Tag: narendra modi

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Enough said

The homeless in Kashmir may be homeless forever

A visit to the Kashmir valley shows disturbing truths of how an apathetic Government is disinterested in helping homeless residents.
Humra Quraishiby Humra Quraishi

I have been restless and upset by the goings-on in the country. I decided to escape the news of the maddening incidents in Dadri and elsewhere with a trip to Kashmir. Only…there is no escaping any grim reminder of the present-day Indian realities when one reaches the Valley. For the reminders come brutally fast and thick here. If anything, one is filled with more despair at the plight of marginalised Indians in the country.

I travelled to Kashmir to report on flood victims and their survival in the backdrop of the fact that those rendered homeless by the ghastly floods are still homeless. Even after a year, as autumn paves way for another harsh winter, there has been no Government assistance to these people. Besides a sense of deep gloom, there is also simmering disgust at the PDP joining hands with the BJP. The latter is widely perceived as a dangerous communal force that will only bring ruin to the Valley.

Even as the BJP makes inroads in the region, I was taken aback at how bitter the average Kashmiri is about the state of his or her life in the State. From cab drivers to persons of the elite class, the opinion is unanimous: the PDP made a huge mistake by partnering with the BJP, and there is hope (even at this late hour) if the two were to part ways. The anger stems from the perception that the RSS is guiding the hands of the BJP in Kashmir (as in other places) and this can only lead to destruction of everything that Kashmiris hold dear.

A young gentleman I met there was vocal about the BJP and Modi. “How can Modi sarkar talk of a Common Civil Code while Muslims and Dalits and Christians are treated like third class citizens?” he wondered. “The Government hangs Yaqub Memon and Afzal Guru, but spares Hindu terrorists from Mumbai to Karnataka to Uttar Pradesh to Madhya Pradesh! Even if one does not want to equate terrorism with any religion, these lapses make one think along these lines. Why are Ministers like Mahesh Sharma allowed to speak whatever they please? Will ordinary citizens like myself be allowed to make provocative statements and not get arrested?”

I also write today about Engineer Rasheed, J&K’s only independent MLA, who I met on October 5, a couple of days after he hosted his infamous beef party. He told me he was a qualified engineer but decided to contest elections to save himself from police brutality – he has faced a lot of it in his younger days. “I wasn’t politically inclined, my basic idea in standing for elections was to save myself from police threats and torture.

“I have gone through hell all through my adult years. I have been wrongly imprisoned, tortured in lock-ups…” He is so wary of the police that he has declined police protection even as an MLA! “I am not comfortable with the police and I have declined all forms of security. I have declined escort vehicles, too.”

Such is the State of affairs, then, that even an MLA shies away from contact with the police. Can one imagine what the ordinary Kashmiri goes through?

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of several books, including Kashmir: The Untold Story and Dagars and Dhrupad, among others.

(Picture courtesy www.ipsnews.net. Image is used for representational purpose only)

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Enough said

The silence of Narendra Modi

Is the PM waiting to comment on communal killings on one of his foreign jaunts? Nothing else explains his silence.
Humra Quraishiby Humra Quraishi

It is an appalling state of affairs in India at the moment.

The Prime Minister spoke eloquently about cleanliness last year, and even posed for a series of pictures to put himself in the media glare with his Swacch Bharat Abhiyaan. The movement is, since then (ironically enough) gathering dust. Just like everything else – there is no cleanliness left in this country any more. And the onus is on PM Modi to start the drive again.

I refer not to the physical filth in the country, but to the moral rot setting in by degrees against minorities. The PM needs to weed out and clean his own ministers who are accused of playing prominent roles in making light of these serious attacks. Take for instance Dr Mahesh Sharma, Minister of State (Independent charge) for Tourism and Culture. For the last several weeks, this physician-turned-politician has been airing obnoxious views on our TV sets. Last week an innocent man was killed in Dr Sharma’s Greater Noida constituency and he termed the killing as a haadsa (accident).

Is this the next step in communal politics? Brand a communal incident as an accident, so that it dilutes or sabotages the investigations? And who will put a stop to these horrific killings in the name of religious sanctity? When will PM Modi break his silence?

We often discount our own terror at these incidents, and tell ourselves that these are stray incidents. But I have been wondering about tourists coming to our lands. Apart from the regular occurrence of rapes, which tourist will feel safe moving around freely in these same areas? Will these communally-charged mobs be lynched for eating mutton or beef in these same areas where Indians are killed for the same offence?

Mr Modi, when will you start branding these mobs as ‘terrorists’?

This is a militant form of Hindutva that all of us will have to grapple with in the coming days. It started from the killing and terrorising of the Muslim population in Muzaffarnagar, Uttar Pradesh. The faces of terror in that incident were known well before the actual findings were made public. But these faces continue to be feted in the public arena, nobody has called them out for spreading terror. One of them is now a Minister – Sanjeev Balyan is the Minister of State for Agriculture and Food Processing!

And yet, there is no official statement or even a one-line comment from the PMO. Or is Mr Modi waiting to say something on the matter when he is on one of his many foreign trips?

Break your silence, Mr PM. It is now or never.

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

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Enough said

As Christmas nears…

Why are Christians in several parts of the country being persecuted? Is this trend a coincidence or a systematic design?
Humra Quraishiby Humra Quraishi

Recently, I got in touch with a prominent Christian leader, John Dayal, for his reaction on the destruction of St. Sebastian’s Church in East Delhi. He was very upset by the manner in which the Church was found burnt and destroyed.

He also said that for the last few months (from the summer of 2014, to be precise), there had been systematic attempts to attack the Christian community in the country. “In Madhya Pradesh, on November 30, two house churches in Annupur district were attacked,” he said. “Chhattisgarh has particularly witnessed regular and repeated attacks on the fundamental rights of the minority Christian community.

“Most recently, local politico organisation such as the VHP are pressurizing local Catholic missionaries to put up pictures of Goddess Saraswati in their educational institutions. Catholic schools are under pressure to rename the principals in their schools, as ‘Pracharya’, or ‘Up-pracharya’, instead of the term ‘Father’, which is usually used,” he said.

Dayal added that the entry and propaganda by Christian missionaries is banned in more than 50 villages of Chhattisgarh’s Bastar region by the local gram panchayats since late May. Elsewhere, in Odisha’s Deggarh district, several tribal Christian families were excommunicated on April 28 allegedly at the behest of religious extremists. “Three Christian families were excommunicated and deprived from enjoying common facilities of the village road, water and forest land because of their faith in Christ. The well commonly used by the Christians was polluted by adding filth to it. And the Christians have been forbidden to mix or talk to anybody, to take part in any social functions or walk on the main road,” Dayal explained.

Reportedly, extremist elements have also threatened to snatch away the Government land allotted to the Christians, cancel their BPL Cards and demolish their houses if they do not renounce Christ. “In Chhattisgarh’s Jagdalpur, about 100 Christians who were denied rations for two months for their faith in Christ were beaten up by a mob,” Dayal went on to add.

Madhya Pradesh fares no better, apparently, with reports of local religious political groups threatening to harm Pastor Bhikanlal Dhurvey several times for conducting prayer meetings in Bhopal. However, the pastor continued to conduct worship services and later started to build a prayer hall in his land. Subsequently, the extremists filed a police complaint against the pastor for illegal construction. The construction has since been stopped and prayers are now being conducted in the homes of local Christians.

Two churches in Kundupur, Karnataka and three chapels in Irinjalakuda diocese were also damaged by miscreants.

I can’t help but wonder, coupled with extremely inappropriate utterances by ministers in Modi’s Cabinet, which way will the tide turn for the religious minorities in the country?

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Picture courtesy www.lapidomedia.com. Image used for representational purpose only)

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Deal with it

‘Swachh Bharat’ is not just a campaign

It has become a trendy new phrase, but maybe we need to take the ‘Swachh Bharat’ campaign beyond mere tokenism. Maybe we should try seriously adopting it.
Pooja Birwatkarby Dr Pooja Birwatkar

‘Swachh Bharat’ is the new ‘in’ thing for the country. When the campaign was launched in October this year, I, like so many others, instantly dismissed it as another campaign which would quickly gather dust as fast as it initially gained momentum. But though it is still in its infancy, the campaign has thus far proved us wrong about its estimated short-lived sustenance.

What is most remarkable about this programme is that it has captured the hearts of the nation’s young the most – in itself, a major achievement. What a way to go, if the future of this country is most enamored by this campaign! The other day, my little son and his six-year-old cousin reprimanded an adult who was about to throw an empty chips packet on the street with the words, “Don’t litter, Modiji ne mana kiya hai.”

