anti-caste

ICL ARTICLE ON POLITICAL CRISIS IN BANGLADESH

Islamist upsurge threatens women, workers and minorities:
Bangladesh in turmoil
For a socialist federation of South Asia!

(Workers Hammer No. 223)

“With the country engulfed in a crisis over the war crimes trials, the worst disaster in the history of the garment industry shocked the country and the world. The Rana Plaza factory building collapse in April annihilated more than 1100 mainly women garment workers. This act of industrial murder showed the real workings of the capitalist market in one of the poorest countries in the world. Some 5000 factories in Bangladesh produce garments for major North American and European brands. The workers toiling in near-slavery in these deathtraps are paid the lowest wages in the world for that industry — as low as $37 (£24) a month, far below subsistence, often working 15-hour shifts.

“At the same time, the garment industry is a cornerstone of the country’s economy and the millions of workers in these factories have potential social power. To prevent such power from being unleashed, the local garment bosses, aided by the Awami League government, brutally suppress trade unions, to the point of targeting union activists with murderous violence (see Workers Vanguard no 1023, 3 May). Nevertheless, a number of strikes have swept the industry in recent years. And when news of the Rana Plaza disaster spread, hundreds of thousands of these workers walked out of work and marched on the headquarters of the garment manufacturers’ association demanding ‘we want execution of the garment factory owners!’

“The women who work in these factories are drawn from the villages, where illiteracy rates are high and the influence of religion and anti-woman prejudices are pervasive. For these women, a job in the garment industry opens up the possibility of escaping from the backwardness of village life. The ability of women to find employment in the cities breaks the taboo on mixing with men outside the home and enables women to become financially independent of their families. This fuels a backlash by the Islamists because it undermines the material basis for the traditional village and family hierarchy, within which women are blatantly traded as property. Dowry was prohibited by Bangladeshi law in 1980 but the legislation had little effect and the practice remains widespread. All aspects of personal and family law — regarding marriage, separation and divorce — are religion-based. Muslims are subjected to Islamic law, Christians to laws agreed by Christian churches and Hindus to Hindu codes. Numerous reports have documented an extremely high level of violence against women in Bangladesh. ‘Sulfuric acid — able to burn through skin, muscle and bone — is thrown on women for various reasons including “refusal of marriage offers, rejection of male advances, dowry disputes, domestic fights, property disputes, and even a delayed meal”’ (quoted in ‘Bangladesh: Violence against women’, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, 2004). In 2002 the government introduced special laws to stop acid attacks; in 2011 the state restricted the sale of certain kinds of acids in an effort to reduce the number of these gruesome attacks.

“Women have most to gain from the overthrow of capitalism in Bangladesh and, as indeed in all of South Asia, they will be a motor force for socialist revolution. The fight for the most basic needs of women — for literacy, education, contraception, an end to forced marriage and a way out of grinding poverty and oppression — requires a struggle to root out the very foundations of capitalist society. In 1994, when Jamaat launched a murderous anti-woman campaign against Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasrin, we wrote that ‘Nasrin’s case raises questions far beyond the important democratic issues of women’s rights, freedom of speech and the separation of religion and the state’, questions ‘that only a revolutionary socialist program can answer’.”

Read the full article

BLASPHEMY LAWS IN PAKISTAN TARGET CHRISTIAN UNTOUCHABLES

Abolish Blasphemy Law and Protect Dalits in Pakistan by Vidya Bhushan Rawat (Countercurrents)

“The notorious blasphemy law in Pakistan has hit again at the ‘Christian’ minority when a Christian man was charged with blasphemy by a Muslim mob which tried to find him went to Badami Bagh colony of Christians and burnt over 125 houses when they could not find the man. [...]

“According to news reports that a mob of over 3000 people by Shafiq Ahmed, looked for the accused Savan, alias Bubby but due to their inability to find him the mob attacked his house, and also burnt the houses of 150 Christian families. Many residents, including women and children, hastily fled to save themselves. The police registered an FIR under section 295-C of the Pakistan Penal Code (death sentence) against Savan and ensuring that he would be given into their custody to decide his fate. They also took Chaman Masih into custody.

“World-over there is a growing concern over the misuse of anti-blasphemy law which has put minorities under deep stress and forced them to convert to Islam. Muslim fanatics have used it to grab land of the poor particularly of the Dalits in Pakistan. [...]

“It has to be understood that in Pakistan a majority of Christians are actually Dalits in general and predominantly the communities of Sweepers which is contemptuously called as ‘Bhangi’. And the Masihs who were attacked were basically sweepers who face untouchability and caste discrimination. They do not get jobs other than sweeping and people do not come near to them. They are completely outcastes and are considered as ‘charsis’ and ‘Bhangedis’ which gives the impression that all the people from the sweeper community are drunkard and chain smokers.”

See also on anti-caste: PAKISTAN: PHONY BLASPHEMY CASE EXPOSED AS A PRETEXT TO DRIVE OUT OUTCASTE CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY AND STEAL THEIR LAND (September 11, 2012)

ICL NOTE ON PARTITION AND THE IMPERIALIST ALLIANCE WITH PAKISTAN

Imperialism, the Cold War and the Creation of Pakistan

(Workers Vanguard)

“The British imperialists have maintained that the partition of India was aimed at creating a homeland for Muslims where they would be protected from Hindus, a claim belied by the fact that far more Muslims were left behind in India than those incorporated in the new entity of Pakistan. Besides, in the provinces that became Pakistan, the Muslims were dominant; they were neither threatened by post-independence Hindu domination nor were they interested in a separate Muslim state. In fact, the majority of Muslims were fearful of the economic and social impact of uprooting and relocation. They resented the fact that they would be confined to the two corners of the subcontinent and have to abandon the heartland of India, where Muslim rulers held sway for over 600 years before their defeat by the British, and in which lie some of the magnificent symbols of past Muslim power and glory such as the great forts of Delhi and Agra, the Taj Mahal and others. Muslim merchants and businessmen opposed the partition out of concern for the loss of a long developed market. The sizable Shi’ite Muslim population, dreading living in a Sunni-dominated Pakistan, was opposed to the partition scheme.

