The Left, Caste and Dalits: A Troubled Relationship

(This post appeared at Jack Stephen's blog, The Mustard Seed. My thanks to Jack for having invited me for writing the post).

The Indian Left has had a troubled association with the caste question.

The major reason, in case of the Left has been the over arching importance that Marxism has attached to class and class conciousness. This has been true of the Marxist Left which includes the original and later CPI, the CPM and even most of the Maoist formations. The socialist parties, specially under Ram Manohar Lohia and to a lesser extent Acharya Narendra Dev acknowledged the issue of caste since the fifties though from the backward caste, and not a Dalit perspective.

This post, however, focuses on the relationship between the Marxist Left and Dalit politics.

The class based approach of the Marxist Left gave little importance to caste, and even saw it as an impediment for growth of class consciousness. It's mass fronts consisted of the trade unions, the peasant associations, landless agricultural workers. Outside these class based fronts were those for women, students and the cultural wing (the famous Indian People's Theater Association).

No scope was seen for a Dalit or any other caste based association. In fact, when the DS4 of Kanshi Ram began to grow in the 1980s, it was seen, even by those cadres in the existing communist parties who came from a Dalit background, as reactionary and dangerous- since these threatened to break the unity of the class based fronts along casteist lines. At no time, till the Mandal Commission forced it to take a firm stand, did the Indian Left see centrality of the caste question in India.

Within the CPI and the CPM, the leadership has been, even till recently, primarily drawn from the Brahmins or the local dominant castes, with very few exceptions. Neither have these parties made any conscious attempt to bring cadre from the Dalit strata into leadership positions. Instead, they have recreated in their internal structures the imbalances of society.

This is not to deny the fact that they have also been relatively less susceptible to casteism, and many among their cadre continue to be within these parties because of the relative absence of casteism within these parties in comparison with others. This is especially so where Dalit movement has been weak or non- existent.

In comparison with some other countries, the Indian communists' participation and acceptance of parliamentary politics has been long and unquestionable. However the stress of political action also blunted the social and mass based actions that these parties should have been involved in.

This came out very clearly when, after the CPI(M) Congress in 1998, in reply to a question as to why the Left had failed to strike roots in Uttar Pradesh, the then party General Secretary H.S. Surjeet explained the reasons thus:

"There has been no social reform movement in the state".

This surely is a case of putting the cart before the horse, since for those on left of the political spectrum, reforms are only a part of a much more comprehensive radical agenda. The task of the left is to carry out changes that go beyond reforms and not wait for others to carry out the job. Surjeet's words raise an existential question for the CPI(M).

Another reason of this dichotomy between the Left and the Dalit movement has been that Dr. Ambedkar, by far the most towering leader of the Dalit movement if not its only one till the rise of Kanshi Ram, had been an opponent of Marxism. His focus remained the social upliftment of the Dalits and as a politician his sensibilities honed in English liberalism restricted his view. W.N. Kuber puts it thus:

In 1937, (Ambedkar) founded the Independent Labour Party, for sometime joined hands with the communists in the labor field but did not take consistent attitude and fight class battles. Though his community was downtrodden and landless and mostly wage- earners, still he could not make them class- conscious, because of the weakness in his inherent thinking. After the Poona Pact he tried to lead the working class, but failed and left the field forever, and chose to become the leader of his community.

(source: Ambedkar: A Critical Study by W.N. Kuber, 1973. Page 304)

His insistence on Buddhism as an alternative to Marxism also did not help to build bridges.

Buddhistic countries that have gone over to communism do not understand what communism is. Communism of the Russian type aims at bringing it about by a bloody revolution. The Buddhist communism brings it about by a bloodless revolution. The South East Asians should give a political form to Buddha's teaching.... Poverty cannot be an excuse for sacrificing human freedom.

(Source: Ambedkar, Life and Mission, page 487, quoted in Kuber).

To the over arching importance that Dr. Ambedkar gave to conversion as a salvation for the Dalits (then called the Depressed Classes), the scholarly CPI leader Hiren Mukerjee commented:

But merely by changing one's religion, one cannot bring a solution, particularly to the kind of problem that we have in our country. That is why I say the conversion to Buddhism was a gesture, a moral gesture, with certain conceptual connotations of its own. Buddhism is a magnificent religion, but somehow it was eased out of India. If by some miracle, Buddhism is brought back again, well and good. But things do not happen in real life like that.

(source: Hiren Mukerjee: Gandhi, Ambedkar and the Extirpation of Untouchability, page 46, quoted in Kuber)

If the Left parties are more sensitive to the caste question in recent years, it is because of the battle lines that were drawn in the aftermath of the Mandal Commission and also because of the political base that caste based parties, especially the Bahujan Samaj Party have been to create for themselves. While these made a dent in the following of all existing parties, the ones specially impacted were the Congress and the Left.

The second reason is the recognition of near absolute identity of the Dalits as one of the more oppressed sections in the country. Earlier observers, even among the most radicals ones, disdained this. Groomed in the modernist, Nehruvian framework in the backdrop of global appeal of Marxism, the caste factor was pushed under the carpet. It was even seen as an obstacle in establishing class-consciousness.

This has now changed, and rightly so. The communists and the Dalit movement share a complementary role. While the Dalit movement has articulated the social and political aspirations of the oppressed community, it has lacked a firm economic program, with the result that once power is gained (in Uttar Pradesh, for example), the lack of a class based theoretical perspective restricts it to either parliamentary politics or the perspective, often narrow, of a single leader. A Marxist understanding and placing the Dalit movement within a larger national and world wide struggle for emancipation complements this social and political approach.

It is not that this has not been attempted, it was there during the brief existence of the Dalit Panthers Movement in the 1970s before its disintegration. It was also there in the approach of Sharad Patil who broke away from the CPM to form the Satyashodak Communist Party in Maharastra in the 1980s.

Given the ossification in the dominant Left, however, this dialogue will have to be initiated by the cadre of the Dalit movement and independent Marxists.

(This post owes much to Raghbir Singh, with whom I've had numerous discussions on the topic. He had first "warned" me about the "threat" from DS4 way back in 1987. Needless to say, we have both substantially revised our understanding since then.)

Inventing India

Arvind N Das, who died seven years ago at a tragically young age at 52, nevertheless packed a lot in his intense life. A product of the "Spring Thunder over India" in the late 1960s, he was part of the brilliant team at the Times of India in the late 1980s which is when one became acquainted with his insightful writings.

Trained as a historian, he moved, first to print journalism and then to the medium of TV setting up Asia Pacific Communications to produce a nuanced documentary on the history of India. In the documentary, as in his writings, he showed himself as a student of DD Kosambi to whom he dedicated the documentary that appeared in 13 parts on Doordarshan. He remained an engaged social historian in the tradition of DD Kosambi and EP Thompson.

In his book "India Invented", he made the observation that India is not something waiting to be discovered, as Jawaharlal Nehru had treated it in his Discovery of India, but something that is to be constantly invented in the process of understanding it- that was his statement of praxis.

The first part of the documentary is now available at google videos. It is also available from Asia Pacific Communications and can be ordered, I believe, from the address given at the google videos site.



Link to Google Videos

Needless to say, it is a very ennobling, and educative experience to be able to watch this documentary once again. One of the best in the series is the one where Das delves into the emergence and decadence of Buddhism (part 5), though this one doesn't seem to be available online as yet. DD Kosambi had himself written very insightfully on the decline of Buddhism in India in his collection of essays Exasperating Essays.


Technorati Tags: India, Kosambi, History, Buddhism

A New Blog for DD Kosambi

I had set up a site on the Indian historian D.D. Kosambi many years back, perhaps in the late nineties, as a tribute to a man who has contributed so much to applying the dialectical method in investigating ancient Indian history. In my student days, it was very inspiring to read his books starting with The Culture and Civilisation of Ancient India in Historical Outline. Over the years I have received a number of emails on the site which only indicates the interest that still exists in Kosambi.

A lot more material is now available on the internet about D.D. Kosambi than when I started out. My initial project was to scan and make available on the internet works by the number of Marxists that have contributed to our understanding of India and its history. For various reasons, the original project never beyond putting up some of his works online.

Only a few months back, I was amazed to find that Arvind Gupta has made available all the significant works by Kosambi on the internet. It lessens my feeling of guilt at not having completed my initial project.

Since his death in 1966, many of Kosambi's formulations have been disapproved. Still, his works retain their significance for their pioneering efforts and rigour that has laid the foundations of modern Indian historiography.

His quintessentially humanistic streak that still inspires many to read his works is best reflected in his own words.

