South Asia Citizens Wire | 12 October, 2004 via: www.sacw.net
[1] Bangladesh:
- Living with terror: Minorities in Bangladesh ( Nurul Kabir)
- Who's to blame? (Dina Siddiqi)
[2] India: Communalism rising in Kerala - Hindutva Targets the Church (R. Krishnakumar)
[3] India: Gandhi And His Killers (Nalini Taneja)
[4] India: Erasing the Past for Present Political Agenda (Ram Puniyani)
[5] India: RSS (Rashtriya Savages' Syndicate) Celebrates Gandhi Jayanti (I.K.Shukla)
[6] India: Satya Satyagrah - Update on Appeal for Solidarity, Reform, Justice and Harmony
[7] Upcoming events:
- Film screen and discussion - Kashmir: The Flashpoint of War and the Key to Peace (Vancouver, October 24)
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[1]
Communalism Combat -- September 2004 http://www.sabrang.com/cc/archive/2004/sep04/cover.html
LIVING WITH TERROR: MINORITIES IN BANGLADESH
By Nurul Kabir
[...]
A non-secular elite? The Islamisation of State, politics and education
After the independence of Bangladesh in 1971, the people's aspiration for a secular democracy apparently found adequate expression in the Constitution of the newly emerged State, formulated in 1972. It rightly proclaimed 'secularism' as a 'fundamental principle' of the State and prohibited any political party based on religious ideals.
"�No person shall have the right to form or be a member or otherwise take part in the activities of, any communal party or other association or union which in the name or on the basis of any religion has for its object, or pursues, a political purpose," said the 'proviso' of Article 38 of the original Constitution.
But it proved to be a false dawn. Soon, the government of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman introduced what turned out to be a somewhat problematic conception of secularism both at the political and ideological levels, in running the affairs of the State. It adopted 'the policy of equal opportunity for all religions' and ordered citations from the holy books of Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Christianity at the start of broadcasts by state-run electronic media.
This policy can be interpreted as being inconsistent with the principles of a secular democracy, if secularism is defined as the absolute separation of Church and State, rather than neutrality toward all religions. The former definition considers 'faith' to be a matter of personal 'belief' of the individual citizen, and subsequently forbids endorsement of or aid to any religious doctrine by the State or the government of a State.
The government of the Sheikh also failed to ensure 'separation of religion from education', although such separation is the sine qua non for the growth as well as perpetuation of secular values in a society, without which the construction and reproduction of a secular democratic State becomes an impossible proposition.
Bangladesh's first education commission, headed by Dr. Kudrat-e-Khuda, recommended that "instead of creating blind allegiance to the external aspects and formal rituals of religion, the curricula and textbooks should inculcate in the students a refined and well integrated system of secular ethics to produce a new generation of citizens for secular Bangladesh". The recommendation was fully compatible with the idea of secular democracy.
"Plants are fashioned by cultivation, man by education," observed French educationist Jean Jacques Rousseau. It is education, particularly primary and secondary education, that shapes the political and cultural future of a populace. A society aspiring to be democratic in its political and cultural psyche therefore needs to formulate its education curriculum in a way that helps shape the psyche of children in a democratic mould. Secularism is inherent in the concept of democracy, since democracy as an original idea had emerged in the West through political struggles against feudalism backed by religious ideologies. That which is not secular is not democratic.
But Dr. Khuda was to be disappointed, thanks primarily to the country's non-secular elite. Earlier, the Khuda Commission circulated among the members of the most educated section of the society - vice-chancellors and professors of the universities and degree colleges, principals and professors of the medical colleges, principals of the higher secondary colleges, headmasters of the high schools, members of the associations of school and college teachers, and superintendents of madrassas, educationists, essayists, poets, novelists, playwrights, newspaper editors, top-level civil servants and Members of Parliament - a set of identical questionnaires for eliciting their opinion on the nature of education necessary for Bangladesh.
As many as 2,869 persons responded, and 74.69 per cent of the respondents said that "religious education should be an integral part of general education". The numbers speak for themselves. It appears the educated elite did not ever embrace a secular system in which faith was purely a personal matter.
The Khuda Commission gave up its secular approach, while the government of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman gave in to the desire of the non-secular elite, leaving behind the democratic aspirations of those who had brought about the nation's independence for, along with other things, a secular society and State.
Subsequently, the kind of religious syllabi that the Pakistani rulers had adopted for Muslim students at the primary and secondary levels, with a view to perpetuating Islamic cultural hegemony in society, remained almost intact, as did the religious syllabi for Hindu students. Moreover, the government adopted the policy of financially supporting hundreds of madrassas - the educational institutions that continue to reproduce a religious world-view, which is bound to ideologically strengthen, and perpetuate, a political culture devoid of secularism. Thus, the cultural stage for the pervasive growth of a non-secular political culture in society was set in the early days of Bangladesh's independence.
The government of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman was overthrown by a military putsch in 1975, and all governments that followed his, with the exception of the one headed by Sheikh Hasina between 1996 and 2001, harshly criticised Mujibur Rahman for his various actions. Nevertheless, all these successive governments, including that of Sheikh Hasina, religiously followed, rather carried forward vigorously, Mujib's programmes, giving a fillip to the process of backward movement of society in general.
To begin with, Ziaur Rahman, through a martial law proclamation in 1976, overturned a constitutional provision that prohibited use of religion for political purposes. Then came another proclamation in 1977, which replaced "secularism" as a fundamental principle of the State with "absolute trust and faith in the Almighty Allah" and announced that "absolute trust and faith in the Almighty Allah shall be the basis of all actions" of the State.
The same proclamation inserted Bismillah-ar-Rahman-ar-Rahim on the top of the Constitution. Later, all these political misdeeds, from the point of view of secular democratic values, were 'ratified' by the erstwhile Parliament in 1979, with Lieutenant General Ziaur Rahman at the helm of the undemocratic State machinery.
Such negative changes in State principles found full expression in the entire education system as well. The new Committee on Curricula and Syllabi under Zia's administration stated in one of their documents: "Islam is a complete code of life, not just a sum of rituals. A Muslim has to live his personal, social, economic and international life in accordance with Islam from childhood to death. So acquiring knowledge of Islam is compulsory for all Muslim men and women." Lieutenant General HM Ershad, in 1982, drove the last nail into the coffin of secular ideals at the state level. His regime got the Constitution amended in 1998 to declare that "the state religion of the Republic is Islam�," virtually degrading the members of minority religious communities to second-class citizenry.
The height of insensitivity of the elite to the rights and dignity of religious minority communities became evident, once again, when an influential group of the elite went to court against "decentralisation of the High Court", which was a part of the autocratic constitutional amendment in question, ignoring the other part that relegated members of the minority religious communities to the status of second-grade citizens.
After the fall of General Ershad in 1990, following some eight years of movement for democracy, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party of Khaleda Zia came to power through a general election in 1991. Notably, one of the central focuses of BNP's electoral campaign was Islam - the "need of defending Islam" from "un-Islamic" political forces. The propaganda infected the electoral campaign of other power contending parties. Sheikh Hasina, chief of the Awami League, which occasionally claims itself to be a secular party, presided over her party's entire electoral campaign wearing a hijab over her head with rosary in her hand.
The government of Khaleda Zia adopted and implemented a policy for primary education in 2000, and the first of its 22 objectives was "indoctrination of students in the loyalty to and belief in the Almighty Allah, so that the belief inspires the students in their thought and work, and helps shape their spiritual, moral, social and human values".
Indoctrination of a "belief system" of any kind is irrational in the first place. Indoctrination of any belief system obstructs believers from questioning the status quo - be it political or ideological, virtually degrading thinking human beings into non-thinking animal entities. And such a situation always helps the establishment perpetuate the existing reality, which is, in the present case, a non-secular Bangladesh.
Then came the turn of Sheikh Hasina's Awami League, which came to power in 1996. The AL government formed another education commission in 1997, headed by Professor Shamsul Haque, which recognised "madrassa education as an integral part of the national education system". The commission recommended modernising the curriculum by introducing science and English but did not usher in changes in madrassa syllabi. The existing curriculum manufactures in hundreds of poor young boys a "medieval" world outlook, plagued by a deep sense of intolerance for opposing ideologies - political or religious. One of the major political agendas of the government of Sheikh Hasina was to prove, by means of patronising, both politically and financially, various Islamic organisations/institutions, that the party in no way lags behind the BNP in terms of its allegiance to Islamic ideals.
Before the last general elections in 2001, the power contending political parties shed the last vestige of secular ideals. The BNP's election manifesto proclaimed that the party, if voted to power, "will not enact any law in contrary to Islam". The Jatiya Party, headed by HM Ershad, went a step further. "Shariah laws will be followed, existing laws will be brought in line with the principles of the Qur'an and Sunnah, special laws will be made for punishing those making derogatory remarks against God, the prophet and Shariah, while religious education will be made compulsory at all levels," said the JP's manifesto.
The Jamaat-e-Islami announced in unambiguous terms that the party, if voted to power, "will convert the People's Republic of Bangladesh into an Islamic Republic". Sheikh Hasina's Awami League did not lag behind, at least, in relation to the BNP. "If returned to power," the AL announced in its election manifesto, "no law will be enacted, which will be inconsistent with the dictates of the Qur'an and Hadith". The AL's announcement reminded some people of the historical fact that the party was born with the name of Awami Muslim League. Only the 11-party alliance, a conglomeration of the left and liberal democratic parties, pledged that they, if voted to power, would work for restoring secular ideals.
Eventually, Khaleda's BNP, which had forged an electoral alliance with some Islamist fundamentalist parties and groups, including the Jamaat-e-Islami and the Islami Oikkya Jote, which has overtly been working to have a theocratic state in the country, won the polls.