“Up until World War II the British depended on the strategically situated India as a military base to safeguard their interests—in the Middle East, Southeast Asia and their colonies across the Indian Ocean in east Africa. As India’s independence dawned, the British, fearing that the Hindu nationalists who would rule post-independence India would deny them military cooperation, settled for creating a weak, truncated entity that would serve their imperialist interests, would depend on Britain for its defence and would be ruled by their pliable lackeys of the Muslim League of Mohammed Ali Jinnah. Through their divide-and-rule policy and using religion as a tool, the British drove a wedge between Hindus and Muslims, built close ties with Jinnah, in whom they nourished separatist aspirations, and recognised him as the sole spokesman of the Muslims of India.

“In his well-documented book, The Shadow of the Great Game: The Untold Story of India’s Partition (2005), Narendra Singh Sarila laid bare the true intentions of the British behind the partition: a meticulously calculated scheme to detach Pakistan from India, create a militarily strategic foothold aimed at the Soviet Union and maintain control over the oil fields of the Middle East.”

READ THE FULL ARTICLE

See also:

links to articles by the International Communist League (4th Internationalist) on South Asia

PAKISTAN: PHONY BLASPHEMY CASE EXPOSED AS A PRETEXT TO DRIVE OUT OUTCASTE CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY AND STEAL THEIR LAND

Blasphemy in Pakistan by Gwynne Dyer

“It was a welcome change from the usual dreary story: a Christian or a Hindu Pakistani accused of blasphemy on flimsy grounds, tried, and sentenced to prison—or found innocent, set free and then murdered by some Muslim fanatic. This time was different.

“The victim this time was a 14-year-old Christian girl, Rimsa Masih, who is believed to suffer from Down’s syndrome. She was stopped by a young Muslim man who found the half-burned remnants of a book that allegedly included verses from the Qur'an in her carrier bag. He told the local imam, who called the police, and she was arrested.

“This kind of story usually ends badly in Pakistan. Two years ago, for example, a Christian woman, Asia Bibi, was arrested for insulting the Prophet Muhammad while arguing with fellow farm workers. She was sentenced to death by hanging, but it was such a manifest injustice that the governor of Punjab province, Salman Taseer, publicly called for the repeal of the blasphemy law. He was assassinated by his own bodyguard in January 2011.

“The bodyguard was tried for murder and convicted, but he was treated as a hero by many Pakistanis, and the judge who sent him to prison had to flee the country. Two months later the only Christian member of Pakistan’s cabinet, Shahbaz Bhatti, was also shot dead when he spoke out against the blasphemy laws. Since then, almost nobody has dared to criticize them.

“Asia Bibi remains in prison awaiting execution. Her entire family, including her five children, live in hiding and cannot work or go to school. And while the higher courts would once have thrown out her conviction—they have overturned hundreds of sentences for blasphemy imposed by lower courts that were too vulnerable to local pressures—she can no longer even be confident of that.

“So the outlook seemed grim for Rimsa Masih when she was arrested last month—but then the imam who had called the police, Hafiz Mohammad Khalid Chisti, was arrested for doctoring the evidence. His own deputy had seen him adding pages from the Qur'an to the young Christian’s bag.

“‘I asked him what he was doing,’ the deputy told a television station, ‘and he said this is the evidence against them (the local Christians) and this is how we can get them out from this area.’ [...]

“Ashrafi added that Chisti was acting on behalf of a group who wanted to drive out the Christian minority in the area: ‘I have known for the last three months that some people in this area wanted the Christian community to leave so they could build a madrassah (on their land).’ They have already succeeded: some 300 Christian families have fled in fear for their lives, and they probably won’t be back. But at least the state is starting to defy the fanatics.

“Bail is not normally granted in blasphemy cases, but on September 8 Rimsa Masih was freed on bail, and a military helicopter lifted her out of the prison yard and into hiding. And Paul Bhatti, the Minister for National Harmony, whose brother and predecessor Shahbaz was murdered last year, broke a political taboo by explaining why ordinary Pakistanis are more hostile to the religious minorities in their midst than most Muslims elsewhere.

“‘It is not just a religious problem,’ Bhatti said. ‘It’s a caste factor, because (the victims) belong to the poorest and most marginalized people. Unfortunately they are Christians, and this caste system creates lots of problems.’

“Islam teaches the equality of all believers, but the caste system is alive and kicking in Pakistan. Go far enough back, and almost all Pakistani Muslims are descended from Hindus—and when those Hindu communities converted to Islam, they retained their ideas and prejudices about caste.

“This was particularly disheartening for groups at the bottom of the caste pecking order who had hoped that Islam would free them. When the British empire arrived in the area, therefore, it was the poorest and most despised section of the population who converted to Christianity.

“So everybody knows that most Christians are really ‘untouchables.’ The argument that got Asia Bibi in trouble, for example, broke out when some of her Muslim fellow workers refused to drink the water she had fetched because Christians were ‘unclean.’

“The Hindu minority is mostly just as low-caste as the Christians, and equally vulnerable. Together they are only six million out of 187 million Pakistanis, but they account for the vast majority of blasphemy accusations. In many cases, these accusations are merely a convenient weapon for Muslims engaged in land disputes and other quarrels with members of the minority groups.”

FORCED MARRIAGE TO SETTLE DISPUTES (SWARA) AND OTHER EXTREME FORMS OF WOMEN’S OPPRESSION IN PAKISTAN

PAKISTAN: Enslaved by tradition (IRIN)

“Despite the placing on Pakistan’s statute books of tougher laws against the practice of ‘swara’ or the ‘giving away’ of a woman to a rival party to settle a dispute, the tradition continues.

“The women’s rights advocacy organization Rahnuma, which guides victims, describes ‘swara’ as a practice “where a girl is given as an offering to `settle’ a conflict or dispute.” The practice is most common in Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa Province (KP) and the southern Punjab, where it is known as ‘vani’, but also takes place in other parts of the country.

“A ‘swara’ exchange can be used to settle murder, adultery (a crime under the law), kidnapping or another offence. [...]

“‘Yes, the laws have helped but “swara,” “vani” and similar practices still go on,’ [activist Samar] Minallah told IRIN. ‘Estimates based on newspaper reports indicate there are hundreds of cases each year. Of course, there are many others which do not get reported,’ she said.

