The Follies of the Natives

Let a country be a secular democracy, a theocracy or a military dictatorship, the most important fact is having rule of law and justice for all.

re: this article
This is a well written article that goes deep into the problem. I have a lot of repect for the writer FerozK. He has, thr` his interactions in Chowk, often shown his objectivity in addressing issues. Issues facing Pak are many. I am glad that the writer chose to concentrate on some of those issues without ever bringing India into the picture, something that most Pakistanis are tempted to do.
I have no answers or comments except that Pakistanis (at least the educated class) must debate among themselves about their country`s future. They must ask the following questions (by no means a complete list):
1. Is Pakistan on the right tract? If not, what is the right path for Pakistan?
2. Is it O.K for Paksitan to be at perpetual enmity with India? Can Pak prosper while it is at constant conflict with its giant neighbour?
3. Are Pakistanis concerned that they are ruled by a dictator who masquerades as a democrat, usurping all their rights?
4. Are Pakis concerned about the role of Army in civilian life?
5. What do the Pakistani people think about Talibanisation of their society? About Islamic fundamentalist party being in power in some states?
At least in Chowk, you have nothing to fear. So, why defend the indefensible? Why not debate openly all the above and many other issues that confront Pak?
Sridhar

re:#8 by Tipu

The media exposure that ``Untouchbles`` in India are getting has a lot to do with powerful Chrisitan organisations active in various states that seek to convert these so called ``untouchables``. This comes at at time when there is resistance to such conversions by the Hindutva elements. This problem has been there for millenia but National Geographic did not focus upon this until recently. Why?
Untouchables are now called Dalits. They were previously called Harijans by Gandhiji. The problem is one of mindset. Just like Slavery existed as long as some people were considered slaves, Dalits will exist as long as some people continue to think in terms of caste. The only thing that can be done is to ensure that these people (Dalits) get their due representation through a political process and are empowered to take care of themselves. Reservation of seats in professional colleges have made some Dalits wealthy. A wealthy Dalit soon forgets his/her roots and behaves like an ``upper caste`` brahmin(a typical eg would be C.M of U.P Ms Mayawati). This is not a caste war. This is a war of minds.
Media is giving more exposure to their cause. It is not surprising what National Geographic wrote. Did the magazine mention that one of the makers of Constitution (B.R. Ambedkar) was a Dalit? Did it mention that the last President of India is a Dalit? C.M. of U.P is a Dalit woman. So, there is no dearth of dalits in high places. Why can`t they abolish this problem?
Hint: it has nothing to do with brahmins. Brahmins in T.N have no political or economic clout but dalits exist there too. The caste war that happens in Tamil Nadu has nothing to do with brahmins. Even the so called ``lower castes`` in that state treat Dalits badly. As i said, it is a mindset that needs to be changed. And change will come only thr` a political process.
http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/2002/12/29/stories/2002122900081700.htm
Excerpt:
``From the caste violence in 1995 in Kodiyankulam, where Dalits breaking out of caste bondage were targeted by the upper caste Thevars who felt economically left behind, to the police excesses last year in Sankaralingapuram, where an entire Dalit colony was ransacked, Dalits have been at the receiving end of both the dominant castes and the State machinery.``

``the Dalits are now stridently demanding separate electoral colleges, and also separate residential colonies. The Samathuvapuram housing project, launched with great fanfare by the DMK Government as a colony for people of all castes, flopped merely because the upper castes were in no mood for any ``artificial integration`` even if it came at Government expense.``
As i said, it is a mindset. Could DMK or any non-brahmin parties in T.N solve this Dalit problem in T.N? It could not. Why? Because they perpetrate a system that seeks to exploit caste for votes. Dalits being the lowermost in this hierarchy are the worst hit.
Sridhar

#17, ferozk: You have raised interesting questions. Rushing out, so I will address them on Monday.
# 16, tahmed32: Welcome. A word of advice to others - don`t believe him, but take him seriously!!!

re: veeresh # 18

It was a mutiny in the understanding of the British, because the natives were trying to over throw their rule; to the Indians, it was seen as a war of liberation. Rudyard Kipling would be the guest of honor at the 50th anniversy of the war in 1907 and he would forever coin the term ``mutiny. Since we were taught by the British and our ``great historians`` were products of the British school of imperial history, we opted for the British version of the events. That is what mental colonialism is - when you consider what is right as wrong and what is wrong as right!