An unhappy Hasina now complains, as reported by The New Age on September 12, 2003, that "the BNP-Jamaat came to power in the name of religion" but the coalition "has so far ignored Islam a lot". "It is an irony that the Awami League was branded as an anti-Islamic party although my government worked tirelessly to establish religion in the country," she was quoted to have said while addressing a group of mullahs at her residential office on September 11.
This brief almanac of the non-secular - rather anti-secular - legal, political, ideological and economic schemes implemented so far by the country's political elite, assembled under various political platforms at different points of time, provides some clues to why the once secular Muslim population of Bangladesh is becoming indifferent to the exploitation of minority religious communities by politically backed vested quarters.
On a more positive note, there are still instances in which ordinary Muslims resist the repression of minorities, even when the perpetrators are law enforcers. A 'fact file', carried by The Daily Star on August 17, 2003 shows that local Muslims, led by a sub-inspector of Tomaltala police camp, carried out an attack on several of the homes belonging to Hindus on June 2, 2003. The attack was instigated by a highly provocative rumour deliberately spread by the concerned sub-inspector that Bishwambar Das Babajee, a priest of a local Ashram, had defecated on the Holy Koran.
At some point during the rampage, someone in the crowd asked the sub-inspector to produce evidence of the charge against Bishwambar Das. The policeman failed to do so. Eventually, it was discovered that the SI engineered the attack against Hindu families in the locality because he was refused bribes from some local Hindus the previous day. "Then the agitated (Muslim) mob, being repentant of their own misdeeds, cordoned the police camp and demanded punishment of the sub-inspector," Bishwambar was quoted to have said to a Dhaka-based human rights organisation, as reported eventually in The Daily Star.
If the Islamisation of the country's State machinery and education system continues without the immediate political, ideological and cultural intervention of truly democratic forces, one can safely predict that the general Muslim population will be 'indoctrinated' to a degree that voices against intimidation, exploitation and oppression of minority communities will be subdued, if not entirely muted.
Future to be created
As events in 2003 show, religious minorities in Bangladesh are exploited in multiple ways. Their land and their property may be appropriated at any time, their lives are never completely safe and their recourse to justice is limited. Moreover, they are always vulnerable to exploitation as politicians of various hues play the religion card to further their own agendas. As such the future of minorities in Bangladesh seems bleak.
However, the future is not merely to be predicted, it is also to be created. The construction and maintenance of a secular democratic society calls for a series of politically conscious actions at different levels, especially including education and culture; this is in addition to the obvious need for organising constant protests against the formulation and implementation of non-secular policies and programmes by the communal elite.
As regards democratic interventions at the cultural and ideological level, fighting for the formulation and implementation of secular democratic curricula remains one of the most important responsibilities. A secular and scientific education generates in children, or future citizens for that matter, a sense of demystification of the universe, which automatically encourages the questioning of all structures, processes, institutions and situations of society. And now is the time for democratic forces to take up the gigantic task, accomplishment of which could help stop oppression of the minority communities of the country.
o o o o
Communalism Combat -- September 2004 http://www.sabrang.com/cc/archive/2004/sep04/cover3.html
WHO'S TO BLAME?
BY Dina Siddiqi
Typical of the situation in Bangladesh, public opinion is deeply divided on the "facts". Some people (mainly but not only from the ruling coalition of BNP/Jamaat) claim the death threats are manufactured by the professors, etc. themselves, either to bring national or international attention on themselves or as a ploy to discredit the government, either way taking advantage of international anti-Islamic hysteria. Others (usually supporters of the supposedly more secular opposition party, the Awami League) are convinced that creeping fundamentalism is the most serious problem facing Bangladesh today.
Assessing the situation with any degree of accuracy is a treacherous task if one wants to avoid the minefield of highly polarised partisan politics. While one does not wish to overstate the case, the current government's coalition partnership with Islamist parties does have a bearing on its rhetoric and responses. The stabbing of Humayun Azad was not imagined or self-manufactured. Typically, by refusing to act until the very last minute (if at all), at the least, the government is complicit if not directly responsible for the current environment of fear and insecurity.
Difficulties in analysing the course of events are compounded by the increasingly blurred lines between criminalisation and communalisation, in the context of a weak and corrupt State complicit in the criminalisation of politics, and a coalition government unwilling to defend basic human rights if that means offending Islamist coalition partners.
The overnight emergence of the vigilante group, the Jagrata Muslim Janata Bangladesh (JMJB), and the rumours swirling around their origins is a case in point. The JMJB has been terrorising communities in the areas under its control. Its stated aim is to rid the northern districts of left wing extremist groups known for their own terrorising tactics and extortionary practices. It is common knowledge that these smaller groups all have godfathers in the two main opposition parties, without whose support they would easily be captured and jailed by now. Presumably, the same holds for the JMJB.
