Journalists labelled spies, illegally detained for probing illegal sand mining

December 5, 2018

Besides two Tamil Nadu based journalists, two French journalists were called spies and named in the FIR by Kanyakumari Police. Investigative journalist Sandhya Ravishankar, who wrote a four-part exposé on illegal sand mining and mafia is also facing threats.

Image Courtesy: The News Minute

Chennai: Two journalists from Tamil Nadu were illegally detained by the Kanyakumari Police on 28 and 29 November for helping two French reporters look into illegal beach and sand mining.

The media fraternity called the arrest of D Anandhakumar and M Sriram, both journalists from Chennai, an attempt by the Kanyakumari Police “to peddle a false narrative on an issue involving media freedom.”

Deputy editor Jules Giraudat and investigative journalist Arthur Bouvart, both French journalists from the Freedom Voices Network Team were labelled as ‘French Spies’ and named in the FIR by the Kanyakumari Police on 29 November for allegedly trespassing government property.

However, the Alliance For Media Freedom said in its statement that the neither Anandhakumar nor Sriram were aware that the French reporters had spoken to officials of Indian Rare Earths Limited (IREL) at Manavalakurichi and taken photographs and videos in a restricted area. They asked the Tamil Nadu Government to ensure that the freedom of the news media in the State is protected in letter and in spirit.

IREL is the central government’s beach sand mining agency. It falls under the purview of the Department of Atomic Energy.

Journalist Sandhya Ravishankar, who wrote the four-part exposé in The Wire on the illegal sand mining in the state and the sand mafia, said that the Kanyakumari Police was “attempting to foist false charges” against her to arrest her “seemingly at the behest of S Vaikundarajan”, chairman of VV Mineral, India’s largest miner and exporter of rare earth minerals. She said the police were trying to “incarcerate” her in the case of the two French and Chennai-based reporters.

“The narrative that is being built by the Kanyakumari Police, especially by DSP Bhaskaran and SP Shreenath, is that I am an alleged ‘criminal mastermind’ of alleged ‘French spies’ who entered the premises of the Indian Rare Earths Limited (IREL) in Manavalakurichi on 26 November 2018,” Ravishankar said.

Ravishankar is known for reporting on illegal sand mining and has been facing harassment, intimidation, violation of privacy and stalking because of her investigative journalism.

“The Kanyakumari Police are planting vicious and slanderous stories attempting to connect me with an alleged ‘plot to steal national secrets’,” she said in a statement. “This is completely baseless and maligns my good reputation and is an attempt to intimidate, harass, threaten and incarcerate me without any basis and in a premeditated manner. I am afraid that I will be unfairly arrested under foisted charges,” she added.

Adding that the Kanyakumari Police had “illegally detained” two Tamil Nadu journalists on 28 and 29 November, she accused the force of spreading and planting rumours that “the French journalists were spies”. “Kanyakumari SP Shree Nath and DSP Bhaskaran have both gone on record with a variety of contradictory versions, preferring to insist that the two Tamil Nadu journalists were with the French journalists when they entered the premises of IREL. This is very far from the truth,” Ravishankar said.

“Now, the police are simultaneously attempting to connect me with Anand and Sriram in a bid to ensure that they can build a case and silence me by arresting me.”

She narrated the entire incident in her statement and said that the “Kanyakumari SP Shree Nath and DSP Bhaskaran, have both gone on record with a variety of contradictory versions, preferring to insist that the two Tamil Nadu journalists were with the French journalists when they entered the premises of IREL. This is very far from the truth.”

Full text of Ravishankar’s statement:

The Kanyakumari police, seemingly at the behest of Mr S Vaikundarajan, appear to be attempting to foist false charges against me in a bid to arrest and incarcerate me.

The narrative that is being built by the Kanyakumari police, especially by DSP Bhaskaran and SP Shreenath, is that I am an alleged “criminal mastermind” of alleged “French spies” who entered the premises of the Indian Rare Earths Limited (IREL) in Manavalakurichi on 26 November 2018.

The Kanyakumari police are planting vicious and slanderous stories attempting to connect me with an alleged “plot to steal national secrets”. This is completely baseless and maligns my good reputation and is an attempt to intimidate, harass, threaten and incarcerate me without any basis and in a premeditated manner.

I am afraid that I will be unfairly arrested under foisted charges. The Kanyakumari police appear to be playing into the hands of vested interests. Despite evidence to the contrary, they appear to be bent on building a fake narrative of alleged “espionage”.

The truth is that the Kanyakumari police illegally detained two Tamil Nadu journalists on 28 and 29 November 2018.

Further, the Kanyakumari police is attempting, for reasons, best known to itself, to peddle a false narrative in an issue involving these journalists.

D Anandhakumar and M Sriram, both journalists from Chennai, had visited Tirunelveli and Kanyakumari districts along with two French investigative journalists. They were assisting the French journalists Arthur Bouvart and Jules Giraudat in documenting the threats to journalists reporting on illegal beach sand mining in the state.

On the morning of 26 November 2018, the two French journalists, along with a local parish priest, Father Kildoss met an official at the Indian Rare Earths Limited. Neither Anand nor Sriram, were aware that the French journalists intended to visit IREL or that they had entered the premises. They were in their hotel rooms while the priest and the two French journalists met with IREL officials.

IREL is the Central government’s beach sand mining agency and comes under the purview of the Department of Atomic Energy. It is a prohibited and high-security zone.

Anand and Sriram met with the French journalists at around 12.30 pm elsewhere in Kanyakumari district. It is only after the priest told them that the three of them (the priest and both French journalists) had entered IREL, that the Tamil Nadu journalists realised what had happened.