So why did this particular campaign strike a chord? Is it merely the charisma of Narendra Modi who launched the campaign? Is it something else? One cannot deny that Modi has been the single most powerful force that has made the campaign what it is. But if you think about it, he merely stated what he have now adopted as a way of life in India. His sentiment that gandagi has crept so deep into our system that we have learnt to live with it to the extent that we condition ourselves to overlook it. Yet, subconsciously, gandagi has always bothered us. Which could explain why the first thing anybody on a first-time trip abroad will say on his or her return is, “People don’t throw garbage on the streets there. Everything was so clean! Yahan aisa nahin hai.”

Let’s talk about our own city – Mumbai, the heart of India, a city famous across the world for both its famous and infamous attributes. But just look at the city and what we have turned it into. Filth in IndiaVehicular traffic, a population bulging at the seams, dearth of greenery, plenty of noise and dirt, garbage strewn all over, filthy beaches, polluted air, numerous diseases, poverty, slums…this is the overall picture of this metropolis.

As we marvel over the huge towers and amenity-laden buildings in Mumbai, just peep at the fringes. The magnificent houses with French windows open to a whole world of garbage, but we are able to miraculously able to look beyond it and focus only on the clouds above. We are all collectively living in a big garbage bin, and then we have the gall to call this indifferent attitude ‘the spirit of Mumbai’. And why are we so proud of this ‘spirit’ anyway, if it makes us immune to these evils of our own doing? We even go a step further and expect the BMC and the Government to clean up after us – after all, we pay taxes, do we not? So cleanliness and hygiene is not our problem.

A campaign like ‘Swachh Bharat’ has shaken us. Even more so, because the country’s PM was the first one to pick up a broom. Suddenly, dusting doesn’t look like such a lowly job.

But simply realising the problem is not enough. We have to fuel this campaign at all times. It doesn’t matter if everybody doesn’t participate in it – let’s pledge to first clean our city and not focus simply on our own homes. Mumbai is home to all of us, and it is everybody’s responsibility to ensure its good health.

Dr Pooja Birwatkar is currently pursuing post doctoral research and working in the area of science education. She has been associated with the field of education in the past as a teacher educator, and her area of interest is research in education. 

(Pictures courtesy deccanchronicle.com, www.ndtv.com)

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Do

Group of Mumbaikars takes up Modi’s cleanliness challenge

CST Station receives a much-needed clean up on October 2, on Gandhi Jayanti, to observe cleanliness, sanitation and community health.
by the Observer Research Foundation and Triratna Prerana Mandal, Mumbai

As part of Gandhi Jayanti celebrations on 2nd October, the Mahatma Gandhi Centre for Sanitation, Cleanliness and Community Health, a joint initiative of Observer Research Foundation (ORF) and Triratna Prerana Mandal organised ‘Shramdaan’— a clean-up drive at Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus (CST), Mumbai.

Mahatma Gandhi dedicated his entire life so that India could attain ‘Swaraj’ but cleanliness was a cause that was even closer to his heart and above all he encouraged and promoted cleanliness of the surroundings, as he strongly believed that “if we do not clean our backyards, our Swaraj will have a foul stench.” Therefore, cleaning public places, like the CST, is the highest form of tribute to pay our beloved Bapu, father of the nation.

Cleaning up CST stationAnswering the clarion call by the Hon’ble Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, all the enthusiastic participants followed in his footsteps by devoting their time towards the 100 hours of ‘Shramdaan’ to promote the ‘Swachh Bharat Abhiyan’. On this occasion, Central Railways had called for public participation in their efforts towards honouring their commitment under the Clean India Mission 2019.

The staff of ORF researchers and interns, as well as volunteers that mainly included school students, teachers and many other citizens worked hand-in-hand to clean Platform No.1 and the adjoining entrance lobby of CST. Everyone contributed to the event with the sweep of a broom, the scrub of a brush and ardent words of appeal to keep Mumbai and our public places clean.