The main rumours are 1) this is a turf war in which a new 'gang' is trying to establish supremacy in the locality 2) the group has been created/nurtured by some members of the ruling coalition who are using it to eliminate their political rivals by labelling the latter as left wing extremists. 3) the JMJB is an 'organic' organisation with ties to international Islamist groups, especially the Taliban. None of these are mutually exclusive explanations.
JMJB atrocities have been carried out in the name of establishing an Islamic State. Their leader claims to be inspired by the Taliban.
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[2]
Frontline - Volume 21 - Issue 21, Oct. 09 - 22, 2004
TARGETING MISSIONARIES [IN KERALA]
R. Krishnakumar in Thiruvananthapuram
A criminal assault on nuns of the Missionaries of Charity in Kerala, the first such incident involving the organisation in the country, raises concerns about the spread of communalism in the State.
THE political furore that followed the attack on the members of the Missionaries of Charity at a Dalit colony in Kozhikode, Kerala, perhaps drowned a significant statement made by a bewildered victim, Sister Kusumum. "We want the police to find out who the culprits are, not to seek revenge, but to understand why they attacked us," she told mediapersons who visited Sneha Bhavan, the local office of the organisation founded by Nobel laureate Mother Teresa. Sneha Bhavan provides shelter to over 50 inmates, Hindus, Muslims and Christians, all of them poor, sick or old.
BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT
Sister Kusumum at a hospital in Kozhikode.
On September 25, a small gang of men assaulted two nuns from Sneha Bhavan and the driver of their vehicle as soon as they reached the `Four-Cent Harijan Colony', at Mampuzhakkadu near Pantheerankavu in Olavanna panchayat. The gang accused them of preparing the ground for religious conversion in the Dalit colony. The nuns were reportedly invited to the colony by a woman who had been receiving rice and essential provisions as charity from them for over a year and who wanted some of her neighbours too to get such help. The assailants told the nuns that they would be burnt alive if they came to the colony again. Finally, when the women of the colony formed a cordon around the nuns, the assailants left the scene threatening that they would wait for the nuns at a nearby location.
The terrified nuns ran to a house nearby to call the police and to inform their colleagues at Sneha Bhavan. Then they took refuge in the nearest police station, at Nallalam. Meanwhile, on hearing the news of the attack, another group from Sneha Bhavan, including Mother Superior Kusumum, Brother Varghese and a visiting member of the Missionaries of Charity from Kenya, Brother Bernard, reached the colony. While they were about to return, a mob, allegedly raising the slogans `BJP-RSS zindabad' and `Bharat Mata Ki Jai', surrounded their vehicle. The mob pushed the outnumbered police personnel aside, smashed the windowpanes of the vehicle and brutally attacked the group members. The mob threw mud at them, hit them on the head and neck with iron rods and metal bangles, and tore their clothes. The group was eventually rescued by the police and admitted to hospital. Although there were initial indications that the first group of assailants were from the locality, residents of the colony later said that "outsiders" carried out the attacks. The nuns also said that the attackers were "outsiders".
Close on the heels of the attack on the nuns, on September 29, "unidentified assailants" broke into the St. Thomas Mar Thoma Church in Thiruvananthapuram city. The altar, curtains and furniture were damaged when the assailants set them on fire, which was contained only because a priest detected it early.
UNLIKE several other States, Kerala had been relatively free of such attacks. But in January 2003, J.W. Cooper, a bishop in a Pentecostal church based in Ohio, the United States, became the target of a communal mob in rural Thiruvananthapuram (Frontline, February 28, 2003). Importantly, the attack came at a time when the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh-Bharatiya Janata Party-Vishwa Hindu Parishad combine was launching a fresh offensive on the religious, social, cultural and political fronts in the State. The incident highlighted the growing intolerance of the Hindutva forces, but it also put the spotlight on the activities of a variety of Pentecostal groups and growing competition among them to win over "human souls" following, especially, the (continuing) power struggles within prominent Churches in the State.
Simultaneously, Kerala also witnessed a large section of the general laity turning to Christian meditation and charismatic centres and small churches and Pentecostal initiatives that sprouted in all parts of the State. In a State where Christians form a substantial section of the population, the mushrooming of such religious centres and activities was viewed with apprehension by the RSS, the BJP and the VHP and they used it effectively to spread their own influence in the name of guarding "faithfuls in the Hindu fold" and protecting them from the "threat of missionary activity". Although the Sangh Parivar's target initially had been the Pentecostal programmes, over the years, charity work and religious activity by a majority of Christian organisations too fell under their suspicious eye, especially after, in the words of Sangh Parivar leaders, "the controversial statement of Pope John Paul II at the turn of the century calling for religious conversions all over Asia".
S. MAHINSHA
In Thiruvananthapuram, a march by Left activists with an effigy of Chief Minister Oommen Chandy in protest against the attack on the nuns.
The editorial published by the BJP's Malayalam daily, Janmabhoomi, two days after the attack on the nuns is a window to the Sangh Parivar's thinking. Titled "The Olavanna incident: Let all the facts come out", the editorial says: "It has become the practice of many Christian Churches today to indulge in religious activity and forced religious conversions in the name of charity work. Many would find it difficult to deny that the main agenda of the Catholic Church and others is forced conversions. In this context we must also take into consideration the call given by Pope John Paul II when he visited India a few years ago. He called for the Christianisation of Asia. On whom does the onus lie to prove that when the Pope's smiling faithfuls descend on the members of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes with wheat, clothes and milk powder, they are not trying to implement the Pope's call? Activities that cast doubts naturally lead to criticism. Such activities may work well among illiterate tribal people and others. But it is not surprising if such activities create suspicion in a colony near Kozhikode city. Maybe it is this suspicion that led to the tension... "
The attack at Olavanna is the first such incident against the members of the Missionaries of Charity anywhere in India. Sangh Parivar leaders have repeatedly denied any role in the incident but, at the same time, they also used the opportunity to cast doubts on the charity work initiated by the nuns. The presence of the Kenyan national, Brother Bernard, in the second group that went to the colony has come in handy for the critics. The Hindutva organisations have been trying hard to portray it as a case similar to the Cooper incident, wherein the U.S. citizen was accused of indulging in "illegal missionary activity" while he was "overstaying" in the country after the expiry of his tourist visa. Soon after the attack on Cooper, even while shrill demands were being made for his arrest, the State police controversially ordered him to leave the country.
According to the volunteers of the Missionaries of Charity, Brother Bernard was on a brief visit to Kerala and he had a valid visa that permitted him to stay in the country for one year and undergo training with the organisation. His presence at the colony on September 25 was accidental, according to them, though he reportedly registered himself with the State police only after the incident occurred, a slip, perhaps, that has now come in handy for his tormentors.
WITH hardly a few months to go before the elections to the local bodies in the State, the ruling United Democratic Front (UDF), troubled as it was by factional wars in the State unit of the Congress and the serious differences with the minority communities that its previous Chief Minister A.K. Antony ran into, had barely managed to start afresh on a "clean slate" under the new Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and his team of Ministers.
The Opposition Left Democratic Front termed the attack as the handiwork of the Sangh Parivar. It also alleged that it proved the failure of the State police under Oommen Chandy. The Dalit colony is generally considered a pro-Communist Party of India (Marxist) area coming under the LDF-ruled Olavanna panchayat. Of late, however, the RSS had intensified its activity in the locality, the latest instance being a mega Hindu ritual held near the colony a few days before the attack occurred. The Sangh Parivar had since then claimed that its "growing influence" had rattled its opponents, both political and religious, and that the first group of attackers included "those from a local club" (known to be run by CPI(M) supporters).
Although Chief Minister Oommen Chandy announced that the police had identified 13 of the assailants, only one person has been arrested so far. Chandy refused to divulge the political affiliation of the assailants or to give further information on the inquiry "prematurely". However, his political compulsions became clear when he sought to use the event to score points with the Opposition at a media conference in Thiruvananthapuram on September 29, soon after his high-visibility visit to the colony and meeting with the victims of the attack.
He said that along with the combined police-Crime Branch inquiry into the attack, the government had decided to conduct a detailed inquiry by a senior Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer into the "circumstances that led to the nuns' visit to the colony". This, he added, was "the extreme and continuing poverty in the colony", which had "no reliable water or power supply or even a pucca road link" with the rest of the panchayat. He also said pointedly that "Olavanna panchayat had for long been a CPI(M)-ruled panchayat" and that "the panchayat member from the particular area had been elected on the CPI(M) ticket". The IAS officer was asked to inquire why "even after several years under the decentralised local body system in the State and people's planning initiatives, a [CPI-M] panchayat like Olavanna, showcased for its grassroots development achievements, had failed the people of the Dalit colony, though mechanisms like the grama sabhas were still supposed to be working well within the panchayat system". The inquiry report would help the government find out "what had gone wrong with the decentralisation experiment in Kerala" (launched by the previous LDF government) and take "corrective measures" elsewhere in the State, the Chief Minister said.
Oommen Chandy also announced a list of relief measures for the households in the colony, including free ration for a month, pucca houses and jobs for women under the Kudumbashree (poverty eradication) Mission. With barely a few months to go for the panchayat elactions, the attack has, obviously, come in handy for the ruling UDF.
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[3]
Peoples Democracy - October 10, 2004
GANDHI AND HIS KILLERS Nalini Taneja
IT tells something about the crisis of our nationhood that even on Gandhi Jayanti, this year, one saw more references to Savarkar than Gandhi in the national and regional newspapers. In the days preceding Gandhi's birthday, Gandhi's killers occupied more space in newspapers and popular magazines than Gandhi was given, if one discounts the routine advertisements. There have been letters and write ups defending and eulogising Savarkar, who was involved in Gandhi's murder. Now there is evidence that show Savarkar's links with Nathuram Godse, the one who did the actual shooting.
What is more, people, and the political leadership in this country, have not only allowed this to happen, they have let it pass by without comment. Some Congressmen are now willing to vouch that Savarkar was a "patriot", even if his ideology and vision for India are not desirable. It is a sad realisation, and one that needs some reflection.
For years now one has noticed that there is little about Gandhi in the popular media apart from a few official advertisements timed for Gandhi Jayanti; and most people have become used to such tokenness. It is part of the general decline in political culture and of the distance the nation has travelled from the first heady days of independence. Few people from that generation survive today, and the sacrifices for freedom are hardly a part of popular consciousness. Freedom is taken for granted and nationhood for the vocal middle class means essentially fulfillment of goals of consumerism. Yet what has happened this year is unprecedented. We are today debating and trying to find 'evidence' for something that was publicly recognised, and evoked mass repulsion in the years after independence and Gandhi's murder.
SAVARKAR'S IDEOLOGY
It is a matter of legal and historical record that Savarkar was part of the conspiracy to murder Gandhi and that he stood firmly opposed to the idea of a secular-composite nationhood. All accounts of the aftermath of Gandhi's murder, emanating from the RSS as much as from the secular publications, testify to the role of Savarkar in Gandhi's murder. His ideas of Hindus and Muslims as constituting separate nations and of India as a potential Hindu rashtra are also freely circulated. The point to ponder over is: why is all this not a part of mass consciousness today?
The government of the newly independent India was forced to ban the RSS because of the widespread public grief and anger that Gandhi's murder evoked among all sections of the Indian people. Prior to his murder there was tremendous response to his last hunger strike undertaken to bring some sanity into political life. In many places communal killings actually stopped with Gandhi's appeal for peace. Gandhi himself evolved in his thinking during the turmoil of independence and partition to emphasise on separation of state and religion, and a secular polity that went beyond religious harmony between the two communities. It is not for nothing that the right wing RSS saw in him their greatest enemy. He was one force within the nationalist leadership firmly opposed to partition on religious grounds and religion as basis for nationhood, despite his roots in religion as basis of individual and social ethics.
LEFT ALTERNATIVE
The Communists won more seats in the first parliament than any other political formation barring the Congress, and Left mass organisations greatly inspired the youth. There was a widespread desire to achieve the goals of freedom for the majority of the Indian people, and a Left alternative seemed viable and desirable. During the sixties and seventies it was still normal to publicly point towards the compromises made by Gandhi with the bourgeois leadership, to criticise him bitterly for his failure to raise the issue of Bhagat Singh during the Gandhi-Irwin pact, to publicly disown Chandra Singh Garhwali, and for his parochial views in the Hind Swaraj . The criticism of Gandhi was from the Left perspective, and it was taken seriously-far more seriously than the RSS calumny against him.
In the years to follow this great political advantage was allowed to erode. The leadership of secular India failed to keep alive the spirit of the popular struggles of the national-liberation struggle. It failed to take seriously the RSS until it began to impinge on parliamentary politics and win parliamentary seats. It failed to carry on the relentless propaganda against these dangerous divisive forces, whose version of nationhood and its history continued to permeate the cultural institutions and dominate the educational system outside the small circle of NCERT. It is the Hindutva forces that gained from the struggles against the emergency, despite the secret overtures of the RSS leadership to Mrs Gandhi, and it is they who gained most from the Janta party post-emergency experiment riding piggy back on the fierce popular opposition to the Emergency, and taking advantage of the political activism and defense of civil rights during those years. Media, educational institutions, the administration and police forces were infiltrated by their cadres, and the secular leadership still did not recognise the danger signs. The parallel resurgence of middle caste based parties after the green revolution could not meet this danger, sharing as they did, most of the parochial prerogatives of the communal forces, and the vocal middle classes were already setting their sights on the anticipated consumer gains from new economic policies. We lost a lot during those years, far more than we realised then.
GLORIFYING THE KILLERS
Even as the communal forces try to appropriate Gandhi's legacy, assassin Nathuram Godse's admirers in Maharashtra and Gujarat continue their campaign to vilify Gandhi and glorify the villain. The play, Mee Nathuram Boltoye (I am Nathuram Godse speaking), by Pradip Dalvi, which had earlier been banned in Maharashtra, was taken out of cold storage in 1995 after the Shiv Sena-BJP coalition came to power. While it still caused uproar in Maharastra, in Gujarat it completed over 60 shows, running to packed houses. This is a state that has spawned over 2,000 institutions in Gandhi's name. A senior Gandhian and Gujarati writer, Manubhai Pancholi, conceded: "We are ashamed that we could not even protest and put the true facts before the people." (Quoted in Communalism Combat, October 2000). It was the same during the 2002 genocide of the Muslims in Gujarat. The legacy of Gandhi is weakest in Gujarat, for many reasons, starting the rebuilding of the Somnath temple (with Patel's cooperation) in the years immediately after independence. If the Hindutva texts and the RSS shakhas give their own version of our history and nationhood, excluding the role of the working people and of minorities, women and dalits, and vilify Communists and leaders like Gandhi and Nehru, we have been guilty of not keeping alive the role of the right wing Hindutva communal forces in our political propaganda till the BJP became a force to reckon with in parliament. Therefore it is part of popular belief today that Jinnah was no good, he caused partition, and is projected as villain, but anti-national elements like Godse and Savarkar still vie for space in the pantheon of nationalist leadership. The Congress, in all this, was not committed to idea of projecting a secular heritage. It preferred ultimately to share a common cultural space with the communal forces, than to stand by its own resolutions of the national liberation days.