After a barrage of calls from unknown persons, all of them decided it was time to wind up and leave. The French journalists returned to Paris via Trivandrum and Mumbai. Both Anand and Sriram returned to Chennai in the early hours of 27 November 2018.

Through the day on 27 November 2018, Anand and Sriram continued to receive calls from Kanyakumari DSP Bhaskaran. He demanded that they arrive in person by 28 November 2018 and said that they would be allowed to return to Chennai the same day after giving a statement. They were told that it was only an enquiry.

Both Anand and Sriram left Chennai on the night of 27 November 2018 voluntarily and arrived in Kanyakumari on the morning of 28 November 2018. They met DSP Bhaskaran at his office at 11 am.

An enquiry took place with representatives of the Intelligence Bureau, state Intelligence, Q Branch, CID and other agencies, with the DSP as the investigating officer. In the midst of the enquiry, the French journalists made a video call via WhatsApp through Anand’s mobile phone and spoke to the DSP, explaining their credentials as journalists. They also displayed their ID proofs to the police personnel, one of whom recorded the entire conversation on his mobile phone.

The questioning of Anand and Sriram went on for hours. DSP Bhaskaran specifically and repeatedly told Anand not to mention anything about illegal beach sand mining or take the name of the key miner VV Mineral. He also “educated” Anand that the coastal erosion had nothing to do with beach sand mining and that it was due to “global warming”. The DSP repeatedly told Anand not to tell the other investigative agencies about the fact that they were, in reality, working with the French journalists on the impacts of illegal beach sand mining.

Anand and Sriram were then asked to write a statement and sign it. They complied. By around 3 pm, the duo was taken to the Sun World Hotel, to room number 412 and locked up, their mobiles taken away. They were brought back to the DSP’s office six hours later, that too only after a number of concerned journalists continually called the police asking why they had been illegally detained. Subsequently, they were taken to the Kanyakumari police station.

Following this, Sriram was allowed to go back to the Hotel after some time while Anand continued to be detained illegally at the Kanyakumari police station. He did not have access to his mobile phone.

Calls began pouring in from journalists from across the country asking the DSP and the local Kanyakumari police as to why Anand was being detained illegally. Alarmed, the police returned Anand’s mobile phone to him at around 1.30am and dropped him back at the Hotel around 3 am where he and Sriram stayed the night – with four policemen sitting inside the room as they slept.

The next day, 29 November 2018, they were taken again to the DSP’s office. There they were asked to sign summons stating that they would appear before the police for questioning on the same day at 2 pm. Anand refused to sign the papers until a lawyer had vetted the same.

Senior lawyer D Geetha then intervened and the police finally released both the journalists, after DSP Bhaskaran claimed that they were not in police custody.

They returned to Chennai by around 10 pm on the same night.

Subsequently, the Kanyakumari police, instead of stating facts, have spread and planted rumours that the French journalists were “spies” and this has been reported widely in the vernacular and English media. Kanyakumari SP Shree Nath and DSP Bhaskaran, have both gone on record with a variety of contradictory versions, preferring to insist that the two Tamil Nadu journalists were with the French journalists when they entered the premises of IREL. This is very far from the truth.

The questions that the Kanyakumari Police needs to answer are:
1. What is the reason for the contradictory statements and versions issued and planted by the Kanyakumari police in this case?
2. Why were the two Tamil Nadu journalists illegally detained for two days?
3. Why did the Kanyakumari police issue summons to the two Tamil Nadu journalists inside the DSP’s office after two days of illegal detention?
4. Why did the Kanyakumari police insist that the Tamil Nadu journalists must not reveal to other authorities (IB, Intelligence etc) that they had been enquiring about illegal beach sand mining?
5. Why is the Kanyakumari police insisting on keeping alive the narrative that the French journalists were “spies” and planting false information “off the record” to journalists?
6. Why is the Kanyakumari police not releasing the CCTV footage of the IREL which will clearly show that neither Anand nor Sriram were with the French journalists at the premises?
7. Who are the vested interests behind the police peddling such a false and vicious narrative against journalists in an attempt to malign and possibly incarcerate them?
Now the police are simultaneously attempting to connect me with Anand and Sriram in a bid to ensure that they can build a case and silence me by arresting me.

‘Now, every woman knows she needs to fight violence everywhere’

December 5, 2018

Congolese activist Julienne Lusenge talks about the struggle to end wartime sexual violence and why she appreciates the MeToo campaign.

‘Now, every woman knows she needs to fight violence everywhere’, the Congolese human rights activist Julienne Lusenge told me on the sidelines of the Council of Europe’s World Forum for Democracy last month.

In a video interview with openDemocracy 50.50, she talks about the struggle to end wartime sexual violence and why she appreciates the MeToo campaign. A lightly edited transcript of this conversation is below.

Nandini Archer (NA): Tell me a little about your work.
Julienne Lusenge (JL): I’m Julienne Lusenge, and I’m an activist. We support women survivors of violence in the DRC [Democratic Republic of Congo] and we promote peace in our country.

NA: What do you think is the biggest misconception, or what’s the least understood, about wartime sexual violence?
JL: I think people don’t understand why violence continues to develop in the DRC. If we don’t work for peace, to restore peace in our country, we won’t put an end to violence against women, and so we need to work for peace.

NA: And what have been some of the biggest successes in recent years? Wartime sexual violence has been in the international news a lot.
JL: The big success is that each woman knows that she needs to fight violence, everywhere… And we saw survivors come together to fight sexual abuse.
We see young people denounce it, even if they have abuse from teachers or pressure, they denounce that. And we now see some judges engaged, to fight this violence, and we now we see our government recognise this situation.

In the past, our government did not accept to recognise that this violence is a big problem in our country. And now we see that in the world, people are coming together to say we need to fight violence.

