“These Taliban-looking people”

The lady reporter of The Asian Age (9 May) has reported the presence of a group in Lakhimpur district of Eastern U.P. that associated itself with the Taliban and like them issues its dictates. According to these dictates, “marriage functions should be organised during daytime, not in the night; marriages should be solemnised with simplicity, extravagance and trivialities must be avoided.” According to the report, those violating this “dictate” will be punished with one hundred lashes. The lady reporter says that “this mission has caused great fear in the people of Palia and adjoining places. This place in Lakhimpur district is situated at the border of Nepal. There are certain influential persons behind the mission; so no one dares to speak against them. The police also know this but do not have courage to take any action.” The report says that the fearful families are either organising marriage functions during the day or leaving the place for other towns. The reporter has also mentioned the names of some such persons.

These are social reform measures

There is not much detail in the report. This report has been prepared in Lucknow. It can be imagined what the reality would have been. It is true that at such places in U.P. Muslims have taken such measures with a view to reform the society so that the society may be saved from extravagance and un-Islamic acts. The purpose of organising functions during daylight hours is that people gather in the day with simplicity and depart after performing necessary acts and customs. In case of marriage functions at night many wrong things happen; participants get involved in trivialities for the whole night; men and women get the opportunity of free mixing as a result of which unpleasant incidents often take place. – This social reform measure is taken not only by responsible Muslims but in other societies as well. In the marriages solemnised in non-Muslim societies the use of pap janani is inevitable part of the function – without which marriage cannot be imagined. This process goes on for the whole night as a result of which sometimes the situation takes a very serious turn. Pro-reform persons in the non-Muslims society are perturbed about it.

Double-sidedness of society

This must have been the reality of the report of Lakhimpur. But here what is worth considering is that the lady reporter has presented this social reform measure in wrong colour by dubbing it a “Talibani” move and in this regard made coercion its basis. If there is really force and coercion being used, it is condemnable. But, believe it, if the entire Muslim society of that place would have done this work with total consent and pleasure of all and no coercion would have been there, even then the media would have presented it as an evil. And this is a big proof of the double-sidedness of society including media. On the one hand, these people raise voice against sexual brutality and other moral crimes but on the other hand when a community or a section of citizens tries to bring the causes and promptings of crimes to an end, they oppose it in the name of freedom, enlightenment and likes and dislikes. – And this is a very easy way to defame Taliban. First they launched an international campaign to defame Taliban by dubbing their (Taliban’s) highly ethical acts as those of dark and middle ages. Then they ascribed to the Taliban those incidents of violence and terrorism for which in fact their enemies are responsible and now they are using the word Taliban as name-calling. 

22/05/2013 khabar-O-Nazar by Parwaaz Rahmani, sehrozaDAWAT, translated by: Abu Yusuf 

Whose SIM was it?

Do you know with whose SIM card the bomb blast near the BJP office in Bangalore on 17 April was operated? That SIM card belonged to an RSS leader who lives near the Karnataka-Kerala border. This has been revealed by the Bangalore police itself. But no, please do not form any opinion with this much information. Read the news that follows: “According to the police, this SIM card along with the mobile phone was stolen one day before the blast. And the burglar is a man named Kichan Buhari who committed the blast. Besides this SIM card, 15 more SIM cards were recovered from him which were all stolen.” Now the question is whether the Sangh leader registered with the police a case of the stealth of his mobile phone. The police did reach this leader, questioned him but having accepted his statement that his phone was stolen as gospel truth threw him out of the purview of suspicion. The police also refused to reveal the identity of that man. (The Hindu, 11 May) The police have detained many Muslims besides Buhari in this case.

This is the practice of police

I don’t know how many Muslim leaders paid attention to this mischief of Karnataka police. It is palpably clear that the police want to protect the real culprits who got this blast committed in order to benefit the BJP in the assembly elections. And this is not the first specimen of this act of Indian police. Rather it is its regular practice. When a bomb blast shook a riverbank in Varanasi a few years ago, the police did catch the two persons who had claimed the responsibility of the crime; they were caught at a place in Maharashtra; they were not Muslims. They made the statement that their computer was hacked. And the police accepted their statement as truth without any argument and let them go. In 2008 some persons were killed while making bombs in a house in Kanpur; they were not Muslims. When the high police official was asked whether anyone was arrested from that place, the reply was: “When no one is taking the responsibility, how can we arrest anyone?” Earlier, the same happened in a house in Nanded and the attitude of the police was the same there too. Many reports have to say that the police do reach the real culprits but having let them free go in search of their pet prey.

