S Anand

Outside the activist world not too many people know about S Anand, CEO of publishing house Navayana. We have covered him many times here at BP:


http://brownpundits.blogspot.in/2014/05/blog-post_3522.html

http://brownpundits.blogspot.in/2014/04/your-endorsement-of-modi-lose-faith-in.html

http://brownpundits.blogspot.in/2014/04/dravidas-against-dalits.html
………..

In Pali, the word “navayana” means “new vehicle”. Dr BR
Ambedkar used the word in 1956 to describe the branch of Buddhism that wouldn’t
be mired in the Hinayana-Mahayana divide, but would help dalits gain equality
in India.
 
It’s a fitting name for the publishing house that S Anand and
Ravikumar set up in 2003 because their Navayana, which won the British
Council-London Book Fair International Young Publisher
of the Year award in
2007, continues the good fight for a more equal and unprejudiced society. 
Navayana
publishes books that tackle caste and caste-based prejudice and in just a few
years, their titles have won praise from all over the world for being produced
beautifully and provocative. Go to their website and you’ll see bravos from
people like Noam Chomsky and Mohammed Hanif. 

In the first section of a two-part
interview, publisher S Anand talks about running an independent publishing
house at a time when big players are fretting about the future of publishing. 
When did you start Navayana and why?  
Navayana was started in November 2003 by
me and Ravikumar, an intellectual and activist in the civil rights movement in
Tamil Nadu and a bank employee back then. I was a journalist then and I worked
for Outlook. 
By 2006, Ravi became a member of a political party, Viduthalai
Chiruthaigal (Dalit Panthers’ Tamil version) and became an MLA;
and in 2007, I
turned to full-time publishing quitting my day job as journalist. Spurred by
winning the British Council-London Book Fair International Young Publisher of
the Year award in 2007, by when Navayana had done only 12 titles, I moved to
Delhi in May 2007. 
It took me a year to find my bearings in this megapolis. In
some senses, Navayana really took off as a serious venture only in 2008. In
2003, we had started Navayana on a whim – the need for Navayana was felt simply
because there were publishers engaging with environmental issues, ‘communalism’
(as the Hindu-Muslim question is called in India); there were independent
publishers engaging with Left issues, such as LeftWord; you had specialist
children’s publishers, women’s movements and feminist publishers, but you did
not have anybody in English language publishing saying that caste is an issue
that infects and inflects everything in India. So there was clearly what we identified
as a ‘gap’ and we decided to try and address this gap with an exclusive focus.
Publishing seems to be a shrinking business. 
Were you ever daunted by the task
of bringing out the titles that make up Navayana’s catalogue? 
In fact, one
finds that in trade and commercial publishing, risk-taking has drastically come
down. Most mainstream publishers want to do ‘safe’ titles that do not incur
financial, political or intellectual risks. The sad part, as the pioneering
American publisher of Pantheon and founder of The New Press, Andre Schiffrin,
says is that publishing was for the longest time not seen as a ‘business’ as
such. A collage of titles published by Navayana. A collage of titles published
by Navayana. Image courtesy: Navayana website People were happy with 4 percent
profits—what you got from a savings bank account. Suddenly with conglomerates
entering the market, with holdings companies treating books like any other
‘investment’, books came to be treated like FMCG products; expectations of
profit went up to an unreasonable 20-25 percent. 
A friend who returned from the
recent London Book Fair says the most interesting titles in the UK are being
done by small and medium-sized independents like Saqi, Serpent’s Tail, Comma
Press, etc. The same holds true for India where presses like Yoda, Blaft, and
Navayana have shown that you can do cutting edge books. Older players like
Seagull and Zubaan have fortified themselves. Seagull has in fact gone
seriously international; they have a Nobel laureate like Mo Yan in their list;
they have all of Mahashweta Devi. So all this gives me courage to be bold,
innovative and experimental at Navayana. But do not forget that the guesstimate
for per capita spending on books in India is an abysmal Rs 80 – per person per
year. Even if only 20 million of the 1.2 billion have the luxury of reading for
pleasure in India, that’s a huge market. And they don’t seem to be reading as
much as they ought to, the mind-numbing sales of the Chetan Bhagats and Amish
Tripathis notwithstanding. 
How involved are you as far as the commissioning
books is concerned? Are you also involved with the design and production of the
books? 
Well, I have to do all of that. Navayana works with very low overheads.
I have one assistant editor working with me and one full-time admin person. So
all the commissioning and selecting and handholding of authors and raising
finances has to be done by me. I respond to emails, handle orders, organize
launches, oversee my website, lobby for reviews etc etc. In most post-DTP small
presses, the publisher wears many hats. Since 2008, I have worked with an
excellent designer Akila Seshasayee, on all our covers, but yes I do get
involved with design. A project like Bhimayana was conceived of and curated by
me, and with such excellent artists as Durgabai Vyam and Subhash Vyam it mostly
designed itself. 
What has been the biggest challenge as far as Navayana is
concerned?
 
Money! And most small publishers would give you the same answer
likely. I do not seem to have a good head for the business end of things.
Bhimayana has been our only funded project, but otherwise it is quite hand to
mouth. Navayana survives primarily on the generosity of friends, though since
2010, after Slavoj Zizek’s first annual Navayana lecture, our market presence
matches the best. We do make sure all our titles are well reviewed. In terms of
profits, I doubt if even the bigger presses really make any profits with all
the heavy overheads they have. The real profit-earners in Indian publishing are
textbook publishers. Ratna Sagar’s turnover could well be more than
HarperCollins or Penguin’s, but the overall visibility of a Ratna Sagar will be
poor. What has been the most satisfying part of Navayana? The fact that one has
done a range of titles which no one else would have done. And that I get to
pursue my passion as an anti-caste junkie. 
Could you pick five titles from your
catalogue that you would categorise as “must-have”? 
 This is a tough
choice to make since I do not publish books that you ought not have on your shelf.
But still, since list-making is one of journalism’s many ways of simplifying
things, here we go: Bhimayana Ajay Navaria’s Unclaimed Terrain Anand
Teltumbde’s The Persistence of Caste, pegged to the Khairlanji carnage Namdeo
Dhasal’s A Current of Blood Srividya Natarajan and Aparajita Ninan’s A Gardener
in the Wasteland, a graphic adaptation of Jotiba Phule’s 1873 text, Gulamgiri.
I do feel bad leaving out Gogu Shyamla’s Father May be an Elephant…, Namdeo
Nimgade’s In the Tiger’s Shadow and Shashank Kela’s A Rogue and Peasant Slave.
Among the forthcoming titles you must look out for A Word With You, World, the
autobiography of Siddalingaiah, a Kannada poet and co-founder of the Dalit
Sangharsha Samiti. Out in July, it is a Chaplinesque work that will make you
laugh and cry. Then in 2014 we will have Jeremy Seabrook’s as yet untitled work
on the sweatshops of Bangladesh, a work that will tell you what’s so terribly
wrong with the Katherine Boo school of nonfiction that’s made to read like
fiction.

….

…….
regards

Ghazi Ilm-ud-Din Shaheed

Raza Rumi has an extensive history of blasphemy (see below) and anti-blasphemy activism in Pakistan (even as part of an unified India). Apparently it all started with the actions of one deeply faithful man-child, Ghazi Ilm-ud-Din Shaheed of Lahore, who was cited for his courage by the likes of Iqbal and Jinnah.

It shines light (again) on that famous comment which in our opinion crystallizes the Two Nation Theory: Hindus and Muslims can never co-exist….their heroes are our villains and vice versa

There are shrines and roads and squares all over Pakistan commemorating the memory of Ilm-ud-Din. But sad to say, the grave of Dr Abdus Salam has been defaced. The nobel laureate was also a proud son of Pakistan and he belongs to the Ahmadi tradition – the same Ahmadis, who as a group were in the forefront of the Pakistan movement. Pakistan has honored one son but not the other. Too bad.
………………………
“As Iqbal placed the body of Ilm Din into the grave, he tearfully
declared: “This uneducated young man has surpassed us, the educated
ones.”




The 1920’s in India witnessed the publishing of an inflammatory book
vilifying Prophet Muhammad (SAW) thereby adding fuel to the existing
Muslim/Hindu tensions.
The British Raj ruled India and the creation of
Pakistan was still a distant dream in the hearts of the Indian Muslims.

The Muslim population was understandably incensed and mass protests were
held. Prashaad Prataab had authored Rangeela Rasool (The Colourful
Prophet), under the pen name of Pandit Chamupati Lal. The word rangeela
means ‘colourful’ but can be understood in this context to mean
‘playboy’.
[Nauzbillah]


….

Rajpal was a Hindu book publisher from Lahore. He took the
responsibility of publishing the book in 1923 and pledged not to
disclose the author’s real name. Pressure from the Muslim community
resulted in the matter being taken to Session court Lahore which found
Raj Pal guilty and sentenced him.
 


Subsequently Rajpal appealed against
the decision of Session Court in the Lahore High court. The appeal was
heard by Judge Daleep Singh who gave leave to appeal on the grounds that
on the basis of criticism against the religious leaders, no matter how
immoral it is, is not covered by S.153 of the Indian Penal Code.
Thus
Rajpal could not be sentenced as law did not cover blasphemous criticism
against religion. The High Court decision was widely criticised and
protests were made against it by Muslims of India. Little did anyone
suspect that one young man’s course of action would bring about a
significant change in the Law, ensuring that Islam would be covered by
blasphemy laws.



Ilm Din was an illiterate teenager from Lahore. His father was a
carpenter. One day he was passing near Masjid (mosque) Wazir Khan. There
was a huge crowd shouting slogans against Rajpal. The speaker
thundered: “Oh Muslims! The devil Rajpal has sought to dishonour our
beloved Prophet Muhammed (S.A.W) by his filthy book!”



Ilm Din was deeply affected by this passionate speech and vowed to take
action. On 6th September 1929 Ilm Deen set out for the bazaar and
purchased a dagger for one rupee.
He hid the dagger in his pants and
waited opposite Rajpal’s Shop. Rajpal had not arrived yet. His flight
had arrived at Lahore airport and he proceeded to phone the police in
order to request them to provide him security. Ilm Deen did not know
what the publisher looked like. He asked a few passer-by’s as to
Rajpal’s whereabouts and said that he needed to discuss something with
him. Rajpal entered the shop without detection but soon after a man
alerted Ilm Din that Rajpal was inside. The young man entered the shop,
lunged forward and attacked him. He stabbed his dagger into the chest of
Rajpal with such force that his heart was ripped from his body. Rajpal
fell dead on the ground. Ilm Deen made no attempt to escape. Rajpal’s
employees grabbed him and shouted for help.



The police arrived at the scene and arrested Ilm Deen. He was kept in
Mianwali jail. The case went to court and Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali
Jinnah was his defence lawyer. Jinnah fought Ghazi Ilm Deen’s case on a
special request from Allama Iqbal.
Jinnah urged Ilm Din to enter a
plea of not guilty plea and to say that he had acted due to extreme
provocation.
The fact that Ilm Din was only 19 years old would have also
worked in his favour. Ilm Din refused to offer such a plea and insisted
that he was proud of his actions. This case was the only one that
Jinnah ever lost.
The Session Court awarded Ilm Din the death penalty. Against his wishes, the Muslims lodged an appeal, but it was rejected.




Ilm Din’s execution occurred on 31st October 1929. When asked if he
had any last requests, he simply requested that he be allowed to pray
two rak’at (units) nafl (voluntary) prayer, thus following the example
of Khubaib (RA) who also prayed 2 rak’ats nafl before the pagan Quraish
executed him.



As the noose was put around the neck of Ilm Din, he repeated before the huge crowd:
“O people! Bear witness that I killed Rajpal to defend our last
Prophet Muhammed S.A.W, and today they are going to hang me. I am
sacrificing my life whilst reciting the kalimah (shahadah – testimony of
faith).”



The young man was killed and the authorities buried him without any
Janazah (funeral) prayer being offered for him. Mass demonstrations
broke out and there the tension between the Hindu and Muslim communities
was palpable. 


The inhabitants of Lahore wanted Ilm Din’s body returned
in order to give him an Islamic janaza (funeral).
Two celebrated
activists — Dr. Muhammed Allama Iqbal and Mian Abdul Aziz — campaigned
to have the body of Ilm Din returned to Lahore for the Janaza prayer.
The British were worried that this would incite unrest. Only after
Allama Iqbal gave his assurance to the British that no riots would
erupt, was permission given.





When the body of Ilm Din was exhumed from its grave, it was found to
be the intact without any change whatsoever. The kaffan (shroud) had not
changed its colour. This occurred on 14th November 1929 — a full 15
days after the hanging. After a two-day journey, the body arrived in
Lahore. Muslims from the whole city and millions from adjoining areas
attended his funeral.
 

Ilmuddin’s father requested Allama Muhammad
Iqbal to lead the funeral prayer and this shivered Dr. Allama Iqbal who
replied that I am a sinful person not competent to do this job to lead
the funeral of such a matchless warrior. 200,000 Muslims attended the
funeral prayer which led by the Imam of masjid Wazeer Khan, Imam
Muhammed Shamsuddeen. Mawlana Zafar Ali Khan said ahead of the burial: “Alas! If only if I had managed to attain such a blessed status!”



Allama Iqbal carried the funeral bier along its final journey. As Iqbal
placed the body of Ilm Din into the grave, he tearfully declared: “This uneducated young man has surpassed us, the educated ones.”




The killing of Ilm Din had far-reaching repercussions. A provision
was added to the Penal Code, making insult to the religious beliefs of
any class an offense.
Allama Iqbal’s proposal of a separate Muslim
state in 1930 resulted in the creation of Pakistan in 1947. The Pakistan
Penal Code makes it a crime for anyone who “by words or visible
representation or by an imputation or insinuation, directly or
indirectly, defiled the name of the Prophet Muhammad”. 

In
1982, President Zia ul-Haq introduced Section 295B to the Pakistan
Penal Code punishing “defiling the Holy Qur’an” with life imprisonment.
In 1986, Section 295C was introduced, mandating the death penalty for
“use of derogatory remarks in respect of the Holy Prophet” in keeping
Islam’s hudood (prescribed punishments). 

Ilm Din’s legacy is still
visible across Pakistan, where parks, hospitals and roads carry his
name.

……………….

Human rights lawyer
Rashid Rehman was killed for defending a man accused of blasphemy [EPA]. The
recent murder of a brave human rights lawyer Rashid Rehman reminds us of the
society we have shaped. It is now an unregulated space where even defending the
rights of an accused is a crime. 
Rehman had made all the
threats, including those in the courtroom, public.  The local state authorities did next to
nothing to protect him or rein in the individuals and groups preaching violence.
It seems when it comes to religiously motivated violence the might of the
state disappears. Victims of blasphemy law are no longer fit for due process.
They need to be punished directly.
A few days after the murder of Rehman,
another accused of blasphemy was shot dead by a teenager in a police station
near Lahore.
Since the brutal murder
of Salmaan Taseer in January 2011, debates on the colonial blasphemy law have
disappeared from the public domain. Those who advocated against its misuse were
also silenced through litigation in courts by the right-wing lobbies that no
longer constitute the lunatic fringe. In fact, the idea of blasphemy as a
threat to Pakistan’s carefully constructed “Islamic” identity mixes
passion, politics and power. A state that quietly smiles at the success of its
project is now complicit in mob justice and even brutal killings such as the
one that took Rashid Rehman’s life.
Earlier in March, on the
eve of Hindu festival Holi, an allegation of blasphemy against a local Hindu led
to the attack on a community centre and a temple in the stronghold of liberal
PPP (Pakistan Peoples Party) Larkana in Southern Pakistan.
The scenes of
vandalisation in Sindh province, otherwise known as the land of Sufis and where
the largest number of the Hindu population lives, were chilling.
It is pointless to moan
the response of the state officials who are content with terming such issues
“sensitive” or in other words a no-go area carved in the public
imagination.
A report by Reuters states that March 2014 was the
“worst month for attacks on Hindus in 20 years with five temples attacked,
up from nine during the whole of 2013”.
Nearly a month ago, a
Lahore court awarded death sentence to another alleged blasphemer, Sawan Masih,
marking a new low in our legal and judicial system. A low income settlement in
Lahore – Joseph Colony – was attacked in 2013 and nearly a hundred homes were
torched. The mayhem was triggered by an ‘allegation’ of blasphemy. To give
credit where it is due the Punjab government promptly helped in rebuilding
these homes. However, its police and prosecution failed to nab those who were
involved in this kind of “collective punishment”. 
The ruling party even
failed to take cognizance of the reported involvement of its local leader from
the area. And the judicial system – trained in the curricula and discourse of
Islamisation and deeply afraid – meted out a tough sentence to another Christian.
The Punjab based
militant organisations according to reports maintain close surveillance of
Christian settlements. The results of this activism have been witnessed in
Gojra, Jospeh Colony and elsewhere. Collusion by political parties and
inability of law enforcement agencies have led to a state of confusion and
impunity.
Pakistan
has the unique distinction of abusing the controversial blasphemy laws and
according to a recent report (prior to Sawan’s sentence), 14 individuals were
on death row on blasphemy convictions and 19 convicts were serving life
sentences
There
are hundreds of others who have been arrested or charged with the crime. It is
not the execution of a sentence but the fear and mob justice that comes in the
wake of such charges. After Rehman’s murder, lawyers would think twice before
taking such a case. Judges would be afraid to deliver verdicts and the police –
already partisan – will further abandon its job.
After the sentencing of
Sawan Masih, a few parliamentarians raised this issue in the national assembly
but nothing changed. Outraged citizens protest, write op-eds in the English
press and few reckless types like me, who tried to raise these issues on
television, face bullets.
Currently, Pakistan’s
largest private TV network – GEO – is under attack for allegedly airing a
blasphemous morning show. The controversial content was a lapse of editorial
judgment but the charges have put thousands of workers’ lives at risk. The
channel that has been in a tug of war with Pakistan’s premier intelligence
agency – the ISI – has now been entangled in the ultimate crisis. It may mend
its relations with the state but charges of blasphemy will continue to risk its
staffers.
Pakistan has turned into
a society where even an allegation of blasphemy is enough to sentence and burn
people. In Sindh and Punjab mobs have burnt the accused reminding one of the
ugliest of practices in human history. The abuse of blasphemy law is nothing
but an issue of power and ideological supremacy by the fanatics in our society.
Ghazi Ilmudin Shaheed, who killed a Hindu writer for blasphemy
in the early twentieth century, is a national hero of Pakistan’s collective
memory.
It cannot be denied that the love and veneration for Prophet
Mohammad (pbuh) is a tenet of lived Islam across the Muslim world.  
However, in Pakistan’s
case, this is less of a religious obligation and more of a political project.
Implementing the blasphemy law with or without the due process is a means of
dealing with a pre-Islamic past, the colonial experience, and modernity.
Above all, it is a
direct result of a state project which has drummed Islamo-nationalism to build
widespread public support for “strategic” aims. The battle with
India is not about Kashmir or water but it is about believers vs infidels.
Similarly,
the engagement with the West can be managed by invoking the spectre of West
attempting to harm Islam and Muslims.
This is why a good
number of my countrymen view the debate on blasphemy law as “Western
agenda” and something that West sponsored “evil” NGOs propagate
to damage Islam and Pakistan.
 
Are we the only Muslim
country on earth? There are at least a billion Muslims living outside Pakistan
and we cannot assume the gatekeeping of Ummah. No one denies that the Western
aggression and misadventures haven’t helped either. But we are now trapped in
our own discourse, glued to an identity that values exclusion over pluralism.
The rise of such discriminatory discourses in Pakistan through publications,
media, militant groups – considered legitimate – have compounded our everyday
reality. Upholding human rights is now a sin punishable by death.
We do stand at an abyss
whether we like it or not.
In the short term,
Pakistan’s Parliament needs to change the investigative procedure of the
blasphemy law and institute safeguards against adverse police reporting. Most
importantly, it will need to protect the judges and lawyers who defend human
rights
.

…….
Link (1): http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/05/pakistan-blasphemy-law-2014523184543404502.html

Link (2): http://www.siasat.pk/forum/showthread.php?53028-The-Story-of-Ghazi-Ilm-Din-Shaheed
…….

regards

Arundhati Roy explains the Modi-plan

Not to worry, no muslims will be killed (any more) only the noble tribals who represent the real India will be sacrificed for the pleasure of the corporates (and Israel).

Now  that Pankaj Mishra and S Anand have spoken out (eloquently) about the Modi menace, can the grand lady representing all that is pure and beautiful about India…..the rivers and the fish which swim up 800km from the ocean, the paintings of Bhimbetka, the blue flowers of the Nilgiris, the Chinar trees planted by some Sufi.….remain silently on the sidelines?

Key points: “Now,
we have a democratically elected totalitarian government,”
she
continues. “Technically and legally, there is no party with enough seats
to constitute an opposition. But many of us have maintained for several
years that there never was a real opposition. The two main parties
agreed on most policies, and each had the skeleton of a mass pogrom
against a minority community
in its cupboard. So now, it’s all out in
the open. The system lies exposed.”

“What he [Modi] will be called upon to do is not to
attack Muslims, it will be to sort out what is going on in the forests,
to sweep out the resistance and hand over land to the mining and
infrastructure corporations,” explains Ms Roy. 
 

Ms Roy believes that India’s
chosen development model has a genocidal core to it.
“How have the other
‘developed’ countries progressed? Through wars and by colonising and
usurping the resources of other countries and societies,” she says.
“India has no option but to colonise itself.”

Also, the hyper Hindu-nationalist discourse which has been
given popular affirmation will allow those resisting ‘development’ to be
called anti-nationals.  

So is there no democracy in India then?
“It would be too sweeping to say that,” she retorts.
She opines that “some amount of democracy” in India is
reserved for its middle classes
alone and through that they are
co-opted by the state and become loyal consumers of the state narrative
of people’s resistances.

In Pakistan, apprehensions are rife about Narendra Modi’s
flamboyant success. But fervent Modi supporters in the Indian middle
classes prefer to place him in the economic governance arena. Dawn
recently talked to renowned Indian writer, Arundhati Roy, in Delhi to
explore what Modi’s rise means for India.

“The massive,
steeply climbing GDP of India dropped rather suddenly and millions of
middle-class people sitting in the aircraft, waiting for it to take off,
suddenly found it freezing in mid-air,” says Ms Roy. “Their
exhilaration turned to panic and then into anger. Modi and his party
have mopped up this anger.”

India was known for its
quasi-socialist economy before it unfettered its private sector in 1991.
India soon became global capital’s favourite hangout, sending its
economy on a high. The neo-liberal roller coaster ride, however, hit
snags. The Indian economy, after touching a peak of over 10pc growth in
2010, tapered down to below 5pc in the last three years. The Indian
corporate class blames this lapse solely on the ruling Congress party’s
‘policy paralysis’. Its ‘meek’ prime minister, Manmohan Singh, was now
identified as a hurdle. The aggressive Modi thus provided the ultimate
contrast.

“What he [Modi] will be called upon to do is not to
attack Muslims, it will be to sort out what is going on in the forests,
to sweep out the resistance and hand over land to the mining and
infrastructure corporations,” explains Ms Roy.
 

“The contracts are all
signed and the companies have been waiting for years. He has been chosen
as the man who does not blink in the face of bloodshed, not just Muslim
bloodshed but any bloodshed.”
India’s largest mining and energy
projects are in areas that are inhabited by its poorest tribal
population who are resisting the forcible takeover of their livelihood
resources. Maoist militants champion the cause of these adivasis and
have established virtual rule in many pockets.

“Bloodshed is
inherent to this model of development. There are already thousands of
people in jails,” she says. “But that is not enough any longer. The
resistance has to be crushed and eradicated. Big money now needs the man
who can walk the last mile. That is why big industry poured millions
into Modi’s election campaign.”

Ms Roy believes that India’s
chosen development model has a genocidal core to it. “How have the other
‘developed’ countries progressed? Through wars and by colonising and
usurping the resources of other countries and societies,” she says.
“India has no option but to colonise itself.”

India’s demographic
dynamics are such that even mundane projects, such as constructing a
road, displace thousands of people, never mind large dams and massive
mining projects. The country has a thriving civil society, labour unions
and polity that channel this resistance. The resistance frustrates
corporate ambitions. “They now want to militarise it and quell it
through military means,” she says. 

Ms Roy thinks that the quelling “does
not necessarily mean one has to massacre people, it can also be
achieved by putting them under siege,
starving them out, killing and
putting those who are seen to be ‘leaders’ or’ ‘instigators’ into
prison.” Also, the hyper Hindu-nationalist discourse which has been
given popular affirmation will allow those resisting ‘development’ to be
called anti-nationals.
She narrates the example of destitute small
farmers who had to abandon their old ways of subsistence and plug in to
the market economy.

In 2012 alone, around 14,000 hapless farmers
committed suicide in India. “These villages are completely resourceless,
barren and dry as dust. The people are mostly Dalits. There is no
politics there. They are pushed into the polling booths by power brokers
who have promised their overlords some votes,” she adds, citing her
recent visit to villages in Maharashtra that has the highest rate of
farmer suicides in India.

So is there no democracy in India then?
“It would be too sweeping to say that,” she retorts. “There is some
amount of democracy. But you also can’t deny that India has the largest
population of the poor in the world.
Then, there hasn’t been a single
day since independence when the state has not deployed the armed forces
to quash insurgencies within its boundaries. The number of people who
had been killed and tortured is incredible. It is a state that is
continuously at war with its people. If you look at what is happening in
places like Chhattisgarh or Odisha, it will be an insult to call it a
democracy.”

Ms Roy believes that elections have become a massive
corporate project and the media is owned and operated by the same
corporations too. She opines that “some amount of democracy” in India is
reserved for its middle classes alone and through that they are
co-opted by the state and become loyal consumers of the state narrative
of people’s resistances.

“The 2014 elections have thrown up some
strange conundrums,” she muses. “For eg, the BSP, Mayawati’s party,
which got the third largest vote share in the country, has won no seats.
The mathematics of elections are such that even if every Dalit in India
voted for her, she could have still not won a single seat.”

“Now,
we have a democratically elected totalitarian government,” she
continues. “Technically and legally, there is no party with enough seats
to constitute an opposition. But many of us have maintained for several
years that there never was a real opposition. The two main parties
agreed on most policies, and each had the skeleton of a mass pogrom
against a minority community in its cupboard. So now, it’s all out in
the open. The system lies exposed.”

India’s voters have given
their verdict. But the blunt question that Ms Roy raises remains
unanswered: where will India’s poor go?

……..
Link: http://www.dawn.com/news/1108001/now-we-have-a-democratically-elected-totalitarian-government-arundhati-roy
……..

regards

Mossad + (jewish controlled) Twitter = Victory!!!

Success has a hundred fathers. Here comes the claim that this was a Twitter election and it was the social media gap that was a big deal with youngsters who are standing with Modi (he has promised jobs for all of them). Twitter has now promised to harvest all the technology innovations developed for Indian elections and utilize them for the upcoming elections in Brazil, Indonesia and in the USA (see below).

Failures have a thousand excuses. There is a claim by Mohan Prakash a Congress bigwig, that Mossad won it for Modi. Mossad is (justifiably) feared for its effectiveness and ruthlessness only behind the ISI. Many wise people have noted the many points of similarity between Pakistan and Israel. It is no surprise that the two secret services are also gold-star organizations driven by a shared zeal to succeed.

It goes to the credit of extensive pajamas media-led investigation (30 sec on the internet) that BP is able to connect the two claims on behalf of Twitter and Mossad.  
The logic path is as follows: (1) In any American top-tier media organization you are guaranteed to find a Jewish name or two. Thus you have Issac “Biz” Stone, a founding father of Twitter (there are also unconfirmed rumors about Jack Dorsey, another Twitter FF; and finally, Jason Goldman, a heavy-weight alumnus of Twitter is also Jewish).  
(2) Whenever something goes “wrong” in any part of the world, especially in muslim lands or near-abouts, the Jews will be blamed (or at least the Jewish controlled media). 

Consider this representative sample from a Canadian-Muslim author (Rehmat’s world). There is an obligatory Arundhati Roy reference that will please her fans.

The Jewish-controlled mainstream media in the US, Canada, Britain and
Israel is overjoyed at the unexpected “landslide” victory of Narendra
Modi, known as Butcher of Gujrat state
.
In 2002, Modi, as chief minister of Gujrat state supervised the Hindu
fascists who murdered over 2000 Muslim men, women and children – and
burned Muslim houses, shops and mosques.




The Jewish media, as usual, has portrayed India as the largest
democracy while ignoring the fact that more than half of India’s
population lives below poverty line.
India is also world’s largest arms buyer.
India’s top arms suppliers are Russia followed by Israel and United
States. India-Israel cooperation includes also military exercises,
sharing of intelligence, and joint academic research programs. 




Modi lead anti-Muslim Hindutva racist parties against the ruling
Congress Party. Israeli leaders have maintained very close ties with
Hindu extremist group based on their common hatred toward Islam and
Muslims.
They have great expectations from Modi as the next prime
minister of India against Pakistan, Iran and Hamas. Last year, India’s
Union Home Minister, Sushilkumar Shinde, blamed India’s two major opposition parties, Bharatia Janata Party (BJP) and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)
for promoting “Hindu terrorism” via their training camps which teach
Hindus hatred toward Muslim, Christian and Sikh minorities. Mossad
agents have visited these camps as instructor.




And finally, the latest “words of wisdom” from
American Jewish writer and blogger Roger Tucker that could be a lesson
for the Indian voters in the future. 
“When the Palestinians do finally return, as
they surely will, I hope for their sake that they expel all the Jews – I
call it the Algerian option. Otherwise, it will be like South Africa,
with the despised Palestinians (except, of course, for the 1%
of quislings at the top) slaving away for their masters.  
We know now
that even a very small percentage of Jews would wind up running the show
and getting fat on the labor of others – just look at the US, the UK,
Canada, Australia, France et al.
Only the direct descendants of the
Palestinian Jews would be entitled to remain.
Listen to Indian author Arundhati Roy explaining why Israelis love Modi.
……………………………………………
Incidentally, Rehmat also has strong views on who are the Zionists in Pakistan (not Imran Khan) and also about the past India (as seen by many muslims) as well as the (Modified) future:

….Imran Khan is not a Zionist though he married Lord Goldsmith’s
daughter after she converted to Islam.
Lord Goldsmith is not related to
Rothschild family. However, as a Jewish billionaire, he financed a lot of
Israeli projects. The famous Pakistani Zionists were Sir Feroz Khan Noon and several Qadiani leaders like M.M. Ahmad.

….Al-Hind (India) was creation of 1000 year
Muslim rule. Before Indian sub-continent comprised of over 5000 Hindu
princely states which kept killing each other.
You should read Pandit
Nehru’s book on Indian history. Yes, everyone knows that like United States, Canada is also an
Israeli colony. That’s what Modi is going to accomplished during his
5-year Hindutva rule.

……………………
US
social networking company Twitter is planning to replicate parts of its
India election strategy across countries that go to polls this year,
after it emerged as a key tool for politicians and media companies
during the world’s largest democratic exercise.

In India,
Twitter Inc worked closely with politicians including the victor
Narendra Modi who used the platform for election campaigning, and also
partnered with mobile and media firms to distribute tweets online and
offline.

Now, with polling due in countries such as Brazil, Indonesia and the
United States later this year, the San Francisco-based company plans to
take its India lessons abroad to expand its foothold in the political
arena and increase its user base.

“The election more than any
other moment provides a nice microcosm of the value Twitter can add …
we are sharing widely the lessons of this Indian election around the
world,” said Rishi Jaitly, India market director at Twitter.

Last week, the company sent its top political strategist to Brazil to
explain the potential of the social network to senators, who are likely
to use Twitter’s six-second video app Vine for campaigning after it was
used by Indian politicians, the company said.

For the US
election, the company has started looking for partners to replicate
their “Tweet To Remember” feature used in India, which enables users to
add the voting date automatically to their mobile calendar using a
tweet.

Twitter widely emerged as a political tool first during
the 2012 US presidential elections, and then during the Arab Spring
uprisings in North Africa and the Middle East. Today, US president
Barack Obama has more than 43 million Twitter followers. In
India, Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) embraced the technology ahead
of rivals, collaborating with thousands of volunteers to spread the
Hindu nationalist leader’s message and counter criticism on the web.

It was the country’s first major Twitter election, and the novelty of
the technology gave an advantage to the politicians who adopted first –
especially the BJP, said Milan Vaishnav of Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace.

“The Indian experience will serve as a
model for other developing countries … In the US, the saturation of
the social media space by all parties may have a cancelling out effect,”
Vaishnav said.

Tech-savvy Modi, who now has 4.3 million Twitter followers, used the
platform relentlessly. He recently tweeted “selfies” and pictures with
his mother. On May 16 he set a Twitter India record with his victory
acknowledgement tweet.

His rivals lagged. A few years before
India’s mammoth election, Congress leader Shashi Tharoor asked Rahul
Gandhi, the lead campaign manager of the now ousted party, to join
Twitter. Gandhi declined.

With about two-thirds of India’s
population under 35, Modi targeted the young and smart by topping up
campaigning with social media, holograms and recorded voice calls.

The potential was, and still is, huge: India has the world’s third
largest internet user base of 239 million and more than 900 million
mobile connections. Many access web on their phones.

Twitter’s
reach was not restricted to its estimated 35 million India users, as
nearly 400 multilingual news channels that closely tracked politicians
on the website reached 153 million households, data from TAM Media
Research showed.

Modi, who is due to be sworn in on Monday, has
not let up his Twitter onslaught since the election and like other
global leaders will make the service a central part of his
communications arsenal.

Tharoor, for now, has again advised his
top leadership to adapt to social media platforms as a part of their
renewed strategy to improve communication. “There is no reason
why we should cede that space to the BJP. This is an area in which we
can be just as good,” said Tharoor, who has over 2 million Twitter
followers.

 

…….

Link (1): http://rehmat1.com/2014/05/17/modi-israels-favorite-wins-election-in-india/
.

Link (2): http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/social/Twitter-to-take-India-election-innovations-global/articleshow/35553707.cms
…………………

regards

An american visits Un-India (discovers Modindia)

We are not sure how Daniel Berman (is he Jewish??) figured out that BJP/NDA will win big by visiting the un-India belt of Kolkata and Chennai but that is just our cynical, suspicious selves.

Overall analysis is pretty much up to the mark. The new paradigm (as we see it) is: Modified Indians think that India is a sleeping developed country. Better not tell that to S Anand or else he will be back with a five hundred page essay (without commas, apostrophes and full stops).