I appreciate the campaign MeToo, because it allows each women to denounce this. In the past, people thought it’s only in poor countries, as the DRC, that violence, abuse or sexual abuse is a very big problem. Now we know that, even in America or Europe, it’s a problem. Women know that each woman, wherever she is, she can be victim – and we need to come together to fight this.

In the past, people thought it’s only in poor countries, as the DRC, that violence, abuse or sexual abuse is a very big problem. Now we know that, even in America or Europe, it’s a problem.

In the DRC, war is about resources, they come to steal our resources, and they kill us. They need to take the space; they need to push people out.

Today, in Beni, Uganda’s rebels come and kill everyone. It’s not possible. But the European people know; the European Commission knows; the USA knows; they know. The leaders in the world know, but they don’t take action.

When Ebola happened in Beni, they came and said, ‘we need to fight Ebola, we need to fight Ebola’. But people said: How can you fight only Ebola? And you don’t fight those rebels who kill us everyday. You need you to fight to rebels and to fight Ebola. So we can be in peace and go to our field and work.

NA: And what do you feel most proud of in your work?
JL: Maybe I can give you just one example – I have many examples to give to you. Because we have today, I can show you, children who were born from rape, and today they grow; they study; they have diplomas; and they continue to study in university. Some of them have babies, today they are married, and some women who came to us as victims, today they are activists – they help themseves, and other survivors, to stand up to continue fighting.

But we aren’t finished, we continue to work; we continue to help women; we continue to mobilise money for the grassroots; and we continue to do advocacy everywhere, internationally, nationally and locally – we go to meet authorities to speak to them. When I went to the UN council, I spoke to them, I told them that they must understand that women in the DRC need peace. And we don’t need any other resolution. Now we have enough resolutions. We need just them to implement those resolutions – that can help. We have a big mission in the DRC and we need them to fight for peace. We need peace in the DRC.

We cannot understand how in the DRC women have no water, no electricity, no hospital. It’s not possible. This year, I went to a village in Beni. We gave women water; we organised that; we paid for that. Women came to me, they danced, they sang, they were very happy, because it’s the first time for them to have water in the village. Every time they went far to look for water, and rebels killed them, kidnapped them, raped them. Now they have water in the village. It gives me encouragement to continue to work, to continue to mobilise money.
We cannot understand how in the DRC women have no water, no electricity, no hospital. It’s not possible.

NA: With the increased attention to sexual violence in wartime situations, has it changed anything in terms of the money you’re receiving?
JL: We cannot say that we have enough to continue to work, because it’s not enough. We need more money, and I need donors to understand that, even if we’re Congolese organisations, we have tools to manage money and we are clever and we are able to manage this money and to give reports.

Because every time they say ‘ah grassroots organisations, Congolese organisations cannot [do this]’. But we can do that, and we do that, because every year we do audits and we have some donors who gave us money ten years ago. We have this confidence.
But I need to say to donors to believe in us and to give us money. Congolese women’s group are able to manage money and change our country… We cannot have democracy in the DRC if women do not participate at the political level. And to have women in this place, we need to support them, we need to train them, so they can be able to participate in that way.

Nandini Archer is 50.50’s editorial and social media assistant. She is an active member of the feminist direct action group Sisters Uncut. She also works with the International Campaign for Women’s Right to Safe Abortion and Overseas Development Institute in London. Follow her on Twitter @nandi_naira.

* 50.50 reported from the World Forum for Democracy (WFD) events in Strasbourg as part of openDemocracy’s partnership with the 2018 WFD.

What Mandela and Fanon learned from Algeria’s revolution in the 1950s

December 5, 2018

On the fifth anniversary of South African statesman Nelson Mandela’s death, it’s worthwhile to remember how his thinking moved from violence to reconciliation as the solution to undoing apartheid.

Umkhonto weSizwe founder Nelson Mandela, receives military training at an Algerian FLN camp in Morocco, 1962. South African History Online

On his journey to a different approach, Mandela visited Algeria – a place where the revolutionary thinker Frantz Fanon also developed his ideas on armed struggle.

A grim revolutionary war started in Algeria in 1954 between the indigenous Arab population, mainly represented by the Algerian National Liberation Front (FLN), and the French on behalf of the white settlers. The casualties numbered around 300 000 with two million Algerians displaced and one million settlers returning to France.

The conflict came to an end in 1962 when French President Charles de Gaulle called out a referendum on whether Algeria should remain as part of France. The vote was overwhelmingly in favour of independence.

This revolution had a profound effect on both Mandela and Fanon’s thinking. It shaped a great deal of their respective understanding about colonisation, oppression and freedom.

Mandela in Algeria

Mandela was an ardent freedom fighter in the early days of South Africa’s liberation struggle – he co-founded the ANC’s military wing Umkhonto weSizwe in December 1961. He believed that violence was necessary in resisting the repressive and brutal apartheid regime. He was eventually imprisoned for attempting to overthrow South Africa’s apartheid regime. Mandela and seven of his comrades were convicted of sabotage in 1964.

Mandela visited troops of the FLN in Morocco earlier in 1961 during a tour of Africa designed to establish Umkhonto weSizwe as the armed wing of the African National Congress (ANC). Later that year he travelled to Algeria to participate in joint exercises between the ANC and the FLN.

Algeria also came to be the first country Mandela visited after he was released from prison in 1990. This was a symbolic gesture to acknowledge the inspiration he drew from the North African nation’s revolution and support for the struggle against apartheid.

The Algerian Revolution inspired Mandela. In his autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, he compares their situation as the closest to that of the ANC in South Africa. The rebels in Algeria also had to face a government representing a sizeable white community controlling most of the indigenous population who were not white.

