==AN APPEAL FOR SOLIDARITY ==

PARADEEP TO PURI:

THE PADAYATRA AGAINST PREDATORY CORPORATIONS

Orissa, the ancient land of Kalinga, has been under attack in recent years in a way not seen since over two thousand years ago when King Ashoka’s army laid waste to the region. This time the marauders are large corporations, both domestic and foreign, preying upon the province’s vast natural resources, among them  - iron ore, bauxite, plentiful water, fertile agricultural lands and marine wealth.

The net impact of this capitalist assault, promoted in the name of ‘development’ by both the Central and Orissa Governments, is obvious. 

Investments in the mining industry, steel plants, captive power stations and ports are meant to give huge profits to corporations and some corrupt politicians/parties while displacing thousands and thousands of people from their land, houses, livelihoods and destroying their culture and environment. 

The resistance to all this planned plunder has also been very strong - be it the anti-POSCO movement in Erasama, anti-Vedanta movement in Puri and Lanjigarh, the anti-Tata movement in Kalinganagar and Naraj, the farmers’ movement in Hirakud, anti-UAIL movement in Kashipur, anti-Mittal movement in Keonjhar, anti-Bhusan movement, anti-Sterlite, anti-Reliance or anti-dam movement in lower Suktel area everywhere people are in struggles. 

In response to all these protests the UPA government at the Centre and Orissa Government have renewed their campaign to use brutal force to compel people to vacate their ancestral lands in proposed POSCO and Vedanta project areas. They have already started preparing the guns and accelerating media campaign. The Indian government has invited the South Korean President as the Chief Guest for Republic Day celebration and planned to arrange his visit to the proposed Plant site.

This is like an open challenge to the people in POSCO site area struggling to save their ancestral lands. The PPSS decides to democratically resist all such moves designed to suppress the people’s voice. With a purpose to create awareness among the people, to involve them and to unite all the movements continuing throughout coastline from Paradip to Puri, a Mass Rally or Padayatra  has been planned by the POSCO Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS) along with various movements and people.

The Mass Rally, of over 2000 people will walk through 120 villages of seven blocks namely Erasama, Balikuda in Jagatsinghpur District and Astaranga, Kaktpur, Gop, Puri Sadar, Puri covering 150 kilometres. The Rally will start from Dhinkia village on 29^th November and culminate at Puri on 5^th December with a massive protest meeting.  

Along the Padayatra’s route, public meetings will be organized as follows:-

1. 29^th November at 4 PM at Erasama
2. 30^th November at 4 PM at naharana
3. 1^st December at 4 PM at Kakatpur
4. 2^nd December at 4 PM at Astaranga
5. 3^rd December at 4 PM at Gop
6. 4^th December at 4 PM at Puri Sadar
7. 5^th December at 2 PM at Puri

 ==Demands: ==

1.    Scrap all plans and projects meant for capitalistic investments and exploitations in coastal zones

2.    Stop anti-people and involuntary displacements

3.    Stop industrialization at the cost of agriculture and food security of millions of people

4.    Promote people centered and agro-based industries in place of corporate friendly minings and industries

5.    Make necessary regulations to protect and preserve the water, forests, lands, ecology and livelihoods of local people and empower the local people to own, regulate and manage the local resources  and their livelihoods

6.    Scrap the special economic zones and withdraw the corresponding acts and orders

7.    Stop all kinds of violence committed directly or indirectly by corporates against people

8.    Refrain from all kinds of repressions and oppressions against democratic people’s movements and human rights activists

9.    Protect sea-coast upto 1 kilometre from sea from any ecologically  harmful activities 

10.    Desist from handing over  natural resources in to the hands of private companies

11.    Promote  people centered, non-exploitative and non-extractive developmental models

==Participants: ==

The participants will include the People from the coastal villages from Paradip to Puri, representatives of various people’s movements going on at different parts of Orissa, Representatives of Left and Democratic Parties, Supporters and Supporters from various parts of the Country, Cultural Troupes from different movements, intellectuals, writers, artists and activists.

==How to Get There: ==

Interested Participants should arrive at Dhinkia village by 28^th evening. One can travel by Train from Cuttack or Bhubaneswar via Trains running to Paradip and get down at Badabandha Station. From here Dhinkia is 6 kilometres. Auto rickshaws are available here. By Bus one can come from Bhubaneswar/Cuttack running towards Paradip and get down at Balitutha.

APEEAL: We appeal you to participate in the Rally and contribute whatever you can against the requirements mentioned below:-

·        10000 Posters

·        20000 Leaflets

·        500 Banners/Festoons

·        500 Placards

·        8 Vehicles (for 8-days)

·        5 Mikes with generators (for 8-days)

·        Medical Team with Fast Aid requisites

·        Water Tank (for 8-days)

·        Tents (for 8-days)

·        Lunch, Dinner and Breakfasts for 2000 people for 8 days

·        250 Uniform  Dress /Tea Shirts/ Caps/badges  for front-line youth volunteers

·        Video shootings

·        Film shows – equipments and films

·        Accompanying Cultural Troupes  - supports 

Abhay Sahu

Chairperson, Posco Prathirodh Sangram Samiti,

Cell No. – 09861501265

Contact Person:- 

Prasant Paikray

Spokesperson, Posco Prathirodh Sangram Samiti)

Cell - 09437571547

Email: prashantpaikray@...

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Book Review

Feminism in Islam: Secular and Religious Convergences

By Margot Badran

Oneworld Publications, Oxford, 2009, pp.349

Reviewed by: Yoginder Sikand

Countless volumes have been written on the issue of Islam and women, by Muslims as well as others. Indeed, the ‘Muslim woman’ question has, for long, occupied a central place in discourses about Islam. Interestingly, the vast majority of works on this furiously-debated question have been penned by men. For many male Muslim writers, the notion of normative Muslim womanhood is key to their understanding of Islamic authenticity. For non-Muslim scholars of Islam, it is a central trope in their critique of the religion. Caught between the two, the diverse voices of Muslim women themselves have received but scant attention in the scholarly literature.

Margot Badran is one of the foremost chroniclers of Muslim women’s struggles for gender justice. This latest book of hers explores broadly two types of women’s struggles for equality waged in different parts of the ‘Muslim world’. The first, which she traces to the colonial period, is what she labels as ‘Muslim secular feminism’, through which Muslim women (and some men) in different countries sought to assert their rights to education, employment and political participation. The arguments they put forward were, typically, secular, presented as a means for the empowerment and advancement of the ‘nation’ and the ‘community’. At the same time, these women were cautious to present their demands as being in accordance with their understanding of Islam. The second form of feminism is what Badran terms as ‘Islamic feminism’, which really emerged in a major way just a few decades ago. Much of the book is devoted to a detailed discussion of the forms, arguments and practical achievements of ‘Islamic feminism’.

 Far from being the oxymoron that many might think it is, ‘Islamic feminism’, Badran writes, is an even more radical and forceful form of feminism than was Muslim secular feminism at one time. ‘Islamic feminism’, she states, is based on the firm conviction about the fundamental equality of men and women as creatures of God, as stated in the Quran. On the basis of this belief and their re-reading of the Islamic tradition, ‘Islamic feminists’ argue that Islam itself demands the fundamental equality of women and men in all spheres of life, both in the personal as well as pubic domains. This demand for equality, Badran says, extends even to the religious sphere, for instance as regards religious professions and mosque rituals. Badran backs her case by citing certain Muslim women scholars—Aminah Wadud, Asma Barlas, Riffat Hasan being only the better-known among them—who seem to argue on somewhat these lines.

Unlike secular feminists, these ‘Islamic feminists’ seek to argue for women’s equality and gender justice wholly through the framework of Islam, broadly defined. Badran briefly describes (although one wishes that this could have been at greater length) the different methodologies that these women adopt in approaching the Islamic scriptural tradition, particularly those parts of the Quran, Hadith and fiqh or Muslim jurisprudence that might seem to militate against the notion of gender equality and gender justice. Badran terms the basic tool that these women apply in this regard as ijtihad, but, curiously, leaves out of the discussion the various rules and conditions governing ijtihad that have enjoyed wide acceptance among Muslims for centuries, according to which some of the formulations of these women writers might not be qualified to be regarded as genuine ijtihad at all. Just because these women might see some of their formulations as ijtihad does not mean that, from the perspective of ‘mainstream’ Muslims to whom these women appeal, these can be regarded as ‘authentic’ or ‘proper’ uses of ijtihad. Badran is, of course, aware of this problem but, yet, gives it scant attention.

