Borders are Made of These

Dear Urstruly,

Why are you trying to justify your hatred for India through half-truths and outright lies? What you have written is at best an attempt to create a ficitonal world where you can stand vindicated in your own eyes. It would be better for you if you could look within yourself and find out the real reasons why you hate India so unquestioningly.

-narain

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Ref Urstruly #: 107

[Thanks for singing that love serenade to me but no thanks, cuz I am married to my cause]

I had to read that sentence twice. I thought you said you were married to your cousin.

Ref 12-head-Bhardwaj-also-posting-as-Aeisha #: 116

[Aeisha #104

I have always believed Pakistan was created by HINDUS as a part of surgical amputationto disownes its own part because it had become MUSLIMS!!!!!!!!!!!!!``]]

RIGHT ON THE BALL Aeisha]

Don`t pat yourself too vigorously on your back. You may break your arm.

As far as I know, my article is an anti-war statement. But the thekedaars of liberalism can only see what they want to see. They refuse to accept that I could ever make any comments about peace. Love is about giving, not taking, I am told. Yes, sure, I know. Unlike spewing lovely nothings on an anonymous board I am ready to pay the price for it; unlike talking about upholding secularism, I practise it in my life. Daily. Not on special occasions. Not when I am asked to prove myself. So, thanks for the advice, but I’ve been there, done it.

I am surprised that the activists have not come out and yet made a strong anti-war statement. Why do we have to wait for later, when it is too late?

I fail to understand what is wrong with anecdotes. They are more real than quoting from Chomsky and Huntington. As for these being generalizations, may I ask how then can we accept the cellphone conversations of those who were on the ill-fated airplanes during the WTC attacks as ‘evidence’ of what had happened? Ironically, the posters here use anecdotes to show their own wonderful experiences. If this is what they want to tell us is reality, then how does my quoting something become less real? Only because it is not palatable to some of you? The phone call that I received after the attack on Parliament was symbolic of a certain insecurity, and to imagine that this is what would get me excited and that “two can play a provocative game” is a ridiculous notion. If that were the case we would have had a full-blooded war going by what one reads here. (And if I am playing to the Pak galleries, then some of you are matadors with a saffron rag, not realising that a bull is colour blind.)

I am aware that the Parliament is not just another building, which is why I think that the custodians of it are not you and I, but our elected leaders. It is their business to do something. I refuse to be forced to take a position on this. The People’s Union for Democratic Rights wrote a letter to the Times of India (Jan 1) wherein they have talked about the selective media interviews of the accused facilitated by the police. Btw, how many NRIs have protested against the statement of the VHP international general secretary where he has stated, ``The time has come for India to declare war and finish Pakistan``? Should I say that some of you are here only to play to the gallery? Nah. I am sure you are too busy.

And before I forget, in my country a Press Card can be bought for Rs. 500 in a State like UP and in Bombay newspapers flaunt owners of car companies, socialites and chefs as columnists, and the chamchas in industrial houses manage to get on the committees of the Press Club and ‘buy’ hacks. So naturally it is a great compliment to me when I am not called a journalist. For, at least my imagination is based on a reality I go out and experience and is not dependent on a few soiled notes and a hangover.

Regards,

Farzana

AeishA #104:

1. I am not a fool.

2. My penis isn`t longer than a Muslim`s - just probably has more skin on it.

3. Haven`t you heard how inclusive we Hindoos are? We include Buddhists, Jains, Sikhs into our fold whether they want it or not. What`s a Maneckshaw or a Jacob to our insidious inclusiveness?

4. If Hindus spend all their time planning confrontation with Pakistan, we`d be doing the world a favour. Unfortunately, unlike the mad mullahs across the border, we DO consider the ramifications of our actions and practice restraint.... at which idiots like you jump up and down gleefully chanting ``coward! hindoo!``

5. Re: your theory that Partition was a Hindu idea, I say: MAN what a great idea, wish we had more of those. Imagine living in a country where half of the population is Muslim. Not a pretty thought.

