South Asia Citizens Wire - 5 Oct 2016 - No. 2911 [via South Asia Citizens Web - sacw.net since 1996]
Contents: 1. Commentary on India - Pakistan War Talk - a select compilation (sept - oct 2016) 2. Escalating war hysteria in Pakistan and India - Joint Statement by South Asian Women Journalists 3. SAHR statement on the postponement of the SAARC Summit 4. India: Ranchi Declaration - Plan of Action adopted at National Convention on Right to Food & Work (Sept 2016) 5. India: Communally Motivated Proposed Amendments to the Citizenship Act, 1955 6. India: SAHMAT Statement on attack on Central University of Haryana 7. Recent On Communalism Watch: ::: URLs & FULL TEXT ::: 8. Bangladesh is building a dirty and expensive coal plant next to the world’s largest mangrove forest | Shahzad Uddin 9. Forgetting Partition: Constitutional Amnesia and Nationalism | Kanika Gauba 10. It’s Time to Bring Kashmir’s ‘Miserable Guillotine’ Out from the Shadows | Shakir Mir 11. 'If you stop water to Pakistan, you will flood J&K' 12. Recent Publication: Pashtun Identity and Geopolitics in Southwest Asia - Pakistan and Afghanistan since 9/11 by Iftikhar H. Malik 13. ‘Vindictive’ Polish leaders using new war museum to rewrite history, says academic | Alex Duval Smith 14. Russian Academy of Education President Wants Bible, Not Tolstoy, in Curriculum 15. Book Review: Silina on DeHaan, 'Stalinist City Planning: Professionals, Performance, and Power' ======================================== 1. COMMENTARY ON INDIA - PAKISTAN WAR TALK - A SELECT COMPILATION (SEPT - OCT 2016) ======================================== News analysis and commentary in India and Pakistan about rising din for war . . . http://www.sacw.net/article12962.html ======================================== 2. ESCALATING WAR HYSTERIA IN PAKISTAN AND INDIA - JOINT STATEMENT BY SOUTH ASIAN WOMEN JOURNALISTS ======================================== We, the undersigned, members of South Asian Women in Media (SAWM), condemn the escalating war hysteria in Pakistan and India http://www.sacw.net/article12963.html ======================================== 3. SAHR STATEMENT ON THE POSTPONEMENT OF THE SAARC SUMMIT ======================================== South Asians for Human Rights (SAHR), a regional network of human rights defenders, is deeply concerned about the postponement of the 19th South Asian Association of Regional Cooperation (SAARC) summit which was scheduled to be held in Pakistan in November 2016. http://www.sacw.net/article12957.html ======================================== 4. INDIA: RANCHI DECLARATION - PLAN OF ACTION ADOPTED AT NATIONAL CONVENTION ON RIGHT TO FOOD & WORK (SEPT 2016) ======================================== The notes from all the plenary sessions and workshops are being compiled and a comprehensive declaration as well as resolutions and report will be shared soon. The points that have been included here are the immediate action points that emerged and were ratified in the final plenary of the 6th National Convention on Right to Food & Work which was held from the 23 – 25 September, 2016 at Gossner Middle School, Ranchi http://www.sacw.net/article12964.html ======================================== 5. INDIA: COMMUNALLY MOTIVATED PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO THE CITIZENSHIP ACT, 1955 ======================================== The proposed amendment to India’s Citizenship Act, 1955 has raised grave concern among democratic circles in Assam and in other parts of the country. http://www.sacw.net/article12956.html ======================================== 6. INDIA: SAHMAT STATEMENT ON ATTACK ON CENTRAL UNIVERSITY OF HARYANA ======================================== That the staging of a play written by the renowned writer and activist, Mahasweta Devi, would lead to questions, inquiry and ‘trouble’ for two teachers of the English department of the Central University of Haryana, Snehsata and Manoj Kumar is very hard to digest and must be condemned in the strongest of terms. http://www.sacw.net/article12961.html ======================================== 7. RECENT ON COMMUNALISM WATCH: ======================================== - India - Madhya Pradesh: 8 cops pay the price for daring to arrest RSS leader - Kashmir Imbroglio 2016 - India: Institutional heads giving in to thought policing - India: Press Statement on the prejudiced NHRC report on Kairana - India: Hindutva Icon Deendayal Upadhyaya Being Resurrected by Modi's Govt - India: Justice for Akhlaq . . .(Editorial, The Times of India, 29 Sept 2016) - Announced new film Kairan, Surkkhiyon ke Baad...' (Kairana, After the Headlines...) - 'unfortunate that the prime minister of India, Narendra Modi, decided to invoke the idea of purification in a speech' - Editorial, The Telegraph (28 Sept 2016) - India: Protest Call Against Communally Motivated Proposed Amendments to the Citizenship Act, 1955 - [29 Sept, New Delhi] - India: How the state nurtures the gau rakshaks of Haryana (Ishan Marvel's report in The Caravan) -> available via: http://communalism.blogspot.com/ ::: URLs & FULL TEXT ::: ======================================== 8. BANGLADESH IS BUILDING A DIRTY AND EXPENSIVE COAL PLANT NEXT TO THE WORLD’S LARGEST MANGROVE FOREST by Shahzad Uddin (The Conversation - September 27, 2016) ======================================== https://tinyurl.com/h8z69cl ======================================== 9. FORGETTING PARTITION: CONSTITUTIONAL AMNESIA AND NATIONALISM by Kanika Gauba ======================================== (Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 51, Issue No. 39, 24 Sep, 2016) Kanika Gauba (kanika.gauba[at]nludelhi.ac.in) is an independent researcher and has taught constitutional law at the Tamil Nadu National Law School, Tiruchirappalli. History’s silence resonates in the textual silence of the Indian Constitution on the immense scale of violence and exodus accompanying the partition of the subcontinent, despite the contemporaneity of partition and constitution writing. Clearly discernible on a closer reading of the Constituent Assembly's debates are implicit influences of partition on key constitutional decisions, such as citizenship, political safeguards for religious minorities and provisions creating a strong central tendency in the union. The constitutional memory of partition, as a freak occurrence for which the "outsider" was to be blamed, resembles the understanding of official historiography. Behind these common registers of memory lie powerful nationalist narratives of identity and unity, which indicate a deep and abiding connection between constitutional amnesia and nationalism. http://www.epw.in/journal/2016/39/special-articles/forgetting-partition.html ======================================== 10. IT’S TIME TO BRING KASHMIR’S ‘MISERABLE GUILLOTINE’ OUT FROM THE SHADOWS by Shakir Mir ======================================== (The Wire - 26 September 2016) When the struggle against the tormentor becomes a torment itself, it is imperative to speak out. A man stands under the half open shutters of a shop after a night of clashes between protesters and security forces in Srinagar as the city remains under curfew following weeks of violence in Kashmir. Credit: REUTERS A man stands under the half open shutters of a shop after a night of clashes between protesters and security forces in Srinagar as the city remains under curfew following weeks of violence in Kashmir. Credit: Reuters Srinagar: On a warm morning a few weeks ago, the city was uncharacteristically serene. The previous night’s protests had died down, giving way to a tranquil dawn. But outside my home in an old part of town, a loud bang woke me up. I thrust my head out, eyes half-closed with sleep. A knot of young men, their heads and faces wrapped in cloth, had gathered around a grocery store whose owner had been tending to a line of customers. In a flash, one of the men lifted a thick lathi into the air and brought it down with full force. It struck hard. The first blow was furious, as was every blow after. The reason? By opening his shop, the grocer had defied the state of collective defiance in the Valley. His act was seen as an affront to those who willingly incurred losses, inflicting harm on themselves in the hope that it would push India into giving up Kashmir. From a distance, I saw his wife running towards him. Sobbing, she pleaded for mercy with the assailants before herself passing out. The men left. The neighbourhood women eased her into their arms, offering her water, while the men watched impotently, muttering curses between their teeth. For over two months, the Valley of Kashmir has been convulsed by chaos. The trigger was the death of a popular militant leader. Though it is said that he had not mounted a single attack, the purpose of his killing is being questioned. He had been part of a media blitz for over a year, yet the security forces never sought to close in on him. The month before he was killed, he released two back-t-back video messages. In one, he aspires to carve Kashmir into an Islamic Caliphate and in the other, he promises attacks in case Jammu and Kashmir policemen don’t come over to his side. Whatever the reason, the decision to kill Wani turned out to be a terrible error of judgment. It mobilised thousands and thousands of people, spurring both peaceful protests and widespread instances of rioting – leading to the death of over 80 people, and injuries to 12,000, of which more than 5,000 are police and CRPF personnel. The government is facing protests of the kind it does not know how to bottle. In trying to, it ended up committing terrible acts of brutality upon the civilian population using pump action guns, firearms, clubs and what have you. But then, there is a reason why I began my essay with an incident so out of keeping with events as we know them. A few days ago, Hurriyat leader Syed Ali Geelani reiterated his message that azadi was round the corner. He asked people to keep steadfast and persevere until it drew nearer and nearer. The more roads we fill, the more rocks we hurl, the closer it is getting. But is it? On the contrary, we have embarked upon a great slide into a dead-end and azadi is yet to show up across the horizon. It hasn’t and in fact, never will. Not at least till another cataclysmic event embroils South Asia, dismembering the powerful nation states of today, leaving a fertile ground for smaller states to seek their separate nationhood. Britain did not relinquish control over India until it felt the crippling pain of World War II – never mind how “steadfast” was India’s struggle for freedom. The current groundswell in Kashmir is spontaneous. There can be no two views about this. Separatist leaders have wielded formidable influence but they can do so only as long as they don’t stop mouthing platitudes that are palatable to a large section of the pubic. For instance, if the Hurriyat even tinkers with its protest calendars – to make them more flexible for daily wagers and businesses, perhaps – protesters will cut them down to size. That is perhaps why even on Eid, the compendium of hartals followed the same course as on other days. Spectre of public fatigue The truth is that even the separatists are caught between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, they cannot show so much as the merest sign of exhaustion. On the other, the spectre of public fatigue has risen all around them. The craving for a normal life is beginning to take hold among a cross-section of people as they come to terms with the futility of self-harm. Anger against India is fine. Nursing dreams of azadi is too. But how long can one do so at the altar of one’s own livelihood? The police will succeed in breaking the cycle of violence. They did so in 2010, allowing the anger to dissipate, rather slide, beneath an illusion of normalcy – only to turn effervescent again and re-emerge out through the cracks, drowning Kashmir afresh. All it needed was a trigger and there were always plenty of those. The bedrock of the secessionist movement has always been the angst stemming from atrocities Indian soldiers commit. The movement is intrinsically unsustainable once the dynamic of the “oppressive military presence” is taken out of the equation. The fatigue couldn’t be more apparent when recently, despite announcing that fruit growers have sworn allegiance to the Hurriyat and are ready to bear losses, it suddenly turned out that 8876 metric tons of fruit had been hauled off in 953 truckloads outside the state in the first half of August alone. There is no telling what mark it touched thereafter. The separatists have channelised public anguish in a direction into which it is destined to peter out. Had it not been so, the situation of the 1990s would have reigned till today. The violence that flared in 2008 and 2010 would not have ended either. This is not because fellow Kashmiris are prone towards treachery or that their conscience is shallow but because human beings are hardwired to not want to live by violence for too long. The bedrock of the secessionist movement has always been the angst stemming from atrocities Indian soldiers commit. When the excesses halt, so does the angst and every other consequence it had branched off into. The movement is intrinsically unsustainable once the dynamic of the “oppressive military presence” is taken out of the equation. A case in point is what happened on August 29, when the authorities lifted curfew for the first time since it was imposed on July 8. The response surprised everyone. Besides the re-eruption of protests across Kashmir, people came out in hordes in those areas which saw incredibly lower levels of violence – such as Srinagar. Traffic trickled past the streets once again and store owners lifted their shutters. By evening, the situation had all reversed. Frequent mob attacks coerced people into scaling back. So scandalised was Geelani by what had happened, he openly warned shopkeepers the next day that if they acted “traitorous”, they would be “wiped out like straw.” In one fell swoop, the ageing leader also alienated thousands of taxi drivers and auto-wallas when he accused them of acting on India’s behest and receiving bounty for taking out their vehicles to commit an act no less sinful than scraping together a living. I asked an ardent pro-azadi friend to show me this stash of money which the ‘deviant’ and ‘corrupt’ taxi drivers were drawing cash from. “I will tell a couple of auto-walla acquaintances so that they don’t have to starve,” I told him, tongue firmly in cheek. He smote his brows together before mumbling a few unintelligible words and leaving in a huff. I smiled inwardly, both at his naivety and the utter irony of the moment. For India, Kashmiri protestors can only be provocateurs driven by Pakistan and Hurriyat to instigate trouble. For their part, the Hurriyat see ordinary Kashmiris who are desperate to make a living in trying times as “Indian agents” – entrusted by Delhi to “derail the movement.” Both sides see events though their own black and white vision, overlooking the real people out there with aspirations spanning a million shades of gray. After a clash with protesters. Credit: Danish Ismail/Reuters To assuage concerns about the downside of prolonged shutdowns, separatist leaders floated the nebulous idea of ‘bait-ul-maals’, where volunteers collect resources food, clothes and money, offering them to the poor. But how far is this going to give succour? I witnessed the rather extraordinary zeal with which people tended to this business. One of my relatives, Muqadas, presides over one of those in our locality in Srinagar. The other day, I happened to snoop into a bagful of stuff he had put together. I saw rice noodles, loaves of bread, milk cartons and biscuits. I admired his spirit. He had spent so much time putting together this assistance – that will last little more than a day before miseries come full circle. Muqadas has two sons. Currently, he is jobless. Outside his house, he might have held his head high with an august air, but inside, his wife’s mind is a jumble of worries. She is grappling with the rising torrent of needs she finds hard to meet. “I worry about him,” she tells me, casting a glance at her son. I realised she was pulling things off with the skin of her teeth and soon would have to give up whatever little “luxuries” she had for the grudging embrace of a new life, harsher and austere. She may be sliding into poverty on account of the unrest but is not yet poor enough to feel entitled to charity. Her mind often alternates between abiding wilfully to the shutdown programmes and feeling plagued by thoughts of the grim prospects awaiting her children should the turbulence prolong. She has a great passion for the Pakistani cricket team. She will brook no word against Geelani saab, yet in this “jubilant” ride towards azadi, she hadn’t signed up of her own accord. Never mind though, her consent doesn’t matter. It never will. Muqadas’s may be the story of one family but it is also a microcosm of the entire situation playing out around him. Besides, bait-ul-maals have not been immune to criticism. Kashmir Images, a regional English daily in Srinagar, published a story about drivers unable to make the monthly instalment on their vehicles as the unrest had out their livelihood on hold. Apparently, the idea of living on somebody else’s dole didn’t sit well with them. Ensuring compliance There is no telling how many attacks by “protesters” of the kind I saw have ensured that people observe the shutdowns. The assailants are partly emboldened by their leaders’ refusal to denounce violence in its entirety. Since the attackers don’t wear their identity on their sleeves, it is easy to disown them once they engage in acts of vandalism. They spring out of thin air, assault those they feel are not compliant enough, and then recede in the vacuum into which no hand ever reaches them. They embody Victor Hugo’s ‘miserable guillotine’ which, he once wrote, is “furtive, uneasy, shameful, which seems always afraid of being caught in the act, so quickly does it disappear after having dealt its blow.” Mirwaiz Umer Farooq recently issued a press release condemning vandals who attacked business owners at time when the protest calendar permits “relaxation.” In his telling, the assailants were naturally “Indian agents”, since real protesters are incapable of wrongdoing. There was no word against attacks that happen when “relaxation” was not in effect, implying that the ‘guillotine‘ had their full backing. Curiously, in the run up to Eid, the attacks registered a sudden uptick. On September 11, driver Parvaiz Dar of Lalad, Sopore sustained grievous head injuries when a furious mob taught him a “lesson” for defying the shutdown near Batengoo in Anantnag. The following day, young Mehraj-ud-din Chopan tried to plead with lathi-wielding young men to let him through an impromptu barrier they had erected at Booru Nagam road in Chadoora, Budgam. The attackers swung their clubs on him. Grievously injured in the head, Chopan was later hospitalised. On September 14, a protesting mob gutted a tourist cafeteria at Awantipora town. The next evening, they torched a Panchayat garh at Pinglish village in Tral. On the same day, commuter Shabir Dar was intercepted by young “protesters” at Kunzer near Tangmarg. Furious at his disregard for the shutdown call, the boys set themselves upon him. Dar’s skin was swollen pink, his car smashed. Infuriated, his father Mohammad Sultan later slammed his fist at the table of a police officer, demanding sterner action. File photo of protests that erupted after the killing of militant commander Burhan Wani. Credit: Danish Ismail/Reuters File photo of protests that erupted after the killing of militant commander Burhan Wani. Credit: Danish Ismail/Reuters The previous night, the mob had also set ablaze a government school at Kanjikullah in Yaripora, Kulgam. Interestingly, this came just days after minister Nayeem Akhtar faced mounting criticism for stationing the army in schools and colleges. But in this case, nobody could summon nerves enough to utter so much as a whimper of protest. There is no knowing how far the anarchy has deepened. These are just a handful of incidents that made it to the news. In the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain writes, “The pitifulest thing out is a mob; that’s what an army is – a mob; they don’t fight with courage that is born in them, but with courage that’s borrowed from their mass.” I have seen people giving in to this surrogate courage that is “borrowed from the mass.” But a discord against it is beginning to rear its head, nonetheless. Recently, protests spread throughout Lal Chowk when some reports claimed that locals fished out a “pellet-riddled” body of a “teen” from the Jhelum. Not unsurprisingly, the news was enough to send bands of young men out from their streets and gullies to have it out with the police while demanding storekeepers and businesses down their shutters. In fact, the protesters vowed against permitting a “relaxation” ever again. But later it turned out that the body belonged to a “non-Kashmiri, non-Muslim” victim, who did not bear any pellet injuries but had a bloodied, disfigured face. I wondered where the impetuousness came from. What drove it? Had people waited an hour more for clarity, we would have been spared another session of clashes with the police and another multitude of injured children. But then, who is interested in steering clear of violent means anyways? Kashmir’s child soldiers On Teachers Day, two weeks ago, Javaid Trali, a friend and affiliate of the ruling party, jocularly took to his Facebook, writing, “#HappyTeachersDay to @sageelani, @MirwaizKashmir & Co from children on streets for teaching them how stone age looks like, practically.” Trali opened a can of worms. His comment was not off the mark, but given the truth that it was under the government’s orders that the police fired pellet guns, it was a morally tenuous line to simply exculpate the authorities while alleging that separatists were solely to blame. He received an angry comment from a person who wrote, “And thanks to you and your government teaching kids what darkness looks like because they’re blinded by you.” There were also others who wrote as much. I could not disagree with their point of view. Their words were profound and truthful. But when they tried casting all pellet-hit children as mere passive victims of the “offensive raged by the Indian state”, it became problematic. I have never come across a single instance where separatist leaders issued counsel, dissuading children from joining violent mobs. Had they done so, the children would have been alright today. The other day, I happened to walk past a famous crossroad in the old city. I saw a troop of children not more than 7, hurling stones and shouting pro-Pakistan slogans at policemen. The cops were merely lounging against the balustrade, grinning in their dismissal of the little, harmless protesters. Their task was something else – to not let the real assailants assemble. A little while later, a group of older boys joined the kids, seething with fury and in no mood to play around. Anticipating a threat, it was then that the police snapped out of their reverie and prepped their anti-riot regalia. I left the scene. I don’t know what happened later. The same evening, I came across a Facebook video in which children pumped their fists in the air, wielding ‘guns’ and sloganeering while marching past a police station near the Shaheed Gunj area of Srinagar, barely two miles away from the secretariat. I marveled at how callous the enablers of violence can be in letting those children push closer to the vortex of death. Granted that cops fighting protests are just angry bulls let loose, but where is the word of caution? Why is it we feel sorry for children only after they turn into a lifeless mass of pockmarked bodies? Why not do something to stem this possibility beforehand? I have never come across a single instance where separatist leaders issued counsel, dissuading children from joining violent mobs. Had they done so, the children would have been alright today. And reading and studying. And preparing for exams. There was always plenty of room to get our act together and preclude the possibility of children falling prey to the security forces. Unless someone, somewhere calculated that dead children, bloodied children, wounded and disfigured children are a potent way of transmitting a political message. The last person to try sounding a word of caution, Maulvi Showkat Ahmad Shah, found himself blown up by an IED in 2011. Geelani tried to describe this as the Indian army’s doing but was forced to eat humble pie after a militant group owned up the “mistake.” This enlisting of children within the ranks of stone-pelters led a Kashmiri friend Rajesh Razdan to post this profound anecdote on Facebook: “In the nineties African despots pushed children as young as eight into their dirty civil wars and the word ‘child soldiers’ entered the lexicon. What we see today on the streets are the child soldiers of Kashmir. In 2006 Thomas Lubango Dyilo, leader of the Union of Congolese Patriots, was charged with three counts by the ICC [International Criminal Court] related to the military use of children in Congo. The charges were: Enlisting children, constituting a war crime in violation of article 8(2)(b)(xxvi) of the Rome Statute of the ICC; Conscription of children, constituting a war crime in violation of article 8(2)(b)(xxvi) of the Rome Statute; Using children to participate in hostilities, constituting a war crime in violation of article 8(2)(b)(xxvi) of the Rome Statute. In 2012, Dyilo was convicted and sentenced to 14 years in prison. Yet, our Dyilos remain free and are openly enlisting every day. About time those who invoke the UN day in and day out are frog-marched in front of the ICC.” Spontaneous protests, calibrated violence Another curious aspect of the current unrest is the pattern of violence. While the peaceful protests happen of their own freewill, large violent confrontations have borne the unmistakable imprints of fine-tuning. My narration is not intended to efface, falsify or minimise the brutalities committed by the government in the name of fighting violence. It is in India’s own interests to restrain its security forces and mete out justice. Take for example the first week of September, when the all-party delegation arrived. The very day the MPs landed in Srinagar, there was a sudden ratcheting up of the violence. A staggering 600 protesters sustained injuries, 500 in south Kashmir alone whereas just three days earlier, only 20 injuries had been recorded. What happened in the intermediate period that the number of injuries rose so swiftly? If the Hurriyat’s allegations are to be trusted, the police and military had vandalised the venues where rallies were scheduled to take place, which fanned the anger, stoking clashes. But the police had been dismantling such preparations for almost a week prior to that. On September 2, the police raided a similar venue in Badasgam village in Kokernag. The number of injuries was much lower. Two days after the delegation left, the police raided many more venues At Kellar in Shopian it intercepted one where ensuing clashes left 24 injured, and another at Lassipora village in Pulwama where 30 people sustained injuries. So what exactly happened on September 5 when more protesters sustained wounds than they normally would? What were the orchestrators trying to demonstrate on the very day that the grand delegation of MPs was visiting, and to whom? The time for justice Great caution ought to be exercised before somebody prescribes solutions for ending the bloodbath in Kashmir. There is no one singular perpetrator in the current crisis whom we can simply restrain in order to restore calm. If there is a sincere endeavour to end violence in Kashmir, the effort has to be a mutual one. Soon enough, Kashmir will have to retrace its steps towards fragile normalcy or slide irrevocably into anarchy, devastation and gloom. And when we finally wake up, the extent of damage fully registering itself on our consciousness, we will realise the debris surrounding us is no one else’s but our own. This is not to say that I am giving the Indian government’s murderous actions in Kashmir moral sanctity. I would not have written this essay had the need not pinched me enough. The atrocities that the security forces commit are too many to train focus on anything else. But when the struggle against the tormentor becomes a torment itself, it is imperative to speak out. My narration is not intended to stake claim on absolute truth telling. It is meant to cast light on an aspect of the unrest which is deliberately ignored. It is not intended to efface, falsify or minimise the brutalities committed by the government in the name of fighting violence. It is in India’s own interests to restrain its security forces and mete out justice. To fully stamp out the protests in Kashmir, it has to do so. Therefore I believe it was in vain that Delhi sent an all-party delegation to Srinagar. The only way it can placate protesters is by ensuring justice and ending the culture of impunity. But for now, it must save Kashmiris from their own kind. Shakir Mir is a journalist from dowtown Sringar ======================================== 11. 'IF YOU STOP WATER TO PAKISTAN, YOU WILL FLOOD J&K' ======================================== (Rediff.com - September 24, 2016) 'In the last 55 years India and Pakistan have gone to wars, but nobody spoke about scrapping the Indus Waters Treaty.' The hawks in India feel Pakistan needs to be punished post the Uri attacks. Since war is unlikely, eyes are turning towards the over five-decade-old Indus Waters Treaty The treaty, signed in 1960, has been the most successful treaty between India and Pakistan lining out the water sharing arrangement between the two nations. Dr Shakil Ahmad Romshoo, head of the earth sciences, geology and geophysics departments, University of Kashmir, explained to Rediff.com's Syed Firdaus Ashraf why it is not possible to scrap the Indus Waters Treaty. There is a view that India needs to scrap the Indus Waters Treaty and cut off water supply to Pakistan. Is that possible? People who talk about scrapping this treaty have no technical understanding. I don't think it can be done. India is an emerging power and it is aspiring to become a permanent member of the United Nation Security Council, so I don't think you can scrap an international bilateral treaty which also involved the World Bank. In this treaty we have divided six rivers. Three rivers on the eastern front are given to India. On the western side three rivers have been given exclusively to Pakistan. This is a win-win situation. Both countries are happy and this is why the treaty has been working so well for the last 56 years. Will the World Bank step in if India abrogates this treaty? For many reasons it is not possible. Both countries are happy about this treaty. There are so many trans-boundary rivers in the world and countries have to find a mechanism to share water. All over the world the Indus Waters Treaty is referred as our most successful treaty. In the last 55 years India and Pakistan have gone to wars in 1965 then 1971 and Kargil too, but nobody spoke in past about scrapping this treaty. At this moment we are sharing water with Bangladesh and Nepal too. If we scrap this treaty we will scare these countries as well. So you should check out who is talking about scrapping this treaty. These are military generals or hawks. I don't think officially this is India's position. Vikas Swarup, the ministry of external affairs spokesperson, hinted at this. He said treaties depend on goodwill. That is what he said. That's all. And that is a fact. India and Pakistan are in conflict over Kashmir and you can't open another front. I don't think we can afford to do that now. There is lot of insecurity in Pakistan too because they feel India is controlling the water despite the fact that this treaty is running very well. I have not heard anyone in Pakistan talking about scrapping this treaty because I believe they cannot get anything better than this treaty. There is a belief that scrapping this treaty would teach Pakistan a lesson. Technically, it is not possible. Even if you put infrastructure to do so, it will take you 10 to 15 years to build (canals to divert the water). J&K is a mountainous state and you will have to build canals to take the water out of the state. Can you explain how many rivers flow from India to Pakistan? There are six rivers. On the eastern front we have the Sutlej, Beas and Ravi for which rights have been given exclusively to India in the treaty. On the western front we have the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab. The rights of these rivers are given to Pakistan except the fact that some water is used from these rivers for J&K for the purpose of hydropower generation, for domestic use and for agriculture. The rest of the water is released to Pakistan. What can be the implications for Pakistan if we stop the water? You cannot do that and let us assume we stop the water supply for the sake of argument. Where would the water go? We do not have infrastructure to store this water. We have not build dams in J&K where we can store the water. And being a mountainous state, unlike Tamil Nadu or Karnataka, you cannot move water to another state. So you cannot stop water technically. Take another example of water flowing from Uttarakhand or Himachal Pradesh. We do not leave this water to Pakistan, but use it in Rajasthan. Will there be flooding in India if we stop the river waters from entering Pakistan? Yes, the Kashmir valley will flood as will Jammu. You just don't have the storage capacity. We never developed diversion canals which could have taken this water to some other state. In Kashmir you do not need too much water for irrigation purposes. If you look at the Indus Waters Treaty, India is entitled to store water, but has failed to develop that infrastructure in J&K. The People's Democratic Party, which currently rules Jammu and Kashmir, has always stated that J&K suffers losses because of the Indus Waters Treaty. That is a different aspect. If you see this treaty you will find that the people of J&K can use the water for non-consumption. We can use it for electricity. We cannot have dam projects. Even the National Conference had argued that this treaty was negotiated during 1960 and that the people of J&K were not taken into confidence and their government should be given compensation. These political parties were objecting because there are several restrictions on the usage of water. What is the role of the Indus commissioner? This treaty has set up a very good grievances redressal mechanism. Each country has its commissioner. If there is a dispute these two commissioners meet to sort out the problem. If they cannot reach an agreement, then they go to the foreign secretary level and failing that, the government. If the problem is not solved there as well, then they go to a neutral expert. That neutral expert panel is decided by these two countries. In the past neutral experts were from Europe and the US. Now even if they fail, then the issue goes to the International Court of Justice. Recently, we went to a neutral expert for the Kishanganga project in J&K where the decision went in India's favour. However, on appeal, the case went to the court of arbitration where the decision went in Pakistan's favour. Syed Firdaus Ashraf / Rediff.com ======================================== 12. PUBLICATION ANNOUNCEMENT: PASHTUN IDENTITY AND GEOPOLITICS IN SOUTHWEST ASIA ======================================== Pashtun Identity and Geopolitics in Southwest Asia Pakistan and Afghanistan since 9/11 Iftikhar H. Malik Innovative study which brings together brings together Pakistan and Afghanistan as two inseparable entities for the first time. Imprint: Anthem Press Hardback ISBN 9781783084944 July 2016 | 286 Pages | 229 x 152mm / 9 x 6 | 2 maps About This Book "Tied together by policy making circles for strategic purposes and referred to in modern day geo-political parlance as Af-Pak, the region widely known as South West Asia has a rich cultural past and civilizational commonalities which have been aptly brought out in this important new contribution by one of Pakistan's most accomplished and prolific scholars." —Ali Usman Qasmi, Lahore University of Management Sciences ‘Pashtun Identity and Geopolitics in Southwest Asia’ brings together Pakistan and Afghanistan as two inseparable entities by investigating areas such as the evolution and persistence of the Taliban, quest for Pashtun identity, the ambivalent status of the tribal region and the state of civic clusters on both sides. In addition to their relations with the United States and the EU, a due attention has been devoted to regional realties while looking at relations with India and China. The study explores vital disciplines of ethnography, history, Islamic studies, and international relations and benefits from a wide variety of source material. The volume takes into account the salient subjects including political Islam, nature and extent of violence since 9/11, failure of Western policies in the region, the Drone warfare, and the emergence of new regimes in Kabul, Islamabad and Delhi offering fresh opportunities as well as new threat perceptions. Author Information Iftikhar H. Malik is Professor of History at Bath Spa University and a historian of South Asia, Political Islam, and Muslim Diaspora communities. Table of Contents Introduction; 1. Gandhara Lands: Wrestling with Pashtun Identity and History; 2. Imperial Hubris: The Afghan Taliban in Ascendance; 3. Masculinities in Conflict: Western Pedagogy and the Return of the Afghan Taliban; 4. Understanding Pakistan: Geopolitical Legacies and Perspectives on Violence; 5. Locating Civic Sentiments and Movements in Pakistan: Stalemated Cycle, or a Way Forward?; 6. The United States and Pakistan: Friends or Foes!; 7. The European Union and Southwest Asia: Perceptions, Policies and Permutations; Conclusion: Pashtun Troubled Lands, Uncertain Southwest Asia, or a New Beginning ======================================== 13. ‘VINDICTIVE’ POLISH LEADERS USING NEW WAR MUSEUM TO REWRITE HISTORY, SAYS ACADEMIC by Alex Duval Smith ======================================== (The Guardian - 24 April 2016 A £72m prestige cultural project is caught in the crossfire between ‘xenophobic’ politicians and historians Alex Duval Smith in Warsaw A spectacular new museum of the second world war is at the centre of an extraordinary row between international academics and Poland’s political leadership, amid claims that the country’s ruling Law and Justice party is putting history at the service of politics. Due to open in December in the northern city of Gdańsk, the museum is billed as one of Europe’s prestige cultural projects for 2016. It comprises 13 storeys – six of them underground – and has been built at a cost of £72m. Dozens of countries across Europe and beyond have donated artefacts, including a Sherman tank and a Soviet T34 tank. The British historian Norman Davies, who is revered in Poland for his many books about the country, has been closely associated with the project for eight years and heads its high-ranking international advisory board. He told the Observer that attempts by the Law and Justice government to hijack the museum are “Bolshevik’’ in style and “paranoid’’. He said: “The Law and Justice government does not want a bunch of foreign historians to decide what goes on in ‘their’ museum.’’ The Oxford-based academic said one of the driving forces behind government hostility towards the project in its present form was Law and Justice strongman Jarosław Kaczyński, “who runs everything like a personal politburo.’’ There is also increasing evidence that a new “politics of memory” policy is being used to settle scores with political rivals, such as the former Solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa and the European council president Donald Tusk, prime minister of Poland at the time of the Smolensk air disaster that killed Lech Kaczyński, Jarosław’s twin brother. Both men are particularly associated with the city of Gdańsk. A government move to take control of the new museum appears to have been long planned. Soon after coming to power last autumn – when the new museum was almost complete – the Law and Justice government announced the creation of another museum in Gdańsk, at Westerplatte, where the first shots of the second world war were fired. Last week culture minister and deputy prime minister Piotr Gliński said he was considering merging the flagship museum with the as-yet-unbuilt Westerplatte museum. “This way he would create a new institution, with a new director,” and ultimately take control of both museums, said a spokesperson for Gdańsk city hall. Davies said he believed the moves against the second world war museum were coming directly from Kaczyński. “He is behaving like a Bolshevik and a paranoid troublemaker. Law and Justice are the most vindictive gang in Europe. Gdańsk is a particular target because of the association with Wałęsa and Solidarity, and Tusk, who is Gdańsk-born, is a history graduate and laid the foundation stone of the museum. Kaczyński was in Solidarity and managed Wałęsa’s election campaign before he became president of Poland [in 1990]. Wałęsa sidelined him, and Kaczyński has been planning his revenge ever since.’’ The historian said that the permanent exhibition planned for the museum was a “complete narrative of 1939-1945’’, put together by an advisory board with experience of building museums. “It is strongly about Europe, with an emphasis on the war as it concerned Poland. There is a substantial section about the Holocaust.’’ Kaczyński, who engineered his party’s landslide parliamentary election victory last October, has devised a “politics of memory’’ policy that aims to highlight Polish heroism and sacrifice throughout history. Last month the opening of a museum in Markowa commemorating the bravery of the Ulma family in saving their Jewish neighbours was fast-tracked. In a measure of the importance of the event for the government, the opening ceremony at the tiny homestead museum was simultaneously translated into five languages and streamed to Polish embassies in 17 countries. In a further move under the “politics of memory’’ banner, the government has proposed legislation that would punish the use of the phrase “Polish death camps’’ where “Nazi German death camps’’ is more accurate. Poland’s chief rabbi, Michael Schudrich, said: “It is hurtful for all Poles to hear of Polish death camps. It sounds like the Poles did it. They didn’t. The Germans did. This government wants to emphasis the positive things Poles did during the war. “The question is, will they de-emphasise the denouncements that occurred? Will they emphasise the righteous Gentiles while forgetting the informers? We do not know yet.’’ Last week the Princeton historian Jan Tomasz Gross – who wrote in September 2015 that Poles during the second world war killed more Jews than they killed Germans – was questioned by a prosecutor on the charge of “insulting the nation’’. The “politics of memory’’ policy has its own department in the ministry of culture and in part depends for its daily running upon measures, condemned by the United States and a range of European bodies and officials, to control the media, the internet and the judiciary. When state television broadcast the Oscar-winning Polish film Ida, the screening was preceded by a 12-minute warning to viewers of alleged historical inaccuracies “The ‘politics of memory’ policy appears to work largely by insinuation,” said Davies. “When I first heard about it 20 years ago, I thought it was aimed at picking up what the Soviets had left out of Polish history. Fair enough. But now that Law and Justice is in government, we are seeing it as it is: a xenophobic attempt to rewrite history. As a historian you can’t help but see the parallels: the [communist] Polish People’s Republic had a ‘history policy’, and here we go again.’’ The ministry of culture and two Law and Justice politicians did not respond to the Observer’s request for comment. ======================================== 14. RUSSIAN ACADEMY OF EDUCATION PRESIDENT WANTS BIBLE, NOT TOLSTOY, IN CURRICULUM ======================================== (Moscow Times - Sep. 30 2016) The president of the Russian Academy of Education says it might be time to drop Leo Tolstoy’s “War and Peace,” as well as several of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s most famous works, from the country’s school curriculum. Lyudmila Verbitskaya, who also serves as the deputy chairperson of the Russian Literature Society, told the Moskva news agency that she wants to replace these readings with more accessible spiritual writings, such as the Bible. “These are deep philosophical works with serious discussions about different topics,” Verbitskaya said. “A child can’t understand their full depth.” Addressing what should take the place of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, Verbitskaya raised the need for spiritual education: “I think that the course of the school curriculum should include works of spiritual literature, but we need to decide which exactly. Everyone, I think, should read the Bible. This is spiritual and moral education — it’s [our] moral foundations.” The Russian Academy of Education is currently debating recommendations to make to the country’s education officials regarding curriculum. Verbitskaya says the academy has yet to finalize its list. ======================================== 15. BOOK REVIEW: SILINA ON DEHAAN, 'STALINIST CITY PLANNING: PROFESSIONALS, PERFORMANCE, AND POWER' ======================================== Heather D. DeHaan. Stalinist City Planning: Professionals, Performance, and Power. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2012. 272 pp. $72.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-1-4426-4534-9. Reviewed by Maria Silina (Université du Québec à Montréal / Research Institute for Theory and History of Fine Arts, Russian Academy of Arts, Moscow, Russia.) Published on H-Russia (September, 2016) Commissioned by Hanna Chuchvaha Heather D. DeHaan's monograph is devoted to the city planning of the Avtozavod district of Nizhny Novrogod (Gorky from 1932 to 1990) that was undertaken in its most dramatic moment in Soviet history. It began in 1928-31 with the series of ambitious avant-garde projects which aimed to build an ideal socialist city and ended with the 1935-39 bombastic projects of representative ensembles that were destined never to come to life. The author’s aim is to emphasize the role of experts in creating a Stalinist city and to scrutinize the “tensions between technological (expert-led) and sociological (class-driven) transformations” (p. 14). In order to achieve this goal DeHaan considers three main topics: 1) the symbolic and representational dimension of the totalitarian state, a domain which is well established in Slavic studies due to the seminal works of Catherina Clark, Evgeny Dobrenko, and others; 2) the expert’s role in making Stalinist culture; and 3) a close-up study of the local institutional history of city planning. The latter two themes are less studied in Western scholarship and discussed only by contemporary Russian scholars.[1] To address the available literature on expert’s role in city planning, we should mention the works of Yulia Kosenkova, which are the most important sources on Soviet planning, construction laws, and institutional history.[2] Evgenia Konysheva has published in Russian and German on socialist city planning in Magnitogorsk, Cheliabinsk, Orsk, and other cities.[3] In his publications, Mark Meerovich also considers planning, urbanization, and mass housing in industrial centers as seen from a social-economic perspective.[4] The detailed studies of local histories of Soviet planning and architecture that contribute to a more nuanced understanding of the mechanisms of Stalinist culture-making and the institutional history of architecture and city planning in the dominantly industrial cities of Western Siberia,[5] such as Yekaterinburg (former Sverdlovsk),[6] Samara,[7] and others, are of particular interest. This list of books, published predominantly in Russian, shows the great bibliographical importance of DeHaan’s research devoted to the planning of Nizhny Novgorod/Gorky in the 1920s and the 1930s. Divided into seven chapters, the book starts with the symbolic cityscape that embraces the development of architecture from Peter the Great to the October Revolution of 1917 and ends with a narrative on city life metaphorically portrayed as a theatrical scene and examined through a description of the spectacular mass and semi-volunteer beautification of the city. These mass mobilizations were widely used throughout the 1930s to conceal the failure of the systematic approach to solve the continual urban problems of Nizhny Novgorod/Gorky. The focus on urban identity and ritualization practices is especially pronounced in chapter 4, which narrates, as the author calls it, the Stalinist “iconographic vision” of city representation (1935-38). The author provides valuable data on the practices of local Gorky authorities, who aimed to include in local cityscapes monumental and impractical designs crafted in and for Moscow, a practice that became routine in Soviet city planning for years.[8] The use of metaphorical language of theatrical performance--“the drama of building socialism” (p. 16)--still follows the concept of Stalinism as an avant-garde creative project, offered and developed by Boris Groys. It seems that allusions and references to theater are popular in Soviet studies because the chaos and anarchy of city management appears to be too confusing for scholars to take a closer look at the complex reality that was a mixture of Communist Party ideological imperatives, spontaneous and irregular administrative and institutional reforms, and professional ambitions. The author, however, proposes a more nuanced and intuitive approach to the history of Soviet city planning by opening the discussion of agency in constructing Soviet socialist cities. DeHaan aims to escape a straightforward understanding of Stalinism, which is usually seen as a producer of either victims or collaborators. To develop her narrative, DeHaan introduces two heroes: Aleksandr Ivanitskii and Nikolai Solofnenko, the city planners of Nizhny Novgorod/Gorky in 1928-39. As described in chapter 3, Ivanitskii was an experienced planner who received his training before the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. His main project for Avtozavod in Nizhny Novgorod was filtered through the numerous state regulations and was eventually rejected after passing through the sophisticated bureaucratic system of construction offices and governmental departments of various levels. His successor, an inexperienced but politically loyal activist, Nikolai Solofnenko, was a typical vydvizhenets of the Stalinist cultural revolution era (1928-31). Despite their totally different profiles--Ivanitskii as enthusiastic practitioner and Solofnenko as politician--they are both portrayed as persons from the ivory tower of pure science whose professional ambitions were far from practical. This image clashes with another powerful narrative. The two individuals are depicted against the background of the dozen governmental and administrative bodies that are described as antagonistic to the planners’ initiatives. Thus, in the case of Ivanitskii, he was required to demonstrate a great deal of flexibility in proposing both statistically proven and empirically based projects. Even more so, the author clearly indicates that Ivanitskii confronted a persistent lack of funds for his projects, set unrealistic deadlines, and faced a measure of personal responsibility that was life-threatening in the age of the Great Purge. As for Solofnenko, who was put under the pressure of the Stalinist mobilized economy, no authentic plan was designed by him, and references to science he used were only to express his loyalty to Stalin. The account on "scientific" idealism, fairly persistent in Soviet history according to recent research of the similar Almaty case conducted by Catherine Alexander,[9] would be more convincing if the author had included available statistics, tables, and figures produced by the city planners and administrative and governmental bodies responsible for the construction of Gorky, which are absent in the current edition. However, what advances the author’s argument to emphasize the agency of professionals is her detailed analysis of alternative opportunities, emancipatory and resistance strategies of the local authorities and citizens to soften the immense pressure of industry and federal bodies, and the local critique of the representational and unrealistic plans. DeHaan’s examination of the mechanisms of involving political slogans and the rhetoric of civic virtues to provide mass mobilization are very helpful in