The Soft Option
Farzana Versey December 3, 2000
#592 Posted by khanfer on March 18, 2001 7:52:05 pm
Hi Farzana,
I think that the Hindus have a claim to Kashmir too. A lot of their cultural heritage goes back to Kashmir. And you have to admit that a lot of Hindus have fled from Kashmir now fearing Islamic persecution. So why not let it remain in a secular India where both Hindus and Muslims can live there in harmony.
/Khanfer
I think that the Hindus have a claim to Kashmir too. A lot of their cultural heritage goes back to Kashmir. And you have to admit that a lot of Hindus have fled from Kashmir now fearing Islamic persecution. So why not let it remain in a secular India where both Hindus and Muslims can live there in harmony.
/Khanfer
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#591 Posted by cutandpaste on January 9, 2001 8:01:40 pm
WEDNESDAY JANUARY 09 2002
Cover story
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0%2C%2C7-2002013426%2C00.html
A state of war
BY TREVOR FISHLOCK
The dispute over Kashmir has brought India and Pakistan to the brink of nuclear war. But why has this beautiful state become the subcontinent`s powder keg?
Poets hymned it as a land of love and languor. In 1627 the dying emperor Jahangir, who shaped its blissful gardens, was asked to name his last desire. “Only Kashmir,” he murmured. “Only Kashmir.”
India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, promised melodramatically that its name was written upon his heart. Today, millions make the same emotive claim.
Passions for Kashmir run hot and bitter, the bayonets almost touch and the urge for war is strong. Two rivals, two ideas, two faiths stand nose to nose in one of the world’s most dangerous places. One mistake or misjudgment and the spark falls on the fuse.
India and Pakistan have fought three wars, two of them over Kashmir. The great bulk of their armies are based along the frontier that runs through Punjab and Kashmir. The border is always tense.
In Kashmir there has been an almost permanent grumbling small war of artillery bombardment. Apart from the all-out conflicts, India and Pakistan have two or three times pulled back from the brink, and now the assessments of their military power have to include their nuclear capability. There was a particularly dangerous stand-off in 1990.
It was inevitable that the terrorist attack on the Indian Parliament on December 13 would bring India and Pakistan once more to the edge of the abyss. It was an echo of the October suicide bomb attack on the Kashmir assembly. The Parliament in Delhi is the heart and emblem of what India stands for. Now India is raging.
Poor Kashmir. It lies in the Himalayan ramparts where the borders of India, Pakistan and China rub together. Reality mocks its beauty. There is no escaping the permeating melancholy of a land that lies under the gun. It is as if malevolent gods, jealous of its loveliness, placed a curse upon it.
The poison entered the garden in 1947 when the war-weary British quit their Indian empire and partitioned it. They had no wish to cut it up: one of their imperial achievements, they said, was to have united India and made it secure. They divided it to meet the demands of Muslim leaders who said that Hindus and Muslims could not live together in one country, that the communities formed two separate nations. Pakistan was therefore created as a homeland for the subcontinent’s Muslims.
Britain ruled India with the co-operation of more than 500 Indian princes, a galaxy of maharajahs, rajahs, ranas, raos, khans, mirs, jams, nizams and nawabs, loyal to the British crown, well-oiled with flattery, some fantastically rich and a few of them barmy. In the summer of 1947, these rulers had to choose whether to take their states into India or Pakistan. It was a personal decision, without referendum.
Public opinion hardly came into it. Most princes joined India. Most knew that they would be extinguishing themselves as a ruling class, but it was clear to all but a few that the game was up. On the eve of independence, all the princes had made up their minds except four.
The Maharajah of Kashmir, Sir Hari Singh, was one of the ditherers. He was vain, pompous and addicted to hunting bears and shooting ducks. As a young man he had an unfortunate scrape in London, being found in bed with a woman at the Savoy Hotel and milked for a lot of money by a blackmailer pretending to be the woman’s husband.
At Partition, Kashmir, more fully known as Jammu and Kashmir, was in a key position: a prize because it was a large state and famously beautiful, a honeymooners’ resort of lakes and cool alpine meadows.
Given its place on the map, it could have swung either to India or to Pakistan. Because of its overwhelming Muslim majority, Pakistan’s new leaders expected that it would join their Islamic entity. But the maharajah had to decide — and he was a Hindu. This was not unusual. In princely India, Muslims often ruled Hindus and vice versa. But Hari Singh dithered. He could not believe that the British would really go home. He did not want to join Pakistan because he could not bear the thought of his state being subsumed. He dreamt that Kashmir could somehow be an independent country and he could keep his power.
India and Pakistan became independent in August. Hari Singh was still dithering in October. As he fiddled, the storm broke. Thousands of Pathan warriors from the North-West Frontier, bordering Afghanistan, rushed into Kashmir, vowing to seize it for Pakistan. Although they were a rabble, they might have succeeded. They were close to Srinagar, the capital, when they were delayed by their lust for loot and women. While they pillaged towns and raped girls and nuns, the hapless Hari Singh gathered up his diamonds and Purdey shotguns and fled his palace in a motorcade.
India acted fast and decisively. In a flurry of action the maharajah agreed to join India, and Indian forces flew to save Srinagar. This was the first Kashmir war, not an all-out confrontation but a series of fights and communal conflicts. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the leader of Pakistan, wanted to send the new Pakistan regular Army into action, but did not do so when the absurdity of the situation was pointed out to him: the forces of India and Pakistan shared a commander-in-chief, Field Marshal Sir Claude Auchinleck, while many officers on both sides were British.
Kashmir was left divided along the line where fighting stopped in 1948. A United Nations ceasefire came into force on January 1, 1949. In 1965 Pakistan tried and failed to annexe Kashmir and was defeated in brief and bitter fighting. At one stage Indian forces were almost at the gates of Lahore and could easily have taken it. Pakistan’s leaders believed that Kashmiris would welcome Pakistani troops as liberators. It was a shock that they did not. In 1971 India and Pakistan went to war again, India assisting the secession of East Pakistan, which became Bangladesh. Pakistan was left truncated and humiliated.
Yet the story of a vacillating maharajah and the ensuing bloody quarrel over territory is only the half of it.
Kashmir is a tragedy for its divided people and a continuing source of danger in a subcontinent inhabited by a fifth of the world’s population. The tragedy has deep roots. Kashmir is the offspring of bitterly divorced parents. Pakistan aches for it but will never possess it. India will never let it go: it is not negotiable. The trouble is that both sides define themselves by this feud.
Their mutual suspicions date from the 8th-century Muslim conquest of western India and the many hundreds of years of Mogul rule that were brought to an end by the British Raj. For India’s Hindu majority, independence in 1947 was a reclamation of their vast land, the end of centuries of foreign domination. Nehru and others believed passionately that this new India would be a daring concept, an embracing of all its religious, linguistic and regional diversity, a magnificent secular state.
The steely and intractable Jinnah did not believe it. His new country of Pakistan grew out of that scepticism, the belief that Muslims in India would be vulnerable, second-class citizens.
Pakistan was an invented state, a by-product of the great Indian struggle for independence. It evolved in the last few years of British rule among people who wanted to escape religious and political discrimination in the new order. Landowners especially thought they would lose out in India. Democracy barely made the journey to Pakistan.
In a sense Pakistan remains stranded in 1947. Its great debate has centred for half a century on what it is for and what it should be. Jinnah mused that it could be a secular country. But in that case, what was the point of Partition? Some of his successors said that Pakistan was nothing if not Islamic and determined to make it more so, a military theocracy.
Yet Islam proved an unreliable glue. It did not cement Pakistan and East Pakistan. Bangladesh erupted as the assertion of Bengali language and culture. Nor did it cement the disparate parts of Pakistan itself — Punjab, Baluchistan, Sindh and the North- West Frontier — or, indeed, the many shades of Islamic belief. Thus Kashmir is useful, the “unfinished business of Partition”. However much Pakistanis disagree about the nature of their society, they find common cause in Kashmir, the belief that they were robbed in 1947. This is the unifying insult. It is why Pakistan has supported Kashmiri insurgents. India’s treatment of Kashmiris during the long years of internal strife are held as proof that Jinnah was right, that Muslims needed their homeland.
It is true that India could have managed Kashmir more wisely, less roughly. But Pakistan has to live with the fact that there are more Muslims in India than in Pakistan. India has the second largest Muslim population in the world: evidently Hindus and Muslims do live together in a secular society, Nehru’s idea of India, even if it is not always easy. And Kashmir, the only Indian state with a Muslim majority, is in Indian minds the shining fact of secular India. Its existence throws the question to Pakistan again: what was Partition for? India has a powerful idea of its identity. It is the giant of South Asia, its Armed Forces are huge and it is proud of its democracy, even if this is somewhat battered. Pakistan, on the other hand, does not enjoy such a positive identity. It thinks of itself in terms of its neighbour and endures the negative of being Not India.
It means that even if the impossible were to happen, that Kashmir should somehow become part of Pakistan, the anxieties and insecurities of Pakistan would endure. There would have to be another issue by which Pakistan could seek to establish its identity and purpose.
In the meantime the two nations face each other again — and judging from what we see and hear, there are many on both sides desperate to fight. Centuries of prejudice are poured into the funnel of Kashmir.
People on both sides treasure the slights of history. There is an endless misunderstanding of each other’s beliefs and opinions. Estrangement is total. Trivial matters become huge. Hindu nationalists complain that Muslims cheer for Pakistan during Test matches. In both India and Pakistan, keen teams of monitors comb through guide books and encyclopaedias searching for maps that might contain instances of “cartographic aggression” — inaccuracies that seem to favour one side or the other.
Words are traps, and there is a sense that a comma could cause a crisis. But the opinions of outsiders are not welcome. For this is a feud between cousins, a quarrel in the family. It could hardly be more acrid and perilous.
Cover story
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0%2C%2C7-2002013426%2C00.html
A state of war
BY TREVOR FISHLOCK
The dispute over Kashmir has brought India and Pakistan to the brink of nuclear war. But why has this beautiful state become the subcontinent`s powder keg?
Poets hymned it as a land of love and languor. In 1627 the dying emperor Jahangir, who shaped its blissful gardens, was asked to name his last desire. “Only Kashmir,” he murmured. “Only Kashmir.”
India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, promised melodramatically that its name was written upon his heart. Today, millions make the same emotive claim.
Passions for Kashmir run hot and bitter, the bayonets almost touch and the urge for war is strong. Two rivals, two ideas, two faiths stand nose to nose in one of the world’s most dangerous places. One mistake or misjudgment and the spark falls on the fuse.
India and Pakistan have fought three wars, two of them over Kashmir. The great bulk of their armies are based along the frontier that runs through Punjab and Kashmir. The border is always tense.
In Kashmir there has been an almost permanent grumbling small war of artillery bombardment. Apart from the all-out conflicts, India and Pakistan have two or three times pulled back from the brink, and now the assessments of their military power have to include their nuclear capability. There was a particularly dangerous stand-off in 1990.
It was inevitable that the terrorist attack on the Indian Parliament on December 13 would bring India and Pakistan once more to the edge of the abyss. It was an echo of the October suicide bomb attack on the Kashmir assembly. The Parliament in Delhi is the heart and emblem of what India stands for. Now India is raging.
Poor Kashmir. It lies in the Himalayan ramparts where the borders of India, Pakistan and China rub together. Reality mocks its beauty. There is no escaping the permeating melancholy of a land that lies under the gun. It is as if malevolent gods, jealous of its loveliness, placed a curse upon it.
The poison entered the garden in 1947 when the war-weary British quit their Indian empire and partitioned it. They had no wish to cut it up: one of their imperial achievements, they said, was to have united India and made it secure. They divided it to meet the demands of Muslim leaders who said that Hindus and Muslims could not live together in one country, that the communities formed two separate nations. Pakistan was therefore created as a homeland for the subcontinent’s Muslims.
Britain ruled India with the co-operation of more than 500 Indian princes, a galaxy of maharajahs, rajahs, ranas, raos, khans, mirs, jams, nizams and nawabs, loyal to the British crown, well-oiled with flattery, some fantastically rich and a few of them barmy. In the summer of 1947, these rulers had to choose whether to take their states into India or Pakistan. It was a personal decision, without referendum.
Public opinion hardly came into it. Most princes joined India. Most knew that they would be extinguishing themselves as a ruling class, but it was clear to all but a few that the game was up. On the eve of independence, all the princes had made up their minds except four.
The Maharajah of Kashmir, Sir Hari Singh, was one of the ditherers. He was vain, pompous and addicted to hunting bears and shooting ducks. As a young man he had an unfortunate scrape in London, being found in bed with a woman at the Savoy Hotel and milked for a lot of money by a blackmailer pretending to be the woman’s husband.
At Partition, Kashmir, more fully known as Jammu and Kashmir, was in a key position: a prize because it was a large state and famously beautiful, a honeymooners’ resort of lakes and cool alpine meadows.
Given its place on the map, it could have swung either to India or to Pakistan. Because of its overwhelming Muslim majority, Pakistan’s new leaders expected that it would join their Islamic entity. But the maharajah had to decide — and he was a Hindu. This was not unusual. In princely India, Muslims often ruled Hindus and vice versa. But Hari Singh dithered. He could not believe that the British would really go home. He did not want to join Pakistan because he could not bear the thought of his state being subsumed. He dreamt that Kashmir could somehow be an independent country and he could keep his power.
India and Pakistan became independent in August. Hari Singh was still dithering in October. As he fiddled, the storm broke. Thousands of Pathan warriors from the North-West Frontier, bordering Afghanistan, rushed into Kashmir, vowing to seize it for Pakistan. Although they were a rabble, they might have succeeded. They were close to Srinagar, the capital, when they were delayed by their lust for loot and women. While they pillaged towns and raped girls and nuns, the hapless Hari Singh gathered up his diamonds and Purdey shotguns and fled his palace in a motorcade.
India acted fast and decisively. In a flurry of action the maharajah agreed to join India, and Indian forces flew to save Srinagar. This was the first Kashmir war, not an all-out confrontation but a series of fights and communal conflicts. Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the leader of Pakistan, wanted to send the new Pakistan regular Army into action, but did not do so when the absurdity of the situation was pointed out to him: the forces of India and Pakistan shared a commander-in-chief, Field Marshal Sir Claude Auchinleck, while many officers on both sides were British.
Kashmir was left divided along the line where fighting stopped in 1948. A United Nations ceasefire came into force on January 1, 1949. In 1965 Pakistan tried and failed to annexe Kashmir and was defeated in brief and bitter fighting. At one stage Indian forces were almost at the gates of Lahore and could easily have taken it. Pakistan’s leaders believed that Kashmiris would welcome Pakistani troops as liberators. It was a shock that they did not. In 1971 India and Pakistan went to war again, India assisting the secession of East Pakistan, which became Bangladesh. Pakistan was left truncated and humiliated.
Yet the story of a vacillating maharajah and the ensuing bloody quarrel over territory is only the half of it.
Kashmir is a tragedy for its divided people and a continuing source of danger in a subcontinent inhabited by a fifth of the world’s population. The tragedy has deep roots. Kashmir is the offspring of bitterly divorced parents. Pakistan aches for it but will never possess it. India will never let it go: it is not negotiable. The trouble is that both sides define themselves by this feud.
Their mutual suspicions date from the 8th-century Muslim conquest of western India and the many hundreds of years of Mogul rule that were brought to an end by the British Raj. For India’s Hindu majority, independence in 1947 was a reclamation of their vast land, the end of centuries of foreign domination. Nehru and others believed passionately that this new India would be a daring concept, an embracing of all its religious, linguistic and regional diversity, a magnificent secular state.
The steely and intractable Jinnah did not believe it. His new country of Pakistan grew out of that scepticism, the belief that Muslims in India would be vulnerable, second-class citizens.
Pakistan was an invented state, a by-product of the great Indian struggle for independence. It evolved in the last few years of British rule among people who wanted to escape religious and political discrimination in the new order. Landowners especially thought they would lose out in India. Democracy barely made the journey to Pakistan.
In a sense Pakistan remains stranded in 1947. Its great debate has centred for half a century on what it is for and what it should be. Jinnah mused that it could be a secular country. But in that case, what was the point of Partition? Some of his successors said that Pakistan was nothing if not Islamic and determined to make it more so, a military theocracy.
Yet Islam proved an unreliable glue. It did not cement Pakistan and East Pakistan. Bangladesh erupted as the assertion of Bengali language and culture. Nor did it cement the disparate parts of Pakistan itself — Punjab, Baluchistan, Sindh and the North- West Frontier — or, indeed, the many shades of Islamic belief. Thus Kashmir is useful, the “unfinished business of Partition”. However much Pakistanis disagree about the nature of their society, they find common cause in Kashmir, the belief that they were robbed in 1947. This is the unifying insult. It is why Pakistan has supported Kashmiri insurgents. India’s treatment of Kashmiris during the long years of internal strife are held as proof that Jinnah was right, that Muslims needed their homeland.
It is true that India could have managed Kashmir more wisely, less roughly. But Pakistan has to live with the fact that there are more Muslims in India than in Pakistan. India has the second largest Muslim population in the world: evidently Hindus and Muslims do live together in a secular society, Nehru’s idea of India, even if it is not always easy. And Kashmir, the only Indian state with a Muslim majority, is in Indian minds the shining fact of secular India. Its existence throws the question to Pakistan again: what was Partition for? India has a powerful idea of its identity. It is the giant of South Asia, its Armed Forces are huge and it is proud of its democracy, even if this is somewhat battered. Pakistan, on the other hand, does not enjoy such a positive identity. It thinks of itself in terms of its neighbour and endures the negative of being Not India.
It means that even if the impossible were to happen, that Kashmir should somehow become part of Pakistan, the anxieties and insecurities of Pakistan would endure. There would have to be another issue by which Pakistan could seek to establish its identity and purpose.
In the meantime the two nations face each other again — and judging from what we see and hear, there are many on both sides desperate to fight. Centuries of prejudice are poured into the funnel of Kashmir.
People on both sides treasure the slights of history. There is an endless misunderstanding of each other’s beliefs and opinions. Estrangement is total. Trivial matters become huge. Hindu nationalists complain that Muslims cheer for Pakistan during Test matches. In both India and Pakistan, keen teams of monitors comb through guide books and encyclopaedias searching for maps that might contain instances of “cartographic aggression” — inaccuracies that seem to favour one side or the other.
Words are traps, and there is a sense that a comma could cause a crisis. But the opinions of outsiders are not welcome. For this is a feud between cousins, a quarrel in the family. It could hardly be more acrid and perilous.
#590 Posted by krashid on December 31, 2000 6:09:18 am
The sexy post #590 cannot be from me, if my memory is still working.
#589 Posted by FarzanaVersey on December 31, 2000 6:09:18 am
TO ALL OF YOU!
Just wanted to say a big thank you for giving so much of yourself to the discussion at Chowk.
However, I do feel that some things have gone of at a tangent. If you guys (and chicks, ok!) are having fun, good for you.
There have been occasions when too much was said about too little, and, being human, I too got caught in the momentum. A ripple was given the status of a storm.
I hope you will understand my need for a break from all this. I was told to just keep quiet and ignore the posts completely; that is unlike me. But I am afraid that I will not reply to any further posts on my two Boards. I just don`t have anything more to say. And as one of you said, I do not need to clarify myself all the time.
Thanks anyway for the music, of all kinds. I will peep in here just to see how you are doing. And I hope to continue to learn something.
And just for the record, those Ganesha statues are not ornamental pieces. They have a great deal of sentimental value for me. Everything does.
So goodbye to all that jazz and the blues,and
hello to a new you. And me.
Warm regards,
Farzana
#588 Posted by krashid on December 29, 2000 10:37:00 pm
nachieta #588
Yes I have also started getting the air of India, and how to play by the RULES:-)
Yes I have also started getting the air of India, and how to play by the RULES:-)
#587 Posted by krashid on December 29, 2000 10:35:31 pm
AnNY..
cool stuff.. well.. you feel you`re wierd. Not so, I`m not a girl, but I know so very many with a mind set the likes of yours.
So how is the feeding frenzy coming along. That`s awesome you fed a few needy. I`m referring to your response in ``When Pinky Broke My Heart`` - You got off on a sarcastic note, or so I interpreted it to be, but then we both made some sense to each other.
I tell you, young women like you in this world, do make that little difference all the normal one`s are hesitant to bother with.
You`re not wierd, you`re sick of the society aloto f other young women like yourself are. I hear from them so very often what you have penned here.
PS. Don`t wax too hard. you`re hurt yourself. No reason to get your frustrations out in this painful manner. Stick to the writing business
CHeers
cool stuff.. well.. you feel you`re wierd. Not so, I`m not a girl, but I know so very many with a mind set the likes of yours.
So how is the feeding frenzy coming along. That`s awesome you fed a few needy. I`m referring to your response in ``When Pinky Broke My Heart`` - You got off on a sarcastic note, or so I interpreted it to be, but then we both made some sense to each other.
I tell you, young women like you in this world, do make that little difference all the normal one`s are hesitant to bother with.
You`re not wierd, you`re sick of the society aloto f other young women like yourself are. I hear from them so very often what you have penned here.
PS. Don`t wax too hard. you`re hurt yourself. No reason to get your frustrations out in this painful manner. Stick to the writing business
CHeers
#586 Posted by MaheshG on December 29, 2000 9:02:42 pm
Farzana,
You would be happy if India was a Hindu state. According to you it is. Then what are you complaining about?
A question though. Do you consider India to be as anti-minority as Pakistan and Bangladesh? Please be honest. If you say yes then I will no longer question you on your fascination of them being openly anti-minority. If you say no then I say you are not justified in talking about India and those two countries in the same breath.
#585 Posted by Nachiketa on December 29, 2000 9:39:09 am
Posts number 585 & 586 are not mine. Some wires at Chowk seem to have been crossed.
Response to Krashid (# 579) - Trust you to bring religion into this.
And to Farzana Versey (#581)-
You say “I do believe that if someone does not agree or like a writer’s way of putting things across, they have no business to run down people who respond”. That is what I define as an illogical conclusion. It was the quality of your writing I was running down, not the interactors nor the quality of their writing. On Chowk often the interacts acquire a life of their own.
You go on to say “since I personally address only those who possess some decorum and have been here on a regular basis, I do not think a one-shot visitor has much worth”. Don’t put much value to research do you ? Refer my earlier posts # 107, 109 and 118. And even if I was a ‘one-shot’ visitor how can you conclude that I have not been regularly browsing Chowk ? Or does that not count as visiting ?
Another gem from Farzana Versey in the #581 – “I am not denying that there may be Pakistani symathisers among Indian Muslims, just as there are Indian sympathisers among the expatriate communities in the West”. The absurdity of this observation is not even worth articulating for most of the readers here but Farzana You say “I do believe that if someone does not agree or like a writer’s way of putting things across, they have no business to run down people who respond”. That is what I define as an incoherent argument. It was the quality of your writing I was running down, not the interactors nor the quality of their writing. On Chowk often the interacts acquire a life of their own.
You go on to say “since I personally address only those who possess some decorum and have been here on a regular basis, I do not think a one-shot visitor has much worth”. Don’t put much value to research do you ? Refer my earlier posts # 107, 109 and 118. And even if I was a ‘one-shot’ visitor how can you conclude that I have not been regularly browsing Chowk ? Or does that not count as visiting ?
Another gem from Farzana Versey (#581) – “I am not denying that there may be Pakistani symathisers among Indian Muslims, just as there are Indian sympathisers among the expatriate communities in the West”. The absurdity of this observation is not even worth articulating for most of the readers here but for Farzana Versey`s sake let me clarify that Indian muslims are not `expatriates` and India has not fought four wars in four decades with the `West`, so the analogy is juvenile.
Response to Krashid (# 579) - Trust you to bring religion into this.
And to Farzana Versey (#581)-
You say “I do believe that if someone does not agree or like a writer’s way of putting things across, they have no business to run down people who respond”. That is what I define as an illogical conclusion. It was the quality of your writing I was running down, not the interactors nor the quality of their writing. On Chowk often the interacts acquire a life of their own.
You go on to say “since I personally address only those who possess some decorum and have been here on a regular basis, I do not think a one-shot visitor has much worth”. Don’t put much value to research do you ? Refer my earlier posts # 107, 109 and 118. And even if I was a ‘one-shot’ visitor how can you conclude that I have not been regularly browsing Chowk ? Or does that not count as visiting ?
Another gem from Farzana Versey in the #581 – “I am not denying that there may be Pakistani symathisers among Indian Muslims, just as there are Indian sympathisers among the expatriate communities in the West”. The absurdity of this observation is not even worth articulating for most of the readers here but Farzana You say “I do believe that if someone does not agree or like a writer’s way of putting things across, they have no business to run down people who respond”. That is what I define as an incoherent argument. It was the quality of your writing I was running down, not the interactors nor the quality of their writing. On Chowk often the interacts acquire a life of their own.
You go on to say “since I personally address only those who possess some decorum and have been here on a regular basis, I do not think a one-shot visitor has much worth”. Don’t put much value to research do you ? Refer my earlier posts # 107, 109 and 118. And even if I was a ‘one-shot’ visitor how can you conclude that I have not been regularly browsing Chowk ? Or does that not count as visiting ?
Another gem from Farzana Versey (#581) – “I am not denying that there may be Pakistani symathisers among Indian Muslims, just as there are Indian sympathisers among the expatriate communities in the West”. The absurdity of this observation is not even worth articulating for most of the readers here but for Farzana Versey`s sake let me clarify that Indian muslims are not `expatriates` and India has not fought four wars in four decades with the `West`, so the analogy is juvenile.
#584 Posted by concerned on December 29, 2000 12:53:40 am
LASHKAR-E-TOIBA: Its past, present and future
http://www.saag.org/papers2/paper175.htm
http://www.saag.org/papers2/paper175.htm
#583 Posted by Nachiketa on December 28, 2000 11:15:05 pm
Re: SameerJB
``On this Eid Day, I see a bright future, happy and prosperous life for the grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great great-grandchildren of all chowkwallas.``
I hope you are right. I don`t think South Asia will see this prosperity until a few decades after the West does, if at all. We are in a mode of intellectual rot in South Asia -- as you have often stated, advancement only comes through intellectual exploration. Survival and religion keep us tied down...fundamental research is the last thing on our minds. We cannot forever borrow from the West`s inventions...we can`t afford most of the West`s inventions. For example, we haven`t even figured out how to provide clean drinking water and reliable power supply to our people (something the West figured out decades ago).
``On this Eid Day, I see a bright future, happy and prosperous life for the grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great great-grandchildren of all chowkwallas.``
I hope you are right. I don`t think South Asia will see this prosperity until a few decades after the West does, if at all. We are in a mode of intellectual rot in South Asia -- as you have often stated, advancement only comes through intellectual exploration. Survival and religion keep us tied down...fundamental research is the last thing on our minds. We cannot forever borrow from the West`s inventions...we can`t afford most of the West`s inventions. For example, we haven`t even figured out how to provide clean drinking water and reliable power supply to our people (something the West figured out decades ago).
#582 Posted by Nachiketa on December 28, 2000 11:15:05 pm
Scout #56:
``If my countrymen/women and I are shown our true faces in the mirror by Indian interactors, I don`t see what`s wrong in showing them theirs.``
Like I said what a waste of your education.
Your Interact # 37 ``Yes, and we haven`t taken the strides that many Indian women have taken by dropping their clothes in front of any camera, farangi, or anything with a penis.`` holds a mirror to YOUR dignity, rather lack of it.
``If my countrymen/women and I are shown our true faces in the mirror by Indian interactors, I don`t see what`s wrong in showing them theirs.``
Like I said what a waste of your education.
Your Interact # 37 ``Yes, and we haven`t taken the strides that many Indian women have taken by dropping their clothes in front of any camera, farangi, or anything with a penis.`` holds a mirror to YOUR dignity, rather lack of it.
#581 Posted by FarzanaVersey on December 28, 2000 9:46:23 pm
Mihir Sharma (#572):
That was a very perceptive post and I had already written my bit before seeing yours. It clarifies many points. You have mentioned the need for “ the decision-making process within the community - I mean women, for example- are given more of a voice”.
Well, this woman sure is facing problems here!
I do intend to talk about what is wrong with the community internally after I catch my breath…
Farzana
That was a very perceptive post and I had already written my bit before seeing yours. It clarifies many points. You have mentioned the need for “ the decision-making process within the community - I mean women, for example- are given more of a voice”.
Well, this woman sure is facing problems here!
I do intend to talk about what is wrong with the community internally after I catch my breath…
Farzana
#580 Posted by FarzanaVersey on December 28, 2000 9:46:23 pm
Mihir Sharma (#572):
That was a very perceptive post and I had already written my bit before seeing yours. It clarifies many points. You have mentioned the need for “ the decision-making process within the community - I mean women, for example- are given more of a voice”.
Well, this woman sure is facing problems here!
I do intend to talk about what is wrong with the community internally after I catch my breath…
Farzana
That was a very perceptive post and I had already written my bit before seeing yours. It clarifies many points. You have mentioned the need for “ the decision-making process within the community - I mean women, for example- are given more of a voice”.
Well, this woman sure is facing problems here!
I do intend to talk about what is wrong with the community internally after I catch my breath…
Farzana
#579 Posted by FarzanaVersey on December 28, 2000 9:46:23 pm
Law of Chowk Interacts:
I do believe that if someone does not agree or like a writer’s way of putting things across, they have no business to run down people who respond. The over 500 posts reveal that some of us are still mature enough to go beyond superficials And, another thing, if you do not like what I am saying , it is terribly patronising to talk about “even by the standards of Indian journalism”. Since I personally address only those who possess some decorum and have been here on a regular basis, I do not think a one-shot visitor has much worth.
As for the rest of you, if this link is cut off, we could continue this discussion on the other Board.
MaheshG (#564):
I am not denying that there may be Pakistani symathisers among Indian Muslims, just as there are Indian sympathisers among the expatriate communities in the West. But to assume that they would condone or support ISI agents is extremely insensitive.
I am surprised you don’t bump into Muslims in the streets. Come on! Or should I just be thrilled that they have so become part of the whole that you do not notice their Muslimness? It is the poor Muslim students who study in the madrassas, and they are learning about not just religion but other subjects as well. It is like many of us attending convent schools. I still remember all the Christian prayers.
Yes, I do believe that the genuine Muslim successes, not the totems touted as symbolic gestures, are in spite of the discrimination.(Azim Premji may be the richest man, but despite not being an obvious wheeler-dealer he is less respected than an Ambani, and you know that.) You say you don’t even know how the Muslims are discriminated against and in the same breath you talk about them congregating in certain localities. Well, they have to do so because they have no choice. I have elaborated on these aspects on my other Board.
Regarding giving militants credit for the ceasefire, look at how our security functions. Did you check out R.K.Laxman’s cartoon in the TOI the other day?
I have no great fascination for either Pakistan or Bangladesh. Whatever gave you the idea? Only because I accept their existence and the reason for it does not mean I am in thrall of them. BTW, you might have noticed that besides the Indians in these posts not too many Pakistanis agree with my views either. Isn’t that a comforting thought?!
(PS: Just caught a glimpse of #574). Why does it rankle you that I appreciate the fact the these people are openly anti-minority, if they are to the extent our ignorance and prejudices assume? I would be happy if India had come out and said, look, we are a Hindu state right after Independence.
Unfortunately, I have to put the blame of the plight of the Muslim community as a whole on the majority, or at least ‘majoritarian’ rule. That is how things work in societies. I agree with you about accepting our faults; many of us do (an article on a certain subject must be taken in isolation and not seen as the person’s worldview, which has happened in my case).
No, meeting me halfway does not mean agreeing with everything I say (though you might want to give that a shot!) but do not construe an opinion as an ideology. There is a lot to discuss. I think I have started it.
Farzana
Jay (#565):
Dear me, now you say I have a desire to create a gun culture…what next? I am in support of any movement that fights for the freedom of a large section of people, and Kashmir is a major problem that has been kept on the backburner purely for political reasons. True, militants kill, but you do remember what Rajiv Gandhi said when Indira Gandhi was shot dead by her security men and the Hindu-Sikh riots followed, don’t you? He said, very nonchalantly, “When a big tree falls, the earth will shake.” Kashmir is not just a tree, it is whole forest.
As for a neighboring country’s religious leaders going around with guns, check out what the swamis carry, okay? It is all a matter of survival…and if they need it, so be it. There is no clash of civilisations, as you say. It is cultures. Civilization is larger than this.
Farzana
I do believe that if someone does not agree or like a writer’s way of putting things across, they have no business to run down people who respond. The over 500 posts reveal that some of us are still mature enough to go beyond superficials And, another thing, if you do not like what I am saying , it is terribly patronising to talk about “even by the standards of Indian journalism”. Since I personally address only those who possess some decorum and have been here on a regular basis, I do not think a one-shot visitor has much worth.
As for the rest of you, if this link is cut off, we could continue this discussion on the other Board.
MaheshG (#564):
I am not denying that there may be Pakistani symathisers among Indian Muslims, just as there are Indian sympathisers among the expatriate communities in the West. But to assume that they would condone or support ISI agents is extremely insensitive.
I am surprised you don’t bump into Muslims in the streets. Come on! Or should I just be thrilled that they have so become part of the whole that you do not notice their Muslimness? It is the poor Muslim students who study in the madrassas, and they are learning about not just religion but other subjects as well. It is like many of us attending convent schools. I still remember all the Christian prayers.
Yes, I do believe that the genuine Muslim successes, not the totems touted as symbolic gestures, are in spite of the discrimination.(Azim Premji may be the richest man, but despite not being an obvious wheeler-dealer he is less respected than an Ambani, and you know that.) You say you don’t even know how the Muslims are discriminated against and in the same breath you talk about them congregating in certain localities. Well, they have to do so because they have no choice. I have elaborated on these aspects on my other Board.
Regarding giving militants credit for the ceasefire, look at how our security functions. Did you check out R.K.Laxman’s cartoon in the TOI the other day?
I have no great fascination for either Pakistan or Bangladesh. Whatever gave you the idea? Only because I accept their existence and the reason for it does not mean I am in thrall of them. BTW, you might have noticed that besides the Indians in these posts not too many Pakistanis agree with my views either. Isn’t that a comforting thought?!
(PS: Just caught a glimpse of #574). Why does it rankle you that I appreciate the fact the these people are openly anti-minority, if they are to the extent our ignorance and prejudices assume? I would be happy if India had come out and said, look, we are a Hindu state right after Independence.
Unfortunately, I have to put the blame of the plight of the Muslim community as a whole on the majority, or at least ‘majoritarian’ rule. That is how things work in societies. I agree with you about accepting our faults; many of us do (an article on a certain subject must be taken in isolation and not seen as the person’s worldview, which has happened in my case).
No, meeting me halfway does not mean agreeing with everything I say (though you might want to give that a shot!) but do not construe an opinion as an ideology. There is a lot to discuss. I think I have started it.
Farzana
Jay (#565):
Dear me, now you say I have a desire to create a gun culture…what next? I am in support of any movement that fights for the freedom of a large section of people, and Kashmir is a major problem that has been kept on the backburner purely for political reasons. True, militants kill, but you do remember what Rajiv Gandhi said when Indira Gandhi was shot dead by her security men and the Hindu-Sikh riots followed, don’t you? He said, very nonchalantly, “When a big tree falls, the earth will shake.” Kashmir is not just a tree, it is whole forest.
As for a neighboring country’s religious leaders going around with guns, check out what the swamis carry, okay? It is all a matter of survival…and if they need it, so be it. There is no clash of civilisations, as you say. It is cultures. Civilization is larger than this.
Farzana
#578 Posted by FarzanaVersey on December 28, 2000 9:46:23 pm
Law of Chowk Interacts:
I do believe that if someone does not agree or like a writer’s way of putting things across, they have no business to run down people who respond. The over 500 posts reveal that some of us are still mature enough to go beyond superficials And, another thing, if you do not like what I am saying , it is terribly patronising to talk about “even by the standards of Indian journalism”. Since I personally address only those who possess some decorum and have been here on a regular basis, I do not think a one-shot visitor has much worth.
As for the rest of you, if this link is cut off, we could continue this discussion on the other Board.
MaheshG (#564):
I am not denying that there may be Pakistani symathisers among Indian Muslims, just as there are Indian sympathisers among the expatriate communities in the West. But to assume that they would condone or support ISI agents is extremely insensitive.
I am surprised you don’t bump into Muslims in the streets. Come on! Or should I just be thrilled that they have so become part of the whole that you do not notice their Muslimness? It is the poor Muslim students who study in the madrassas, and they are learning about not just religion but other subjects as well. It is like many of us attending convent schools. I still remember all the Christian prayers.
Yes, I do believe that the genuine Muslim successes, not the totems touted as symbolic gestures, are in spite of the discrimination.(Azim Premji may be the richest man, but despite not being an obvious wheeler-dealer he is less respected than an Ambani, and you know that.) You say you don’t even know how the Muslims are discriminated against and in the same breath you talk about them congregating in certain localities. Well, they have to do so because they have no choice. I have elaborated on these aspects on my other Board.
Regarding giving militants credit for the ceasefire, look at how our security functions. Did you check out R.K.Laxman’s cartoon in the TOI the other day?
I have no great fascination for either Pakistan or Bangladesh. Whatever gave you the idea? Only because I accept their existence and the reason for it does not mean I am in thrall of them. BTW, you might have noticed that besides the Indians in these posts not too many Pakistanis agree with my views either. Isn’t that a comforting thought?!
(PS: Just caught a glimpse of #574). Why does it rankle you that I appreciate the fact the these people are openly anti-minority, if they are to the extent our ignorance and prejudices assume? I would be happy if India had come out and said, look, we are a Hindu state right after Independence.
Unfortunately, I have to put the blame of the plight of the Muslim community as a whole on the majority, or at least ‘majoritarian’ rule. That is how things work in societies. I agree with you about accepting our faults; many of us do (an article on a certain subject must be taken in isolation and not seen as the person’s worldview, which has happened in my case).