"The subtle mystic philosophies, torturous religions, ornate literature, monuments teeming with intricate sculpture and delicate music of India all derive from the same historical process that produced the famished apathy of the villager, senseless opportunism and termite greed of the ‘cultured’ strata, sullen, uncoordinated discontent among the workers, general demoralization, misery, squalor and degrading superstition. The one is the result of the other, one is the expression of the other…it is necessary to understand that history is not a sequence of haphazard events but is made by human beings in the satisfaction of daily needs."

This blog will serve the purpose of collecting links to internet resources on Damodar Dharmanand Kosambi and his works. There is a Wikipedia entry on Kosambi now, and has a number of useful links, this blog will supplement the Wiki entry and link to a wider range of information on the internet.

The new blog is here.

kisan bhai lage raho in 2007 too

kisan bhai lage raho in 2007 too- this new year resolution is a macabre comment on the continuing farmer's suicides in Vidarbha and elsewhere.

Link via Andolan

Sewer Divers of Mumbai, Dalits and Technology

Technology is rarely seen as liberating for Dalits, most discussions are around social distinctions, and of late, around reservations and violence against Dalits.

Mulk Raj Anand, in his novel 'Untouchable' written in 1935 had opined the use of technology- like the usage of water closets and a drainage system to do away with many of the jobs that Dalits do. 70 years on, the situation has not changed dramatically.

While people will discuss about the 100 dollar laptop, no one will talk about simple technologies that impact those doing the most unproductive, if not filthy jobs.

It was this post by KA Muston writing at Daily Kos that led me to this observation- looking at technology from the point of view of the Dalit is something that is matter of fact for an American, not so for those writing on Dalits in India, from whatever perspective.

Each year about one hundred Dalit men across India die from breathing methane or drowning in filthy water. (There are no figures collected on the Dalit women who empty the thousands of village cesspits.) Worse, there is no count of the workers who die from respiratory diseases, urinary tract, skin and eye infections, gastrointestinal ailments and lung cancer. Fewer than 14% of them live to the age of 50. What a backward people the Indian people are. George Bush is right. We have a moral responsibility to deliver these people out of ignorance and into the enlightened path of democracy.

When they first built the London sewer (in the 1860’s) large metal balls just a few millimeters narrower than the diameter of the sewers were periodically fed through the brick tubes, driven by water current and driving all blockages before them. These balls are still used to maintain the sewers in London and Paris. Why couldn’t the people of New Deli (sic) (now Mumbai) have come up with a similar system? The answer is that in India people have always been cheaper than technology.

Technorati Tags: Dalit, India, Technology

The Secret of Mirza Ghalib's Poetry

We now know the secret of the bard's poetry, well, it was the ...mangoes

...with his stunning memory and deep study of Ghalib's life, Hali was the winner in proving that Ghalib had in fact tasted most of the 4,000 varieties of mangoes grown in India. This might be a funny incident but the truth is that Ghalib was the one who loved eating mangoes in sweltering summers more than composing his couplets.

The varieties of mangoes that Ghalib mentioned in 63 letters written to his friends are - Malda, Fasli, Chausa, Zard Aaloo, Jahangir, Dasehri, Rehmat-e-Khas, Sarauli, Malghoba, Aziz Pasand, Mahmood Samar, Sultan-us-Samar, Ram Kela, Bombay Green, Ratol, Safeda Mallihabadi, Dil Pasand, Husan Aara, Nazuk Pasand, Kishan Bhog, Neelam, Khudadad, Hamlet, Tota Pari, Nishati, Zafrani, Sinduri, Khatta Meetha, Barah Masi, Langra, Alfonso, Fajri Samar Bahisht, Gulabakhsh, Bishop, Xavier, Rumani and Badami. Ghalib had tasted all these.

Understanding the Spirit of Indian Politics

(This unusually long post was written at Krish's blog in four parts. The last part appeared today.
Thanks to Krish for having provided the space and opportunity to write there.)

Defining the Ethos of Indian Politics

Indian politics after Independence has to be seen in the context of the national struggle for freedom.

The Indian freedom struggle was marked by few characteristics that ingrained a certain ethos or spirit that has continued for more than the past half a century though interrupted intermittently- most powerfully in the six years under the shadow of the mushroom cloud that rose up in 1998.

The key to this ethos was acceptance of India as not only a territorial concept but also one that was united by its common struggle against economic drain by British colonialism, an acceptance of its unity in diversity and also of its identification with worldwide struggle against imperialism.

Today, much of this may sound as Leftist banter. But none of these were the product of the Left in India, which, in its contemporary Marxist incarnation came into being only in the 1920s and acquired some political organization in the aftermath of the Civil Disobedience Movement, which also coincided with the worldwide crescendo of the Marxist Left in the aftermath of the Depression. What the Left provided was a deeper and stronger thrust on these elements and a firmer theoretical basis based on Lenin’s analysis of Imperialism as the highest stage of capitalism.

It was the Indian nationalists starting with Dadabhai Naoroji and RC Dutt who pointed to the economic basis of (un)British rule in India than indulging in a xenophobic or religious phobia. It’s acceptance of “unity in diversity” was articulated by Mahatma Gandhi himself- sometimes going to the other extreme, for example, during the Khilafat movement, but what stands out is the inclusiveness that permeated Gandhiji’s vision. It was accepted only to differing degrees within the Indian National Congress leadership- itself a conglomeration of various forces and groups, more of an umbrella organization rather than a political party.


Its identification with other movements against imperialism came, admittedly, only after 1927 after Jawaharlal Nehru attended the Brussels Congress against Imperialism. But the opposite, that is, the participation of non Indians in the INC had been a reality since much earlier (I need not list the names, but some of them come instantly to mind are Madame Blavatsky, CF Andrews, Meeraben).

Within the INC leadership, it was Jawaharlal Nehru who, above all, and almost single-handedly carried forward this ethos in all respects. He differed fundamentally with Mahatma Gandhi on many issues but most strategically on the question of modernization. While Gandhiji advocated an essentially Narodnik (or ‘back to an idealized village economy’) approach, Jawaharlal advocated an uncategorical acceptance of modernization (”dams are the temples of modern India”).


Jawaharlal’s own fascination of Socialism specially under the influence of Professor Harold Laski, was clear, even if shifting in its stress at various times. The 1955 Avadi session of the INC outlined “Our Basic Approach ”

‘In order to realise the object of the Congress as laid down in Article I of the Congress constitution, planning should take place with a view to the establishment of a socialistic pattern of society, where the principal means of production are under social ownership or control, production is progressively speeded up and there is equitable distribution of the national wealth.’ On the Five Year Plans the resolution read, ‘The First Five Year Plan was based on a public sector and a private sector. The public sector must play a progressively greater part, more particularly, in the establishment of basic industries.

In reality, the “socialistic pattern” came to mean no more than “nationalization”, that is, state ownership of industries. Jawaharlal insisted that increasing productive capacities of the nation in the making had to be built before the question of distribution could be taken up. This model was called “mixed economy”, which referred not so much to the question of distribution that the State was, on the whole, to ignore during his reign, but merely to the question to ownership. ‘Socialism’ was a vague intent for the State (”socialistic pattern”, not even “socialism”) and not a matter of policy for the government.

The idea was to nurture Indian capitalism by channeling public funds to build a state- owned industrial base. This was an experiment that had been carried out in “socialist” USSR, a model then for all industrially backward countries. Indeed, the USSR’s model gave rise to many variants, and with the benefit of hindsight, the Indian model of mixed economy was rather creative, combining planning within a capitalist framework.

More on this later. At this point it is sufficient to make the point that of all the Congress leaders, only Jawaharlal had given enough thought to the economic foundation of the country. Gandhiji’s own ideas on this (articulated most pithily in his Hind Swaraj) were at best ignored by all except his least influential admirers). It is no coincidence that post- 1947, this fringe of Gandhians were left with practically no agenda after independence had been won.

The only other persons in the INC who were modern in their outlook were Mohammad Ali Jinnah and Subhas Chandra Bose. That Jinnah fell victim to communalism, and indeed, became the Muslim League’s nationally acceptable face, is a sad story that needs separate treatment altogether.

I am not sure what Subhas Chandra Bose’s ideas on economic development were, possibly they were close to Nehru’s but he was not in the picture during the decisive years of 1947-55. All other major leaders like Vallabhbhai Patel, C Rajgopalachary and Maulana Azad were either organizers of the party (Patel) or regional or section satraps/ representatives (CR, the Maulana to some extent). Those who were to come to prominence in 1969 and form the Syndicate bloc in 1969 came from this wing.

Despite the fact that Gandhiji shared his social conservatism with Patel and CR, it was Jawaharlal that he passed on the mantle to: “Jawaharlal will speak my language when I am gone.” This was nothing but Gandhiji’s acceptance of modernization, in his own- some will say,convoluted- manner.

Jawaharlal continued the discourse on economics that had been started by Dadabhai Naoroji and the other critics of colonial economics. He built on this borrowing contemporary themes- from Fabian socialism as well as Marxism and later Russian “socialism”, but unswervingly committed to building capitalism.

It was this state- capitalist structure whose dismantling began in 1991 and continues. It is at best amusing, if not outright hilarious,to see the proponents of neo- liberalism criticize “Nehruvian socialism”, when no such thing existed.

***
The Challenge to the Ethos

Despite the broad hegemony that the INC was able to achieve, it was challenged by radical voices from the fringes even during the national struggle for freedom. These were the Communist Party, the Muslim League, the Hindu Mahasabha and BR Ambedkar’s Depressed Classes movement.

The Communist influence was partly because of reflected glory of the Russian Revolution (it should not be forgotten that to the outside world, the USSR was an undiluted “success story” in the thirties) but also because of the much strongly committed intelligentsia that it was able to rally around itself and who carried the influence of socialist ideas much greater than warranted by the numerical strength of the CP.

In terms of organization, the Communists were far ahead of realizing the significance of an organized assault on political power and had some of the most committed cadre. Bhagat Singh’s sacrifice at the tender age of 23, and his espousal of socialism led to many of his associates to join the CP (among his jailed compatriots was Ajoy Ghosh, the future General Secretary of the CPI).

The Communists, while they may have had tactical disagreements with the INC at some points, were the radical wing of the Indian struggle for freedom. This came from their understanding of imperialism as well as the fact that in many states the communists were those young men and women who felt that the INC’s goal of political freedom was limited. In some states the a number of INC leaders came over to the CPI (Kerala, for example), and in some others maintained participation in both the INC and the CPI.

The Congress Socialist Party (CSP) within the INC represented a more organized wing, and perhaps even a bridge with the CPI. The CSP was to emerge as a separate, though peripheral force in the 1950s, and only after the 1990s did it get re- incarnated in shapes and forms that someone like Acharya Narendra Deva could not have envisaged then. But more on this later.

The Muslim League, the Hindu Mahasabha and the Depressed Classes movement shared a perspective that was different and even opposed to these three fundamental aspects. All these formations saw internal enemies as more immediate and major threats and the British as a stabilizing force, even feeling that the British were better than their “other”- the Muslim League was scared of a Hindu dominated Congress leadership, the Hindu Mahasabha was scared of the Muslim “snakes” and the Depressed Classes of the dominant upper caste (if not Brahmin) domination of the Congress. The Depressed Classes did have a point- the leadership of the INC, the CPI and the Hindu Mahasabha were indeed Brahmin dominated.

It also needs to be remembered here that the RSS, the major formation of the Hindutva Right was formed as much to counter the lower caste upsurge in Maharashtra specifically in Nagpur, as to fight the Muslims.

Sumit Sarkat et al have provided insight on the RSS in their tract “Khaki Shorts and Saffron Flags”:

“The centrally of Maharashtra In the formation of the ideology and organisation of Hindutva in the mid -1920’s might appear rather surprising, as Muslims were a small minority and hardly active, and there had been no major riots in the region during the early 1920′8. But Maharashtra had witnessed a powerful anti -Brahmin movement of backward castes from the 1870’s onwards when Jyotiba Phule had founded his Satyashodhak Samaj.

By the 1920′8, the Dalits too had started organising themselves under Ambedkar. Hindutva in 1925 and in 1990-91; was an upper caste bid to restore a slipping hegemony: RSS’s self -image of its own history makes this abundantly clear. There was, in addition, the distrust felt for the new Gandhian Congress on the part of a section of the predominantly Chitpavan Brahmin Tilakites. It is symptomatic that B.S.Monje, an old associate of Tilak, was one of the five who founded what became the RSS on Vijaya Dashami day, 1925″ {pg10-11).

The Muslim League, the Hindu Mahasabha and the Depressed Classes movement, each of these focused on sectional interests rather than on an over arching “national” interest. despite a much firmer theoretical understanding of colonialism and imperialism, the Communists were restricted by their dogmatism derived from MN Roy and later RPD’s “India Today”.

This is not to deny that some of the sectional fears and the reality of contradictions between various classes and sections in India existed at the time, but the fact is that they did not see the common principal enemy of the Indian peasant- which was colonialism.

***
Negation of the Ethos

Post independence, with the Muslim League practically out of the picture, the major political formations were the INC- now re-incarnated as a political party, the CPI, the Bharatiya Jan Sangh (with its lone representative S. Mukherjee), the “Socialists” who now advocated an essentially backward caste politics (Ram Manohar Lohia) and the (c)overtly capitalist PSP.

For all of Ambedkar’s qualities, he remained in political backwaters and also led his followers into the same- something that was to change a few decades after his death (and hence the significance of Kanshi Ram).

This framework was sustained more or less in its 1950s form till the late eighties. A lot of change in social structures had taken place in the meanwhile; the Green Revolution had altered the social base of the peasantry in many states in the country led to the emergence of new political parties or of hitherto marginal ones.

Most of these parties are in some way or the other linked to their predecessors of the 1950s in one way or the other. The INC and the CPI/CPM remained perhaps the only one with direct lineages to the 1950s, and even to the days before independence.

The Lohiate groups manifested themselves in various ways, generally these are led by one or few personalities and have “Janta” and/or “socialist” in their names, the major ones being the Samajwadi Party, Lalu Yadav’s Rashtriya Janta Dal, and the Nitish Kumar led Janta Dal (U). The only significant exception is the Bahujan Samaj Party. Though it can, technically speaking, trace itself to Ambedkar’s Indian Labour Party and later the RPI), it had practically nothing to start off with in the states where it is powerful today (UP and MP).

South and East India has shown relatively more resilience in terms of older political parties continuing to remain the major players,though the TDP’s rise in 1980 was certainly spectacular (marking the rise of both Telugu sub- nationalism and the emergence of new castes (the Kammas) in politics.)

The second major emergence at the same time was that of the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP), which was amazingly, able to build hysteria against the Muslims. The fact that Muslims are worse off than even the Dalits, indicates not only the communal anti- Muslim nature of the BJP but also its essentially anti- poor nature.

Much to the chagrin of Marxists, the developments in the last few decades generally over the world, but particularly in India, have indicated the rise of identity based movements. It places them in a difficult situation where class consciousness and not primordial identities determine the nature of political alliances. It places them in a difficult situation where primordial identities and not class consciousness determine the nature of political alliances. It is all the more piquant when identity overlaps with broad economic classes. This, in the background of the collapse of the Soviet Union and the economic model of “existing socialism” placed them in a state of stupor, of a paralysis. Communist influence between 1962- 1990 was in a state of stifling stagnation and actually declined in many areas like Bihar, Andhra Pradesh and Punjab.

The INC also underwent a massive crisis in the face of the rise of the BJP and the OBC political parties especially in the “BIMARU” states (also called the “Hindi heartland”). Decades of power had corrupted the party to such an extent that a mere hint of failure at the polls makes Congressmen flock to the BJP in hordes. Ideological loyalty had over the years given place to personal loyalties, and even this was based on favors and when the source of those favors- political power at the Center- seemed to dry up, an exodus happened, particularly to the BJP.

What amazed all political analysts was the dramatic rise of the BJP, of course the oft cited comparison with 2 MPs to 88 MPs in 1991 elections is an exaggeration since the Jana Sangh component during the Janta Party rule had been considerable. But still the rise of the BJP was something unexpected and unforeseen. The CPI and the CPM had treated both the Congress, the representative of the bourgeoisie and the BJP, the representative of communal fascism as not only equal, but the Left also entered into an unholy alliance with it within the National Front in 1989.

It took the destruction of the Babri Masjid, the Gujarat pogrom of 2002 and the grisly riots in other states in the interim period for them to realize the difference between the two parties. The Left support to the present UPA government, therefore, is based on the realization that despite the differences with the INC especially on economic policies, the Left and the Congress share the same political ethos.

The present day BJP traces its origin to the Bhartiya Jana Sangh though for a brief period some of its leaders merged into the Janta Party in the seventies (I believe that the BJS, and its founder leader Balraj Madhok both exist, at least on paper). Even before that, it can be linked to the Hindu Mahasabha. One of the Hindu Mahasabha’s leader Shyama Prasad Mukerjee was to later found the BJS. Nathu Ram Godse, another member of the same outfit, had assassinated Mahatma Gandhi in 1948.

The RSS itself had focused its energies in galvanizing Hindu youth against the Muslim “enemies”, since its formation in 1925. The Hindu Mahasabha, too had directed its energies towards the same goal. In terms of its overall, it came closer to the Muslim League than to the INC.

After Gandhiji’s assasination in 1948, the RSS was indicted by the judicial commission investigating the Mahatma’s assassination for creating an atmosphere where a group of political activists planned and carried the assassination of the most outstanding advocate of ahimsa. Because of the repercussions that the Sangh faced in the immediate aftermath of the murder, it’s castigation of the Mahatama became oblique. So, while Jawaharlal comes in for direct rebuke in Golwalkar’s “Bunch of Thoughts”, his abuse of Gandhi is implied though unmistakable.

Golwalkar says:

“Those who declare ‘No swaraj without Hindu- Muslim unity’ have thus perpetrated the greatest treason to our society. They have committed the most heinous sin of killing the life- spirit of a
great and ancient people. To preach impotency to a society which gave rise to Shivaji who, in the words of the historian Jadunath Sarkar, ‘proved to the whole world that the Hindu has drunk the elixir of immortality’ and to break the self- confident and proud spirit of such a great and virile society has no parallel in the history of the world for sheer magnitude of its betrayal”.(page 150,151, 1966 edition of Bunch of Thoughts)

His criticism of the Mahatma is more than evident, despite the thin veneer. His criticism of Jawaharlal, indeed, a perverted hatred for the man and what he symbolized in the same book provides the backdrop to the later hatred for Jawaharlal that came into prominence.

This leads me to some conclusive summarization of the ideological character of the assault on India and its concept in the last two decades, since the launch of the infamous Toyota yatra.

This assault has been on both economic and the political fronts, the first one manifested as reneging on “Nehru’s socialism” and the second one, sometimes covertly in cultural terms, but more often than not in showing the Muslims, Christians and minorities in general as the enemies, the fifth columnists in the country- in other words, it harked back to the days of the nationalist struggle where the internal enemies, and not the colonial state were seen as the enemies.

It is a perversity of our times, that a party that had no role to play in one of the greatest movement of men and women in the 20th century next only, in terms of the populations involved, to the Chinese Revolution in 1949, took on the garb of a “nationalist” party!

The inter relation of the two- the assault on the basic premises of the Indian Nation, its inclusiveness and modern vision rooted in the elements of Enlightenment from within the Indian tradition and the overwhelming fascination with neo- liberal economics is hard to miss.Under the globalization that came to be synonymous with neo- liberalism of the 1980s the only major opponent is the national state.

Despite the quintessentially capitalist nature of the Indian state established during the days of Jawaharlal Nehru, it also embodies the anti- imperialist and anti- colonial elements.

It is these elements that have been assault since 1991, by elements from within the INC but most rabidly by the Hindutva BJP. While much was wrong, and stifled development especially after the 70s, and needed to be corrected, the last 15 years have seen the shrill assault against everything. The baby is being thrown out along with the bathwater.

In the backdrop of a decrease in the euphoria over the defeat of ‘existing socialism’ in Eastern Europe in the West, even its decrease in the “war against terror” (another term for war against Islam), it is strange that many in India still seem to clap to its otherwise fading echo. There are sounds from other parts of the world that it needs to wake up to, most resoundingly in South America where majority of the countries have turned to the Left.

As the early part of the 21st century comes to resemble, more and more, the early part of the 20th century, it serves neo- liberalism (another term for neo- colonialism) to forget the struggle against the colonialism. The cause is expedited by a party that wants to erase the struggle of the Indian freedom fighters and replace it with those situated in a mythical past.

***
Recovering the Ethos

The Left world wide has historically voiced the concerns against the dominant classes. It has set itself as its goal, the emancipation of the working people, of the subjugated against ruling classes. It is the Left that in India has to recover, and leverage, the ethos of the Indian freedom struggle. It will be represented not only the Communist Parties but also any other group, political party and movement that carries forward that ethos.

The success of Marxist theory between 1917 to the sixties was so great (spawning Marxist schools of thought in many disciplines) that it became difficult to separate the Marxist method from the theory. And classical Marxist theory had very little patience with both the ‘nation’ and identity based movements, except in class based context. This is something that was rectified to a large extent in many other countries but not sufficiently in India, primarily because in India, the communist movement was not without successes and it never felt the need to question its basic premises, and hence there has been no ‘New Left’ in India.

The Left is situates itself the fact that one cannot be “left” in certain aspects while being “right” on others and that xenophopia (manifested in India by Hindutva) and globalization are two faces of the same animal.

The Left in India will be made of up of the many movements that will work sometimes in a contradictory manner. It will be built up of organic intellectuals from a Dalit resurgence, from the backward castes, the middle and poor classes and from the sensitive intelligentsia from the ruling classes who realize both the immorality of the increasing gaps between the rich and the poor and the unsustainable nature of “development” fostered by neo- liberalism.

The intellectual tradition for an Indian Left consists of the path breaking method and theories of Karl Marx and F. Engels and the political intensity of Lenin, Trotsky, Rosa Luxemburg and Antonio Gramsci. It also draws from the literature and traditions of dissent from within India and South Asia, of Charvaka and Sufism, of the Buddha and Kabir. The political traditions that it carries forward are not only political leaders like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Bhagat Singh, but also Babasaheb Ambedkar and the subaltern protests of Birsa Munda. It cannot but find itself within the fraternity of those who struggle for the weakest of the weakest even as they also sympathise with similar movements across the world that wage a daily struggle against oppression, including the working people in the West who lose their jobs as corporates look for profits in the poorer nations.

The Left in India will embrace internationalism- the universal brotherhood of mankind, not the forced corporatization of the world that goes under the name of globalization.

It will have its heretics. It will learn from them as well.

Indian Vendors of the American Dream

Girish Mishra questions the basis of the American Dream being transplanted by its Indian vendors:

Ever since the beginning of the economic reforms mandated by the Washington Consensus, the gap between the rich and the poor has rapidly increased. Similarly, regional economic disparities are largest since Independence. The new jobs that have been generated require the skills that cannot be acquired by the poor, especially from the rural areas. Most educational institutions in rural areas do not have furniture, proper buildings, teachers, blackboards and electricity. They cannot afford computers even in their dreams. In this situation, the American Dream has no relevance for them. Maybe it can inspire the young people in higher income groups who can think of emulating their counterparts in the USA.

On a personal note, I am very happy to have discovered Girish Mishra's site, having been an avid reader of his column in New Wave that used to be published from New Delhi many years back. Along with Girish Mathur's articles, it used to be something to look forward to.

Girish Mishra has taught Economics at Kirori Mal College in Delhi and has been a voice of wisdom from the Left for a long time. It gives me a sense of deja vu to find his articles available on the internet.

I would urge you to bookmark his site and read the online articles at his site as well as the Znet site.

The Shadow Lines by Amitav Ghosh

Amitav Ghosh's The Shadow Lines (1998) is an intense and anguished meditation on the creation of modern states in South Asia.

There are two streams in the novel- one that of the narrator who has heard about England from a cousin who lived there for sometime and his own discovery of the country when he visits it later in life.

The other stream is that of his grandmother visiting her old home in Dhaka, her nostalgia and the discovery of alienation from what she had remembered before Dhaka became part of Pakistan. I found the second stream to be far more readable than the first one, especially the grandmother's character as seen by her young grandson (the narrator).

The grandmother goes to Dhaka to bring 'home' her uncle who had decided to stay on in Dhaka after the partition in 1947. He obdurately refuses, delivering one of the finest dialogs in the novel:

Move? the old man said incredulously. Move to what?

It's not safe for you here, my grandmother said urgently. I know these people look after you well, but it's not the same thing. You don't understand.

I understand very well, the old man muttered. I know everything, I understand everything. Once you start moving, you never stop. That's what I told my sons when they took the trains. I don't believe in this India- Shindia. It's all very well, you are going away now, but suppose when you get there they decide to draw another line somewhere? What will you do then? Where will you move to? No one will have you anywhere. As for me, I was born here, and will die here.

Even then, the grandmother tries to take her away from Dhaka when riots break out in the city and he is killed along with the narrator's cousin Tridib and the rickshaw puller Khalil who had been looking after the old man.

It is an engrossing read, and shares a few elements with Midnight's Children, though the latter is on a broader canvas. The Shadow Lines is written effortlessly and without the baggage of 'magical realism' that Rushdie carried even in his first novel. Ghosh's prose is evocative and realist.

