The Silly Case of Laal Chowk Flag Raising Ceremony

Kashmir is without any doubt an integral part of India and as I have always stated, one of my stated aims and objectives is the re-unification of the entire Indian Subcontinent from Afghanistan to Sri Lanka and from Baluchistan to Burma into one thread..... there is no question of my accepting hence any attempts at secession....

However, the recent Yatra undertaken by the BJP youth wing has completely flummoxed me by its time and tenor.... the wounds of the last intifida have not even died out, but the BJP has decided to engulf the country into one more conflagration.... there are already a thousands of issues that the current government is incapable of handling, on top of it, the main opposition, having abrogated it's position as the watchdog of democracy has decided to take part, and that too, gleefully in the rape of the country's prestige and authority...

I do not seem to really understand what is the problem with the BJP..... is it really as stupid as it tries to show itself? Does it not understand that it's chauvinistic attitude is impacting the nation more than the status quo attitude of the Congress and it's allies? Is it so foolish that it really thinks patriotism is a vocal chord match and all of us are back in ancient Sparta where issues were decided by the virtue of who would shout the loudest, by virtue of who could out-shout the competition?

Does it really think of the irreparable damage it is doing to the nation's fibre by it's insistence on a march that has no sense, no logic, no future thought, except to embarrass the ruling party? Does it even comprehend that by using vocal denunciation of the Congress at every available opportunity, it's actually playing into the hands of the Congress by proving itself as a distant number two? Why can't it pay more attention to the logics of the situation? Why does it have to always use the principle of the Shout as against the principle of the Debate?

Anybody who has lived in India of the 1990's knows of the irreparable damage Murli Manohar Joshi did by his Flag Yatra at Lal Chowk in 1992..... The premise was the same, that we need to prove ourselves by putting up the flag but in the process, MM Joshi managed to do the impossible... he actually got all the extremists to unite and put up a united front, lead to an increased spurt in violence and secessionist activities in the valley which took a decade to abate.... What did we gain from this show of patriotism? Nothing, except deaths of our valiant soldiers who fought and died for the sake of the unity and integrity of our India..... It could have been avoided. But then BJP is not exactly known for subtle diplomacy and statecraft.... and that too from the party, which when in power took Navin Jindal to court for his right to raise the Indian flag...

The BSF itself has clearly stated that there is no need to raise the flag at the Laal Chowk... it's also true that it has been raising the flag in the chowk every year and had stopped it since it has no more political significance.... Secondly, the Chief Minister of Kashmir would definitely be raising the flag in the senate as would all the Govt offices, army services etc... where then is the need for one more?

The BJP has put out an interesting statement that if the flag of Pakistan can be raised in Kashmir, why not the flag of India? I have two counter-questions to this:

Question No. 1: If this is true, what were they doing about it for the 6 years they ruled India? At that time, the NC of Omar Abdullah, which is in power in the state of J&K today, was a part of the NDA, the BJP-led coilition

Question No. 2: Can the BJP, which is used to a language of obfuscation provide documentary proof of when the local administration of J&K, including the office of the Chief Minister was guilty of raising the Pakistani Flag on the Republic Day?

Talking about secessionists raising the flag is stupid because they are secessionists and indeed if they raised the Indian flag, they would cease to be secessionists, of course they should not be tolerated but that does not mean that the state is guilty of the same ... what is important is to ask, if the local government did the same? And if it did, why did the Govt of Atal Bihari Vajpayee, one of the greatest leaders of recent time did not speak of it? Why did the Iron Man, L K Advani who speaks so much on the issue today, remain silent then? Or is it just a case of out-of-power syndrome?

The BJP, using it's policies of division and victim play has already created a rift between Jammu and Kashmir, when will it learn to start behaving like a responsible opposition? Does it really think, this is good for the state and the country in the long run?

An interesting anecdote of the time is that the great leader that MM Joshi is, he was not even aware of the colours of the Indian flag and managed to do the impossible task that even does not happen in Kindergarten - he hosted the flag upside down!

BJP..... we need you to become a responsible opposition - the time is running out.... is the will too?

A Call to Muslims

Salman Taseer was assasinated in Pakistan on January 4, 2011. His crime was that he spoke against the Blasphemy Law as contained in the Pakistani Constitution. His assassin, Malik Mumtaz Qadri assassinated him because he firmly believed that Salman was denigrating the state and humiliating the creed of Islam by such a contrarian stand on an issue that he considered as a matter of faith.

Today as I listen to both the parties on the issue, the charges and counter-charges, the points of discussion and rebuttals, I feel much more disillusioned on this entire issue then I ever was... Have we as humans, divorced ourselves so much from Reason that we even need to see the obvious - that Blasphemy Law is wrong, that the use of the gun to silence an opposition is wrong, that Human Intellect has a right to speak? Hence, Today as I speak on this issue, I shall speak not as an atheist which I am but as a Muslim for that is what I was  .... the reason being simple, Islam needs to free itself primarily from it's own custodians..... and if a Muslim won't speak, albeit an atheist, who will?

Jammat-E-Islami has tried to pretend that there is no issue, that this is an internal matter within the ranks of Islam, an issue for which the punishment has been decided long ago and hence there is no need for discussion, no need for introspection, no need to talk... for them, it's a closed issue!

But is it a closed issue? Is it really a crime to speak of such things as the law of blasphemy? Is it being-anti Islamic if one tries to reason out the tenets of the religion, or to ask questions, however uncomfortable, they may be? Was not ijtehad supposed to be the cornerstone of the Islamic fiqh as opposed to taqlid?

In a civilization and system that prides itself on it's inclusive nature, that first spoke of the Brotherhood of Men, when did the right to speak on behalf of one's brethren become a rallying-cry for the demise of Islam? Are these custodians of Islam doing Islam a duty by being contrarian to the very principles of Islam or are they plotting it's downfall by destroying the very essence of it's existence? Time will tell....

For the time being, the power of the Gun and the Fear inherent from it's barrels has cowed down the majority to silence.... For the time being, the tongues that should speak are tied down by their duties to their near and dear ones.... For the time being, the droning of the machine gun of the extremist has silenced the common man to a state of imprisonment, but the question is how long will it be able to contain the anger within his breast that shall not be silenced even by the explosion of a million atom bombs and it's these voices of silence, which when spoken will shake the edifice of Islam as it stands today ...... Islam has a lot to fear from it's custodians within it's boundaries than from it's enemies that are battling the religion from outside.

Since the time of the Prophet, the doctrine of ijtehad (analytical reasoning) was upheld and promulgated and taqlid (imitation), though accepted in matters of one's personal relations with God, was not given the same emphasis as Ijtehad, till finally the Sunni fiqh went ahead and closed the door to ijtehad in the 10th century. It's no major coincidence that the closing of doors on Ijtehad lead to hardening of stances within the community leading to major repercussions, as the Islamic world lost it's preeminence in worldly matters post the 15th century and turned insular and insecure.

If Islam needs to re-invent itself, it's time for Islam to go back to the early days of it's existence not in terms of the external forms or observances as the orthodox may point out, but in terms of the openness of thought and reason that gave it the vitality to stand back in times of it's adversity.....  What were those parameters? If one needs to know them, one needs to travel back in history and understand why Islam could strike out on it's own, while others failed.....

Islam took roots in the human subconsciousness in the 7th century due to it's simple creed and methods of  connecting the human with the humane and divine. Historical evidences abound that speak for the humaneness that was the cornerstone of the Islamic creed. Equality of Men before God irrespective of colour, creed or station; Right of Women to property and life as opposed to being subjected to feminine infanticide as was the norm in Arabia, No place for Racism in the context of human differences, Absence of a priestly class and many more such reasons that were a revolutionary thought in those days of human endeavour, of course today the world is much more enlightened and better off than those days, but when  we compare a particular ideology to others, we need to look into the times to understand and decipher it ...... The gun was never the choice weapon of Islam even in the days when the existence of Islam was threatened by such powerful enemies as the Meccan Confederacy and even though Islam fought three wars in it's early days of existence, the gun was always secondary to the olive palm... so then today when Islam is in a strong position worldwide with more than a billion adherents and many Islamic nations, what place does the gun have in the normal discourse?

Why can't the champions of Islamic jurisprudence come out and speak out on this issue in an open debate? Why does the gun have to answer for every query that's put to Islam? That was not the way of the Prophet, why is that the way of the follower? What Islam are you following when you put up such conditions as can destroy the spirit of Islam?

Prophet Muhammed allowed the Christians and the Jews to reside peacefully in the nation of Islam and even forgave those hands that fought against him, including the one we know as Hind, the one who mutilated the body of his favourite uncle, Humza and ate his liver raw on the battlefield.... If you declare that you follow the principles as stated by him, what wrong did Salman do to pay with his blood?

An Anti-Blasphemy Law, as a law, goes against the creed of Islam; it was introduced in the Christian countries to prevent one sect speaking against the other, what place does it have in a Islamic society?.... The Quran explicitly states that the Muslims are not allowed to abuse the religion of the other for the reason that it may give unto the other the right and the opportunity to abuse Islam... the action of Malik has ensured that today, even those who would not speak against Islam have spoken.... aren't you, the leaders of Islam, then responsible for this repercussion? By what right do you dare to call yourself, the defenders of the faith them....?

And coming to the main point, what exactly does the law of Blasphemy achieve? How does this law ensure a better place to those living in your society? Can you force people to change their views about your religion by forcing them under threat of life and property or can you try and reach out to them via dialogue? The biggest massacres in Islam were not perpetrated by the foreign element unto the followers of Islam but by those who called themselves Muslims... examples can be made of Yezid and later the Abbasids .... are you the next link in the names of those who mouth Islam and kill it by actions?

So if you want to know who killed Salman, it's not Malik who killed him.... it's you who killed him ... you, the men and women of Islam who dared not speak against those who hijacked our religion for their purpose.... it's you, the men and women of Islam, who suffered silently when Islam was being chained by traitors within .... it's you, the men and women of Islam, who gave away the key of your religion to those who transfigured it and destroyed it beyond recognition .... and it's you, the men and women of Islam... who forced rational men and women out of Islam to wherever they found the right to be themselves  ..... Think why Islam which gave Avicenna to the world has given nothing in an entire millennium and you will know what I talk about.... Silence is a good thing, but not when your life is being threatened with extinction....


A lot has gone down the plains of Mount Arafat since those days and today, the religion that taught of enlightenment is a refugee of it's own thoughts and a prisoner of it's own conscience. Today, in times when the doctrine of Islam is in mortal threat from the world at large, Islam is not doing good by itself by being a ready supporter of it's demise by the ways of it's followers.... It's time for Ijtehad, it's time for a new reasoning.... It's time for a new Jihad... against those who claim to speak for your religion but take it away from your grasp.....

There is a Cat among the Doves, remove it from the doves or there shall be no more doves.... and conversely once there are no doves, there shall be no Cat either.... so act quick.... and remove the Cat before any more innocent doves face death from him....

Evidences of the Prosecution

MMXI is here .... and we are all watching it with a lot of hopes and expectations, but will anything change... I guess not, for one thing that I have really learned in life is this: the more things change, the more they remain constant ..... and maybe that's the reason why it's stated that those who fail to study their History tend to become History....

I will still continue speaking on Dr. Binayak Sen's curious case .... the last blog was all about why sedition should not be anymore a cause of treason for any person in any of the civilized or should I say, democratized nations of the world... Had it been treason, I would have understood and accepted the conviction - but the very nature of the case makes it difficult for me to suggest any reason why it even was fought - it should have been thrown out of the judicial window, considering the flimsiness of the case....

I took time off to post the second part of the blog because of the many threats and admonitions I received for my last blog.... It was not fear that stopped in my tracks but a feeling that the shriller the voices that condemn, the calmer should be the response....

Prima facie, the entire case is a stack of cards that cannot stand scrutiny even by the worst standards that can be applied .... Here is a guy, a pediatrician of repute from one of the best institutions of India, who has been working selflessly for the downtrodden, going where even the might of the state machinery fails..... a guy who has openly spoken against the Maoists and their tactics, has deplored the methods of warfare and criticized it's leadership.... It's indeed strange that this man has been singled out to be a Maoist....and on grounds that are as shaky as the plains of the Sunderbans after a cyclone.....

If tomorrow, one of my friends asks me to carry a letter to his friend who happens to be in another city, do I by the virtue of having carried a letter become a suspect in the eye of the law? When did an act of genuine humanitarian effort become a barometer of crime by guilt of association? If this be taken as the proof of wrong-doing, I do not know how many of us can avoid falling into this trap at one time or the other?

My critics would point out to the fact that these letters spoke of rebellion and unrest in the country.... that's a plea that's as irrational as it can be.... Going by the attestations of the police manning the jail, there was not a single instance wherein Dr. Binayak met the Maoist leader alone.... they must have been real masters of subterfuge and hypnosis if they were able to carry out such a brilliant piece of planning, all by themselves, in a cell, separated by irons and in presence of officers who kept on looking ... What were the officers discussing while the planning took place - the last Shahrukh Khan movie or the rising price of foodstuffs?

To the best of my knowledge, not a single officer has been accused of dereliction of duty... so it transpires that they were alert and brave soldiers of the motherland - so how could two individuals, who have neither been trained in subterfuge and camouflage carry out such a brilliant operation, not once but many times....

The jailor has also attested that all letters carried the official seal of the prison - in other words was pretty harmless - maybe the good jailor was not trained in the art of cryptology and the Chattisgarh government should make it compulsory on the incumbent and the ones that follow that he should have an advanced knowledge of the subject in the future to save such embarrassments .....

Another major point of contention for the security agencies is that, in one of the letters Dr. Sen was addressed as the Comrade, thus making him a Maoist! I am surprised by the gall of the prosecuting attorney, the stupidity of the defense and the irrationality of the Bench that such an interesting observation was allowed to go unchallenged in the court of Law!

Thank God, the leter did not have such terms as 'Saala' or else, we would have had a more powerful alliance - I mean Dr. Sen and his 'comrade' friend could have been brothers-in-law, we should really thank God, for small mercies..... I am thinking though, going by this particular logic, how many girls have I been married to and how many guys have become my brothers-in-arm.... I  hope none of them is a terrorist or else I am on my way to the prison, thanks to this brilliant piece of art.....

Mahatma Gandhi had once, when asked of the keystone of Indian legal system commented that he preferred a system wherein, even if a thousand guilty could be saved from their just punishments, even one single person should not be punished for the crime he did not commit.

Dr. Binayak Sen may or may not be a Maoist... I am no one to hold a brief for him but I do state that as a concerned citizen of this nation, that the charges framed on him should not seem framed and the evidence brought against him should be found lacking and flimsy.... Neither of the above contentions hold water in an intense cross-examination of the facts.... It's high time Judiciary redeems itself from the clutches of 'guilty by prosecution' syndrome....

Its time we thought deeply about the entire issue. And before I start getting threats again, let me reiterate, I am not a Maoist but I am not a Quisling either ....

The Curious Case of Dr. Binayak Sen's conviction on Sedition

One of the things, I really do not appreciate among the intelligentsia, whether in India or abroad, is their propensity to see things only through their rose-tinted glasses and to denounce all contrarian views as fascist or rightist .... What really makes me go mad in the brain and red in the face is the fact that these so-called mandarins of morality are often found to be appeasing to a fault to certain sections of society and critical to a detail to the others.... This is where my path diverges from these mandarins of morality for I believe that there should be the same set of laws for both the parties ... that it's important not only that Caesar and his wife should be above the law but also the entire retinue that associates itself with Caesar!

Still, there are times, when my own stand is found to be very much in sync with these custodians of public morality.... Contradictory? Well, I am quite a bundle of contradictions and so lately on one issue I have found myself closing ranks with the intelligentsia to a very large extent ... the case is that of the life-imprisonment imposed on Dr. Binayak Sen on charges of sedition.

This is indeed a curious case and a curious sentence for a crime under a curious charge... the charge of Sedition! And specially so, in a country like ours which got independence after a long battle wherein many of our national leaders like Bal Gangadhar Tilak were time again accused and imprisoned on the grounds of Sedition!

The question that I seem to be asking myself regularly these days is a simple one ... does a charge of sedition actually deserve merit in a democratic country and if yes, under what circumstances can the charge be made? And the more basic question is, does the concept of democracy allow for the charge of Sedition .... and finally, was the sentence proportionate to the crime, if any? Being a common man, I can only speak my heart on the last part, the learned judges do have much more material in connection with the case than a lay person like me to discuss the subtleties of the case, however I do think being an aware citizen of India, I can and should have a point of thought on the concept of Sedition....

The Indian constitution is a remarkable piece of art, in that it incorporates the best of all constitutions and provides for the loopholes in each and every constitution on Earth... Indeed, Indian ingenuity has to be appreciated that it can provide such a constitution and then tear it to shreds too ....

Para III of the Preamble to our Constitution underlines the Fundamental Rights of the Citizens of India.... Here I will not be concentrating on all the different rights including those enshrined in Articles 15-18 for in the current discussion, the important part of Part III that needs to be discussed, is enshrined in the Articles 19, 20, 21 and 22 ... in totality, these 4 articles give the citizenry of India the following rights:

• Freedom of speech and expression (although the phrase, "freedom of press" has not been explicitly defined, freedom of expression for all intent and purpose includes freedom of press.)
• Freedom to assemble peacefully without arms
• Freedom to form associations or unions
• Freedom to move freely throughout the territory of India
• Freedom to reside and settle in any part of the territory of India (This article does have a safeguard for the Tribal Regions, by restricting non-tribals from purchasing or moving into tribal lands. This has been done to protect them from exploitation of any sort. Furthermore, Article 370 restricts citizens from other Indian states and Kashmiri women who marry men from other states from purchasing land or property in Jammu & Kashmir.)
• Freedom to practice any profession or to carry on any occupation, trade or business.

In addition to the above, the constitution also guarantees the citizenry the fundamental right to life and personal liberty, which in turn cites specific provisions in which these rights are applied and can be enforced. They are as follows:

• Protection with respect to conviction for offences is guaranteed in the right to life and personal liberty. According to Article 20, no one can be awarded punishment which is more than what the law of the land prescribes at that time.
• Protection of life and personal liberty is also stated under right to life and personal liberty. Article 21 declares that no citizen can be denied his life and liberty except by law. This means that a person's life and personal liberty can only be disputed if that person has committed a crime.
• Rights of a person arrested under ordinary circumstances is laid down in the right to life and personal liberty. No one can be arrested without being told the grounds for his arrest. If arrested, the person has the right to defend himself by a lawyer of his choice. Also an arrested citizen has to be brought before the nearest magistrate within 24 hours.

None of these rights are absolute; the constitution imposes restrictions on these rights. The government restricts these freedoms in the interest of the independence, sovereignty and integrity of India, and also in the interest of morality and public order, the government can impose restrictions on these rights. However, interestingly the right to life and personal liberty cannot be suspended, even in an emergency.

Let us now try and define Sedition: In simple words, Sedition is the stirring up of people against the government in power and is very much different from the much more intense word, Treason that means levying a war against the state.So if you look at it closely, Sedition is any overt act of a citizen or an organized group that not only criticizes the government of the day but also exhorts that people to start thinking on similar lines.... In the Indian scheme of things, there is a specific law against Sedition ... Sec124A of the IPC.

Sec 124A states, "Whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by signs, or by visible representation, or otherwise, brings or attempts to bring into hatred or contempt, or excites or attempts to excite disaffection towards, the Government established by law in India, shall be punished with imprisonment for life, to which fine may be added, or with imprisonment which may extend to three years, to which fine may be added, or with fine”

This brings us to an interesting point.... .the concept of Sedition as outlined above can be applied in equal measures to anyone in the state, a leader of an opposition party who may have an axe to grind against the ruling party can call on to the people with a stated objective of getting the people to change the government... should that be considered as Sedition? If yes, does that not sit heavily on the rights as enshrined by Para III of the Indian Constitution?

Secondly, if you look at Section 124A, it can be argued that the spirit of the law goes very much against the right to life and liberty as enshrined in Articles 20 and 21 ... to the letter of the law, they may be different but if the person on the basis of a speech or an action is construed to be acting in defiance of a government in power and arrested,  and his fundamental rights abrogated, in the interest of the nation or public mortality, then without a shred of doubt, even his right to life and liberty in endangered, even before the court of law can take due course and find out if the accused in indeed a perpetrator of dissatisfaction or a victim of government mores.... this defeats the very purpose of the founding fathers of the Indian Constitution!

I think a democracy, as defined by Abe Lincoln, is the government of the people, by the people and for the people and so a democracy can have varied viewpoints and there need not be a consensus to the differences within. If we get to a stage where a criticism to the government can constitute a case of sedition, isn't it the end of democracy as we know it? To take things to the conclusive end, this is a draconian act that can be used by the opponents of Democracy to stifle every voice of dissent .... If Sedition is allowed to be a part and parcel of the democratic process, wherein constructive criticism can be put into the garb of Sedition, time if not far when a welfare state would be converted into a police state for lack of space for political dissent and opposition.

I do not advocate that Sedition should be per se removed from the annals of Indian legal code but I do firmly believe that in a democratic setup, the concept of Sedition has outlived it's requirement.... It can only be brought to the light only and only in times of emergency, and even then should be used only for acts that challenge the independence, sovereignty and integrity of the country.... such a law does not have any need in a society that's democratic, mature and has a stomach for digesting dissent.... which is the most notable power in a democratic setup.... else what Sahir wrote for a fascist state can be true of India as well:

Bediyaan Aaj Bhi Pehney Hai Azeezaan-E-Watan
Farq Itna Hai Ki Zanjeer Mein Aawaaz Nahin Hai....

The handcuffs are still bound on the hands of the patriots of my land,
the only difference being, they don't scream their presence like in the past (Transliteration)

Where is the Alternative?

Let me start off today by clearly stating that I am neither a Congressman nor a Comrade nor a revisionist though at different phases of my life, I have been associated with or fraternized with people who belong to any one of the 3 blocs that currently seem to hold in India - the Left, the Right and the Left-of-Centre.......

Yes..... I did vote for the Congress in 2009 but if the truth be told, I voted not for the Congress but for Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi, had it been 2004, I would have still done the same ..... but had it been 1999, I would have voted firmly for Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his team ..... so, if you look closely, I have never voted for the party, but for the personality which is an anachronism, considering that we live in a parliamentary democracy and not a presidential one ... And I am not alone, a large number of people in this great country do the same - others of course vote on religious and castiest considerations....

The reason behind this anachronism is very simple.... there is nothing on paper and manifesto that differentiates the two largest parties in the country! On the face of it, both the Congress and the BJP are complete opposites of each other - the first, a symbol of minority appeasement in the form of secularism, the other reactionary to the principles of secularism.... the first, an unabashed speaker of crony populism, the second, a party close to the moneyed ..... but if you scratch beyond the surface, the one thing that strikes you is this simple fact, that beyond all the external posturing, all the blatant attempts at vote-bank engineering, both the right and the left-of-centre are one and the same.... Whether it's issues of foreign policy, whether it's issues of corporate and social paradigms, both the parties speak in the same language - the words used or phrases coined maybe different but the reality remains that the message is the same ..... Indeed, if the manifestos of the two parties could be exchanged and written on a simple parchment, minus the ideological posturing of Aam Aadmi or Ram Janambhoomi, the chances would be that none would be a bit wiser of which manifesto stands for which party -  so alike are they in thought or deed!

This is a sad point of reference - for the BJP at one time had a chance to be something different - they had a different agenda, they had a different focus, they had a different point of engagement - people would argue that their religious agenda had no place in a secular country like India ... that may be true but a Conservative space was there's for the taking..... this would have helped the country in many ways - the birth of a true Conservative Party would have pushed the dominant Congress to the Centre more strongly or even made a Liberal Party of it ... thus giving ample choices to the populace at large.... The failure of BJP to hold on to that space and it's continuous efforts to define it's position in religious terms led to the great failure of the 1990s. Today, the competition is not between two different strands of thought, but between two different hues of the same strand - it's either hawk or kite .... hard or soft ..... but increasingly the same!

The only party that seems to have a different opinion is the Communist bloc parties but these parties have not stopped living in the heydays of the 1970s. How can a citizen of 2010 vote for parties, that though different, still are averse to change or even to keep in single step with the changing times? The Land reform policies, the Social Security Act may have a large Communist footprint to the text but the fact remains that the Left has failed the nation by not watching it's step and in the process has marginalized it's own existence in the country. So, what could have been a credible force of opposition has failed the right to enter the hallowed portals of the Parliament itself!

The less said about the regional and casteist and communal parties the better ..... the joke of India is that today we have more than 500 parties but not a single party that can be considered as an alternative. Interestingly, while the populace of India has increased and the pressures of governance become more and more crucial, the political space has shrunk and this is not a good sign for the future.....

Man lives on Hope and Hope is all I have with me today.....

Wo Subaah Kabhi To Aayegi ..... Wo Subaah Kabhi To Aayegi

Bihar Elections - A New Trend or Old wine in a New Bottle?

The Bihar Elections is not a story of the success of Nitish Kumar and the defeat of Laloo Prasad Yadav ... it's not a story of the astonishing growth of a party essentially built on a Hindu backlash to Muslim vote banks (the BJP), in the Muslim hinterlands, it's also not a story of the final dismantling of the great social engineering plank that the Congress once was ...... it's much beyond all of this!

It is a story of a state that was once at the vanguard of India, as we know it - a state that once led India in all possible indices of development and prosperity.... It is the story of a state that gave rise to the first empire of India, the Nandas and then nourished the next two..... This is the story of a state that was once synonymous with power and diplomacy, where Chandragupta taught the power of the sword and Ashoka showed the power of the word; where Arya Chanakya taught statecraft and Gautam Buddha delvered enlightenment .....

It's all of the above 'But' more importantly this is a story of a state that fell from grace as did Adam from Eden and then languished in the doldrums to such an extent that a day did arrive when the state that had burnt many a candles for two millenia and more, was suddenly left in the dark with no candles, no torch, no light.... It's also the story of Man's indomitable fight against circumstances - of the dream that lives on, even when the reality forces one on, on a path different from the dream...... This is the story of Bihar!

Karpoorji Thakur had two illustrious and much-appreciated students - students, any teacher would be proud of ... this is the story of those two students, their contrasting ways and purposes and how a state was destroyed while the two went their separate ways....

But for India and for the rest of the continent, this is also a story that asks one specific question: Can the Governance of the Indian Sub-Continent be ever liberated from the cesspool of personal and communal considerations in which it finds itself mired today? Do not think, for a second, that this is the question of India alone - for it's not! Every incident in this entire-subcontinent even if takes place on the far-flung corners of the same, does in a course of time impact each and every player, sooner or later....

The results are out - on the face of it, it seems development has won the first round and casteist and  communal politics have been shown the door... In the words, of television anchors and reporters, the ones who are the first to see a trend where there are none and also the first to abandon the trend when public or business opinions change, Bihar has made a turnaround..... today, the populace of Bihar has rejected the charisma of Laloo to the pragmatism of Nitish.....

To an extent, it's true that, yes, Nitish has been a benefactor to Bihar.... he has brought about a turnaround that none could have ever expected or believed in ..... where doing business yesterday was a matter of fear, today chambers of business proclaim increment in investment! Where kidnappings was once the order of the day, today womenfolk are seen travelling even about 7 PM! And finally, the roads of Patna do look somewhat like the cheeks of Hema Malini - so what if the cheeks still belong to the Hema of 2010 and not the Hema of 1970 - still it's a vast improvement, at least they do resemble the much-vaunted Libran cheeks and that too for quite a distance in the hinterland.... not even Delhi can boast of such cheeks in the hinterland!

Yes, development has come to Bihar! Finally! At Last! but is this the end of the Caste Politics, has the Vote Bank Politics finally come to an end, has the sub-continent finally moved on? These are more difficult questions and to be frank, it would be too early to sound the bugle on any of these....

The Great success has not come without making concessions to the other side, the decadent dark face of the spectrum .....  as we shall see, the politics of they versus us has not yet been fully dismantled and this is where the concern lies ....

Where Laloo had ruled the crest of power on the MY factor (Muslim-Yadav factor), what Nitish did was to make the same combine redundant by taking two concurrent steps; the first step was to create a bigger block of the Mahadalits ..... the castes, now called MBC (Most Backward Castes), these are the backbone of his current success and have taken the war to the next level.....

From the 50s to the 80s, the battlefield was the SC and the ST, by using the Mandal Commission to it's benefit, Laloo and his counterparts, launched the OBC (Other Backward Caste) Revolution, becoming thus the face of social re-engineering and enjoying years at the helm; what Nitish did in Bihar was to position himself to the lower ends of the spectrum and weld them into a weapon of his choice..... Laloo's alliance partner, Ram Vilas Paswan could have countered him as a leader of the MBC but Nitish, using brilliant choice of men and measures, converted him from a leader of the Dalits to only a leader of the Paswan community, thus taking away from him the leadership of the entire Dalit community, thus marginalizing him in his own den ... It takes a Mayawati to play those kind of smart manoeuvring games (one of the reasons she continues to be a powerful player in neighbouring Uttar Pradesh), but Ram Vilas is no Mayawati ..... hence, what could have been, did not happen....

On the other hand, by consistently refusing Narendra Modi, who's perceived all over India as a butcher of innocent Muslims, a chance to campaign for his allaince, he got 2 things in clear perspective - 

• he reminded the entire BJP brass, that in matters concerning Bihar, he was the boss and he also ensured that the man on the street also felt and understood this message clearly, and 
• secondly assured the Muslims that a Gujarat kind of carnage could not be repeated in Bihar, since he was in complete control here ......

Contrary to the expectations from a Chief Minister of the NDA, Nitish actually reached out to the Muslims by effectively allowing the integration of the most backward in the community - the Pasmanda Muslims, thus creating a major rift in the formidable MY Equation.....

These two strokes, masterfully played along religious and casteist lines ensured that the much-famed Laloo hand was in severe disarray.....

Add to it, the fact that Development that was something the secular public (not to be confused with leanings but with the open category) always wanted and were now finally enjoying after more than a decade of hunger.... today Bihar is more connected, more confident, more sure of itself and the janata there feels more empowered then it ever did in the last 20 years ....  it was but obvious that Laloo had a battle on his hand...

The final act in the game was women .... with 50% reservations accorded to the women in local and panchayat polls, with free bicycles being distributed among women so that they could study and by endorsing and ensuring the safety of women on the streets by killing the crime rate, Nitish was able to get the most powerful and most difficult players in the game on his side..... whether it's tokenism or not, we will see later .. but as for now, Nitish had the backward community, the Muslims, the general public, the businessmen and the women on his side- something that got reflected in the elections..... Muslims were voting for BJP candidates not because suddenly there was no love lost between traditional enemies but because they were looking beyond BJP to Nitish.....it was the strings of Nitish which got him the result

Looking backwards, everything seems so easy .. .the challenge is not behind but ahead... as the Spiderman comics and movies, often declare..... 'With Great Powers come Great Responsibilities' .... I would say, with Great Expectations come Greater Disillusionment.... the clock is ticking .... and he is now in the most challenging of times.... till yesterday, he was being judged against the inefficiencies of Laloo.... today, he's being judged against the past successes of Nitish.... the battlelines have been drawn.... one wrong step and things can go downhill.... Public perceptions are fickle, they can never be trusted, as Obama would regretfully attest..... so from this time on, it's a walk on a tightrope.....

If Nitish succeeds this time, it may mean that Caste and Community considerations, can, if not today then tomorrow, be slowly marginalized because a second consecutive success would mean that a new rainbow coalition has emerged and rainbow coalitions can and may change the rules of the games..... till then, the battle is in balance....

All the Best Nitish.... and a beautiful couplet from Iqbal ..may it help

Khud Hi Ko Kar Buland Itna, Ke Har Taqdeer Se Pehle,
Khuda Bandey Se Khud Poonchey, 'Bata, Teri Raza Kya Hai?'

26/11 - A Moment of Truth!

26/11 is a watershed date in the History of Bombay specifically, India generally and the Indian sub-Continent at large; many would be surprised by my assertion of including the entire Sub-continent as an entity that was scarred by an event which was seemingly perpetrated locally on one specific place within the Sub-continent..... but I do believe that this brazen attack on Bombay will go a long way in asserting itself in the relations the many, different nation-states within this single civilization share in the long run

I am not trying to play the Big Brother here; as has often been the accusation against India by it's neighbours in the sub-continent, nor am I trying to dramatize or over-exert the importance of a localized incident to an entire canvas.... that would be entirely unfair and grossly incorrect but the fact remains that the incidents of that day mark for a change in the structured responses of the area and restructuring and re-alignment of the entire world.

There have been many terrorist attacks in India and beyond India before that eventful day.... it's not as if terrorism in South Asia suddenly made a date with history, or a tryst with destiny on that particular day..... to be precise, even when the entire world was supportive of Jihad (from 1979-1990) and unaware of the course future events would take, even before 9/11 had shattered America out of it's Rip Van Winkle-like slumber and forced it to take a stand against it's own creations, even before the world talked of terror and against Islam, India had witnessed the shattering of innocence, the coming of age, the beginning of the war against a return to medieval mores, way back in March 1993.

But in the beginning, this unruly war had a different echo. The blasts of 1993 and the ones that followed it were divisive and often spoke in terms of Hindu-Muslim relations, Hindu-Muslim animosity, Hindu-Muslim incompatibility on the sub-continent; they positioned themselves as the weapons of vengeance and blamed the demolition of the Babri Masjid and the whirlwind riots that followed the demolition in Bombay, Bhagalpur, Godhra etc as the cause for the blasts...... throughout India, every blast from 1993 to 2008 was just another event that furthered the divisive agenda of hardliners, making rapprochement impossible and strengthened the extremists within both the communities. This hard-lining of  positions within communities was exploited successfully by the political parties - the BJP for Hindus and the Samajwaadi Party for the Muslims for growth and power and both these parties and their affiliates grew fat on the blood of the common man. It's true that neither, on prime face value was involved in the blasts, however, each took the resultant paranoia and used it for their own better prospects.....

So what is different about 26/11 that it has to be looked at, from a different angle!

Should it be more important because it was an attack on the nation's economic and financial capital, challenging the economics of the city and creating a feat psychosis in the investment community .... not necessarily, because the first blast on 12/3 was also faced by Bombay, (in fact the BSE, the symbol of India's financial power was one of the premises bombed that day) and it was a more severe and sustained attack on all the symbols of India's financial Strength than 26/11!

Should it be more important since it was a major attack that was sustained continuously for such a long period? Not necessarily .... attacks in Kashmir and the North-East have been continuous and more serious and they have been continuing for a generation or more now ...... and in the heartland of India, the 2008 Jaipur serial Blasts which were followed on consecutive days by the blasts in Ahmedabad and Bangalore were worse in their sustaining impact!

Should it be more important because, it was a direct, open and frontal attack on the concept of India - no, because the December 2001 attacks on the Indian Parliament were the most direct, frontal and open challenge to India's authority and sovereignity

So what was it about the 26/11 that made it different from all the others .... what was it about this attack that made all the difference?

The difference in the 26/11 attacks over the ones that preceded it and the ones that followed it till this time, was the living horror that people of Bombay and India were subjected to, for a period of 72 long hours, continuously .... Every blast till that time had been a matter of quick minutes or as in the case of the Ahmedabad serial bombs, the Jaipur serial bombs or the Mumbai serial train blasts, it was all over in
a few hours.... but this time the horror just went on and on!

Secondly, till this point in time, all the blasts had been targeted at one community or the other, one place or the other, one strata of society or the other, but for the first time on 26/11, the attacks had not been directed at one point itself but was spread out to cause maximal emotional, psychological and physical impact! From the poor migrants who were slaughtered at CST Terminus to the rich, Armani-clad socialites who were trapped in Trident and the Taj to the middle-class who worked in these places or were unfortunate to fall on the radar of the terrorists that fateful night, the event was a dark cataclysm that many have still not been able to move out of..... People who died on that day, did not die on account of their faith, as in the Akshardham attack or the Malegaon Blasts, people who died on that day, died in spite of it!

And the most unfortunate part is that those who did not die, still faced the trauma of having to see this entire drama unfold for the next 72 hours.... 72 helpless hours wherein the entire city that never sleeps was held to ransom, the might of one of the strongest countries on Earth was put to the sword by a bunch of 10 unlettered, illiterate but high on fervour and committed terrorists, and all we could do was to sit before the idiot box and wring our hands in despair and bow our heads in shame!

How could 10 men hold us captive against our wishes for such a long time? How could 10 people make us relive the horror of the moment for such a long period?

The answers are still out there but the mind is still too numb to ask these questions. The trauma is still fresh, the fact that justice has not yet been meted out is still festering in our minds, the collective anger and frustration of the day have been internalized to such an extent that no fair discussion of the event is possible without a recourse to emotional

The only positive from the event was the realization that the bullet of the mercenary had not asked a question of community or religion .... that the Hindu and the Muslim suffered equally.... that the rich and the poor were both susceptible and the only thing that mattered was whether we were are part of the 10 who attacked or the many who defended! And therein was the change made.... the change that made it difficult to impart a name to terrorism as religious or communal.... and that's the reason 26/11 marks a departure from the ones that preceded it and the ones that followed it....

The effect of 26/11 was seen all over the sub-continent.... In Sri Lanka, within 6 months of the incident, the LTTE was destroyed in a ruthless war ... none came to stand for it, none decided to support it.... it was simple, the terrorist word had stuck and stuck mercilessly, no one was in a mood to support any organization that stood for terror, even if it meant ostracizing one's own kith and kin for the same .... Terrorist havens were uprooted in places as diverse as Burma and Bangladesh..... Pakistan had to finally take cognizance of the groundswell in popular opinion and register a case against the perpetrators, though as expected the trail was never as serious as it should have been .....

This could have never happened in 2001, though the attack on Parliament was the attack on India itself..... it happened in Bombay because Bombay, in the minds of people, still maintains a glamour, a position as a city of hope, of dreams and aspirations and what people saw on that day, was a bunch of villains trying to take away the dream... the aspiration! Had it been a clean, surgical attack, it would have been forgotten, relegated to the past but it was a living horror that none would forgive... that none could forgive ... and this is the fire, kindled by tears, blood and sweat that forged the new weapon of unity and belonging that continues to this day

It was 5 AM on November 27, 2008 and I was walking near Flora Fountain, close to Ground Zero, dazed at the battle still being fought, sounds of the war in my mind, sights of broken reporters, shocked citizens, lost policemen and determined army-men around me, anger on my face, tears in my eyes, looking at the sea from where my enemies had arrived to fight against my psyche, my soul..... and my heart said 'NEVER AGAIN'

Two years have passed by, I was still near that place today and my heart said ... NEVER AGAIN..... surprisingly, there was no emotion in my voice, only cold and resolute determination......