grasping the everyday life of city planners and construction professionals. The third main theme of the research is the institutionalization of city planning. DeHaan uses a variety of sources from the state to local archives, as well as from the local periodical press that rarely come up in the general literature on the subject. Reborn as a giant site for the in-all-but-name Ford factory, the Avtozavod district of Nizhny Novgorod saw years-long delays during its reconstruction that were typical of Soviet city planning in the 1930s, such as transitions in and the unclear status of city construction, which was transferred from one design organization (Gorproekt) to another (Giprogor), and seemingly endless stages of city plan approval. The book provides the reader with an impressive depiction of numerous conflicting planning, administrative, and scientific bodies[10] that were acting in the face of exclusive attention to industrial construction and total disregard of mass housing. According to Kosenkova, it was typical of Soviet cities, and the construction was often conducted irregularly due to the available capacities, ambitions of local governments and industrial bodies, and disregarding the general plan.[11] In Gorky, this led to the massive construction of poor-quality temporary barracks and unfinished buildings, and enduring problems with city melioration and transportation. The book concludes with an examination of the deeds of the professional experts who failed to fulfill any of the proposed plans for Nizhny Novgorod/Gorky, seen against a polyphonic or even chaotic background of Soviet institutional history, which paradoxically combined weak connections and a strong bureaucratic network along with the immense power of Stalinism to produce rituals and symbols.[12] The reader will find this book a thought-provoking contribution to the contemporary scholarship on Stalinist culture and will admire its author’s desire to eloquently portray experts’ areas of responsibility, the all-embracing Soviet bureaucracy and political slogans, the socialist economy and numerous reforms during the turbulent cultural revolution period and the evolution of institutions and agencies of the Stalinism since the mid-1930s. Heather DeHaan’s book is one of the few studies of local city planning in the Soviet Union accessible in English. This makes the monograph a valuable source for researchers of Soviet architecture and urban history; it also points to the problems that still need to be addressed, such as experts’ agency and the institutional history in art and architecture domains in the USSR. Notes [1]. For some notable exceptions see Paul Stronski, Tashkent: Forging a Soviet City, 1930-1966 (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2010); Harald Bodenschatz, Piero Sassi, and Max Welch Guerra, eds., Urbanism and Dictatorship: A European Perspective, (Basel: Birkhäuser, 2015). On post-Soviet reconstruction see Fabien Bellat, Une ville neuve en URSS Togliatti (Marseille: Parenthèses, 2015); and Karl D. Qualls, Sevastopol From Ruins to Reconstruction: Urban Identity in Soviet Sevastopol after World War II (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2009). [2]. Y. Kosenkova, “Opyt formirovaniia pravovoi osnovy sovetskogo gradostroitel’stva. 1920–1930-е gody,” in Gradostroitel’noe iskusstvo. Novye materialy i issledovaniia (Moscow: Editorial URSS, 2010), 335-351; Y. Kosenkova, Sovetskii gorod 1940- h – pervoi poloviny 1950-h godov. Ot tvorcheskikh poiskov k praktike stroitel’stva, 2nd ed.(Moscow: URSS, 2009). [3]. Evgenija Konyśeva, Mark Meerović, and Thomas Flierl, Linkes Ufer, rechtes Ufer: Ernst May und die Planungsgeschicte von Magnitogorsk (1930–1933) (Berlin: Theater der Zeit, 2014); E. V. Konysheva, Gradostroitel’stvo i arkhitektura Chel’abinska kontsa 1920-h – 1950-h godov v kontekste razvitiia sovetskogo zodchestva (Chel’abinsk: ChGLU, 2005); E. V. Konysheva, “Rabochie poselki i goroda pri ural’skikh promyshlennykh predpriiatiiakh v kontse 1920-h – nachale 1930-h godov: transformatsiia planirovochnykh podkhodov,” Akrhitekturnoe nasledstvo 55 (2011): 375-396; and E. V. Konysheva, “Orsk i Magnitogorsk: nasledie ‘sotsgorodov’ kontsa 1920-h – pervoi poloviny 1930-h godov na Iuzhnom Urale,” Akrhitekturnoe nasledstvo 52 (2010): 311-338. [4]. M. G. Meerovich, E. V. Konysheva, D. S. Khmel’nistkii, Kladbishche sotsgorodov: Gradostroitel’naia politika v SSSR (1928–1932 gg.) (Moscow: RosPen, 2011); M.G. Meerovich, Tipologia zhilishcha sotsgorodov-novostroek (Irkutsk: IGU, 2014); M. G. Meerovich, “Giprogor. Pervye gody deiatel’nosti. K 85-letiiu Gosudarstvennogo tresta po planirovke naselennykh mest i grazhdanskomu proektirovaniiu ‘Giprogor’,” Akrhitekturnoe nasledstvo 61 (2014): 293-312; M. G. Meerovich, “Metodologicheskie osnovania izuchenia urbanizatsii v SSSR,” in Fundamental’nye issledovania RAASN po nauchnomu obespecheniiu razvitiia arkhitektury, gradostroitel’stva i stroitel’noi otrasli Rossiiskoi Federatsii v 2014 godu (Kursk: Delovaia Poligrafiia, 2015), 364-376. [5]. S. S. Dukhanov, “Istoricheskie tsentry novykh promyshlennykh gorodov Zapadnoi Sibiri v 1930-e gody,” Akrhitekturnoe nasledstvo 62 (2015): 303-318; S. S. Dukhanov, “Organizatsiia arkhitekturno-gradostroitel’oi deiatel’nosti v Zapadnoi Sibiri v kontse 1920 – nachale 1930-h godov,” Vestnik TGASU 4, no. 51 (2015): 81-92. [6]. Mikhail Goloborodskii, L’udmila Tokmeninova, and Sergei Sanok, eds. Istoriia general’nogo plana Ekaterinburga, 1723-2013 (Ekaterinburg: TATLIN, 2013). [7]. A. K. Sinel’nik and V. A. Samogorov, Arkhitektura i gradostroitel'stvo Samary 1920-h – nachala 1940-h (Samara: SGASU, 2010). [8]. On Moscow reconstruction as a model of the socialist city, see Katerina Clark, “The ‘New Moscow’ and the New ‘Happiness’: Architecture as a Nodal Point in the Stalinist System of Value,” in Petrified Utopia Happiness Soviet Style, ed. Marina Balina and Evgeny Dobrenko (London: Anthem Press, 2009), 189-200, see also Qualls, From Ruins to Reconstruction, 46-84. [9]. On the scientism of Soviet city planning see C. Alexander, “Soviet and Post-Soviet Planning in Almaty, Kazakhstan,” Critique of Anthropology 27, no. 2 (2007): 165-181. [10]. For a systematized overview of Soviet urban planning agencies, see Blair. A Ruble, Leningrad. Shaping Soviet City (Berkley: University of California Press, 1990), 4-15. [11]. Kosenkova, Opyt formirovaniia; A brief overview on Nizhny Novgorod/Gorky city planning and Yaroslavl’; see also Yulia Starostenko, “Razrabotka i realizatsiia proektov rekonstruktsii gorodov v SSSR v 1930-e gody i sud’ba naslediia na primere Nizhnego Novgoroda i Yaroslavl’a,” Arkhitektura. Stroitel’stvo. Dizain 3, no. 80 (2015): 50-57. [12]. Bureaucracy issue had become classical already since Leon Trotsky critique of Russian Socialism, as noted in Stephen Kotkin, Magnetic Mountain: Stalinism as a Civilization (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), 2-6. _/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/_/ South Asia Citizens Wire Buzz for secularism, on the dangers of fundamentalism(s), on matters of peace and democratisation in South Asia. Newsletter of South Asia Citizens Web: www.sacw.net/ ##### #### _\_ ________ ##=-[.].]| \ \ #( _\ | |------| # __| | |||||||| \ _/ | |||||||| .--'--'-. | | ____ | / __ `|__|[o__o]| _(____nm_______ /____\____ DISCLAIMER: Opinions expressed in materials carried in the posts do not necessarily reflect the views of SACW compilers. ===================================== _______________________________________________ SACW mailing list SACW@insaf.net http://insaf.net/mailman/listinfo/sacw_insaf.net