Nevertheless, what I found disconcerting at the end of the novel is the author's treatment of the modern nation in South Asia as a given, and not historically formed entity. So the madness of the continuing riots is seen as inexplicable, and the humanist effort on part of his cousin to rescue his grandfather from the rioting mob, as fatal and meaningless.

Take this rumination of Tridib's brother when he is reminded of Tridib's death in a Bangladeshi restaurant in England, fifteen years later. It more then sums up the cynicism towards the nation states, towards the borders- the 'shadow lines.'

And then I think to myself why don't they draw thousands of little lines through the whole subcontinent and give every little place a new name? What would it change? The whole thing is a mirage; the whole thing is a mirage. How can anyone divide memory? If freedom was possible, surely Tridib's death would have set me free.

For some reason, after finishing it my immediate urge was to reach out for VS Naipaul's India: A Million Mutinies Now, because I think it helps to explain better the significance of shadow lines and why they are being continually redrawn, in physical geography as well as geographies of minds.

"We locked away Gandhi on Feb 28"

"Terror was unleashed at Godhra Station because this country follows Gandhi, we locked away Gandhi on Feb 28 (2002), reform yourselves or we will forget Gandhi. Till we follow Gandhi's policies of non- violence ... kneeling before Muslims, terrorism cannot be eliminated. Brothers we have to abandon Gandhi."

- Praveen Togadia (quoted from his speech in the video)

A heart wrenching documentary Final Solution on the Gujarat pogrom of 2002 and subsequent elections in the Hindutva laboratory.




Link to google videos

Link via comment at All Things Pakistaniat

Indian Politics- A Dialogue

I am blogging, for much of this week at Krish's blog. The first post in the 4- post series appeared on Monday. The remaining will appear over this week and next. See the introductory note if you are interested in following the debate. The 4 posts are:
Part 1: The Defining Ethos of Indian Politics (Monday, 18 Dec )
Part 2: The Challenge to the Ethos (Thursday, 21 Dec)
Part 3: Negation of the Ethos (Monday, 25 Dec)
Part 4: Recovery of the Ethos (Thursday, 28 Dec)

Tips and Tricks to Kill Baby Girls

Renuka Chowdhury, India's Minister for Women and Child Development on India's "distinction" of killing 10m baby girls in the last two decades alone (I will neither comment nor respond to comments on this post; I have no words except unfathomable silences)

"Today, we have the odd distinction of having lost 10 million girl children in the past 20 years," Chowdhury told a seminar in Delhi University.

"Who has killed these girl children? Their own parents."

In some states, the minister said, newborn girls have been killed by pouring sand or tobacco juice into their nostrils.

"The minute the child is born and she opens her mouth to cry, they put sand into her mouth and her nostrils so she chokes and dies," Chowdhury said, referring to cases in the western desert state of Rajasthan.

"They bury infants into pots alive and bury the pots. They put tobacco into her mouth. They hang them upside down like a bunch of flowers to dry," she said.

"We have more passion for tigers of this country. We have people fighting for stray dogs on the road. But you have a whole society that ruthlessly hunts down girl children."

According to the 2001 census, the national sex ratio was 933 girls to 1,000 boys, while in the worst-affected northern state of Punjab, it was 798 girls to 1,000 boys.

The ratio has fallen since 1991, due to the availability of ultrasound sex-determination tests.

Although these are illegal they are still widely available and often lead to abortion of girl foetuses.

Chowdhury said the fall in the number of females had cost one per cent of India's GDP and created shortages of girls in states like Haryana, where in one case four brothers had to marry one woman.

Economic empowerment of women was key to change, she said.

"Even today when you go to a temple, you are blessed with 'May you have many sons'," she said.

"The minute you empower them to earn more or equal (to men), social prejudices vanish."

The practice of killing the girl child is more prevalent among the educated, including in upmarket districts of New Delhi, making it more challenging for the government, the minister said.

"How do we tell educated people that you must not do it? And these are people who would visit all the female deities and pray for strength but don't hesitate to kill a girl

Full report

Remembering 06 December 1992: "Doosra Banwas "

Kaifi Azmi's poem written in the aftermath of the Babri Masjid demolition revealed the contradictions in the movement that led the demolition.

Ram banwaas se jab laut ke ghar mein aaye,
Yaad jangal bahut aaya jo nagar mein aaye,
Raqsse deewangee aangan mein jo dekha hoga,
6 december ko Shri Ram ne socha hoga,
Itne deewane kahan se mere ghar mein aaye?

Jagmagate thhe jahan Ram key qadmon ke nishaan,
Piyaar kee kahkashan leti thi angdayee jahan,
Mod nafrat ke usee rah guzar mein aaye,
Dharam kya unka hae, kya zaat hae, yeh janta kaun?
Ghar na jalta tau unhe raat mein pehchanta kaun,
Ghar jalane ko mera, log jo ghar mein aaye,
Shakahari hae mere dost tumahara khanjar.

Tumne Babar kee taraf pheke thhe saare patthar
Hae mere sar ki khata zakhm jo sar mein aaye,
Paun Sarjoo mein aabhi Ram ne dhoye bhee na thhe
Ke nazar aaye wahan khoon ke gehre dhabbe,
Paun dhoye bina Sarjoo ke kinare se uthe,
Ram yeh kehte hue aapne dwaare se uthe,
Rajdhani kee fiza aayee nahin raas mujhe,
6 December ko mila doosra banwaas mujhe.
(Acknowledgement: Zafar Iqbal)

A rough translation:

"The Second Exile"

That evening when Lord Ram returned to his home
He remembered the jungles where he had spent his years of exile
When he must have seen the dance of madness that December 6
It must have crossed his mind
From where have so many demented ones landed on my home

Wherever he had stepped and his footprints had shone
The river waters where thousands of stars of love meandered
Instead now took turns of violence and hatred
What is their religion, what is their caste, who knows?
Had the house not burnt, who would have known the faces
Of those who came to burn my house
Your sword, my friend, is vegetarian.

You threw towards Babar all the stones
It is my head's fault that, instead, it bleeds
Lord Ram had not even washed his feet in the Saryu waters
When he saw deep blots of blood.
Getting up without washing his feet in the waters
Lord Ram left the precincts of his own residence, bemoaning,
The state of my own capital city no longer suits me
This December 6, I have been condemned to a second exile

Related link: Review of PV Narasimha Rao's book 06 December 1992

Kaifi Azmi: The Poet who would die in Socialist India

(The play Kaifi aur Main based on the memoir written by Shaukat Azmi, and played by Shabana Azmi and Javed Akhtar is currently on tour in India)

Kaifi Azmi was part of the fiery triumvirate of the Urdu poets in post independent India. Along with Sahir Ludhianvi and Ali Sardar Jafri, Kaifi Azmi wrote "red poetry" when the appeal of socialism among the intelligentsia in India and the world at large was substantial.

Two names that should belong to the list are Faiz Ahmed Faiz and Makhdoom Mohiuddin.

Makhdoom gave priority to politics over his poetry- representing the Communist Party of India as an MLA in Andhra Pradesh while Faiz Ahmed Faiz in a metaphorical sense, and in a reversal of roles, substituted the lack of the political Left in Pakistan with his poetry. Sahir Ludhianvi wove magic with his uncanny, and unsurpassed ability to lyricize complex ideas, including ideological, into a brilliant tapestry of words making films his terra firma.

Kaifi Azmi and Ali Sardar Jafri together tread the path of literary activism, practically being the official poets of the Communist Party of India.

It would be futile to look for Kaifi Azmi, the man, in his film lyrics. They represent him only partially and those that do, bring out only the personally romantic side of him, specially in those sung by Mohammad Rafi in his mellow, bass elegance. Kaifi lacked the lyricism of Sahir that appealed to Bollywood movies and also the great literary sweep of Faiz Ahmed Faiz.

What Kaifi excelled at was the nazm, marking as he did, the break from the classicism of the ghazal form. As one of the angry young men thrown up in the aftermath of the Civil Disobedience Movement, at the time when it was very heaven to be young- the time of Jawaharlal Nehru's youthful swerve to socialist ideas, the formation of the Congress Socialist Party and the radical appeal of the Communist Party of India under P.C. Joshi who made culture as one of the 'fronts' on which the party had to fight in its struggle for socialism- much before Antonio Gramsci's concept of cultural hegemony came to be known and gain credence.

Kaifi was one of the major activists of the Indian People's Theater Association in his younger days and in 1986 made a valiant effort to revive the movement as its president. He was known for his closeness to the CPI, and even once had a spat with Sahir when he accused the latter of compromising his lifestyle while proclaiming his leftist political commitment.

