Forgive me, Danny

Adnan:

``But, not a single Indian is willing to admit it...``

...to Pakistanis. No Indian thinks that everything in Kashmir is hunky dory. But admitting it to a Pakistani is tough because there is a territorial claim attached to it.

If Pakistan were to say, we give up claim on the land, just remove the army and enforce human rights, the situation would improve. Ofcourse, things would not be great, but that`s coz things are not great anywhere in India.

Beisdes, why do you waste time reading Jay`s posts in any case?

TAhmed:

``average person in the subcontinent has more sense than the ``educated specimen`` who visit chowk for purposes of engaging in India-Pakistan self-aggrandizement and mutual-insult competitions. ``

Oh c`mon...I am an educated ``specimen`` and I frequently take part in mutual insult competitions. But c`mon, it`s just time pass. I believe that most people in real life would remarkably be more sophisticated. God knows, I get on well with Pakistanis in real life, though, we still occaisionally trade insults. Its a guy thing. You shouldn`t take it too seriously.

Sattar2:

``Ground reality is that you mullahs are screaming for civil rights and due process … because you are now dealing with someone who carries a bigger stick. ``

Exactly, My dear Sir. Exactly!!! The hypocricy of the Mullahs is astounding. The Taliban did diddly squat for human rights, but cry and moan when theres are violated.

adnan_rafiq #64

[quote]
The fact remains that India has never honored Nehru`s promise to the U.N. for a plesbicite in Kashmir.
[/quote]

Do you have any knowledge of the conditions of this plebiscite? The very first condition is the complete withdrawal of all non-indian forces from ALL of J&K. Do you think this condition can ever be fulfilled? Why did Pakistan refuse to act on this from 1948 to 1971?

We can all selectively pick up bits of history and fling it in each others faces. This propaganda is the trademark of forces like the VHP which emphasize only one incomplete aspect of history in terms of hindu-muslim relations. You are doing exactly the same thing with respect to J&K.

The solution to J&K has been on offer since Vajpayee`s brave trip to Lahore. But the pakistani military and jihadis cannot accept it. Hence Kargil, hence the public affirmations of the Kashmir jihad, the ludicrous Agra summit in which reasonable people all over india concluded that Musharraf was an irresponsible clown.

You can keep going with your victim complex and tours to naive and uninformed parties. You can keep on funding murder and terrorism (and then wonder why there is extremist violence in your society!!). Or you can work for a practical solution which respects ground realities.

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ahmadzai#67

THe question is not whether 1 mohajir was killed by state or 10,000, the question is of extra-judicial murders. State has no authority to use its apparatus to murder any citizen under absolutely no circumstances. Otherwise, it fails the purpose of having a judiciary or even of establishment of a civilized society. In this case state has overstepped its authority under local constitution, law, and recognized international laws.

A report was published by the GOP in 2001, which admitted that since 1986, about 35,000+ people were killed in Karachi because of ethnic violence. The loss of property and productivity was in billions of rupees. The independent sources put the casualty figure into 50Ks.

As for your question of ethnic cleansing goes, I am a witness to the murder and a survivor. I have survived this civil war through four years and lived to tell, when rest of the country is in denial and suffering from collective amnesia. I have seen mass migrations of Pathans, Punjabis, Sindhis, and Mohajirs from each others areas. I have witnessed the trains full of families leaving from Karachi to Punjab and upper Sindh. There were camps established in Sadiqabad and Bahawalpur to give relief to those refugees, who were fleeing in their own country to save their lives.

The murder of Mohajirs by state apparatus in early `90s qualifies as genocide if you look up the dictionary.

The military establishment of Paksitan started this ethnic violence in `80s to break the political clout of PPP in rural sindh and that of JI in urban sindh. They are the one who have occupied the major resources of this land. Because of this the economic disparity and unconstitutional distribution of revenues has created discontent between the provinces. This situation has not gotten any better. This government has not done any different. They have again used state apparatus against one Mohajir group and sided with other to establish its government in sindh after lota elections.

Where are the constitutional rights of the people?

jay #64:
Jay, those who live in glass houses don`t throw rocks at others. No one`s denying that Pakistan did not commit attrocities in the name of religion. No one`s denying our shameful role in Afghanistan and the support of terrorist activities in Kashmir or the way we treat our minorities. And, I am not stupid to expect a handful of New Hampshire lawmakers to put a dent in American foreign policy visavis Pakistan and India. But, the fact remains that they went there and saw something that runs contrary to all the claims made by Vajpayee and the rest of the saffron brigade. But, as usual not a single Indian has bothered to accept that perhaps there is some truth in it. Its complete denial as usual. As far as they are concerned the lawmakers are compulsive liars. Isn`t it?

I am not out here to prove that Pakistan is better or to support the policies of our armed forces. I don`t. I have said many times that Pakistan should get out of Kashmir immediately and focus on its internal problems (which seem to be growing exponentially) first. Also, given the size of India (in terms of size, population and economy) it is a suidical attempt for Pakistan to try to achieve parity. This competition will hurt Pakistan a lot more than India. But, given the stranglehold our military has on all aspects of Pakistani life, I am not holding my breath.

However, I do have a problem with the `holier than thou` attitude of many Indians. The fact remains that the Indian army has also committed crimes in Kashmir - murders, rapes, harassment, illegal arrests, etc. These facts are acknowledged by many international humanitarian agencies including Amnesty Internationa, and now the lawmakers. The fact remains that India has never honored Nehru`s promise to the U.N. for a plesbicite in Kashmir. The fact remains that Kashmiris are not happy with the current Indian government. Yes, they are not happy with the terrorists who cross over from Pakistan (please note that I am calling them terrorists not jehadis or freedom fighters), but that does not mean that all is hunky dory for Kashmiris. But, not a single Indian is willing to admit it. Instead of admitting the merciless slaughtering of Muslims or sikhs in the eighties, you guys are busy telling us about Taliban, Afghanistan and madrassas.

Adnan Rafiq at # 30:

``But, the attrocities committed by Benazir and Naseer-ullah Babar during the early nineties come very close to the definition of genocide. Extra-judicial killings, false arrests, harassement of family members, intimidation of local newspapers, etc. were the order of the day during their time. Perhaps, a more balanced approach would divide the blame equally between MQM and the establishment.``

I have problem with the over-utilized words of genocide (killing of an ethnic group) and ethnic cleansing. How do you campare targetted killing of less than 100 MQM activists (let us take a maximum of 1,000 or let us even go beyond that and take 5,000) with the following:

1. The killing of 700,000 Jews by Germans during the WW2 that is termed a genocide.
2. The killing of 200,000 Tootsies by Hootoes that has also been termed a genocide.
3. The death and destruction of Bosnians, Croats and others (well over 100,000 by Serbians that has been termed ethnic cleansing.
4. The report of NH parliamentarians that you have referred to arjun_m is also talking about genocide (take the usually quoted figure of 75,000 by Pakistanis).

IMHO, MQM`s killings cannot be termed either a genocide or an ethnic cleansing. But I agree that even this is not permissible.

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Perceptive comment from an Indian Express columnist. Syed Naqvi has also made similar points in his writing.
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Fighting Barista Brahminism?


The VHP and the rise and rise of ‘Shudra Hindutva’


Sagarika Ghose




When members of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad assembled in New Delhi last week they complained that they were treated with scorn. They said English-speaking secularists made fun of them. They said they were ridiculed by the ‘Macaulayist’ media.

The VHP-Bajrang Dal has, over the last decade, added a new enemy to their list of evil influences on Hindu rashtra. Not just the Muslim and the Christian, but also the ‘English speaking’ ‘western educated’ class, exemplified in the persona of the ‘secularist’. The secularist is not recognised merely by his stance on the Babri masjid or the Shah Bano case or on terrorism. Instead, a secularist is anyone who listens to western music, eats in Italian restaurants or does not sport a tilak and dhoti. A secularist is an upper caste individual employed in a corporate job or the private sector. As Pravin Togadia never tires of saying,‘‘Our enemies are the Three Ms: Muslims, Macaulayists and Marxists.’’ Togadia hates secularists but loves the fact that they exist because without them he would lose his “son of the soil” appeal. “Please argue with me,” he pleads.


Yet Togadia’s critique conceals the increasing class and caste anger of the VHP. The VHP’s new definition of ‘Brahminism’ is anyone who is urban, educated and drinks cappuccino at Barista. As a VHP worker said, “Today we may riot against Muslims, tomorrow we will fight against Brahmin dogs if the need arises.”

When the VHP was first formed in the sixties as a loose organisation to feed into the programmes of the RSS and strengthen Hindu feelings among the diaspora, among its founders were Brahmins like K.M. Munshi and Ramaprasad Mookerjee. Subsequently during the Ramjanmabhoomi movement, caste differences were suppressed in the overall mission of creating a Hindu monolith. But over the last decade, the VHP has become transformed from an organisation of traders, petty industrialists and provincial bureaucrats to a grouping whose cadres are made up predominantly of Other Backward Castes (OBCs). As Manjari Katju writes in the recently published Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Indian Politics, “with change in social composition, the VHP’s language of mobilisation changed from mild socio-religious criticism to a vitriolic attack on the entire social and political ideology of the state”.

As part of the deliberate campaign of ‘social engineering’ and bringing lower castes back to the Hindu fold, the VHP-BD is as much a party of Shudras as it is of Brahmins, for whom strident oratory is in fact a deliberate drama enacted to gain votes and social recognition.

Take a spot poll. Earlier generations of the VHP leadership may have been Kayastha like Giriraj Kishore or Bania like Ashok Singhal. But new generations are all OBCs or Shudras. Pravin Togadia? Patel, sometimes classed as ‘Backwards’. Narendra Modi? OBC. Uma Bharti? OBC. Vinay Katiyar of the Bajrang Dal? OBC. Acharya Dharmendra? OBC. Sadhvi Rithambhara? OBC. Kalyan Singh? OBC. The VHP is thus, today, a movement that has been described by a Dalit historian as a movement of ‘Shudra Hindutva’. VHP Hindutva was once obsessed with the aim of bridging caste divides in the creation of the Hindu vote. But now it increasingly sees itself as anti upper-caste, anti-English and anti-metropolitan. In the VHP’s terms, even BJP members like Jaswant Singh or Arun Jaitley or Arun Shourie or even Vajpayee himself are all the ‘secularist’ enemy.

Today certain VHP workers claim a self-image akin to the revolutionaries of the French revolution, who guillotined the elite on the street. “Why do you accuse us of being violent? Didn’t the French kill their rajas and ranis?” Some VHP members say that their hero is Parashuram, slayer of upper castes. They speak of the need to fight the “new Brahmins”, who must be “fought because of their monopoly on English-language education, employment and access to international careers”. While the RSS may be made of genteel Brahmin patriarchs, the Shudra Hindutva of the VHP is a violent protest movement against all elitism, a social revolution aimed to snatch power from the speakers of angrezi and the wearers of bell bottoms. “Shudra Hindutva” is not only fiercely competitive with Muslims but also enraged at being left out of the new economy.

In the anti-Muslim riots in north India in the eighties, Kurmis, Jats and other OBCs formed the main fighting force. The VHP cadres in Gujarat are predominantly OBC. It was the OBCs in the Gujarat Bajrang Dal, not Brahmins or Banias, who were the frontrunners of the attacks against Muslims. OBCs are seen to be more anti-Muslim than Brahmins precisely because their professions place them in direct competition. A Muslim artisan’s or a Muslim tailor’s main competitor is not the Hindu Brahmin or the Hindu Kshtriya but the Hindu OBC.

Many OBC fortunes have been made by membership in the VHP or Bajrang Dal. The BJP’s trishul distribution campaigns in Rajasthan are taking place among OBCs, apart from Dalits and Adivasis, with the promise to hand them Kshtriya status and an avenue for upward mobility. Membership in the VHP thus provides a higher caste status in the Hindu hierarchy. Also, OBC youth who fail their school-leaving examinations or suffer academically because of the lack of English, can often find employment in the VHP. There are many instances of ABVP activists or Reddy businessmen not only becoming affluent through membership of the VHP but also acquiring liquor contracts, real estate and licences to set up private colleges.

The Congress has failed to understand OBC aspirations. The OBC parties led by Laloo Prasad Yadav and Mulayam Singh Yadav are in mutual competition with the VHP, but one only has to cast one’s eye at the chic Diggy Raja to the Scindia scion, to trendies like Aiyar, Soni, Alva and Nath, to realise that the leadership of the Congress is still suvarna and paternalistic. The restless new cadres powering their way into the VHP and the BJP cannot be won over by pointing them towards Kabir’s pluralism or the excellent bhajans of Mirabai. What they are looking for is a counter-identity that provides social status, seats in Parliament but, most importantly, the jobs and privileges of the English-speaking class. They may not ever get these jobs, but the VHP provides, at least, a place in the social sun. Togadia who grew up in an Ahmedabad chawl may never get to play tennis at the Delhi Gymkhana but being in the VHP has guaranteed him a place in a television studio

adnan 45

``And never have I seen an Indian to mention the human cost of oppression at the hand of their armed forces in Kashmir and the human cost of Muslims slaughtered in Gujrat as the police and other authorities stood at the side lines.``

Pl read dawn, the daily report to the jihadic supporters in various parts of the world. There are 70,000 killed in kashmir, 800,000 troops in srinagar, 8000 muslims killed in gujarat.