Can these admittedly scattered voices—mostly of elite women, many based in universities in the West—be really taken to represent a social movement, in the true sense of the term? This is something that Badran does not deal with. The actual impact of the writings of these women, in terms of policy or legal changes or women’s mobilization at the ‘grassroots’, is missing in Badran’s otherwise engaging narrative. Absent, also, is any substantial discussion about the internal Muslim critique of their writings, mainly, though not only, by conservative ulema and Islamist ideologues on precisely Islamic grounds. This is, needless to say, an issue of immense practical import in that on it hinges the possibility or otherwise of popular acceptance of their interpretations of the faith.

Besides these elite Muslim women, some of who may well insist on being called ‘Islamic feminists’, are a much larger number of others who, working within a broadly-defined Islamic framework, shun the label, seeing the term ‘feminist’ as being tainted by its association with the West. They see their struggle as one that aims to recover what they variously understand as ‘authentic Islam’, and not, as the title of the book suggests, ‘feminism in Islam’. They may not go so far as the elite women-scholars Badran describes as being at the cutting-edge of the development of ‘Islamic feminism’ in their demands, such as, for instance, advocating women-led prayers for joint congregations or women muftis. Yet, Badran seems to lump them together with the elite women-scholars, inadvertently homogenizing what is admittedly a very diverse set of voices. Badran chooses to discuss these women as also representing forms of ‘Islamic feminism’, but, this, to my mind, does injustice to how these women see themselves and their struggles. Why impose categories on people against their will, one might ask? Why bracket them in boxes that they refuse to recognize? Why describe their struggles as ‘feminism in Islam’, when this is not how these women see themselves as promoting? If they see themselves as engaged in an ‘Islamic’, as opposed to an ‘Islamic feminist’ struggle, then why not let them define themselves on their own terms?

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The ingenuity of Madhu Koda and his associates continue to surprise investigators probing what is being referred to as the Great Jharkhand Robbery. For all his claim to be a humble tribal, Koda and his men not only had the smarts to acquire mines in Liberia and Thailand, they also knew how to spirit away the money they allegedly made by handing over mining leases to different corporates to banks in Switzerland.

Officials from Enforcement Directorate (ED) and Income Tax (I-T), who are on the probe, have found details of accounts where they are suspected to have hoarded money. More importantly, they have also located the bullion trader from Mumbai's Zaveri Bazar who was their conduit to Swiss banks, trusted by corrupt rulers across the world for their secrecy.

The discovery of the Swiss dimension of the Jharkhand Loot coincided with the arrest of Vikas Sinha, one of Koda's accomplices. Sinha, younger brother of key Koda aide Binod, was arrested in Ranchi on Friday. Sources said Vikas admitted to carrying Rs 40 crore to Binod's chartered accountant S K Naredi -- a claim that was vehemently denied by the accused. Vikas, who has been remanded to judicial custody for 14 days, alleged that he was coerced into signing documents about which he knew nothing.

Importantly, Naredi is also Koda's chartered accountant, and is suspected to have cooked books to help the former chief minister acquire sponge iron and rolling mills in Jharkhand.

Vikas is considered to be the first of the catches that the ED and Income Tax want to net before moving on to Koda himself. Others who may be picked up soon are Binod and Sanjay Chaudhary.

While lookout notices have been put out for them, the focus of the probe from now shifts to the Swiss connection of the Koda group. The investigation has also exposed that even PSU banks were not carrying out due diligence for checking the source of extraordinarily huge cash deposits.

Sleuths have found that Zaveri Bazar branch of Union Bank of India failed to find anything amiss about Rs 61 crore that the Koda cartel deposited with it. The whole transaction took place in the space of less than 30 days -- between March 2 and March 31, 2007 -- and should have set off alarm bells claimed to have been installed in the aftermath of 9/11 terror attack.

The timing of the transactions is also significant and shows that Koda did not waste much time after he, helped by political uncertainty and a group of Independents, manoeuvered his way into the chief minister's office in September 2006.

Officials found out about the huge account during a search of the premises of Manoj Punamia, an associate of Koda, whose Balaji Bullion and other companies were central to money laundering by Koda and his group.

Sources claimed that investigators had found that one of Punamia's companies -- Balaji Universal Trade -- had a turnover disproportionately huge to its size -- $350 million. One deal alone was worth $55 million in cash.

The Balaji group of companies floated by Koda's associates had transferred $100 million using hawala route. Significantly, it also transferred at least $10 million to a Dubai frontman through legal channels in what could be a step to gradually legitimise the illicit overseas operations.

Another group firm -- Balaji Bullion -- had alleged transactions worth Rs 990 crore, it was found during initial probe. Three of the directors in Balaji Bullion were Binod Sinha, Sanjay Chaudhary and Arvind Vyas, all associates of the former Jharkhand CM.

Post-9/11, stringent measures had been deployed globally, including stiff due diligence procedure applied on banking channels in India to ensure that any dirty money infiltrating the system did not went undetected. All suspicious high-value transactions are supposed to be reported within a week to the Financial Intelligence Unit which after filtering them sends for further investigation to relevant intelligence agencies.

In this case, it seems the accused indulged in money laundering in a big way using both the banking channels and illicit hawala means hoodwinking the due diligence mechanism and intelligence agencies.

TNN 7 November 2009

By Charudutta Panigrahi

By now we all know that The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award Nobel Prize in economic sciences, in memory of Alfred Nobel for the year 2009, to Elinor Ostrom of Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA, for her analysis of economic governance, especially the commons.

I was going through her work where she has emphasised on the proven success of the management of common property by the communities, user-groups or societies. She decries the general perception going in favour of central authority (read government) or the most abused “privatisation”. Between the central rule and privatisation we have user-governance. She has taken the examples of studies of user-managed fish stocks, pastures, woods, lakes, and groundwater basins.

User management has yielded much better results and the resource users develop capabilities to develop home grown management systems and tools which assist in decision-making and rule enforcement. User groups are sometimes also naturally enabled to handle conflicts of interest because I guess it is a natural way of aspirations for greater access to resources.

In the user transactions we generally tend to ignore economic activities because it is again a perception that in case of self-management a user group can rarely find the benefits of an economic activity evenly or proportionately distributed among the beneficiaries or users. But, in the teeth of traditional theories debunking user groups’ self-management theories, Odisa has shown great progress and ability.

It is a common knowledge that Odisha lags behind other states in economic prosperity. And that there are severe resource crunch in the society which leaves a majority of the population striving for existence and leaving the state for gainful employments. I realized this the hard way when we started the Rural Knowledge center programme in Odisa, about 7-8 years back. I realized that when presented with a resource problem the community can cooperate and act for the common good. The Knowledge Centers were designed as common centers of knowledge for the village or community with access to modern Information and Communication technologies.

Even today not many villagers have the privy to general knowledge and information concerning his welfare or his or her children’s’ welfare or even government schemes leave aside global progress or knowledge through the wikipedias or googles of the world.

They are simply bereft of all the access and services. Information doesn’t reach them as diligently and smoothly as any developing nation would have desired to.

We started the Knowledge centers with the help of the communities and importantly, managed by the communities. It was extremely challenging in the beginning with no agreement on the defined systems for community management, no unanimity in the constitution of the community committees for the management of the centers, no leadership to take charge of the centers, the economic transactions and so forth.

In the last these many years all the centers are self managed by the communities through their own representation and through their own developed systems of checks, balances and reporting. This was a great learning for me on how self-organization and local-level management works to keep common resources, whether natural (e.g., forests) or man-made (e.g., infrastructure), viable.

In the process we have unearthed numerous principles that govern successful sustainability and which defy most of the dogmatic beliefs. Community has been my best management guru.

In one of her dissertations, Ostrom discussed an issue quite pertinent to Odisha: water management. In 1945, some individuals in western Los Angeles noticed that water quality from one of the key groundwater basins under the city seemed to be declining. Salt water was found to be intruding into the system.

A few individuals formed a water association to try to solve this problem. “They bargained in the court; they created a new set of rules; they established a water replenishment district, and then started injecting water along the coast. It was incredible,” she says. “If the salt water intrusion had continued for a few more years, the basin might never have been recouped.” In what would become a long-term theme for Ostrom, this experience taught her “how disparate individuals could collectively band together to protect a common resource.”

