ventured into diverse business activities, including real estate, share brokerage, the hospitality industry, banking and so on. One of them, Dorabji Naorojee, founded the cross-harbour transport service that evolved into Hong Kong’s famous “Star Ferry” service. The Parsis were also known for their involvement in charitable activities in Hong Kong. The individual, who played the pioneering role in the establishment of the University of Hong Kong, was a Parsi businessman known as H N Mody. The Ruttonjee family established one of the earliest antituberculosis sanatoriums on the island.

All of the above and much much more- from Cucumber, Clover and Cotton to Sugar Making, Nagarjuna and Sun Simiao in the amazing and thoroughly awesomeEncyclopedia of India-China Cultural Contacts“.

Some charts from Human Development Report 2014

South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa are really the laggards of the world:

 


        

Cognitive Development is getting wider attention:

  
As is the importance of culture (logic of Hundred Nation Theory?):



South Asia is better-off than Sub-Saharan Africa in the long run (optimistic scenario):


Manufacturing is just the beginning (gateway to technological sophistication and much more money):

South Asia and Europe (Welfare laws):

From: Human Development Report 2014

Indians as Over-cooked Rotis

Once Dr Radhakrishnan went for a dinner. There was a Briton at the event who said, “We are very dear to God.” Radhakrishnan laughed and told the gathering, “Friends, one day God felt like making rotis. When he was cooking the rotis, the first one was cooked less and the English were born. The second one stayed longer on the fire and the Negroes were born. Alert after His first two mistakes, when God went on to cook the third roti, it came out just right and as a result Indians were born.”—Page 8, Prernadeep -3. (Dr Radhakrishnan was the second president of India.)


This and several other bizarre passages are part of books that school children are being encouraged to read by the education department in the state of Gujarat. These books instruct students to look down upon foreigners, worship cows, die for their religion and shun “western practices” such as blowing out candles on birthdays. A senior official in the education department said these books were “reference material” for primary and secondary schools in the state.
Of course, most Indians are black- not “wheatish”. This book, supposedly written to instill national pride, ironically reinforces the deep-seated Indian inferiority complex of never being pale enough.

More here.

180, 900, 180,000

That is to say: 180 days, 900 posts, 180,000 page views.

The new BP kicked off during snow-showers in Wisconsin (hyperbole?). Right now, intense rain showers in Mumbai (fact).
………

Backed by a top-drawer management that knows all the trapeze-ing tricks on the metaphorical spider-webs and with our blogger-badshah(TM) leading from the front (assisted by many contributors), the BP ship is on full-steam ahead mode.  
The pace has been truly intense.  
The top three posts presently add up to more than 20,000 views (twice the page-view total for entire Feb)!!
…..
Thanks also to our reviewers (Asok, Shah Alam, Prashanth,….) for just-in-time alerts so we steer clear of them icebergs.

For people who prefer a more dignified pace and a monochromatic show (and less hyperbole), not to worry, achhe din (good times) will come in a short while.

Lastly, we would love to have some ladies on board. Equality and all that- it is also a responsibility (for you and people behind you).

Now onwards to Mission-1000!!!

thanks and regards

Xinjiang (again)

The night (and also day) of the long knives continues apace. March, May, and now July (next month with 31 days is….August).

Remember, when MH-370 vanished, there was suspicion/panic that it was an attack by the Uighurs? Turned out it was an Iranian kid traveling on a false passport. We try so hard to forget (and reality drags us back to all the fear and the loathing).

We have to say this about Islamists, they have absolutely no fear. 
Right now they are up against two of  the fiercest (ideological) adversaries: Israel and the Chicoms. But they are fighting an excellent asymmetric war with all the tools at their disposal.

The global public opinion is weak (yet) but strongly in favor, because the Palestinians and the Uighurs are so hopelessly out-matched. Everybody loves an under-dog.

