Just Jo

A group of scientists and technologists did a research and found out that contrary to the claims of Election Commission of India (of India’s EVMs being “perfect” and “infallible”), the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) are easy to tamper with. Their technical paper (PDF link) details the process they have done to prove their point, with a real EVM. But rather than ordering a detailed inquiry and a fix to those EVMs, the Election Commission arrested Hari K Prasad, one of the researchers, to have stolen an EVM. The research website says “in 2009, the Election Commission of India publicly challenged Prasad to demonstrate that EVMs could be tampered with, only to withhold access to the EVMs at the last minute.”

As per the research website, the device was given by an anonymous source which itself raises questions about the security of these machines. And what exactly should we say about an independent researcher being charged for stealing the machine while the more important questions he raised about the credibility of EVMs are muted? The technical paper (PDF link) also claims that Hari Prasad “was approached in October 2009 by representatives of a prominent regional party who offered to pay for his technical assistance fixing elections. They were promptly and sternly refused.”

It’s another Independence Day. Time to celebrate where we have come so far and to remind ourselves of the roads ahead.

Independence Day is quite often considered as a time to display our nationalistic fervor. We exhibit our nationalism by waving flags or raising flags, distributing sweets and wishing each other. We also exchange emails that say we should take pride in our country etcetera but I wonder if that is what it is all about – an exhibition.

I have asked this question myself – am I proud of my country? I am. I am proud of all the good things and good people we have here. But at the same time I am ashamed of all the bad things and bad people and a bad system that we have in this country. And I think patriotism is not about feeling superior or inferior to any other countries in this world. Plainly put, it is about belonging here.

But just because I feel that I belong no where else in the world but here, it doesn’t mean that I would ridicule any other Indian who doesn’t feel like belonging here and find that sense of belonging elsewhere. I wouldn’t call him/her unpatriotic. Because their feeling of being alienated in their own country pauses a question before ourselves. What is it that makes them feel that way, though they have lived all their lives in this same soil? What makes them feel India is worse for them and perhaps there is a better place in the world than India? What makes them feel that they are secondary citizens in their own country? What makes them feel that democracy and politics are a softened form of the old colonial system? These are the questions that we should ask ourselves and to our society. And it would open up our eyes to see the nation in a different light. Through others’ eyes, and see what went wrong and where. It’s a long process. Seeing it, identifying it, talking about it, getting others to engage with it, making a movement, pressuring authorities to do something about it and thus finally making the change – however small or big it is. In this long process, often people would call you names – “un-patriotic“, “pseudo-nationalist“, “pseudo-secularist“, “anti-development” and what not. Let none of that make you feel down. Keep working your way.

I have high hopes for my country even through all the idiocy and the hopelessness it gives me at times. I think many things have changed for good from the way it was several years ago, thanks to the continued efforts of change makers from grass-root level. I am sure things will continue to improve as many selfless people work towards it even when they are being ridiculed by their fellow countrymen. And I don’t feel inferior of my country when I compare the situation here with other countries that have a more liberal, inclusive and better system in place. Because it did not happen for them on one fine day. It took many brave souls and a long process there too, perhaps the time they took for such changes was shorter.

So here is my humble tribute to those martyrs. To those who were shot at for speaking against the oppressors. Those who were jailed. Those who were beaten or hanged for voicing out. And to those freedom fighters of our times. Many of them, unknown to us. Those who work on to make India a better and better place. Those who work on several issues – dalit, tribal/adivasis, marginalized and economically backward communities, women, sexual minorities, health care, domestic violence, political violence, terrorism, religious extremism, justice, corporate crimes, environment and so on.

To all those brave souls, I dedicate my song…

Song: Vande Mataram 2010
Composed, lead & harmony vocals by: Joseph Thomas (Jo)

Download “Vande Mataram 2010″ MP3 file here (3.58 MB)

“..but more importantly, while the governments in the west agonize over what to do about nutrition for kids, India has actually gone ahead and done something about it.” (From the docu film “India’s Free Lunch“.

As Madhukar Shukla said in Facebook while sharing this video link – “mostly noted when a report of a lizard comes in news, the funds get diverted, or scam hits the scheme, India’s Mid-Day Meal scheme has gone largely unnoticed for the positive impact it has made to many young lives.”

It is official now. Suresh Kalmadi, the organizing committee chairman of the Commonwealth Games has officially stated that beef will not be served during Commonwealth Games in Delhi. Even though he has offered no reason for the beef-ban, the issue was first raised by the former BJP president Rajnath Singh when he wrote to Kalmadi asking him to keep cow meat out of the menu during the Games. Meaning, congress has chosen to succumb to BJP.

What makes me petrified is that this could be the beginning of governments like this surrendering to the demands of religious extremist forces. I think this will lead to an anti-beef bill nationally and Congress’s will take up the role to help BJP implement its agenda (the anti-cow slaughter bill and anti-conversion bill are BJP’s prime agendas). Think about a federal government calling itself ‘progressive‘ and ‘secular‘ doing this in such an international event. What is next? Will they ban pork meat too because radical Muslims find pork meat offensive?

The ultimate question here is about surrendering to the religious extremist forces and taking away a citizen’s freedom of choice. By the same so called ‘progressive‘ and ‘secular‘ government.

Suresh Kalmadi, I bestow upon thee, the Order of the Holy Cow. You and your sirs and madams in Congress can now proudly bear your soft-Hindutva badge on your sleeves.

In my post about Prof. Joseph’s hand-chopping incident, I had written about the intrusion of religious elements into the liberal, democratic and political spheres of Kerala in disguise. I think this is more dangerous than the Hindutva politics because Hindutva politics is there on the surface for everybody to see. Hindutvavaadis thrive on anti-minority sentiments and extreme Hindu-nationalist views, and everybody knows that. Hindutavavaadis never hesitate to boast upon their beliefs (except for the grooming campaigns of Narendra Modi these days), but on the other side, the hard-core Islamists chose to play different. When they learned that terrorism and an extreme Islamist movement is a growing concern in the public, they put on the mask of liberal activism and tried to play more left than the Left. While the Left in Kerala has left itself to be rotten, there was an empty space in the field of activism that was available for others to occupy. And the Islamists were quick to fill in that space. It is said that ‘even the BJP is Leftist in Kerala’. So the best way to get public acceptance was obvious – be more left than the Leftists.

The first step in that direction was taken long back – starting with media. A prominent Malayalam weekly and news daily is owned by such a group. They invited the prominent figures in the socio-political-liberal sphere to write for them and made a mark. Then came their student/youth organizations. They started campaigns and agitations on several issues – Capitalism, Globalization, Bourgeoisie, Western Imperialism, Environment, Development, Human Rights etc. When they shouted slogans against America and Israel, their tones were sharper than the Communists. When they talked about freedom of speech for M F Hussain, they kept mum on the threats and Fatwas issued to Taslima Nasreen. When they talked about Imperialism and Human Rights, they never talked about the Islamic imperialist countries and the grave human rights violation in those countries.

When Madani was released from jail, he also played the same political card. Madani was smart. He saw the possiblity of a wider political spectrum and thus included “Dalits” in his come back. The term “Dalit” had already become a fine selling point of all political parties by then. Madani also banked upon the same “anti-imperialistic” politics of the other Islamist organizations.

But people failed to notice it or chose to ignore. And our socio-political leaders kept taking part in their meetings and that image has been used to boast upon their public acceptance. And now the final step – Jamaat-e-Islami is forming a political party in Kerala. And what is their declared obective? Their Wiki page says, “Establishment of (Islamic) way of life in all aspects of life“. And their core doctrine? “the Divine Being is solely Allah, there being no God except Him, and that Muhammad is Allah’s messenger“. Tell me how it is different from the dream of a Hindu nation proposed by the Sangh Parivar.

Now we have a number of such “political parties” and “activist organizations” in our public sphere. And the news of bombs and detonators being placed in the public spaces and people being hacked in the name of religion is increasing day by day. Even though some of the socio-political leaders and intellectuals have turned a blind-eye towards such developments, the consolation is that there are people like Hameed Chennamangaloor who have been voicing against these groups openly since a very long time. And publications like Mathrubhumi weekly having open debates about this as cover stories. But that is not enough. People have to stand up and say, we don’t want an Islamic or Chrsitian version of BJP or Sangh Parivar. We don’t want religion in our political space. We don’t want that one God or multiple Gods and their doctrines to rule us, instead the secular ethos envisioned by the founding fathers of this country. We want to keep our democracy in place, how much shortcomings and failures it has.

While skipping through the photo galleries of the protest against BP oil spill in America, I saw the following slogans:

BP = $ Over Life
BP profits: The planet & people pay

For a moment, I thought about UC (Union Carbide) and the Bhopal verdict that came out recently. 25 years taken for a weak verdict to come out. It is a shame on us by itself. Add to that the reports of our own Government tried to help Warren Anderson escape the country back in ’84.

Now that the oil has spilled over to the shores of America, killing 11 workers and many species, and demanding BP to clean it’s shores of the USA, would the American Government now understand what it means to a country that lost 20,000 people and the chemical exposure of over 500,000 people in the Bhopal gas tragedy? And help put Warren Anderson to trial?

I don’t know whom to believe any more.