Fanon in Algeria

The Algerian Revolution made a profound imprint on Fanon’s work, too. He hailed from the island of Martinique in the Caribbean, then studied psychiatry in France and ultimately ended up working in an Algerian hospital in the 1950s.

It was there that he became acutely aware of the damage oppression wages both on the colonised and the colonist. Fanon became a member of the FLN and was involved in the resistance against the French.

Fanon is considered by some as an advocate of violence because of the prominent role it plays in his work, which can be read from a certain angle as a kind of manifesto. But he did not glamorise violence. The point for him was rather that violence becomes a necessary response to oppression where the oppressor does not recognise the humanity of the oppressed.

There are only a few references to apartheid in Fanon’s famous work, The Wretched of the Earth, but he saw the situation in South Africa as an exemplification of the struggle for decolonisation. Fanon’s ideas played an important role in South African political thinker Steve Biko’s work on the ideology of Black Consciousness.

In conversation

Mandela and Fanon never met. By the time that Mandela visited Algeria, Fanon was on his death bed in Washington DC; he had leukaemia, and would die at the age of just 36. Fanon’s ideas didn’t feature in Mandela’s thinking, but one could imagine a conversation between them. There would be some points of agreement, and some areas in which they’d differ.

There would be agreement between Mandela and Fanon on the role of violence as a necessary foil to oppressive regimes. This was Mandela’s train of thought during his visit to Algeria when he emphasised armed struggle.

Mandela’s thinking about the role of violence changed during his 27 years in jail. He realised that violence was necessary to counter and undo the institutions of apartheid. Violence has its place in purifying society of institutional oppression, racism and hate but it cannot continue indefinitely. Once apartheid was undone, Mandela reasoned, violence would only become a destructive force.

Mandela opted for reconciliation with the old oppressors, which had mixed results in retrospect.

What might Fanon say about Mandela’s eventual change of mind? He would probably praise the South African’s acknowledgement of the damage which oppression does to both the oppressor and the oppressed. Reconciliation – or what Fanon called mutual recognition – becomes a remedy, absolving both sides of culpability for the violence which they exercised.

Fanon might criticise Mandela regarding the decision to embrace neo-liberal capitalism, which has led economic injustice to persist on a massive scale.

There is one major achievement in Mandela’s compromise which Fanon would acknowledge: his decision to include oppressor and oppressed as part of the post-apartheid dispensation has brought about the promise of something like the new humanity that Fanon envisioned beyond decolonisation.

Charles Villet, Independent Researcher (PhD, Monash), Monash University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

In Rajasthan, Vasundhara Govt Achieved Growth But Not Social Progress

December 5, 2018

Mumbai: Rajasthan, India’s seventh most populous state, which goes to the polls on December 7, 2018, with Telangana, registered a 7% growth rate, exceeding the national average. But it has not been able to use this growth to create enough jobs, improve women’s literacy or combat high maternal and child mortality rates.

IndiaSpend compared Rajasthan’s indicators on health, agriculture, unemployment with 11 other states, using diverse sources, such as the National Family Health Survey (NFHS), National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) and Niti Aayog. We picked these 12 states for their size and development: Punjab, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Jharkhand, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Kerala.

At 7.2%, Rajasthan’s gross state domestic product (GSDP) growth in 2017-18 was higher than the national GDP growth of 6.7%. However, it ranks eighth in our 12-state list. (table below)

Agriculture, industry prospered but employment fell
Rajasthan’s agriculture output grew 23% from Rs 119,103 crore ($24 billion) in 2011-12 to Rs 145,948 crore ($23 billion), as the table below shows. Compared to the 11 states we analysed, Rajasthan ranked fifth, with Madhya Pradesh registering the highest growth (67%) over the last eight years. However, under the current Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government, led by chief minister Vasundhara Raje Scindia, agricultural output grew only by 9% between 2013-14 and 2017-18.

Further, the state’s secondary sector, including manufacturing, construction and electricity, grew by 28%, and the services sector by 40%, according to 2017-18 data from ministry of statistics and programme implementation.

However, this growth has not been able to propel employment. Unemployment–usually underestimated in official data–in Rajasthan increased from 1.7% in 2011-12 to 7.1% in 2015-16, according to the labour bureau data. In 2011-12, rural unemployment was 1.6% but it rose to 7.7% in 2015-16. The unemployment rate in urban areas increased from 2% to 4.3% over the same period.

Infant, under-five and maternal mortality are yet to be controlled
On health indices, Rajasthan ranks fourth in NITI Aayog rankings (which are based on health outcomes, governance and information and key inputs and processes). But its infant and under-five mortality rank third worst in our analysis. This is despite the fact that infant mortality declined from 65 deaths per 1,000 births in 2005-06 to 43 in 2015-16 and under-five mortality fell from 85 to 50 over the same period. The national average for these is 41 and 49, respectively, according to sample registration survey data of 2015-16.

The state does well compared to the national average for institutional births–it enjoys an average of 84% while the national average is 78.9%. Its record for antenatal care (82.7%) too exceeds the national average of 79.3%.

Maternal health remains a concern in the state–its maternal mortality rate (MMR) stands at 199 deaths per 100,000 live births, the third highest in the country. The state’s sex ratio, 973 per 1,000 boys, ranks fifth among the 12 states in our analysis. It also ranks fourth lowest in vaccination coverage–54.8%.

More health facilities, but they are plagued by shortages
Rajasthan’s primary healthcare infrastructure improved since 2005-06, but it has yet to deal with vacancies. Access and power supply to these facilities, too, remain inadequate.

Health Infrastructure Indicators For Rajasthan
Indicators	2010-11	2017-18
Sub-centres	11487	14406
Primary Health Centres (PHC)	1528	2079
Community Health Centres (CHC)	368	579
Doctors possessing recognised medical qualifications	28797*	40,559
Vacancy of specialists in district hospitals	41.5#	45.8^
District hospitals	33	34
Sub-centres without female health worker/ANM	328	1775
PHCs functioning without a doctor	70	167
Shortfall of surgeons at CHCs	218	452
Shortfall of physicians at CHCs	206	390
Shortfall of total specialists at CHCs	980	1819
Medical officer posts vacant at PHCs	Surplus	282
Sub-centres without regular water supply	21.80%	34.90%
Sub-centres without electric supply	7.50%	36.10%
Sub-centres without all-weather motorable approach road	2.60%	10.20%
PHCs with labour room	79.30%	80.00%
PHCs with 4-6 beds	99.90%	77.80%
PHCs without regular water supply	0.00%	10.20%
PHCs without electric supply	0.00%	4.60%
PHCs without all-weather motorable approach road	0.00%	7.80%
PHCs with referral transport facility	36.20%	65.90%
CHCs with all four specialists	20.10%	7.40%
CHCs with functional laboratory	98.40%	96.50%
CHCs with functional O.T	81.50%	77.70%
CHCs with functional labor room	98.40%	95.60%
CHCs with referral transport facility	77.20%	91.50%

Source: Rural Health Statistics 2017 and National Family Health Survey 2015-16
*refers to 2010, #refers to 2014-15, ^refers to 2015-16

The number of sub-centres increased by 25%, primary health centres by 36% and community health centres by 57% between 2010-11 and 2017-18, according to rural health statistics 2017. However, this increase in the health facilities has not seen an equal increase in medical health professionals and adjoining infrastructure.

For example, the number of primary health centres functioning without a doctor has gone up from 70 in 2010-11 to 167 in 2017-18. The number of sub-centres without an auxiliary nurse or female health worker increased from 328 in 2010-11 to 1,775 in 2017-18.
The lack of physical infrastructure has also risen–sub centres without regular water supply increased from none in 2010-11 to 10% in 2017-18, while the PHCs without all-weather motorable approach road went from none to 8% over the same time period, according to rural health statistics of 2010-11 and 2017-18.

Poor ratings in women’s literacy, employment
Women’s education indicators could explain the state’s poor ratings in children’s health and maternal health: States with more educated women show better health outcomes for children, as IndiaSpend reported on March 20, 2017.

The table above shows that in Rajasthan, women’s literacy and participation in the economy are low. The state ranks second lowest in women’s literacy–56.5% to the national average of 68.4%, according the 2015-16 NFHS. It is last in the list of women who have completed 10-11 years of education.

Female participation in the labour force is 21.5%, lower than the national average of 23.7%.

(Salve is a programme manager at IndiaSpend.)

Courtesy: India Spend

False to Assume Agents of State Act in Good Faith: Vrinda Grover

December 5, 2018

Why do we continue to operate with the colonial jurisprudence where the citizen is a suspect, and the state is presumed to act in good faith?

Speaking in context of the spate of the arrests made in the aftermath of the Bhima Koregaon violence, senior human rights lawyer Vrinda Grover criticises the manner in which the government is trying to suppress the rights of the citizens, and the voices of those who wish to contest the socio-political imagination propagated by the government. She questions why we continue to operate with the colonial jurisprudence where the citizen is a suspect, and the state is presumed to act in good faith. Grover feels that the authorities and agencies have been used and abused against those who are challenging and contesting the state power.

Courtesy: Newsclick.in

“You do not want us to occupy your space because we smell?”

December 5, 2018

In the light of the deaths of manual scavengers, the Indian Writers’ Forum organised a screening of Newsclick’s A Battle for Freedom: Wilson and the Safai Karamchari Andolan.

Manual Scavenging was outlawed in 1993. The amended Act of 2013 prohibits the cleaning of sewers and septic tanks without protective equipment. This Act also seeks rehabilitation of manual scavengers by providing them with alternative employment. Yet most governments today deny even the existence of the profession in toto.

In September 2018 eleven manual scavengers were reported from across the country. These include five deaths which took place on a single day in the National Capital Region of Delhi. These deaths resulted in massive protests led by the Safai Karamchari Andolan.

In the light of the deaths of manual scavengers, the Indian Writers’ Forum organised a screening of Newsclick’s A Battle for Freedom: Wilson and the Safai Karamchari Andolan at Ambedkar University, New Delhi. Held on October 03, a day after Gandhi Jayanti, marking four years of the much-hyped Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, the screening was followed by a discussion with activists and writers Harsh Mander and Bhasha Singh.

The students of Ambedkar University ensured that all sanitation workers were offered the choice to join them for the film screening. As a result, the programme witnessed a large audience, comprising of both students and sanitation workers who participated by sharing their personal experiences with each other.

What transpired in the discussion was a sharp reminder of the grave reality overshadowing the lives of the safai karamcharis in India. During the post-screening discussion, crucial questions were raised, both by the panellists as well as the sanitation workers. One of the sanitation workers’ spokesperson recounted the everyday experiences of the workers at Ambedkar University and their encounters with the administration in great detail while acknowledging his fears of using a public platform to voice his concerns – individual and collective.

The spokesperson said that the ambivalent term “housekeeping” was often misused and no prior clarity about the nature of the work was told to them. The workers were expected to pick up malba (human excreta) and clean sewers and despite it having no mention in their contracts. He added that these activities comprised a major part of the work they were expected to do. Moreover, some workers had to travel almost seventy kilometres every day for work, which meant having to leave their houses as early as four in the morning to reach the campus on time.

They were often asked to sit separately from the rest of the people on campus. “After cleaning the toilets and classrooms from 6:30 in the morning, you do not want us to occupy your space because we smell? So, where should we sit if not in the same space that we cleaned?” he contested. He also narrated about a certain occasion, when they were not even given chairs to sit on, it was only after they expressed dissent were they provided with chairs.

Such incidents display an unabashed casteist mindset. Most people are unaware that manual scavenging is not a legend, but a regular practice, and an occupation all over the country. Under the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, the union government is on a rampage to build toilets in villages. Attempts are made to declare them officially as open defecation free. In such a scenario, asks Bhasha Singh, “Who will be the ones cleaning these five crore toilets that the government is getting constructed all over the country? If the idea is to clean the society, we will first have to change the way we think,” she argued.

The spokesperson also recounted an incident when a worker met with an accident. A nail had pierced through his foot, and when they rushed to get him help, they were ordered to resume work immediately and not waste any more time. This incident displayed such administrative apathy that the spokesperson, along with others, decided to raise their voices against such working conditions. He said, “It was humiliating and made me think that if we all have to die we might as well die with dignity.”

Does the university, space which nurtures all kinds of voices accommodate voices of its own contract workers? – one is moved to ask.

Untouchability still remains a cruel reality for them and it comes from the “nature” of their job which is a result of the caste they were born into. It is not a matter they have a choice in. In another instance, a security guard asked the workers to take the food packets distributed by the administration on Independence Day, only after everyone else had eaten, as some people had a problem with the safai karamcharis taking the food in the same line as the others. “Independence for whom, and from whom?” they seemed to ask.

The sanitation workers are employed by the university on a contractual basis and receive no benefits from their employers. Narrating a personal experience, the spokesperson said that some time ago when he was hurt, he had incurred an expense of four lakh rupees from the hospital where he was being treated. Forget receiving monetary support from the university, “no one,” he remarked “from the university staff or administration had cared to even pay him a visit during his stay at the hospital. In spite of this, I am still here being the good worker that I am and I will be here tomorrow as well.”

Courtesy: Indian Cultural Forum

Babri Masjid: What should Muslims do?

December 5, 2018

A section of Hindu supremacist organizations are once again mobilizing to demand the construction of Ramjanmabhoomi temple (RJT) in Ayodhya on the spot where Babri Masjid once stood and was demolished on 6^th December 1992. Provocative speeches are being made and threats are issued. Sentiments of Hindus are being aroused around the construction of Ramjanmabhoomi temple. Media too is playing the ball and faithfully publicising the claims of Hindu supremacist that sentiments of all Hindus are hurt unless a temple is forthwith constructed. The Hindu supremacists remember RJT as elections approach.

Most of the public speeches seeking to arouse the sentiments of Hindus around RJT accuse the Supreme Court of India to be insensitive to the feelings of Hindus and even discriminating against them. They argued that a terrorist, Yakub Memon, was given hearing at 3.00 am on 30^th July 2015, as he was to be hanged till death the following morning the same day. Adjourning the matter would require stay on his hanging and not hearing his final plea would have left the court open to the charge of not doing justice. Their charge that Apex Court does not have time to hear the “issues of Hindus” is without any basis.

Besides comparing apples and oranges, their outbursts also amount to contempt of court as they are discourteous towards the court and seek to lower the dignity of the court. They are also interfering in the dispensation of justice by resorting to intimidation. Why is the Apex Court not proceeding for contempt of court suo moto against all those who made such provocative statements perhaps tells its own story.

The Hindu supremacists are deliberately twisting the facts about the issues involved in the Babri Masjid – RJT case. Basically the case pertains to title suit of 2.77 acres of land on which Babri Masjid once stood and was demolished on 6^th December 1992. Who was the legal owner of the parcel of land in question and the structure on it legally? Through political mobilization other issues were piled on viz. whether the disputed site is believed by Hindus to be birth place of Lord Ram and whether the mosque was constructed after demolition of RJT under the orders of Mughal Emperor Babar.

The Hindu supremacists are converting the title suit into an issue of faith according to which Hindus believe the land parcel to be birth place of Lord Ram; and since they believe so, their faith should reign supreme and disregarding any other legal issues the parcel of land should be handed over to them for construction of RJT. They further argue that Muslims have not prayed in the Mosque since 1949 and therefore the place is not a mosque any more. Further, they argue that Muslims can pray anywhere and therefore it is not essential and integral part of their religion. Some even argue that since the Mosque was constructed after demolition of a temple, it was done so in violation of tenets of Islam and therefore it was never a mosque. Be as it may, it is for the Apex Court to do justice on the basis of laws as applicable in the land.

The dispute is not for temple or mosque anymore
Although the dispute appears to be between the Hindu community and the Muslim community, it is not so! That is what the Hindu supremacists want to turn the dispute into. If it becomes one between the two communities, then on the basis of sheer might of numbers and levers of power that the community elite control, the Hindu supremacists stand to win hands down! Construction of RJT has become a milestone in asserting ‘faith’ and power of the Hindu supremacists. All Hindus are not Ram bhaktas and all Ram bhaktas are not in favour of the RJT on the very spot where Babri Masjid was demolished.

Although the issue – whether Hindus believe that Lord Ram was born on the very spot where Babri Masjid once stood, was answered by the Allahabad High Court in affirmative, the Hon’ble court did not have any sufficient material to reach the conclusion. There was no referendum or even a fairly representative survey carried out to ascertain beliefs of the members of Hindu community on the issue. The constant mobilization by Hindu supremacist and the nature of media coverage may have coloured the judgement of the court. In the south of Vindhyas, the issue of RJT and place of birth of Lord Ram is of much less consequence that North. The slogging classes and castes are much less bothered as to where Lord Ram was born, although they have firm faith in Lord Ram. Dalit leader Chandrashekhar Azad has named himself “Ravan”.

Before the year 1985, the question, ‘where was Lord Ram born?’, would not have been answered with certainty by most Hindus, including those in Ayodhya, pointing to any precise spot. Overwhelming number of Hindus would have been clueless, except saying that the Lord was born in Ayodhya. Ayodhya city had more than 14 temples located in various places claiming to be on Ramjanmabhoomi which have now been demolished to make way for another one. The faith pertaining to precise spot on which Lord Ram was born has been constructed in late eighties using mobilization for political outcomes aided by mass media.

The plea of supremacy of faith over facts and law is not a religious project but a political agenda. For, to privilege faith of one section of populace sharing a particular religion over other faiths, and more importantly over demonstrable truths requires a theocratic state, not a democratic state which gives space to all religions, faiths and beliefs subject to certain reasonable restrictions in the interest of peace, harmony, equality, liberties and dignity of all individuals. The mobilization of gullible sections willing to subscribe to the faith being propounded by Hindu supremacists forcing the state to hand over the parcel of land based on their faith for construction of RJT is therefore a political mobilization to hammer nails in the coffin of democracy. More than construction of RJT, the Hindu supremacists are keen on dismantling democratic state which affords more or less equal space to all faiths subject to certain reasonable restrictions. That is why there was series of mobilization and show of strength by various Hindu supremacist organizations, including Vishwa Hindu Parishad, Hindu Mahasabha, Dharmasabha and Shiv Sena. Their target was the Supreme Court which they do not seem to trust, fearing that Supreme Court’s outcome might not be based on faith but law and justice. Their demand was that Parliament pass a legislation to hand the entire land on which Babri Masjid once stood for the construction of RJT. Construction of RJT on ruins of Babri Masjid is simultaneously laying foundation stone of Hindu Rashtra, a communal state that privileges the elite of Hindu community and relegates the rest who do not subscribe to Hindutva political ideology and its faith to second class citizens without any rights.

The conflict therefore is not between Hindu community and Muslim community, but between those who want India to be democratic, diverse, liberal respecting all faiths, including that of rationalists and atheists, dignity of all individuals and equality of all citizens on the one hand, and those who want India to be one homogenous society with state monitoring food and clothing and regimenting religion, state and community elders overlooking matrimonial alliances faith and truth is what the elite declare it to be so. That latter notion is against Hindu religion as propounded by great saints like Kabir, Ravi Das, Mirabai, Chokha Mela, Aakho, Narsi Mehta, Sree Naryana Guru, Basavanna, Swami Vivekananda, Guru Nanak, Buddha, and many other saints.

Muslims should leave resolution of the dispute regarding Babri Masjid-RJT to the Supreme Court and to those Hindus who follow the saints mentioned. It is more important to defend the Constitution and Constitutional idea of diverse, inclusive India where all citizens enjoy equal rights, liberties of thought, expression and conscience, where dignity of all citizens is upheld and there is social justice. The difficulty is that the religious leaders and political elite of the community also do not desire the idea of India which is democratic and respects the Constitution. They too give precedence their faith over Constitution, law, liberties and social justice. This was evident from the affidavit they filed in Supreme Court in support of triple talaq, when they deny equality to women on plea of right to follow their religious laws or Muslim Personal Law; when they demand ban on Salman Rushdie written book Satanic Verses; when they mobilized to oppose the Shahbano judgement that granted maintenance to a divorced Muslim woman under section 125 of the Indian Penal Code.

In fact the demand to open the locks of RJT for darshan and worship of Lord Ram and construction of grand RJT got tremendous boost after they forced the Rajiv Gandhi Government to bring in a law in Parliament to reverse the Shahbano judgement of the Supreme Court.
The Muslim community and its political leaders are doing well by maintaining silence over the Babri Masjid-Ramjanmabhoomi dispute. They are neither giving in under the pressure of mobilization by Hindu supremacists nor are they defiantly opposing construction of the RJT subjecting themselves to the judgment of the Supreme Court. The Hindu supremacist have succeeded only in getting some degenerate leaders of the community to do the bidding for them.

The Muslim community needs to focus on secular education as Sir Sayyid did in the late 19^th century. Education would enable members of the community to be civil services and other important professions. Matured intellectual leadership of the community can come only from the educated class to steer them out of their social and educational backwardness.

The political leadership of the community needs to address itself to the issues of security and communal violence along with discrimination seeking justice and remedies through Constitutional mechanisms. In order to be able to do so, the leadership will have to build alliances with other marginalised classes who face similar discrimination, oppression and violence in their daily life. The alliance with other marginalized groups should not be opportunistic and only political power, but to seek political power to build robust democratic institutions that defend human rights of all citizens, to deepen democracy and democratic state that is accountable to its citizens. Muslim political leadership should apply itself to building structures of accountability and institutional mechanisms like Equal Opportunity Commission.

The political, intellectual and religious leadership of the community needs to apply itself to reforms in family laws that are within the framework of Islam as well as the Constitution. The Muslim political leaderships resists any reforms even though many Muslim countries have carried out reforms. Reforms should particularly ensure equality and equal status of women in the community in accordance with the Quranic spirit. Islamic laws and modern but still the community refuses to usher in reforms.

If these steps are debated within the community and followed, it would go a long way in weakening the Hindu supreamacist. More than Babri Masjid we need democratic India, educated India and India that embraces gender justice and diversity.

