“If anyone raises a finger towards Hindus or if someone thinks that Hindus are weak and leaderless, if someone thinks that these leaders lick our boots for votes, if anyone raises a finger towards Hindus, then I swear on Gita that I will cut that hand.”  – Times

‘Gau hatya rukwana hai, Varun Gandhi ko jitana hai’ (Cow slaughter must stop, Varun Gandhi must win) and “Varun nahin yeh aandhi hai, doosra Sanjay Gandhi hai (Varun Gandhi is like a storm, he is another Sanjay Gandhi)”. – HT

Says Varun Gandhi of BJP on his campaign trail to make L K Advani the next Prime Minister of India. He is 29. Can you take this? Another nakli Gandhi for like another five decades.

But if there is anyone out there who believes what Varun Gandhi says, like the BJP which might be having gleeful visions of a Saffron Gandhi, they’ll most probably be proven wrong before the 2009 political season ends. Because there is none other more Secular than a Gandhi. It doesn’t matter to a Gandhi if you slaughter a cow, a muslim or a sikh. It doesn’t matter to a Gandhi if you do shilanyas or destroy a mosque or you forcibly castrate a thousand. It doesn’t matter to a Gandhi if you are a tamil terrorist or an Akali radical. Capitalism, socialism or public or private banks don’t matter. Nuclear deal or no deal does not matter. Forcible evictions for a car factory or a Kalawati doesn’t matter. Democracy or Article 356 or Emergency does not matter. All that matters to a Gandhi is the Gandhi’s right to power. In every possible way, a Gandhi is truly secular. Only arguable exception is Mohandas Karamchand asli Gandhi. Then again, even Varun wouldn’t dream of being a doosra Sanjay Gandhi. One reason is India has changed.  But a more persuasive reason is that Sanjay Gandhi’s mother’s name meant ‘India’ at one point in time.

The Gandhis contesting on the Congress ticket at least seem to have come to terms with their mortal nature, given the pre-poll alliances they are building. But some people back home in Kerala seem to be so keenly out of touch with reality (like  nakli Iron Man of India’s website) that they are indeed as Varun nakli Gandhi says ‘raising their middle fingers’ at Hindus.

Like Archbishop Daniel Acharuparambil of the Latin Catholic Church.

The powerful Latin Catholic Church in Kerala has written to Congress president Sonia Gandhi urging the party to consider Hybi Eden, chief of the Congress’ student wing, as party candidate for the Ernakulam Lok Sabha seat. – The Hindu

‘Powerful‘ as in,

Ironically, whenever the church sponsored a Congress candidate, with public statements and pastoral letters, he lost. Edezhath, a close confidant of the high priests, lost by over 70,000 votes to an LDF independent in 2004. – DNA

Here, as I am located, in the heart of the Ernakulam constituency, this stupid letter which claims even the number of votes Acharuparambil has will do no good to the candidate, the Congress party or the larger Catholic interests but will only help consolidate Hindu and Muslim votes in favour of CPM’s arguably weakest candidate in the state – Sindhu Joy. If Hybi is indeed the candidate and if Sindhu defeats him, Acharuparambil Archbishop will have to wear a uniquely malayali ‘thorthu mundu’ over his head while he ventures out of his den in Varapuzha.

Perhaps what Acharuparambil Archbishop should have done was to take a leaf out of Nair Service Society’s (NSS) Narayana Panicker’s Book of Strategics. This is how it goes – tell the media that you’ll defeat 10 candidates (across 20 constituencies), and tell them that the names are secret. After the election, minimum 20 candidates will be defeated, and then, THEN tell the media how effective you were in defeating 10 people and claim how powerful Samsthakerala Nairs are.

P.S: The two parties, CPM and Congress who fight for the torch of Indian Secularism, could may be go through this very simple test to prove their secularism (at least in the next 20 years) – A Christian Candidate in Malappuram or Ponnani; A Hindu Candidate in Eranakulam and a A Muslim Candidate in Kottayam.(how about next 50 years?)

The Kerala Government continues to refuse demands for withdrawal of the 7th Standard Textbook which promotes Atheism and questions God.In completely unrelated news, the Monsoon has literally kept out of Kerala, the state football team failed to reach the Santosh Trophy semi-finals and K Karunakaran turned 90.
The message from up above is clear. God Exists and he is punishing us!

On a Personal Note

BD‘s Comment on the textbook post read,

I think the thought behind the text book and the way its been designed is really good, enabling children to think about what is happening around them. But the biggest enablers, in this scenario will be the teachers, as you were telling me. All the lessons, in this text, are very idealistically put and the best in class if an objective discussion can be stimulated in the classroom. That would be wow! But thoughts can be directed to a particular direction, if a teacher wishes so. There is a thin line.

On a personal note, BD’s comment above is what I feel about the text. Whether the text will be effective or whether it will trigger positive changes is dependent on the teacher. There is a plenty of scope here, and hence it can go either way when a teacher interprets the text. I hope that sense prevails, that the sanity we lost in our debates is regained in our classrooms.