SM

urstruly,

let us know when pok muslims are allowed to set up offices in islamabad demanding freedom from pakistan and are given widespread coverage over ptv, like the indian kashmiri muslims are allowed to do in new delhi. maybe then some indians would take you seriously. till that time, farzana would remain your best bet.

THE WOLF WHO HAS SEEN THE RAINS

Dear Farzana # 91

It is the nature of your question becuae of which I will have to use the first person singular several times in this post. So bear with me. But before I begin let me tell you about a Persian proverb, which is also used in Urdu i.e. ``Gurg-e-BarN Deedah``. The literal translation of this proverb is ``The wolf who has seen (survived) the rains``. The background of this proverb goes something like this. In Iran when the winter season comes it comes with hail storms, frozen rain, snow, and rain. Sometimes it rains and snows for weeks, which causes every living thing, man or animal, to take refuge in shelters and they are literally trapped there. Same thing happens to the wolves, who roam about in packs, are forced to take refuge in caves. Sometimes they are trapped in those caves for days, hungry and thirsty. They usually sit in a large circle, staring at each other with their glowing red eyes, huffing gently with their tongues out. The hunger starts playing tricks on them and then a time comes when the weakest and most tired wolf can`t take it anymore due to hunger and sleep deprivation and blinks its eyes. Just at that moment the whole pack jumps on it and with in a minute reduces it to just an inedible piece of skin and hair. It keeps on happening to the weaker wolves until the rain stops and they come out to hunt other animals. The wolves who thus survive are called the ``Gurg-e-BaraN Deedah``. They are the toughest and the meanest of the pack. In Urdu and Persian proverb Gurg-e-BaraN Deedah is referred to a person who is the toughest and meanest (of the pack).

Sometimes ignorance is a bliss and sometime playing ignorant is. I would have been very indifferent to Kashmir issue, hadn`t there been two incidents, that changed my thinking drastically. So it has now become very personal. The first incident is not actually a single incident but a series of incidents that happened over a period of four years when I was living in Karachi in the early 90s. During those years I survived a brutal civil war, but I did not or could not become the Gurg-e-BaraN deedah-may be because I was the weakest wolf who just survived due to his good luck. I have seen human beings suffer at the hand of state machinery and believe me it is the most brutal and effective killing machine that man has ever invented to hurt, kill, and maim other. I don’t expect you or any one else to be able to relate to me because every one has different experiences in life. And our experience is our perspective. But we share the same society. A society where even the most lowly of the instrument of bureaucracy, a clerk, can make your life a living hell just for little things like your driving license, your sons admission in school, your pension, your bills, your permits and just name it. These clerks and other instruments are not aliens, they belong to the same society; their children go to school with our children, they worship at the same places that we worship- but it is the absolute and unquestionable power that corrupts them absolutely. It takes the human decency away from them due to which we care for each other. Now imagine what happens when these people are given control of our life and death, they are given authority to decide our fate, and they are given the powers to make us do the things their way or else. A politician is nothing but an elected clerk, isn`t it? The worst tragedy of a human society is when its own state machinery is turned against itself. Where do you go to find justice then? What doors do you knock at to seek refuge then? Then only things you hear are the wails of mothers who weep for their sons; the cries of the sisters cut through your heart, who cry for their brother who went alive but came back as bullet ridden corpse, with broken bones, with torture written all over him. It is impossible to look into the inferno of a mans eyes who had just seen his sisters raped before him by none other but those who were supposed to protect their honor. Then what you do?

The second event that had actually changed my thinking about state machinery is when I met Kashmiri refugees in early 90s in Azad Kashmir. Those were the people who had survived an Indian Death Camp that were established all over Indian held Kashmir in those days. The horror and the degree of helplessness that those people had faced in those camps could melt a heart made of stone. That was my second lesson about the brutality of the state apparatus.

I am not an anarchist, I am far from it. But I believe in demolishing a system that organizes the injustice. We are not a society of wolves, we are human beings; and we are human beings because we care for the weakest and we speak for those who cannot speak for themselves. I believe in organized justice.