This I believe is our way out of the deadlock of development that is staring in our faces. Our dependence on the government for every little issue of development, our growing disillusionment with the election systems, the riding menace of separatist forces, our cries for land, water, forest rights all could be dealt with our own power of self management or cooperative management.

At the time when the knowledge centers were started there was a prevailing presumption that these centers would lapse into the conventional system of NGO funding and would be “externally” managed with heavy injections of funds and resources. But over the years, with the obvious start-up hitches, they underwent economies of scale and have emerged as the single largest network of knowledge centers in India. All this at the grassroots of one of the most sluggish economies of the country and populated with tribal communities. We mostly work in the tribal dominated areas.

She has worked with the Police department and writes the following:

“The end results of this 15-year collaborative effort revealed several important conceptual processes of urban policing and turned widely held presumptions on their head”.

“The presumption that economies of scale were prevalent was wrong; the presumption that you needed a single police department was wrong; and the presumption that individual departments wouldn't be smart enough to work out ways of coordinating is wrong,” Ostrom says. Most aspects of police work in fact experienced diseconomies of scale. “For patrolling, if you don't know the neighborhood, you can't spot the early signs of problems, and if you have five or six layers of supervision, the police chief doesn't know what's occurring on the street,” she explains.

When I was reading the above observations, I could find uncanny similarities in the knowledge center programme in Odisha. In probably one of the daring experiments with “federalism” in the development sector, the knowledge centers in Odisha are all managed by the communities themselves, as I have mentioned above and any form of central rule or policies or systems has been unwarranted. Never ever, even for once the thought of having a centralized function of these centers came to us. Nor was there any necessity or scope for triangulations. This practice had its share of doomsayers warning us of collapse at every step. But to our comfort every time the whole network emerged stronger. Community resources managed and incremented by the communities.

Common-pool resources, shared goods such as center buidings, infrastructure, have been managed at the local levels and they offer one of the best common – property arrangements ever in the state. Similarly we have to take up watersheds, irrigation systems, fishing grounds, even crops.

In Governing the Commons, Ostrom began examining specific types of common resources in more detail. “I started working with colleagues in Nepal, and together we developed a large database on irrigation and developed a whole series of studies just on that,” she says. The results of that work showed that farmer-managed systems tended to be superior to government-managed ones. Ostrom again notes that concepts such as local-level monitoring help ensure forest sustainability. This recurring theme of user-level management is especially promising for sustainability because it counters the gloomy future envisioned by the “tragedy of the commons,” the concept wherein human desires to maximize individual rewards inevitably destroy long-term resource viability.”

With self-sufficiency not only in resources but in the creation of resources and their management, we could have simple solutions to many painful strains we encounter due to central controls. This is, however, not to depart completely from a central viewpoint.

However, for Odisha strapped with the migration issues, youth skills issues, farmers' suicides and growing Naxal problem,  it is high time we learn to manage our own wealth – both natural and man made and be accountable. No more blame game, please!  I started with Ostrom’s economic theory for which she has bagged the Nobel Prize and how that is appropriate for Odisha and now I am dwelling on the politics of the state. This is the beauty of economics and this is the centrality of economics in the progress of our state.

PM, Tribal Ministry, State Governments: Respect the Law and Forest Dwellers'
Rights

Protest at 1 pm, Parliament Street on Nov 4th, by Adivasis from Chhattisgarh,
Rajasthan, MP, Gujarat

The Central government claims that it cares about the rights of adivasis and
forest dwellers and it wishes to provide them "development."   In that case, why
is it breaking the law and promoting initiatives that will deprive people of
their rights?

On November 4th, the Prime Minister will address a meeting of State Chief
Ministers to "review" the implementation of the Forest Rights Act 2006.  The
Centre claims it wants to complete implementation of this law by December 31st,
2009, but in reality it is:

     * Both ignoring and actively supporting the Forest Department and State
governments in breaking the law.  This will result in people not having their
rights to land, forests, water etc. properly recognised.
     * Ignoring the most important right in the Forest Rights Act - the right and
power of communities to protect and control their forests.
     * Pouring money into plantation projects that will result in people losing
more individual and common lands as well as cause environmental damage.
     * Sending in troops and police while doing nothing to protect people's legal
rights; across the country, even in areas that have never seen Maoists, the
police are used against peaceful struggles and in the defence of corporate
interests.

Are these the actions of a government that is behaving in good faith?

To protest this, forest dwellers from four States have gathered at Jantar Mantar
for a dharna today (Nov 3rd) and will stage a protest at Parliament street
tomorrow.

Our Demands

     *       Implement all provisions of the Forest Rights Act and the respect
powers of the gram sabha under it
     *       Recognise the right and power of the people to protect their forest
resources under the Forest Rights Act; terminate the sham scheme of "Joint
Forest Management"
     *      All projects in forest areas – development, industrial, forestry,
etc. - must be undertaken with the consent of and as per plans prepared by the
community
     *      Halt repression and respect democracy, peace and justice

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Based in New Delhi, Zakia Nizami Soman is one of the founder members of the Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA), a movement of Muslim women across India struggling for their citizenship rights. In this interview with Yoginder Sikand, she talks about the BMMA’s work and reflects on the daunting challenges facing Muslim women in India today.

Q: How did the BMMA start? What made you and your colleagues feel the need for a separate Muslim women’s movement?

A: The BMMA was formally inaugurated in Delhi in January 2007, but before that we—numerous Muslim women—were working in our individual capacities on issues related to Muslims, particularly Muslim women, in different parts of India. I was working in Gujarat, my home state, before that, with Action Aid, in the wake of the state-sponsored genocidal attacks on Muslims in 2002. In a sense, it was the Gujarat genocide that brought us Muslim women, scattered across India, together. We met at numerous conventions, rallies and public hearings that were held in different parts of the country in the wake of the genocide. We were all Muslim women who were deeply concerned with the plight of the Muslims, including and especially Muslim women, and the enormous danger of Hindutva fascism, and who were trying, in our own ways, to intervene. That was when we decided to form a loose collective of our own. We felt that the issues of Muslim women were somehow being sidelined in a climate of heightened Muslim insecurity. We urgently felt the need for Muslim women to speak out, not just against patriarchy within the community and unjust personal laws, but also against growing anti-Muslim discrimination, against Muslims being treated as second-class citizens in this country and against neglect, indeed, discrimination by the state and other forces. We felt the desperate need for a Muslim women’s voice at the national level.

We began our work in 2005 by organizing meetings in various cities of India of like-minded Muslim women—in Delhi, Bombay, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Lucknow and so on. In the beginning, we did not have any clear agenda. These meetings served as a means for us to get to know each other and to clarify our thinking on issues related to Muslim women, the Indian Muslims as a whole, as well as the larger society and the struggles of other marginalized groups for justice and equality. After considerable discussion and deliberation about what our ideology and form of our collective, finally we announced the formation of the BMMA at our first national convention in Delhi in January 2007. Some 500 women attended the convention. Thereafter, our numbers rapidly grew, and now we have almost 20,000 members, with chapters in fifteen states across India. Most of them are volunteers, who take up Muslim community, particularly Muslim women’s, issues at the local level.

Our name expresses our mission. We are ‘Bharatiya’, or Indian. We refuse to let the advocates of Hindutva monopolise the term. We are Muslim and not at all apologetic about it. We are ‘Mahilas’, or women. And, finally, we are an ‘Andolan’ or movement, not an institutionalized NGO, that seeks to mobilize and work with not just Muslim women alone, but also the whole secular and democratic movement in India, for the problems we all face are so deep-rooted that large scale people’s mobilization is the only way out. The BMMA is based on the values of the Indian Constitution as well as the Quran, both of which have given Muslim women equal rights. Our basic mandate is to work on issues related to education, livelihood, health and security and personal laws of Muslims in general, and Muslim women in particular. This also includes the struggle against communalism, against the stereotyping of Muslims and Islam and the tendency to link them with terrorism.

Q: You speak of the Quran as gender-just, but what would you say about the very obviously patriarchal, and, in several aspects, patently anti-women, stances of the conservative ulema?

A: Islam speaks of a God who is just. The Quran has given women equal rights and equal dignity. We are as much God’s followers as men are. The problem arises not from the Quran but from distorted, patriarchal interpretations of the Quran and other texts by some sections of the ulema. This is something that we have to fight against. Islam is a religion of justice. So, how, if it is interpreted properly, can it discriminate against women? For us, religion is something between the individual and God, a belief grounded in the faith that God cannot be unjust towards women. So, even if a thousand maulvis stand up and demand that women are inferior and that we should remain shut in their homes we will refuse to listen to them.