On a political note, if teachers are interpreters, shouldn’t they be appointed based on merit? by the Public Service Commision?. Why does the Catholic Church, the NSS, the Muslim trusts and SNDP insist that they appoint their own teachers, whom the state government pays with my tax money? Wouldn’t the teachers appointed by the Religious and Caste organizations interpret textbooks in a way favourable to those interests? Shouldn’t that stop first?

Eyes of 12 year olds, voice over by history

I have always considered TV Chandran’s 1995 movie, Ormakalundayirikkanam (It is important to have memories) a classic. The uniqueness of the movie is the fact that, it refuses to talk to anyone who doesn’t remember, and you need to have an understanding of history to make sense of the montage. The life around him seen through the eyes of Jayan, a 12 year old boy, in the 1957-59 time period, around the echoes of the liberation struggle with characters including Tharakan (Bharat Gopi), Tailor Bhasi (Mammooty) and even a large python. The movie does not make judgements, nor does it claim that 1959 was a CIA funded intervention, but it makes you uncomfortable by asking questions which you tend to hear only if you have an understanding of history. It is Critical Pedagogy for the audience, through the eyes of a 12 year old and through the voice of history.

The new 7th Standard Textbook has triggered debates and agitations in the state with a breadth similar to that of 1959, though nowhere near in intensity or scale. Major players in the Caste-Religion-Politico nexus of the “Right front” have come together and a joint struggle encompassing the Muslim organisations in the north, the Catholic Church in its 11 assembly strongholds and the Nair Service Society(NSS) in Travancore seems very much in the cards – perhaps within a few weeks. 

The condemnation of the state government and the CPM by the  NSS in its Budget session last week was perhaps the strongest direct warning about the consequences that await the Left front in the 2009 elections to Parliament.

And because warnings are not lullabies, it is important to figure out how potent they are. This is where it is very important to have memories

2009 Elections and Political expediency

These caste organisations are not potent enough and this is why I feel so -

In 2006, the Left front swept the assembly polls winning 100 of the 140 seats. This is what it looked like,

Across the state stalwarts of the outgoing government are facing defeat.Muslim league is facing defeat in all its bastions,fallen include its general secretary P.K.Kunhalikutty.The three top leaders of league Kunhalikutty,Muneer and Basheer have been defeated at home.Eleven time winner Gauriamma has been defeated,Balkrishna pillai,Murali and around fifteen ministers have lost,M V Raghavan and T M Jacob have been defeated.It is as if Keralites have chased and defeated the bad apples.In the southern districts Congress party has been wiped out,forts have fallen across the cochin belt and in Malabar,muslim league is facing its worst nightmare – malappuram the league fort has turned red.

But there were 2 results I found interesting. General Secretary of SNDP yogam (the largest caste organisation in the state), Vellapally Natesan had announced a HIT LIST of candidates whom the yogam will selectively defeat. Topping the list was two names, two Congress candidates – K C Venugopal and P C Vishnunath, both of them contesting in constituencies where the yogam held sway. Despite the “RED” wave that swept the state, both the Congress candidates won. Yes they did.

Insider logic said the NSS had stepped in to make sure that these two Nair candidates won. By that logic, NSS would have been the most potent force in 2006 elections, making a Nair candidate win despite a political and caste wave. We can verify that with the election result of R Balakrishna Pillai, the strongest NSS insider who contested from his pocket constituency of Kottarakkara. Balakrishna Pillai lost badly.

Read it along with the results from the so called Catholic belt and the Muslim belt and you see a Kerala different from 1959.

The Trivandrum Lok Sabha result is just one instance of this surprising change. When Pannyan Ravindran of the CPI won the election by a hundred thousand votes, someone who was not a “Nair, Nadar or Nattar” was winning the state capital for the first time. (don’t give me Karunakaran’s example).

My point is, 2009 is not 1959. The caste-religion nexus has recent history against it, and the Congress or the CPM don’t need to be afraid of them the way they are. Despite this I wonder why V S Achuthanandan nor Pinarayi Vijayan has the spine nor the political acumen to declare that the government will not succumb to the religious right nor the caste organisations. They have a Kerala that will more receptive to such a message, than the scheduled outcries from Changanassery and Thrissur.

Critical Pedagogy and Curious new names

One thing I like about the bearded leftists is the curious names they throw up every time. We’ve heard of Bakunin, Bretch, Neruda, Camus, Gorky, Foucalt, Chomsky,Trotsky from the bearded lot. The non-stop debates in the past 2 weeks across the 9 malayalam news channels throwed up another name – Paulo Freire. It seems the new textbook is modeled based on his vision of education.

Without going into details of Critical pedagogy which the left intellectuals seem to be so sure of and I don’t know head or tail of, I would like to touch upon an interesting pattern. The last left front government in the state made an audacious move to democratize development. Even the worst critics of the “Janakiya Asuthranam” [People's Plan] cannot deny the grass root changes it brought about. Every suburban centre or rural outpost will have something to point out, like a bridge or a small road or a water harvesting tank that materialised through the people’s plan. And Paulo Freire has ideas on democratization of education,

This is one of the few attempts anywhere to implement something like democracy as an educational method and not merely a goal of democratic education. Even Dewey, for whom democracy was a touchstone, did not integrate democratic practices fully into his methods, though this was in part a function of Dewey’s attitudes toward individuality. In its strongest early form this kind of classroom has been criticized on the grounds that it can mask rather than overcome the teacher’s authority.