But what if a majority refuses to accept responsibility for any injustice. Do we have to give them respect just because they impart injustice democratically? And believe me it happens. Societies are like human bodies, who get sick, and who become healthy. A society becomes sick when injustice prevails, when injustice is overlooked and preferred over fairness and as a mean to progress . Just as South African society was sick, even though democratic, the Hindu society is also sick.

Please note that I have used the term Hindu Society and not the Indian society. The reason is that when we talk about a society we talk about its dominant norms. For example, although US society is muti-racial and muti-ethnic but dominant norm is Anglo-Saxon. We cannot call it a Spanish or black society. Similarly the case is with Indian society but with a major difference with US society. In Indian society the Hindu aspect is so dominant that it is forced down the throat of others. Take, for example, Muslims, who are kept in line with the threat of patriotism, revoking of citizenship, and violence. The threats are not just threats they are actually acted upon-like for example Kashmir Muslims are out rightly denied any constitutional or citizenship right. Their basic human right of right to live is violated without remorse and without impunity. Another visible minority is the Sikh minority who were silenced with the brutal force of state machinery and today they are afraid to the extent that they have given up any dreams for justice and equality. Some may disagree with my last statement vehemently but you have to meet a Sikh personally to see the word ``compromise` written all over their forehead. That happens when the will of the weak is broken successfully and he compromises with the cage. Kinda like Red Indians who have compromised their freedom for Casino licenses and safety of reservations and state stipend.

One may argue with the same logic that why Hindu society is sick and why not Kashmiri society? We must analyze the whole thing objectively here. Hindu society has the power of democratic institutions Kashmiris don’t. Hindu society has all the citizenship rights Kashmiris have none. Hindu`s rights are protected by constitution but same constitution denies rights to Kashmiris, including the right to live. Hindus have the power to control state apparatus like bureaucracy, military, and law enforcement agencies but Kashmirsis don’t. Hindus have a political forum and Kashmiris don’t. Hindus have set up torture cells and investigation dungeons but Kashmiris haven`t. So all the things that Kashmniris do not have are actually taken away by the Hindu majority. In addition to that it is the direction and extent of violence, which is from Hindus on to Kashmiris and it is far more than vice versa.

Why so much venom and spite by me? Because I am weak and yet I have taken on the daunting and back breaking responsibility to speak for the weakest and despite all that I have refused to consider us a pack of wolves. We are not a society of wolves, we are humans.

Here is a truth we can all agree on

There can`t be real friendship between India and Pakistan until two old, angry wounds are healed

Kamila Shamsie

Thursday January 3, 2002

The Guardian

A decade ago, more than 50 of my 96 classmates and I left Karachi to attend university in the US and UK. We didn`t give much thought to the fact that many of us would be meeting Indians for the first time in our lives. It`s hard now to find anyone among those 50-odd Pakistanis who didn`t make at least one Indian friend. But what we all discovered was this: we might agree with our friends from across the border on everything else - our embarrassed attachment to 80s music; our despair at the floundering fortunes of the West Indian cricket team; our inability to eat Uncle Ben`s rice without thinking weepily of basmati; our positions on capital punishment, gay rights, abortion, and gun control - but we could not agree, not one whit, on the two interrelated wounds of Indo-Pak relations: partition and Kashmir.

There are worse things, I suppose, than discovering at 18 that, no matter how many books you read and analytical skills you acquire, your truths will never be objective.

It would be nice to say that, after a decade of talk, those Indo-Pak friendships have resulted in a shifting of positions which can serve as an example to the politicians of our two countries. Perhaps this is true in one or two cases. But, largely, we just learned to stop talking about certain things to each other, and accepted that we had grown up with two different narratives about the same events.

If the ``two nations, two narratives`` issue only centred on the creation of Pakistan 55 years ago, I expect we could learn to live with our differences. But as long as the situation in Kashmir remains unresolved we will continue to see border tensions and doomsday predictions and radically differing interpretations arising from a basic set of facts.