I am slowly re-educating myself in the history of South Asia; sub-continent is a British term. I do not know about the battle you quote, but it resmembles the reality. The war of 1857 was fought by people who had a direct stake in the balance of power and their politics never concerned the average Indian in the village. Religion was never an issue in the village - it was an issue to the politicans and just like today, the political issues of India and Pakistan do not adqueately represent the issues of the average Indian or Pakistani. Take away the politicans and their politics, and we no reason, which can divide us into arch-rivals! How is that for a revolting thought!

Tahmed32 asks, how many ancestors I lost. I have no idea. Does it matter that my father`s cousin was the first Muslim president of India? That another relative of my mother`s is the present attroney-general of India? Does it matter that Sam Mackenshaw is a distant relative like A. Cowesjee? I have no idea how many ancestors I lost, because my mother`s family, who were Zorastrians, fled the Muslims from Iran. I have no idea, because I do not know how many of my ancestors the British killed in India or the Muslims killed in Iran. I have ancestors in both India and Pakistan and both my parents` familes are still in living in India; Agra and Gujrat. My national identity is Pakistani, but my historic antecedents are in India.

How do I feel? I feel like a child caught up in a bitter divorce, where both the parents are fighting and only I am suffering. India and Pakistan are both my parents and no matter what, I can never deny the truth of that identity. Whether Indian or Pakistani, it does not matter, because we are the sum of the same proposition.

Ciao

re: Inquirer # 6

This was not an analysis - this was a crie de coeur!

Democracy has nothing to do with secularism. Democracy is about tolerance and acceptance of others opinions. Israel is a theocratic state; created in the name of the Jewish religion, but its politics was, atleast used to be, secular. Just, because a nation has the label of secular, does not mean it is secular! Look at India! Your consitution say that India is secular, but look at your politics and then tell me, where is the secularism in Indian politics. The national discourse in Pakistan is dominated by the issues of Sharia, but your secular nation`s, India, politics is dominated by the issues of discovering the ancient site of a temple and your present govenment in India came to power on the promise of reconstructing a religious mythology!

Adolf Hitler`s government was democratically elected, but that did not stop the trains from depositing the Jews to the marshalling yards of Bergen-Belsen, or Nordhausen or Auschwitz! Nawaz Sharif was democratically elected in Pakistan, but that did not stop him from banning any parliamentary dissent against his government. His democratically elected government passed the Fifteenth Amendment in less than 15 minutes! Where was the democracy, where was the parliamentary or national or provincial debate over the issue? Your democratically elected government in India, the world`s largest democracy, passed the POTO laws. Pray inform: what part of the democratic process are they going to be strenthening in India with these laws?

Democracy is what Voltaire meant, when he said the following words: ``I do not like what you have to say, but I will defend to death your right to say that you hate me!`` Democracy is a sense of humility, which teaches that no one is infalliable. Like I said, democracy is not about elections and keeping religion out of politics and you cannot judge a democracy on the basis of these two yardsticks. Democracy, as the Greek word suggests, is about the rule of the people and the closest form of government in the world to a true democratic model is a populalist government. Democracy is about the majority of the people and issues in democracy are settled not by elections, but like the Swiss do - with referandums. That is true democracy. People deciding the issues and not being told, what to think!

America is a free market and not a democracy and it is not even secular anymore! If you equate democracy with debates, then you might as well read Hamlet, because sound and fury does not signify democracy. Democracy really exists, when the people have the right and the choice to decide for themselves on the issues, which matter to them and not to pass judgments on issues created by the politicans to justify their own careers!

Ciao

Hi Feroz . . . thanks for referring to 1857 as a ``war``. I don`t know about Pakistan, but in India till the `70s, our great historians were telling us it was a ``mutiny``.

Just btw, are you aware of the Battle of Wadgaon-Malvan, 1779? Jats, Rajputs, Sikhs, Muslims, Goans, Mahar and ofcourse Marathas fought together under Mahadji Shinde to defeat the Britishers? This is just about being recognised, and taht also because the goraas are making a movie about it!

It is another thing that Balaji Natu went and hoisted the Union Jack in 1817 at Shaniwaar-vada, Poona.

a well written artcle...i would say these `facts` are what everyone is wanting to change. identity crisis is spread thru out the country in pakistan and india. five decades and still there is a confusion :) people in these two countries need to rethink what they are and where they belong!!

I greatly admire the intellectual honesty of Nazarhayatkhan and ferozk. I am afraid that ferozk`s all-dominant attachment to the idea of Pakistan is also at the root of personal and national discombobulation in ferozk and Pakistan. Khan sahab with a nazar on the reality of hayat has provided a most wise statement. Please pardon me for the facetious element in the last sentence.