 And this worry of the Muslim leadership

It is heard that Muslim leaders are worried about the arrests of innocent Muslim youth and implicating them in concocted cases, and very much concerned about the police actions. Processions, conferences and high-sounding statements confirm this. But this worry is surface-level. No solid action is in sight. Had the Muslim leadership been conscious.

19/05/2013 khabar-O-Nazar by Parwaaz Rahmani, sehrozaDAWAT, translated by: Abu Yusuf 

Sexual brutality – an aspect

Famous Dalit scholar Kancha Ilaiah is of the view that it is not mere sexual lust or mental disorder but also some social phenomena that gives way to sexual brutality on women, young and little girls. In an article in The Asian Age on 10 May he writes: “In the Indian society woman has always been considered inferior. Her status has never been more than a maidservant and dutiful being. Man always behaves with her thus considering her inferior and dissolute. And this behavior is in accordance with the ancient religion and culture and has roots in the acts of great personalities of ancient mythology. We have Lord Krishna who stole the clothes of women while they were bathing in river Yamuna. He did so to tease them and for the pleasure of watching the beauty of their naked bodies…. We have Lakshman, the brother of Ramchandraji, who cut the nose and ear lobes of a woman who approached him professing her love…. And there is Ramchandraji who left his dutiful wife on the random outburst of a dhobi so much so that she commits suicide. And there is Shivji, who insisted on meeting Parvati and did so by eliminating a child who was keeping guard at the open door….”

Doings of mental upbringing
According to Prof. Ilaiah, it is these gods and goddesses whose images are installed in homes with much reverence. Rather the images of those acts of theirs the reference of which has been mentioned above are decorated in homes. Children grow up seeing these images. He has also criticized Gautam Buddha, who is considered a god of Dalit sections, about how he abandoned his dutiful wife with an infant child. Besides this history, Prof. Ilaiah has also thrown light on the character of great political personalities who never behaved equally with their women. He has mentioned among them Gandhiji, Pandit Nehru and Dr. Radhakrishnan. While dealing with other phenomena, he has analyzed films. He has written that the film industry has made the exhibition of beauty and physical shapes of women the source of its income right from the beginning. In short, to Kancha Ilaiah, behind sexual assault lie historical realities and the mental upbringing and habits of the inhabitants here.

Consider these aspects as well
Kancha Ilaiah is director, Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policy, Maulana Azad National Urdu University, Hyderabad. As a Dalit scholar, he severely criticises social system and the behaviour of so-called high castes here; he looks at every evil found in the country from the same angle. Maybe, there is exaggeration in his presentations but he presents his submission with arguments. Perhaps due to paucity of time he did not mention the sculptural specimens in the caves of Elora and Ajanta that speak of the ancient history of sexual promptings here and serve as prompters of the sexual act. In his future commentaries the Professor must analyse the double standard of this society that they have adopted in ignoring the causes and promptings of sexual brutality. This society does not talk of imposing ban on alcohol and other intoxicants. It also does not believe in moralising women and young girls. It goes out of proportion with the mention of hijab, purdah and modesty. If Professor Ilaiah discusses these aspects too, his writings will be more effective.

16/05/2013 khabar-O-Nazar by Parwaaz Rahmani, sehrozaDAWAT, translated by: Abu Yusuf

This cost the government dear

The Union Government did create a “national hero” and “brave son of the soil” of Sarabjit Singh but now it has been facing consequences. The question being raised is: on which basis was he conferred this honour?: funeral with state honour, participation of great state and political personalities therein, financial aid to his kin, high-sounding condolence messages, why all this? While his kin say that when he was in the Pakistani jail, no sincere effort at any level was made to free him. And, had he been hanged there, there would not have been this much fuss. But, why this burst of sentiments of love and compassion when he was attacked by his jail inmates and succumbed to it? About all political parties and other social and media circles had come together to make a hero of him but the butt of criticism is the government in particular; for the government is constitutional and legal; its money is public money; it is accountable to the government. But above all, it is responsible for all the consequences and repercussions of its actions.

These are the consequences and repercussions

And it is these consequences and repercussions that are chasing the government. Some realities that had been unknown to the public are also coming to the fore. One of them is that the various security and intelligence agencies of the country recruit spies on their own, pay them monthly remuneration, convince them to do this work in the name of patriotism and service to the nation, and promises to look after their family members in case they are caught or get confronted with some incident abroad. In this regard a report was published in the English daily The Hindu on 5 May, according to which, after the Sarabjit incident, all those who had been sent abroad for espionage are raising voices for remuneration and rehabilitation. They were caught there and when returned home after undergoing long jail sentences they found their respective houses ruined and none to look after their family members. Some of them knocked the doors of courts of law but they were not accepted as spies there; even respondent government officials would refuse to acknowledge them.

On the wings of sentimental politics

According to the report, a Chandigarh based advocate Ranjan Lakhanpal has filed cases on behalf of forty such persons in the Punjab and Haryana High Court and fighting their cases for free. The biggest hurdle he has been facing is how to establish the status of the applicants. The court and the government do not accept them as spies. But after the Sarabjit incident they have got fresh breath and Advocate Lakhanpal is also in fresh mood. Although the government did not accept even Sarabjit as its spy, nor did any intelligence agency declare him as its “own man” – it was as if his status was yet to be established, yet there is a ray of hope for the former spies of Punjab and Jammu. In response to the question as to why the government made Sarabjit a hero, only one thing can be said: the politics of sentimental patriotism. Had it not done so, Saffron parties would have created a fresh headache for the government and the Congress. However, with the Sarabjit episode, one fact once again stands proved that besides having the desire to emerge as a wold power the ruling class here cannot go ahead without hollow patriotism and sensational issues.

13/05/2013 khabar-O-Nazar by Parwaaz Rahmani, sehrozaDAWAT, translated by: Abu Yusuf

“Why was India silent?”

The whole India did cry over the killing of Sarabjit Singh in the Kot Lakhpat jail of Lahore; both the Houses of Parliament rang with the cry; but why was India silent on the killing of a young man named Muhammad Qateel, who was killed in the same condition, in a Pune jail last year?” This question was raised by the Shahi Imam of Jama Masjid Delhi, Syed Ahmed Bukhari during his Friday sermon at Jama Masjid on 3 May. And this is the question which would have been haunting the mind of Indian Muslims as well as every other conscientious person who would have listened to in the evening of 8 June or read in newspapers on 9 June last year the news of brutal killing of 27-year old Qateel Siddiqui in Yerwada Jail of Pune. Qateel was charged of being a member of “Indian Mujahideen” and of having been involved in the blasts at Delhi, Bangalore and Pune; the charges were not proved till then as they were being heard. Two of his jail inmates slaughtered him brutally in the Pune jail in the morning of 8 June 2012; and he died then and there; there was no use of rushing him to hospital. Qateel was inhabitant of Darbhanga and father of a little girl. Delhi Police had handed him over to Maharashtra ATS.

This is the question of every justice-loving person
This question of Shahi Imam is in fact the question of every justice-loving person in the country. Further, this question is not to the government or any other institution but to the whole country. Shahi Imam has awakened the conscience of the nation by saying that “why was India that raised a mountain out of a molehill on the killing of Sarabjit silent on the killing of Qateel”. Sarabjit, who was a culprit in the eyes of our neighbouring country and the court of law over there, was a terrorist; a sentence was pronounced formally against him. It is yet not clear as to what Sarabjit was, who he was, whether he was a government man and was there on duty. But extending so much extraordinary sympathy to him that he was declared a national hero, his last rites were performed with state honour, great government and political personalities participated therein, wealth and bubbling compassion was showered upon his family members, is alright. We have no objection to this much sympathy shown to him. The fact remains that the way he was attacked in the jail is to us very unfortunate. We too have sympathy with his family members, particularly with his two daughters who have now been orphaned. But the question is why even the one-hundredth rather one-thousandth of this sympathy was not given to Qateel and his family?

And such is the occasion
And such is the occasion whereon state discrimination between citizens and citizens comes to light. Whatever the union and state governments as well as political parties did is understandable because this was the requirement of their politics. All this is in accordance with the tradition of pseudo-nationalists. But what is a matter of concern is that none of the great commentators and those participating in discussions of TV channels made any mention of Qateel, not to say of making any comparison (between the two cases). And this fact also lends credence to the question raised by the Shahi Imam as to why (the conscience of) India was silent? – This question should be a moment of reckoning for the government and the ruling class. If a large chunk of the population in the country starts feeling discrimination, injustice and discriminatory behaviour, what will be its impact on the society? – As for making Sarabjit a national hero, some newspapers have raised question thereon. The Editor of the Indian Express in the 3 and 4 May issues of the paper has discussed this very question as to why Sarabjit was given this status. Although, the Express too has ignored any comparison of the case with Qateel’s, yet the question is vital and the Express wants the government to clarify it.

10/05/2013 khabar-O-Nazar by Parwaaz Rahmani, sehrozaDAWAT, translated by: Abu Yusuf