“She also said that tougher laws and arrests made under them had ‘led to people disguising the handing over of a woman or girl. The deal is not announced within the community as a “swara” or “vani” marriage, though within the families concerned it is known that the woman has been given away as “swara” and is treated accordingly,’ Minallah said.

“While ‘swara’ brides are wed to the men they are given to, these men are usually far older than the ‘brides,’ who are often mere children.

“The girls are also usually treated extremely badly or ‘like slaves,” according to Minallah, in the home of their in-laws.

“‘Honour killings’

“Other ‘traditional’ practices also harm women. According to the autonomous Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRPC), there were 943 ‘honour killings’ in 2011. An ‘honour killing,’ according to HRCP, involves the murder of a woman who is deemed to have let down her family, or ‘dishonoured’ it in some way. This can involve an act such as alleged adultery, a marriage decided on by the woman herself or other trivial matters. Couples choosing to wed by choice frequently end up having to go on the run, as in a recent case reported in the media from Karachi in June this year.

“The kinds of threat women face was illustrated by a recent case from the remote Kohistan District of KP where four women were sentenced to death by a local ‘jirga’ (gathering of tribal elders) after being caught on video clapping as two men unrelated to them danced at a wedding.

“Child marriages

“‘Custom’ or “tradition” also works against women in other ways.

“According to figures presented at a seminar in Karachi by the Family Planning Association of Pakistan, 30 percent of all marriages in the country are child marriages though the law bars the marriage of a girl under 16 or a boy under 18.”

CENTENARY OF URDU-LANGUAGE SHORT-STORY WRITER NOT CELEBRATED IN PAKISTAN

Remembering Saadat Hasan Manto (1912-1955) by Tariq Ali (Counterpunch)

“Saadat Hasan Manto’s centenary is being observed quietly by friends and admirers in Lahore. No official recognition or mention. He’s almost become a non-person. Manto died in Lahore in 1955. He was forty-three years old. The life of one of our greatest short-story writers had been prematurely truncated. [...]

“It was the Partition of India in 1947 along religious lines that formed his own attitudes and those of his numerous detractors. The episodes associated with the senseless carnage that accompanied the withdrawal of the British from India loom large in Manto’s short stories. [...]

“Manto was amongst the few who observed the bloodbaths of Partition with a detached eye. He had remained in Bombay in 1947, where he worked for the film industry, but was accused of favoring Muslims and was subjected to endless communal taunts, even from those who had hitherto imagined to be like him, but the secular core in many people did not survive the fire. Manto came to Lahore in 1948, but was never happy. He turned the tragedies he had witnessed or heard into great literature. He wrote of the common people, regardless of ethnic, religious or caste identities and he discovered contradictions and passions and irrationality in each of them. [...]

“Years later he was still trying to come to grips with what had happened:

Still, what my mind could not resolve was the question: what country did we belong to now, India or Pakistan? And whose blood was it that was being so mercilessly shed every day? And the bones of the dead, stripped of the flesh of religion, were they being burned or buried? Now that we were free who was to be our subject? When we were not free, we used to dream about freedom. Now that freedom had come, how would we perceive our past state?

The question was: were we really free? Both Hindus and Muslims were being massacred. Why were they being massacred? There were different answers to the question; the Indian answer, the Pakistani answer, the British answer. Every question had an answer, but when you tried to unravel the truth, you were left groping.

Everyone seemed to be regressing. Only death and carnage seemed to be proceeding ahead. A terrible chapter of blood and tears was being added to history, a chapter without precedent.

India was free. Pakistan was free from the moment of its birth, but in both states, man’s enslavement continued: by prejudice, by religious fanaticism, by savagery.

“In a series of Open Letters to Uncle Sam he marked his displeasure at the state of world politics and Pakistan’s Security Pact with the US. He displayed a remarkable prescience as expressed in this extract from his ‘Third Letter to uncle Sam’, written shortly before his death:

Another thing I would want from you would be a tiny, teeny weeny atom bomb because for long I have wished to perform a certain good deed. You will naturally want to know what.

You have done many good deeds yourself and continue to do them. You decimated Hiroshima, you turned Nagasaki into smoke and dust and you caused several thousand children to be born in Japan. Each to his own. All I want you to do is to dispatch me some dry cleaners. It is like this. Out there, many Mullah types after urinating pick up a stone and with one hand inside their untied shalwar, use the stone to absorb the after-drops of urine as they resume their walk. This they do in full public view. All I want is that the moment such a person appears, I should be able to pull out that atom bomb you will send me and lob it at the Mullah so that he turns into smoke along with the stone he was holding.

As for your military pact with us, it is remarkable and should be maintained. You should sign something similar with India. Sell all your old condemned arms to the two of us, the ones you used in the last war. This junk will thus be off your hands and your armament factories will no longer remain idle.

Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru is a Kashmiri, so you should send him a gun which should go off when it is placed in the sun. I am a Kashmiri too, but a Muslim which is why I have asked for a tiny atom bomb for myself.

One more thing. We can’t seem able to draft a constitution. Do kindly ship us some experts because while a nation can manage without a national anthem, it cannot do without a constitution, unless such is your wish.

One more thing. As soon as you get this letter, send me a shipload of American matchsticks. The matchsticks manufactured here have to be lit with the help of Iranian-made matchsticks. And after you have used half the box, the rest are unusable unless you take help from matches made in Russia which behave more like firecrackers than matches.

“Given the circumstances it is hardly surprising that he sought solace in alcohol and drank himself to death. He had written over 200 short stories and had no doubt of his place in literary history and left behind the following epitaph for himself:

Here lies Saadat Hasan Manto. With him lie buried the arts of short-story telling. Here he lies underneath tons of mud still wondering if he was a better short-story writer than God.”

See also:

A Hundred Years of Manto by Shivam Vij (Kafila)

And see:

Manto on the Hindi-Urdu debate (Kafila)

Read Saadat Hasan Manto’s “Toba Tek Singh”

AGRICULTURAL LABORERS IN FLOOD-RAVAGED PAKISTAN: BETWEEN A NATURAL DISASTER AND A SOCIAL ONE

Pakistan One Year After the Floods by Christian Parenti (The Nation)

“Why would desperately poor flood victims fight to stay in a dust-choked tent camp on the outskirts of a violent mega-city rather than go back to their homes? [...]

“‘We don’t want to go back because the landlord will double our debt,’ says Hassan Khoso. ‘We want the government to give us land.’ He says that landlords have been coming to the camp urging the haris to return. Khoso and others say that is part of what keeps them close to the city. Along with work, there is access to hospitals and the promise—at least the promise—of education for their children.

“As at the camp on the western edge of Karachi, these people have formed a camp committee. To make their demands heard they marched to the local press club and held a sit-in. And how are such calls for reform and development being met by officials? Dead silence. [...]

“At the camp on the outskirts of Karachi one landlord from Baluchistan came with five armed guards, threatening to take away several brothers from a family named Bux. All the brothers were in debt to the landlord; he threatened to lock them in his private jail if they did not return and start working. But the camp rallied and faced him down.

“All through the Indus flood zone I heard similar stories—landless haris in urban camps preferring to become day laborers rather than return to debt peonage in the districts and landlords complaining that relief aid was keeping the haris away from their obligations. Standing on an earthen levee along a canal in the village of Arazi in the Dadu district of northern Sindh, a stout landlord named Kahari Bhutto exclaimed, ‘The farmworkers—their homes were wiped out, and they are gone. I don’t know where they are. Landowners themselves are having to do the work!’”

See also anti-caste on the 2010 floods in Pakistan and their aftermath

TARIQ ALI ON U.S.-PAKISTAN RELATIONS IN THE LIGHT OF WIKILEAKS

Elephantine Corruption by Tariq Ali (LRB Blog)

“The WikiLeaks confirm what we already know about Af-Pak. Pakistan is a US satrapy: its military and political leaders constitute a venal elite happy to kill and maim its people at the behest of a foreign power. The US proconsul in Islamabad, Anne Patterson, emerges as a shrewd diplomat, repeatedly warning her country of the consequences in Pakistan if they carry on as before. Amusing but hardly a surprise is Zardari reassuring the US that if he were assassinated his sister, Faryal Talpur, would replace him and all would continue as before. Always nice to know that the country is regarded by its ruler as a personal fiefdom.”

UNTOUCHABLE HINDUS IN PAKISTAN TURNED AWAY FROM AID IN AFTERMATH OF FLOODS

Caste away: Scheduled caste Hindus in Sindh are facing floods as well as discrimination (The News International (Pakistan), September 19, 2010)

“According to a report, scheduled caste Hindus were even denied shelter and food at a Dharmshala in Larkana where local management had made arrangements for 500 upper caste Hindus displaced due to floods from upper Sindh and Balochistan.

“Nisar Khokhar, a BBC correspondent from Larkana, says that arrangements at Dharmshala were very impressive, but unfortunately there was no place for scheduled castes. ‘Milk and other food items were available in huge quantity, but the entry of scheduled caste Hindus inside Dharmshala was banned,’ he tells TNS.

“He says that he was impressed by the efforts of local Hindu Panchayat, which did not take money from the government and was managing flood relief facility inside the Dharmshala on self-help basis. But, unfortunately, those who were in the most need were denied access to the facility just because they belonged to lower caste.

“The attitude of government officials is no different. In Makli, Prithvi Raj and other scheduled castes are denied registration as displaced persons. This registration will entitle them for government aid in cash and kind. The government had already started distribution of cash (Rs20,000) through “Watan” card scheme.

“‘DCO office in Thatta has refused our registration and told us to go to Hyderabad because our NIC is from Hyderabad,’ complains Pirthvi Raj. ‘Yes, we have NIC from Hyderabad, but when flood came we were settled in Thatta District,’ he argues.

“The official plea that they should go and register themselves in Hyderabad will deny these poor people compensation because Hyderabad is not included in the list of affected districts.

““We have received nothing, be it ration or cooked food,’ says Sono Bagri at Sabzi Mandi Camp in Hyderabad city. ‘When we try to reach them, we are told to go away because we are “Bagri” schedule caste.’

“An NGO activist tells TNS she has been asked by her boss not to focus on Bagris because they are not affectees, but beggars. Even provincial ministers are on record saying that Bagris and other schedule castes are beggars and have gathered in and around camps to receive aid.”

IN CONTEXT OF CAPITALISM/IMPERIALISM, FLOODS POSE MAJOR SOCIAL CRISIS IN PAKISTAN

Floods Could Have Lasting Impact for Pakistan (New York Times)

“The floods have submerged about 17 million acres of Pakistan’s most fertile croplands, in a nation where farming is an economic mainstay. The waters have also killed more than 200,000 head of livestock, and washed away large quantities of stored commodities that feed millions throughout the year.

“Relief workers warned that if farmers missed the deadline to reseed in the fall planting season, the nation could face long-term shortages. [...]

“The loss of even nonfood crops, like cotton for the nation’s textile industry, could undercut the nation’s ability to recover.

“With 20 percent of cotton washed away, Pakistan’s famed textile industry, which accounts for 60 percent of the country’s exports, is certain to stagger. As a result, textile plants are likely to make large-scale layoffs. Plants that do manage to purchase cotton will face electricity shortages, as more than seven major power stations have been demolished.”

See also:

Pakistan flooding submerges new areas (CBC, August 21, 2010):

“According to [a spokesman for the Canadian Red Cross], six million people are already homeless, and there are upwards of 20 million people whose lives have been impacted.

“The floods began in the northwest, hitting the Swat Valley and areas close to the main city of Peshawar, before moving down the country by way of the River Indus, devastating millions of hectares of crops in the country’s ‘breadbasket’ in Punjab and the Sindh.

“About one-fifth of the country–a chunk of land about the size of Italy–has been affected.”

And see:

Pakistan Flood Sets Back Infrastructure by Years (New York Times, August 26, 2010)

And see on anti-caste:

NOTES ON THE HISTORY OF PAKISTAN (June 2009)

ON CASTE DISCRIMINATION AGAINST SURVIVORS OF THE SOUTH ASIAN TSUNAMI (January 15, 2005)

IS URDU A MUSLIM LANGUAGE?

Myths about Urdu by Dr Tariq Rahman (Dawn (Pakistan))

"[On the myth that Urdu is a Muslim language:] For about 500 years of its existence nobody called it Urdu. It was called Hindi and had many words of Sanskrit origin as do other texts—until the 18th century.

"Then a language reform movement initiated by Muslim poets (Hatim, Mirza Mazhar, Nasikh’s students, etc.) threw out certain words from the corpus of the language. Among them were words like chinta (worry), prem (love), sundar (beautiful), etc. The movement was actually an attempt to create a linguistic marker for the cultural elite which was mostly Muslim. However, instead of being merely a class movement it became a religious one. Thus, Urdu was imbued with distinctive Perso-Arabic cultural content and served as an identity symbol for the Muslims of India.

"In the same way, after 1802, modern Hindi was created by weeding out Persian and Arabic words and using only the Devanagari script for writing. These new languages—Sanskritised Hindi and Persianised Urdu—drifted apart from each other and still serve as identity markers for Hindu and Muslim nationalism in South Asia.

"During the Pakistan Movement, Urdu became a symbol of the identity of South Asia’s Muslims. It was invested with emotional force and Maulvi Abdul Haq, who used to term it a composite language while in India, started calling it the mainstay of Muslim separatism.

"Similarly, Sanskritised Hindi became the symbol of the attempt to eliminate the share of Muslims in Indian culture. This political gulf between the two sister languages remains to this day—although at the spoken level, Urdu and Hindi remain the same language as all Indians who watch Pakistani dramas and all Pakistanis who watch Hindi movies will testify."

U.S.-BACKED PAKISTANI ARMY LEAVES A TRAIL OF BLOOD IN SWAT

Pakistan Army Said to Be Linked to Swat Killings (New York Times)

"Pakistan’s military operations against the Taliban in Swat, begun in May under public pressure from the United States, has been hailed by Washington as a showcase effort of the army’s newfound resolve to defeat the militants. [...]

"Now, concerns over the army’s methods in the area threaten to further taint Washington’s association with the military, cooperation that has been questioned in Congress and has been politically unpopular in Pakistan.

"The number of killings suggests that the military is seeking to silence any enthusiasm for the Taliban and to settle accounts for heavy army casualties, said a senior provincial official who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprimand by the army.

[...]

"A sullen, uncertain atmosphere prevails in Mingora, where people interviewed last week in shops, homes and government institutions nervously complained of the arbitrary and unpredictable army rule.

"Bodies, some with torture marks and some with limbs tied and a bullet in the neck or head, have been found on the roads of Mingora and in rural areas that were militant strongholds.

"Reports on Sept. 1 in two national daily newspapers, Dawn and The News, said the bodies of 251 people had been found dumped in Swat.

[...]

"A well-to-do landlord, Sher Shah Khan, who had criticized what he termed the army’s early reluctance to confront the militants, said he was not worried about the reports. 'If the security services kill in the same manner as the Taliban killed, people have no problem.'"

See also anti-caste: WHAT IS THE CLASS NATURE OF THE CONFLICT IN SWAT? (REVISITED) (July 28, 2009)

POGROM OF LOW-CASTE CHRISTIANS—SEVEN KILLED, HUNDREDS HOMELESS

Hate Engulfs Christians in Pakistan (New York Times)

"The attack in this shabby town in central Pakistan — the culmination of several days of rioting over a claim that a Koran had been defiled — shows how precarious life is for the tiny Christian minority in Pakistan.

"More than 100 Christian houses were burned and looted on Saturday in a rampage that lasted about eight hours by a crowd the authorities estimate was as large as 20,000 strong. In addition to the seven members of the Hameed family who were killed, about 20 people were wounded.

"The authorities, who said the Koran accusation was spurious, filed criminal charges in the case late Sunday and apprehended at least 12 people. Officials said a banned Sunni militant group, Sipah-e-Sohaba, was among those responsible for the attacks, the third convulsion of anti-Christian mob violence in the region in the past four weeks.

"Christians, who make up less than 5 percent of the entire population, are often treated as second-class citizens in Pakistan, where Islam is the official religion. Non-Muslims are constitutionally barred from becoming president or prime minister.

"While some Christians rise to become government officials or run businesses, the poorest work the country’s worst jobs, as toilet cleaners and street sweepers."

WHAT IS THE CLASS NATURE OF THE CONFLICT IN SWAT? (REVISITED)

With Unrest in Swat, Landowners Remain in Exile (The New York Times)

"The landlords, many of whom raised sizable militias to fight the Taliban themselves last year, say the army is again failing to provide enough protection if they return.

"Another deterrent to returning, they say, is that the top Taliban leadership, responsible for taking aim at the landlords and spreading the spoils among the landless, remains unscathed.

"If it continues, the landlords’ absence will have lasting ramifications not only for Swat, but also for Pakistan’s most populated province, Punjab, where the landholdings are vast, and the militants are gaining power, said Vali Nasr, a senior adviser to Mr. Holbrooke, the American envoy.

"'If the large landowners are kept out by the Taliban, the result will in effect be property redistribution,' Mr. Nasr said. 'That will create a vested community of support for the Taliban that will see benefit in the absence of landlords.'"

See also anti-caste: WHAT IS THE CLASS NATURE OF THE CONFLICT IN SWAT? (April 16, 2009) and AFTER PAKISTANI GOVT ACCEPTS TRUCE WITH THE TALIBAN... (February 23, 2009)

And see:

report on peasant uprising in Swat (Pakistan Forum, June-July 1972)

FOR THE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT OF BALOCHISTAN WITHIN A SOCIALIST ECONOMY!

Another Insurgency Gains in Pakistan (The New York Times)

"Hundreds, possibly thousands, of Baluch were rounded up in a harsh regime of secret detentions and torture under President Pervez Musharraf, who left office last year. Human rights groups and Baluch activists say those abuses have continued under President Asif Ali Zardari, despite promises to heal tensions.

[...]

"The discovery of the bodies [of three Balochi political leaders believed to be assassinated by Pakistani intelligence agencies] on April 8 set off days of rioting and weeks of strikes, demonstrations and civil resistance. In schools and colleges, students pulled down the Pakistani flag and put up the pale blue, red and green Baluch nationalist flag.

"Schoolchildren still refuse to sing the national anthem at assemblies, instead breaking into a nationalist Baluch song championing the armed struggle for independence, teachers and parents said.

"For the first time, women, traditionally secluded in Baluch society, have joined street protests against the continuing detentions of nationalist figures. Graffiti daubed on walls around this town call for independence and guerrilla war, which persists in large parts of the province.

"The nationalist opposition stems from what it sees as the forcible annexation of Baluchistan by Pakistan 62 years ago at Pakistan’s creation. But much of the popular resentment stems from years of economic and political marginalization, something President Zardari promised to remedy but has done little to actually address."

Baloch women protest

DEBT BONDAGE AND CHILD LABOR IN PAKISTAN

Pakistan's Kiln Workers Bricked In by Debt (The Washington Post)

"'This work shortens your life. No one would do it by choice,' said the man, Abdul Sadiq. 'The problem is that you can never earn enough to leave. If your wife needs an operation or the rainy seasons lasts too long, you have to borrow from the kiln owners. You try to repay it, but the debt stays with you, sometimes for your whole life. It's like a pair of invisible handcuffs.'

"Brickmakers toil near the bottom of Pakistan's economic and social ladder, forever at the mercy of heat, dirt, human greed and official indifference. By law, they cannot be compelled to work or be kept in bondage; in practice, the great majority are bound to the kilns by debt. The work is seasonal and families move often, but if they leave one kiln for another, their debt is transferred to the new owner. If they try to escape, they said, they are hunted down.

"At least 200,000 Pakistanis, many of them children, work in more than 2,500 kilns across the country, according to studies by labor advocacy organizations. Their plight is well known and often described as a national disgrace. Human rights groups have exposed cases of kiln owners chaining or imprisoning workers; reformists have initiated programs to forgive their debts and educate their children.

"But resistance to change has been stubborn. Kiln owners tend to be economically powerful and politically well-connected, while many brick workers are illiterate, nomadic, cut off from modern society and unaware of their rights."

See also anti-caste: ESTIMATED 8 MILLION BONDED LABORERS IN PAKISTAN (June 26, 2006) and CASTE-BASED BONDED LABOR IN PAKISTAN (March 13, 2006)

WHAT IS THE CLASS NATURE OF THE CONFLICT IN SWAT?

Taliban Exploit Class Rifts in Pakistan (New York Times)

"In Swat, accounts from those who have fled now make clear that the Taliban seized control by pushing out about four dozen landlords who held the most power.

"To do so, the militants organized peasants into armed gangs that became their shock troops, the residents, government officials and analysts said.

"The approach allowed the Taliban to offer economic spoils to people frustrated with lax and corrupt government even as the militants imposed a strict form of Islam through terror and intimidation.

“'This was a bloody revolution in Swat,' said a senior Pakistani official who oversees Swat, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation by the Taliban. 'I wouldn’t be surprised if it sweeps the established order of Pakistan.'

"The Taliban’s ability to exploit class divisions adds a new dimension to the insurgency and is raising alarm about the risks to Pakistan, which remains largely feudal."

See also:

Behind the crisis in Swat by Sartaj Khan

reply: No class war in Swat by Farhat Taj

rejoinder: The nature of war in Swat by Sartaj Khan

And see:

Taliban push Robin Hood image in Pakistan (CNN, April 27, 2009)

HONOR KILLINGS ORDERED BY ISLAMIC-TRIBAL LAW

PAKISTAN: A young couple is in hiding after a tribal court sentenced them to death for their inter-tribal marriage (Asian Human Rights Comission)

"Tensions between tribes are not uncommon in Pakistan, and Balochi tribes such as the Jatoi consider it a particular dishonour if their women marry into another group. The groups are strictly feudal and religiously conservative, with justice meted out by tribal courts or jirgas: illegitimate gatherings of elders, in which women have no voice and hearsay more often than not, replaces evidence. In cases of female dishonour these cases often result in a woman being marked as Kari. A Kari or 'black marked' woman can be killed by any member of the tribe with impunity, for the sake of honour.

"Recent statistics have reported that about 300 women are killed every year in Pakistan because of Kari, often in land distribution disputes, and often by male relatives. This kind of rural vigilante justice is generally tolerated by local police, due to the influence of powerful tribal leaders, and few cases reach the courts."

AFTER PAKISTANI GOVT ACCEPTS TRUCE WITH THE TALIBAN...

Class Dismissed in Swat Valley: The Death of Female Education (video by Adam Ellick and Irfan Ashraf for the New York Times)

A short documentary profiling an 11-year-old Pakistani girl on the last day before the Taliban close down her school.

In the course of this moving video, a young girl, her face veiled to conceal her identity, bravely reads the following speech at a school rally:

"Swat Valley: the land of waterfalls. Lush green hills and other gifts bestowed upon it by the nature. But my dear friends, today Swat has in the past few years become a heartland for Pakistan Islamic militancy. Today, this idyllic valley of peace is burning. Why the peace of this valley is destroyed? Why our future is targeted? Schools are not places of learning but places of fear and violence. Our dreams are shattered. And let me say, we are destroyed."

WATCH THE VIDEO HERE

But see also:

Who are the "Taliban" in Swat? by Humeira Iqtidar (Open Democracy, April 30, 2009)

"Much media attention has focused on the worsening plight of women in Swat, particularly after the video-taped public flogging of a 17 year-old girl. Unfortunately, the kinds of atrocities perpetrated by the TNSM against women also occur in the feudal holdings of many of the "secular" political elite of Pakistan. Yet these incidents do not make headlines in the same way. Few Pakistanis can ignore the fact that restricting women's mobility and reducing their educational opportunities (as the TNSM intend to do) along with gang rape, abduction, and honour killing have a long history in southern Punjab and Sind, areas where both President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani have vast landholdings."

FIRST BLOOD FOR OBAMA

Pakistan protests to US over air strikes (Dawn (Pakistan))

"Twenty-two people were killed in two missile strikes in Waziristan on Friday.

"The two missile strikes, coming three days after the new administration assumed office, are being taken as an indication that President Obama has endorsed drone attacks on Pakistan.

"President Obama, during his campaign for the White House, had called for attacks against high-value targets in Pakistan.

"The outgoing administration had increased the frequency of drone attacks in the dying weeks — about two dozen attacks occurring over five months. Some top Al Qaeda leaders were killed in these attacks."

ON THE SEPTEMBER 26-29 MUMBAI ATTACKS

We're told that this atrocious assault on several sites in the city was the work of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Toiba. Vijay Prashad ("The Fires in South Asia," Counterpunch) points out:

"The Lashkar is one of those organizations that emerged in 1991 out of the detritus of the Afghan jihad (it was formed in Kunar province). Carter’s Brzezinski vowed to 'sow shit in the Soviet backyard.' His Afghan toilet overflowed into South Asia."

But was it them? Ayesha Ijaz Khan ("Mumbai Terror Attacks," Counterpunch) writes:

"The fact that the Indian government is accusing Pakistan is taken with a grain of salt as this is not the first time the Indian government has blamed Pakistan, only to find later that Pakistan had nothing to do with the violence it was being accused of. Interestingly, four times previously the Indian government falsely accused Lashkare Taiba directly as the organization sponsoring violent incidents in India, and Pakistan indirectly for harbouring the militant group, although Pakistan officially banned the outfit in 2002.

"In each of the incidents, namely, the Chattisinghpura massacre, the attack on the Indian Parliament on 13 December 2001, the Malagaon blasts and the Samjhota Express incident, investigations were either refused or revealed that neither Lashkare Taiba nor Pakistan but groups from within India were responsible."

Alexander Cockburn, writing in The Nation, raises the question of perspective:

"No Western journalist chose to bewail a huge human catastrophe when that same chief minister of Maharashtra, Deshmukh [who resigned last week, accepting 'moral responsibility' for the attacks], supervised the destruction of 84,000 homes in Mumbai back in 2004-2005, nearly three times the number rendered homeless in Nagapattinam by the tsunami. 'Many people will be inconvenienced and will have to make sacrifices if the city has to develop,' Deshmukh said then. Once again, the lowly were making sacrifices in the interests of the mighty, many of them real estate gangsters in league with Deshmukh and the ruling Congress party."

Finally, in "Hotel Taj: Icon of Whose India?" the Tamil writer Gnani Sankaran questions where the cameras were pointed, and why. Which is the true icon of Bombay, the Hotel Taj, "where the rich and the powerful of India and the globe congregate," "the icon of the financiers and swindlers of India," or the first site attacked, the Chatrapathi Shivaji Terminus (CST) railway station [better known by its old name, Victoria Terminus, or VT]? It's through the latter that

"Indians from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan, West Bengal and Tamilnadu have poured into Mumbai over the years, transforming themselves into Mumbaikars and building the Mumbai of today along with the Marathis and Kolis.

"But the [TV] channels would not recognise this. Nor would they recognise the thirty odd dead bodies strewn all over the platform of CST. No Barkha Dutt [NDTV English news editor] went there to tell us who they were. But she was at Taj to show us the damaged furniture and reception lobby braving the guards. And the TV cameras did not go to the government-run JJ Hospital to find out who those 26 unidentified bodies were. Instead they were again invading the battered Taj to try in vain for a scoop shot of the dead bodies of the page 3 celebrities.

"In all probability, the unidentified bodies could be those of workers from Bihar and Uttar Pradesh migrating to Mumbai, arriving by train at CST without cell phones and pan cards to identify them. Even after 60 hours after the CST massacre, no channel has bothered to cover in detail what transpired there."

AFTER FIVE WOMEN BURIED ALIVE FOR TRYING TO CHOOSE THEIR OWN HUSBANDS....

Pakistani lawmaker defends honor killings (Associated Press)

"A Pakistani lawmaker defended a decision by southwestern tribesmen to bury five women alive because they wanted to choose their own husbands, telling stunned members of Parliament this week to spare him their outrage.

"'These are centuries-old traditions and I will continue to defend them,' Israr Ullah Zehri, who represents Baluchistan province, said Saturday. 'Only those who indulge in immoral acts should be afraid.'

"The women, three of whom were teenagers, were first shot and then thrown into a ditch."

PAKISTAN: TELECOMMUNICATION WORKERS WIN MAJOR CLASS BATTLE

PTCL accepts workers’ demands; strike ends (Dawn)

"The two-week tussle between the Pakistan Telecommunication Company [PTCL] and its employees ended when the management accepted the latter’s demands on Wednesday.

"Soon after the management’s decision, the PTCL United Workers Alliance called off its nationwide strike that had disrupted phone service and rendered more than half a million fixed line connections non-functional.

"The management issued notifications to regularise contractual employees on the New Compensation Pay Grade (NCPG) and increase the salaries by 35 per cent."

The PTCL is the largest telecommunications company in Pakistan, employing 40,000 workers. Formerly government-run, it was privatized and sold off to a Dubai-based company in 2005 despite workers' protest.

(image via Daily Voice (Pakistan))

ON BHUTTO ASSASSINATION, SUCCESSION

A friend writes:

"When I heard the news the other day that Benazir Bhutto had been killed, my second or third thought was: which member of the Bhutto family are they going to put in now? Two days later I read a headline: 'Bhutto’s husband, son to lead party.'

"Benazir herself had of course been put in after her father was hanged by the military in 1979. Just as in India when Nehru died they put in his daughter, Indira, and when Indira was killed they put in her son Rajiv, and when he was killed in turn they put in his Italian-born wife, wrapped in a sari. That’s how these Eastern dynasties work. Good thing it’s not like that here in the United States, where you would never have two people from the same family holding or seeking the presidency.

"If Ms. Bhutto had a tragic flaw, it was her lack of thrift. Had she and her husband not squandered the money they stole during her first administration, she would not have been forced to seek power a second time in 1993, and recently for yet a third time. This was a clear case of returning to the cookie jar one too many times. One and a half billion dollars, carefully managed, can be enough for a couple to retire on, even comfortably. With budgeting, avoidance of credit-card debt, and a little common sense, this story might have had quite a different ending."

PAKISTAN: GANG RAPE OF TEENAGE GIRL AS HONOR PUNISHMENT OF FAMILY

Girl raped and paraded naked (Daily Times, Pakistan)

"The police have arrested six men who allegedly raped a teenage girl and forced her to parade naked through a village in a so-called 'honour punishment', officials said Wednesday.

"The men kidnapped the 16-year-old girl in Habib Labalo village in southern Sindh province on Saturday because her cousin had an affair with a woman from their family, local police officer Aftab Farooqi told AFP."

See also:

Pakistani rape victim says attacks increasing (Reuters, February 1, 2007)

"Mukhtaran Mai, who was gang-raped in 2002 on the orders of a traditional village council, said she was appalled by a similar attack on a 16-year-old girl at the weekend.

"'Such inhuman acts are increasing in Pakistan as the government is not sincere about punishing offenders,' Mai told Reuters on Thursday.

"'When I read about this girl's ordeal, I felt the work we have done for women in the last four years was for nothing,' she said."

See anti-caste: MUKHTAR MAI: EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF A LOW-CASTE PEASANT WOMAN WHO STOOD UP (January 29, 2007)

MUKHTAR MAI: EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF A LOW-CASTE PEASANT WOMAN WHO STOOD UP

After being gang raped by her village elders, Mukhtar fought back... (Telegraph (UK))

"Mukhtar and her family are from the lowly Gujar caste and are expected to be subservient to the Mastoi. She thought that she was being asked, as a respectable woman, to speak to the village elders on behalf of her brother. As Mukhtar, accompanied by her father, Ghulam Farid Jat, an uncle and a family friend, approached the mosque, she could see a large gathering of men outside. This was the panchayat, the village council. What she didn't know was that it had been taken over by the Mastoi men, who had resolved that to appease the honour of their caste, she must be raped in revenge for what they claimed was the rape of one of their women by Shakur."

See also:
Breaking the silence: review of Mukhtar Mai's new memoir, In The Name of Honor (The Asian News.co.uk, February 9)

Mukhtar Mai: history of a rape case (BBC News, June 28, 2005)

And see anti-caste article: Muslims and Caste

CASTEIST, ANTI-WOMAN ATROCITY BY HENCHMAN OF PAKISTANI MINISTER

Pakistani graduate raped to punish her low-caste family (London Times)

"A young Pakistani woman has been kidnapped, raped and beaten by a gang of high-caste villagers because her uncle eloped with one of their relatives. She was chosen for punishment because she had recently gained a degree and was the pride of her low-caste family.

[...]

"Last week human rights campaigners said Shaheen was unlikely to see her attackers brought to justice because President Pervez Musharraf had failed in an attempt to repeal the Hudood Ordinance, which requires four male Muslim witnesses to support a rape charge. If the accused is acquitted, the victim becomes liable to prosecution for adultery.

"While Musharraf was out of the country earlier this month, a committee of hardline Islamic scholars neutered his bill to protect women’s rights which would have repealed the Hudood Ordinance. The scholars claimed the bill was un-Islamic because it 'encouraged adultery'.

"Shaheen’s ordeal began last month when 11 armed men, believed to be security guards employed by one of Musharraf’s ministers, forced their way into her home, attacked her father and brothers and pulled her and her mother into the street."

See also:

Vendetta Rapes Continue as Pakistan Resists Change (New York Times, October 4, 2006):

"Since then, Ms. Shaheen’s ambitions have been shattered, and it is she who suffers scorn for the rape. She says she feels helpless. The school where she was to teach has refused to accept her.

"'They said they can’t accept me as it is a matter of their repute now,' Ms. Shaheen said."

And see:

PAKISTAN: Police and government henchmen abducted and confined a mother and a girl for 12 days (Asian Human Rights Commission, September 7, 2006)

ESTIMATED 8 MILLION BONDED LABORERS IN PAKISTAN

Walking Out Of Slavery by Sarah Stuteville (The Indypendent)

"The Pakistani Bonded Labour System Abolition Act, which was officially adopted by parliament in 1992, outlaws bonded labor, cancels all existing bonded debts, forbids lawsuits for the recovery of debts and punishes using children as bonded labor with up to five years in prison and an $800 fine. Bonded laborers can petition for a writ of habeas corpus and free themselves legally. Despite these laws, the number of bonded laborers in Pakistan is estimated conservatively at several million, while human rights activists believe the total hovers closer to 8 million.

"The nature of bonded labor in Pakistan explains why these laws are ineffective. Many laborers are confined to brick kilns in Punjab and agricultural fields in Sindh, where they work seven days a week from sunrise to sunset. They are often born into bondage and never receive any kind of education, leaving them incapable of performing the basic math to calculate the debt that enslaved them or the wages they earn. They are easily tricked – if not terrorized – into laboring long after their real debts are paid.

"If they are not born into bondage, Pakistan’s poorest, most marginalized populations can find themselves there due to an expensive dowry, an illness or a drought in their native villages. Their financial difficulties drive them to factory bosses or landowners who offer them peshgi, or advance wages, and they and their entire families – including young children – are claimed as property.

"Even if offered freedom, some workers have no other economic options. But many do escape and are often hunted down by owners and forced back into bondage. Human rights groups have reported that landlords, particularly in rural Sindh, maintain private jails where errant laborers are kept. Local police and politicians often turn a blind eye to such practices due to strong ties with landowners."

WORKING IN PAKISTAN'S COAL MINES

Exposé: Death in the Mines (Newsline (Karachi))

"Bonded for their working life through contractors, young boys of 13 work till they are 30 years old for a paltry sum until their damaged lungs can no longer withstand the chronic exposure to coal dust."

CASTE-BASED BONDED LABOR IN PAKISTAN

PAKISTAN: Free at Last, From Generations of Bonded Labour (Inter Press Service News Agency)

'''All my family members worked, including my mother and younger sister. My mother would say we have to work to pay off the loans taken by my grandfather from the landlords. However hard and long we all worked, the exorbitant interest on the loan my grandfather had taken was never paid.'''

See also:

In Pakistan, 'slavery' persists (The Christian Science Monitor, December 15, 2003)