Independence Day in India – a day of celebrating our national sovereignty and saluting the anti-colonial freedom struggle. The triumph of Indian independence, however, is inseparable from the trauma of the Partition experience. Hence, in mainstream culture in India, August 15 becomes a day of bashing Jinnah left, right and centre. It makes one suspect that the ideals of populist nationalism and inclusive democracy have been long forgotten under a sea of symbolism, antipathy and myth making– of what a successful nation we could have had, had there not been an evil separatist at work whose legacy sabotages us even today.
Category: Commentary
Nobody would have any doubt whatsoever now that Sharmila is extraordinary. She has that madness in her that few are gifted with. By madness we of course do not mean insanity. Instead we mean in the sense that Zorba the Greek meant it when he said, “In life we need some madness, otherwise we will never have the courage to cut the rope and be free.” Sharmila’s decision to go on an indefinite hunger strike, her perseverance despite persuasions by many to end it, and now her decision to call it off and join politics, all say this loudly. This madness notwithstanding, let everybody be reminded nobody is infallible.
Malignant Narcissists are paranoid and don’t trust anyone, apart from one or two cronies who are like extensions of themselves. And although they have an unquestioning belief in their own perfection, they constantly need another, like these cronies, to tell them so, to give them ceaseless attention and to feed their ego.
One of the world’s most infamous Malignant Narcissist Hitler had two cronies he stayed loyal to for life, Goebbels and Goering.
Modi has Amit Shah and Adani who he seems to be deeply loyal and committed to.
I hardly have to remind anyone of Modi’s obsession with selfies, an obvious sign of negative narcissism but since becoming Prime Minister, the everyday, simple-living, high-thinking chief minister of Gujarat has transmogrified into a veritable peacock.
On 13 August 2016, Amnesty International India organized an event in Bengaluru as part of a campaign to seek justice for victims of human rights…
It was probably the longest Budget Speech ever in Assam. But this simply reminds us of the proverb “an empty vessel makes a lot of sound”.
Just saw the PR film for much talked about Monolith Festival 2016 held at Mawphlang. I have a few troubling thoughts
Uniformed nationalism is not only limited to the idea of the nation within the territorial boundary but it transcends to all other nations where Indian origin persons are located. Such nationalism limits the possibilities for people to be global citizens whose humanism supersedes their insular nationalism.
Dear Sir, Greetings! Hope you are enjoying the monsoon flurry sweeping across the North-India. I can see your Facebook posts about the beautiful rainbows and…
When Narendra Modi described Gau Rakshak vigilantes as anti-socials at a town hall-type gathering at the Indira Gandhi Stadium Complex in New Delhi, centrism-minded Indians breathed a sigh of relief. He followed that up with an overture to Kashmiris, this time at a rally in Madhya Pradesh. Finally, the silence, that silence, had been broken. What they were referring to was the Prime Minister’s insistence on maintaining a mauna vrat in the midst of a series of atrocities against ethnic minorities that had unfolded across the length and breadth of the country.
In the present day world-order and given the historical perspective, can Independent Kashmir [IK] exist? Moreover, regarding the small area and population of the region, will it be practical? Given the poor educational status, the IK could be a breeding ground for ‘Islamic Jihadist’. And the much talked about issues are: security, land locked region, economic dependency and many more which are often raised. The most obvious question to be followed should be: Is an Independent Kashmir practical and a viable solution? Let’s examine it through various dimensions:
Hashwa ban tih ia u uranium ha u snem 1967, ka UCIL ka la wan ban pynbiej iaki Adivasi ba lada ki ailad ban tih uranium yn sa ai iaki iaka kam ka jam, yn sa wanrah iaka roi ka par ( development) bad ruh wat ban ai Pisa ( bribe) phewse hadien ba la tih pat, ki trai ri trai muluk ki la jan duh wat ka thliew jingtep na bynta ialade ruh.
We’re far from liberal as a group, except on issues where being liberal helps our survival. Like many other immigrant groups, we’re opportunists and political chameleons. Isn’t it time to dispassionately ask what the term ‘model minority’ should really mean, and whether we Indian-Americans deserve that label?
This dead body is Raju Mistry’s corpse was the bewildering claim by the Police, which was then quickly corrected, to the right Dalit, Kamal Valmiki. The plan backfired and Police were now asked to produce Raju Mistry from my depths. All 15 policemen of my outpost have been suspended. One has been accused of murder. A few are on the run. But what difference does it make? The fascists are in Government and they have the judiciary in their pocket. Indict with impunity but your caste clout will guarantee your acquittal. Raju Mistry will return but not empty-handed. He has thrived as an outlaw after his escape. He has heard about Kamal Valmiki’s murder. He has rounded up the fleeing policemen. Only gangsters can catch the police that the police can’t catch.
Having accustomed to lecturing the Dalit movements of all stripes to focus on ‘real’ issues like economic resources, the Hindu Left will now have to decide what to do with a mass mobilisation that demands land as much as dignified employment, two revolutionary demands, in the same breath.
Relatively well-off sections among the urban educated Dalits, who are used to the easy method of invoking the pain of others (manual scavenging and other degrading forms of obligatory work, caste atrocities, especially in the enclaves where being a Dalit is as much an advantage as a drawback, with their greedy and narrow dream of keeping away the other victims of Hindutva such as Muslims and Christians, and other opponents of Hindutva such as Leftists and Tribals, will now have to decide for themselves if they are ready to throw in their lot with fighting Gujarati Dalits and their leftist and Muslim supporters.
I don’t know how to write ‘universal’ poetry
That would please the editors of journals that are the pride of
Hoary academia – I know no Greek myths,
like Dom Moraes and Keki Daruwala.
(Anapaest is a pest as far as I am concerned and
Dactyl sounds like the name of a detergent.)
As a Christian, it has often been impressed on me that I need to be involved in evangelism. However, in spite of my sincere belief of the need for the same, i find for some reason I have been very reluctant. When I think of it, it is not because of a fear of some sort but rather a difficulty of a different kind.
Numbness doesn’t go away. It’s suffocating to hear the loud proclamations of news anchors on Indian TV channels, describing it as a victory for its ‘jawans’. I want to get rid of this suffocation. I ask a friend to meet me outside. We meet and proceed towards Jamia Masjid. People are slowly assembling at the square. It’s a mass of people. The mass palpitates with anger; a subdued anger of the sort a martyr’s death evokes. Slogans pierce the tense air.
While village after village was being lost to the mighty Brahmaputra, officials in Delhi were more concerned with the man made flood in Gurugram – a result of just bad unplanned urbanization. Dirty sewage water reaching the affluent and the expatriates are definitely Prime Time news worthy unlike the flood in Assam which is seen as a part of life of the people languishing in tents and relief camps.
The internet has rewired civil society, propelling collective action into a radically new dimension. Democracy is now not only exercised at the ballot box, but lived and experienced online on a day-to-day basis. While this may have positive implications for political participation, it’s also causing problems for leaders. They have been elected through time-honoured democratic systems, but now find themselves vulnerable to the whim of the baying internet mob.
Bastar today is witness to the most cynical mockery of constitutional values and civil liberties. Under cover of a war to ‘save Bastar from Maoism,’ or ‘make Bastar safe for democracy’, the Constitution is in fact being trampled to ‘make Bastar safe for corporations’ and ‘purify Bastar for the RSS.’ Every day, every week, there are horrific atrocities being unleashed on Bastar’s people – and the incidents outlined in this report should be seen, not as isolated aberrations but as the tip of the iceberg. Raiot is extracting the chilling testimonies of persecuted Christians in Bastar from AIPF report BASTAR-WHERE THE CONSTITUTION STANDS SUSPENDED.
Ashwin looks at the Action Plans prepared by the Narmada Valley Development Authority in the 1990s and analyzes the ambition of a developmental project and the way a planning document looks at Project Affect Persons and at activists involved in the anti-dam struggle.
Our country does not lack in skilled people, it only lacks in respect for these millions of informally skilled people. Instead the crony capitalists who skim off public resources at will without providing sustainable development opportunities are the ones who command respect and that is why despite all the economic growth in recent years, poverty and hunger continue to dog most of the people.
Dear Mr. Mishra,
So I heard you beheaded a Dalit today and axed his wife to death. What a pity that all this is doing the rounds on social media, alternative media and on all international media except our own of course. Don’t worry Mr. Mishra, our media love you but they are compelled to run this story for fear of being labelled as anti-human, which they are but only when it comes to Dalits, mind. They’ll run the story as a token and claim that you did it in a fit of insanity and that you are quick to anger, not because of the casteist animosity that courses through the country’s veins…
While the real sangbaaz are busy heroically fighting one of the mightiest armies in the world and their local stooges, some “unknown elements”, allegedly J&K Police Sangbaaz Association in collaboration with IB Stonepelters League, have been busy putting up fake posters in some localities in Srinagar to bring disrepute to the sangbaaz by showing them as misogynistic etc.
We made a few additional posters to demonstrate the name of the game. Check ’em out.
Talking about individuals, local visitors going to rural destinations travel in their beautiful and posh cars, loud music and cases of booze stuffed on the back of their vehicles, beautifully dressed up like supermodels and celebrities with huge and colorful sunglasses/shades, finishes a packet of chips and a sip from the bottle by throwing outside the car’s window and after sometime stops the car somewhere and pee on the road side. Intoxicated youths are breaking bottles all over the destination.
The Sixth Schedule of the Indian Constitution was enacted to protect the indigenous community from getting alienated in their own land. But the forces of alienation are present within the indigenous community and are getting further intensified. Sadly there is no protection from it; no right for the tiller; and no restriction on hoarding of land. What this will lead to is not hard to guess. Should not changes be deliberated? Only those who wish to hide the wretchedness of the poor for personal benefit will want status quo.
I fear the present atrocities against Dalits to be a prelude to more violence against Muslims in India. Let me explain.
While walking the streets of Kashmir even on a usual day but especially in the month of Ramazan, you can’t help but juxtapose two stark Indian presences. One is that of the Indian soldiers patrolling or bunker bound – brandishing their guns, poised and ready. Second is the iconic face of the Indian panhandler – dusty, beseeching, and tired. The military a symbol of India’s physical and ruthless prowess while the panhandler, a manifestation of a deep-set, endemic poverty of its viscera. India’s poorest of the poor, the panhandlers manifest a specific kind, almost laudable type of professionalism, which the Indian military has failed at instituting and which should be the wont of any occupying force.
The opposition to uranium mining is not just a fight against the ill-effects of mining a dangerous substance but a struggle for democracy and the defence of the principles meant to safeguard humanity itself.
In his unpublished memoir, Pandit Rughonath Vaishnavi writes that it was clear that Kashmiris had been “relegated to the position of slaves” after India gained its independence. “Kashmiri freedom fighters were lifted during the darkness of the night and kicked into dark cells without knowing the grounds of their imprisonment.” Pt. Vaishnavi was himself jailed seven times for his steadfast commitment to the Kashmiri right of self-determination. Along with some of his supporters he was jailed under the most brutal conditions and ordered several times to cease his political activities.
What comes to your mind when you think of India? If you’ve been seduced by films, books, pictures and anglophile Indians over the last century then you will no doubt paint a happy picture. You might romanticise the poor yet happy people, the colours, the cuisine, the attire, the mystics, the music, the dance, the cacophony, the heat and the sensory overload of this one country. The only colour missing in your picture will be any shade of black because black is a colour that India hides. Black is a colour that India detests whether it be the colour of your skin or the colour of the sewer that you’re lowered in. A bottomless pit is where you will find the true colour of India.
In principle, water ATMs had been proposed for areas that did not benefit from piped water supply. Even this was controversial because the underlying message was that only basic drinking needs would be taken care of, rather than all basic household/domestic needs. In practice, there has been slippage. In the first place, the Delhi Government was meant to be installing water kiosks providing free water in ‘underdeveloped’ areas. Yet, the first water kiosk installed was near a metro station for the convenience of the travelling public. Further, alongside the free water distributed in those kiosks, the Delhi Jal Board (DJB) agreed in late 2015 to a proposal for setting up water ATMs in various parts of Delhi at a price of Rs 5 per 20 litres. Supply through water ATMs is probably an excellent option to fill specific gaps where there is no water supply, preferably on a temporary basis. There are, however, various reasons why water ATMs should not become a permanent tool for accessing drinking water.
People were returning from their regular chores, when the news that the famous Kashmiri local rebel who had turned to militancy at the age of 15, had been killed in an encounter near Kokernag, 15 kms away from district Anantnag. People in long chains came out from their houses, leaving the comfortable life aside, with sloganeering “Burhan tera khoon sa inqilab aayega” just to mourn the death of their hero who had become an icon for many youths across valley.