Q: Why did you feel the need for a separate Muslim women’s voice?

A: The experience of the Muslims of Gujarat in the wake of the 2002 genocide taught us one valuable lesson: that Muslims have to stand up on their own for justice for themselves. Thousands of Muslim men, women and children were slaughtered in cold blood. Three hundred Muslim women were brutally raped and then burnt alive, some in front of their children. With the exception of a few, the so-called secular Indian feminists did not dare to speak out against the Gujarat carnage. It is a shame that Gujarat is home to some of the largest women's organisations and yet they chose to remain mute. Either they were too scared or else it was a case of them showing their hidden anti-Muslim prejudice. They maintained a deafening silence. They had shown their deep-rooted, often unacknowledged, pro-Hindu and anti-Muslim bias on several occasions before, as during the dastardly massacre of Muslims in Bombay in 1992.

This made us realize that we could not depend on the women's movement to take up our cause, to speak for us. We needed to speak for ourselves. Also, our multiple exclusion, just like that of Dalit women, has failed to find any real representation in the discourse of the so-called 'mainstream'.To reflect this, we coined the slogan Jiski ladai, uski aguvai (‘She shall lead whose struggle it is’). Most self-styled Indian feminists are so-called ‘upper’ caste Hindus. Of course, there are individuals who are different, by and large, as far as Muslims are concerned, there is no difference, generally speaking, between a Brahmin woman and a Brahmin man. They are both part of the same patriarchal, hegemonic system. That is also how, for instance, Dalits or Adivasis, similarly oppressed communities, would view them.

That said, we were, and still are, open to alliances with democratic, secular-minded women and men from other communities. Our membership is not restricted to Muslim women alone. Our membership is open to all, except those who are not secular and those who lack financial integrity. In fact, some 15% of our members are non-Muslims. We also have some male members. We also seek to build alliances with other groups and communities fighting for justice, because we see our struggle not just as a Muslim women’s one, or even a Muslim one, but, rather, as part of a broader movement for all secular-minded and democratic Indians. We often attend meetings organized by Dalits, women's groups, and trade unions, and they, too, come to our meetings to express their solidarity.

The second reason why we felt the need for an independent national-level voice for Muslim women was our objection to the fact that when it comes to discussing Muslims, only people with a certain sort of identity—and all males, incidentally, particularly conservative ulema or rabble-rousers are projected as the representatives of the community. The fact is that the male Muslim religious and political leadership has completely failed not just Muslim women, but Muslims as a whole. Typically, they remain silent on the pressing issues of Muslim women—not just on issues related to outdated and patriarchal understandings of family law, but also on matters such as Muslim women’s educational and economic empowerment. Many of them even adopt patently anti-women stances, and, moreover, have done precious little, if at all, even for Muslim men. Muslims in India are victims of discrimination, including by the state, but a major cause of our plight is also the existing Muslim elite. We cannot accept them as our leaders. When the Sachar Committee Report talks of the all-round social and economic exclusion of Muslims, it is not a situation that has developed overnight. It is a tale of pervasive discrimination as well as the failure of the supposed Muslim leadership to enable the Muslims to participate in Indian democracy.

It was not that we want to speak for Muslim women alone. Rather, we speak for, and highlight the concerns of, Muslims as a whole, men as well as women. Till now, those who have claimed to be the leaders of the Muslims have all been men. Why can’t it change? Why can’t Muslim women also lead the whole community—not just Muslim women?

Q: Some women’s groups project the major concerns of Muslim women to be issues related to personal law—triple talaq in one sitting, polygamy, and so on. How do you look at this?

A: These are definitely crucial issues that need to be addressed, and certainly I believe that the existing Muslim Personal Law in India needs to be reformed on gender-just lines and within the broad framework of the shariah, and then codified. But, I do not believe that they are the major issues facing the vast majority of Indian Muslim women. Their foremost concerns relate to endemic poverty and illiteracy that characterizes the Muslim community as a whole, including Muslim men, and anti-Muslim discrimination by the state and other forces. We do not see Muslim women’s issues in isolation from the issues faced by the wider Muslim community. Unless these issues are simultaneously addressed, you cannot expect Muslim women’s conditions to be ameliorated. The tendency to locate the sources of Muslim women’s marginalization solely within the community itself—blaming just Muslim men or the ulema and their patriarchal understandings of religion—is patently unfair. How can you expect Muslim women to be empowered and able to resist male domination if they are not educationally and economically empowered? A major responsibility in this regard is that of the state, which continues to marginalize and neglect Muslims, including Muslim women. How can you expect divorced Muslim women to be paid a decent sum as maintenance if the vast majority of Muslim men continue to wallow in poverty?

Then, I must add, there is this marked tendency, even among so-called feminists, to stereotype Muslim women as hapless, helpless creatures, heavily oppressed by their men and religious leaders, as if Muslim women are unique in this regard. This is not the case at all. This stereotypical image of Muslim women can be very misleading. For instance, surveys have proved that a lower proportion of Muslim couples are polygamous than other communities in India, including Hindus, although, by Indian law, polygamy is possible only for Muslims. Likewise, there is such media hype about the burkha that feeds negative images of Islam and Muslims. In the BMMA we have several members who wear the burkha or hijab, some of who work outside their homes. It does not restrict their mobility. Some of these sisters are among our most vocal and outspoken activists. That said, to wear or not to wear the burkha is a woman's personal choice, and nobody should force her against her will.

Q: What has been the reaction of the ulema to the BMMA? Have you encountered any opposition or hostility from them?

A: Contrary to what some of us had initially feared, we have faced no problems at all from the ulema. In fact, some of them have even addressed our meetings. The latest one to do so was Maulana Kalbe Sadiq, the Vice-President of the All-India Muslim Personal Law Board, who is a great champion of women’s rights and education. That said, I must also mention that we deliberately do not seek to court those ulema and their organizations that are communal and are known for their misogynist views. The BMMA is a non-sectarian group, and we have members from different Muslim sects—Shias, Sunnis, so-called 'lower' castes and so on, and so we do not work with any sectarian Muslim ulema groups. At the same time, I must also stress that we are not anti-religion at all. Personally, I see no contradiction between the Quran and equality and justice for women. I think that by providing positive models of Muslim women as social activists we are serving the cause of Islam at a time when its image is being sullied, being presented both by its foes as well as conservative and radical Muslims as anti-women.

Q: What practical activities has the BMMA undertaken so far?

A: We have formulated and published a model nikah namah or marriage contract, which, in contrast to the ones generally used in India, safeguards the rights of both spouses, and is fully in accordance with the Quran. It was framed by a team of Muslim women scholars, with the help of the well-known Islamic scholar Dr. Asghar Ali Engineer. Till now, almost three hundred marriages have been conducted, mainly in Maharashtra and Gujarat, using this nikah namah.

Two years ago, we launched a national campaign to press for the implementation of the recommendations of the Sachar Committee Report on Muslims. The Congress-led Government, which had appointed the Committee, is doing nothing about it—true to form, it is simply hoodwinking Muslims with false promises—but still we need to keep up the pressure. Our members have been going around in their areas, asking local MLAs, MPs, bank managers and so on what they have, if at all, done for Muslims, and we plan to compile these findings and publish them as a report soon.

Q: Personally speaking, what was the source of inspiration that led you to join this movement?

A: My source of courage were the Muslim women of Gujarat, where I come from, whom I worked with in the course of the state-sponsored genocide in 2002. In the face of the barbaric criminality, not just of Hindutva mobs but also of the state itself, many Muslims felt it was best to remain silent, to accept things as they were, to remain low and subdued. But it was these women, whose husbands and children had been slaughtered in front of their very eyes, whose houses had been burned down, who refused to keep silent. They wanted to fight back, to denounce the criminals behind the carnage and those who backed them. They came in their hundreds to rallies and demonstrations, even before the Parliament House in Delhi. Many of them were burkha-clad, but that did not stop them from coming out in droves. They were not begging for relief or hand-outs. What they demanded was justice. These women who lit a fire in my heart. If they could be so brave, so committed, why could I not be like them?, I thought.

Zakia Nizami Soman can be contacted on zakiasoman@...

'Rights activists and film producers romanticise Maoists'

http://news.rediff.com/report/2009/nov/03/rights-activists-and-film-producers-ro\
maticise-maoists.htm

November 03, 2009

The threat posed by the burgeoning Maoist movement is grave and if it
is not controlled in time, the Indian democracy could be in serious
danger, believes Mahendra Lal Kumawat, former director general of the
Border Security Force and former special secretary (internal
security).

Kumawat, who delivered an hour-long lecture at a conference on Counter
Terror 2009 in New Delhi also talked to rediff.com's Vicky Nanjappa
about the internal threat posed by the Maoists and the terror menace
from across the border, in the wake of the terror attack on Mumbai.

On the dire consequences of underestimating the Maoist threat:

"This is the greatest internal threat to India. The bigger problem is
that the Maoists are tying up with anti-national forces in order to
further their cause. The belief that Naxalites will not team up with
anti-national forces is a myth. They will do anything and everything
to ensure that India does not become a super power and the country is
robbed of its democracy.

In order to further their cause, the Maoists are procuring weapons
from outside India and they have tied up with Jihadi elements.
Initially, politicians of our country termed them as patriots.  I have
gone through the literature of the Maoists in detail. They very openly
state that the democracy in India is a sham and their main intention
is to throw out democracy from our country.

We need highly specialised forces to deal with the sophisticated
weapons they have procured through the Jihadi elements. The Maoists
have mastered the strategy of tackling the security forces by
outnumbering them in the jungles. While the threat looms large, the
apathy shown by some of the state governments in dealing with this
issue is terrible. Take Bihar for instance. There have been no fresh
recruitments in the police force for 14 years. This means that there
are no young cadres to fight the Naxals. The case in Jharkhand is
similar.

The Maoists are adopting general warfare and their fight against our
security forces is restricted to the jungles. Very few police
personnel can fight in the jungle. The major difference between the
police force and the Maoists is that the latter are ready to die for
their fight, the policemen are not.

This is because our police personnel do not have the motivation that
the Naxals do. Another issue that needs to be mentioned is the
temporary tenure of a police man. His tenure is like a football;
before a policeman can get accustomed to the situation, he gets
transferred.

The biggest culprits who have given rise to this problem are civil
rights activists and film producers who spare no effort to romanticise
the cause of these Maoists. Movies are being made to depict them as
heroes. What these people don't realise is that by romanticising the
cause of the Maoists, they are only contributing to the bloodshed.

The war against these people is not easy. They are great strategists
and after each incident, they analyse the pros and cons of it. They
conduct extensive researches and after each incident, they learn from
their mistakes and make amends during the next attack.

There are certain issues that one needs to bear in mind. We need to
understand their ideology. We must realise that the Maoists are not
friends of this nation. Whoever thinks in this manner is living in a
fool's paradise.

It would be foolish to use the Indian Army to curb the Maoist threat.
Our police forces should be upgraded to fight these people. Using the
Army against them means we have lost the battle and accepted that our
police are incapable of fighting these people.

On the Mumbai terror attack and the threat from across the border:

"During the Mumbai terror attack, there was an absolute lack of
coordination, which made the attack a successful one. What happened on
that day was horrid. The scene was chaotic. The Mumbai police
commissioner was not available in the control room and hence they were
not able to coordinate and counter the attack.

We speak so much about enhancing security. However, enhanced security
alone will not help in preventing a Mumbai-type attack. Intelligence
gathering is a key aspect (of preventing a terror attack) and there
has to be constant upgrading of our intelligence network. We must also
make efforts to network and coordinate our forces so that the enemy is
on the back foot. We must create a data base of people posing a threat
to our nation and each person in the security force must have access
to the same.

Securing our borders is also an important aspect of fighting
terrorism. We are aware of the fact that a person determined to enter
the country will do so anyway. What we need to do is to secure the
borders even more.

I personally feel that there is a grave threat from our border with
Bangladesh. This border witnesses a lot of infiltration and this
border ought to be fenced completely. As I pointed out earlier, there
have been instances of people entering the country from across the
border. They bribe the security forces and at times even kill them to
enter the country. The need of the hour is not to slip up at any cost
and maintain an eternal vigil.

Maoist link to malaria
  OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT, The telegraph

*New Delhi, Oct. 28: *India's malaria hotspots appear to overlap with Maoist
strongholds, public health experts said today, listing local development and
improved governance among actions that could help reduce illness and deaths
from the infection.

Malaria is rampant in parts of Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, and
Orissa where lack of development and poor administration has prevented the
emergence of reliable healthcare services, the experts said at a
consultation on public health.

We look at the map and we see malaria is now localised in about 70
districts  but most of them are trouble districts, said Jayaprakash
Muliyil, professor of community health at the Christian Medical College,
Vellore.

They are tribal areas, forest areas, places where the health systems arenâ
working, places where there is unrest, Muliyil told *The Telegraph*, on the
sidelines of the consultation organised by the Public Health Foundation of
India.

Infectious disease experts believe the health ministry as figures of 1.7
million malaria cases and 1,707 deaths during 2006 are gross
underestimates. Using independent estimates, they believe up to 10 million
people were infected and more than 15,000 died from malaria that year.
We âre not getting the true picture said Garima Pathak, assistant
professor at the Indian Institute of Public Health, New Delhi.
more at...

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1091029/jsp/frontpage/story_11672759.jsp

The National Forum of India | The National Forum of India | The National Forum of India | => => 01. http://Andhra.ozg.in => => 02. http://Arunachal.ozg.in => => 03. http://Assam.ozg.in => => 04. http://Bengal.ozg.in => => 05. http://Bihar.ozg.in => => 06. http://Chhattisgarh.ozg.in => => 07. http://Goa.ozg.in => => 08. http://Gujarat.ozg.in => => 09. http://Haryana.ozg.in => => 10. http://Himachal.ozg.in => => 11. http://Kashmir.ozg.in => => 12. http://Jharkhand.ozg.in => => 13. http://Karnataka.ozg.in => => 14. http://Kerala.ozg.in => => 15. http://Madhya-Pradesh.ozg.in => => 16. http://Maharashtra.ozg.in => => 17. http://Manipur.ozg.in => => 18. http://Meghalaya.ozg.in => => 19. http://Mizoram.ozg.in => => 20. http://Nagaland.ozg.in => => 21. http://Orissa.ozg.in => => 22. http://Punjab.ozg.in => => 23. http://Rajasthan.ozg.in => => 24. http://Sikkim.ozg.in => => 25. http://Tamilnadu.ozg.in => => 26. http://Tripura.ozg.in => => 27. http://Uttarakhand.ozg.in => => 28. http://Uttar-Pradesh.ozg.in => a. http://Delhi.ozg.in =>b. http://Bombay.ozg.in =>c. http://Kolkata.ozg.in =>d. http://Chennai.ozg.in =>e. http://Bangalore.ozg.in The National Forum of India | The National Forum of India | The National Forum of India

It was a quite but extraordinary expression of resolve. Thousands of Bodo youth, who gathered at a function to pay homage to the world’s most acknowledged apostle of peace and non-violence the Mahatma Gandhi signed up on a pledge to shun the path of violence and use of guns.

Young boys and girls lined up at the lined up at the site of ‘People’s Assembly on Non-Violence’, organized by influential All Bodo Students Union (ABSU), at Kokrajhar to enlist their name in a public campaign ‘to build an arms and violence free society’.

A huge white ‘democratic wall’ was erected at the entrance of the venue, where anyone who wanted to end the cult of gun, could sign on it to express his or her voice against militancy in the autonomous Bodoland Territorial Council areas of Assam.

ABSU chose the birthday of Mahatma Gandhi celebrated country wide as Gandhi Jayanti as the occasion to start off this civil society movement against violence and gun culture. The idea is to collect as many signatures as possible of people of Bodoland who are against the pervasive violence, which can be mobilized to pursue peace.

“There is possibly no way to secure justice other than principle of non-violence so effectively employed by the Mahatma to free our country of foreign rule. Same holds true even today,� said ABSU president Pramod Boro.

He said the Bodo society today was cowering under the shadow of gun. A section of politicians and opportunist people are promoting this culture of violence to perpetuate their personal ambition and vested interest.

“The most distressing fact is that young people , who are lost and find themselves without any direction and hope, are being sucked into this evil design, and tearing apart the social peace and harmony� Boro said. As a result, a naturally peace loving, gentle and democratic society finds itself in a situation where people cannot express their opinion freely, fearing retaliation from the arm wielding men.

