Re: [Assam] News from Sentinel - prisoners' children
I do wish that Assamese NGO take up the task of raising children of imprisoned ULFA members. Prima -facie from the article it seems that Indian govt has granted special concession to allow the ULFA members to remain together . I my own home -- I look at the case of my poor cousin who was poisoned by his wife last year and died subsequently. The wife and her paramour are in jail now. What happened to the children?? Noone in our family wanted to shoulder the burden of raising them. Ultimately now they are with my father -- who is a distant relative of theirs. Perhaps similarly noone wants to raise the children of imprisonedULFA members. It is good that this issue has been raised. maybe NRAs can do something for the children - like opening a residential school in Assam and providing funds for international level studies. UmeshChan Mahanta [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 9:40 PM + 11/8/05, umesh sharma wrote: C-da, From the article: "The jail has seven children. They are not prisoners, but are insidethe jail by default as their mothers are prisoners who have no safeplaces to keep their children outside the jail. *** And the difference from being imprisoned? At best semantic, isn't it? The bottom line: These children are being made to pay for their parents' sins, real or imagined. Do civilized people do that? You tell us. But I will take a step back and ask you and others if it is a Hindu thing: For children to pay for the sins of their parents, and ancestors? Why I ask is that I am reminded, very vaguely, about certain rites by offsprings, at the demise of their parents, dealing with their salvation or something to do with that. Maybe there IS such a thing in Hindu traditions for the offsprings to pay for their parents' sins. Is there? If it is so, it might explain this profoundly despicable practice. I am going to look into referring the issue to Amnesty International. If there is anyone in the net who have made contacts with AI in the past, will appreciate any feedback. cm The jail authoritiesgot in touch with the Sarba Siksha Mission who in turn provided themwith a teacher." UmeshChan Mahanta [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 21:15:20 -0600To: assam@assamnet.orgFrom: Chan Mahanta [EMAIL PROTECTED]Subject: [Assam] News from SentinelThis is the kind of democracy that is running the country, in whichCHILDREN are in prison along with their parents. Is this the legacyof a ten, and why not even 15, thousand year (un)civilization?cmOf ISI teachers and ULFA 'kids'NAGAON, Nov 7 (UNI): The teachers are dreaded ISI agents and thestudents "ULFA children". Nothing sinister here but.This unique school with seven students and three teachers is insidea jail of Assam. The students are mostly offsprings of the jailedULFA leaders and the teachers are three dreaded ISI agents,condemned for life.The! ir daily activities related to schooling have brought in a freshair of expectation and happiness in the entire jail compound whichhas been resounding with nursery rhymes along with the usual soundsof thick heavy boots walking on the long verandahs.The school curriculum is a healthy mixture of alphabets, English andgames besides the lively nursery rhymes.The school, without a name, is housed inside the Nagaon districtjail, 130 kilometre from Guwahati, where the three ISI agents and agroup of ULFA detenues, many of whom are women, are jailed.The jail has seven children. They are not prisoners, but are insidethe jail by default as their mothers are prisoners who have no safeplaces to keep their children outside the jail. The jail authoritiesgot in touch with the Sarba Siksha Mission who in turn provided themwith a teacher.But the three ISI agents, one each from Karachi and Bangladesh, cameforward and, according to jail authorities, they are proving to begood teachers with children enjoying with them.The three ISI agents are Fasiullah (45) from Karachi, Billal Miyan(35) of Shyllet, Bangladesh and Mosaha Samsed Khan (30) ofMuzaffarpur of Uttar Pradesh. Of them, Fasiullah is the dreaded oneand his arrest five years back was considered as one of the greatestsuccess of Assam Police as well as the Central Intelligence Agencies.Fasiullah was the actual kingpin of the ISI racket in the North eastIndia, supplying both money and material in the fertile land ofIslamist Fundamentalists in bordering areas of lower Assam.He, along with other two, were lodged in the Guwahati jail and onlyon August 8 were they transferred to Nagaon jail as the Guwahatijail had become overcrowded.All the three were lodged at Hospital ward of the Nagaon jail wherethey have opened their school also. The ULFA detenues are kept! a little away in the general ward or National Security Act (NSA)prisoner's ward.There is no fixed time for the school and it all depends on thechildren's waking up and getting ready.The jail authorities have provided each child
Re: [Assam] News from Sentinel - prisoners' children
I think, when one looks at the whole thing, this seems to be rather a positive and creative thing that GOI is doing by allowing the children to live inside the jail with their mothers. On a negative sense, we may say, like Chandan is doing, look, they are putting the children also in jail, what a shame. But look at thealternatives. In the West, where things are looked either as black or white, suchchildren would have been completely abandoned and would have been drug addict or something like that.(No wonder, USA has the highestnumber of peoplebehindbars). In this creative scheme done by India, the children are allowed to live with their mothers who are in jail. That has definitely lessened the pain of the jail term on both the mother and children. Second the childrenare getting an education. The children probably would not feel that they in jail. I am sure they have the freedom to go out with some guardian. I think the whole experience will pacify the mothers in the end and will make them rather realizethe futility of their mission to die for their country rather than to live for theirchildren.After all, when one looks at things philosophically,all missions, whether religion or patriotism or revolution or revenge, that people often commit themselves to die for,would seem rather childish. After all the whole thing depends onbasicallywhat type of training or lesson onegets inchildhood, or what type of horrible experience people go through in life etc. I am not saying that one is good and the other is bad. Both are life, and people esteem life depending on the value system that they believe. Gandhi was a revolutionary who fought for the freedom of India. Rabindra Nath Tegore or Vivekanand or Aurobindo did not, In the end, I really don't know whose contribution is more for India.Would India would have been bad, if Gandhi were never born? May be India would have been under British rule ten or twenty more years. Would it have been bad? Bad for whom? Definitely not for Assam, many would say. After all the Assamese may be right in taking life rather easy without any strong committment or in as they say, in a Hobo Diok manner. Today Assam may be lagging, but we cannot ssay that the Assamese are lagging. RB - Original Message - From: umesh sharma To: Chan Mahanta ; assam@assamnet.org Sent: Tuesday, November 08, 2005 5:11 PM Subject: Re: [Assam] News from Sentinel - prisoners' children I do wish that Assamese NGO take up the task of raising children of imprisoned ULFA members. Prima -facie from the article it seems that Indian govt has granted special concession to allow the ULFA members to remain together . I my own home -- I look at the case of my poor cousin who was poisoned by his wife last year and died subsequently. The wife and her paramour are in jail now. What happened to the children?? Noone in our family wanted to shoulder the burden of raising them. Ultimately now they are with my father -- who is a distant relative of theirs. Perhaps similarly noone wants to raise the children of imprisonedULFA members. It is good that this issue has been raised. maybe NRAs can do something for the children - like opening a residential school in Assam and providing funds for international level studies. UmeshChan Mahanta [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 9:40 PM + 11/8/05, umesh sharma wrote: C-da, From the article: "The jail has seven children. They are not prisoners, but are insidethe jail by default as their mothers are prisoners who have no safeplaces to keep their children outside the jail. *** And the difference from being imprisoned? At best semantic, isn't it? The bottom line: These children are being made to pay for their parents' sins, real or imagined. Do civilized people do that? You tell us. But I will take a step back and ask you and others if it is a Hindu thing: For children to pay for the sins of their parents, and ancestors? Why I ask is that I am reminded, very vaguely, about certain rites by offsprings, at the demise of their parents, dealing with their salvation or something to do with that. Maybe there IS such a thing in Hindu traditions for the offsprings to pay for their parents' sins. Is there? If it is so, it might explain this profoundly despicable practice. I am going to look into referring the issue to Amnesty International. If there is anyone in the net who have made contacts with AI in the past, will appreciate any feedback. cm The jail authoritiesgot in touch with the Sarba Siksha Mission who in turn provided themwith a teacher." UmeshChan Mahanta [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Date: Mon, 7 Nov 2005 21:15:
