AFGHANISTAN

The ‘D’ word

Danishgah, danishkada, daanishmand, daanishjoyan…

Say these words on Afghan TV and you’re busted.

Three Afghan journalists working for government-owned media have been fined five days salary for using words from the wrong language (Persian) and for not “observing cultural and Islamic principles”.

“Abdul Basir Babai had been reprimanded for using three words from Persian, as used in Iran, instead of their local equivalent derived from Pashtun — the language of the Afghan majority.”

One of the word was daanishgah instead of pahantoon to refer to university. Farsi speakers suggest that there’s nothing wrong with the terms, Pashtoons say otherwise. Why change our language? Why be influenced by external factors, namely Iran? Unfortunately, i’ve witnessed this on Afghan TV where majority of the newsreaders and hosts adapt the Iranian accent and terminology. At the same time, I don’t think journalists should have lost their jobs over it. What if the journalist has spent most of his/her life in Iran? Can’t blame them can you?

I’m sitting on the fence here.

– Atash Parcha, www.wordpress.com/tag/afghanistans-development

BANGLADESH

Rickshaw v car

It’s an unfortunate aspect of my personality, but to become passionate about something I need to view it in terms of side versus side, and inevitably as underdog versus favourite. When it comes to the plight of the rickshaw and their wallahs (pullers) in Dhaka, I immediately think of cars as their mortal enemy.

Living in Dhaka has made me realise what little affection I have for cars. Here, the automobile is one of the biggest status symbols there is and owners have attitudes to match. The majority of the population, the working class and the homeless, struggle to fuel themselves, let alone a vehicle.

It’s the middle class, who favour slightly dinged-up Toyotas and maritime-themed window sunshades, and the uppers and otherwise rich with their expensive-smelling Mercedes Benzes, that pollute the streets with their honking, exhaust fumes, and utter disregard for road etiquette (I would say ‘utter disregard for road rules’ but I don’t think road rules exist in Bangladesh). While there is an increasing number of private car owners in Dhaka who want to sweep aside the rickshaw for their own convenience, the issue, as it so often is in Bangladesh, is not quite as simple as a war between wheels.

For those who have never seen that brightly-coloured vehicle of everyman, the Bangladeshi rickshaw, the typical model consists of a gearless bicycle at the front, connected by an extended chain to the axel of the carriage, which curves like a boat underneath. The small bench seat where passengers sit is covered with a hood, much like a pram. Underneath the rickshaw is where the wallah stores most of his earthly possessions—a spare shirt, lungi (sarong) and gumcha (scarf/towel), a plastic sheet to keep the customers dry in rainy weather (the sides are open and subject to weather), he’ll use this himself to nap behind, some tools, cigarettes, and maybe a small wodge of taka.

Rickshaws are moving works of art that make a statement by gathering in packs, outside shopping centres, at stations where wallahs eat their morning meals of dhal bhat (lentils and rice), stop for a cup of cha (tea) and a cigarette, a snooze under the hood of their ride with their feet propped on their bike seat, or you’ll see wallahs squatting on the dusty ground, to fixing tire punctures and oiling chains.

In addition to the artfulness of their social presence, books have been dedicated to rickshaw art – that is, the painted vehicle—which is more than the large, enamel-painted tin panels at the rear of the rickshaw where number plates should be, bright with Dhallywood stars, landscapes, flowers and animals, but pretty much everything that decoration can be attached to: the vinyl on the passenger seat and hood, mudguards and metalwork. Most rickshaws are hired out to wallahs, and the decoration seen is a collaboration of work; creating a moving canvas, if you will, created by multiple artists.

Wallah fashion is also an art that defies the crush of the city. Shirt, lungi and flip-flop are the standard ensemble, with lungis either in a practical checked fabric, flashing against a plain background, or tropical themed with palms and flowers. Shirts are the main pieces, however, and what pieces they are: shirts with glitter, flowers, cityscapes, landscapes, braying horses, quarrelling monkeys, stripes, and geometric print.

In cold weather, these masterpieces are covered by woollen vests, jumpers, or a gold-buttoned blazers, and topped off by a gumcha around the head, neck or waist. Close observation of wallah couture reveals the harsh, day-to-day reality of these valiant garments, and show the thousands of washes and slappings they’ve endured. Some shirts are at the point of wearing thin, some have succumbed and sport holes, some are nicely mended and in monsoon season, some are dotted with black spots of mould.

So who would dream of waging war on the humble rickshaw and the colourful men who ply them? Car owners, traffic police and the World Bank, that’s who. The growing gap between the rich and poor in Bangladesh can be reflected in the increasing use of privately owned vehicles:

In 1998 the data showed that Rickshaws took up 38% of road space while transporting 54% of passengers in Dhaka . The private cars on the other hand, took up 34% of road space while only transporting 9% of the population — www.voiceofsouth.org

Given the insanity of Dhaka’s roads, where motorised and non-motorised vehicles struggle violently for a place of their own in laneless traffic, it is not surprising that cars, bullied on the road by buses and even the tough, boxy little dodgem car that is the CNG (autorickshaw), make rickshaws the scapegoat for Dhaka’s maddening traffic congestion and accidents. One particular morning on Satmasjid Road, my rickshaw wallah had no choice but to veer into the path of a car to avoid a pedestrian who had mistimed his crossing. Sideswiped, the wallah caught most of the car’s weight on his right arm.

We stopped at a rickshaw station, and as my wallah wailed in pain and his brethren tended to his injuries, I demanded to know what the bloody hell the car’s female passenger thought she was doing. Not realising at first who I was shouting at (and, as a friend pointed out, the driver of the car was also to blame, but the woman was a much better symbol), she replied that my rickshaw wallah was a “stupid guy”. With literally pointed finger, I called attention to the fact she was a rich woman in the back of a chauffer-driven car and he was a poor man trying to earn a living, then ended my rant with an acrimonious “Shame on you!” Her only response to this was to tell me that I should be ashamed, and with the pressure of one manicured finger on the button of her electric window, the issue was neatly shesh (ended).

Like car owners and drivers, traffic police view rickshaw wallahs as a menace. In their case, since they rely on control of rickshaw traffic as part of their living, they only try to maim, not kill, wallahs. These men, and you can always spot them because of their white helmets and tight green tunics, enforce traffic management strategies by way of a large wooden stick. They literally beat wallahs, hit rickshaws, slash tyres and in fits of childishness, even let the air out of them. But don’t blame the uncouth element of a developing country for these wicked ways—the World Bank recommended the following methods, which may sound innocuous, to be freely interpreted by the police:

…traffic management measures…will [not] work without discipline on the streets and effective performance by the traffic police…Physical investments to improve traffic management won’t pay off unless they are backed up by enforcement of traffic management and traffic rules — www.worldbank.org

In addition, and despite emphasising the importance of accessible non-motorised transport for people living in developing countries, and the benefits of non-motorised transport in the face of climate change, the World Bank nevertheless announced in 2001 that Dhaka’s traffic flow would improve only by:

…banning or separation the movement of non-motorized traffic on major corridors…The needs of the city’s rickshaw pullers must be recognized, but they shouldn’t be allowed to clog the cities’ main arteries. Separate lanes can be installed for them, or, in some places, they may have to be diverted to alternative routes on side roads. — www.worldbank.org

This, too, may seem innocuous – an effort to improve vehicle and pedestrian safety, perhaps – but until separate lanes are provided for rickshaws, if separate lanes are ever constructed for rickshaws – the already marginalized wallahs and their relatively ‘lowly’ passengers are forced off major thoroughfares and thus ‘ghettoized’ from the growing affluent ‘mainstream’.

Funded by 180 million of the World Bank’s dollars, the Dhaka Urban Transport Project (DUTP), declared in 2004 a ban of rickshaws and other forms of non-motorised transport on Mirpur Road from Russell Square to Azimpur, a major thoroughfare in the south of the city. The World Bank report started a subtle movement to push rickshaws to the sidelines. A Daily Star article from 2004 describes unlicensed rickshaws as one of the prime causes for “constant traffic jams and violation of traffic rules”. Dhaka Deputy Traffic Commissioner Anseer Uddin Khan Pathan added that “the ban will make commuters ‘happy’ because it will reduce traffic congestion.”

Yet the rickshaw is a magic vehicle with a magnetism of its own, and popular outcry against the ban worried the government, especially considering the national election was approaching close to the time of the initial Mirpur Road ban. As a result of popular and organisational pressure, the World Bank reversed its policy and withdrew its support of rickshaw bans and indeed conceded in a final report on the DUTP that “wider civil society consultation” is “essential for potentially controversial measured, such as non-motorised transport-free conversion.”

Rightly so, for banning rickshaws would mean the collapse of an important web of culture and economics in Bangladesh. Not just the loss of art and street vibrancy, and an easily available and environmentally friendly form of transport, but the economic ramifications stretch far: not only to the wallahs, but to their families living in rural Bangladesh, to the mechanics and artists who create and fix rickshaws, and the vendors of the cha and food stalls. It is general knowledge amongst local patrons of rickshaws that the average daily earning of the wallah is 200 taka a day, of which about 80 taka goes to the owner of the rickshaw they hire. A report conducted by the WBB (Working for Better Bangladesh) Trust, showed that the Mirpur Road ban resulted in a 32 percent net loss of earnings for the average rickshaw wallah, increased the cost of trips for passengers, as well as time taken to travel.

For me, and this could well be the maudlin aspect of my personality coming out now, it is the personal culture of the rickshaw and the wallah that is just as valuable to Bangladesh as art or economics or traffic management. Further, the preservation of the rickshaw (and all that requires in traffic management and road safety) is a smart approach to the infrastructural development of Bangladesh – and the process needs to be done at a steady ‘Bangladesh’ pace, rather than in rushed leaps and bounds.

Despite language barriers between wallahs and myself, I’ve found that they are quick to teach me Bangla phrases, happy to practice English with me, and eager to converse about the Australian cricket team and crack a joke. Indeed, the best rickshaw drivers double-duty as cultural ambassadors. They race each other up busy streets, curry sly favour with the traffic police, hop off their seat in a traffic jams to buy a single cigarette, slow down for you so you can chat with friends moving in the opposite direction, point out local landmarks, and ride you to safety during street riots.

Express a dislike for the police and you’ll earn their respect; barter too hard and bad-naturedly for the local price (as opposed to the fare with a bideshi tax attached) and they will keep themselves detached. Collect yourself from being tumbled out of a rickshaw during a prang by grabbing onto your wallah and you’ll find yourself more intimately connected to the wallah and his rickshaw than you’d probably like.

Oh, there are nasty wallahs who agree on a price upon departure and charge you double on arrival, and then they’ll yell at and humiliate you when you refuse to pay the unexpectedly increased fare. Others will, perhaps feeling their tip was not sufficient, give you change in the dirtiest, most crumpled two taka notes imaginable.

But when I ride the rickshaws, I think of the lovely, strapping, curious country boys who, like Oliver Twist, come innocent to the big city to make their fortune. Or I remember the wallah who, alarmed by the fact that I burst into tears at the end of a hard day, rode me home in such haste that his chain slipped and he almost crashed into the gutter. Then he drove into the carpark so that I wouldn’t get wet from the rain. Fixing a price tag to such a constant mobile display of human nature might prove as difficult as banning the rickshaw in the face of such need and sentimentality.

– Kathryn Hummel, www.popmatters.com

INDIA

On my own

I don’t agree with the view that I succeeded because Noorjehan left for Pakistan in 1947. It was God’s will that I should achieve name and fame in 1947. I was gifted with a good voice, I worked hard with learning and practicing music, but ultimately it was not so much what I did was much as what I was meant to do in this lifetime. For some reason, success in music was ordained for me. It had nothing to do with who came or who left the scene.

– Lata Mangeshkar in Ganesh Anantharaman’s Bollywood Melodies: A History of the Hindi Film Song, Penguin Books 2008.

PAKISTAN

An odd war

The Kashmir War was a very odd affair. Subedar Rab Nawaz often felt as if his brain had turned into a rifle with a faulty safety catch.

He had fought with distinction on many major fronts in the Second World War. He was respected by both his seniors and his juniors because of his intelligence and valour. He was always given the most difficult and dangerous assignments and he had never failed the trust placed in him.

But he had never been in a war like this one. He had come to it full of enthusiasm and with the itch to fight and liquidate the enemy. However, the first encounter had shown that the men arrayed against them on the other side were mostly old friends and comrades with whom he had fought in the old British Indian army against the Germans and the Italians. The friends of yesterday had been transformed into the enemies of today….

Formerly, all of them were Indian soldiers, but now some were Indians and others were Pakistani soldiers. Rab Nawaz could not unravel this puzzle. And when he thought about Kashmir, he became even more confused. Were the Pakistani soldiers fighting for Kashmir or for the Muslims of Kashmir?

– Saadat Hasan Manto, The Last Salute

THE MALDIVES

Music is haraam

One of the five members of the Human Rights Commission of Maldives have publicly articulated that Music (listening, playing or getting involved with it) is haraam (completely forbidden, and a sin deserving of punishment in hell fire).

HRCM member Sheikh Ahmed Abdul Kareem was among the 22 Islamic Scholars who was shown declaring music is haraam in a special video presentation at a Jamiyyath-uh-Salaf (a wahhabi islamic NGO) meeting. Several government employed sheikhs; including senior members of the Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs, and the Centre for the Holy Qur’an were seen in this video. Among other notable people shown on this video were Adhaalath party president Dr Abdul Majeed Abdul Bari and Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) religious council member Sheikh Adam Naseem.

The ‘Human Rights’ Sheikh

Sheikh Ahmed Abdul Kareem is a fundamentalist who cannot write anything without turning it in to an Islamic sermon, be it a newspaper article on international politics or a human rights commission report.

His profile on HRCM official website says that he had his secondary and tertiary education at Jamaia Daarul Salaam, Umar Abad in South India. He obtained his First Degree from the Islamic University of al-Madinah al-Munawarah in Saudi Arabia.

He have always been very active in promoting fundamentalist ideas in Maldives through national Television, Radio and by other means. Since a long time ago he have been writing articles regularly for some local newspapers (Mainly for papers owned by president Gayoom’s friends and family members; Miadhu and Aafathis dailies)….

– More at Secular Maldives, www.secularmaldives.blogspot.com/2008/03/hrcm-sheikh-declares-music-illegal.html

NEPAL

Holi hooligans

Last year, a week before Holi, I was walking to college when some school children splashed a bottle of water from their bus window and drenched me from head to toe. The school bus whizzed past as I stood horrified by such a ruthless act. The water aimed at a lady who was waiting for a friend on her parked scooter splattered on me when I passed her. The lady who shared my disgust was kind enough to take me to my destination, thanking me instead for saving her from getting wet.

This year the plight has not been different. I have been the target of a number of water balloons, though none of them were able to spoil my dress. They may not have hit the target but I have been seriously traumatized. My state of mind is similar to other women who are the victims of Holi hooligans. These hooligans can be found everywhere from street corners, grocery shops to roof tops. They shamelessly target women whom they think are vulnerable and will not protest their act. Pretending to be minding their own business, as soon as your back is turned towards them they hit you with a balloon and run away. Physical pain, shock and embarrassment do not only make such an act despicable. It’s simply inhuman. How can an action that hurts someone and destroy their whole day give joy to another? Can it celebrate the spirit of any festival? Let us not forget that Holi marks the beginning of a new season.

Holi, a festival of colorful celebration, is now a warning for women to ready themselves for embarrassment and shock. They are forced to walk out of their homes in constant fear of becoming targets of senseless hoodlums. Cheap water balloons, irresponsible guardians and lame authorities are adding fuel to the already prevalent problem. Little kids with smiles on their faces carrying water balloons parade streets and find fun in drenching passersby with water. Their guardians are nowhere around. Isn’t it the duty of parents and guardians to teach their children proper manners? Should they be encouraged to create situations which could also be devised against them?

Holi is not Dashain when celebrations begin ten days before the main festivity. Playing with colors and water is a gesture of brotherhood. Let’s not turn it into a dreadful act of harassing strangers. By harassing passersby just for a little fun the essence of celebrating Holi will be lost. It will prove the triumph of evil over truth. Holi that celebrates the victory of the sincerity and honesty of Prahlad over wickedness will be portrayed as a hoax. It will be a stupid myth when in real life people carrying on their own business are dragged into a mess. They have no role to play in an act where their endurance is tested unnecessarily.

– Dikshya Karki in the Kathmandu Post

SRI LANKA

Arthur C Clarke: Of Nukes and ‘Impotent Nations’

“Do you know about the only man to light a cigarette from a nuclear explosion?” Sir Arthur C Clarke was fond of asking his visitors. Thee man in question was Theodore (Ted) Taylor, a leading American nuclear scientist who designed atomic weapons in the 1950s and 1960s. Apparently he just held up a small parabolic mirror during a nuclear test – the giant fireball was 12 miles away – and turned light into heat.

“The moment I heard this, I wrote to Taylor, saying ‘Don’t you know smoking is bad for your health?’” Clarke said.

Years ago, Clarke had coined the slogan ‘Guns are the crutches of the impotent’. In later years, he added a corollary: “High tech weapons are the crutches of impotent nations; nukes are just the decorative chromium plating.”

Shortly after the nuclear bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended the War, he wrote an essay “The Rocket and the Future of Warfare”. In that essay, he said: “The only defence against the weapons of the future is to prevent them ever being used. In other words, the problem is political and not military at all. A country’s armed forces can no longer defend it; the most they can promise is the destruction of the attacker....”

Shortly after India carried out nuclear weapons test in May 1998, Clarke issued a brief statement saying: “Hindustan should be proud of its scientists - but ashamed of its politicians.”

While campaigning against nuclear weapons, Clarke was equally concerned about all offensive weapons. “Let’s not forget the conventional weapons, which have been perfected over the years to inflict maximum collateral damage,” he said in a video address to the 50th anniversary celebrations of the Pugwash Movement in October 2007. “If you are at the receiving end, it doesn’t matter if such weapons are ‘smart’ or stupid…”

Arthur C Clarke’s passionate arguments against warfare were heard, though not always heeded in the corridors of power and geopolitics.

For such people, he had the perfect last words from his own hero, H G Wells: “You damn fools – I told you so!”

– Nalaka Gunawardene, Colombo-based spokesman for Sir Arthur C Clarke, www.movingimages.wordpress.com

TIBET

Sheela Bhatt: Asking for freedom for Tibet is considered by Chinese as an anti-China activity.

Tibetan Prime Minister-in-Exile Samdhong Rimpoche: Asking for freedom is not an anti-China act. It’s a pro-China activity. We are trying to have more freedom for the Chinese people. We are trying to have more respect for human rights and we want them to have more respect for different cultures. How does it become anti-China activity? We are not seeking separation. We are not seeking independence. We are only seeking freedom. And, freedom is a birthright of every human being.

SB: [Why do you think that] India is more powerful [than China]?

SR: Why do you think India is so weak? When you say China has better focus than India in other words it means that it is the totalitarian regime. In India, diversity ensures that it remains a free and democratic country. Of course, Western people, who are only concerned with economic development, invest in China and not in India because India is a free country; India has a free press; India has democracy; India has an independent judiciary.

Therefore, they cannot do whatever they want to, but in China they can by meeting just one powerful party member. You have visited China but not met the real people, who are poor and suffering. No Tibetan is willing to take Chinese money, but they have no option. Chinese money is thrust on them. Development is thrust on them. People have not participated in the development of Tibet.

– Tibetan Prime Minister-in-Exile Samdhong Rimpoche, in conversation with Sheela Bhatt, www.rediff.com

REGION

Esteemed Didis and Dadas, Ladies and Ladas, Babies and Babas…

Myself is carrying on, your goodselves are thinking? But permit me to share my excitement, the news is rushing in from all quarters, even southwest like recent monsoon, but more volumetric. Your magazine, it is seeming, is being more popular than its circulation manager is imagining (she is the simple soul only). We are finding much of Indian publishing industry, nation’s pride, is following it very closely. Then it is carefully cutting out pages, putting same in cheap scanner, and scanning same. Then it is printing same from same scan, same to same. Again and again. And nobody is finding out, they are thinking. Hah!