I remember Kaifi Azmi, Comrade Kaifi to us youngsters, reciting his famous nazm Naujawan, after a spate of street dramas enacted by various groups in the IPTA troupe. His recitation was the last one as night crawled around us and a mild March breeze began to blow. His voice boomed in the pin drop silence, what a voice he had !

Raah agyaar ki dekhain yeh bhale taur nahin
Hum Bhagat Singh ke saathi hain, koi aur nahin.

Zindagi humse sada shola e jawaani maange
Ilm o hikmat ka khazana humdaani maange
aisi lalkaar ke talwaar bhi paani maange
aisi raftaar ke dariya bhi rawaani maange

(That we would wait for others to take lead, does not suit us,
We are the comrades of Bhagat Singh, and none else

Life beseeches us our burning youth
The treasures of knowledge and courage
A cry so sharp that the swords may cry out
Such an electric flow that the oceans may look to us for inspiration)

At its most sensitive turns, Kaifi Azmi's poetry was meant to highlight the life of the poor and the suppressed, and at its most inspired movements, meant to inspire the young cadre of the communist movement to go out and work for upliftment of the "insulted and the humiliated". Kaifi Azmi had once proudly declared: I was born in colonial India, I have lived in an independent India, and will die in a socialist India.

Kaifi lived to see the dreams of his youth smothered as fort after fort of existing socialism collapsed in East Europe and its citadel, the Soviet Union. He was shell shocked.

And even in his silences he spoke for the grim silence of all those who had been inspired by the message of the October Revolution. After the fall of the Soviet Union, he did not speak for many months, and neither did he write.

It was the attack on Indian secularism on 06 December 1992 that awoke the activist poet in him and he wrote the nazm invoking Lord Rama.

Towards the end of his life, he returned to his roots, the small mofussial town of Azamgarh, building a high school for girls and a hospital. He had written:
Woh mera gaanv hai, woh mere gaanv ke chooleh
Ke jinme shole to shole, dhooan nahin milata

(That indeed is my village, and those indeed are the ovens of my village
In which, not to speak of the fires, even the smoke is not seen)

In the more famous matla of this ghazal, he had expressed the restlessness that inspired him:

Main dhoondta hoon jise woh jahan nahin milta
Nai zameen, naya aasmaan nahin milta

(The world that I search for, I do not find,
The New World, the New Heavens I do not find)

To look for Kaifi, is to keep on searching the for new, better, more egalitarian worlds. And heavens that are more just. To remove this search from his poetry would be to take away its soul.

On a personal note, I had the opportunity to meet with "Comrade Kaifi" at Ajoy Bhawan in New Delhi in 1986. On seeing a bunch of youngsters from the Punjab, he gave me a pointed look, the tuft of hair on his forehead falling over his eyes, and asked me, referring to the Khalistanis: Why are these young men angry?

I did not have an instant answer. And perhaps the question in that context has become irrelevant. But then, perhaps Kaifi was also referring to his own younger days, and asking: What is it that makes young men (and women) angry?

He had spent a lifetime in poetry trying to answer this question.

***

Thanks to Alok for having revived memories of Kaifi and for the link to the "Kaifi aur Main" site.

Image Source

Hooray ! Dalits have progressed !

(Click on image to enlarge)

Update: Though this post is labelled under 'Humour', let it not distract the very serious issue at hand.

Siddharta Varadrajan remarks in The Hindu:

Based on the data leaked so far, it is evident there are entry barriers Muslims — who account for 17 per cent of India's population — are unable to cross in virtually all walks of life. From the administration and the police to the judiciary and the private sector, the invisible hands of prejudice, economic and educational inequality seem to have frozen the `quota' for Muslims at three to five per cent. Thanks to a hysterical campaign run by the Bharatiya Janata Party and some media houses, the Sachar committee was denied data on the presence of Muslims in the armed forces. But even there it is apparent that the three per cent formula applies.

This gross under-presence of Muslims in virtually every sector is presaged by substantial inequalities in education. Muslim enrolment and retention rates at the primary and secondary levels are lower than the national average and this further magnifies existing inequalities at the college level as well as in the labour market. For virtually every socio-economic marker of well being, the Muslim is well below the national norm — not to speak of the level commensurate with her or his share of the national population — and the evidence suggests these inequalities are not decreasing over time.

This bleak statistical picture is rendered drearier still by new trends visible in many cities. Muslims, for example, find it extremely difficult to rent and buy property outside of "Muslim areas" in some metros.

Thanks to Krish for the link to Siddharta Varadrajan's article.

Image Source: The Tribune

Remembering a friend this Diwali

To write about Divali in South India is to invite intense fire from saffron troops. For, Ram stands delinked from the festivities. Nor, for that matter, does Lakshmi figure in anything that goes on that day. What kind of a Divali is it then?

An article by friend, comrade, mentor - the late TKR

I was reminded of this article by hip Grandma's post.

Tags: India, Diwali, Festival

Adivasis and the Environmentalism of the Rich

Indian Tribals ...and...the environmentalism of the rich

Guest post by Ishwar Singh Dost

Whatever I say here, is born of three decades of day-to-day experience of India's poor. And, amongst them, India's tribals share a worse fate. Theirs is a faceless existence. They are in India from ancient times, for thousands of years, yet the mainstream India has continually refused to recognise them. In the tribal society there is no caste division, no dowry system, divorce and widow remarriage is socially sanctioned. They are, after centuries of oppression and neglect, still so civilized! Yet we have simply refused to recognise their worth, have made them bonded slaves in the unorganised sectors, have evicted them from land wherever we have founded industries, or built dams.

Having been denied fundamental human rights, they have joined the floating population of the other poor who follow the contractors and go anywhere for a pittance. The mighty tribal culture, their fantastic dances, music, painting and wood cuttings are lifted by middlemen for a handful of coins and sold at high prices at home and abroad. The artisans receive next to nothing.

- Indian author Mahashweta Devi on the Indian tribals, aka adivasis

In comparison with other sections of Indian poor, the adivasis or the tribals are at the lowest rank of the Human Development Index, much below the Dalits. 50% of the adivasis live below the poverty line- a figure twice of the other rural poor. The Below Poverty Line (BPL) percent for all agricultural labourers is 45% but 61% of the adivasi agricultural labourers live below the poverty line. The number of adivasi cultivators declined from 68% in 1993- 94 to 45% in 1999-2000. Poverty increased by 5% among the rural adivasis and by 30% among the urban adivasis between 1993-94 to 1999-2000.

The Scheduled Tribes are the only strata of Indian population whose number of poor went up during this period- when other vulnerable sections of the population, the scheduled castes, agricultural labourers and urban casual workers have shown some decline in poverty.

Historically, the tribals have been pushed farther and farther into the interiors of the forests and away from cultivable lands- it is no coincidence that they occupy the land rich in minerals, since such land tends to be poor in terms of cultivation.

But it was British rule that dramatically altered the patterns of land and forest use forever. By 1860, Britain had become a world champion of deforestation. Besides denuding forests in its own country, it also ravaged the jungles in its colonies the world over, using the timber in shipbuilding, railways, smelting iron and so on.

The colonial state declared the forests as state property and the dispossession of the adivasis from their own land bagan. While the Forest Department established in 1865 was assigned the role of a revenue generating organ, the Indian Forest Act of 1927 gave arbitrary powers to the forest officers.

Post independence experience of marginalisation and subjugation continued- laws like the Land Acquisition Act of 1894 and the India Forest Act of 1927 are still in force. The pattern of industrialisation reinforced processes introduced by the British, the same laws were retained post 1947 while ensuring that "development" was achieved via internal colonialisation.

The extent of the colonisation of the forests can be discerned from the following statistics:

Export of wood and forest produce was worth Rs. 4,459 crores, about 15% of the total exports from India in 2000-01 from Rs 95 crores in 1960-61. This is despite the fact that the area under forests has continued to shrink from 40% in 1854 to 22% in 1952 to 10% in the 1980s. The revenue from forest lands rose from Rs 24 crores to Rs. 472 crores in 1980-81.

The count of people displaced from the projects like dams, mines and industries ranges between 20 to 30 million. Almost half of these displaced persons are adivasis. They are only 8 percent of total population of India, but constitute 40% of displaced persons. If we add the numbers of displaced persons after 1990, this would go to 50%.

The Forest Policy of 1988, however, brought about some welcome changes to the country's approach to the issue, and to some extent reflected the aspirations of popular movements. It introduced elements of conservation- replacing monoculture cultivation with mixed forests- the World Bank funded Pine project in Bastar had by then proved how disastrous monoculture cultivation- specially of pine, can be.

While adivasis continue to be displaced for ostensibly nationalist projects like construction of dams, reserved forests, sanctuaries and national parks are being seen as the new destination for eco- tourists- that is the new mantra of the international aid agencies, governments, environmental lobbyists and agencies like the World Wildlife Fund.

Recent years have also seen the rise of the fashionable "environmentalism of the rich" within India, which is not unlinked to the Western nations' invocation of conservation- countries that had achieved a degree of progress by destroying the ecology now demanded that the victim countries now help conserve it to save the world from global warming, while evading the question of compensation.

It is also being pushed by a conglomeration of ex- maharajas, ex- shikaris, tourists and other privileged sections.

It is a paradox that while adivasis are being driven out from their habitats, tourist activities are being promoted. The adivasis are being blamed for "encroaching" on their own lands.

A report last year in Down to Earth magazine pointed out:

Tourism is flourishing in Ranthambore, with hotels mushrooming around the tiger in its reserve. Till the mid-1990s, there were just over 10 hotels in and around the forests of the reserve and in the town of Sawai Madhopur some 12 kilometres (km) from the gate of the national park. Now there are 33, of which 26 are prominent. Six new hotels are under construction. Average room rents vary between Rs 400 a night to a staggering Rs 30,000 for a night of ultra-deluxe luxury in the midst of the wild tigers.

...

Lack of regulation has meant that many hotels have come up on agricultural or charagah (grazing) land, within a 500-metre radius of the park boundary. “The demand for new hotels has led to the sky-rocketing of land prices,” says a local hotelier. Along the Ranthambore road, land prices have gone up from Rs 1.25 lakh to Rs 1.5 lakh per hectare (ha) 10 years back to anywhere from Rs 30 lakh to Rs 40 lakh per ha today, depending on the proximity to the park entrance. “Due to the high prices villagers prefer to sell the land near the park,” says Hemraj Meena, a guide at the tiger reserve.

...

Among those who own houses and hotels near the (Ranthambore) park are Valmik Thapar, well-known conservationist and member of the Supreme Court’s Central Empowered Committee, and his relatives, and Fateh Singh Rathore, former field director of Ranthambore and now vice-chairman of Tiger Watch, a non-governmental organisation (NGO), and his family. These properties are within 500 meters of the forest boundary. “Hotel Sher Bagh located at a distance of 104 meters from the forest boundary is run by Jaisal Singh, Thapar’s nephew,” says Chandu Sharma, a local journalist. “Sher Bagh is a deluxe tented camp owned by Valmik Thapar’s family,” confirms wildlifeworldwide.com.

The stark truth brought about by the report is: People who direct conservation policies profit from the regulations that promote tourism and park management.

This is just the continuation of the so- called "Panchsheel policy" established during Jawaharlal Nehru's time. Nehru had himself stated while addressing villagers who were being displaced by the Hirakund dam:

If you are to suffer, you should suffer in the interest of the country.

Mrs Indira Gandhi wrote in the same vein to Baba Amte in a letter dated 30 August 1984:

I am most unhappy that development projects displace tribal people from their habitat, especially as project authorities do not always take care to properly rehabilitate the affected population. But sometimes there is no alternative and we have to go ahead in the larger interests.

The end of the story has remained the same: whether it is the development of the nation or conservation of the environment, the "somebody" who has to pay the price is the adivasi.

Ishwar Singh Dost is a long time activist, researcher and journalist. His paper "Forests, Adivasi Rights and the State" is due for publication in a book edited by Prof. A.V. Afonso

Picture Acknowledgements

Tags: India, Adivasi, Tribal, Economy, Politics, Environment

Ganesh Devy in the heart of Hindutva's Lab

A new controversy has arisen in Gujarat. This time around Ganesh Devy. That the soft-spoken Devy could cause a controversy would surprise many.

...The controversy started after Sankarshan Thakur of Tehelka spoke to Devy after the demolition of a mazar of a Sufi saint in Vadodara by municipal authorities who claimed they had only razed an encroachment. Riots broke out. Tracing the source of the growing violence in Gujarat, Ganesh Devy told Tehelka that there was a relationship between a society’s acquisitive tendency and the emergence of violence. He also talked about the role of the ‘decent’ people in breeding hatred.

...Photocopies of the piece were circulated and nearly everybody in Gujarati literature reacted angrily to Devy’s comments. Articles appeared in newspapers and writers made statements demanding that Devy tender a public apology.

...Wali’s tomb was an encroachment, the Sufi mazar was an encroachment, anything which comes in the way of a seamless Hindu Gujarati identity would be stigmatised as an encroachment and then it would be easy to remove it by popular consent. Wali’s tomb is no more, the Vadodara mazar does not exist anymore. Would the democratic world keep watching till something similar happens to Ganesh Devy?

Link

A previous GN Devy interview by Sankarshan Thakur. An excerpt:

You do not become a bad man in Gujarat if you hate Muslims; you are normal. Decent people hate Muslims. And it is not a city phenomenon alone; this is true of villages as well. If a Muslim is traumatised, it is a normal thing. Just to give a sense of how Gujarati Hindus relate to Muslims, I will come to the Narmada issue. Gujarat is extremely pro-dam and, therefore, extremely anti-Medha Patkar. Gujaratis will call all pro-Medha people Muslims.

Tags: Hindutva, Gujarat, India

Thanks to email prompt by Ishwar Singh Dost for the link to the interview
Picture Acknowledgement

Dr. Ambedkar and Sikhism

Kanshi Ram's last rites were performed last week as per Buddhist rites. His family has apparently not approved of this. What is interesting in this episode is that Kanshi Ram was born in a Sikh family, and as far as I can recollect, he hasn't ever said anything on the issue of Dalits and Sikhism- whose tenets deny casteism. Nor did he convert to Buddhism.

Kanshi Ram's family said they suspected foul play in Kanshi Ram's death and would file a case against Mayawati. They sought a probe into the circumstances leading to Kanshi Ram's death and objected to the last rites being performed according to Buddhist traditions.

(news report)

However, there is more to the relationship between Dalits and Sikhism. The founder of the Dalit movement Dr. Ambedkar had once himself seriously considered conversion to Sikhism at one point. His interest then waned, though the reasons are not known, and he finally converted to Buddhism with half a million of his followers.

***

By 1935, Dr. BR Ambedkar’ s disgust with Hinduism and its caste system was complete. His patience at reforming Hinduism from within by securing for the untouchable castes the right to drinking water from public places, using metal utencils and receive education, was wearing thin. Earlier in 1929, he had advised his followers to embrace any religion that would give them respectability. Following this advice, some of his followers took to Islam.

Referring to his own personal decision in the matter, Ambedkar said that unfortunately for him, he was born a Hindu Untouchable. It was beyond his power to prevent that, but he declared that it was within his power to refuse to live under humiliating and ignoble conditions.

“ I solemnly assure you that I will not die a Hindu”, he thundered.

He called for an end to the decade long struggles he had led for temple entry and which was brutally opposed by caste Hindus. Ambedkar’s call to the Untouchables to stop frittering away their energies over fruitless attempts and to devote themselves to carve out an honorable alternative for themselves shocked the nation, especially the caste Hindus.

As to conversion, he said it will be done in five years and he would reconsider his decision if caste Hindus assured him by positive results. He added that he wanted to absorb his community into some powerful community and was thinking of embracing Sikhism.

On April 13-14 1936, Dr. Ambedkar addressed the Sikh Mission Conference at Amritsar. He had earlier indicated that this would be his last speech he would deliver as a Hindu. The main feature of the conference, however, turned out to be the conversion of five prominent Depressed Class leaders of the Thiyya community of Kerala headed by Dr. Kuttir and 50 others from UP and Central Provinces to Sikhism.

In May 1936, he called a conference of the Mahar community to which he belonged, and his abominations and the condemnation of Hinduism was biting, coarse and yet smashing and dissecting. He ended his speech with a quotation from the lips of the dying Buddha- he asked his people to seek refuge in Buddhism. This quotation from the Buddha led to speculations that Bhimrao was veering towards Buddhism. He himself, however, avoided a straight answer. A few days before, however, he had sent his son and nephew to Harminder Sahib as a gesture of goodwill towards Sikhism. They stayed there for over one and half months.

By June of that year, Ambedkar after consulting his colleagues decided to embrace Sikhism- his friends and colleagues felt that he should seek the support of the Hindu Mahasabha leaders in their conversion to Sikhism, for the Mahasabha leaders believed that Sikhism was not an alien religion. It was an offspring of Hinduism and therefore the Sikhs and Hindus were allowed to intermarry and the Sikhs were allowed to be members of the Mahasabha. In his proposal, Dr. Moonje agreed to the inclusion of these neo- Sikhs in the list of Scheduled Classes and enjoy the benefits under the Poona Pact, if Ambedkar preferred to embrace Sikhism in preference to Islam and Christianity and that he agreed to counteract the Muslim movement to draw the Depressed Classes into the Islamic fold.

Ambedkar said that he preferred to embrace Sikhism which offered less than social, political and economic power than Islam and less material attractions than Christianity (western nations). He favoured Sikhism in the “interests of Hindus”.

Dr. Moonje and Dr. Kurtakoti (the Shankracharya) in giving their blessings obvioulsy chose the “least evil”. In choosing thus, they also showed their belief that Sikhism is another branch of Hinduism and that it owed the same culture and principles.

Gandhi voiced concern over the proposed conversion, but Ambedkar continued to increase his contacts with the Sikh Mission. There was even a proposal to start a college in Bombay for the proposed neo- Sikhs. 13 of his followers who were asked to study the Sikh religion at Amritsar actually converted to Sikhism and returned to Bombay, where, writes Ambedkar’s biographer Dhananjay Keer, they were coldly received as they had only been asked by Ambedkar to study and not to convert.

Soon, Bhimrao went on a tour of Europe. It seems after returning in 1937 his love for Sikhism had evaporated. He continued to talk of his proposed conversion though, and in 1955 along with half a million adherents went over to Buddhism.

(Much of the above I had written in 1997, and as far as I recollect is mainly based on the notes I took from the wonderful biography of Dr. Ambedkar written by Dhananjay Keer.)

Update: The Story of Kerala's first Sikh Convert
(Thanks to Bajinder for pulling the story out of his archives)

a story by Ramesh Babu
in hindustan times(cannot get exact date)

Nintyone-year old Sardar Bhupinder Singh from Kadakarapally is the only living Malayalee Sikh in Kerala. People call him "Sikh Chettan", that is, elder brother.

On Baisakhi day in 1936, fed up of caste barriers, Bhaskaran embraced Sikhism and became Bhupinder Singh. he was not alone. Around 300 families, mostly from backward castes, converted at that time.

There is a historical background to this conversion. During Vaikkom Satyagraha in 1922, at the instance of Mahatma Gandhi, a few Akalis came to Vaikkom to make langar for satyagrahis. After successful completion of satyagraha and the Temple Entry Proclamation, some of the Akalis stayed back. Some youth were attracted by the discliplined life and joined Sikhism.

Bhupinder has a different story to tell: "After Vaikkom Satyagraha, backward castes basked in a renewed vigour. At that time, Ambedkar exhorted people that if you don't get self-respect and dignity in your own religion, you should get out of it. This prompted many of us to join Sikhism.

Initially it was tough. "My father was liberal enough but his brother opposed my conversion tooth and nail. But I stuck to my belief."

After becoming a Sikh, Bhupinder went to Gujaranwallah and Lahore for theological studies. He worked some time in Khalsa College. But the returns were inadequate. So he joined the British Royal Army as a technician in 1940. He retired in 1968 as Subedar.

Though he married a Sikh, his daughters and sons are Hindus and married under Hindu Ezhava customs. "When the community shrank we found it very difficult to find matches. So none of us insisted the second generation to follow our example. Many families later re-converted to Hinduism. It is one of the reasons for our decline in Kerala."

Bhupinder complains that when numbers became dwindled, the Sikh Committee stopped showing any interest in them.

Every Sunday Bhupinder visits the only gurdwara in the State of Elamakkara in Kochi. Recently the Kochi Gurdwara Committee honoured him with a saropa.

The nonagenarian always keeps a low profile. "Once S S Barnala came here. He was eager to know more about Malayalee Sikhs. He asked me so many things and wanted me to write a book, but I politely refused.:

Leading a solitary life after his wife's death, Sardar Bhupinder has only one wish: "Till thee last breath I want to be a true follower of the Panth."


Picture Acknowledgement


Tags: India, Ambedkar, Dalit, Sikhism, Religion, Kerala

The Signifinace of being Kanshi Ram: An Obituary

Kanshi Ram (1934-2006): There is more to his legacy than meets the eye

It is not difficult to downplay the role of Kanshi Ram- he inspired little intellectual appeal, he has left no worthwhile writings on the cause that he is linked with and his political legacy consists of a one- woman dominated Bahujan Samaj Party that is as opportunist and as mired in corruption as any other political party.

Unlike Dr. Ambedkar, with whom he stands in poor contrast, he did not convert to Buddhism or give any other broad direction to his followers. Unlike Jotiba Phule he did not argue for social reform or made any case to further it. Unlike Periyar, he did not stand for Rationalism and launch an attack on the religious basis of caste based oppression.

Instead he directed all his energies to launch a monotone assault on political power and create political mobilisation among the Dalits and others under the broader sweep of what he called, after Jotiba Phule, the "Bahujan Samaj", bothering himself little with more onerous and long term endeavours of social reform.

Yet, Kanshi Ram is significant for a number of reasons and one has to acknowledge the singular, if not stellar role that he played in the Indian political stage in general and Dalit politics in particular.

From a little known outfit called DS4, he created a political party that rose to rule the most populous state of India- Uttar Pradesh, a state that determined the power equations in the Centre- every Indian Prime Minister who has lasted a 5 year term has come from Uttar Pradesh- and has been a Brahmin, one may add (Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Atal Bihari Vajpayee).

It would be difficult to ascertain whether Kanshi Ram came in at the right moment when identity based politics was asserting itself, or whether he helped to create that politics.

If it is former, then one has to credit him with having done the ground work and be prepared to seize that opportunity when it arrived. If it is the latter, then he needs to be understood better and not contrased with Dr. Ambedkar or Periyar.

For one, Kanshi Ram created, for the first time in history, a resurgence of the Dalit community in those states where little or no reform movements have taken place.

In the North, the state of Punjab, where incidentally he was born in a Sikh family, had the reform movements in Sikhism as well as the Arya Samaj, besides the Sufi influence. On the Eastern side, Bengal had Brahmo Samaj, in South, in Tamil Nadu, the Self Respect Movement and in Maharashta on the West, the non- Brahmin movement under Jotiba Phule and later Dr Ambedkar.

It is central India, the so- called Hindi heartland or also, more derisively, the BIMARU states that did not undergo a social reform movement within Hinduism. In most of those places social reform movements evolved into radical political movements- Communist in some places but also the Justice Party (and later the Dravida Kahzagam) in Tamil Nadu and the Republican Party of India in Maharashtra.

Kanshi Ram bypassed the social reform thus catapulting political assertion in the Hindi heartland.

Some may aver that this short cut is fraught with danger- it is hoisted on a fragile base and is the reason why the Bahujan Samaj Party has degenerated so quickly.

To do so would be to ignore the mammoth task that lies in the Hindi heartland states. The upper caste population is relatively large, and has never tried to reform itself in a major way. There has been an absence of any efforts to democratise education. Notably Uttar Pradesh and Bihar have historically been politically volatile and provided the fulcrum on which the Indian National Freedom movement hinged and where it became a truly mass movement.

Kanshi Ram merely extended that political mobilisation to the Dalits specially in Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.

In doing so, did he put the cart before the horse?

There is little reason to think so.

For one, there really was neither a cart nor a horse in the Hindi heartland before the BSP stepped in.

For another, any emancipation movement needs not only the dreamers and theorists but also the organisers and the builders. Marx needed a Lenin to make the world even aware of his writings.

Kanshi Ram was no Lenin. His legacy is flawed in many ways and fraught with dangers, indeed its fragility became evident within his own lifetime.

But it also has ensured that the word Dalit has become part of the vocabulary in some of the most socially regressive areas in the country. It poses one of the few ideological challenges to Hindutva and one of the ways that emancipation of bulk of Indians can be attempted.

Kanshi Ram's BSP has taken Ambedkar from Maharashtra to all over the country and specially where it is needed more. Nearly every party- from the Congress to the BJP to the communists today carry a picture of Ambedkar in their posters and hoardings.

It has cast the net of possibilities of Dalit resurgence, wider.

It is for that reason alone that it would be an exercise in deception to overlook the importance and significance of being Kanshi Ram.

Related Post: Biography of a Poor Dalit Family

Picture Courtesy: ambedkar.org

Update: A comprehensive collection of links on Kanshi Ram 'saheb's passing away. Harish Khare's somewhat tangential take on the debt that we owe to Kanshi Ram (Link via Great Indian Mutiny)


Tags: India, Dalit, KanshiRam, BSP, Obituary, Politics