More challenging is Freire’s strong aversion to the teacher-student dichotomy. This dichotomy is admitted in Rousseau and constrained in Dewey, but Freire comes close to insisting that it should be completely abolished. This is hard to imagine in absolute terms, since there must be some enactment of the teacher-student relationship in the parent-child relationship, but what Freire suggests is that a deep reciprocity be inserted into our notions of teacher and student. Freire wants us to think in terms of teacher-student and student-teacher – that is, a teacher who learns and a learner who teaches – as the basic roles of classroom participation.

The Minister for Self Government in the previous left ministry was said to be having “Power to eventually destroy Power”, as in centralised state power. It works well with the CPM’s ideology of working within the Indian republic to eventually destroy it. So is the textbook another of the lefts attempts to change an educational system little by little, so that an eventual systemic collapse is brought about? Only time will tell.

Why we are, Where we are

Unlike textbooks and teaching which try to create a historical perspective which enables students to answer the social reality of the day, the 7th standard textbook asks the students to answer why we are where we are and provides them with the historical perspective to answer those questions. It is a different approach, history will judge its implications and success.

Our Hypocrisy, and theirs

Why didn’t the textbook ask why the farmer in Kerala is not cultivating paddy these days?

Why didn’t the textbook ask the students whether we should thank the millions of malayalees in the Gulf?

Why didn’t the textbook ask the students whether it is the Coconut tree or the Rubber tree that is important for us?  

AND

If one can quote India’s first Prime Minister, is it wrong to quote India’s firt Opposition leader just because he is a Communist?

Is it wrong to teach children about Socialism? About Secularism?

When did Socialism become such a bad apple for the Indian middle class? for the Congress Party?

Socialism is one of the committed goals of the Congress Party. If you have a problem with Socialism or Secularism as an objective of Indian Republic, it is not the 7th standard text book you need to change, it is the Indian Constitution.

Here is the Preamble, in case you have forgotten or the system of education failed you,

WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens: JUSTICE, social, economic and political; LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship; EQUALITY of status and of opportunity; and to promote among them all FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation; IN OUR CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY this twenty-sixth day of November, 1949, do HEREBY ADOPT, ENACT AND GIVE TO OURSELVES THIS CONSTITUTION. 

and the Supreme Court Judgment on Kesavananda Bharati Vs Kerala State.

So without question, within the framework of the Constitution if you can teach that India should be Sovereign enough, you can as well teach that India should be socialist enough. The book doesn’t take that liberty.

On a related note – Manmohanism seems to believe that Sovereignty and Socialism are directive principles which can be compromised based on need or benefit. The only doubt is whether the Nuclear deal is a fallout of the 1991 reforms OR the Nuclear deal is a necessity if the 1991 reforms has to go forward. And that is the state of the Union in 2008.

The Outcome and a Classic Dilemma

Religion occupies a very important part in our psyche and plays a very influential role in our society. While one can list out the corrupting and retarding influences it has on young minds, there is no denying of the comfort it brings to a lot of people. The value system and liturgy of religions which sustains the holy remains of the feudal oppression cannot be wiped out in a go. To be poetical, religion resides in the heart of people and that is a belief, like Marxism, which does not require proof.

This is a classic dilemma that the Left faces in the state. A vast majority of the society that left tries to bring into its fold are believers – be it unionised and unorganised labour, government employees, students or teachers. No struggle lead by the left will be meaningful without the participation of these people who belong to one or the other religious group, who believe and need God, and look up to the Left front for thought leadership. Alienation of believers by going overboard in its opposition to organised religion will be a costly mistake. The natural and sustainable option would be to gradually remedy the socio-economic conditions necessary for oragnised religion to exist.

The only way to kill the beast, is to kill it with a thousand stabs. One stab at a time.

Thats exactly what the 7th Standard textbook did. The ensuing debate has dragged a lot of “sacred” things into the street. The political angle and controversy made sure that the people who opposed the text had to give a reason, and a lot of “sacred” people have made clowns out of themselves in the past few weeks.

This text book controversy will sow doubts in “hearts of people”, and create confusions within religious orders while they try to hold ground. A revolution in by next week? Well not exactly, a thousand stabs girl, a thousand stabs! This is just one of them, but an incisive one at that.

Like the confusion EMS created within the Muslim community when he blamed the Congress Government for US invading Iraq in 1991. The result was Kerala’s Muslim vote bank becoming an uneasy powder keg, with the sparks of  Dec 6, 1992 igniting it into a hundred splinter groups.

The controversy will get over, the government may relent, may be it wouldn’t. But as the song goes, We may win, we may lose, but we’ll never be here again. The damage is done, one hell of a controversy it was. Thanks to everyone who joined the party!

Good Night and Good Luck!

Education Reform in Kerala - VIIth Heaven Standard….