Bodos by the large believe in mainstream and democracy, even as a section took to arms to achieve social justice and political rights for the Bodos. After decades of violence and bloodshed, two peace accords were signed in 1993 and 2003 to achieve self rule and all round  development in the Bodoland areas. Bodos whole heartedly supported creation of autonomous Bodoland Territorial Council (BTC) hoping that would bring peace and development in the violence ravaged areas. “We did achieve some semblance of peace and development in the past few years,â€� ABSU president said, but even this, he felt, was now in jeopardy with the spreading virtue of corruption and suppression of democracy by brute force.

“We are now in such a situation which is governed by gun, inflicting unbearable suffering to ordinary people,� ABSU president said. IN the past one and half years, at least 107 people died in fratricidal killing or encounters with the security forces. All together 34 women lost their husbands while 74 children never saw their fathers, he said.

“We (ABSU) can no longer remain a silent spectator to this mayhem; we need to come together and help rebuild our society rooted in non-violence and democracy,� Boro said. ABSU had always stood for peaceful resolution of all problems and would continue to work for that goal.

“This (call against violence) is a timely step and also a very significant development in the region, which is mired in mindless violence� said noted Gandhi worker Padmashree Natwar Thakkar, who was invited as the key speaker on the occasion.

The youth, which is often seen as the purveyor of violence, pledge to non-violence as a means to secure social justice and peace is not only praiseworthy but also exemplary, Thakkar averred. He also praised ABSU, a highly efficient and organized student body in the region, for spearheading this silent but highly motivational campaign for non-violence.

“In fact, non-violence is not a mere slogan; it’s a potent weapon of peace which is being advocated across the world,� the noted Gandhian worker said. He suggested that the ABSU carried out a year long signature campaign against violence and use of arms launched on the auspicious day of the Mahatma’s birthday at the people’s Assembly on Friday. “Move out to village to village and enlist support for non-violence, which eventually can be used as people’s referendum against violence,� he opined.

Speaker after speaker, including former Bodo Sahitya president Brajendra Brahma and national Sahitya Academy awardee and leading intellectual Mangal Singhj Hajowari, passionately reminded the youth of futility of violence and armed action, which is self-destructive. They exhorted the people of Bodoland to follow the path of non-violence shown by the Mahatma, which is the only way of sustained peace and social harmony.

The new initiative of non-violence, though failed to attract enough media attention, if sustained could have overwhelmingly positive impact on the entire trouble –torn region.

The Pioneer, October 6, 2009

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Don’t Cry Foul on Naxalism

The Corporate Home Minister P. Chidambaram keeps saying that the Human Rights Groups must condemn violence perpetrated by the Maoists on one hand and some intellectuals like Swapan Das Gupta and News Anchors like Arnab Goswami have even gone beyond their limit by discovering some uncivilized words like “Maoist-Terrorist” and are attempting to manufacture the consent that all the Adivasis are Maoist-Terrorists therefore they must be blown up by the military operation without looking other side of the story. The Naxal politics between the Trinmool Congress and the Left Parties have also intensified in the West Bengal. 

The most important question here needs to be answered is why there are so many hues and cries on “Naxalism” though it is not a new issue. The Naxalism has been flourishing in India for last 4 decades. There were several cases of beheading people, many police pickets were blown up in the past and train was also hijacked for 16 hours in 2006 in Jharkhand. The matter of the fact is the Central and State governments were never serious in addressing the issue of Naxalism and now when the problem is utterly intensified, they are crying foul with the clear intention of burying the failure of the entire system of governance. The government officials were busy in bagging money of the development and welfare schemes meant for the poor. The law enforcement agencies were quite active in collecting money in the police stations, check-posts and other places. And the politicians engaged themselves in capturing power through every ways and means. Consequently, the Naxalism is growing day by day. 

However, the main reason is that the so-called ‘Red Corridor’ is full of minerals, where the Adivasis have been residing for centuries. The Multi-National Companies are eyeing on the minerals of the regions and the government is all set to sell it in the market rate therefore it has signed hundreds of MoUs with these MNCs. Since, the Adivasis of these areas strongly feel that they have been betrayed, neglected and dispossessed in the name of development, industrialization and the national interest in India for last 6 decades after the Independence therefore they are resisting against unjust displacement. Consequently, the industrialization process has come to a halt. The Corporate Home Minister P. Chidambaram knows the best way to get the land clear is brand the Adivasis as Naxalites, capture the land and hand it over to the Multi-National Companies. 

It is obvious, because P. Chidambaram has very good corporate connections world wide. Earlier, he represented the bankrupt American energy giant “Enron Corporation”, as a senior lawyer in India. He also represented the controversial British mining conglomerate ‘Vedanta Resources’ in the Mumbai High Court until 2003 when he became the finance Minister of India. He was also a member of the board of directors of the Vedanta and withdrew $70,000 that equals to Rs.35 lakhs in 2003 and also enjoyed hotel and travel facilities on the account of the Vedanta while he visited different parts of the world during that period. 

One sees the Naxal cry as corporate link also because there are many cases filed against the Adivasis who are raising their voices against unjust displacement but at the same time not a single case was registered against the corporate house, who have terrorized the Adivasis, violated the laws of the land and taken away the constitutional rights of the Adivasis. For instance, the Sponge Iron factories are operating in Kolhan and Chhotanagpur regions of Jharkhand without pollution clearance, fulfilling of the job promises and compensation to the people but no action was taken against these corporate houses but at the same time, the state government has filed 11 criminal cases against 3505 Adivasis in Jharkhand who are fighting against corporate houses like Tata Steel, Jindal Steel, Mittal Steel, Bhushan Steel and RPG Group. Why? 

Ironically, we live in a democratic country, where the government, the media and the other Institutions are run by the corporate houses, as a result, the rich people are always privileged and the poor are marginalized in every way. The paradox is the government promises land and forest rights through the forest right act 2006 to the Adivasis, who have been neglected, dispossessed and marginalized for the years on one hand and also signs the MoUs and promotes the forcefully land acquisition in the various part of the country in the name of so-called development on the other. Consequently, the people have lost their faith on the government. Therefore it must withdraw all the MoUs signed for the steel plant, mining projects and power plants, create a democratic space for the common people, where decent voice can be heard because the theories of the sunglasses will only complicate the problem. 

The failure of the state, growing social inequality and non justice delivery are the main reasons of spreading the Naxalism therefore the state has no moral rights for crying foul at this moment. The conflict between the state and the Maoist will never come to an end till the marginalized people were ensured social, economic and cultural justice and also they are made stakeholders to the development and welfare schemes. In a democratic country any kind of violence perpetrated either by the state or non-state actors can not be justified and violence can never be the means to address the issues in either ways. Therefore, both the parties should come together and find out the middle ground, where the media can also play a constructive role because the society can not survive without harmony and peace. 

Gladson Dungdung

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Without natural-cultural farming, the poor will go hungry

By Achyut  Das & Vidhya Das

‘Podu Chaso’ as slash and burn cultivation is called in the tribal regions of Orissa is significant for the  bio-diversity of crops it has helped to sustain, as also the diversity of cultivation practices it  has generated. Crop rotations, inter-cropping, and other sustainable agricultural practices are a part of the inherited knowledge system of the Podu farmer.

Now, not all of this is grown on hill or mountain slopes, the typical shifting cultivation or swidden land. For example, most of the scented varieties of paddy are low land varieties. Not all of the land under shifting cultivation is mountain land either. But, it is the entire system of agriculture practised by the tribal communities that has helped preserve this rich bio-diversity of crops, as also the diversity of cultivation, as different systems of cultivation are practised on different types of land and different types of soil. This knowledge system is of high value in this day and age, when the genetic wealth of plant resources is being usurped by multi-national corporations and their aggressive market strategies.

But the greater threat to this bio-diversity which has been a part of the unique ecology of the tribal regions, and has in fact helped to preserve it, is commercial felling which has destroyed the forests, which thrived side by side with podu patches, and climate change which is changing rainfall patterns drastically.

The traditional 'swidden' patches of the tribal communities were clearings in the middle of forests, which in fact were primarily taken up to supplement the roots, tubers, and other foods that the tribal communities got from the forest. Tubers from the forest formed a staple of several months every year, for tribal communities. What a rich and varied diet! A variety of tubers, a range of  fruits (including the most delicately flavoured mangoes, kendu and wild figs), mushrooms, supplemented by a variety of cereals and a choice of pulses! There is a wide range of other foods, which included a huge range of edible greens, and vegetables, wild and semi-wild.

Alas 'modern' man far from trying to learn about these life styles, and knowledge systems chose to commercialise these regions. Deforestation and its ill-effects have been further aggravated by big dam projects, mines and industries, which not only acquired and destroyed forests that tribal communities had preserved for centuries but also displaced the communities themselves, destroying their culture, society and livelihoods.

Dams have taken up lakhs of hectares of forests and tribal lands in the four districts of Rayagada, Koraput, Malkangiri and Nawrangpur, that formed the undivided Koraput district till 1992. This land acquisition has forced the indigenous populations to take up cultivation on steeper and steeper hills slopes and hill tops causing huge amounts of soil erosion, and further deforestation.

In addition, climate change has also changed the rainfall patterns of the region, affecting cultivation practices, and the fragile geo-physiology of these regions. The podu system has developed in tune with the climatic conditions of the Southern Orissa districts.

Here monsoon is the main agricultural season. It is characterised by a thin continuous drizzle for four to five months of the year as indicated in the district gazeteers. It provides the continuous moisture necessary for hill slope cultivation, without washing away the soil to any significant extent. The mean Minimum Temperature used to be 16 degree Celcius and mean Maximum Temperature 20 degree Celsius.  The shifting cultivation crops are completely tuned to this.  Their shallow root zones thrive on the thin soil layers of shifting cultivation, while their moisture tolerance enables them to survive and produce a bountiful harvest. The burning enriches the potassium content of the soil, while also controlling pests, and weeds.

Tribal knowledge systems also have a deep understanding of the crop rotation practices required to maintain the shifting cultivation cycles at the optimal level. In the lowland paddy areas tribal communities have developed indigenous systems of water management and crop optimisation, combining long duration and short duration varieties that enables the crops to withstand the high water currents of the monsoons in the valley bottom land, while optimising land use.

In recent years, this pattern of gentle rain for long periods has been replaced by cloud bursts and cyclonic weather that cause huge soil wash outs, destroying upland crops, and inundating valley bottom fields as well. 

All this has brought the tribal communities, to the brink of starvation. In fact hunger stares them in the face for several months in a year, their rich forests have disappeared, their luxurious hill slopes on which they could grow unto 10 different crops in one place in one season have turned to barren patches of rock, and rubble, on which they keep trying their 'Podu', in desperation trying to relive the memories of those bountiful days, in not such a distant past.

What is the way out? Permanent tree crops substituting 'Podu'  is an option which only underlines the failure of modern science, and present day government and multi-lateral programmes in addressing the problem. It has been tried time and again, and lead to little change.

On the other hand, if the plantation economy is established in regions like Koraput, then we are in grave danger of loosing the tribal communities, who will be replaced by rich business men, who can easily afford to wait out the period required for plantations to become productive. This business class can also respond to the other dynamics of a commercial plantation economy, unlike the local tribal farmers. Along with the tribal communities, we will also loose the rich plant genetic diversity so carefully preserved by these conscientious and responsible ecosystem people. The proliferation of Eucalyptus groves already bears silent testimony to this in Koraput. The many orchards of spices and coffee coming up are almost all owned by people who are not even from this state.

In the 1990s, the International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD) implemented a project for tribal development in Kashipur Block of Orissa - Orissa Tribal Development Project - the objective was to improve tribal livelihoods through agricultural and market development. A major thrust of the programme was Agro-forestry, wherein the hill-slopes under shifting cultivation were divided into three zones based on gradient, 0-10 degree, 10-30 degree and 30 degree and above. The 0-10 degree slope was earmarked for annual cropping with soil and water conservation measures being undertaken; 10-30 degree slope was earmarked for agro-forestry and slope above 30 degree were earmarked for plantation. The entire hill slope was divided into stripes of one hectare and was distributed to the tribal families with priority being given to the landless. The zone of 0-10 degree slopes was surveyed and settled with ownership rights given to the tillers.  

Soil conservation measures like constructing contour stone and vegetative bunds on the hill slopes checking gully and ravine formation through appropriate drainage treatment and other erosions control measures, etc. Fruit-bearing trees like mango, litchi, guava, cashew etc. were introduced as part of agro-forestry.

Miscellaneous plantation was taken up on the slopes above 30 degree. Using sophisticated equipments, land survey and settlement processes was completed in 400 villages of Kashipur and pattas were distributed in more than 150 villages. Local NGOs and Tribal Leadership were engaged in the decision making process. Thus, the conflict was minimized.

Initially, this model was adopted by the tribals with a lot of enthusiasm. The land was settled and pattas were issued after the government  passed an order that this kind of agriculture should be applicable to all tribal areas. However, the impact of these measures had poor sustainability, and now the agro-forestry slopes bear mute testimony to the inadequacy of present day know-how to reclaim wastelands in high relief shifting cultivation areas.

Several watershed projects have also been taken up under different government programmes in the tribal regions. These projects with substantial investments for earthworks, water resource development, manpower, etc. have had hardly any impact as also done very little to establish the viability of the soil conservation and erosion treatment model for environmentally degraded upland tribal areas. A few watersheds have helped a fraction of the tribal community to improve their livelihoods, but by and large, these fractions do not include the poorer sections. On the other hand the land development measures have done little or nothing to improve soil fertility, decrease top soil loss, or to help establish a healthy vegetative cover.

According to a Planning Commission Report, the 16.5 million hectares treated under the micro-watershed approach; do not get reflected in net sown area, which has stagnated at around 142 million hectares for the last 20 years. According to the Planning Commission, “Although the Ministries of Agriculture and Rural Development have implemented watershed projects for more than a decade, evaluation reports have shown that most projects have failed to generate sustainability because of the failure of government agencies to involve the people. ………….Most government watershed development investments have yielded disappointing results given the vast resources allocated…….”

Several reports indicate the multi-level failure of the watershed programme. Many of the causes of failure are attributed to poor people’s participation. However, there is little review of the techniques and technology used for the treatment of watersheds, and to link the interventions to livelihood needs of the poorer sections of the community.

Thus while NGOs do better with their increased sensitivity towards the needs of the more marginalised sections, the cost-benefit ratios for watersheds, still raise a huge amount of questions.

This is especially unfortunate in the upland tribal areas, where the pace of environmental degradation is accelerating, with accompanying impoverishment of and distress of the local communities. The poor results of the watershed approach does little to build up the faith of the tribal people who respond in but a superficial manner, in anticipation of the wage payment as some succour to their poverty stricken lives. Watersheds also fail to recognise the traditional knowledge systems, and do little to promote indigenous varieties and crops. There is an imperative need to address all this, for any level of people’s involvement and sustainability.

One option for tribal communities could be conservation agriculture. In Brazil as also other Latin American countries, a concerted effort for Conservation Agriculture has helped shifting cultivation farmers to improve production, check soil erosion, and improve the overall ecology. These efforts have gone to show that “Where new conservation-effective technologies or practices have met farmer requirements for risk aversion, create no major conflicts and have an assured beneficial effect, adoption has been shown to be very rapid, e.g. zero tillage in the Brazilian credo, use of shade trees for coffee production in parts of Costa Rica, agro-forestry in Kenya and Nepal.” (FAO Case Study). Conservation agriculture is being actively promoted as it is now known that this technology mitigates, and in fact counters climate change by sequestering atmospheric carbon into the soil.

The European Parliament in its final wrap up conference of a project initiated by European Parliament under initiative of Member of Parliament M. Stephane Le Foll, and run by the Joint Research Center of European Union under the leadership of Directorate of Agriculture and Rural Development of the Commission recognized that Conservation Agriculture, with “No-Till in continuous soil coverage, should be retained as the main way to maintain a productive agriculture, to meet the challenge of food security, but also to assume its place on global agricultural markets by producing more, and respecting the resources, and being competitive.”

The Commission further recognized “Conservation Agriculture, because of its proven results, [as] has been confirmed by the studies and during the feed-back sessions by nearly all speakers, as the form of agriculture the more able to meet the missions of the future European agricultural policy.”

As conservation agriculture allows farmers to cultivate the crops of their choice and preference, we have found a high level of acceptance of CA and especially OCA (Organic Conservation agriculture) practices amongst farmers in the tribal areas. The acceptance and readiness to give land for OCA experiments was beyond all our expectations in the districts of Koraput and Rayagada .

In India, many farmers have established OCA farms following in the foot-steps of the great Japanese Philosopher-farmer: Masanobu Fukuoka. Their natural farming efforts have visibly better results than the farms of their neighbours who insist on sticking to traditional practices. One such farmer in Madhya Pradesh is Mr.  Raju Titus. His example in his own farm, as also his efforts to upscale it, in farms of some of the retired bureaucrats of MP Government have had their effect, with the State Government now planning to bring the whole state under CA, and Natural Farming.

In India, the state as well as the NGO sector must necessarily begin efforts in this direction; otherwise, we shall loose a wealth of genetic resources, along with the local knowledge systems of indigenous communities, whose value cannot be calculated in dollar or rupee terms!

Now coming to the issue of distress migration, many tribals in South Orissa and Landless and small farmers in West Orissa are facing distress migration. It is noticed that despite a plethora of government schemes and programmes, the number of migrants are increasing alarmingly every year.

The media is also bringing out pathetic stories of these migrants languishing in the most inhuman manner away from their home. The most practical strategy to combat this migration is to promote Family Farms with application of Conservation Agriculture.  The Family Farms can be established in the land of small and marginal farmers. The Landless can be settled in family farms giving them 1 Ha of government wasteland and providing them with back-up support. The success of Family Farms depend on three things – a) Good Fencing to protect from cattle menace , b) Second crop with residual moisture and c) Application of organic manures and composts to increase soil fertility.  If irrigation is provided, it is a plus point. We have several case-studies where the tribal farmers are earning substantial income by taking three crops of different combination. Organising these small-land holders into a Network will be the next stage of support to facilitate transfer of technology, marketing and value addition. The village commons can also be transformed to Family Farms by Mahila Mandals which can be integrated as a family or Kutumb. If the whole village converts all the arable land into Family Farms with application of Conservation of Agriculture, then it will be converted into an Eco-village. The concept and practice of Eco-village is a global phenomenon. Some so called scientists are talking of soil-less agriculture, water-less agriculture, human-less and machine-driven agriculture. Everything is perhaps possible in this crazy world but without going in the natural and cultural way of farming, the poor will go hungry.  

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Letter of protest from Orissa to Arvind Kejirwala on study for award  by PCRF

Dear Mr.  Arvind Kejirwala

To-day on 29.10.09, I came across a news item in various  local Oriya news papers  like DHARITRI, PRAGATIVADI where It was found that  you have  congratulated Mr. D. N. Padhi, Orissa Chief Information Commissioner  as best performing Commissioner in India. I seriously object it  and your  nomination procedure   for selecting Mr. Padhi as best performer.

While going through your mail to RTI Activist groups of Kerala  who have seriously objected  your awarding giving endeavour, I came to know that you have taken two parameters like (a)  disclosure of information to complainant/appellant by Information Commissions and (b) Deterrent Impact: Percentage of cases in which penalties were imposed.

In these two fields, the performance of Information Commission  is worst in Orissa. The bad performance of Orissa Commission has made the activists and Citizens  disappointed and frustrated.

You have mentioned that you have drawn the conclusion from the orders downloaded from the website of the Commission. Now the question is raised is it downloaded randomly  or total cases of a quarter. If it is downloaded randomly, then it is wrong. It is better take a disposal of cases of a quarter.

I do present  here   statistics of disposal cases of a quarter  of Orissa Information Commission.

Analysis of  Hearing and final decision of Orissa Information Commissioners in a Quarter ( July to Sept.’09)

• Within this quarter, both the Commissioner has heard total no. of 728 cases.
• No. of cases heard by one Commissioner within 3 months is  364
• No. of cases heard by one commissioner in a month  is    182
• If 24 days is taken as dates for hearing in a month, then a single commissioner heard only 8 cases per day.
• In this quarter, both the commissioners have disposed of 200 cases ( 184 complaint case and 16 second appeal cases) as per figure available in  the website.  
• One Commissioner has disposed off 33 cases per month. It means approximately  1 case in a day ( 24 days taken as date for hearing in a month)

Please judge the performance of the Orissa Commission from  this stistics.

In Orissa, Functioning of Orissa Commission is dismal.  The complaint cases filed by the citizens take years together ( two to three years)   for final disposal with six to eight times hearing.  When  a citizen gets information after two years  with the final disposal orders , the information gets irrelevant  for the citizens. Even in hundreds of cases, the citizens have not got information despite  intervention of the Commission. The Commission has precariously failed to ensure it  ( for example CC No- 105/2007) on the ground that information is not available in the office as  presented by PIO. The office of the Orissa Commission is also going redundant  for citizens which we  discovered  in the State Convention  on RTI organized  in Bhubaneswar on  22^nd and 23^rd November’09. Many citizens, RTI Activist shared their discontentment over functioning of the Commission and denial of hustice to them. I will share with you the details report for your reference.

Secondly,  in case of penalty cases which you have referred, it is horrible in Orissa. If we take total complaint and appeal cases as violation of RTI Act for which a citizens  has made complaint or appeal, the Commission has imposed penalty  on less than  10% of cases. The PIOs who have  got penalty are lower level officers like  Panchayat Executive Officers, Junior clerks, diarist,  assistant  etc. not any officers of the  high rank of OAS, IPS, OPS, OJS, IFS, OFS etc. though they are found guilty.   How could you conclude that  the Orissa Information Commission has acted properly. It is totally useless. If you want more information, please go through the study report on  “Status of RTI in Orissa-2008”published by PRIA, New Delhi. If you require any more information we will be happy  to provide you.

Keeping in view the extremely dismal performance of the Orissa Commission, we have  made a lot of complaints  to Governor  to constitute an enquiry  under section 17 of RTI Act.

I request you not to do such type of study in the greater interest of the country. It will simply  kill RTI  in  India in general and RTI in  Orissa in particular.  My request to you is  not to  make RTI mockery which we have got  as weapon after protracted struggle for a transparent and accountable governance system in the country. 

Thanks

Pradip Pradhan

RTI Activist

Orissa

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Dear friends

As you know, to mark the occasion of four years completion of implementation of Right to Information Act,2005 in Orissa, the Civil Society Organisations, RTI   Activists, Journalists, advocates of Orissa High Court, concerned citizens  had congregated  in a State Convention  organized  by “Right to Food Campaign, Orissa” and “NAMASKAR Organisation”  held at Red Cross Bhawan, Bhubaneswar, Orissa  on 22^nd and 23^rd October,2009.  Around 200 participants, RTI Activists hailed from Bolangir, Boudh, Dhenkanal, Angul, Puri, Nayagarh, Kendrapara, Koraput, Sundargarh, Cuttack, Kalahandi districts  had participated  and reflected their experience  and problems  relating  to implementation of RTI Act  in their respective areas. Prominent figures  in the convention were Mr. Prafulla Shamal, Minister for I and PR, Govt. of Orissa,  senior journalists like Mr. Ramahari Mishra,  Mr. Rabi Das, Mr. Prashant Pattnaik,  Mr. Soumya Ranjan Pattnaik, Editor, Mr. Amar Satapathy, MLA, Mr. Panchanan Kanungo, former Minister, Mr. Raju Singh, State Secretary, JD(U), Mr. Karunakar Pattnaik, retired IAS, Mr. Achyut Das, Director, Agragamee,  Dr. Bhagaban Prakash, prominent Civil Society Member, Ms. Supriya Pattnaik, Advocates like Mr. Biswajit Mohanty, Mr. Asish Mishra, Mr. Khirod Rout, Mrs. Usharani Behera, BGVS, Mr. S. .A Safiquee, Mr. Lalit Mishra, Orissa State Vigillance Council, Mr. Chitta Behera, expert had shared their views on four years implementation of RTI Act in the state.

In this convention, a back-ground paper  on  four years  implementation of RTI Act in Orissa   was circulated  among the participants which is enclosed herewith for your reference.

A Booklet on “ RTI in Orissa- Lost 4 years 2005-09: whys and hows” has been published  by Right To Food Campaign, Orissa   which was also circulated   in the convention. This booklet has made  critical analysis   how State Govt., Orissa Information Commission, Office of Speaker, Orissa Legislative Assembly  have failed  to  implement the Act in letter and spirit.  I will be happy to send the booklet to any person interested  to get it. The cost of the Booklet is Rs. 30/- per copy.

Thanks

Pradip Pradhan

S-74, Maitree Vihar

Post-Rail Vihar

C.S.Pur, Bhubaneswar-23

M-99378-43482