CST station, a UNESCO world heritage site — littered with garbage, posters on the walls and the splotches of paan stains — is not as welcoming to travellers and commuters as it should be. In an honest effort from all those who participated and without any hope or expectation of pats on the back, five hours were spent diligently scrubbing the station and to ensure that it was left in a better condition than before. Students and teachers from the Al-Muminah Girls School at Masjid Bunder participated enthusiastically in the clean-up and awareness campaign to encourage commuters to do their part towards keeping India clean. As the day progressed, commuters and curious onlookers also joined in. And, that is not all! Those who took a break from cleaning duties switched to spreading awareness by engaging commuters at the station.

On Independence Day 2014, Observer Research Foundation Mumbai and Triratna Prerana Mandal (TPM), one of Mumbai’s best-run community-based organisations, launched a joint initiative − Mahatma Gandhi Centre for Sanitation, Cleanliness and Community Health. This Centre aims to take up research, policy advocacy, activism and leadership development in the areas of slum sanitation, waste management, waste recycling, water conservation and public health in Mumbai and the larger Metropolitan Region (MMR).

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Enough said

At last, a proper analysis of 100 ‘achche din’

An independent people’s report on Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 100 days in Government by a US-based raises some uncomfortable questions.
Humra Quraishiby Humra Quraishi

I have been wondering how America will react to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s arrival on US shores. Amidst the hype surrounding his visit, came the news that the Ghadar Alliance, a US-based educational watchdog coalition created by concerned citizens in the wake of the recent BJP victory, is releasing a report on September 26.

The report is touted as a comprehensive 100-day report evaluating the performance of the Modi Government’s first 100 days in office. Titled Fast Track To Troubled Times, the report is reportedly the first independent people’s report to be published since Modi came into office, and it identifies the economy, religious extremism and human rights as grave areas of concern.

“We have been very careful and meticulous in collecting data only from public sources to build an evidence-based and fully data-driven report,” said Raja Swamy, economic anthropologist and one of the authors of the report. “When it comes to the economy, our report shows that the new administration wants to eliminate all democratic protections in favor of corporate giveaways and ripoffs.

One example of this are the amendments that the Modi regime has proposed to the Land Acquisition Act of 2013, that do away with meaningful safeguards for those losing land, especially for India’s poor, marginal peasantry and indigenous peoples. The proposed amendments accept in toto all corporate demands and eliminate existing safeguards. From the evidence available, can we not conclude that the minimal protections for ordinary people are being wiped out to favor corporations?” he asked.

The report is replete with such detail as it compares the Modi Budget with the previous United Progressive Alliance budget, and points to such facts as the BJP government’s plan to raise four times more money through the ‘sale of State assets’ than the previous government did. The report highlights the ‘empowerment of violent gangs of the supremacist Hindu Right under the Modi dispensation’. In the three months since Modi took charge, there have been over 600 cases of anti-minority violence in one single state, Uttar Pradesh, and several cases of forced ‘reconversion’ of Dalits (India’s so-called untouchable castes) to Hinduism.

“If there is one thing that is clear already, it is that under Modi, Hindu supremacist gangs will virtually rule the streets. There is a palpable sense of insecurity today among minorities, Dalits and women as non-State actors have turned hyper-aggressive, and Modi, through his consistent silence and refusal to hold offenders accountable, has given tacit approval,” said Anu Mandavilli of the San Jose Peace and Justice Center and a co-founder of the Ghadar Alliance.

“The privileging of economic growth as the primary goal functions to dictate an amnesia about Modi’s Gujarat record with US investors eager to capitalise on the Indian market,” added Professor Snehal Shingavi, also a co-founder of the Alliance. “And for many of us born and raised in a racialised US context, the targeting of minorities in India by Hindu reactionaries uncomfortably corresponds to our own experiences with anti-immigrant racism here.”

The report also compares the first 100 days of the new government with Modi’s 12 years of rule in Gujarat. “Examining Modi’s first 100 days in the context of his record in Gujarat reveals a number of disturbing parallels, and these parallels legitimise the report’s predictive capacity,” said Mandavilli.

The report is the first in a series of actions that the Ghadar Alliance is initiating to keep a consistent and critical focus on the BJP/RSS from outside India. The Founding Committee of the Alliance is intergenerational, of multiple faiths, of diverse professions and geography. “We represent the true diversity of India rather than the narrow homogeneity of Modi supporters lining up to welcome him here in the US,” said Dr Swamy.

Humra Quraishi is a senior journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant. ‘Enough Said’ looks at current social, political and literary trends in the country.

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