Now can you tell me how many shaheeds in pakistan, the type that left the madrassa, went looking for the kafirs to kill, the archetypal homo erectus pakistanicus. Tell me adnan, how many killed, sorry, martyred in afghanistan, how many in kashmir. As a pakistani, no one keeps count, they are the un-countables of pakistan, the men driven by the species specific urge to kill homo sapiens. There is no ther country in the world today where men have gone of their own volition, no ecnomic incentives, but the raw urge to kill in the promise of a heaven. Adnan, pakistan is singular in this achievement to the extent that anthropologists have coined a new term, hono erectus pakistanicus.

FORGIVE ME SAMIA SARWAR,

I know my name is similar to yours,
only an ``i`` is missing
Stll I cannot remeber your name
It is strange that a man cross the border
That too a horrible hindoo
Keeps your name alive

I talked to tahmed about you
And he said that your were no-innocent
And according to tahmed
That is certain jihadic death

I talked to YLH about you
He quoted from wolpert
He quoted from one speach
And he kept quoting, I left him alone.

I still cannot remeber you
Many like you are dead
Why should you be special
Because I could be you tomorrow.

A poem NOt by Ayesha Sarwari

Urstruly …

While you are working on explaining the peaceful aspects of your Islam … feel free to also shed light on the peaceful aspects of killing people for apostasy and adultery …

I know hotel California is one thing … and its unplugged version was a bad idea … but must we drag this nonsense into real life … and hunt people down like hound dogs … if, after once flirting with the idea of waiting for 70 chicks in the hereafter, they decided that a bird in hand is better than two in the bush?

So they get to pick … either do the nasty and get killed for adultery … or revoke their pledge to the Almighty and get killed for apostasy. I know a choice between coke and pepsi is always good … but isn’t this death-fatwa thing pushing the limits too far? And besides, what good has your Islam done to your goat-screwing Arab leaders anyway … they cannot even hold a f#%king summit on Iraq … without shouting obscenities and death threats to each other. The live telecast was taken off the air … I read recently.

I know you got angry when Junior warned … “either you are with us, or against us” … but he was probably quoting from your Quran or a book on ahadith. After all … you are the one to tell us that Mohammad had people killed for merely making fun of him … and that Quran commands us to wage jihad against those worshipping cows and kangaroos.

Ground reality is that you mullahs are screaming for civil rights and due process … because you are now dealing with someone who carries a bigger stick. You started this mess … now deal with it. Or better yet … with one hand holding your shalwar above the ankles … grab a talwar in the other hand … yell takbeer … and make a dash towards that big white building. You’ll become famous overnight … and will immediately get to make out with 70 chicks all at once!

hxn #59 I think we have had a reasonable discussion, even if we have somewhat different views on the situation regarding religious extremism in India vs. Pakistan.
I think we both agree that religious extremism is a problem in both countries. Whether religious extremism is a bigger problem in India than in Pakistan, and whether there is broader based support for religious extremism than in India than in Pakistan is something we could debate ad nauseum, but it would be a bit like debating which of the two ugly sisters is uglier.
Instead, I think let us both wish all the best to the future of this armpit of the world we call home (i.e. the subcontinent), and let us both be thankful that the average person in the subcontinent has more sense than the ``educated specimen`` who visit chowk for purposes of engaging in India-Pakistan self-aggrandizement and mutual-insult competitions.
Cheers :-)

Correction to #58
In 1999 clemency petitions were filed with the President of India. In 2001, and after Sonia Gandhi`s appeal to award clemency, the death sentence of one of them who was a woman with a child was commuted to life imprisonment. The other 3 have not been hanged yet.

tahmed # 55

i`ll concede that point.

the brutal murder of the christian missionaries and his children was absolutley sick and a huge blot on india, as has been all the communal violence in recent years including Gujurat.

and i also concede that these events are related to larger trends in indian society.

i hope that the slow march to market reform and greater freedom that pluralistic india has embarked on will allow us to overcome these evils.

i might be on shakier ground here and few pakis on this board may believe me, but as you, even when i put ``the ritual`` indo-pak contest aside, i do feel pakistan is in worse shape. the pearl murder is directly linked to sept. 11, to kashmir, and the fundamental muslim resentments/inferiority complexes about other religions and peoples that led to the creation of the country in the first place - just an ever downward spiraling whirlwind of hate. but hey, that`s just my take.