LOST OPPORTUNITY
Today we are faced with a serious political and economic offensive. In the bargain, we have lost an opportunity to talk about Gandhi as we would like to-as democrats and from the perspective of the working people of this country. The ascendancy of the Hindutva right wing politics since the 1980s has robbed us of the right to really evaluate and critically comment on Gandhi's role in our national life.
One remembers that today the Left has more members in Parliament than at any time since the first national elections after independence; it constitutes the second largest political bloc as then. But there is a sea change in the political and social ethos. The Left is not as strong a force as it should have been, despite the tremendous growth in our mass organisations and the political bases in West Bengal, Kerala and Tripura. From being the leaders in the early 50s of campaigns voicing the betrayal of workers and peasants by the nationalist bourgeois leadership and the limitations of the Constitution of the new Republic, the Left is now the best guarantee for the defense of this same Constitution and of bourgeois democracy in the country.
Savarkar's photo in the Parliament alongside Gandhi's is a reflection of this political juncture in the history of our nationhood, as is the recurrence of a debate that should have been closed long ago because there are no two sides on the matter. Savarkar is no patriot, while Gandhi died for the unity of this country.
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[4]
sacw.net > Communalism Repository | October 11, 2004 http://www.sacw.net/DC/CommunalismCollection/ArticlesArchive/puniyani11102004.html
ERASING THE PAST FOR PRESENT POLITICAL AGENDA
by Ram Puniyani
Come elections and some emotional issues are brought on. The recent campaign by BJP associate, Vishwa Hindu Parishad, has come at a very crucial time. While the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance is groping for victory, it could not have thought of better issue, Afzal Khans tomb, to whip up emotional hysteria to garner more votes. This time both parties are planning their strategy in a slightly different fashion. While BJP is harping on Tiranga (Tri color) agitation of Uma Bharati and are trying to demolish Afzal Khans tomb, Shiv Sena is taking up the issue of Savarkar in full steam. Needless to say all these issues have nothing to do with the problems of daily lives of people but are meant for bringing in polarization of votes for the electoral purposes.
The demolition of Afzal Khans tomb is a very complex issue. In this case the attempt is not to prove that there was a temple, which was demolished to build this tomb but that the tomb is a blot on Maharashtrian self pride, since Afzal Khan was against Hindus etc. Not many knew that none other than Shivaji himself, who had slain Khan in an encounter, built this tomb. This encounter was planned as a negotiation meeting, which was called on the understanding that both Shivaji and Khan will come to meet without arms. Violating this Shivaji carried the iron claws. Interestingly it was Shivajis spy Rustam-e-Jaman who advised him to carry this secret weapon. In the scuffle, which followed their meeting, Shivaji killed Afzal Khan. Following Shivajis attack on Khan, Khans private secretary, Krishnaji Bhaskar Kulkarni attacked Shivaji with his sword. Shivaji survived the attack.
Following the death of Afzal Khan, Shivaji with his magnanimonious attitude got the tomb of Khan made from his funds. Pure and simple it was a battle between two kings for power and religion had nothing to do with this. RSS in its agenda of spreading hatred through concocted history is trying to pick up all these scattered events and giving them the communal color. This view totally forgets that Kings were not aligned along religious lines. Shivajis initial battles were against the Chandra Rao More another Maratha chief who was ruler of Javali, a nearby Kingdom. Similarly it was Raja Jaisingh who represented Auranzeb in his confrontation against the Mughal rule of Delhi. Can one forget that most of the mughal Emperors had Hindu kings as in charge of their revenue departments, or the likes of Raja Mansingh who was the Commander in Chief of Akbar? Instances abound, loyalty was the central marker for the Kings, kings employees and the subjects of the kingdom.
One cannot forget Hakim Khan Sur who was on the side of Rana Pratap and laid down his life for him in the battle of Haldi Ghati. Shivaji himself had Maulana Hyder Ali as his confidential secretary and many a Muslim generals in his army, more particularly in the cannon and naval divisions. Auranzeb, who is regarded as the most bigoted Muslim king had around 34% court officials in high places that were Hindus. Bahadur Shah Jafar went on to lead a section of Indian Kings, Hindus and Muslims, against the British in the 1857 revolt. Many other kings kept aloof from this anti British battle and sided with British during this.
The British initiated most of the lopsided presentation of History. As they came here and gradually usurped the power, they had to rule, for which they had to win over the loyalty of the people away from the Muslim Kings. Through two of their books, James Mill, History of British India, and Elliot and Dawsons eight volume History of India as told by her Historians, saw the whole past as a conflict between Hindus and Muslims. Also to demonize the Muslim Kings they propagated that Muslim Kings destroyed Hindu temples, spread Islam on the strength of sword and heaped atrocities on Hindus. They (British) claimed that they have come here on the mission from the God himself to civilize the barbarians here, white mans burden, and also that they wanted to save the Hindus from the atrocities of Muslim Kings. One is struck by the similarity of the language of the colonial powers. Not very long ago our own George W Bush also claimed that he is attacking Iraq to save the Iraqis from the atrocities of Saddam Hussein. And the rest, like his liberating actions in Abu Graib prison and other tortures heaped on Iraqis is too well-known to be recounted again.
This communal view of History was picked up the Communalists, both Muslim and Hindus and modifies in their own way for their own political gains. The Togadias and Modis merrily project the murder of Afzal Khan as the victory of Hindus over the Muslims. And in their effort to break the Indian community into warring religious communities the offsprings of RSS are on the hunt to discover the so-called contentious spots. Having got a major break through the demolition of Babri Masjid, they feel such discoveries of History can bring them in power. So they went in to create problem in Baba Budan Giri dargah (Datta Pitham), Idgah Maidan (Rani Chennama ground), Maula Masjid (Bhojashala), Haji Malaang (Malanggadh) and so on. Their Hate department is working overtime to discover the spots which can create problems, which can create violence and in turn give them power which they are desperately seeking to maul the democratic and liberal space, which is the prerequisite for social transformation.
The response to post Babri spots shows that RSS may not succeed in its designs. Though emotive issues make the people blind, there a limit to which they can be blinded. It seems the formula, which RSS progeny thinks is sure to work for breaking the unity of Indian society, may not work beyond a point. Thanks to the enlightened people that RSS offsprings are biting dust one after the other. One waits with baited breath as to what other gimmick Advanis and Togadias have in store to attack the plural and syncretic values of Indian society.
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[5]
http://communalism.blogspot.com/2004/10/rss-rashtriya-savages-syndicate.html South Asia Citizens Wire | October 12, 2004
RSS (Rashtriya Savages' Syndicate) CELEBRATES GANDHI JAYANTI by I.K.Shukla
We took a solemn pledge long long ago To kill that MG every day in every way From Syn duty and Hindutva we won't stray Our right to pre-empt and prevail we won't forego. Unless we purge the Bharat of our dreams of all That Muslims, Christians, Dalits, Tribals, Women, plan To soil us with by dotting Bharat with their offal We'd be seen as void of brains as we were of brawn. We're the "cowards and Quislings of Indian history". True. Why the hell should we give a damn for India We did so much to break, not make, as devil's tapestry, That failing to trash or trump we cried culpa mea? We purged Bharat with our swindles and scams With robbery, rape, butchery, and blaze of non-Hindus Sowing terror and tyranny with black-capped whams Scaring qualms of conscience with our bans and boos. The world knows: As cultural nationalists we didn't fail We're famous as founders of "Crime: Our Religion" Our treason and terror all Bharat would hail As divine, tho' drenched in blood, but draped in saffron.
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[6] Satya Satyagrah - Update on Appeal for Solidarity, Reform, Justice and Harmony
SPRAT Society for the Promotion of Rational Thinking SF-8, Rajnagar Complex, Narayan Nagar Road, Paldi, AHMEDABAD 380 007 Tel: +79-2663 46 55 /66 /77 M [Sudha] 9825457065 Fax: +79-2661 20 49 Web: www.mysprat.org e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 11-Oct-04
Dear Madam / Sir,
The People of India resoundingly rejected communalism in the last general elections.
The Government at the Centre was changed.
But has the situation changed for the victims of Gujarat's 2002 riots?
From 2nd October 04 [Gandhi Jayanti] Satya Satyagrah A Humble Reminder for Reform, Justice and Harmony 24-hr Sit-in on Liquid Diet [Rasaahar Dharna] In front of NENSEY NAWABKHAN CARAVAN, Baug-e-Nawab Complex, Nr Shalimar Cinema, Shah Alam, Ahmedabad
[Full Text at:
http://communalism.blogspot.com/2004/10/satya-satyagrah-update-on-appeal-for.html ]
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[7]
[Upcoming Events:]
A documentary film And an Open Discussion
KASHMIR: THE FLASHPOINT OF WAR AND THE KEY TO PEACE
SANSAD invites you to a viewing of Kashmir, Pakistan, India: Crossing the Lines of Control a video documentary by Dr. Parvez Hoodbhoy followed by an open discussion.
Location: Video In 1965 Main Street Vancouver
Sunday, October 24, 2004, 2-5 pm
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Buzz on the perils of fundamentalist politics, on matters of peace and democratisation in South Asia. SACW is an independent & non-profit citizens wire service run since 1998 by South Asia Citizens Web: www.sacw.net/
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