Bottomline, Obama is not amused with a Modi victory (he counts Manmohan Singh as one of his five top global friends) but Modi will want to bond closely with the USA (really? we thought he was a China fan. Perhaps if he is smart enough he will play one against the other).

BTW Daniel’s reference to a major city with rolling blackouts must be Chennai (Kolkata has no industry to speak of and hence no power cuts either).  So by this limited measure at least Kolkata wins (also in IPL cricket where the Kolkata Knight Riders won massively due to a blitz by Yusuf Khan- 72 runs in 22 balls and presently ranking above Chennai Super Kings). Ho ho ho.
……..


I had the pleasure this winter of visiting India for three
weeks. Unlike many Americans who head to India in University or after, I did
not go with the intention of finding spiritual enlightenment, to walk India Gandhi’s
footsteps, or to learn more about development.
Nor will I attempt to claim any
special insight into the nature of India from my trip. I recognize that what I
saw in Kolkata(Calcutta) and Chennai(Madras) was only a small slice of India,
even if I was blessed to meet with diplomats and leading business figures
during the trip, as well as representatives of local newspapers.




Nonetheless, as someone interested in electoral politics
around the world, I could not help questioning those around about India’s
upcoming elections. Those elections, which pit the Indian National Congress
against the right-leaning Bharatiya Janata Party, and its leader Narandra Modi
have largely been portrayed in the west as a choice between two bad options.

Congress is portrayed as corrupt, while a large degree of focus is attached to
Modi’s role in the 2002 riots in Gujarat where over 2000 Muslims were killed in
retaliation for an attack on Hindu pilgrims that saw a number burned to death.
Modi was first Minister at the time, but has been cleared of responsibility bythe Indian Supreme Court.







Where one comes down in the coverage in the West tends to
come down to what you care about regarding India. If your interest is primarily
financial, as the Economist is, you’re likely to see the race as a trade-off
between better economic performance and human rights. If, on the other hand,
you are deeply invested in the idea of India as some sort of romantic image of
a spiritually-inclined indigenous culture that threw off colonial rule, as far
too many Western twenty-something’s who spend time in India before returning as
amateur analysts are, then you are likely to be horrified by Modi as he
represents a challenge to the Nehru paradigm that has dominated India since
1947.
In either case however, one is inclined to project those concerns onto
the Indian electorate, with the result that outside analysts expected a weak
Modi performance, perhaps with major gains for third forces.



I did not believe that was going to happen. When I was India
I saw a poor country. For all the talk of India as a rising superpower, I saw a
country with no traffic lights in major cities, one where it was impossible to
get back correct change at any establishment without haggling, and one where
one of the major cities in the country has rolling blackouts on a daily basis. This
is not to in anyway condemn India, only to point out that I failed to see much
spiritual or noble in streets that are dangerous to drive on, and where it
takes over an hour to go seven kilometers.







Most importantly, when I spoke to people I saw a country that
was tired of being poor. For all the discussion about BRICs and solidarity with
rising powers like Brazil to undermine Western dominance, I found that most of
those I met had no time for those flights of fancy that seem to
entertain Western political scientists and which have been a staple of Congress’
Foreign Policy ever since Nehru co-founded the non-aligned movement. Instead I
saw people who while admitting that Modi had drawbacks, saw him offering a different
narrative and wanted it. Almost everyone over 45 who I spoke with opposed him;
every single person I spoke with under 40 was voting for him.



Why? Because Modi this year offered a different narrative,
one that is far more attuned to Indian aspirations than the one it has been
cast in. Rather than seeing India as a leader of the developing world and a
peer of Brazil, Modi and the BJP portray it as a sleeping developed country, a
peer of European and Chinese civilization as one of the three great cultures of
world history, condemned by invasion, Arab in the 9th century, not
British in the 19th, to weakness and underdevelopment. 
For Modi and
the BJP, Congress by embracing non-alignment and its sequel in the BRIC concept
had condemned India to underdevelopment, using its affirmative action programs
to turn one of the most effective civil services in the world into one of the
world’s least efficient and corrupt.







For those observers then who see a decision to vote for Modi
as a clash between the good(economic development) and the bad(communalism and Hindu
nationalism) fail to grasp that in his case the two are intrinsically linked.
Modi is offering to make India great again, and if his promises are excessive
or likely to prove difficult to keep, they may well be the only way to justify necessary
reforms of the labor system, tariff 
controls, and monetary policy that are going to be painful for many.



Witnessing this in my conversations, I became convinced that
not only was Modi likely to win; he was likely to win big. Just as Obama
offered hope in 2008, the vote was a choice between more of the same and
potential for change. That may be the case in any election, but in this case
the “more of the same” was the state policies since 1947, and the “change” was
something entirely new.


..

Furthermore, his opponents in the Congress party blundered in making the
campaign about Modi rather than presenting any form of positive vision.
This meant that while the BJP ran a campaign promising reform and
economic growth, Congress talked endlessly about the 2002 riots. 
The
mistake here was not that the riots were an asset to Modi; on the
contrary, they were a liability. It was rather that they were less
important to many voters than pocketbook issues, and Congress, by
attacking Modi personally, failed to engage or provide a competing
narrative to his policies. As a consequence, Modi was allowed to promote
the narrative of his economic wizardry unchallenged, and in a choice
between fear for minority rights and a desire for economic growth and
national success, the voters are likely to chose the latter.







Exit polls so far show that the BJP’s performance likely
exceeded all expectations, with the party winning anywhere from 240 seats to
more than 280 in the Lok Sabha out of 545. We will find out the truth tomorrow
when official results are announced.







What will this victory mean for the United States? Currently
Modi is denied entry into America, a procedural decision of a Bush Administration
which at the time was trying to build support in the Islamic world, and one undoubtedly
continued by the Obama administration out of sentiment; Obama named incumbent Indian PM Singh as one of his five closest friends among world leaders.
Nonetheless, if Obama may dislike a Modi victory, the feelings are not
reciprocated. The BJP is pro-American and Pro-Western because it sees India fundamentally
as Western; it sees America, Europe and Japan as its peers, not Iran, South
Africa or Brazil. The BJP has had a table set up at every Republican National
Convention for a decade, and has bought space at the Conservative Political
Action Conference. A BJP ruled India is a potential ally of America in a way
and manner a Congress-ruled India can never be.




That requires Obama to let it. By instinct the very definition of a man
too broadminded to take his own side in quarrel, Obama has always had
difficulty with Nationalists, whether they be Putin or Modi. He seems to
believe everyone should be as broadminded as him. Yet beyond that he
has embraced an Asian pivot, and recognize the need to contain China,
and hence the need for good relations with India.

 ……
Link: http://www.therestlessrealist.com/2014/05/pre-result-thoughts-on-indian-elections.html
……

regards

Kashmiri students expelled from Meerut

First charged with sedition, now expelled from college. This will create even more bad feelings, in our opinion, young people must be allowed to have their say, else they may go down the path of violence. Post 2014, India and Pakistan must have a public plan for Kashmir, put things down in pen and paper, and reduce tensions and improve commerce. Enough is enough.
……….
10 Kashmiri students caught in a row over cheering for the Pakistani
cricket team have been expelled by a private university here after they
were found guilty of misconduct and damaging property while the
suspension of 57 other Kashmiri students was revoked.




Over two months after a controversy broke out over Swami Vivekanand
Subharti University taking action against students for allegedly
cheering for the Pakistani team, a disciplinary committee set up by the
university found ten students guilty of misconduct and damaging
university property, Vice- Chancellor Prof Manzoor Ahmed said here
today.



However, the committee revoked the suspension of 57 other students.


“The 10 students are writing their exams now. Once exams get over, they will be sent back home,” he told PTI, adding after their exams are over, they will be issued migration certificates.


67 Kashmiri students of the SVSU were suspended after they had allegedly
distributed sweets at the university hostel and cheered for the
Pakistani cricket team’s victory in a cricket match with India on March
2.


….

The university authorities had set up a disciplinary committee to probe the incident.


The city police even slapped sedition charges on students which was
later withdrawn following widespread criticism, including from Jammu and
Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah.


The local police is also probing the matter and they have recorded
statements of the university administration and committee members.

………
Link: http://news.outlookindia.com/printitem.aspx?841687
……

regards

Herat

The long war continues with proxies in the lead. There were bombings yesterday in Xinjiang as well. The islamists are ambitious but they may be making a big mistake in provoking China. However Chinese Kashmir is much more vulnerable to civilian attacks due to the Chicom policy of settling Hans in Xinjiang (to the point where Muslims have become a minority).
….
I’m a bit surprised that the explosion that killed dozens of people at an open-air market in the city of Urumqi in China’s Xinjiang
province yesterday hasn’t gotten more international notice…..But I suspect it’s also because these incidents are becoming
depressingly commonplace. Today’s explosion follows recent deadly
attacks on train stations in Guangzhou, Urumqi, and Kunming, all of them blamed on Uighur extremists from Xinjiang.
 

Today’s attack, however, is of another order of magnitude more
serious. With at least 30 dead, it may be China’s most serious terrorist
attack in years,
and the use of explosives indicates an escalation in
tactics over the other recent attacks, most of which were mass
stabbings. The mysterious car attack on Tiananmen Square, which took
place while I was in Beijing last October, would have been a substantially more serious event if the perpetrators had used the tactics seen today. 


A Xinhua article this month also highlighted the fact
that “Separatists appear to be shifting their focus from symbols of the
government – such as public security stations and police vehicles – to
random, ordinary civilians, and operating in areas outside Xinjiang.”


After the last attack in Urumqi, President Xi Jinping promised a “strike first” strategy
against separatists in Xinjiang, where Uighur Muslims have longed
agitated for independence and claimed discrimination by the authorities.


But with attacks expanding in both geographical scope and severity,
it’s becoming increasingly clear that Beijing’s default strategy of
cracking down hard on Xinjiang isn’t working.

….

The Indian Consulate in Afghanistan’s
Herat province was today attacked by heavily armed gunmen, who were also
carrying rocket-propelled grenades, top Indian officials said, adding
that everyone was safe.


“India’s Consulate in Herat, Afghanistan attacked. Brave ITBP
(Indo-Tibetan Border Police) personnel and Afghan soldiers rebut
attackers. All are safe,” said a spokesperson in the Ministry of
External Affairs in New Delhi.

Three gunmen were killed, one by the ITBP (Indo-Tibetan Border
Police) and two by the Afghan Police, out of four attackers who struck
the Consulate which houses two buildings, Indian Ambassador to
Afghanistan Amar Sinha said.



In a pre-dawn assault, the gunmen attacked the building which houses the
residence of the Consulate General, Sinha said, adding that there were
nine Indians in the mission apart from local Afghans.



One attacker was killed while climbing the wall to enter the premises of the consulate, Sinha said.
“India-Afghanistan officials (were) in touch on attack on India’s
Consulate in Herat. Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh (was) monitoring
(the) situation,” the official said.



Afghan police officials said that three gunmen armed with machine guns
and rocket-propelled grenades opened fire on the consulate early this
morning from a nearby home. The police killed two of them, though one
continued to fire on security forces.


No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.


….

India has invested in some major infrastructure projects in Afghanistan
like Salma Hydroelectric Dam in Herat province and the Afghan Parliament
building in Kabul.
India’s development assistance programme for Afghanistan currently
stands at USD 2 billion, making it the leading donor nation among all
regional countries.


….

Afghanistan has experienced a rise in Taliban attacks as foreign troops
plan to withdraw from the war-torn country by the end of the year.



In August last year, a failed bombing on the Indian Consulate in
Jalalabad city near the border with Pakistan killed nine people,
including six children. No Indian officials were hurt.


The Indian Embassy in Kabul was attacked twice in 2008 and 2009 that left 75 people dead.

….

Link (1): http://news.outlookindia.com/printitem.aspx?841659

Link (2): http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_world_/2014/05/22/urumqi_explosions_china_has_a_real_terrorism_problem_now.html
….

regards

Nawaz Sharif is coming to Delhi

Maryam Nawaz Sharif ‏@MaryamNSharif I personally think cordial relations with new Indian
govt should be cultivated. Will help remove psychological barriers, fear &
misgivings. 

If anyone can make miracles happen it will be MNS for sure
…….
She has the face of a movie star, political savvy of Benazir Bhutto and
a rising role model for the nation’s youth as “abba,” Prime Minister
Nawas Sharif, reposes growing trust in her abilities.
Meet Maryam Nawaz Sharif, 40, the new political star on Pakistan’s
political firmament — twitter-savvy, yet traditional, and certainly
among the most arresting faces in South Asian dynastic politics.



..
Last month, the Cambride-doctoral-aspirant daughter of Pakistan prime
minister Sharif — notice how Maryam retains her maiden name — was
named chairperson of the PM Youth Programme, an outreach of the
six-month-old Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) regime.





Within 15 days of her investiture, Ms. Sharif has been tasked to
spearhead the most ambitious Youth Loan Scheme in Pakistan’s history.
She’ll work pro bono and ensure bankers and civil servants,
one-and-a-half times her age, dispense loans worth Pakistani Rs.100
billion (Nearly $9.5 billion) in the next seven months to some 100,000
Pakistani entrepreneurs, 50 percent being women.




Ms. Sharif’s presence has ensured that the prime minister himself sat
with the team for over 60 hours and promised zero-tolerance to political
jockeying, those associated with the programme told this IANS columnist
during a visit here. Fifty-five model business plans have now been
posted to guide the applicants.



….
Hereafter, monthly ballots will decide who gets the first tranche of
loans. Those left out – but whose proposals matched the criteria
otherwise – will flow into the next month’s ballot. The loans entail a
service charge of eight percent. Banks will subsidize the remaining
seven percent.



….
A record 2.1 million application forms have been downloaded over just six days.



Such numbers are both a challenge and an opportunity for the elegant
Lahore-born known to relax to the music of Rahat Fateh Ali. If she can
pull off the loans without her bankers courting a scandal, schemes on
micro businesses, skill development, fee reimbursement, and laptop
computers will be the other components of the Youth Programme. “We’re happy, so long as the money comes back,” the chairman of a top Pakistani Bank told this IANS columnist informally.

An alumna of the Convent of Jesus and Mary in Lahore, Ms. Sharif is now
a direct counterweight for the youth constituency coveted by cricketer
and Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf leader Imran Khan.




Khan leads, say on twitter, with over 800,000 follows, but Ms. Sharif
is not doing too badly at 200,000 already. It’s a medium she used
extensively to connect with new-age Pakistan during the election
campaign that culminated in May last. Evidence? Ms. Sharif has 26,000
tweets under her belt, nearly 15 times more than the more-reticent Khan.




For the record, Fatima Bhutto, of the Bhutto family, is marginally
ahead at 238,000, though Bilawal, the official political heir of slain
prime minister Benazir Bhutto, languishes at 98,000.




The Sharif clan isn’t without internecine claims, though. While Nawaz
Sharif’s two sons, Hussain and Hassan, haven’t shown a direct interest
in politics so far, his brother Shahbaz, who is the ruling party’s No.2
and chief minister of Punjab, has a talented son, Hamza, 39, who is
already a member of the National Assembly.




Beyond a famous maiden surname, Ms. Sharif’s rapid climb is due to tact
and communication. A query on whether the clause of a “guarantor” for
the grant of money can be replaced by “property papers” evoked an
immediate response triggering dozens of “likes” and reteets.




So do hundreds of questions even on specific project ideas. Result? The
Pakistani visual media, not just state-owned PTV, finds Ms. Sharif’s
public engagements a manna for their ratings.




Her tact was in evidence when Mr. Sharif threw out her husband, one Capt. Mohd. Safdar, from PML-N last year. “I’m glad that my father preferred justice and equity over familial
relations. This is an unexampled step, which negated the notion that
PMLN is a family party or patronises favouritism. No one is above law.
Justice & fairness must prevail. PMLN stands for rule of law,” Ms.
Sharif said.

But not before tweeting a soothing message on her husband. “I am also
glad that Safdar has taken it positively and vows to abide by party
rules and regulations. Thankfully, we as a family keep politics and
family matters separate,” she posted.




“Maryam is sincere, controversy-free and a role model,” says Majyd Aziz
Balagamwala, a Pakistani industry senior in Sindh, who steered the
Benzir Bhutto Shaheed Youth Development Programme that trained 200,000
marginalized youth. “She deserves to be groomed for higher responsibilities.”

………Pakistan
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif will be attending Narendra Modi’s
swearing-in ceremony here on May 26, Pak government sources said on
Saturday. Pakistan PM House spokesperson confirmed that Sharif will be visiting New Delhi following Modi’s invite.

The two leaders will hold a bilateral meeting on May 27, said the
Pakistan prime minister’s office. Pakistan foreign minister Sartaz Aziz
would accompany Sharif during the visit.

The Pakistani premier’s attendance will be a first in the history of the nuclear-armed neighbour countries.

Sharif’s decision comes after days of speculations following New
Delhi’s invite. ​ However, Tariq Azeem, advisor the Pak PM told Times
Now: “Don’t expect discussions on any big issues.”

Friday’s pre-dawn attack on the Indian consulate by Taliban in Herat in
western Afghanistan, just three days before Narendra Modi’s swearing
in, underscored the extremely tough task for Modi as he opens up a new
channel of communication with the Nawaz Sharif government in Pakistan. The attack came just days after Modi invited all Saarc leaders, including Sharif. ​

Sharif had telephoned Modi to congratulate him on his party’s election
victory and invited him to visit Pakistan after assuming office.

Other key Saarc leaders, Sri Lankan President President Mahinda
Rajapaksa, Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, Bhutan Prime Minister
Tshering Tobgay, Nepal Prime Minister Sushil Koirala and Maldivian
President Abdulla Yameen Abdul Gayoom have confirmed that they will
attend the ceremony.

……..
regards 

!!!!!!

Yes, we are also sad (and a bit stunned) at the unexpected turn of (political) fortunes but this is how unhinged the (upper-caste) warriors of the left have become.  

Dear Anand, with all due respect, there will be no loss of dignity for the Niyamgiri tribal folks if you play by proper Queen’s English rules (American English is of course evil). It will be a brave man who can even comprehend your prose (this is probably intentional) and a braver one who can put up a defense of any sorts in response. Requesting the good doctor to step forward please.

Really, it all seems like an epic caricature nightmare. If you can string together words like Fukushima, Koodankulam, Ambedkar, Manto, Bhagat Singh, Sanatan Dharma, Surpanakha (Lakshman cut off her nose in Ramayana)…. in random sequence then you too can become a folk hero.

This is the key (we hate to say paragraph) section and the key grievance: you neo-Hindus you fools, you dupes of the manuvadis….
………………
whereas we have you, a
chaiwallah, claiming to be a Modh-Ghanchi from Gujarat, and it appears
there are some uses for your caste that the Knickers of Nagpur have,
just as the Brahmins of yore had for a Yadava, cowherd,and made him
chant ominous verses to justify birth-based inequality as a
prerequisite to the balance of universe,…..,
and today they
need you to have a chat with us over a cup of human blood, and, to
cover this barbarity, your friends have stitched you a garment called
democracy which is actually a janeu fashioned by the Brahmin tailors of
Nagpur.

…………………..
Tea-cup and cup of blood: the word play is done nicely. Modi is truly from the Ghanchi caste, and it was his DAD who was a chai-wallah, Modi used to help his dad by serving customers and washing dishes.

Gopal Krishna Gandhi gave the best possible response to these open expressions of bigotry:

When some spoke rashly and derisively of your having been a “chaiwala,” I felt sick to my stomach. What a wonderful thing it is, I said to myself, that one who has made and served chai for a living should be able to head the government of India. Far better bearing a pyala to many than being a chamcha to one. 

If such a comment was made against a Dalit, it would qualify for a non-bailable warrant under the SC/ST atrocities act. We are sympathetic to demands of free speech but here is the thing: why lower yourself by abusing his background? Is that really your best shot? This is how you will achieve paradise on earth??

And yes, if you dont like the “garment of democracy,” then why not suggest a better “living” alternative: North Korea, Iran, Cuba, Syria, take your pick. 

The charm of a democracy, even a deeply flawed one (such as India), lies in the claim that the people at the bottom have at least a fighting chance. Just the other day we had Nitish Kumar step down as Chief Minister of Bihar. The new CM Jitan Ram Majhi is a mahadalit. People who know these things (this includes you) know that maha-dalits have been abused by all other castes, including higher-caste dalits. While one swallow does not make a summer, it is indeed wonderful that within a few decades of independence, democracy has achieved this memorable milestone in a backward place like Bihar. And we will not stop here, we will continue to fight on behalf of all our fellow citizens.

……
what you claim as
your history basically begins with the history of caste and the history
of inequality in this part of the world

……..
Are you sure that everything was very equal and fair in the Bhimbetka caves? People were sitting around the fire, drawing pictures, and singing Kumbaya, right?

We know inequality is a high crime and India suffers from this deeply. You can try to purge the concept of caste from your society (an admirable goal in and of itself), it is still likely that inequality will not change.

The Islamic Republic of Pakistan is a good example, right next door. Islam is without question the most progressive religion in the context of caste, every believer (and non-believer) is the same in front of Allah. So how do you explain the inequality that persists in that society? How do you explain Asia Bibi – who is in jail because some muslim ladies took offense because she offered them water it looks like a case of untouchability (the blasphemy was a bonus). If the most radical social engineering (as promised by Islam) cant help cure social divisions then what hope do we have for humanity?

Then you have the Maoists, another progressive band of brothers. The citation below is from Aakar Patel in Outlook (April 30, 2012). Not a single woman and only one tribal occupying the high table of the Maoist Central Committee. Why this inequality- are tribals not well grounded enough to speak for themselves?

The Maoist central committee members are: V. Subramaniam, A. Hargopal,
P.S. Mukherjee, M.R. Reddy, V.K. Arya, N.K. Rao, Kobad Gandhy, S. Singh,
N. Sanyal, P. Mishra, A. Bagchi, P. Bose, K. Sudarshan, A. Yadav,
Ramakrishna, B.P. Singh, M. Venugopal, Misir Besra and M.L. Rao
‘Ganapathy’.
This is a list of caste Hindus and one Parsi. Of these 19,
only one—Besra—is a tribal.

…………….
In the history of earth which is close to five billion years, in which
the lineage of humans spans just five million years, what you claim as
your history basically begins with the history of caste and the history
of inequality in this part of the world,
and this is but a few
thousand years, in effect a speck in the gyre of time, and your version
of the history of this speck is just one speck among many billion
such, a speck that will be blown away by a change in the direction of
the breeze, a speck that is not even aware of the gyre it is part of…..



…..the gyre that has no beginning nor end, a gyre that knows that all its
futures are but a repetition of all its pasts, a repetition of
tragedies and farces, and you are a sad speck that does not know any of
this, a speck unaware of its own inconsequentiality, a speck that
thinks it is the world, a speck that thinks the world of itself, a
speck that has no sense of the larger universe it is part of, for your
history begins with the idea of a temple for a fabled god at a certain
place, a god who waged wars on the autochthonous people of this land,
helped deface a woman, beheaded a man who sought knowledge, a god who
defeated a valiant king by hiding behind a tree, who scorched his
beloved born of the earth in the fire of doubt,
your history begins and ends with the idea of a temple for such a
hollow god, your history that claims to be sanatan, timeless, is bound
by a paltry three, okay four, thousand years; you are an unending
nightmare in the apnoea of time’s sleep, you are a moment when time
holds its breath, and you mistake this to be a moment when time has
ceased to breathe….



…..but by the time time releases its breath, you will be
hurled into the black hole of timelessness, a hole of infinite density
where light itself becomes trapped and all objects become invisible,
for, after all, as Berger suggests, what we come to believe as time is a
field magnetised by eternity, and your speck is a temporality with
defeat written all over it, you are your defeat, please do not think of
yourself as a victor, your victory is your defeat;
you likely think of
this as an event, a historic event, but in the sweep of a few billion
years, what you represent is a moment that will fade even before we
begin to articulate the moment, for what you really seek to write on
the wall of time amounts to a scratch, a desecration, for these are
walls that carry traces of life……



…..led more than a million years ago by
the people of a place we today call Bhimbetka, with scenes in ochre and
white done some thirty thousand years ago by our forebears who began
lining the dots, a time when we ate the animal we prayed to, wore it as
cloth and also painted it; do rewrite all the history textbooks you
want to rewrite, raise the ugliest statue for your Iron Man, but these
will in no way pose a challenge to the place a few pot-shreds from
Mesopotamia and Arikamedu will have in history,
your script of animus
will be so easy to decipher unlike the signs left behind in Harappa,or
the Brahmi of Tamilakam……



……as for what you and your admirers call
development, nothing you have done can match what the people of
Mohenjo-Daro did to deal with their piss and shit, because you believe
that some humans are meant to carry the shit of other humans,
you think
it’s a divine calling; to realise how small you and your history are,
all you need to do is just see yourself in the backdrop of Qomolungma
and the Himalayas,
and these, let me tell you, are the youngest of
mountain ranges in the world, they were here long before your violent
gods, before caste, before the first ever jacarandas bloomed in Kumaon,
these Himalayas have emerged on this earth only as recently as sixty
million years ago…..



….and so much has happened before them and after them,
and they are all so indifferent to you, as are the poppies that bloom
in a range of reds this May in Satholi; it will soon become evident
that you are the beginning of the best imagination people born in this
crevice of time are, or will soon be, capable of; your absolute lack of
imagination will stir the best in us, the best poetry, the finest art,
the boldest theatre, the longest sentences, the most powerful songs, the longest taans to please Mallikarjun Mansur, the most haunting cinema, the finest fiction
that will crush you,
all these will be wrought now…..



…..each of us will
defeat you by being incomprehensible to you, for to be incomprehensible
to you all we need to do is speak the language of love, sing the
history of love, and you will not understand a syllable or a note, and
when we collect every syllable of love and compassion uttered in human
history your hoarse roar of hatred will be drowned out, we will defy
you by singing songs that have no beginning nor end, and by writing
lines that you will never comprehend, and, thus enraged, when you try
to cap these imaginations, try to ban our dreams, try to throw our
bodies into jail, our spirits will soar and make love, break every
taboo and breed in numbers your census-takers won’t be able to keep
pace with…..



….you will cause the spawning of a million Kabirs, a million Mantos, a million Ambedkars, a million Iqbals, Savitribais, Birsas,
Meeras, Bhagat Singhs, Valluvars, Ghalibs, Sido and Kanho Murmus,
and as One less hope/ becomes one more song we
will defeat you with Akhmatova and Pessoa, Iyothee Thass and
Jibanananda Das, Nainsukh and Malcolm X, Jangarh Shyam and Gramsci,
Namdeo Dhasal and Lal Ded, Buddha and Gaddar, Marx and Lal Singh Dil,
ah, yes, Dil, another chaiwallah, a teashop vendor, a Chamar from
Samrala, who held the most mischievous smile between his lips that also
held chain-smoked joints, Dil, who wrote, Chop off every tongue if you can/ But the words would have still been uttered,
a poet who died living the revolution for himself and dreaming of it
for others, a man who knew it was the same sun that warmed the Jat
households that also kissed the Chamar huts……..



…….whereas we have you, a
chaiwallah, claiming to be a Modh-Ghanchi from Gujarat, and it appears
there are some uses for your caste that the Knickers of Nagpur have,
just as the Brahmins of yore had for a Yadava, cowherd,and made him
chant ominous verses to justify birth-based inequality as a
prerequisite to the balance of universe, and justify the recourse to
mass murder over a property dispute between cousins, the charioteer who
plotted the killing of a warrior who was fixing his chariot wheel, a
god who killed a great archer by hurling a rock at him,
and today they
need you to have a chat with us over a cup of human blood, and, to
cover this barbarity, your friends have stitched you a garment called
democracy which is actually a janeu fashioned by the Brahmin tailors of
Nagpur.



They say you won a majority with a huge number of votes, they use words like magic with
a total lack of imagination that might well make you believe you can
write poetry, but let me tell you this to your face, you do not have
the vote of any of the rivers that you may well interlink, not even the
Narmada and the Ganga, you do not have the vote of the forests, the
oaks, deodhars and pines of Kumaon, you do not have the vote of the
kurinji flowers that once every twelve summers, for millions of years,

have turned a section of the Western Ghats gregariously blue, giving
the Nilgiri  Hills its name……



…..you do not have the mandate of the urbanised langurs of
Jodhpur who wear no purple ink on their index fingers but whose
tongues are purplish black after gorging on jamuns, you do not have the
vote of the sparrows that have learned to survive by enclosing
themselves in the Bangalore airport and by feeding off the leftovers in
the restaurant, sparrows that have forgotten what a tree looks like,
you do not have the vote of thousands of tulsi plants the Brahmins grow
in their backyards, terraces and balconies, you do not have the votes
of the cows of India nor of its buffaloes, you do not even have the
vote of the lions of Gir in Gujarat, and the hilsa, that crazy fish
which travels up to eight hundred miles to spawn at the place of its
birth in freshwater did not vote for you….



……you do not have the vote of
the hills of Niyamgiri nor of the corals being ripped apart along the
monstrous reactors in Koodankulam,
you do not have the vote of the
thousands of cockroaches that hide in the wet corners of parliament and
plan to unleash terror, just as the vote of the millions of acorns it
takes to make for the varieties of oaks in the foothills of Himalayas
eludes you; the reserves of coal being hollowed out of Jharia’s earth,
the mines of uranium that have depleted Jaduguda, the radioactive
thorium glistening on the beach-sands of Kerala,
none of them even
knows of your existence…..



…..you do not have the vote of the un-censused
population of the harsinghars that makes Delhi’s pollution bearable
every winter, you do not have the vote of the dogs or the cats, you do
not have the peacocks behind you nor do you have the snakes, you do not
have the vote of the olive ridley turtles, bloody infiltrators that
sneak into this country through the eastern coast every winter, nor of
the Siberian cranes, harbingers of crossborder militancy, and the
rhinos of Kaziranga surely resent you for attributing their poaching to
some devious communal scheming, and you undoubtedly do not have the
vote of the carnivorous red ants of Bastar, and you do not have the
vote of the most ancient chinar in Chattergam, planted by some Sufi,
nor the vote of the raja mirchis of Kohima, you do not have the vote of
the stars, you do not have the vote of the constellations, you do not
have the vote of the milky way, you do not have the vote of the waning
moon, you do not have the vote of the sun that will rise unfailingly,
and, you do not have my vote.



So please run your minority government for five years, show us your
baddest face, and time which will outlive all time will say it has seen
worse; launch a pincer attack, sink one set of claws into Kashmir and
wage a low-intensity war with the Pakis for four years, and at the same
time, sink another set of claws into Dandakaranya and flush out the
Adivasis like rats, the corporates who sponsored you will fund these
wars, create crisis after crisis for the Muslims, Dalits, the poor, the
Adivasis….



…..criminalise all love, fight internal and external enemies,
and in the fifth year launch a few full-scale wars, take us to the edge
of a nuclear disaster and starvation, watch the southern tip of the
subcontinent melt as a tsunami or a quake does to Koodankulam what it
did to Fukushima, then ride back to power sheerly on the strength of
the number of people you have caused to disappear,
and stretch yourself
for another three years, then maybe press the emergency button, by
when, like any speck of dirt you will be sucked into the widening gyre
that keeps turning and turning.

………………
Link: http://www.outlookindia.com/printarticle.aspx?290785
…………

regards

Mother Ganga can gift you votes (and water)

She has made you the tallest man in the land, and she needs to be nutured (back to good health) now so that the votes (and the water) keep flowing. India will resemble Pakistan even more as she switches from rail to roads (why?). There will be a hard push to get more BJP seats in the un-Indias- Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Odisha, Bengal, and….Axom(???). Bengal and Odisha may be the most promising of  the lot, Kerala/TN will have to be long-term projects (20 years).

We are no experts but some of this seems dreamy-eyed and wrong-footed. If we were leading the charge, the immediate goal would have been to make sure that the dynasty does not recover. Right now the popular pressure is towards dumping Rahul and anointing Priyanka. Hit the soft spot hard- the crooked damad who said the famous words – I am a mango man in a banana republic. This man, who was the sole person permitted (by name) to go through airline security without screening (yes we know, petty stuff). Make an airtight case against him (put Ashok Khemka in charge) throw him into Tihar and throw away the keys.
……………..
So CEO Modi has laid down five flagship projects as top priority.
These would include economic, social and political projects. ….It is
with this in mind that a complete revamp in the sectors of road,
railways, freight transport and ports is being plan­ned. Immediate
action would be seen on the Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi-Calcutta corridors.
Modi’s emphasis, sources say, will be to shift freight transport from
railways to road and to reduce oil import.




Modi’s team confirms that attention will be paid to the revamp of
ports, in fact a complete facelift is being planned.
Team Modi is
looking at possibilities of opening newer ports and competence delivery
will be top focus. Modi, sources say, is also keen on turning around the
coal, steel and power sectors
with focus “first on solving the current
mess in the coal sector and then working towards providing quality power
generation”. Special attention will be paid to the Northeast. 




On the social projects front, the Ganga will remain Modi’s pet
project once he takes charge of the government as prime minister. 


Sources concede that the Ganga project has political significance for Modi which is why Team Modi has been told to have a special plan in
place revolving around the river. A team member says, “Electoral
dividends for Modi came from the Ganga belt of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.
Both the BJP and Modi know that if we want to keep that goodwill coming
our way from that region intact, then something concrete needs to be
done for that region.”



No doubt, politically, the Gangetic belt is an important region for the
BJP and particularly Modi, considering many party MPs come from that
area. As a result, Modi has asked his team to have a three-pronged
approach towards the Ganga project. In the pipeline is a massive
clean-up programme for the Ganga, followed by a flood control management
scheme. That done, Modi wants to put in place a water tourism economy
plan around the Ganga
that would help generate not just employment but
even transport opportunities through the river. “We will also ensure
that the river generates an economy around itself, which is why water
transport for goods and water tourism on the Ganga will be emphasised
upon,” a source revealed.




Those close to Modi confirm that he would be looking at the next five
years also as a time to consolidate his position politically. On the
agenda therefore is an expansion plan for his party.




Modi would therefore be working hard on increasing the imprint of his
party in states like Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Orissa, West Bengal and Assam.
A source explains, “In future elections, we don’t want to be dependent
solely on the Hindi heartland for an election victory.
These states then
become very important bases for us and Modi is clear he wants a massive
geographical expansion to ensure that.” 

…………
Link: http://www.outlookindia.com/printarticle.aspx?290756
…………

regards

Brown Pundits