Yes, Babies and Babas, very many publishers are frequently reproducing articles and pictures from your magazine, without telling. In case of English publisher, it is simply copying. In case of poor Indian language publisher, it is having to take heavy trouble of translating. Indian language always less fortunate, which is why myself is now learning English. You do same.

Popularity is making me feel warm all over. Also hot in head, when I am remembering that such much of republishing is with no permission. Damnfool publisher brothers and sisters are thinking that if we are knowing, we are demanding money. Not always, bhai, it is on ability to pay. And believe you, we are knowing fully well who is having said ability and who not.

So bottomline is: No more flitting and sipping. If you are liking what you are reading enough to republish, do not steal, it is a bad thing. Contact to us asking permission, or when we are finding out, we are sending notis and maybe polis to you. Silence now, publisher will take dais vacated by TLM Gnome.

– The Little Magazine, Volume VII, Issue 3&4

Hello Bhutan!

The other day, I was at a lecture on the politics of personal law systems in South Asian countries. The speaker decided, in his infinite wisdom, to read slowly from his paper for about an hour and a half. I was too bored and sleep-deprived to be able to give an apt rendering of my opinion of it, but suffice it to say it was not the most intellectually engaging lecture I’ve ever been to; that it ran well over time was frustrating to say the least.

The reason I mention this story is to tell you why I became sympathetic to the speaker by the end. He was about 70% of the way through the talk, had just gone through the politics of religion and personal law in Sri Lanka and Nepal, and was about to go on to Bhutan and the Maldives. Upon hearing this, the person from my school who had invited the lecturer crankily interrupted and asked him to skip to the conclusion, which the speaker subsequently did.

Voila! No Bhutan and Maldives. It’s amazing how that happens, isn’t it.

My purpose here is not to go into the usual tirade about the neglect of the fragments in South Asian studies, despite that the contents of my postgraduate education in South Asia has followed roughly this pattern: India, India, India, Pakistan, India, India, Pakistan, India, India, India, India, Bangladesh, India, India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, India, India, Pakistan, India. And despite that I seriously believe it could be much worse.

In a general sense, if a certain topic is not being adequately covered in a medium, there’s probably a structural flaw producing that failure. What follows from this is that if it requires serious extra personal effort to integrate a topic into discussions, then in all likelihood no amount of beating yourself (or others) up will ensure that those contexts and perspectives and many others will ensure an effective and adequate dialogue about them. This is true in the specific examples mentioned here (my postgraduate curriculum in South Asia at my institution, blogging on South Asia, lectures on South Asia, etc., etc.)

Contrary to usual practice, I’m not posing this idea as a justification for complacency, but simply to suggest that once the need is recognized, the subject of poor representation properly becomes an object of analysis and subsequently a site for strategy, rather than a reason for defensiveness/denial/guilt/martyrdom. Here is the kind of thinking I’m taking about: the reason I know what little I do about the Maldives (including that there’s an election in November) is because there’s a woman in one of my classes from the place. Similar social reasons behind why I have at least minimal exposure to Islam in Kerala, the French conception of secularism, German Christmas traditions, etc. So this might suggest that one possible tactic in the higher education setting by South Asian studies departments might be actively privileging people who bring underrepresented perspectives (of which there are many).

Similarly, when I spoke to the speaker on personal laws after the talk, he expressed some regret that he hadn’t had a chance to get to the politics of Bhutan, which he thinks is interesting. I told him I thought he should lead with Bhutan and the Maldives next time and leave India for later. Having said it to some extent in a spirit of humor, I can see why he partially took it as a joke, but whatever…I think he and I both partially meant it too. Well I did, anyway.

I could, and I’m sure you could too, give 100 other examples. By identifying specific problems, looking at structure, finding personal fixes that don’t require martyrdom, and being committed to collective action / community, we can do a better job than attempting to individually provide a voice to “the voiceless” (who, in fact, frequently actually have voices – they’re just not heard).

– Pass the Roti, www.passtheroti.com