New Delhi veers to the seers

There’s no doubt about it.

 May 26 will be remembered as the day saffron returned centre-stage. The swearing-in ceremony on Monday underlined the significance of sadhus and seers to the new political regime.



Most of them were seated in the front row picked up by the TV cameras. Sri Sri Ravishankar who is  perceived to be sympathetic to Narendra Modi, Ramesh Ojha who has the Ambanis among his disciples, Ramdev's second-in command Acharya Balkrishna and Bhaiyyuji Maharaj were prominent. VHP leader Ashok Singhal and  Sadhvi Ritambhara, who shot to prominence in the 1990s because of ‘fiery speeches’ during the Ram Mandir movement, were seated in the second row.  We saw RSS leader Indresh Kumar, who had appeared in Delhi's CBI headquarters in Delhi last week in connection for his alleged role in the 2007 Mecca Masjid blast.

We noticed how Rajnath Singh, the new home minister, was seen touching the feet of some of these ‘saffron saints’ and leaders. What sort of message does this send out? Personally, I find this really worrisome, given the additional fact that a man who is widely believed to have instigated violence against Muslims in Uttar Pradesh has been inducted into the new council of Ministers.

TV viewers would have heard two slogans that rent the evening air: Vande Mataram and Bharat mata ki jai. You couldn’t have missed a third one: ‘Jai Shri Ram!’, one of the lead slogans in the Ram Janambhoomi movement leading to the demolition of Babri Masjid in 1992.

The presence of the conservative Hindu right in such large numbers and the respectful treatment meted out to them emphasized the umbilical cord between the BJP and the RSS/VHP is very much intact. There will be no radical break from the past, just a calibrated adjustment.

The presence of rightist elements at centre stage- be they Hindu, Muslim, Christian or Buddhist- unfortunately has meant a raw deal for the minorities - especially those who are on the fringes, such as the LGBT community, the rationalists, and so on.

 It is also worrisome for the moderates and the liberals, and those who maintain that religious practice should remain in the private realm, and should not impinge upon the rule of law and human rights.

 

 

From my camera... working men

The daily wash load...

Mobile toting bricklayer @ government school

This dude was relaxing after serving us chiken-bhaat at a dhaba

If I had a hammer...

It's smoked mud-fish on the hunting man's menu

Happy Days and Long Dark Nights?

Is the tricolour that is hosted today a symbol of the liberation of the Adivasis - the aboriginals- of the country? Sadly, the question is, what does the tricolour represent for most of tribal India, particularly those who have not been co-opted by the system. Is it in fact a symbol of internal colonialism that has had a history of some 60  plus years?
Is it true that the Indian state functions basically as a vehicle to promote the interests of colonialism vis-a-vis the tribal population... the adivasis of the country?

Will the 'post-modern' state of India under the new 'Modi-fied' government  witness  an even greater and more organised appropriation of the resources of the tribal population for commercial conglomerates than has been happening under other dispensations?

The Indian state in its present condition is structurally incapable of addressing itself to the needs of the marginalised populations.

The issues of the tribals have been consistently misreported or side-lined  by the mainstream Indian media. the media essentially reflects the mainstream process, and so one cannot really complain that the media has utterly failed to portray tribal problems.

It has been said that poverty elimination was never intended to reach the poor, it was meant for the rich. How can the internal colony provide you cheap  labour , unless there is in place an oppressive system in place?

As the 'eager beavers' of corporate world begin to hum 'happy days are here again' - will today be the beginning of the long dark night for India's marginalised and disempowered populations?
 

Modi... and Justice???

Gujarat Police gave him the “choice” of being implicated in the Godhra train burning, Haren Pandya murder and Akshardham terror, one of the men acquitted by the Supreme Court in the temple attack case alleged on Tuesday.

Mohammed Saleem was eventually sentenced to life under POTA for involvement in the Akshardham case.

On May 16, the day Prime Minister designate Narendra Modi won his historic mandate, the Supreme Court set Saleem and five others free, pulling up the Gujarat Police for framing innocent people, and blaming the then home minister — Modi — for “non-application of mind”. Four of the six men had already spent over 10 years in jail.

So, when will the criminal minded policemen face punishment? And have you noticed how this story has been totally ignored by the mainstream media and TV?

Watch out Muslims, Pseudo-seculariusts, Pakis... NaMo development agenda

- AN EXTRACT FROM AN ARTICLE I ENDORSE

Independent India, it says, will be a "Socialist, Secular, Democratic Republic". Well, the man they call NaMo is no socialist: the "development model" he coined while running Gujarat was based on handing cut-price land and soft loans to big business, who in turn flew him around on private jets. This brought cash into the state, but very little of it has been shared out beyond big cities such as Ahmedabad. Modi's Gujarat lagged behind the other big states in India in tackling infant mortality, poverty and illiteracy.

Secular? Modi was interviewed by one of the country's leading intellectuals, Ashis Nandy, in the 1990s, when he was almost unknown. Nandy later wrote: "I still remember the cool, measured tone in which he elaborated a theory of cosmic conspiracy against India that painted every Muslim as a suspected traitor and a potential terrorist. I came out of the interview shaken and told [his companion] Yagnik that, for the first time, I had met a textbook case of a fascist and a prospective killer, perhaps even a future mass murderer." In 2002, Modi presided when a pogrom killed 1,000-2,000 Muslims. As for "democratic", Modi ran his home state like an autocrat, giving thuggish lieutenant Amit Shah no fewer than 10 portfolios.

A man who opposes all the foundational ideals of the Indian state now has an absolute majority to demolish. Why? First, those pluralist principles were seriously eroded by those in Congress who mouthed them. Indira Gandhi suspended basic rights during the "emergency" of 1975; her son, Rajiv, played with the iconography of Hindutva. More recently, Congress had settled into a warm bath of corruption. And finally, this year's election was notable for its parade of unpalatable characters.

As a joke doing the rounds in Delhi put it, the three national-party candidates were a Duffer, a Bluffer and a Muffler. The duffer was Rahul Gandhi; the muffler referred to third-party leader Arvind Kejriwal's habit of wrapping himself in a scarf. As for Modi the bluffer, his party has won a simple majority on only 31% share of the vote (by way of an indicator, David Cameron was forced into coalition with 36%).

For over a decade, Modi has not lacked for comparators. He's been likened to Nero, Hitler, Putin. To me, he has all the makings of a Recep Tayyip Erdoğan: a hi-tech populist holding together a fragile coalition of big business, impatient urban youth and religious fundamentalists. Those disparate groups can be kept together as long as growth comes. But if it doesn't, Modi and his generals will go hunting for an enemy: Pakistan, India's own minorities, and the pseudo-seculars.

 

READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE

Breaking the Silence

The time has come
To break my silence
To make it known
Exactly where I stand

Dark clouds hover on the horizon
Temporarily obscured
By the dazzle of the fireworks display
And the poor fools who opened the doors
To a wolf in the guise of a shepherd
Will soon be served up as his dinner

Watch as they first attack
Gays, lesbians, and queer people
377 will not be gone
There will be stoning, and boys burnt alive
there will be humiliation of single women who dare take on patriarchy

first they will target the homosexuals
then they will target the Catholics
then they will target the Tribals on mineral land
then they will target the Buddhists

then they will come for my friends and me
the liberals
and then it will be your turn....

Unless you break your silence....
Unless .......