| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"John Flogger" |
| Date: |
09 Nov 2003 07:02:55 PM |
| Object: |
Intolerance and Fanaticism in INDIA |
India's best newspaper The Hindu has come under attack from the
Tamilnadu assembly which has sentenced its editor N Ravi and four
others to 15 days simple imprisonment for ‘breach of privilege of the
house'. The editor-in-chief of the 125-year old paper, N Ram, has
said: "Our paper has been targeted. It is unconstitutional, illegal
and anti-democratic. The police invaded our office seeking to arrest
the newspaper's editors and staff members without warrant and later
came there for the second time to search the office premises with
incomplete papers". Five members of the paper's staff have sought the
intervention of the Supreme Court of India to declare the resolution
passed by the Tamilnadu assembly on November 7 against them as
illegal, and to quash the warrants issued by the speaker for arresting
them. They have also prayed the court to restrain the police posse
sent by the speaker to neighbouring Karnataka from executing the
warrants issued by him. The court will hear the petition today
(Monday).
Apparently the Assembly in Chennai is up in arms against an editorial
published in The Hindu on 25 April 2003. Its members have passed a
resolution claiming that it was "written in a manner causing breach of
privilege of the action of the assembly speaker who was the custodian
of the house, as well as the action of the Privileges Committee, and
in the primary process imputing ulterior motives to the house as a
whole". It held that the editor of The Hindu and four others had
"committed a punishable offence of breach of privilege of the House
and sentenced them to undergo 15 days' simple imprisonment".
The response from New Delhi by deputy prime minister Mr LK Advani has
been lukewarm. He said that he was ‘pained' at what he had heard about
the ‘incident' in Chennai, but he wouldn't say more than that because
any fair comment would have called into question what his own BJP is
doing in Gujarat. The Tamilnadu assembly majority, it may be noted,
belongs to former filmstar chief minister Jayalalitha who doesn't
enjoy a good reputation outside the state territory and who daily
shocks many honest Tamils.
Three of the ‘objectionable' reports in The Hindu pertained to the
chief minister. But she is on record as saying that she is not
interested in pursuing the case further. However, the assembly, it
seems, is being more loyal than the chief minister. Even so, the
normal course should have been to call in the editor and his
co-workers and ask them to explain and defend their comments and
stories. If the assembly was right in thinking that its privilege had
been wounded, an open hearing would have helped the readers of the
newspaper make up their minds. But after its unilateral and autocratic
move, 120 million readers of daily newspapers in India will most
likely form a negative view of Tamilnadu politicians. Of course, the
fanatics of Hindutva in the Sangh Parivar are pleased: they would wish
to revenge themselves on The Hindu newspaper which can easily be
called the most honestly secular newspaper in India.
What is happening to India? More and more the country is showing signs
of a collective brainwash that upright journalists like N Ram
doubtless find objectionable. This is exactly how a Muslim lady, Zakia
Begum, says she felt after she had appeared before the Nanavati-Shah
Commission at Ahmedabad on the killing of her husband, former MP Ehsan
Jafferey. She was mobbed by the Sangh Parivar but no one in Gujarat
seemed to feel anything for her. Similarly, the famous artiste Malika
Sarabai, who has been speaking up for humanity in that benighted
state, has been harassed by the BJP and ostracised by hardline Hindu
Gujaratis. This suggests that those who think that the secularists of
India will finally succeed in getting rid of the BJP will have to
contend with this new mindset which negates humanity and the pluralist
values India was supposed to stand for. *
Iqbal's message?
An Urdu daily in Lahore herded a number of ‘intellectuals' (danishwar)
into a hall to talk about Allama Iqbal on the occasion of the birth
anniversary of the great poet which fell on November 9. The facile
judgment of these great intellectuals was that the ‘secularists' had
interpreted Allama Iqbal all wrong. The ‘secularists' who had got
Allama Iqbal wrong, in their eyes, included his son Justice (Retd)
Javid Iqbal. The discussants were firmly of the opinion that had
Allama Iqbal lived today he would have condemned America and exhorted
the Islamic world to get together for confrontation (muqabila). The
‘intellectuals' were also of the opinion that Allama Iqbal would have
been greatly pained at what his son Javid Iqbal was doing in the way
of interpreting his message.
What would Allama Iqbal experience if he were to arrive in Pakistan
today? He would first note that the Quaid i Azam has already been
‘revised' as far as his 11 August speech is concerned. In this speech
he clearly declared Pakistan a pluralist state and didn't think
pluralism contravened Islam. (We quickly imposed separate electorates
after his death.) He would also be pained to see the Hadood Laws in
effect because in his famous Sixth Lecture he opposed the imposition
of Hudood. His son Justice (retd) Javid Iqbal had the guts to stand up
before General Zia in 1986 and tell him so. In his latest book, the
son has reminded us that, like Sir Syed Ahmad Khan, his father too
disagreed with the orthodox interpretation of ‘riba' (bank interest).
And so on. Our intellectuals should not blame the so-called
‘secularists' and Justice (Retd) Javid Iqbal. They should admit that
if Allama Iqbal were to arrive in Pakistan today he would fail the
test of ideology set by the great defenders of the integrity and
solidarity of Pakistan, which include intellectuals such as
themselves.
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