—

Irfan Engineer
Director,
Centre for Study of Society and Secularism

IPS officer brags about filing false cases against Dalits, caught on video

December 4, 2018

In the clip that is recorded on phone, Navtake is heard telling Maratha community men that she beats up Scheduled Caste people who come to her to lodge complaints against upper caste atrocities under the Atrocities Act.

A probe has been ordered against a police officer in Maharashtra for lodging fake cases against Dalits and Muslims. DSP Bhagyashree Navtake was caught on camera making communal remarks and the video soon went viral leaving Maharashtra government red-faced.

Beed Superintendent of Police Shreedhar Govindrajan has ordered an inquiry against his deputy Navtake but the rot in the police system against minorities has been exposed. In the video, she said that she beats up Dalits and Muslims as revenge for filing complaints under the Atrocities Act. She also identifies herself as a Maratha and is sympathetic to the cause.

“In the clip that is recorded on phone, Navtake is heard telling Maratha community men that she beats up Scheduled Caste people who come to her to lodge complaints against upper caste atrocities under the Atrocities Act. “I tie the hands and legs of Dalits and take my anger on them,” she is allegedly heard in the clip. Another person in the video is also heard saying that the IPS officer has filed cases under Section 307 of the IPC of attempt to murder against Muslims so that they don’t get bail easily,” reported Economic Times.

“Navtake is also allegedly heard saying that when she was posted in Pimpri recently, she did not arrest Marathas accused of caste atrocities for three days, and instead asked the Marathas to file a false case against the Dalits. The IPS officer is also heard advising the Marathas to file a case under Section 122 of the IPC, which is an offence to bear arms without a licence. Many Dalit organisations have demanded action against the officer who identifies herself as a Maratha,” the report said.

The police have ordered an investigation against the IPS officer from Beed’s Majalgaon tehsil, but reports suggest that this is not the first time she has shielded Marathas from cases filed against them.

“The group of persons, allegedly Marathas, has come to seek the officer’s help as it appears that a case under the Atrocities Act has been lodged against them by members of the Dalit community. The officer is further heard saying that if she released them [the Marathas] now, there would be a hue and cry. The group is heard expressing their appreciation for the officer for not arresting members of the Maratha community in a similar case in Pimpri where she was posted,” the Hindu reported.

“I saw you when you were brought in front of me, but I could not do anything as there were other policemen. I know you were pleading with me, but if I had stopped them, they would have objected. And a wrong message would have gone out that I am supporting you because I am a Maratha, as they have also seen how I have thrashed 21 Dalits and Muslims in the past six months… I have registered cases under Section 307 against Dalits, and hence a strong message was sent out that madam doesn’t spare anyone. If I had spared you, it would have looked like madam is a Maratha and hence stopped us from assaulting (Marathas),” she is heard saying in the video clip.

“Narrating another incident, the woman says while she was posted in Pimpri near Pune city, she didn’t arrest accused Marathas in a case for three days and instead told them to file a false case against the Dalit in question. “An inquiry has been ordered. IG Dorje will carry out an inquiry to probe the authenticity of the clip and submit his report. During the course of the inquiry, Navtake would be asked to explain her stand,” said Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order) Parambir Singh in a report by the Indian Express.

Navtake can also be heard saying that she was unhappy because she had to become an IPS officer despite ranking 125 in the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) examination. “I am from the ‘open’ (general) category… A candidate from the OBC (Other Backward Classes) category became an IAS officer despite scoring 600th rank,” she said in the video.

Sources said a preliminary assessment of the clip has revealed that the video was shot in Navtake’s office in Majalgaon. The date and time of the video will be a matter of probe. Sources added that the men in the video are workers of the Maratha Kranti Morcha that had staged protests across the state seeking reservation in jobs and education for the Marathas.

Govindrajan said that Bahujan Vikas Morcha, a Dalit outfit, has submitted an application, urging them to file an FIR against Navtake.

“A key demand in the Maratha rallies for reservations across Maharashtra in the last two years has been to dilute the provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, which the community believes unfairly targets them, citing low conviction rates. However, critics have said that conviction rates are low precisely because the state apparatus is biased against Dalits. The airing of the clip has sparked a debate in some circles about caste allegedly managing to prevail despite the atrocities act,” a report observed.

1...1,6181,6191,620...2,697 Page 1,619 of 2,697

Journalists labelled spies, illegally detained for probing illegal sand mining

Besides two Tamil Nadu based journalists, two French journalists were called spies and named in the FIR by Kanyakumari Police. Investigative journalist Sandhya Ravishankar, who wrote a four-part exposé on illegal sand mining and mafia is also facing threats.

‘Now, every woman knows she needs to fight violence everywhere’

Congolese activist Julienne Lusenge talks about the struggle to end wartime sexual violence and why she appreciates the MeToo campaign.

What Mandela and Fanon learned from Algeria’s revolution in the 1950s

Mandela in Algeria

Fanon in Algeria

In conversation

In Rajasthan, Vasundhara Govt Achieved Growth But Not Social Progress

False to Assume Agents of State Act in Good Faith: Vrinda Grover

Why do we continue to operate with the colonial jurisprudence where the citizen is a suspect, and the state is presumed to act in good faith?

“You do not want us to occupy your space because we smell?”

In the light of the deaths of manual scavengers, the Indian Writers’ Forum organised a screening of Newsclick’s A Battle for Freedom: Wilson and the Safai Karamchari Andolan.

Babri Masjid: What should Muslims do?

IPS officer brags about filing false cases against Dalits, caught on video

In the clip that is recorded on phone, Navtake is heard telling Maratha community men that she beats up Scheduled Caste people who come to her to lodge complaints against upper caste atrocities under the Atrocities Act.

JOIN OUR MAILING LIST

JOIN OUR MAILING LIST

Important Links

Other Links

CONNECT