No, meeting me halfway does not mean agreeing with everything I say (though you might want to give that a shot!) but do not construe an opinion as an ideology. There is a lot to discuss. I think I have started it.
Farzana
Jay (#565):
Dear me, now you say I have a desire to create a gun culture…what next? I am in support of any movement that fights for the freedom of a large section of people, and Kashmir is a major problem that has been kept on the backburner purely for political reasons. True, militants kill, but you do remember what Rajiv Gandhi said when Indira Gandhi was shot dead by her security men and the Hindu-Sikh riots followed, don’t you? He said, very nonchalantly, “When a big tree falls, the earth will shake.” Kashmir is not just a tree, it is whole forest.
As for a neighboring country’s religious leaders going around with guns, check out what the swamis carry, okay? It is all a matter of survival…and if they need it, so be it. There is no clash of civilisations, as you say. It is cultures. Civilization is larger than this.
Farzana
I do believe that if someone does not agree or like a writer’s way of putting things across, they have no business to run down people who respond. The over 500 posts reveal that some of us are still mature enough to go beyond superficials And, another thing, if you do not like what I am saying , it is terribly patronising to talk about “even by the standards of Indian journalism”. Since I personally address only those who possess some decorum and have been here on a regular basis, I do not think a one-shot visitor has much worth.
As for the rest of you, if this link is cut off, we could continue this discussion on the other Board.
MaheshG (#564):
I am not denying that there may be Pakistani symathisers among Indian Muslims, just as there are Indian sympathisers among the expatriate communities in the West. But to assume that they would condone or support ISI agents is extremely insensitive.
I am surprised you don’t bump into Muslims in the streets. Come on! Or should I just be thrilled that they have so become part of the whole that you do not notice their Muslimness? It is the poor Muslim students who study in the madrassas, and they are learning about not just religion but other subjects as well. It is like many of us attending convent schools. I still remember all the Christian prayers.
Yes, I do believe that the genuine Muslim successes, not the totems touted as symbolic gestures, are in spite of the discrimination.(Azim Premji may be the richest man, but despite not being an obvious wheeler-dealer he is less respected than an Ambani, and you know that.) You say you don’t even know how the Muslims are discriminated against and in the same breath you talk about them congregating in certain localities. Well, they have to do so because they have no choice. I have elaborated on these aspects on my other Board.
Regarding giving militants credit for the ceasefire, look at how our security functions. Did you check out R.K.Laxman’s cartoon in the TOI the other day?
I have no great fascination for either Pakistan or Bangladesh. Whatever gave you the idea? Only because I accept their existence and the reason for it does not mean I am in thrall of them. BTW, you might have noticed that besides the Indians in these posts not too many Pakistanis agree with my views either. Isn’t that a comforting thought?!
(PS: Just caught a glimpse of #574). Why does it rankle you that I appreciate the fact the these people are openly anti-minority, if they are to the extent our ignorance and prejudices assume? I would be happy if India had come out and said, look, we are a Hindu state right after Independence.
Unfortunately, I have to put the blame of the plight of the Muslim community as a whole on the majority, or at least ‘majoritarian’ rule. That is how things work in societies. I agree with you about accepting our faults; many of us do (an article on a certain subject must be taken in isolation and not seen as the person’s worldview, which has happened in my case).
No, meeting me halfway does not mean agreeing with everything I say (though you might want to give that a shot!) but do not construe an opinion as an ideology. There is a lot to discuss. I think I have started it.
Farzana
Jay (#565):
Dear me, now you say I have a desire to create a gun culture…what next? I am in support of any movement that fights for the freedom of a large section of people, and Kashmir is a major problem that has been kept on the backburner purely for political reasons. True, militants kill, but you do remember what Rajiv Gandhi said when Indira Gandhi was shot dead by her security men and the Hindu-Sikh riots followed, don’t you? He said, very nonchalantly, “When a big tree falls, the earth will shake.” Kashmir is not just a tree, it is whole forest.
As for a neighboring country’s religious leaders going around with guns, check out what the swamis carry, okay? It is all a matter of survival…and if they need it, so be it. There is no clash of civilisations, as you say. It is cultures. Civilization is larger than this.
Farzana
#577 Posted by sadna on December 28, 2000 12:58:48 pm
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001228/wl/separatist_passports_dc_1.html
``...More than 162 people, including 38 Indian security personnel, 39 militants and 85 civilians have been killed since the cease-fire began....``
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/south_asia/newsid_1091000/1091056.stm
``... A British Muslim has been named by an Islamic militant group in Indian-administered Kashmir as the suicide bomber who carried out a car bomb attack on Christmas Day which killed 10 people...``
``...they say he set off the bomb when he was challenged by guards at the checkpoint outside the main entrance, killing six Indian soldiers and three Kashmiri students who were returning home to celebrate the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. ...``
How many of those 85 civilians were killed by militants and how many of those civilians were Muslims? Wasn`t it a crime against Islam to kill fellow Muslims?
Sadhana
``...More than 162 people, including 38 Indian security personnel, 39 militants and 85 civilians have been killed since the cease-fire began....``
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/south_asia/newsid_1091000/1091056.stm
``... A British Muslim has been named by an Islamic militant group in Indian-administered Kashmir as the suicide bomber who carried out a car bomb attack on Christmas Day which killed 10 people...``
``...they say he set off the bomb when he was challenged by guards at the checkpoint outside the main entrance, killing six Indian soldiers and three Kashmiri students who were returning home to celebrate the Muslim holiday of Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. ...``
How many of those 85 civilians were killed by militants and how many of those civilians were Muslims? Wasn`t it a crime against Islam to kill fellow Muslims?
Sadhana
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