I thank bbabu for the kind support. But in response to veeresh suggest that Hindus should not glory in the plight of Muslims. There are many an Achilles Heels that they too have to cure/adjust to. They need to remember the lessons that Mahatma Gandhi, Pandit Nehru and Indira Gandhi taught and be in conformance with the higher elements of theory and practice of the Hindu faith. They have to avoid the trap of seeking the ``old glorious times.``

Above all, we all have to avoid the din from likes of Tipu whose solution to all problems is to mix up the situation so no one would know what the real problem is!! I admit some of the din from Tipu personally is due to the use of an unfamiliar language but that does not make it anymore acceptable.

ferozk #13 ``my ancestors lost their lives after the war of 1857, when they were blasted from the mouths of the British cannons``

How many of your ancestors thus lost their lives?

I await the day when I run into someone on chowk whose ancestors did not introduce a new religion, did not belong to the prophet`s tribe, did not rule as rajas or emperors, did not have Alexander the Great as their ancestor, or did not fight at the forefront against the Brits in 1857.

My poor ancestors only tilled the soil all these centuries I am sure...I guess SOMEONE has to do that too...it must have been terribly lonely for them ploughing the field all day long, being it seems the only farmers in all of the sub-continent who lived ordinary lives and died quietly in bed at home rather than in a blaze of glory. I guess someone had to produce the wheat needed by all these brave soldiers and profound sufis who seem to have formed the remainder of the population of the subcontinent. And the only one left to do that would have been my humble ancestors. Also I guess someone also had turn the wheat into chappatis before the above-mentioned great men, and the only ones left would again have been my poor naani`s naanis.

And all these centuries the entire remaining population of the subcontinent was having fun in their palaces producing rajputs, or in Badshahi mosque introducing Islam in the subcontinent, or making history on the battlefield or bravely dying at the wrong end of the cannons while sweet victorian ladies looked on from under their parasols. ;-)

Identity.

It is such a fickle subject. I am of the opinon that `crisis of identity` are as abstract as the concepts of identity itself. abstract in a very irrelevant way. they can motivate one just as strongly as they can lead one to persecute another. in the end, it is not worth trying to compartmentalize humans into groups.

As far as Pakistan is concerned, Pakistan`s only problem is lack of free institutions. Those can be the only real and practical and dependable safeguard to fascist tendencies. At this point, though I despise seeing what the MMA is doing, I despise even more Musharaf- the champion killer of insitutions today- claiming that `Talibanization is not for Pakistan`.

Become Buddhists for a few generations, and all your problems will be solved. You will also get Richard Gere free-of-charge and a new land route from Murree to Shimla via Dharamshala.

re: nadeemkhan # 1

FYI, I was born in Lahore in 1965. I am a Pakistani first and everything else second. This article is not about the ancestry of my forefathers, but about my right to question my leaders and hold them accountable! Do not confuse the issues! I have no notions of moral superiority, but I do question those, who claim it as a pre-condition to represent and govern over me!

FYI, my ancestors lost their lives after the war of 1857, when they were blasted from the mouths of the British cannons and, hang and dropped into lime pits, while the genteel British ladies shaded under their parasols applauded!

If you wish to live in a world of ethnicity, then please do, but realize that you will never have a nation as a result of such believes; only ghettos of ethnic anger, rancour echoing with cries of a misguided revenge!

Ciao

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I think our problem lies in our crisis for identity.

We have to realize that we are a part of greater South Asia (India).

Our roots do not lie in the Arab world or in that fuzzy concept of Muslim world.

Our (specifically military & Mulla) all attemps to malign India as our enemy have failed. A common man still has no enmity towards India and wishes to interact with India.

And finally, as Inquirer pointed out in Post # 6, Democarcy is secular. Let us not adultrate this concept by binding our constitution under the Quran & Sunnah.

Tipu #7
Tipu # 8

`` Is USA Secular ?

It does not say in the constitution.......

If you like USA without SECULAR ``

The US constitution clearly states the government shall favor no religion over the other. Even supporters of school prayer will not dispute this. There is debate over which how much seperation there should be between the state and religion.

`` What adding SECULAR word to India will do ...like naming Taj Mahal to Tejo MAHAL???? ``

Adding the words secular, republic, socialist, Islamic mean nothing.
I hate to tell you that you can have massacares like Gujarat and still be secular. Hwoever it would not be a society with the rule of law.