Any careful analysis of Salafism must take into consideration the diversity within the movement before lumping all self-identified or suspected Salafis or Salafi personalities together and expressing a blanket demonization of a monolithic Salafism
U Thlen is a symbol of greed that is a human heart and greed can make people do thing which is even against the common good people of the and even their own will for the sake of wealth. The Khasi-Pnar believed that they had killed the beast and did away with greed from the heart of the people except from some of the rich families, but that is not so. Our ancestors may have killed the beast, but greed prevails in the heart of the people. It is difficult to satisfy greed because greed knows no bound. We know this because our ancestors have lived with whatever is underneath the ground for ages and live happily on these rolling hills till we start exploiting the minerals.
Lada kadei ban mih sha pyrthei, ka alphabet Pnar kadei ban mih na trai na khyndew shaneng. Kadei ban mih namar ba ka nongrep, ka nongdie jhur, u draibar taksi, u nongbylla ki kwah bad donkam ia ka.
BACHCHA PRASAD SINGH, alleged CPI(Maoist) Central Committee member who has been recently released after Six years and Four months in various prisons, in a lengthy interview to Shailza Sharma in Kafila talks of prisons and political prisoners, analyses the international and national situation and indicates What is to be Done. On a personal note he concludes: “I was always a part of the radical movement, I am a part of the radical movement and will always be a part of the radical movement”
After the martyrdom of Commander Burhan Wani, the Indian state was in the mood of jubilation ‘to eliminate the most wanted terrorist’. But it soon turned into its nightmare. It was not the first time that the funeral of a rebel was attended by thousands but the immediate response across Kashmir through demonstrations and funerals in absentia made the civil and military establishment of Indian State frustrated. The immediate response that it resorted to was putting the whole valley under seize by imposing curfew and clamping down of internet services.
It is a popular belief that women who live together synchronise their menstrual cycles, and that it’s mediated by their pheromones – the airborne molecules that enable members of the same species to communicate non-verbally.
The debate arises whether it is feasible to allow Uranium mining in Domiasiat/Mawthabah in Meghalaya considering the percentage of nuclear energy as a source of electricity and the ramifications faced by communities like Jadugoda, Jharkhand in the past four decades.
Recently during my college break, a heavy boredom overcame me and I decided that it was time to get out of the house and enjoy nature. My inability to drive at the time greatly limited my range, but luckily for someone who lives in Shillong, the Shillong Reserve Forest offers a wonderful location to bask in nature’s glory without travelling too far.
“We are wont to reminding the people of Kashmir, the “freedom(s)” that India affords them, and promptly mention the horrors that await them if they chose (as they deserve) to go to Pakistan. Time and again, we pose as a free people. This comes with a string of Whatabouts. A fellow traveller to Kashmir retorted to my mention of militarization in Kashmir, “What about North Korea? What about Saudi Arabia? What about Pakistan?!” It is amusing to see the average Indian entertaining such delusions of freedom when every day, Kashmiris are being tortured, killed, encountered, disappeared, raped in their names.”
Kashmiris know the occupation is chronically violent, persistently vindictive, and is going to remain so as long as it exists. The state that denies a people their right to self-determination can be nothing but repressive. How could Burhan not have shared the same understanding of the Indian control over Kashmir? Is it misplaced to think so? And is it then an accident that Burhan became Commander Burhan Wani?
I have this to say to those super patriots who keep bringing up the bogey of “jihadis”, “radical Islamists” or “Pakistani proxy” while justifying all atrocities against Kashmiri Muslims.
This video report from “Headlines Today/Aaj Tak/12/12/2004″ exposes the harsh reality of the people being affected by the operation of uranium mining in and around Jadugoda being run By Uranium Corporation Of India, Government of India Limited(UCIL) . Although the company claims radiation stories as ” myths “, Headlines Today documents the evidence where the entire environment, community and the future generation has been put to risk by the sheer negligence of the company.
Don’t weed out the WEED
On the 6th of August, 2016 a consignment of around 850 kilograms of Marijuana or Ganja in the local lingo was confiscated by the authorities from some truckers along the Shillong By-Pass much to the disappointment of connoisseurs in Guwahati to where it was apparently bound and to the glee of the self claimed moral authorities who run the local print media.
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