Founding Editor: Daya Varma (1929-2015)
Editors: Vinod Mubayi (New York) and Raza Mir (New Jersey).
Editorial Board: Ram Puniyani and Irfan Engineer (Mumbai); Pervez Hoodbhoy (Islamabad); Dolores Chew (Montreal); Vamsi Vakulabharanam (Amherst); Ajay Bhardwaj (Vancouver).
Circulation/website: Feroz Mehdi (On behalf of Alternatives, Montreal).
ANNOUCEMENT: DR ASGHAR ALI ENGINEER VISITING NEW YORK EARLY IN 2008
Dr Asghar Ali Engineer, noted human rights activist and Director, Centre for the Study of Society and Secularism, Mumbai, will be in New York for a conference from February 19-22, 2008. He will be available for a week or so after that to meet groups, deliver lectures, etc. If you are interested in sponsoring a talk by him in your city or institution, please contact Vinod Mubayi at 516-380-3204 or mubayi@bnl.gov)
INDIAN AMERICANS DEMAND THE DISMISSAL OF GUJARAT GOVERNMENT
Friday, October 26, 2007: Several prominent Indian organizations and individuals based in US and Canada have called for the immediate dismissal of the state government in Gujarat, India following an exposé by the Tehelka news magazine in which many top Hindu nationalist figures linked to the administration admitted to their active role in orchestrating and perpetrating the massacre and ethnic cleansing of Muslims in 2002 in Gujarat. The exposé reveals active participation of key state institutions including police forces and judiciary in the anti-minority pogroms. Read more…
HINDUS DETAIL INVOLVEMENT IN DEADLY ’02 RIOTS IN INDIA
Rama Lakshmi
(Washington Post Foreign Service, October 26, 2007; A13)
REVIEW OF YOGINDER SIKAND’S BOOK
Syed Muhd Khairudin Aljunied
The Book: Bastions of the Believers: Madrasas and Islamic Education in India by Yoginder Sikand (Penguin, New Delhi, 400 pp., Rs. 495, ISBN 9780144000203)
GURNAM SINGH MUKATSAR PAYS TRIBUTES TO SAHEB KANSHI RAM
Jai BirdiOn Saturday, October 27, a visiting scholar from India Prof. Gurnam Singh Mukatsar will pay tributes to Saheb Kanshi Ram who died on October 9 last year. The event is organized to pay tributes to one of the foremost leaders after Dr. Ambedkar who mobilized Dalits, minorities, and other oppressed groups to organize politically and make effective differences in their lives. Mukatsar had known and worked diligently under Kanshi Ram and has now written several books highlighting Dalit assertion in India. In his book, “JOOTH NA BHOL PANDE”, Mukatsar “emerges as the sole spokesman of Dalit Sikhs and point blank tells the upper caste Sikhs not to speak falsehood but acknowledge what is said in the Guru Granth itself that the founders of Sikh religion are the Dalit saints. Guru Nanak’s admission that Guru Ravidas is his guru is mentioned in the Guru Granth”, says VT Rajshekhar of Dalit Voice. The tribute was organized at the Dr. Ambedkar Library, Shri Guru Ravidass Community Centre at 7271 Gilley Avenue in Burnaby
MASS PROTEST OVER MURDER OF A COMMUNIST ACTIVIST IN CUSTODY IN BIHAR
Thousands of people held out a Resistance March on Oct. 12 at district headquarters of Sitamarhi to demand immediate arrest of killers of Comrade Ashok Sah, who was murdered in custody by the Sitamarhi police after illegally arresting him at mid-night of 3-4 October. This march was led by AIALA National President Rameshwar Prasad and CPI(ML) Central Committee member Mina Tiwary along with many local leaders and cadres of Sitamarhi and Darbhanga districts.
NEPALESE PRIME MINISTER HOPES MAOISTS WILL REJOIN THE GOVERNMENT
Nepal’s Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala announced on October 20 a new date for the Constituent Assembly (CA) elections would be fixed after holding a meeting of the seven-party alliance immediately after Dashain festival ends next week. He expressed unhappiness over the postponement of the CA elections which was scheduled for November 22. He made a point that the Maoists would rejoin the government once the fresh date for the CA polls is finalized. “If the Maoists don’t join the government after date for the polls are finalized, then it would prove that the Maoists are running away from the elections,”
Koirala added. He said that the Maoists have failed to abandon the attitude of armed group even after inking the comprehensive peace agreement. “It takes time for change. Prachanda and Baburam alone cannot help it,” he said.
PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION WILL DELAY POLLS, SAYS UML LEADER
Madhav Kumar Nepal, the General Secretary of Communist Party of Nepal (CPN-UML) said that elections to the Constituent Assembly (CA) will be delayed for at least five years if the poll is switched to the proportional representation (PR) system of voting now. Nepal expressed optimism that the new date for the CA elections could be fixed soon “as the Maoists have already agreed to declare the country a republic through the first session of the elected Constituent Assembly.”
The elections were deferred for a second time earlier this month for an indefinite period after the Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala-led Nepali Congress outright rejected the Maoist demands for declaration of a republic through the interim parliament and a PR system for the CA elections.
OTTAWA CONFERENCE ON NEPAL
Canada Forum for Nepal held a two day conference from Oct 5-7 on Nepal under the title “Unfolding Futures: Nepalese Economy, Society, and Politics” from October 5th to 7th 2007.
MYTH, HISTORY AND POLITICS
K.N.Panikkar
(28 September, 2007, Countercurrents. Org)
Ever since Ayodhya became a disputed territory, Rama has been at the centre stage of the political mobilisation by Hindu communal forces. The incidents associated with the Rama Katha were invoked one after the other to appeal to the religious sentiments of Hindus. It began with a claim to the birthplace of Rama at Ayodhya, around which Hindu religious sentiments were so aroused as to lead to the destruction of the Babri Masjid. In the movement culminating in this vandalism, several symbols linked with Rama such as Rama Jyoti, Rama Paduka and Rama Shila were floated.
MODI, DEVELOPMENT AND THE WEAKER SECTIONS
Irfan Engineer
With the impending elections for the State Assembly, the Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi is busy re-packaging himself as the Vikas Purush (to borrow the term from Venkaiah Naidu, ex-BJP President). After Modi took over the reins of power in Gujarat in the year 2001, he essentially packaged himself as Loha Purush, a term Venkaiah Naidu might have borrowed from the description used for Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. All the might of this Loha Purush was exercised not on any powerful sections of the society but on the vulnerable and hapless minorities. Fake encounters targeting Muslims, misusing POTA on Muslim youths, Government’s failure to provide an environment in which theatre owners could screen films like Parzania and Fanaa, BJP members vilifying and castigating B.B. Lyngdoh, the then Chief Election Commissioner, and Sonia Gandhi for being Christians who meet in church and conspire for BJP’s defeat in Gujarat are some of the instances of the Loha Purush avatar of Narendra Modi.
THE POST BOMBING SCENARIO – NARRATIVES FROM THE HOSPITAL
Shahid Fiaz
The October 18th – we will remember it for a long time and for all the wrong reasons. Today is 21st October – the third day of the bombing of Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) rally. The nation is mourning the dead and trying to help the injured.
PAKISTAN AT THE CROSSROADS: THE HOMECOMING OF BENAZIR BHUTTO
Daya Varma and Vinod Mubayi Benazir Bhutto, the leader of the Pakistan People’s Party returned to Pakistan on October 18, 2007. She was greeted by an unprecedented mass of over 200,000 people, who had come to Karachi from all parts of Pakistan. All other political considerations aside, the very fact that so many people welcomed her is in itself very significant. The fact that the majority of Pakistanis welcoming Bhutto were ordinary people, workers, peasants, laborers and unemployed lends credence to her claim to political leadership in Pakistan. Not too many leaders in South Asia can elicit such a response at this point in time. The fact that the other prominent Pakistani politician in exile, Nawaz Sharif, when he returned to Pakistan, failed to attract anything close to the magnitude of the crowd that welcomed Benazir is testimony to the relative popularity of the two leaders. Even though Nawaz Sharif was refused entry into Pakistan by the government and unceremoniously put back on a flight to Saudi Arabia, the protests by his supporters against the treatment he received were of a perfunctory nature. Read more…
THE 123 DEAL IN LIMBO ALONG WITH UPA
Vinod Mubayi and Daya Varma
The last few months have witnessed many media and street protests in India by left intellectuals, the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPM)-led left parliamentary caucus and other left parties, the champion of Hindutva, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and various environmental groups and anti-nuclear activists – all against the nearly finalized Indo-US nuclear deal (the 123 Deal), which was negotiated by the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Since CPM has apparently decided to oppose the deal no matter what, the fate of the deal seems to be sealed, at least for the moment, while the fate of the UPA government itself appears to be in limbo.
NARENDRA MODI AND INDIAN DEMOCRACY: THE TWO CANNOT COEXIST
Daya Varma and Vinod Mubayi The Tehelka exposure of the crimes of Hindutva fascists led by Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi only proves what was already well known. Yet proof is important because legal action against any one requires proof. The crimes committed by the ruffians of Sangh Parivar in 2002 are horrendous. They cannot happen unpunished in a civilized society and the fact they happened in India and the criminals remain scot-free simply reveals not only the cultural degeneration of Indian society but also the sham and incompetent nature of Indian democracy. Read more…
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