Yet another pastoral letter across churches yesterday, KSU(Congress’s student wing) activists and police clash across the state, Muslim League enters the protests arena in its North Kerala strong holds, and today the opening session of the state Assembly comes to a virtual standstill on the issue. Education Reform in Kerala is in the eye of another storm and this time it is the revised 7th Standard Social Studies textbook. The pastoral letter has threatened protests till the book is withdrawn and asked the believers not to teach or learn the book; KSU, Muslim League and the Congress have called for an immediate withdrawal of the book.

Even though several issues have been raised about the new textbook, to be precise, one page in the textbook is in the eye of the storm. This is how Page 24  reads….

Page 24 – Titled – Jeevan without Religion (Jeevan means Life in malayalam)

The lesson is set in a school room where two parents and their kid meet the Principal for school  admission. The Principal fills in the forms,

Principal: “What is your name?”
“Jeevan”
Principal: “Nice…father’s name?”
“Anwar Rasheed”
Principal: Mother’s name?”
“Lakshmi Devi”

The Principal  looks at the parents

Principal: “What should I fill in for the kid’s religion?”
Parents : “Keep it blank…or else add No Religion”

Principal: “Caste”
Parents : “not needed”

The Principal leans back on his chair and asks solemnly

Principal: “What if he wants a religion when he grows up?”
Parents : “If he wants a religion when he grows up, he can choose the one he likes then”

End of Lesson

Do I see a problem with this? I do, based on yesterday’s Pastoral letter read across churches and TV Channels…

1. This revision in text books and deviation from the syllabus prescribed till now, in the name of improving the thought process of children is a handywork of Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad (KSSP – Kerala Science and Literature Movement), the left leaning NGO in Kerala which has permeated every level of education in the state.
2. This lesson creates animosity in the minds of children towards religion and propagates atheism, which in turn will result in a society devoid of values.
3. The education department drops a hint through this lesson, that right from the Principal, every faculty should teach and propagate atheism in class.

This is not the first time the Left front government has tried to inculcate Communist ideology and Atheism in children, they have permeated every sphere of social and cultural activity through their shadow organisations like the KSSP and the Progressive Arts and Literature Society. The left front ought to be fought tooth and nail if religion is to survive in Gods Own Country. If the recent attacks by the left junta on Hindu God Men and Christian Charismatics be any indication – the Commies will have to be stopped in the streets if Ram and Allah and Jesus and their Mullahs and Mukris and Bishops are to have any future in the state.

As Youth Congress President Siddique pointed out on TV “…you dont have to create thought in children or let them think at this age, just teach them to read and write and the lessons…they’ll think for themselves”

Right On Siddique, we don’t need no education!

Then I remembered our last election in college, when the commies would say “use your brain” and Siddique’s party would say “use your heart”. In the final day of the campaign, before the commies swept the election, one of Siddique’s protégés got the message all wrong, he literally cried out through the microphone “Please! Please! Do not use your brain”

Are you listening Kerala? Please! Please! Throw that book away!

P.S: To sum it up - 7th Std Textbook – Good, Bad and the Holy Ghost

We write poems, short stories, essays and blogposts to interrupt the programme. We sign online petitions – I just did one for saving the tiger. We did the same when Iraq was about to be invaded. One hundred and fifty thousand Iraqis have died since then. The problem is we don’t have a strike force.

How sad were we when
110 stories fell to the ground on Sept 11, 2001
How concerned are we about the
110 stories before and after Sept 11, 2001
Which were never told and
Which perhaps
Will never be told

What happens in Mumbai spreads to Nasik

September 11 is a metaphor for silence, a reminder about times when we are comfortably silent and uncomfortably so. I remember the heated argument we had in the much dreaded Electrical Lab on Wednesday – the day after. I realized that religion was not a defining theme there. A few of us argued that killing people, that too in thousands will corrupt both the victim and the invader for generations. Another group argued that this was the only language the nihilistic west and the United States of America understand. I repeat there were no religious lines in the arguments, there were Muslims, Christians and Hindus on both sides of the table. Kerala is that diverse. The fact was, both the points of view were equally safe and to be matter of fact we really didn’t care. So it was with Mumbai when Raj Thackeray did his uncle.

CNN-IBN’s coverage of FOBJP (Friends of BJP) meet in USA threw up an interesting irony. The gathering was celebrating Narendra Modi’s sweep in Gujarat. The man they supported just won. Gujarat was in safe hands. Then CNN-IBN asked a few of them about their overwhelming support for Democrats in the 2008 Presidential Elections. The reply was more than an American diamond, it was a gem. An elderly friend of BJP told the reporter that the Republicans with their extreme right wing stands and religious propaganda did not suit the progressive values of the United States of America, and so they’ll vote Hillary or Obama. I wondered whether we who live in India were born of blow jobs. Swear words apart, there is a Friend of BJP in every one of us.

As BD, pointed out, in Mumbai we are comfortably silent when the Shiv Sainiks take on the valentines or muslims or the touring Pakistan cricket team or M.F Hussein. They are like that, we know they are crazy. But when the Sena turns to North Indians, there is news value, and perceivable outrage because there is a vague feeling within us that we are all Indians wherever we are born. Because when the NewYork flight lifts off from Mumbai, we have a vague feeling that we are leaving something very important behind.