Some say that Maoists are fighting for the tribals because of the abuse they face by the corporates and government. Maoists seem to be a group of people fighting for a cause.

But then I see Maoists killing people, jawans and civilians alike, and that makes me think how can such a group of killers ever fight effectively for a just cause.

Then some activists, including some ex-Naxalites, sign a press copy saying that they condemn the heinous acts of Maoists. They say that both the state and Maoists are abusing the tribals. They say that the fight against the mining industry was born even before Mao himself. And if Maoists have any sincerity in the matter, they should first fight the mining corporates than just plainly taxing them for business.

I don’t know. The picture that I get from all these is of the state and its politicians who make way for some corporates to function smoothly because there is big money for everyone to make in those thick, dark layers of land. And a set of killing machines who kill people to overthrow a corrupt system to replace it with another more centralized and violent system in the name of revolution. And a state-sponsored militia that fights/kills/abuses it’s own people.

I don’t know whom or what to believe anymore. But I do know that I should thank God that I was not born a tribal. For, at the end of the day, they are the ones who are most suffered, abused and wiped out of history that we, rest of the people in this land, keep making. I should be happy that I am not one of those unlucky tribals. But then that darn line keeps ringing in my head:

“THEN THEY CAME for me
and by that time no one was left to speak up.“

I’ve just gone through a series of videos by Unreported World and two of them struck me so much because it was shot here in India. You MUST checkout their series of reports from world over and particularly the following:

The Broken People
“We’re forced to eat rats, because we cannot afford to buy food”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yc7iiFPDbDc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=leUEtR7ZUWk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiLFVuosdm4

The Land of Missing Children

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7Wm4nasexY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_fT-yQ6WnE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I4Lc-yDGJU

“Justice is done” was the initial response of many Indians in the online and offline world, when the court verdict on Ajmal Kasab came out yesterday. I don’t understand what justice is being done here. Let me clarify – I am not talking about human rights and all that when it comes to Kasab. He deserves a severe punishment for the kind of crime he did. And a death row is definitely not a severe punishment for Kasab, because we are ending up doing LeT’s job for them. Kasab came here to kill as many people as he could and also either to kill himself or get killed in the process. And ironically, in the name of justice we are giving him what he really wanted – death. His masters would be happy that a country’s judicial system is doing what they originally intended to do – to kill a low-level suicide militant. Is that justice done to the victims of 26/11?

And is this going to send any message to LeT or such terrorist outfits? Is hanging Kasab going to stop them? Kasab’s masters would get a thousand Kasabs to replace him for their on-going or future operations. They have no use of getting a Kasab back, when they have new, unknown and enthusiastic Kasabs ready to kill themselves for their masters.

So what result is hanging Kasab going to bring? Kasab, the scapegoat of his terrorist masterminds in Pakistan, has now become the scapegoat here too. The government with all it’s intelligence failures and the inability to track down the mastermind roots will now gloat that we could kill a terrorist (after he’s done what he came here to do). The issue of our police force not being equipped with the right and proper armor (Karkare, a brave man, gave his life because of such ill-planning) will now die down.

I am not asking for mercy for Kasab, but a severe punishment; severe than a death sentence. And I think the best way to punish Kasab would be a rigorous life sentence as actor Rahul Khanna has tweeted. There would be more suffering than ending your life in a moment. With the hanging of Kasab, we are just taking a revenge, not doing justice.

And that’s got me thinking – When a victim takes revenge, it is called a Crime. When the state does that revenge for a victim, it is called Justice. Isn’t that funny?

I have a thing against the Burqa. I think that thing represents a system of oppression designed by religion and men. Burqa, in my mind, has always remained to be a symbol of oppression, no matter how much those religious folks try to justify it by calling it a way of “protection”. So I was slightly amused when this Burqa-clad woman followed me on Twitter and had a look at her profile and there she is – A Burqa-clad woman who is fighting the very same thing that I think Burqas represent – Oppression.

Meet Masarat Daud, who is working to set girls of our rural areas free from oppression using education as a tool and bringing an event like TEDx to India’s villages, even with fighting the religious orthodoxy. Masrat runs an educational program called 8 Day Academy. She is changing the face of education in rural India through her work and is responsible for hundreds of girls getting the opportunity to attend schools. Since February 2009, Masarat has held three sessions of 8-Day Academy in her hometown Fatehpur, Rajasthan, training teachers and students from a local school in Computers and in Public Speaking & Communication skills. After eight days of Computers training, the team was able to use MS Word, MS Paint and know the theory of computing. All this by people who had never seen a computer before!

And then she brought TEDx to Shekhavati and you can read/listen more about her exciting and inspiring stories here and here . Also see her TEDx Shekhavati speech below: