Dear all
Yesterday on March 8th, i received several messages on my mobile "Happy women's day" and "Watch Cady's Video and get hot", and "We are cute daughters, sisters, wives, lovers, mothers and are sources of strength" Yes I am happy that my spouse, child and myself are all alive and happy together. But not at the injustices that I see around based on class, caste, race, ethnicity, religion, sex/gender etc. In India around 56% women are anemic, around 45% of the population live below $1.25 per capita per day and many women die during/after delivery (due to hemorrhage, sepsis, toxemia, unsafe abortion in that order). The picture is more pathetic with regard to dalits, adivasis, landless, Muslims (in some pockets), slum dwellers and migrants and women amongst them. The possibility that there may come a time when women are few with decline in sex ratio at birth is another cause of anguish (in China, India, Georgia, Vietnam, Nepal, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan, Republic of Korea, and even in Pakistan I hear). Poor women and girls are bought and sold, polyandry is being strengthened in pockets o f India, poor women's wombs are being sold through surrogate motherhood, and sex work will soon be considered as work if liberal feminists and HIV/AIDS lobby have a say (put the men behind bars, and decriminalize women pushed into prostitution). Do we want a society where there are few women/girls and there is no institution of family or an institution where patriarchal family does not exist- whatever form heterosexual- or people of diverse sexual/gender identities living together? Abortion research and advocates are being pushed in India by northern donors/research institutes due to global concern over population growth, while unsafe abortion is only the fourth reason for maternal death in our country. Perhaps it is the first in some other country where abortion is illegal. Do we need a monoculture of solutions? Climate change is not due to our growing population of poor, but due to unfettered consumption in the north and by elites in growing economies. Is it not due to unequal power relations, lack of temporary methods of contraception and sexuality education that girls and women are pushed into abortion in India? Is not population growth linked to poverty and lack of economic security? Provide safe abortion on the grounds that poor women and girls want- rape, husbands forcing themselves, husbands leaving them, domestic violence etc- but not as a method of contraception or for sex selection of males or sex balancing. Is our body our private property, or are we trustees to our body, intellect and resources to meet our basic needs and then give back to society wherein inequities are a reality? As I get called every March 8th or before or later to speak I wonder who am I to speak on behalf of the 75% not shining India/global population. Let them speak in proportion to their numbers, not just the LGBTI groups and women compelled into prostitution due to patriarchy and poverty (sorry my friends from out there from both these groups ). Collective rights of marginalized women and girls have to prevail over individual ones. Gender justice has to prevail, linked to economic and social justice for all. Lastly, I no longer see myself as a daughter, sister, wife, mother, daughter in law or sister in law. I just want love and friendships, see progress towards justice in my life time, and claim my humanism and self respect from its margins- for i have sold my mind, body and soul for fifteen years for paid development work. Not occupying relation positions and institutions, hopefully my source of strength will emerge soon! Thanks anyway all those who wished me Ranjani K.Murthy --- On Wed, 2/3/11, Kamayani <[email protected]> wrote: From: Kamayani <[email protected]> Subject: [humanrights-movement:3830] Militants say killed Pakistani minister for blasphemy To: Date: Wednesday, 2 March, 2011, 5:05 PM By Augustine Anthony ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Gunmen shot dead Pakistan's only Christian government minister on Wednesday for challenging a law that mandates the death penalty for insulting Islam, the second top official killed this year over the blasphemy law. Security officials examine the bullet-riddled car of slain Pakistan's Minister for Minorities Shahbaz Bhatti outside the emergency ward of a hospital in Islamabad March 2, 2011. (REUTERS/Faisal Mahmood) The assassination of Shahbaz Bhatti, minister for minorities, is the latest sign of deep political instability in the nuclear-armed U.S. ally. Frequent militant attacks and chronic economic problems have raised fears for Pakistan's future. Pakistani Taliban militants claimed responsibility for killing Bhatti, with a Taliban spokesman saying the minister was a blasphemer. Bhatti was shot in broad daylight while travelling in a car near a market in the capital, Islamabad, police said. "The attackers were wearing shawls and opened indiscriminate fire as they got close to the minister's car," Islamabad police chief Wajid Durrani told reporters. The windscreen of Bhatti's car had four or five bullet holes and blood covered the back seat. A hospital spokesman said Bhatti, who had spoken out against the anti-blasphemy law, received several wounds. The law has been in the spotlight since last November, when a court sentenced a Christian mother of four to death. On Jan. 4, the governor of the most populous province of Punjab, Salman Taseer, who had strongly opposed the law and sought a presidential pardon for the 45-year-old Christian farmhand, was killed by one of his bodyguards who had been angered by the governor's stand. Bhatti was travelling without security, having left two police escorts at home, Durrani said. "There was no protection when he left the house," the police chief said. "There was just a private driver with him. We don't know about the minister's thinking, but we had provided him two escorts because he was under threat." Al Qaeda-linked Pakistani Taliban militants, fighting to bring down the state, had called for Bhatti's death because of his attempts to amend the law. A militant spokesman, Sajjad Mohmand, said they had killed him. "He was a blasphemer like Salman Taseer," Mohmand said by telephone from an undisclosed location. Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani condemned the killing and ordering the Ministry of Interior to investigate. "PROTECTION FROM HEAVEN" Last month, in an interview with the Christian Post, Bhatti said he had received threats. "I received a call from the Taliban commander and he said, 'If you will bring any changes in the blasphemy law and speak on this issue, then you will be killed'," Bhatti told the newspaper. "I don't believe that bodyguards can save me after the assassination (of Salman Taseer). I believe in the protection from heaven." The January killing of Taseer was widely praised by hardline Islamist groups such as the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), the country's largest religious party. But the party denounced Bhatti's murder. "We condemn this killing. This is a conspiracy and it may be an attempt to divert attention from the case of Raymond Davis," senior JI leader Farid Paracha told Reuters. Davis is an American CIA contractor on trial for killing two Pakistanis. The case has been taken up by religious parties which have called for Davis to be hanged. Bhatti's killing is likely to further deter any attempt to change the blasphemy law that mandates death for anyone who speaks ill of Islam's Prophet Mohammad. Sherry Rehman, a former government minister and member of the ruling Pakistan People's Party, of which Bhatti was also a member, tried to change the law last year but the party leadership forced her to stop in the face of opposition. The Anglican Church, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, and the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, condemned the murder and the impact it would have on Pakistan's religious minorities. "This further instance of sectarian bigotry and violence will increase anxiety worldwide about the security of Christians and other religious minorities in Pakistan," they said in a statement. The law has its roots in 19th Century colonial legislation to protect places of worship, but it was during the military dictatorship of General Mohammad Zia ul-Haq in the 1980s that it acquired teeth as part of a drive to Islamise the state. Liberal Pakistanis and rights groups believe the law to be dangerously discriminatory against tiny minority groups. Under the law, anyone who speaks ill of Islam and the Prophet Mohammad commits a crime and faces the death penalty, but activists say the vague terminology has led to its misuse. Christians who make up about two percent of the population have been especially concerned, saying the law offers them no protection. Convictions hinge on witness testimony and often these are linked to personal vendettas, critics say. Security analyst Imtiaz Gul says the law was open to abuse by people settling scores. "We would hope this forces the government or the parliament to take action," he said. "They should somehow improve the blasphemy law." Convictions are common although the death sentence has never been carried out. Most convictions are thrown out on appeal, but mobs have killed many people accused of blasphemy. (Additional reporting by Zeeshan Haider and Faisal Aziz in Karachi; Editing by Rebecca Conway, Chris Allbritton and Robert Birsel) Copyright © 2011 Reuters http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2011/3/2/worldupdates/2011-03-02T162513Z_01_NOOTR_RTRMDNC_0_-552589-7&sec=Worldupdates -- Adv Kamayani Bali Mahabal +919820749204 skype-lawyercumactivist "Nobody is giving up violence. Neither the state nor the Maoists are giving up violence. 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