Then again, it is a very vague irritant. It hit close to home when the MNS started destroying shops in Nasik which had boards in Malayalam, Tamil or English. When the malayali gets hit for being a malayali, it hits somewhere near home. But then I should have known that what happens in Mumbai, spreads to Nasik. That the Shiv Sena is not an anti-muslim or anti-art or pro-marathi organization, though its roots lie in the violent retributions organized against South Indians in Mumbai in the 70s and 80s. Shiv Sena is not a hindutva party, they took up hindutva in the 90s because in the 90s hindutva fetched votes. Shiv Sena essentially is an organization that wants to come to power, so it is with the MNS. Now how wrong is that?

The same day, the violence erupted in Mumbai, two more north Indians where killed in Assam for being north Indians. Now explain that to me, a person who thinks anything above Bangalore is North India. Explain that to a Sri Lankan who is afraid of his big neighbour, whose residents are called Indians. Only if we could tell him, that off the cricket ground, there as such is no India they need to be afraid of.

Who is condemning Raj Thackeray? Is it the Namma Kannadiga who once and for all destroyed the fabric of Bangalore when Rajkumar died, who destroyed shops in Brigade and MG Road which didn’t have hoardings in Kannada. Remember Bangalore is just 36% Kannadiga. Is it the Tamilian who blocked buses and trains from Kerala in the “National” Highway on a petty Railway Zone issue. Is it the Assamese who is about to kill a couple of Biharis who are building roads in their state. I hear it when Raj Thackeray asks why Bengal needs to erupt when Saurav Ganguly is dropped from the team. Do they gather around their televisions and condemn Raj Thackeray?

There are two hypocrisies that come into play here. First and less important is the state’s hypocrisy. I mean the Indian state’s. When India condemns 9/11 and decries all forms of terrorism, what we mean is Kashmir. When India says it will not accept a divided Sri Lanka, we mean Kashmir. When India votes against Iran, perhaps the only muslim country that sided with us after the 1998 nuclear tests, we mean a nuclear deal with the west and in the end we mean Kashmir. A state supposedly based on a destiny to pursue the truth ends up as a hypocrite state. Children in India grow up seeing this hypocrisy of the Indian state and if they learn from the Indian state that it is OK to be hypocrites if there is a tangible benefit in that, you cannot possibly blame them. These children grow up to be marathis, tamilians, gujaratis and kannadigas.

The second hypocrisy, the one of comfortable and uncomfortable silences, is a little more innocent. Language is a simpler, more basic emotion in comparison with religion. When we argue that our fellow hindu or fellow muslim is being ill treated, like say the Fiji hindus or the Hindraf in Malaysia or the muslims of the Balkans, we are aware of a pointlessness within us. Because we have nothing in common or no stake in their welfare, and it really doesn’t hit home.Language presents a different picture, and that is why Tamil Nadu reacts to the situation of Tamils in Malaysia, Gujarat reacts to Kenyan crisis or the communists sweep elections in Kerala on the back of a crisis in the middle-east which directly affects malayalis.

Our silence moves from comfortable to uncomfortable when the discrimination moves from religion to language. Maybe because religion is abstract enough to easily distance yourself from it, but there is no denying your language.The fact that language is a motivation potent enough to make people uneasy, like the attack on malayalis in Nasik by MNS makes me sit up, should give us a better idea about the tower of Babel that is India.

A silent majority of marathi speaking people who see a point in what Raj Thackeray says today or what Shivsena has been saying for decades, is the quintessential cross section of vernacular India. It is only a matter of time before Chennai explodes with similar sentiments, and so will be the case in all the knowledge economy hubs across the country attracting a high inflow of migrants like Bhubaneswar, Ahmadabad, and Calcutta.

The spike in investments, fast growth and the accompanying congestion and further migration will be a continuing story. In these cities people wake up everyday, more and more strangers to the place they once called home. Bangalore, a retirement paradise with fresh air, wide roads, clean water, and a lot of flowers and dogs, is a smoggy city today. If the erstwhile Bangalorean wants some order restored, and supports the right-wing Kannada groups which promise this, can we blame him or her. Do we explain to them, that we are all Indians? Try explaining that to yourself when you lose your city.

It is inevitable that the idiocy of village life be replaced, scattered populations be agglomerated into cities and towns, centralize means of production and concentrate property in very few hands. This will in turn remove all separate interests like religion and language, and integrate everyone into one colossal system of production. We will all work for one trans-national corporation. But end of history is still far out in the horizon. We need some immediate patch up solutions before Chennai starts smouldering like Bangalore and Mumbai.

How about legislating?

Rising above language is theoretically not possible. But what is theoretically not possible is politically possible. Like George Bush did in Iraq – every theory of war and geopolitics advised against it. When you have political will power, anything is possible. Because political action needs only 75% proof (any random percentage between 0-100).

But what do we legislate? I don’t know, neither do you. Thats why we spend 1500 crores on general elections.

One question is, for how many more years will we dodge the need to make Hindi our official language?