Modern technology is also helping in shaping opinion. When Israel killed four boys playing on the beach the cameras were watching. And for all their famed efficiency, the Chicoms are unable to choke off (and shut up) Xinjiang. In the old days they would have simply packed off 15-20 mil people to the Gulags, and got rid of a few million young men altogether. But now it is not so easy. Thank heavens for small mercies.

Make no mistake, this is a full-on, hot
war, just like the
one in the middle-east. This one will not quietly burn off, just like the other one. Yet, there is no dandi march for peace plan from Kerry (and Ki-Moon). Why not?

More significantly, there are no protests (that we know of) in Turkey and
in Iran. Nary a rock thrown in anger in Pakistan and in Kashmir. No call for Boycotts, Divestments, and Sanctions from (Islamic) civil rights organizations. No wrist bands declaring solidarity from courageous (muslim) sportsmen……There is no Ummah Q.E.D.
………………..
Dozens of people were killed and injured in a “terrorist attack” in
China’s far western Xinjiang region, home to the mainly Muslim Uighur
minority, state media reported Tuesday.

…….
A knife-wielding gang
attacked a police station and government offices in Shache county early
Monday, the official Xinhua news agency said citing local police, and
“dozens of Uighur and Han civilians were killed or injured”.

“Police officers at the scene shot dead dozens of members of the mob,” the report added.

“Initial investigation showed that it was a premeditated terror attack,” it said.
Beijing
commonly blames separatists from Xinjiang for carrying out terror
attacks which have grown in scale over the last year and spread outside
the restive region.

Among the most shocking incidents was a market
attack in Xinjiang’s capital Urumqi in which 39 people were killed in
May, and a deadly rampage by knife-wielding assailants at a train
station at Kunming in China’s southwest in March, which left 29 dead.

Rights groups accuse China’s government of cultural and religious repression they say fuels unrest in Xinjiang.

Beijing
argues it has boosted economic development in the area and that it
upholds minority rights in a country with 56 recognised ethnic groups.

….

Link: http://www.dawn.com/news/1122343/dozens-killed-and-injured-in-terror-attack-in-chinas-xinjiang

……

regards

Aakar Patel: Kabaddi made esay

…..no shortage of Punjabis who are 6’3″ and 100 kg and can
crawl 20 metres….this
height-weight thing has to do with some optimum kabaddi size….A centre
of gravity issue, a strength versus agility thing……. All the players
are medium-build and stocky….this
body type makes it easy for the South to participate……

 ……
Aakar Bhai has (momentarily we hope) switched off the political channel and activated the sports channel. And what an exciting game it is: Professional Kabaddi. There is even a Pakistani pro-k team that is expected to participate.

….
A few fun facts….the game did NOT originate in China. Instead it is the Dravida civilization that gets the credit. Also it is the national sports of Bangladesh where it is known as hadudu (we suspect cricket is more popular).
…….

….
Did you ever play kabaddi in your youth?? We did (really), our school even had a ladies k-team (Iran vs. Taiwan, above). Why not give it a try, it is loads of fun, there is even beach kabaddi (Indian team, below). Plus the youth (in the enlightened west) are no longer encouraged to play contact sports (dodge-ball anybody???).  
…………

….
So think of kabaddi as akin to bull-fighting, an art that will be forgotten in a couple of generations time as we focus on more civilized pursuits. 
Which brings us back to the original question. Why did Patel maharaj suddenly change his beat? Perhaps because only he can delve deep into sociology and bring out  the clues that point to the proper cultural environment required to create a genuine kabaadi artist. And even though we may not learn more about pro-kabaadi we will certainly learn more about the master and admire HIS craft.

Thus all in all, good news for the legions of AP fans (and also the haters). Enjoy the new avatar while it lasts!!!
…………..
There is something very warming about watching Pro Kabaddi. I
mean in the names of the players. Their origins are on display and they
are men from simple peasant stock.   

……
This shows also in the way that they
speak when interviewed.
Thick north Indian accents abound. “Bilkul
amajing hai” one player said before a match. Two team captains are
police inspectors from Haryana.

The other thing that is
interesting is the way they look. Kabaddi players do not resemble our
cricketers. This is not a sport where one can get away purely on talent
with the unfit and chubby Tendulkar-Gavaskar type of body.

Kabaddi
players tend to be of a particular height, about 5’8″, and around 78
kg.
Let’s go through the list of captains to demonstrate this.
Bangalore’s Manjit Chillar is 5’7” and 80 kg, Mumbai’s Anup Kumar is
5’9” and 80 kg, Jaipur’s Navneet Gautam is 6’ and 80 kg, Patna’s Rakesh
Kumar is 5’9 and 78 kg, Bengal’s Nilesh Shinde is 5’8” and 79 kg,
Hyderabad’s Rajaguru Subramanian is 5’8” and 77 kg, Delhi’s Jasmer Singh
is 5’6” and 78 kg, Pune’s Wazir Singh is 5’6” and 83 kg.

There
is no shortage of Punjabis and Haryanvis who are 6’3″ and 100 kg and can
crawl 20 metres with three men on their back. That there is not a
single man of those dimensions in any team leads me to suspect that this
height-weight thing has to do with some optimum kabaddi size.
 

A centre
of gravity issue, or a strength versus agility thing. All the players
are medium-build and stocky and – here’s some armchair sociology – this
body type makes it easy for the South to participate. There are quite a
few Southerners,
including a 39-year-old (inevitably nicknamed Anna) in
the Bangalore team.

Something else struck me after watching
kabaddi for a second night. Here is a game that could become our version
of basketball. A made-for-TV sport that is tough and exciting and
followed nationally, with encounters short enough to be watched over a
couple of beers.
A physical sport that leaves one with a sort of
satisfaction that cricket often doesn’t. This was especially true after
watching the first match on Sunday, a terrific contest between Bangalore
and Pune.

The show opened with the usual celebrity interviews.
After the Khans and Big B on Saturday, however, the standard plummeted
and we had Rakesh Omprakash Mehra and Nakul Vaid (I don’t know either)
and Karan Patel (no relation).

Of course there also was the one
celebrity who could be relied upon for a quote. “Although the Pink
Panthers aren’t playing today, we’re here for Ronnie, and for the U
Mumbai team and to support kabaddi,” said Abhishek Bachchan. Achcha. I
was clearly wrong to think he came because he doesn’t have much work.

The
other irritating thing is that Star has decided to play the national
anthem before every match, so that is twice in one night. As a result,
the chanting is in the same dreary atmosphere as in cinema halls, where
it is inflicted on revellers who have gathered for something else.

Once
it began, however, as I said, it was an outstanding match and had me so
riveted that the ice cubes melted and diluted the good liquid in my
untouched glass.

The match was won by Bangalore, the work of a
superb raider called Ajay Thakur, who did most of the offensive work for
his team. He had a calm and lethal manner, picking up a point or two
every time he went over. Explaining his team’s win on Saturday, Thakur
said simply: “Hum sab 80-up the”. (We were each of us over 80 kilos). A
man to watch out for in this tournament.

Sunday’s match was
actually a close run thing and with 10 minutes to go, Pune were tied
30-30, mainly because of plenty of penalty points picked up in the first
half. But then some tactical play by Bangalore (explained lucidly by
commentator Suhail Chandhok, racing driver Karan’s brother) took the
match away.

You should give watching Pro Kabaddi a try. Though
some of the rules are recent inventions, and sometimes things are not
easy to understand, the game is never boring. I thought it might be,
when I saw Saturday’s matches, but Star appear to be cleaning up their
act and telecasting it the right away.

Rule of the day: When a team down to three men catches a raider, it wins two points instead of one.
…….


[ref. Wiki]  

Kabaddi is a contact sport based on wrestling originated from
very early (Tamil) Indian civilization. The word Kabaddi is derived from
the Tamil words Kai-pidi,which literally meaning “(let’s) Hold Hands.”




Kabaddi is popular throughout South Asia, and has also spread to Southeast Asia, Japan and Iran. It is the national game of Bangladesh where it is known as Hadudu. It is the state game of Tamil Nadu where it is said to be founded as Sadugudu, Andhra Pradesh,Punjab and Maharashtra in India. 

It is played by the British Army
for fun, to keep fit and as an enticement to recruit soldiers from the
British Asian community. The game is also played extensively in the
small town of Peebles
in the Scottish Borders, mainly in the local primary school playground,
where it is favored to more traditional childhood past-times such as ‘British bulldogs’ and ‘Kiss, Cuddle and Torture’.



India won World Kabaddi Cup in 2013 held at Guru Nanak Stadium, Ludhiana, (Punjab) India.


 
In the international team version of kabaddi, two teams of seven
members each occupy opposite halves of a field of 10 m × 13 m in case of
men and 8 m × 12 m in case of women.
Each has three supplementary players held in reserve. The game is
played with 20-minute halves and a five-minute halftime break during
which the teams exchange sides.




The rules of the game are as follows. The teams take turns sending a
“raider” into the other half. To win a point, the raider must take a
breath, run into the opposing half, tag one or more members of the
opposite team, then return to his home half before inhaling again. The raider will chant “kabaddi, kabaddi” with his exhaling breath to show the referee he has not inhaled.




The raider will be declared “out” and will not gain the point if he
inhales before returning to his side, or returns without touching an
opponent. The tagged defender(s) will be “out” if they do not succeed in catching the raider who tagged them. Wrestling the raider to the ground can prevent him escaping before he needs to inhale.




Defenders may not cross the centre line (the “lobby”) of the field
and the raider may not cross the boundary lines. However, there is one
bonus line which can grant extra points for the raider if he manages to
touch it and return successfully.




Players who are out are temporarily sent off the field. Each time a
player is out, the opposing team earns a point. A team scores a bonus of
two points (called a “lona”), if the entire opposing team is declared
out. At the end of the game, the team with the most points wins.


….
Matches are categorized based on age and weight. Six officials supervise a match: one referee, two umpires, a scorer and two assistant scorers.

…….

Link: http://scroll.in/article/671931/Pro-Kabaddi-is-actually-made-for-television

…..

regards

The Great Sindhi Exodus (Nakba??)

……When I rose to touch his feet and take his leave, he clapped me
firmly on my back. This clap on the back used to be his blessing…..‘Now you go and evacuate people from Sindh. You leave only after
evacuating everyone else. Make sure you don’t leave before that…..
I saw what appeared to have been flourishing
townlets before, complete with houses, temples, fields, now entirely
deserted, the whole of the population – evidently all Hindu – gone to
the last man.’
…..

….


We mean Sindhi Hindus of course, driven out by the irreversible logic of the two nation theory. 
….

….
If it is any solace, in two generations time-span they have occupied the first row of Indian business, politics, art….one giant Sindustrialist called* the late, lamented C-Sarkar as “apni dukan.” Also the fact that BJP has conquered Delhi today is because of the effort of these four (horse) men: AB Vajpayee, LK Advani, MM Bhagwat, and ND Modi. Such a transformation from rags to riches is nothing short of astonishing.
……………..
…Narayandas Malkani was then a 57-year-old Congress worker, who had
worked closely with Gandhi in Delhi’s Bhangi Colony.
He had narrowly
escaped being attacked during the Karachi pogrom. After this, he and
Govardhan Vazirani, secretary of the Congress, were deputed to fly to
Delhi to convince the Congress high command to evacuate Hindus from
Sindh. 

Narayandas Malkani recalls:

“On arrival, I met Gandhiji
and other senior leaders and I told them face to face about the Karachi
riots. I was there for a week, and I met everyone about two or three
times. Pandit Nehru told me to go meet Bajpayee, the secretary general
in the main office. I met him, and I briefed him about the conditions in
Sindh; I told him that the time had now come for the Hindus to be
evacuated from Sindh and resettled in India by the government. He
listened to everything attentively and then I took his leave.

“Finally
Vazirani and I came to the conclusion that our work was done and that
we could return to Karachi by air the next morning, that is 31 January.
Before returning, I went to meet Gandhiji for the fourth and last time,
to take his leave. It was about four in the evening, and he was sitting
outside Birla House in the sun, with a straw hat on his head.

“His
voice was not weak any longer, and his bare body shone, burnt in the
sun. When I rose to touch his feet and take his leave, he clapped me
firmly on my back. This clap on the back used to be his blessing. He
said, ‘Now you go and evacuate people from Sindh. You leave only after
evacuating everyone else. Make sure you don’t leave before that. Give Mr
Khuhro a message that I will come to Sindh and make efforts towards
securing peace in Sindh. But for that, he will have to take Mr Jinnah’s
permission and send me a telegram.’”

Malkani used to stay with
Gandhi’s son, Devdas, whenever he visited Delhi. Shortly after he
returned to Devdas Gandhi’s home, they were informed of Gandhi’s
assassination. A grieving and distraught Malkani flew back to Karachi
the next day, where he was astonished to find that staff from the Indian
High Commission had come to receive him in a car, and that he had been
appointed additional deputy high commissioner in Karachi, specifically
for the purpose of evacuating Hindus and Sikhs from Sindh. Malkani
supervised the work of evacuation in Karachi and Hyderabad, by turns,
and also toured other towns in Sindh, to assess the situation of the
Hindus there.

Special trains were run from Hyderabad and Mirpur
Khas to Pali and Marwar Junction in present day Rajasthan, where refugee
camps were set up. These trains went directly – and safely – from Sindh
to Rajasthan and had no need to traverse Punjab, with its history of
violence. Moreover, the organised evacuation of Hindu and Sikh refugees
from West Punjab by rail had been completed by the first week of
December 1947,and now the Indian government could divert its attention
and resources towards refugees from Sindh.

Owing to the
determined intervention of the Indian government, and the assistance of
Sri Prakasa, the Sindh government was obliged to facilitate the
relatively smooth departure of non-Muslims from the province. The Sindh
government announced that there would be no more searches of women among
the departing Hindus and Sikhs.

Also, a large number of Hindu
government employees now wanted to either resign or to go on leave. The
Sindh government relaxed its rules, permitting these employees to
withdraw advances from their provident fund, and granted them long
leave, thus enabling them to escort their families to India.

The Sindh government was keen to avoid congestion in Karachi of Hindu
emigrants from the interior of Sindh: by the end of January 1948 there
were about 40,000 Hindus in the city waiting for passage to India, and
many more in the hinterland. In order to control and slow down the
passage of Sindhi Hindus through Karachi, and so minimise chances of
renewed violence, [Chief Minister] Khuhro imposed a permit system on 15
February 1948, whereby no Hindu could leave his or her town of origin
without a permit issued by the local authorities. While this was meant
to preserve law and order, it only caused greater distress to the
Hindus, impatient to leave.

More often than not, local officials
demanded bribes in order to issue permits. Sri Prakasa [India’s High
Commissioner in Pakistan] recalls the flood of Sindhi Hindus who came to
his office, requesting permits to travel to India:

“In the
office of the High Commission, we had to encounter heavy crowds. It was
difficult to regulate them. Everyone wanted to get a permit as soon as
possible so that he could go away. Everyone wanted to reach India […]
as soon as possible.

“The High Commission, however, had to act
warily and to keep all practical considerations in view. We could give
permits at a time only to as many persons as could be provided with
trans-port. Even this tragic scene was not without its lighter side.

“One
day I was looking after the arrangements myself. A woman came up to me
and quietly told me that a particular young lady of her family was in an
advanced stage of pregnancy. The child may be born any day. In these
circumstances, would I think of giving priority to her? I did so; but
the very next day, a strange scene presented itself before me. I found
that all women suddenly found themselves in an advanced stage of
pregnancy!

“They came to know that the High Commissioner was
partial to women in that condition, and was willing to treat them with
particular consideration. They thus found a good opportunity of saying
that all of them were in the self-same condition. It was obviously
impossible for the High Commissioner to get them medically examined!

“I
had smilingly to tell them that I did not think it was possible that
all of them would suddenly find themselves in such a delicate condition,
and I was therefore compelled to give these permits in the ordinary
course without making any distinctions between one person and another.”
 

By
the middle of June 1948, 10,00,000 Hindus had been able to migrate to
India; 4,00,000 more remained in Sindh. In August 1949, there were
incidents of renewed communal violence in Shikarpur and Sukkur, giving
new impetus to the exodus. Evacuation continued for three whole years,
finally tapering off in 1951. By this time, the transit camp set up at
Karachi still had 644 evacuees waiting to leave, but Sindh was largely
emptied of its Hindus: It was estimated that a scant 150,000 to 200,000
remained in their home province.

Sri Prakasa tells us, ‘On my
tours in the interior, I saw what appeared to have been flourishing
townlets before, complete with houses, temples, fields, now entirely
deserted, the whole of the population – evidently all Hindu – gone to
the last man.’

Yet, it should be noted that the stream of Hindus
fleeing Sindh only thinned down to a trickle by 1951, and never dried up
entirely. There has been a continuous migration of Sindhi Hindus from
Pakistan to India from the 1950s to the present day, varying in
intensity over the decades.
……………
Here is the narrative of a Sindhi
Hindu’s departure in 1949, which depicts the large crowds still in the
process of migrating to India. Kirat Babani, the prominent Sindhi author
and journalist, was a young man of 25 in 1947, working with the
Communist Party in Karachi. He and his other Communist friends decided
not to migrate, but many of them were arrested in 1948. Babani was
jailed for 11 months and released on the condition that he would be
externed from Karachi.

Later, in 1949, he thought he would visit
his family, which had migrated to India, and then return to Sindh. When
he boarded the ship at the Keamari docks, government officials searched
his belongings extremely roughly, and then served him a legal notice of
exile from Pakistan. He recounts his departure from Sindh in his
autobiography:

“Evening has fallen as I sit on the empty steel
trunk. I have no idea when the ship weighed anchor and set sail towards
its destination. My belongings are still scattered around me, and there,
on the entire deck, people are scattered. Entire families, mostly from
villages in the interior of Sindh, have been thrown here.

“They
are from the poor and middle class, their dress and behaviour is Sindhi.
Some mothers also have suckling children with them, whom they are
nursing, covered with their dupattas, and with their backs to the men.
This transgression of custom must cause them mental agony. […]

As
night falls gradually, and as the ship starts to careen up and down and
sideways like a rocking horse, subjected to the blows of the forceful
waves of the deep sea, the condition of the travellers on deck begins to
worsen. Many begin to feel dizzy and their stomachs start to churn.
Many are retching, and some are actually vomiting. The crying and
wailing of the children has cast a pall of gloom everywhere.”

…….

Link (1) : http://scroll.in/article/671669/The-Making-of-Exile:-Sindhi-Hindus-and-the-Partition-of-India

……
 
* Mukesh Said, Haan Yaar, Ranjan, Congress To Ab Apni Dukaan Hai’.

Link (2): http://www.outlookindia.com/article/Mukesh-Said-Haan-Yaar-Ranjan-Congress-To-Ab-Apni-Dukaan-Hai/268088

…..

regards

Brown Pundits