The basic set of facts we are faced with is this: on December 13 there was a failed attack on the Indian parliament, and the attackers were killed along with several Indian security personnel.

One narrative surrounding these basic facts goes like this: soon after Israel showed how easy it is to milk the ``no distinction between terrorists and those who harbour them`` line, gunmen miraculously got through security checks, in a time of heightened alerts, and attempted to destroy the Indian parliament. In a further miracle, none of the ministers were hurt and the terrorists were killed. The Indian government refused to show the faces of the terrorists to reporters, insisted that the terrorists were part of two groups fighting for the liberation of Kashmir (though that is not quite how the Indians phrased it), and that the attack was planned in training camps in Pakistan and involved the collusion of Pakistan`s intelligence agency, the ISI. Pakistan offered a joint inquiry into the affair, and India refused.

The other narrative, in which I`m not as well-versed, follows these lines: Pakistan decided to take advantage of its newly warmed friendship with the world`s superpower by launching yet another in a long series of attacks on India. Pakistan-sponsored terrorist groups attempted to bring the Indian government to its knees by blowing up the Indian parliament. The plan was foiled and the terrorists were killed. If the war against terrorism is to be a global war then surely India must have the right to attack Pakistan. But the US cautioned restraint, and Pakistan, in a brazenly cheeky move, insisted that it be part of the investigation into the attack.

Or, here is the condensed version of the two narratives, which can stand in for the two narratives during any conflict between India and Pakistan.

Narrative one: India always lies.

Narrative two: Pakistan always lies.

But there is an important third narrative. In the first days after President Musharraf came to power in Pakistan more than two years ago, he repeatedly expressed his admiration for the aggressively secular Kemal Ataturk. And then, abruptly, he went silent. It was widely believed that Musharraf was warned against the perils of taking on the hardline religious groups. But in a post-September 11 Pakistan the extremists have been dealt a severe blow due to their inability to drum up significant support for their anti-government rallies, and the president has been speaking openly about the need to combat those who have been holding hostage a nation which is essentially moderate.

Pakistan`s best chance to move against the extremists is now. But it`s one thing for Musharraf to root out terrorists; it`s quite another for him to appear to do so at the behest of India. In government circles, it is being said that Musharraf is furious about the attacks on the parliament building, and - more importantly - that India`s belligerent demands that he arrest militants are actually slowing down the crackdown on extremists. Perhaps this is the narrative to which more Indians should be paying attention.

For a moment I thought I could end this column on that previous line. But to do so would be to leave out the most important narrative here: that of the 70,000 and more (every week, more) who have died since 1990 in the struggle for Kashmir`s future. When Indo-Pak narratives clash, the fallout is almost always in Kashmir. India insists there is no genuine struggle for self-determination and that the uprising in Kashmir is Pakistan-sponsored. Pakistan insists it offers only moral support to the Kashmiri struggle.

India lies.

Pakistan lies.

But here is a truth we can all agree on: a solution to the Kashmir dispute must be found so that the phrase ``threat of nuclear war`` can be consigned to the history books and the next generation of Pakistanis and Indians does not become so accustomed to such a phrase that, in the midst of the massive build-up of troops along the border, it continues to live its life as though nothing out of the ordinary is going on. (I don`t know about the major cities of India, but in Karachi New Year was a wildly celebratory affair, and not just among groups who are associated with fiddling during fires.)

And here is another, no less important truth: a solution must be found for the sake of the Kashmiris who have waited far too long already to approve a joint narrative of peace.

Kamila Shamsie is the author of Salt and Saffron

Perhaps we should pray to the god of small

`jee-hads` instead... I`m sure she`s listening.

great read

````sigalph #89 Please dont waste your time by trying to reason with this man. He resorts easily to name-calling, thereby betraying his low-class origins````(tahmed)

Happy New Year -- tahmed and Sigalph

http://www.pakobserver.com/january2002/02/a

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http://www.pakobserver.com/january2002/03/a

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