But political action needs martrys. Without bloodshed, the state wont wake up and take notice, the state won’t touch something like language. Otherwise politicians will evade the issue like Maharashtra CM Deshmukh did. Cities across the country will have to shut down with rioters on both sides speaking different tounges, the programme needs to be interrupted for the couch potatoes to legislate. This is taking the solution a bit too far. But Indians need to have Civil Rights in India. The hundreds of North Indians who fled Nasik in the past two weeks will agree to this.

Interrupting the programme

The root cause of migration into Mumbai is the investments being done in the city. The capital inflow and the surge in development in the city are triggering the need for migrant labor. Rather than asking the north Indian migrants to leave the city, Raj Thackeray could have asked the investors not to invest in Mumbai or Nasik. Raj could have easily stopped the handful of investors, compared to the pain that he took in terrorizing the hundreds of thousands of laborers. I wonder why Raj didn’t do that. I still wonder why Kannada Rakshana Vedike didn’t do that in Bangalore.

Maybe because if the wall is not there, you can’t write on it.

We write poems, short stories, essays and blogposts to interrupt the programme. We sign online petitions – I just did one for saving the tiger. We did the same when Iraq was about to be invaded. One hundred and fifty thousand Iraqis have died since then.The problem is we don’t have a strike force.

When construction workers were chased out of Mumbai and Nasik in the past few weeks, CNN-IBN, true to its nature, asked Sharukh Khan what he felt about the situation. But the problem is King Khan is not a strike force. If construction workers across the nation went on strike to protest the violence and discrimination, the programme would have been interrupted, the Biharis wouldn’t have fled to their hometowns. That is a strike force. The state which badly needs a double digit growth would have made amends.

When IT and ITES employees in Bangalore spend days hiding from rioters in the Bangalore streets after Rajkumar died a natural death. The state didn’t even think of banning the organisations involved. Banning an organisation is important. That sends out a signal that working or affiliating with that organisation is illegal. These organisations lie awake in Bangalore, for another trigger. If IT and ITES workers, the motors of Bangalore’s growth quit work till the state acted, they would have been a strike force. They wouldn’t be afraid of negotiating with an autorickshaw driver just because he is a Kannadiga.

The point is, we are different in collar colours – white or blue, we are the same in existence – unorganized and helpless.It is not the malayali or tamil or kannada or marathi culture or language that keeps the engine running. When the motors of this nation realize their true potential, we will rise above irritants like language and religion, and make ourselves and our lives comfortable. It will take time.

Because it is easier to sleep than to wake up. It is easier to be enslaved than to be free, which is a responsibility. Because it’s easier to believe that you are a Muslim or a Marathi than to believe you keep this world going. But when the breaking point comes, we wake up. And when we wake up, we won’t be watching it on television. Nobody will, this programme will be interrupted.

The debate is now about how many migrants come to Mumbai.Raj’s share of prime time on TV; whether Ambani feels he is Gujarati or Maharashtrian, how Bachchan needs to build schools in Mumbai. King Khan has competition as to who the best entertainer this season is. Today there are reports of statements made by MNS leaders regarding the “provocative statements” made by North Indian leaders. Give me a break!
 
My colleague, who was totally disturbed at the whole thing, says, “This is silly. Mumbai runs by North Indians and South Indians. Taxis, Dabhawallas are all North  Indians”
 
I try my hand to pacify him. “They just need an issue. And this “me, mumbaiker” was something that the Shivsena had always taken up and now Raj Thackeray is just continuing on that”
 
But for what followed, I was not ready!
 
He continues, “They had always taken up issues of muslims here in India. Wo theek hai, that has been going on for ages, but this is silly”
 
Well, to this, I did not know what to say.
 
Maybe I’m just overreacting.But then, to me, the issue is not about North India or South India, or Muslims or Hindus!
 
This idea of hatred! This reaction to differences! And when someone tries to provoke the differences, why do we have to react with ours? And why is it not silly when we hear provocative statements against certain religions? How many more speeches and statements must we hear to know that this does not help!
 
The answer my friend is blowing in the wind!
 
That hate is silly!
 
On another note, in India, if we are not able to see the treasure that she embodies in these differences, well, the loss is all ours!
 
I cannot say it better than Nehru. If we are not able to see this, we have not seen India :(
 
“Another and a major excitement had seized me, and I was again on a great voyage of discovery and the land of India and the people of India lay spread out before me. India with all her infinite charm and variety began to grow upon me more and more and yet the more I saw of her, the more I realized how very difficult it was for me or for anyone else to grasp the ideas that she embodied. It was not her wide spaces that eluded me, or even her diversity, but some depth of soul which I could not fathom, though I had occasional and tantalizing glimpses of it. She was like some ancient palimpsest on which layer upon layer of thought and reverie had been inscribed and yet no succeeding layer had completely hidden what had been written previously. All of these existed in our conscious and unconscious selves, though we may not have been aware of them, and they had gone to build up the complex and the mysterious personality of India. That sphinx like face with its elusive and sometimes mocking smile was to be seen throughout the length and breadth of the land. Though outwardly there was diversity and infinite variety among our people, everywhere there was that tremendous impress of oneness, which had held all of us together for ages past whatever political fate or misfortune had befallen us. The unity of India was no longer a merely intellectual conception for me; it was an emotional experience that overpowered me. That essential unity had been so powerful that no political division, no disaster or catastrophe had been able to overcome it.”

Modi asked the crowd, ”What should be done to a man who stored illegal arms and ammunition? You tell me what should have been done to Sohrabuddin?”

The crowd replied, ”Kill him, kill him”.

”Well, that is it. Do I have to take Sonia Gandhi’s permission to do this? Hang me if I have done anything wrong,” responded Modi.

Modi will possibly lose the elections, probably will not. But what do we do with the crowd. Isn’t that the real problem in Gujarat? Are we afraid to say that? I mean, face the horror?

In a completely unrelated development widely reported by almost all Malayalam dailies, Archbishop Joseph Mar Powathil has asked Christians in Kerala to send their children to Christian schools (read church run schools). I hope the Bishop hasn’t said this, else atleast he withdraws the remark. I’m not sure whether self respecting Hindus and Muslims in Kerala should stop sending their children to Christian schools. There is a limit to which the majority community will ignore the pastoral letters. After that don’t ask how Modis are created, because you are creating a crowd for him every sunday.

Otherwise lets go ahead and segregate schools for the Muslims, Christians, Nairs and Ezhavas. Then probably Kerala will reach that level Vivekananda once warned of in the near future.

Goethe,Leibnitz, Kant, Karl Marx, Nietzsche, Beethoven, Bach, Mozart, Albert Einstein, Max Planck, Heisenberg, Schrödinger, Fahrenheit, Röntgen, Hertz, Hegel and Hitler

Kant, Hegel, Marx and then Hitler – the “germ” is always there

For anyone out there crouched in their prison cell, who cannot hear the ocean, who thinks “secular” and “progressive” are cliched twentieth century words – Germany is one lesson from history on eternal vigilence. A secular progressive society where every human being has the right to live in the land they were born into, a right to “food, medicine, clean air, pure water, trees and grass, pleasant homes to live in, some hours of work, more hours of leisure” is not a destination, it is a journey – something the society needs to achieve at the end of every day. Any one who strives for it is not a utopian but a realist. Because the ‘germ’ will always be there and every sunrise is another day.

Thackeray who recently celebrated his 80th birthday, made an emotional appeal to the Marathis saying there was a conspiracy to separate Mumbai from Maharashtra and it would not be “tolerated”.

“The city will burn if it is taken away from Maharashtra,” Thackeray said.

“Let them even try to separate Mumbai from Maharashtra and we will give them a fitting reply. One hundred and five martyrs, mostly mill workers, had sacrificed their lives for the cause of Maharashtra with Mumbai and we will not let it go to waste,” he added.

Source : CNN-IBN

Asking Hindus to break linguistic barriers and unite, Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray said his dream was to feel a “Hindustan of Hindus” that would bring “Islam in this country down to its knees”.

Addressing a massive rally at Shiv Sena stronghold Shivaji Park, Thackeray said “it is my dream that we would create a Hindustan of the Hindus. Maharashtrians or Punjabis alone cannot fight against Islam. That is why, I appeal to all Hindus to break the linguistic wall around them and come together so that we can bring Islam in this country down to its knees.”

Source : Indian Express

So Papa Bear, lets get to burning this Mumbai thingy down shoulder to shoulder with all those surviving mill workers *who the stingy-pig eating- Afzal loving- Sickle carrying commies allege you had sold out again and again to mill owners while you were the trade union Sarkar* . Lets drive all those Biharis, Gujjus, Madrasis and coconut selling Malayalis out of Brihanmumbai. Shall we use electoral rolls this time like Modi uncle did ?
Let me tell you that is not as comprehensive as the marwadis think, why cant this godforsaken non-marathis circumcise ? Neways, lets drive them out, one by one.

After that Papa Bear, we’ll fight the Muslims. We’ll throw them into Arabian sea, let them drown or swim to Mecca, Dubai or Madina. Christians we’ll ship them back to Italy, along with Maino. HOLD ON !!!! Did you say break the linguistic wall and fight Islam ? What about the first plan then ? Here I’m confused Papa Bear, I wouldn’t dare say you are aging. But I’m confused – its like the whole plan is lost in translation.

P.S : Don’t worry Papa Bear, all opinion polls say we’ll win Brihanmumbai. These morons will vote for us. If they don’t we’ll burn Mumbai.Either ways,next week they’ll again squat near the Gateway and go gua gua gua about the spirit of Bombay.These morons.

- O V Vijayan’s Gurusagaram

It is the printing technology of the West that made us so fond of maps. In schools they made us work overtime to clearly draw the boundaries of India, they punished us for every little curve we missed and while lying to us about Kashmir. But they never told us the difference between the human beings on either side of the line, they just told us the others are our enemies as if it was obvious . Maybe thats what their parents taught them, which becomes our inheritance.

The poison of inheritance runs through each one of us and we, after our day long struggle with our tiny big insecurities, go home to the comfort of those inheritances – of being an upper caste or lower caste Hindu, a Muslim ,a Sikh, a Christian, a Bengali, a Tamilian and a thousand other things. We have deep running prejudices against each other, the Hindus think the Muslims are invaders and terror mongers and the Christians are out there to convert them, the Muslim thinks the Hindus are out there to kill them, the North Indian thinks South India is some other country, Andhraites who can’t stand the tamilians and the tamilians who think everyone else want to steal their water and their classical language, Biharis are called illegal aliens in the mountains and in Assam; Nagaland and Manipur does not believe in India and the rest of India does not believe these places exist.

We are prejudiced to the core with our deep rooted inheritances and one fine day they pull one billion of us together and say we are a republic. The deep divisions and conflicts within us that defeats us every single day go by the pet name of “Unity in diversity” ; our teachers force us to write essays on that till our hands pain and our brain fatigues.

We build walls around certain colonial demarcations and live smug faced within those walls entrenched in one thousand riots stretching from Kashmir to Vadodara, from Kaveri to Singur and from Narmada to Garo-Khasi. If we do all this in the name of security and in the name of development, why dont we build walls around Assam,Kashmir,Gujarat,Manipur,Punjab and then around each state,district and finally around each human being who lives here. We call ourselves a republic, one billion people suspicious of each other within artificial boundaries with tickets to a tryst with destiny. Is there a more horrible sight in the world than a republic with borders ? Yes there is, a republic with borders with people in it with no clue why they are there.

What makes us build walls with Pakistan and Bangladesh? That same thing makes us suspicious of one another, the same thing makes us build nuclear bombs and the same thing makes the Indian state a miserable failure. At the root of the problem lies the acceptance of the “majority’s culture” as the mainstream and the treatment of the minority’s culture as an aberration. The hidden grudge against the aberration will wait for a chance and once sparks start flying, the powder house of pent up emotions explode – like Gujarat , like the Anti-Sikh riots of Delhi ’84 and more than anything the Partition of India.

We followed the post 1857 colonial idea of division by defining the Indian culture as Hindu culture – which was not true. Then in our textbooks and history books we defined the Manusmrithi and Arthashastra which belonged to a microscopic minority as our mainstream culture – which was not true. Then we placed vegetarianism and cow worship as core ideas of Hindu worship which was not true. Well we did make the British leave,but we inherited their colonial droppings.

The republic’s boundary is nothing but a tool of exploitation. The map-bound spirit of extreme nationalism helps nobody but the capitalist bourgeois who actually controls every sphere of this nation. Nationalism is a right-wing rallying point in India, issue after issue, atleast after Nehru. The border-defined-republic is the worst case of usurping land and nature, the height of state sponsored hypocrisy. The “developmental” future of the republic and its dependency on the bourgeois and foreign funds has been so ingrained in our psyche by the border-defined-republic that we are ready to sacrifice lives and livelihood for the republic’s “future”.Each of us feel the “turn on” of invasion when troops are rallied in our northern borders, and some of us at the height of our xenophobic orgasm cry “nuke the bastards,just nuke them !”The national boundary and the wars over it makes us more intolerant, and at times it makes us ask the Indian Muslim to go back to Pakistan,where he didn’t come from.

Its in vogue to criticize Gandhi, but the fact remains that he was one of the few people who understood the importance of a multi-cultural secularist India, who understood what India really stood for in the world and the importance of worshipping Ishwar and Allah together. There was this other person who claimed to have discovered India but ended up discovering a throne for his daughter and grandson.

Every nation has a destiny, the republic is just another oppressive roadblock in the nations path. If the undying urge for individual freedom is the corner stone of western civilization, for India it is our spirituality. Our spirituality which time and again has refused to inherit lies,inherit hypocrisy and inherit tyranny. It is the denial of inheritance that Krishna talked about in Gita, that is exactly what Buddha did , Kabir and Nanak practiced and Gandhi died for. The partitioned India is our inheritance and it is upon us to deny it or build walls to protect our patriarchal fortune. If India is a mother we should find her.

There is no India without Pakistan and Bangladesh and Nepal and Sri Lanka. Our destinies and our myths are so entwined. We would, I hope one day define what India really means and discover her in all her glory and her all encompassing Sanathana dharma. We can deny Gandhi and Mohammed, Nanak and Kabir, Krishna and Buddha, but we shouldn’t overlook the underlying love in their messages which runs through this nation. Our philosophy doesn’t differentiate between plants and animals, then where do we find boundaries in it.

Our Indus is a river which carries the holiness of the Hindu’s penance from the Himalaya’s along with the sacred chants of the Buddhist Lamas, courses its way through the fertile land of the holy Gurdwaras to enter Islam’s promised land of Pakistan and finally flows into the sea of the Arabs. Our India is a Sufi.

Good Night and Good Luck !

Note : Its always a very confusing experience to understand India and I can see my view of it changing every minute I wrote this post. I might be contradicting myself at times but that I believe is the fun of the whole exercise.

I found this touching piece by Alakananda, another collateral damage of building borders.

ICYAI the full, disturbing essay is here,

Nothing short of a massive social movement is required to cleanse the state of Gujarat.