Just International

Leaderless!

By Philip A Farruggio

Can you imagine that after my generation either was pushed into the Vietnam phony war or pushed into the streets to get us out, we have arrived at this, this ****? Bad enough that less than twenty years later we twice destroyed and invaded Iraq ( occupying it the second round), destroyed much of Afghanistan and set our sights on the rest of the Middle East. Let’s look at what the rigged system has given us since 1980:

The ‘ crème de la crème’ had to then be Dutch Reagan, informer for the HUAC ( House Un-American Activities Committee) and friend of the California Super Rich Mafia. Already going senile, Reagan actually used the moniker that Trump later stole: MAGA ( Make America Great Again) to convince many Two Party/One Party suckers…sorry, voters, to make him the quintessential front man for the Super Rich corporate predators. While his wife’s war on drugs was going on, the CIA, handled by his VP and former CIA boss Bush #1, was making sure plenty of crack cocaine was flowing into the US, especially Southern California. Ronnie baby meanwhile made sure the super rich got lower tax rates as the nation saw less and less private sector unions. The great illusion was when states passed the contradictory ‘ Right to Work’ laws, which meant having to work with NO union to protect you. None!

Reagan did his job, which meant acting like a commercial pitchman ( which he knew from experience) and napping while Bush #1 ran the corporation… sorry, the country. Then, when Governor and Democratic Party presidential candidate Michael Dukakis wore that silly helmet while foolishly riding on top of a tank as his numbers dissipated, we got Bush #1. He was there when the Deep State wanted to punish Saddam Hussein for not staying on his side of the reservation and getting too big for his britches. So, Saddam became Hitler and the Brits and us destroyed Iraq with the asinine ” Coalition of the Willing… to do Uncle Sam’s bidding’ with mostly our firepower. One surmises that the economy under #1 was enough to turn off the suckers… sorry, voters. Even the yellow ribbon BS on this ‘ Wag The Dog’ phony war ( Go and get that film by Barry Levinson) could not save the day. So, we got ‘ Mr. Bill’….

If there was ever a professional bullshit artist better than Billy Clinton, show me! This guy could BS his way out of any scrap. ‘ I did not inhale’ is as good as it gets. The funny thing is he did what the professional card players call a ‘ Tell’. They can read a person’s hand by how he or she gestures or looks. Books have been written on that skill in reading body language. Well, Billy boy would ‘ Tell’ while having a conversation by giving a ‘ shit eating grin’ or pausing before finishing a thought. You could just know this guy was about to BS, and did he! ‘ I did NOT have sex with that woman!’ Gold, pure gold.

Bush #2 or Junior as his dad referred to him, was a true piece of work. This spoiled frat boy who supported our phony war in Vietnam while conveniently using #2’s influence to fly with the Texas Air National Guard. For you novices on history out there, during the 60s and 70s the last military personnel to ever get sent overseas into any hornet’s nest was our National Guard and Reserves. You would need an attack by North Vietnam on our shores to see those guys in action. After all his personal peccadilloes and failures as a ( so called) businessman Junior got to work for the Texas Rangers. Bush #1 sure did have lots of friends. Then, after a failed attempt at Congress the Super Rich Texas Deep State got Junior into the governor’s mansion. From there, with the help of an army of right wing movers and shakers, Junior became President… in name only. They made sure Tricky Dick Cheney would run things as his Veep. The increasing suspicions as to what really went down on 9/11 led Junior to sign off on War on Iraq 2, to perhaps wash some of that **** away from the public’s attention. Junior became the idiot emperor who just didn’t have any clothes. He ruled MoronAmerika during the absolute worst foreign policy maneuver our nation has ever made.

The damage that the Bush/Cheney Cabal had done just opened the door to the need for ‘ Hope and Change’. Enter Barack Hussein Obama, advertised as a true activist for progressive change. He was handled so well by the Democratic Party movers and shakers that mega millions of suckers… sorry, voters, put this guy into the Oval Office. His greatest foreign policy maneuver was to increase drone missile attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan by tenfold of what the Cheney/Bush Cabal did. How many innocent civilians happened to be near where the **** happened is a tragedy in itself. Barack also continued the bailout AKA gift to the Wall Street banksters on the taxpayer’s dime. He was the reverse front man to Reagan’s own servitude to the Super Rich.

What can one say about The Trumpster that hasn’t been covered by serious researchers? Put it this way: If we were back in the days of the Old West, The Donald would have been the epitome of the con man pushing his medicinal remedies from the back of a wagon. He took the ( rightful) anger of millions of working stiffs ( mostly white, by the way) and mesmerized them with his populist rhetoric. A man who stood up to his knees in the Deep State **** his whole career convinced them that he was anointed to save them. The real twist is that most of them still follow his tune right over the cliffs of reason.

Finally, we have Lunchbox Joe, who they now have to guide to and from the podium. This guy was always a piece of work his entire career. He helped break the railroad workers strike and then had the audacity to stand on the picket line with auto workers. Biden destroyed Anita Hill 32 years ago when she told the world the truth about Clarence Thomas. Biden also supported the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq in ’03. Before that he supported Billy Boy’s welfare reform bill, which took us back closer to the Gilded Age. Now, he follows the orders of the Deep State and keeps sending our tax dollars down the rabbit hole in support of a Neo Nazi infiltrated Ukraine. Read my lips: If they run this guy again he will lose… even to a crook like Trump.

Philip A Farruggio is regular columnist on itstheempirestupid website. He is also frequently posted on Nation of Change and Countercurrents..

5 October 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

Teenager Burns Quran in Chicago, Extremist Links Suspected

By Pieter Friedrich

Video which emerged this past week of a Naperville, Illinois area teenager setting a Quran aflame and throwing it on the ground has not only disturbed the local Muslim community but caused many to speculate it exemplifies increasing Islamophobic radicalization within the region’s large Indian-American Hindu community.

Local sources strongly suggest that the perpetrator in question is a 16-year-old Indian-American Hindu boy who, two years ago, participated in a mass opposition campaign to the building of a new mosque in the area. Records from Naperville City show his presumed mother similarly expressing opposition to the mosque. Contacted for comment about the current incident, the woman believed to be his mother claimed that “rumors” are being spread about “my son.”

According to sources, the family has already come forward in the local community and admitted that their son — whose name I am withholding — is the perpetrator.

In 2021, when the Islamic Center of Naperville submitted an expansion proposal to the city, opposition elements mobilized thousands of in-person speakers and letter writers to the city council. Local Muslim sources strongly believe that the opposition campaign was primarily spearheaded by the Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh (HSS), an American Hindu nationalist outfit, and records show that the vast majority — perhaps 75 percent or more — of people registering opposition were of Indian-American and likely Hindu origin. While most comments followed what appeared to be a carefully tailored script focusing on concerns about traffic increases, opposition to the mosque falls in line with the Islamophobic agenda of the HSS and its Indian parent organization, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).

The RSS is a paramilitary founded in India in 1925 with the express purpose of unifying, homogenizing, and militarizing Hindus. Its founders were particularly disdainful of Indian Christians and Muslims, saying that the latter should be treated the same way as German Jews. They described both communities as “traitors” to India based on the belief that only Hindus can be true patriotic Indians.

Since 2014, elements linked to the RSS have controlled India’s national government and calls for social boycotts, economic boycotts, and even eradication of Muslims have become routine in the country.

RSS activity is not confined to India, however. The HSS, a registered US nonprofit deriving inspiration from the RSS, serves as that group’s American wing. With 230 chapters nationwide, HSS has a heavy presence of 11 chapters in Illinois, including one chapter just 10 miles away from Naperville.

The city itself has a long history of platforming and praising the HSS in a variety of ways. Most recently, in August 2023, the HSS was welcomed by the Naperville Fire and Police Departments to celebrate a Hindu festival with them. At the event, the mayor applauded his city’s “collaboration” with the group.

A recent investigation by The Nation uncovered that countless local governments and elected officials around the country have engaged in similar interactions with the HSS. Yet, upon reaching out to over 80 and speaking with 15, the outlet discovered that not a single one was aware of the HSS’s links to the RSS or, in the words of one mayor, “the political interests of the HSS.”

HSS’s political interests, however, appear to run deep, both in the US and in India.

In 2014, top HSS leaders in America led large campaigns to support the election of Narendra Modi, an RSS member, as Prime Minister of India. HSS-linked outfits have been key sponsors behind campaigns to change how American school curriculum teaches about India, Hinduism, and related topics, including Islam. HSS has also been linked to Chicagoland US Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi, who has not only keynoted some of their events but also taken hundreds of thousands in campaign donations from people linked to the outfit or one of its affiliates.

HSS, which is present globally while maintaining its links with the RSS, also runs educational camps for children. At one such, in the United Kingdom in 2016, an on-camera sting operation revealed that a visiting instructor from India was teaching Islamophobic content which was regurgitated by the young students.

The teacher called Islam “the world’s worst religion.” The only good Muslims, he said, “can be counted on fingers.” Muslims, he agreed with students, are the biggest problem in Britain for “everybody.” Various students claim that “you can’t unify with Muslims,” suggest bombing Muslims, and state: “I hate Muslims…. We should keep them out of society without killing them.” One student admits, “We’re equated as, like, Hitler Youth.”

Links between Hindu nationalism (or Hindutva) and Western fascism trace back to the RSS’s origins, when its founders modeled the outfit on the same lines as the fledging movements in Italy and Germany. They continue to this day.

In the UK, the HSS has had links with nationalist groups since its origins in that country, while the far-right English Defence League has repeatedly associated with Hindutva elements due, apparently, to their shared platform of Islamophobia. In the US, the Hindu American Foundation — many of whose leaders have been linked to various entities within the family of Hindu nationalist organizations to which the RSS/HSS belong — has cultivated a collaborativerelationship with the Middle East Forum, a group which has been described as both “a right-wing anti-Islam think tank” and “an extremist policy organization that has produced and distributed anti-Muslim and anti-Arab policies.”

Meanwhile, this year, we witnessed the first attack on American soil by an apparently radicalized Hindu teenager.

In May 2023, 19-year-old Sai Kandula rammed a truck into barriers outside the White House. He then got out and waved a Nazi flag. Once in custody, he reportedly said he was trying to assassinate the president and praised Hitler.

While Kandula’s case remains a bit of a mystery, it wouldn’t be the first example of modern-day affinity between white nationalism and Hindu nationalism. In 2011, Norwegian white supremacist terrorist Anders Breivik — who has tragically inspired a host of copycat killers —infamously praised the RSS for “often riot[ing] and [attack]ing Muslims,” even calling for mutual learning and cooperation.

The incident in Naperville, thus, raises questions about the presence of Hindutva ideology in America and its influence especially on youth.

In a video circulating on social media, which appears to show a confrontation at a school between the boy in question and other students who are angry at him for burning the Quran, he admits, “I was stupid to do that.” Whether it was this incident or his opposition — at the age of 14, according to his own remarks, as recorded by the City of Naperville — to installation of a mosque, one can argue that the true blame for such manifestations of hatred can be placed on the parental or educational environment. Yet the whole affair must raise red flags about how Hindutva appears to be spreading in our own American backyard.

In that case, considering especially its links to the RSS and its past exposure in the UK as a breeding ground for Islamophobic brainwashing, one wonders if the influence of the HSS in Naperville had anything to do with this sad situation.

While in the latest video, the boy appears to claim that he has “already apologized,” it’s important to contextualize that claim. First, apologizing because one got caught is not the same thing as being sorry; second, this issue is about far more than the actions of a single individual, but rather should raise questions about potential radicalization into Hindutva ideology occurring in our own suburban American backyards.

Pieter Friedrich is a freelance journalist specializing in analysis of South Asian affairs.

5 October 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

I Have Written Only Facts: Paranjoy Guha Thakurta

By A K Shiburaj

Police carried out early morning raids yesterday on the NewsClick office and the homes of almost 50 journalists, activists, and comedians across India under anti-terrorism laws, deepening concerns over a crackdown on freedom of expression in the country. The journalist Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, the activist Teesta Setalvad, and the comedian Sanjay Rajoura were also among those raided and taken in for police questioning. After the questioning Paranjoy Guha Thakurta told journalists that a FIR has been lodged ‘apparently’ under the Unlawful Activities Preventions Act.

This conversation with Paranjoy Guha Thakurta was held in February 2023 when he came to Kerala for the release of the book ‘Adani Empire: Beyond Crony Capitalism‘ published by Transition Studies

What was the situation that led to the Ahmedabad court order directing you not to comment or criticize Adani and its business entities?

Such a judgment comes in the case following the publication of a series of articles titled ‘Justice Arun Mishra’s Final ‘Gift’ of Rs 8,000 Crore to Adani’It was an order from the Ahmedabad Magistrate’s Court in September 2020.  A series of three articles written by Abir Dasgupta and myself were published by NewsClick. The judge was of the view that its content and especially its title lowered the esteem of the judiciary in the eyes of the public of India. Therefore, the court prohibited me and Abir Dasgupta from commenting on and criticizing the Adani Group. At first, it was a civil case against defamation and later it turned into a criminal defamation case. Then the NewsClick’s lawyers appealed to the High Court. After this case, I did not respond to the Adani issue for two and a half years in public.

How did you manage to speak freely and break your silence after two and a half years?

Two and a half years later, even as the court order against me remained, I decided on my own to reveal the facts to the outside world. I will not share my personal opinions with you, just facts. Every citizen is free to draw a conclusion from the facts I share. If I say that the share markets of Adani companies fell after January 24, it is not an opinion. I’m not saying it’s good or not as well. It is up to you to draw a conclusion or analyze its different aspects. What the court has blocked is my expression of opinion. That is how I am convinced. I don’t know if the judge who issued the order meant more than that.

Was the Hindenburg Report a reason for the decision to share the facts?

Is it not a fact that the Hindenburg Research Report confirms what I have been telling the world for so long? Independent journalists like me and my colleagues like Ravi Nair and Abir Dasgupta have been saying these facts since 2015. An important report of mine on Adani came in April 2016 after I became an editor at the Economic and Political Weekly (EPW). I shared its contents with the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), Revenue Department, Finance Ministry, Customs Department etc. I handed over information to them about financial irregularities in the importation of coal and power generation equipment by over-invoicing by about forty private and government firms. Adani’s companies were also involved in it. All this information is mentioned in the Hindenburg Research Report.

Are you sure there won’t be any other court proceedings against you for sharing such facts now in the context of  the Ahmedabad Magistrate court order?

How can I tell what will happen in the future? How can Gautam Adani tell what will happen tomorrow? Just as I cannot say now what will happen to Narendra Modi in the 2024 elections, so are the possibilities of cases that could be filed against me in the future.

You are the only Indian media person e mentioned in the Hindenburg Research report released on January 24, 2023. Can you tell me the details?

Apart from me, media houses like CNBC and Economic Times were also mentioned in it. The Hindenburg report had 88 questions for Adani Group to answer. My name was mentioned in the eighty-fourth question. The question is, ‘Gautam Adani, if you believe in freedom of expression and freedom of speech, why did you go to the steps of arresting a journalist named Paranjoy Guha Thakurta? The lawyer for the Adani group replied that ‘we have no part in it, it is a decision of a court’. That is true in a sense.

I feel that the public should be told what actually happened when the Adani Group responded to this case in the Hindenberg Report. The case was related to an article published in the Economic and Political Weekly in June 2017 when I was editor. The article was reprinted by The Wire (https://thewire.in). That article titled Modi Government’s Rs 500-Crore Bonanza to the Adani Group is still available to readers. This happened in July 2017. After that, the Adani Group approached the court in Gujarat. They filed civil and criminal cases in Bhuj and Mundra in Gujarat. I have appeared thrice in the court of First Class Magistrate, Mundra, Gujarat.

The Bhuj Magistrate in the civil case did not ask for the complete withdrawal of the article. What the magistrate asked to do was to retract one word, one sentence of that article and so did The Wire. To the surprise of all of us, in May 2019, the Adani Group decided to withdraw the cases against my co-authors and The Wire and to continue the case against me only before the results were announced after the Lok Sabha elections. Then the court was closed during the Covid. So in January 2021, a journalist friend of the Press Trust of India (PTI) called me and informed me that the Mundra court had issued a non-bailable arrest warrant against me. Many others had received this information before even my lawyer knew about it. Then I appeared in court and my lawyer argued that the arrest warrant issued against me was against Supreme Court guidelines. Ten days later, the Gujarat High Court got a stay order for this warrant, so my arrest was avoided. Following this, I appeared in court in February and March 2021. That case is still ongoing.

What is the current status of your cases?

Now both the cases are going on in the Mundra court. Three other cases are pending in the Ahmedabad court and that is where the ban on not talking about the Adani issue came from. I am the only person in India facing six defamation cases filed by Adani’s company. Recently, another criminal case for defamation has been registered against me and my co-writer Abir Dasgupta and the NewsClick portal in the Baran district of Rajasthan. The sixth case relates to the publication of an article written by AICC member Varun Santhosh and myself on my own website (https://paranjoy.in) under ‘The A Files’ section. The Hindenburg Report mentions many of the documents and reports published in it.

Why would EPW, a well-known independent media, ask you to retract the article on Adani, questioning their credibility?

Only Samiksha Trust can say the reason and its Chairman Prof. Deepak Nayyar is bound to answer that. But I can share things related to my resignation. The article, titled Modi Government’s Rs 500-Crore Bonanza to the Adani Group, was about how one company, Adani Power, was able to make huge gains as a result of the government’s policy changes in power sector projects for Special Economic Zones (SEZs). Along with me, the Trust and the publisher had received legal notices from Adani Power’s firm regarding this article. I had replied directly to the notice sent to me by my lawyer. Then the Samiksha Trust asked me for an explanation for not seeking permission from the publisher prior to replying to the solicitor’s notice. Samiksha Trust pointed out that it was a serious failure on my part and it was an act of great impropriety. Although I did not think so, I considered it a technical error on my part and apologized to the Trust.

They also alleged that I have acted in various ways to destroy the reputation of the publication EPW. So I was told that like my predecessors, I would no longer be able to write articles in EPW under my own name and that they were going to hire an associate editor. They also said that I should not leave the office without withdrawing the article from the website. Having done so I wrote my resignation letter on a piece of paper and submitted it to the Trust. The reactions that followed when the news spread across the world surprised me. Hundreds of people responded by supporting me. Among them were Nobel laureates Amartya Sen and Angus Deaton, and Noam Chomsky, whom I greatly respect.

Could the continued legal action against you be part of a conspiracy even after the charges against The Wire and your colleagues were dropped? What is the reason you are targeted? Who could be behind that?

This is a very relevant question. But I don’t know the answer to that. Gautam Adani and his lawyers can answer this.

You are not only writing an article but also publishing a lot of important documents that validate the arguments in it. Could it be the consequences it creates that prompt Adani to take such a strong stand against you?

That is your opinion. I can’t say whether that’s right or wrong. All I can say is the facts and you can come to any conclusion. Freedom of speech for every citizen of India is envisaged in the Constitution of India.

It’s a well-known fact that Adani is a big source of election funds for Modi and BJP. Do you think the Hindenburg report and the crisis in the share market that Adani companies are currently facing will have a decisive impact on the next election?

I don’t know what will happen in the 2024 elections. Did we expect Pulwama and Balakot before the 2019 elections? Let me tell you some things that surprised me. On January 25, the day after the Hindenburg Research report, Adani Group’s flagship company, Adani Enterprises, opened its Follow-on Public Offer (FPO) by offering Rs 20,000 crore shares to the public. A follow-on public offer is a process by which a company listed on the stock exchange issues new shares to investors, existing shareholders or promoters. FPOs are used by companies to diversify their equity base and raise capital for their business. The day after the opening of the FPO was a public holiday as it was Republic Day. The central budget was presented on February 1. Let me tell you what happened in the meantime. Immediately after Adani Company’s FPO of Rs 20,000 crores, there was a positive response from the share market. But then its value began to decline. When the FPO ended on January 31, everyone thought Adani’s crisis was over. Naturally, on the day the budget was presented, the value of shares of many companies went up and down. But Adani Group was down. Later, to everyone’s surprise, Adani Enterprises made a formal announcement at 10.30 pm that it was withdrawing its Follow-on Public Offer and returning the money to those who had invested. The next morning, Gautam Adani said in a video that he was withdrawing the FPO on moral grounds. But before that, the Adani Group had alleged that the Hindenburg report shared baseless information about his company and that it was intended to tarnish his reputation and that of his country.When the chief financial officer of Adani Group held a press conference on that day, the national flag of India was larger than the logo of Adani Group. He also made a reference to the Jallianwala Bagh massacre in his message that the British soldiers used Indian soldiers to shoot Indians and so on. After all this, we all know that since January 24, the value of all shares of Adani Group has fallen by 50-70 percent. Let’s wait and see the consequences of this in the political and economic spheres.

Did you help Hindenburg Research Organization to publish the report that came out about Adani companies?

Many people have asked me this question. I had not even heard the name of such an organization until that report came out. I only know about Paul Von Hindenburg who ruled Germany. All I knew was that he commanded the Imperial German Army during World War I and later held that position as President of Germany from 1925 until his death.

You are a person who is constantly writing about crony capitalism and the crises it creates in democracy and the financial sector. How does political economy become a central theme of your media intervention?

While I am a journalist, I am also a student studying the political economy of India and the world. I studied Economics at Delhi University and later I completed my post graduation from Delhi School of Economics. Since then I have written on various topics, produced documentaries, and published some books. I was also a part-time teacher. I have been in the media for over 45 years and I have prepared reports on all important business establishments. I published a book on Ambani in 2014 called Gas Wars: Crony Capitalism and the Ambanis.

How do you happen to focus on Adani?

I have never focused on any particular business entity. I have been researching and writing about Adani when he became the second and third richest man in the world in a short period of time. His growth was truly astonishing. Adani said in an interview that the policies of the Rajiv Gandhi government and the liberalization policies of the P. V. Narasimha Rao government initially helped his business grow in Gujarat. His decline today is as dramatic and surprising as his growth since then. I have always been interested in the nexus between politics and business and the give and take between them. And of course, it has a lot to do with our elections and democratic systems.

Crony capitalism is not a new phenomenon in India. It has been functioning in India and the world for a long time. But what is the difference in its operation in India before and after Narendra Modi came to power?

A significant change that can be seen is the shift from crony capitalism to oligarchic capitalism. It can be seen that the special treatment that was given to a group of business organizations before Modi’s regime is now concentrated in one company. On the other hand,  Birla, Tata, Reliance, and many other companies have been able to influence the government’s policy programs in the past. Learning these things is my interest but it is not just hatred or opposition to Adani. It can be seen that Modi is implementing more extreme right-wing policies than the right-wing policies during the UPA government. During the UPA government, the welfare state, rights of citizens, relief measures for the marginalized, rights of women, farmers, tribals, etc., and economic growth for all were often heard. Moreover, some policy programs and activities in that direction had also taken place those days. It is a fact that even then the policies were in favor of the wealthy class. Politicians and business firms have always been close. This was the case even before India gained independence.

The main difference now is that Adani’s company has an unprecedented influence on the Indian economy and dominates almost every sector of business. Adani established his business in the diamond and plastic waste sector and twenty years ago, people did not know about Adani. Very soon he becomes the second and third richest person in the world. It can be said that there are no major areas of business in the country where Adani is not investing today. The government is also supporting him to open business opportunities for him regardless of his previous experience in the fields of airport and fighter aircraft manufacturing.

Isn’t the distribution of wealth essential, even though it would not bring equity, to the survival and success of capitalism? So wouldn’t oligarchic capitalism, confined its benefits to one person, be a threat to the economic system of capitalism itself?

That’s right. It appears that the problems with Adani have little to do with any economic and political ideology. Suppose you are someone who thinks capitalism is the best. Aren’t there some rules and regulations for that too? What is the purpose of institutions like SEBI and Reserve Bank? Even in America, there is a Securities and Exchange Commission. It can be seen that Adani’s company is not complying with any system existing in India. The Hindenburg Research report says that Adani is following his own rules. That is why the investigation by SEBI has not been concluded even after months and no report has come out. I would say that what is happening in India now is not capitalist economic policies. Capitalism is about a level playing field. There is no possibility of competition among different business enterprises here now.

What were the circumstances that led you to meet Adani?

I have met and spoken to Gautam Adani twice. I first met him when I was working at EPW in 2017. The second meeting was in February 2021. All conversations were conducted on the understanding that they would be off the record. My lawyer took the initiative in the hope that the cases could be settled out of court. A telephone conversation was also held with him recently. It was after the Hindenburg Report. The main talk was about FPO matters. Even then I requested him to withdraw the defamation cases against me. I can only say that he did not respond positively to it.

You have been dealing with court cases for several years. How has it affected your life and journalism?

The cases have affected my personal life, my family life, and my writing. My lawyers have to spend a lot of time and travel on my case. Apart from traveling to court in many places, hotel accommodations and meals are also expensive. My family was very worried when a non-bailable warrant was issued against me. They asked me to stop working on cases that the work I had done for so long was enough and that I should not become a martyr.

Is it in this situation that Adani was approached and an out-of-court settlement was sought?

The possibilities were already looked at and my lawyer has tried on his own. He had asked Adani why the cases were continuing only against me. It takes a lot of time to settle the case through normal court proceedings. Until then, money and time will have to be spent. Call it a SLAPP, Strategic Litigation Against Public Participation. It is also a warning to others aimed at discouraging others from asking questions.  I have co-authored a book with Subir Ghosh about this called ‘Sue the Messenger’. It is clear that if what we wrote offends someone, the lawsuits filed against it could eliminate the accused in a sense.

If the cases are dropped through an out-of-court settlement, isn’t that likely to be interpreted as your final surrender to Adani? And isn’t it possible that there could be clauses in the settlement that might affect you?

This question is very important. The answer depends on what the settlement is. It is impossible to say what will happen if a settlement is reached.

Isn’t it pathetic that your freedom of expression is being suppressed?

Article 19A of the Constitution guarantees freedom of speech to all citizens and journalists. Article 19(2) also allows for reasonable restriction on freedom of expression. That’s all I want to say now.

Do you wish there were more independent journalists like you?

How do I judge others? I can say that a large section of media workers are extremely loyal to the government in power. They are also subservient to corporate interests. There are very few journalists today who hold those in power accountable and ask tough questions. Narendra Modi is the only Prime Minister of India who does not hold a press conference without preparing it beforehand. Since becoming Prime Minister in May 2014, he has not faced questions from the media to date. He has given interviews only to a selected few and those journalists then asked only the questions the Prime Minister wanted. Do you remember the first question Akshay Kumar asked him in one such interview? Does Modi eat mango? The next question was whether he eats the mango cut or the whole.

A.K. Shiburaj is an independent journalist

4 October 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

NewsClick Office Sealed, Founder Arrested

By Press Release

Today, on 3rd October, 2023, raids were carried out by the Special Cell of the Delhi Police at various locations including Newsclick’s officen, residences of journalists and employees associated with Newsclick.

Several persons were questioned, and as of now, our Director Mr. Prabir Purkayastha and one Mr. Amit Chakraborty have been arrested.

We have not been provided with a copy of the FIR, or informed about the exact particulars of the offences with which we have been charged. Electronic devices were seized from the Newsclick premises and homes of employees, without any adherence to due process such as the provision of seizure memos, hash values of the seized data, or even copies of the data. Newsclick’s office has also been sealed in a blatant attempt at preventing us from continuing our reporting.

What we have been able to gather is that Newsclick stands accused of offences under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), for purportedly carrying Chinese propaganda on its website.

We strongly condemn these actions of a Government that refuses to respect journalistic independence, and treats criticism as sedition or “anti-national” propaganda.

Newsclick has been targeted by a series of actions by various agencies of the Government of India since 2021. Its offices and residences of officials have been raided by the Enforcement Directorate, the Economic Offences Wing of Delhi Police and the Income Tax Department.

All devices, laptops, gadgets, phones, etc. have been seized in the past. All emails and communications have been analysed under the microscope. All bank statements, invoices, expenses incurred, sources of funds received by Newsclick in the last several years have been scrutinised by different agencies of the Government from time to time. Various directors and other related persons have spent countless hours on several occasions being interrogated by these government agencies.

Yet, in the last two plus years, the Enforcement Directorate has not been able to file a complaint accusing Newsclick of money laundering. The Economic Offences Wing of Delhi Police has not been able to file a charge sheet against Newsclick for offences under the Indian Penal Code. The Income Tax Department has not been able to defend its actions before the Courts of law.

In the last several months, Mr. Prabir Purkayastha has not even been called in for questioning by any of these agencies.

Yet, a Government that has not been able to substantiate any charges against Newsclick despite being in possession of all its information, documentation and communications, needed a motivated and bogus article published in the New York Times to invoke the draconian UAPA and attempt to shut down and stifle independent and fearless voices that portray the story of the real India – of peasants, of labourers, of farmers, and other oft-ignored sections of society.

We want to state for the record:

1. Newsclick is an independent news website.

2. Our journalistic content is based on highest standards of the profession.

3. Newsclick does not publish any news or information at the behest of any Chinese entity or authority, directly or indirectly.

4. Newsclick does not propagate Chinese propaganda on its website.

5. Newsclick does not take directions from Neville Roy Singham regarding the content published on its website.

6. All funding received by Newsclick has been through the appropriate banking channels and have been reported to the relevant authorities as required by law, as substantiated by the Reserve Bank of India in proceedings before the High Court of Delhi.

All journalistic content ever published on Newsclick website is available on the internet, and can be seen by anyone. The Special Cell of Delhi Police has not referred to a single article or video that they consider to be Chinese propaganda. Indeed, the line of questioning adopted by the Special Cell of the Delhi Policy – regarding reportage on the Delhi riots, the farmers protests etc., all demonstrate the motivated and malicious intent behind the present proceedings.

We have full faith in the Courts and the judicial process. We will fight for our journalistic freedom and our lives in accordance with the Constitution of India.

4 October 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

European Union foreign ministers meet in Ukraine to escalate war with Russia

By Alex Lantier

The foreign ministers of the European Union’s (EU) member countries met yesterday in Kiev for a summit to pledge continuing support to NATO’s war with Russia in Ukraine.

Though the summit came after the bloody failure of Ukraine’s counteroffensive and amid mounting divisions in ruling circles over how to finance the war, leading EU governments signaled their intention to escalate war with Russia.

“I am convening today the EU Foreign Ministers in Kyiv, for the first-ever meeting of all 27 Member States outside the EU,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell wrote on X/Twitter. Borrell added, “Ukraine’s future lies within the EU.” Borrell announced that the summit had agreed to spend a further €5 billion on the war.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba echoed Borrell’s remarks, tweeting, “Glad to welcome EU foreign ministers at the historic meeting in Ukraine… For the first time in history, outside current EU borders. But also within its future borders.”

With Ukraine’s army shattered, an estimated 300,000 to 400,000 Ukrainian soldiers dead and many more maimed, such statements amount to a reckless, open-ended pledge to escalate war with Russia, a nuclear-armed power. Before the EU summit, UK officials indicated that British troops could deploy directly to Ukraine, ostensibly to advise Ukrainian soldiers. Plans to anounce EU military deployments to Ukraine are no doubt also at an advanced stage.

The EU has emerged as the top financier of the war, having given Kiev €84.8 billion, including €5.6 billion in arms, by the end of July 2023, according to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. This is on top of spending by individual European states, led by Germany (€20.87 billion), Britain (€13.77 billion), Norway (€7.45 billion), Poland (€4.27 billion), and the Netherlands (€4.08 billion). These figures include €17 billion in weaponry from Germany, €6.6 billion from Britain, €3.7 billion from Norway, €3 billion from Poland and €2.5 billion from the Netherlands.

In Kiev, German Defense Minister Annalena Baerbock called to further arm Ukraine. She said, “We must now further intensify all our efforts to prepare Ukraine for this winter. When I was here in September, I already made it clear that Ukraine needs a protective shield for winter… that consists of air defense but also generators and strengthening energy supply.”

The summit came amid signs of mounting divisions in European ruling circles over the financing and planning of the war. The foreign ministers of Hungary and Poland did not attend the Kiev summit, after Warsaw announced last week that it would send no new arms shipments to Ukraine.

At the Kiev summit, the leading EU imperialist powers were intent on signaling that they will allow no climbdown in participation in the war. They replied in particular to Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov, who said that “fatigue from this conflict, fatigue from the completely absurd sponsorship of the Kyiv regime, will grow in various countries, including the United States.”

At a press conference in Kiev, French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna pledged French support for war on Russia. Colonna called the Kiev summit “a demonstration of our resolute and lasting support for Ukraine, until it can win. It is also a message to Russia that it should not count on our weariness. We will be there for a long time to come.”

Borrell added, “The EU remains united in its support to Ukraine… I don’t see any member state folding on their engagement.”

EU officials stressed their close collaboration with Washington on the war. Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen said the EU must arm Ukraine “to support Ukraine, but also to send a strong trans-Atlantic signal that what’s going on on our own soil is something we have to take on a great responsibility for.”

The EU was founded in 1992, the year after the Stalinist bureaucracy dissolved the Soviet Union, as a free-market, pro-austerity economic bloc. NATO’s war with Russia is accelerating its emergence as a military alliance asserting European imperialist interests on the world stage. This has gone hand-in-hand with the rehabilitation of neo-fascist parties and the emergence of police-state regimes in Europe that violently repress strikes and protests against the austerity measures and wage freezes that serve to finance war spending.

The political and class character of this war was exposed last week, when the Canadian parliament unanimously applauded Yaroslav Hunka, a 98-year-old Ukrainian ex-member of the Nazi Waffen-SS, as a Ukrainian patriot for fighting against the Soviet Union in World War II. The Waffen SS played a central role in the Holocaust of European Jewry, Hitler’s war of annihilation against the Soviet Union, and the repression of resistance to Nazi occupation in Europe.

This exposed the close ties between NATO and far-right Ukrainian forces, like the Right Sector militia that led the 2014 NATO-backed coup in Kiev that brought NATO’s current Ukrainian puppet regime to power. With other far-right militias, like the Azov Battalion, it now plays a central role inside the Kiev regime. Stepan Bandera, the leader of the Ukrainian collaboration with Nazism, is regularly hailed by top Ukrainian officials.

The Canadian parliament’s politically-criminal applause for a Waffen-SS fighter also speaks to the character and political implications of the EU’s redefinition as a militarist bloc dedicated to war with Russia until total victory.

“The EU has changed. There is no turning back. We have turned out the lights behind us and there is basically only one way,” Danish EU commissioner Margrethe Vestager declared at a May 2023 EU summit in Brussels. Waging the Ukraine war, she continued, “is absolutely Europe’s top priority, and we will stay supportive of Ukraine until the war is won and Ukraine has been rebuilt, and become a member of the European Union.”

Commenting on Vestager’s remarks, the Guardian cited top advisors of Borrell who asserted that the Russian war overcame the conflicts between the European powers in the 20th century. “The European project was first and foremost intended to prevent a new conflict between France and Germany. It aimed to pacify intra-European relations through exchange and economic cooperation,” wrote Zaki Laïdi, a professor at Sciences-Politiques university in Paris.

Now, however, argued Nicole Gnesotto of the Jacques Delors Institute, war with Russia is overcoming conflicts inside Europe. “In one night, Russia killed all EU philosophy since 1956,” she said.

Claims that the EU will overcome historically-rooted contradictions of European capitalism via war with Russia testify to the reckless, fascistic moods seizing the ruling class. In reality, divisions are mounting in ruling circles across the continent, as was seen with the absence of Hungarian and Polish officials in Kiev. Moroever, it is notable that France, Italy and Spain, historically more oriented to imperialist conquest in Africa than in Eastern Europe, have spent less on Ukraine than their northern European allies (€1.69 billion, €1.29 billion and €900 million, respectively).

The working class must intervene independently to stop the war. Workers cannot rely on conflicts inside the bourgeoisie to avert the catastrophe that the EU has set into motion. They must base its policy on the fact that the European bourgeoisie is staking everything on a NATO war with Russia that threatens Europe and the world with escalation all the way to nuclear war. In the ruling class, there is broad awareness that this entails legitimizing far-right politics and forms of rule.

This spring saw a powerful movement of strikes erupt across Europe against the wage austerity and social cuts used to finance war with Russia. During mass protests in France against pension cuts, a large majority of workers declared their support for mass strikes to block the economy and bring down President Emmanuel Macron. This explosive opposition must be developed consciously as an international movement of the working class in opposition to imperialist war and the capitalist system that gives rise to it.

3 October 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

The Kenya Resistance Archives Adds the Missing Links to the History of Kenya

By Shiraz Durrani

The official or ‘normal’ history of Kenya ignores or downplays resistance to capitalism and imperialism by the people of Kenya. Mostly ignored are organisations of those who opposed the rule by the comprador bourgeoisie. Some examples of such downplaying can be seen in many public sources. None of these, including most of the texts used for teaching in Kenya, pay attention to the resistance to capitalism and to the struggle for socialism waged by many organisations and their members. Also ignored are class and ideological struggles waged by those resisting capitalism and the rule of the comprador class.

In recent years, The Kenya Socialist, Communist Review and Vita Books have published a number of studies of Kenyan movements and personalities who have contributed to the struggle for liberation from colonialism and imperialism, both before and after independence. Many of these articles have challenged the traditional history of Kenya and added class and resistance dimensions which are missing from official history, as well as from history as taught in schools, colleges and universities in Kenya.

What may not be obvious at the first readings of such material are the sources used. Many of them are from the Kenya Resistance Archives (KRA), which consists of material from the underground resistance in Kenya, mostly from the 1980s to about the 1990s. Those movements, their ideology, leadership and activities do not feature in the mainstream history of Kenya. Their very existence is denied or passed over lightly.

The Kenya Resistance Archives and Library (KRAL) originated in the work of one of the cells of the underground December Twelve Movement (DTM) – the Kabete Cell, with its main sub-cells, Ngara and Nairobi. It thus does not include material collected by other DTM cells. Security consideration required minimum direct contact between the cells. The KRAL also does not include publications from before the formation of the Kabete Cell, around 1975. It is known, however, that some earlier material is available with some founder members of the DTM. Similarly, material on the DTM’s successor organisation MWAKENYA (MK) is available with its former officials; while much of the archives of UMOJA, which merged into MWAKENYA, was lost through administrative mishap, although some key documents are available in the KRA.

The Kenya Resistance Archives 

The KRA is a unique collection brought together and looked after by political activists and independent institutions not funded or supported by public bodies. It is, indeed, part of resistance which it documents. No public library, archive or research institute in Kenya has collected, disseminated or archived the material that is available in the KRA. This is an aspect of the class struggle in Kenya, where the ruling class decides what is ‘history’, which it sees from its own class perspective, while working people record and disseminate their version of history in their own ways. The former is consolidated through government policies, education and the mass media, while the latter is allowed to gradually die. However, it is stored in people’s memory and disseminated through oral and alternative media.

It was the British government that destroyed the archives and libraries of Mau Mau before being forced to give independence to Kenya. The full story of the collection and the destruction of these records is available in various records. The comprador bourgeois government under Jomo Kenyatta and KANU,  handed power by the departing colonial power, made sure that resistance and its documents were not allowed to see the light of day. President Daniel arap Moi then followed Kenyatta’s nyayos in repressing resistance and not allowing the documents to be collected. It is then remarkable that the KRA has been preserved, having survived journeys to and from London, and can be seen in Nairobi at the Ukombozi (‘Liberation’) Library today. The lesson from this experience is relevant to resistance organisations in Kenya and elsewhere, to ensure that their documents are well preserved, otherwise their history will not be recorded or survive.

The Kabete Cell 

Many of the documents held by the Kabete Cell in 1984 had to be destroyed once one of its members was interrogated by the Special Branch of the Kenya Police. While it did not have all the underground publications of the DTM, the cell had some significant titles as well as many working papers and work in progress, together with the typewriter used for some underground publications, the DTM rubber stamp and other equipment. All this had to be destroyed. Yet some important material was saved and sent to London in 1978 by another member of the cell. In the late 1990s, this was then sent in small batches to MK-DTM in Nairobi. The material was passed on to Ukombozi Library once it was set up in 2017 by Vita Books, MK-DTM and the Mau Mau Research Centre.

The material included documents of the Kabete Cell and the main cells under it – the Nairobi Cell (based at the University of Nairobi, but including many worker and peasant members under its sub-cells) and the Ngara Cell, where the DTM’s main library was located. The Kabete Cell split into a number of semi-independent cells after the suspension of its leader by members around 1983-84, and material from these cells is not included in the KRA. However, Kabete cell members in London later re-established links with Upande Mwingine, formed from the earlier Ngara Cell. Some of its material was used for MWAKENYA publications, and these are also part of the KRA.

The Kabete Cell also had, as its library, many Marxist and progressive Kenyan titles, as well as books from socialist and revolutionary countries around the world. While the main DTM Library at the Ngara Cell included many more titles, this was also a substantial collection which could not be sent to London. Other cells, now independent of the Kabete cell, were reluctant to connect with it for security reasons, once one of its members had been identified as ‘an enemy agent’ by the Special Branch. It was therefore decided to pass on these key books to contacts at the University of Nairobi and among communities around Nairobi. A member of the Kabete Cell took great risks and deposited the books among those needing them. They were used and distributed among other cells and progressive individuals.

An important collection that the Kabete Cell had was the 36 carvings on Mau Mau by Wakamba carver activists. Photos of some of these accompanied an earlier CR article.3c The carvings were too heavy to be transported to London when the Kabete cell came under attack, nor was it possible to pass them onto other cells because of the security concerns already mentioned. A Kabete Cell member later contacted Willy Mutunga, a trusted member of DTM who, despite having been previously detained, was willing to support the cell by taking the carvings for safe keeping. A small number of the carvings were taken to London after Moi was no longer in power and it became possible for cell members to return to Kenya. The remaining carvings were distributed among various rural communities in Kenya as part of the people’s heritage.

An important DTM document that was saved and taken to London was Publishing, An Annotated Bibliography and Study Guide. It was an internal document to inform DTM publishing activities, and a copy is included in the KRA. Among the articles listed were:

  • Marx, Debates on Freedom of the Press 
  • Engels, Marx and the Neue Rheinische Zeitung (1848-49) 
  • Lenin, Draft of a Declaration of the Editorial Board of Iskra and Zarya, Declaration of the Editorial Board of Iskra, The Character of Our Newspapers 
  • Stalin, articles for the Georgia revolutionary press 1901-1911
  • Mao Zedong, Introducing ‘The Communist’, Introducing ‘The Chinese Worker’, Oppose Stereotyped Party Writing, Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art 
  • Stanley Harrison, Poor Mens’ Guardians: A record of the struggle for a democratic newspaper press, 1763-1973.

An interesting feature of the work of the Kabete Cell was that it contributed a large number of articles to local and international journals. Some of these were later published by Vita Books, Nairobi, in a number of books. These include Information and Liberation: Writings on the politics of information and librarianship (2008) by Shiraz Durrani. Some more articles written at a later period are to be included in a forthcoming book, Writings and Reflections on the Class Struggle in Kenya,1992-2022. 

A decisive period for the Kabete Cell was an article by Shiraz Durrani on Pio Gama Pinto, published in theStandard in1984. Events after this led to the exile of the Kabete Cell to London (one of whose members and the leader having earlier been suspended). But the early drafts of the material on Pinto, as well as other manuscripts on Makhan Singh, Mau Mau and the history of publishing, were all written in Kenya prior to the exile in 1984. They would have been published in Kenya, but the intervention by the Special Branch interrupted this process. However they were all published later by Vita Books, initially based in London but moving to Nairobi in 2017.

The Nairobi Cell 

Among the material saved from the work of the Nairobi Cell, now available in the KRA, are the proceedings of a number of workshops for working-class librarians at the University of Nairobi and other libraries in Nairobi. These were reproduced in the University of Nairobi Library Magazine, later renamed Sauti ya Wakutubi. Four issues of the magazine were printed and published at the Library.

The Nairobi Cell also created a Sehemu ya Utungaji – creative wing – for artwork and creative activities. It also co-produced the play, Kinjikitile, Maji Maji with Takhto Arts, a Nairobi play group. The play ran at the University of Nairobi Education theatre in 1984 and was directed by a member of the Kabete Cell. The KRA has full documentation, including photos, of the play.

The focus of material collected in the KRA moved to London where the former Kabete Cell members were active in UMOJA and MWAKENYA. The material they collected forms the rest of KRA. The histories of DTM, UMOJA and MWAKENYA have been documented in recent years or in forthcoming articles.

The Kenya Resistance Library (KRL) 

The Kabete Cell was formed around 1977-78. It soon began to expand and formed other cells under it. The first one to be set up, around 1978, was the Ngara Cell, which in time became one of the most productive cells in the Kabete ‘cell family’. Its publications are held in London and will be moved to Ukombozi Library in due course.

Some details of the work of the Ngara Cell are mentioned in Liberating Minds, which “consists of biographies of progressive South Asian Kenyans written by Nazmi Durrani. Originally published in Gujarati in the 1980s, they are available here in English for the first time, together with the original Gujarati.” This was in the tradition of DTM activists to write on the history of their nationalities. The cell member also wrote resistance poems in Kiswahili and translated them into English, with accompanying drawings. The poems are to be published by Vita Books in 2023 under the title Tunakataa! We Say No! There are many unpublished works by the cell which are included in the KRA.

It is, however, the information and documentation work for which the Ngara Cell is better known. It produced a large number of regular publications which give a clear picture of the class struggle in Kenya. These are aspects that have been ignored by most historians and they indicate the political orientation of the DTM. The publications included:

Article 5: a monthly journal inspired by Article 5 of the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights, which states that “No-one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” Article 5 collected newspaper cuttings highlighting the regime’s human rights abuses.

Hali Ya Nchi (‘State of the Country’), a fortnightly summary of events in Kenya, highlighting repression by the regime, acts of resistance by Kenyans and important events on the economic, political and social fronts.

• Upande Mwingine (‘The Other Side’), a monthly summary of resistance to the regime by workers, peasants, students and generally by all democratic-minded Kenyans. It included strikes, demonstrations and other activities.

The Ngara Cell at this period took up different names on its publications, but is known generally as Upande Mwingine, and this is the name used here to distinguish its work from the earlier Ngara Cell. In the 1990s, the Kabete Cell members in London re-established links with Upande Mwingine and exchanged a large amount of information and activities.

Besides the publications mentioned above, Upande Mwingine started a photo-documentation work of the main resistance fighters against colonialism. It sent to London over a hundred photographs, with details of sources and brief histories. The plan was for Vita Books to publish these in the 1990s as a pictorial history of resistance in Kenya; but this was forestalled by the death of the key member of Upande Mwingine (as described in Liberating Minds). Since then, lack of resources and other difficulties have prevented publication. However, all the material, photos and notes are available in the KRA, currently in London to be transported to Ukombozi Library in due course.

The work of Upande Mwingine is acknowledged by MWAKENYA which used the research by the group for its 1987 publication, Kenya, Register of Resistance, 1986, which says:

“Upande Mwingine” – Register Of Resistance 

We here present this analysis of the actions of the workers, peasants, students, small traders for the year 1986, to expose the lies of the Moi- KANU regime. The analysis is based on the very brilliant, meticulous monthly and annual documentation of the resistance deeds and actions of workers, peasants, and students etc in industry, commerce, plantations, schools and colleges, carried out by Upande Mwingine, the underground workers’ organ. Upande Mwingine has systematically compiled this Kiswahili register of strikes and demonstrations by the working people over a number of years. But we have chosen 1986 deliberately. 1986 saw the heightening of repression in Kenya under the guise of hunting for MWAKENYA cadres. The Register shows quite clearly that it is the mass movement of Kenyans that is basically frightening the regime. The regime fears that MWAKENYA will give the correct political direction to this mass unrest.”

All these documents, MWAKENYA’s Register of Resistance and many publications from Upande Mwingine are available at the Kenya Resistance Archives. The Archives are indeed an important resource of a period of resistance that would otherwise remain undocumented and hence unknown to future generations.

The Library

Besides all the above work, it is the Ngara Cell’s Library that remains a lasting legacy to the cell and the DTM. It was set up by teacher and librarian Nazmi Durrani, and contained over a thousand books, including complete sets of Selected Works of Marx, Lenin, Stalin and Mao. Such publications were banned in Kenya, and anyone found with them was likely to be detained. In addition, the Library included key works from resistance movements around the world. It was located in Nazmi’s house in the Ngara district of Nairobi, hence the name Ngara Cell. After Nazmi’s death in an accident in1990, the books were looked after by members of his family and later passed on to other members of the (reconstituted) Ngara Cell. It was in 2017 that the books were transferred to the Ukombozi Library on its foundation.

Vita Books and the Ukombozi Library are the two organisations that continue to support the DTM Library and archival legacy of the DTM, and move it forward to meet today’s needs. While the Archives and Library would not have survived without their support, their history remains outside the scope of this article. However, the following interviews and articles provide some background to their work and history:

  1. Shiraz Durrani and Kimani Waweru, interviewed by Stephanie Kitchen (2017), at https://www.readafricanbooks.com/publisher-profiles/shiraz-durrani-and-kimani-waweru/
  2. Shiraz Durrani and Kimani Waweru, Vita Books, The Home of Kenya Left and the Forgotten Radical Histories, at https://www.academia.edu/93677210/Vita_Books_The_Home_of_Kenya_Left_and_the_Forgotten_Radical_Histories
  3. Kimani Waweru and Loren Balhorn, Kenya’s First Socialist Library, at https://www.rosalux.de/en/news/id/41361/kenyasfirst-socialist-library/.
  4. Kimani Waweru, ‘Ukombozi Library’, in The Kenya Socialist, No 5, 2022, pp 31-2.

A previous article in this journal also gave a brief introduction to the Ukombozi Library.

Conclusion 

While a number of public institutes, libraries and archives in Kenya have important documents on the country’s history, none, as far as can be ascertained, holds material like that contained in the Kenya Resistance Archives. This is a reflection of the ongoing class struggle in Kenya, where the ruling class controls what information and documents should and could be collected by public institutions. It is possible that foreign libraries such as the Library of Congress and the British Council Library hold such material. If so, they are not shared with Kenyan public. This points to the importance of KRA as perhaps the only publicly available record of resistance material in Kenya.

Shiraz Durrani is a Kenyan political exile living in London. He has worked at the University of Nairobi as well as various public libraries in Britain where he also lectured at the London Metropolitan University.

1 October 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

Flagging Support: Zelenskyy Loses Favour in Washington

By Dr Binoy Kampmark

Things did not go so well this time around.  When the worn Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy turned up banging on the doors of Washington’s powerful on September 21, he found fewer open hearts and an increasingly large number of closed wallets.  The old ogre of national self-interest seemed to be presiding and was in no mood to look upon the desperate leader with sweet acceptance.

Last December, Zelensky and Ukrainian officials did not have to go far in hearing endorsements and encouragement in their efforts battling Moscow’s armies.  The visit of the Ukrainian president, as White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre stated at the time, “will underscore the United States’ steadfast commitment to supporting Ukraine for as long as it takes, including through provision of economic, humanitarian and military assistance.”

Republican Senator from Utah, Mitt Romney, was bubbly with enthusiasm for the Ukrainian leader.  “He’s a national and global hero – I’m delighted to be able to hear from him.”  Media pack members such as the Associated Press scrambled for stretched parallels in history’s record, noting another mendicant who had previously appeared in Washington to seek backing.  “The moment was Dec. 22, 1941, as British Prime Minister Winston Churchill landed near Washington to meet President Franklin D. Rosevelt just weeks after the attack on Pearl Harbor.”

Then House Speaker, the California Democrat Nancy Pelosi, also drew on the Churchillian theme with a fetishist’s relish.  “Eighty-one years later this week, it is particularly poignant for me to be present when another heroic leader addresses the Congress in time of war – and with Democracy itself on the line,” she wrote colleagues in a letter.

Zelenskyy, not wishing to state the obvious, suggested a different approach to the question of aiding Ukraine.  While not necessarily an attentive student of US history, any briefings given to him should have been mindful of a strand in US politics sympathetic to isolationism and suspicious of foreign leaders demanding largesse and aid in fighting wars.

How, then, to get around this problem?  Focus on clumsy, if clear metaphors of free enterprise.  “Your money is not charity,” he stated at the time, cleverly using the sort of corporate language that would find an audience among military-minded shareholders.  “It’s an investment in global security and democracy that we handle in the most responsible way.”  Certainly, Ukrainian aid has been a mighty boon for the US military-industrial complex, whose puppeteering strings continue to work their black magic on the Hill.

Despite such a show, the number of those believing in the wisdom of such an investment is shrinking.  “In a US capital that has undergone an ideological shift since he was last here just before Christmas 2022,” remarked Stephen Collinson of CNN, “it now takes more than quoting President Franklin Roosevelt and drawing allusions to 9/11, to woo lawmakers.”

Among the investors, Republicans are shrinking more rapidly than the Democrats.  An August CNN poll found a majority in the country – 55% – firmly against further funding for Ukraine.  Along party lines, 71% of Republicans are steadfastly opposed, while 62% of Democrats would be satisfied with additional funding.

Kentucky Republican and Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell continues to claim that funding Ukraine is a sensibly bloody strategy that preserves American lives while harming Russian interests.  “Helping Ukraine retake its territory means weakening – weakening – one of America’s biggest strategic adversaries without firing a shot.”

The same cannot be said about the likes of Kentucky’s Republican Senator Rand Paul.  While Zelenskyy was trying to make a good impression on the Hill, the senator was having none of it.  “I will oppose any effort to hold the federal government hostage for Ukraine funding. I will not consent to expedited passage of any spending measure that provides any more US aid to Ukraine.”

In The American Conservative, Paul warned that, “With no end in sight, it looks increasingly likely that Ukraine will be yet another endless quagmire funded by the American taxpayer.”  President Joe Biden’s administration had “failed to articulate a clear strategy or objective in this war, and Ukraine’s long-awaited counter-offensive has failed to make meaningful gains in the east.”

Such a quagmire was also proving jittering in its dangers.  There was the prospect of miscalculation and bungling that could pit US forces directly against the Russian army.  There were also no “effective oversight mechanisms” regarding the funding that has found its way into Kyiv’s pockets.  “Unfortunately, corruption runs deep in Ukraine, and there’s plenty of evidence that it has run rampant since Russia’s invasion.”  The Zelenskyy government, he also noted in a separate post, had “banned the political parties, they’ve invaded churches, they’ve arrested priests, so no, it isn’t a democracy, it’s a corrupt regime.”

Republicans such as Missouri Senator Josh Hawley are of the view that the US should be slaying different monsters of a more threatening variety.  (Every imperium needs its formidable adversaries.)  The administration, he argued, should “take the lead on China” and reassure its “European allies” that Washington would be providing “the nuclear umbrella in Europe”.

On September 30, with yet another government shutdown looming in Washington, the US House approved a bill for funding till mid-November by a 335-91 vote.  But the measure did not include additional military or humanitarian aid to Ukraine.  In August, the Biden administration had requested a $24 billion package for Ukraine but was met with a significantly skimmed total of $6.1 billion.  Of that amount $1.5 billion is earmarked for the Ukrainian Security Assistance Initiative, a measure that continues to delight US arms manufacturers by enabling the Pentagon to place contracts on their behalf to build weapons for Kyiv.

The limited funding measure proved a source of extreme agitation to the clarion callers who have linked battering the Russian bear, if only through a flawed surrogate, with the cause of US freedom.  “I am deeply disappointed that this continuing resolution did not include further aid for our ally, Ukraine,” huffed Maryland Democrat Rep. Steny Hoyer.  “In September, the House held seven votes to approve that vital funding to Ukraine.  Each time, more than 300 House Members voted in favor.  This ought to be a nonpartisan issue and ought to have been addressed in the continuing resolution today.”

As Hoyer and those on his pro-war wing of politics are starting to realise, Ukraine, as an issue, is becoming problematically partisan and ripe.  The filling in Zelenskyy’s cap is inexorably thinning and lightening.

Dr. Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge.

1 October 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

The Perilous Path From Western Domination to De-Dollarization

By Justin Podur

Two interesting things happened at the BRICS summit in South Africa in August. Several new members were invited to join BRICS in 2024: Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. And, at Brazil’s urging, a commission was established to study the possibility of a new currency to replace the dollar in international trade. Currency swap agreements will continue to be the way the process moves forward in the short term, though, because the dollar cannot be replaced in a rush.

To escape the shackles of dollarization, Global South countries have a perilous path to walk. The major problems, as described by political economists Michael Hudson and Radhika Desai, are as follows: Global South countries are saddled with immense debts in dollars, and Western corporations claim ownership over their resources. The international legal structure favors the West, finding in favor of American corporations and vulture funds. The U.S.-run covert network continues to have the ability to foment wars and coups against those who defy Western rules—including financial ones. These problems now confront most countries of the world.

Thus far, most of the world is not polarized. Very few countries (mostly in Europe) are unconditional supporters of the U.S.-led West. On the other side, only a handful of states (e.g. Russia, China, Iran) dare to categorically refuse when the West makes demands.

Everyone else—where the future of the global economy will play out—is in-between. Will they find a way out of these traps?

Argentina’s Politicized Debt

For about 200 years, Argentina has been the site of first British, and then U.S. experiments in debt-driven subjugation. Each time a developmentalist government came to power and tried to get the country out of a crisis, it would be followed by a right-wing government that would plunge the country back in.

Among the in-between countries, Argentina has a special role. The country is on the list of the new invitees to BRICS. Its finances are in disarray, and its leading presidential candidate, who takes economic advice from his four dogs, wants to close most of the government down and use the U.S. dollar as the currency. Like many right-wing Western politicians, from Berlusconi and Sarkozy to Trump and Bolsonaro, Milei’s electoral brand is damaged neither by clown antics nor by infeasible economic plans.

And infeasible they are. The Economist notes that “Milei promises cuts worth 15 [percent]… of GDP, to a public sector that accounts for 38 [percent]… of GDP, but struggles to outline where they will come from.”

Nor does he know

“how… Milei’s government would find the $40 [billion] his team thinks is necessary to make the switch to dollars. Currently, Argentina cannot even repay the [International Monetary Fund (IMF)]… to which it owes $44 billion. Having run out of American currency, the central bank is instead burning through yuan borrowed from China… Milei has suggested selling state-owned firms and government debt in an offshore fund to raise the necessary capital. It is hard to imagine there will be many buyers.”

Argentina’s fate has been controlled by imperial debt since 1824 when the British Empire’s bank (Barings—whose Lord Cromer used financial methods to take over Egypt, among other notable operations) first advanced a loan of one million pounds to newly independent Argentina. This was less than 20 years after the British landed forces to try unsuccessfully to colonize Argentina. They ultimately found the financial weapon more effective. The first of nine defaults followed in 1827. The latest was in 2020 (the Economist is advocating a tenth).

In the 20th century, Argentina alternated between elected governments and military dictatorships and switched between developmentalist and neoliberal economic approaches. In the neoliberal periods, Argentina was the site of innovation—new experiments in plundering a country were invented. Among these was what Esteban Almiron outlined as the “financial bicycle” made possible by the peg of the peso to the U.S. dollar:

“When billionaire speculators were allowed to exchange Argentine pesos for unlimited amounts of dollars, benefiting from [high-interest]… rates in pesos, it was the state that had to borrow those dollars from [U.S.]… private banks or from the IMF and pay interests on them. Once exchanged, the dollars obtained by the speculators were moved out of the country, leaving the debt to the state.”

In 2001, Argentina defaulted and dropped the peg. It then paid its $9.5 billion IMF debt in full in 2005, saving the country $842 million in interest in subsequent years. It also negotiated, through to 2010, a restructuring of 92 percent of the rest of the national debt.

Almiron’s history of Argentina’s debt describes what happened next: a story of Argentina and the American vultures. The remaining 8 percent of the debt offers a case study of the rigged international legal structure that facilitates the U.S. plunder of Global South economies. It was held by vulture funds run by American billionaire Paul Singer and others. The vultures turned to the U.S. courts and, predictably, in 2012, got exactly what they wanted—a U.S. judge ruled that Argentina would have to pay them in full.

Then-president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner refused to pay, but subsequent elections brought Mauricio Macri into power. Macri increased Argentina’s debt-to-GDP ratio from 52.6 percent to 90.2 percent and oversaw an increase in poverty from 30 percent to 40 percent (four million people entering poverty). By the time he left power in 2019, Argentina had experienced $79.8 billion in capital flight—and defaulted again. Almiron writes that “Macri and his team wrecked the relatively healthy finances of the Argentine state in less than two years.” Macri brought back the financial bicycle:

“Their trick was to buy pesos, profit from the [high-interest]… rates in pesos, then convert them to dollars and move the dollars out of the country. In the meantime, the state had to provide a virtually infinite amount of dollars for the speculators, and was left with the pesos.”

On his way out the door, Macri took out a $57 billion loan from the IMF, later reduced to $44 billion, which “disappeared in just 11 months.”

His successor Alberto Fernández tried to rebuild the gutted health ministry during COVID-19 but was stuck with the $44 billion loan. Out of desperation as much as out of developmentalist ideology, Fernández turned to China, joining the Belt and Road Initiative in 2022 and applying—successfully, it turns out—to BRICS. Argentina will join in 2024. However, collaboration with China (and Qatar) so far has been a matter of getting additional loans from China to pay the IMF. This is not exactly the type of “win-win” deal China seeks with Global South countries in its infrastructure investments and trade deals around resources.

If elected, Milei can be expected to withdraw the BRICS application. If he keeps Argentina in BRICS, he will apply his (and his dogs’) financial genius to facilitate the U.S. use of Argentina not just to drain Argentina, but China (and perhaps other emergency lenders) as well.

With each new plunge into debt, the country’s right-wing attempts to sink the state so much deeper that it can never emerge. When he arrives in office, dog whisperer Milei has promised to outdo Macri’s record of destruction.

The Travails of Pakistan, Ally of Both the U.S. and China

Like Argentina, Pakistan has been controlled by imperial debt regimes—first British, then U.S.—for centuries. What is now Pakistan was once a group of rich provinces in British India. Each kingdom that Britain’s East India Company brought under its boot was saddled with debt, the principal mechanism (there were others) through which Britain drained $45 trillion from the subcontinent. Britain then partitioned the subcontinent into India and Pakistan before handing it over. Today India is playing an ambiguous role in BRICS, while Pakistan’s post-coup government has resorted to severe violence to try to get the country under control.

Also like Argentina, Pakistan is a place where both BRICS and the IMF have a heavy economic presence. In April, about a year after former Prime Minister Imran Khan was ousted, the U.S. Institute for Peace reported that Pakistan was facing an “existential” economic crisis. Dividing the debt into three types (multilateral, private, and Chinese), the USIP gave a breakdown of Pakistan’s debt and to whom it was owed: “As of December 2022, Pakistan holds external debt and liabilities of $126.3 billion. Nearly 77 percent of this debt, amounting to $97.5 billion is directly owed by the government of Pakistan to various creditors; an additional $7.9 billion is owed by government-controlled public sector enterprises to multilateral creditors.”

Pakistan’s multilateral debt of $45 billion broke down as follows: the World Bank ($18 billion), the Asian Development Bank ($15 billion), and the IMF ($7.6 billion), with smaller amounts to the Islamic Development Bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. It owes another $8.5 billion to major creditor countries Japan, Germany, France, and the United States.

Pakistan’s private debt was led by Eurobonds and global Sukuk bonds, amounting to $7.8 billion. It also had foreign commercial loans to the tune of nearly $7 billion, likely to increase to nearly $9 billion by the end of the current fiscal year.

Finally, the USIP placed the “Chinese debt” of $27 billion in a separate category:

“This includes around $10 billion of bilateral debt and $6.2 billion in debt provided by the Chinese government to Pakistani public sector enterprises, and Chinese commercial loans of around $7 billion. In addition, China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) has placed $4 billion worth of foreign deposits with Pakistan’s central bank.”

With a GDP of $376 billion and a debt of $126 billion in 2022, Pakistan’s debt-to-GDP ratio of 34 percent is much more favorable than Argentina’s even before the Macri disaster. Still, Pakistan’s Western creditors presented it as an impossible situation and inflation was indeed causing popular hardship.

The 2022-23 government budget projected revenues of $24 billion and expenses of $33 billion. Debt repayments, not factored in, were looking like they would exceed state revenues, at almost $25 billion.

The Chinese debt could be rescheduled as per historical precedent—but it was only 30 percent of the total. What about the rest? Over the decades, Argentina’s developmentalist governments tried to use economic growth to raise the tax and export base to shrink the debt when in power, but Pakistan’s growth forecast wasn’t looking good. Likewise, in the long-term, as documented in Jawad Syed and Yung-Hsiang Ying’s 2020 book China’s Belt and Road Initiative in a Global Context Volume II: The China Pakistan Economic Corridor and its Implications for Business, the CPEC envisions upgrading Pakistan’s value chains and infrastructure as a process of economic development for both countries.

But what about the short term? Pakistan tried to get creative: Prime Minister Imran Khan had just struck a deal for energy and wheat—the two most necessary and inflationary items in the basket—from Russia when he was ousted. The post-coup government scuttled the deal, trying to avoid trouble with the U.S. for trading with U.S.-sanctioned countries outside of dollar transactions. Pakistan took a page out of pre-Nixon-visit China’s book and used barter. But the Western creditors are still there, demanding to be paid (in dollars). Whether by downgrading Pakistan’s credit rating or monitoring and punishing Pakistan as a financial sponsor of terrorism through the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the United States has many tools to force debt compliance on Pakistan.

How did the situation get so dire? Pakistan’s finances, including its U.S. debts, are tied up in the two countries’ web of covert relationships and the interventions of both countries in Afghanistan since the 1970s. Sure, the United States and Pakistan trade cotton and textiles, steel and machinery, but the heart of the economic relationship is martial. The people of Afghanistan suffered the worst, with author Nicolas J.S. Davies estimating a death toll of 875,000, but Pakistan too suffered. Pakistan’s intervention in Afghanistan and U.S. operations in rural Pakistan cost the U.S. ally $150 billion and 70,000 lives according to the Pakistani ambassador to the United States in 2021 and 325,000 deaths according to Davies.

The amount of money the United States spent on the Afghan occupation is immense and probably uncountable. There are official accounting numbers of $100 billion in military contracts alone. Columnist Khawaja Akbar quipped that if Pakistan was passing military aid money onto the Taliban, it could only be a fraction of what the United States spent: “The $1 trillion spent by the U.S. in Afghanistan during the same time period failed to negate the effect of the $30 billion given to Pakistan.”

When Imran Khan ended support for the U.S. effort in Afghanistan, the occupation’s days were numbered: U.S. logistics for the 2001-2021 Afghan war all ran through Pakistan. A New York Times article published shortly after the Taliban takeover noted “Pakistan’s ports and airfields provided the main entry points and supply lines for American military equipment needed in Afghanistan.” American occupation logistics were a touchy issue and the U.S.-Pakistan relationship broke down over it numerous times.

Tariq Ali wrote of one such moment in his 2008 book, The Duel:

“The country is in the grip of a food and power crisis. Inflation is approaching 15 [percent]… The price of gas (used for cooking in many homes) has risen by 30 [percent]… and the price of wheat by more than 20 [percent]… since November 2007. Food and commodity prices are rising all over the world, but there is an additional problem in Pakistan: too much wheat is being smuggled into Afghanistan to feed the NATO armies. According to a recent survey, 86 [percent]… of Pakistanis find it increasingly difficult to afford flour, for which they blame their new government. [Former president Asif Ali] Zardari’s approval rating has plummeted to 13 [percent].”

There is no discussion of the smuggling economy in Pakistan and Afghanistan without mentioning opium. It was an economy of literally uncountable riches, maybe $2 billion, maybe much more, for U.S.- and Pakistan-based covert organizations, criminal organizations, and financial institutions that the Taliban has put an end to.

When the United States stole Afghanistan’s $7 billion in reserves after the Taliban takeover, Pakistan also suffered as the country’s major trading partner.

During the decades of Afghan wars, the United States and Pakistan developed dossiers full of secret leverage on one another—so much so that after invading Afghanistan in 2001, the United States made sure Pakistan was able to get its most important operatives out. This operation would later be called the “airlift of evil.” by the United States.

We can summarize this as follows: Over the course of the U.S. war on Afghanistan, Pakistan ran up an immense covert expense bill, an immense death toll, and an illicit, parallel economy that only harmed the formal economy.

After the Taliban takeover and Imran Khan’s ouster, the United States would resume this web of covert relationships with Pakistan—not over Afghanistan this time, but Ukraine. According to the Intercept, Pakistan’s post-coup IMF negotiations were smoothed by a secret agreement to produce munitions for the United States—munitions the United States would then send to Ukraine to fight Russia. Needless to say, had Imran Khan’s wheat-energy deal with Russia gone through, Pakistan probably would not be sending munitions for the Ukrainian side of the war.

Other Cases

Between Argentina and Pakistan, many of the dilemmas of the dollar-dominated and the post-dollar world are encapsulated. But a quick tour of some other states reveals some other dynamics. The IMF wants Egypt (another new BRICS invitee) to devalue; Egypt’s president, who came to power in a coup a decade ago, is stretching the negotiations out. Keeping Egypt out of a revolutionary situation is how the United States provides for Israel’s security, so expect those negotiations to keep dragging on. In Lebanon, the IMF strategy is different—keeping Lebanon in a state of financial collapse is another plank of the U.S./Israeli strategy, so as with Argentina, the objective is an unending financial crisis. So far, mission accomplished. Tunisia has been pillaged by neocolonial debt arrangements since the 19th century. This continues uninterrupted. Sri Lanka, devastated by the tsunami of 2004, became a recipient of IMF-led predatory lending from that point on. Even though just 10 percent of this debt is owed to China, Sri Lanka is referred to in the West as being caught in a “Chinese debt trap.” In fact, because so little of the debt is Chinese, Sri Lanka is fairly straightforwardly in a Western debt trap from which it will have difficulty escaping.

A couple of final cases to conclude: In Kenya, the IMF is pressuring hard, demanding more suffering from Kenyans in the form of higher taxes and lower spending—the usual austerity measures. Kenyan authorities announced earlier this year they aren’t going to try to reschedule or restructure. Kenya is also the site of one of the flagship China-Africa projects, the Mombasa-Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway (SGR), along with other infrastructure. On the other hand, a U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM) military base is also in Mombasa. Zambia, lucky enough to owe $4.1 billion of its $6.3 billion debt to China, restructured in June. Naturally, the IMF claimed this as a triumph for its own flexibility and long-term vision, claiming the agreement was “helping put Zambia on a path toward sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction.” France’s President Emmanuel Macron also took credit for the “historic achievement”: “We remain [mobilized]… to ensure that other countries caught in a debt trap benefit from a multilateral response,” he tweeted.

In all of these cases, the U.S. and IMF are careful to pressure only when they hold the cards. When China holds a big share of the debt or can offer a meaningful alternative, the IMF also seems to find a way to be less haughty with its debtors. The IMF needs to tread lightly as well: they are no longer the only game in town, and negotiating too hard in the presence of alternatives will lead to default—perhaps the IMF’s last.

In summary: De-dollarization is a road fraught with many challenges. Most countries are not the world’s biggest economy (China) nor the military peer of the United States (Russia). Few countries fall into the category of Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, Afghanistan, and the DPRK—those who have suffered everything the United States can realistically throw at them and have nowhere to go but up.

Most are like Argentina and Pakistan, in the in-between of economic suffering, perils, and difficult decisions. Extricating themselves from Western power will be painful, but no longer appears impossible.

Justin Podur is a Toronto-based writer and a writing fellow at Globetrotter.

29 September 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

An open letter to JNU VC – Your association with RSS defies humanism, anti-colonial struggle Indian democracy!

By Shamsul Islam

Respected VC of JNU, Santishree Pandit Madam,

Namaskaar!

I hope the following report in one of the leading English dailies of India did not misreport you when it stated that Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) Vice-Chancellor (VC), Santishree Pandit while speaking at a book launch function on September 17, 2023 at Pune where RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat was present on the dais, told: “I am proud to be a Hindu and belong to the Sangh [RSS].”

https://www.hindustantimes.com/cities/pune-news/proud-to-be-associated-with-rss-need-to-counter-leftist-narrative-jnu-vc-shantishree-pandit-101694975582697.html#:~:text=Jawaharlal%20Nehru%20University%20(JNU)%20Vice,need%20to%20counter%20left%20narrative.

Respected Hindu VC of JNU,

Since the above report has not been contradicted, I am not sorry to state that it was a horrible statement coming from an educationist who heads a University that stood as the 2nd best in the national rankings of 2022 and was named after the first PM of the democratic-egalitarian of Indian polity. Some important questions waiting eagerly for your answers are:

  1. You were appointed the VC of JNU for being an educationist or being a proud Hindu? If you were appointed as an Indian educationist (if it was otherwise, I seek no response) then why you need to identify your religious identity on a public platform where you participated as the VC of JNU?
  2. By declaring yourself as Hindu VC of JNU have you not divided the all-inclusive JNU fraternity of being Indian into separate religious groupings? If you are the Hindu VC then what is the identity of Sikhs, Muslims, Buddhists, Jains and Christians present as teachers, students and non-teaching employees of the University? Should they also be known as per their religious identities? Is this not what Mohammed Ali Jinnah believed and applied causing Partition?

Respected Madam,

You not only declared to be a proud Hindu but also proud to be belonging to the Sangh. I am sure by Sangh you meant RSS. Do I need to remind you that RSS since its inception hated everything which represented an all-inclusive democratic-egalitarian-secular united India/Bharat? Let me take you to a tour of RSS archives so that there is no complaint of misrepresentation.

RSS denigrated the Tricolour

Respected VC,

As an Indian you must be familiar with the fact that the Tri-colour as the National Flag represents Indian nation. It was this flag carrying which thousands Indian patriots laid down their live as during the British rule it was crime to unfurl it in public. How much RSS hated it can be known by the following denigration of the Flag in its English organ, Organizer just on the eve of Independence (August 14, 1947):

“The people who have come to power by the kick of fate may give in our hands the Tricolour but it never [sic] be respected and owned by Hindus. The word three is in itself an evil, and a flag having three colours will certainly produce a very bad psychological effect and is injurious to a country.”

RSS betrayed India’s Freedom Struggle

Respected Madam,

The Non-cooperation Movement (1920-22) and the Quit India Movement (1942) were two great milestones in the history of the Indian Freedom Movement but RSS kept aloof not only from these but any other anti-colonial campaign. Guru Golwalkar, the most prominent ideologue of the RSS shamelessly denigrated these movements in the following words:

“Definitely there are bound to be bad results of struggle. The boys became unruly after the 1920-21 movement. It is not an attempt to throw mud at the leaders. But these are inevitable products after the struggle. The matter is that we could not properly control these results. After 1942, people often started thinking that there was no need to think of the law.”8

[Shri Guruji Samagr Darshan [Collected works of MS Golwalkar in Hindi in 7 volumes], vol. iv, BhartiyamVichar Sadhna, Nagpur, nd, p. 41. Hereafter referred to as SGSD.]

Thus Guru Golwalkar wanted the Indians to respect the draconian and repressive laws of the inhuman British rulers! After the 1942 Movement he further admitted,

“In 1942 also there was a strong sentiment in the hearts of many. At that time too the routine work of Sangh continued. Sangh vowed not to do anything directly. However, upheaval (uthal-puthal) in the minds of Sangh volunteers continued. Sangh is an organisation of inactive persons, their talks are useless, not only outsiders but also many of our volunteers did talk like this. They were greatly disgusted too.” [SGSD, p. 40.]

Guruji tells us that RSS did nothing directly. However, there is not a single publication or document of the RSS which throws light on what the RSS did indirectly for the Quit India Movement. During this period, in fact, its mentor, ‘Veer’ Savarkar, ran coalition governments with the Muslim League.

RSS denigrates martyrs of India’s Freedom Struggle

Respected Madam,

I would like to know your views on the statements of ‘Guruji’ decrying and denigrating the tradition of martyrdom following which Bhagat Singh, Chandrashekar Azad, Ashfaqullah Khan, Ram Prasad Bismil and countless other patriotic Indians laid down their lives for the independence our Motherland. Here is a passage from the chapter, ‘Martyr, great but not ideal’ from Bunch Of Thoughts, a veritable Geeta for RSS cadres such as yourself.

“There is no doubt that such men who embrace martyrdom are great heroes and their philosophy too is pre-eminently manly. They are far above the average men who meekly submit to fate and remain in fear and inaction. All the same, such persons are not held up as ideals in our society. We have not looked upon their martyrdom as the highest point of greatness to which men should aspire. For, after all, they failed in achieving their ideal, and failure implies some fatal flaw in them.”

[Golwalkar, MS., Bunch of Thoughts, Sahitya Sindhu Prakashana, Bangalore, 1996 edition, p. 283.]

Could there be a statement more insulting to the martyrs than this? The founder of the RSS, Dr. KB Hedgewar, went one step further: “Patriotism is not only going to prison. It is not correct to be carried away by such superficial patriotism.” [CP Bhishikar, CP., Sanghavariksh Ke Beej: Dr. Keshavrao Hedgewar, Suruchi, 1994, p. 21.]

Don’t you feel, Madam, that if martyrs like Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, Sukhdev, Ashfaqullah, Chandrashekhar Azad had come in contact with the then RSS leadership, they could have been saved from giving their lives for ‘superficial patriotism’? This also must be the reason why RSS leaders or cadres did not face repression during British rule and the RSS did not produce not a single martyr during the Freedom Movement.

RSS’ hatred for democracy

VC Madam,

You will agree with me that it is due to our democratic and egalitarian polity that you have become the administrator of the 2nd best University of India. But if Guru Golwalkar had his say it would not have been possible. Guruji hated democracy as per his following decree which he presented before a group of 1,350 top level cadres of the RSS in 1940 at the RSS Headquarters: “RSS inspired by one flag, one leader and one ideology is lighting the flame of Hindutva in each and every corner of this great land” [SGSD, vol. I, p. 11.]

As a leading intellectual you must be familiar with the fact that decree of rule under ‘one flag, one leader and one ideology’ was also the battle cry of the Fascist and Nazi parties of Europe in the first half of 20th century. What they did to democracy is well-known to this world!

For RSS Hinduism and Casteism are synonymous

Respected Madam, allow me to ask whether you like RSS believe that Hinduism and Casteism are one and same. The most prominent ideologue of RSS, Guru Golwalkar stated:

“The Virat Purusha, the Almighty manifesting himself…[according to Purusha Sukta] sun and moon are his eyes, the stars and the skies are created from his nabhi [navel] and Brahmin is the head, Kshatriya the hands, Vaishya the thighs and Shudra the feet. This means that the people who have this fourfold arrangement, i.e., the Hindu People, is [sic] our God. This supreme vision of Godhead is the very core of our concept of ‘nation’ and has permeated our thinking and given rise to various unique concepts of our cultural heritage.” [Golwalkar, MS., Bunch of Thoughts, Sahitya Sindhu Prakashana, Bangalore, 1996 edition, pp. 36-37.]

For this infallible belief in Casteism RSS strongly demanded that Manusmriti should replace the Indian Constitution. When the Constituent Assembly of India finalized the Constitution of India under the guidance of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar on November 26, 1949, RSS was not happy. Its organ, Organiser, in an editorial four days later complained:

“But in our constitution there is no mention of the unique constitutional development in ancient Bharat. Manu’s Laws were written long before Lycurgus of Sparta or Solon of Persia. To this day his laws as enunciated in the Manusmriti excite the admiration of the world and elicit spontaneous obedience and conformity. But to our constitutional pundits that means nothing.” [Organizer, Delhi, November 30, 1949.]

Respected VC Madam,

I am reproducing a selection from Manusmriti for your kind reference and would like to know whether you also believe in these decrees of the Manu Code. These dehumanizing and degenerate laws, which are presented here, are self-explanatory.

Laws of Manu Concerning Sudras

  1.  For the sake of the prosperity of the worlds (the divine one) caused the Brahmana, the Kshatriya, the Vaisya, and the Sudra to proceed from his mouth, his arm, his thighs and his feet.
  2.  One occupation only the lord prescribed to the Sudras, to serve meekly even these (other) three castes.
  3.  Once-born man (a Sudra), who insults a twice-born man with gross invective, shall have his tongue cut out; for he is of low origin.
  4.  If he mentions the names and castes (jati) of the (twice-born) with contumely, an iron nail, ten fingers long, shall be thrust red-hot into his mouth.
  5.  If he arrogantly teaches Brahmanas their duty, the king shall cause hot oil to be poured into his mouth and into his ears.
  6.  With whatever limb a man of a low caste does hurt to (a man of the three) highest (castes), even that limb shall be cut off; that is the teaching of Manu.
  7.  He who raises his hand or a stick, shall have his hand cut off; he who in anger kicks with his foot, shall have his foot cut off.
  8.  A low-caste man who tries to place himself on the same seat with a man of a high caste, shall be branded on his hip and be banished, or (the king) shall cause his buttock to be gashed.
  9.  Let him never slay a Brahmana, though he have committed all (possible) crimes; let him banish such an (offender), leaving all his property (to him) and (his body) unhurt.

Laws of Manu Concerning Women

  1.  Day and night woman must be kept in dependence by the males (of) their (families), and, if they attach themselves to sensual enjoyments, they must be kept under one’s control.
  2.  Her father protects (her) in childhood, her husband protects (her) in youth, and her sons protect (her) in old age; a woman is never fit for independence.
  3.  Women must particularly be guarded against evil inclinations, however trifling (they may appear); for, if they are not guarded, they will bring sorrow on two families.
  4.  Considering that the highest duty of all castes, even weak husbands (must) strive to guard their wives.
  5.  No man can completely guard women by force; but they can be guarded by the employment of the (following) expedients:
  6.  Let the (husband) employ his (wife) in the collection and expenditure of his wealth, in keeping (everything) clean, in (the fulfillment of) religious duties, in the preparation of his food, and in looking after the household utensils.
  7.  Women, confined in the house under trustworthy and obedient servants, are not (well) guarded; but those who of their own accord keep guard over themselves, are well guarded.
  8.  Women do not care for beauty, nor is their attention fixed on age; (thinking), ‘(It is enough that) he is a man,’ they give themselves to the handsome and to the ugly.
  9.  Through their passion for men, through their mutable temper, through their natural heartlessness, they become disloyal towards their husbands, however carefully they may be guarded in this (world).
  10.  (When creating them) Manu allotted to women (a love of their) bed, (of their) seat and (of) ornament, impure desires, wrath, dishonesty, malice, and bad conduct.
  11.  For women no (sacramental) rite (is performed) with sacred texts, thus the law is settled; women (who are) destitute of strength and destitute of (the knowledge of) Vedic texts, (are as impure as) falsehood (itself), that is a fixed rule.

Do I need to remind you that these laws are for Hindus? I would like to remind you that a copy of Manusmriti was burnt as a protest in the presence of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar during historic Mahad agitation on December 25, 1927.

RSS celebrated assassination of Gandhiji

Respected Madam,

I hope you know that Nathuram Godse and others who conspired to kill Gandhiji, claimed to be ‘Hindu Nationalists’. They described killing as something ordained by God. RSS celebrated his killing by distributing sweets was the finding of none other than the first home minister of India, Sardar Patel. In a letter written to Golwalkar on September 11, 1948, Sardar stated:

“Organizing the Hindus and helping them is one thing but going in for revenge for its sufferings on innocent and helpless men, women and children is quite another thing…Apart from this, their opposition to the Congress, that too of such virulence, disregarding all considerations of personality, decency or decorum, created a kind of unrest among the people. All their speeches were full of communal poison. It was not necessary to spread poison in order to enthuse the Hindus and organize for their protection. As a final result of the poison, the country had to suffer the sacrifice of the invaluable life of Gandhiji. Even an iota of the sympathy of the Government, or of the people, no more remained for the RSS. In fact opposition grew. Opposition turned more severe, when the RSS men expressed joy and distributed sweets after Gandhiji’s death.”

[Justice on Trial, RSS, Bangalore, 1962, pp. 26-28.]

Respected VC Madam, since you claim to be a proud member of the RSS, the Indian academic fraternity specially the JNU one would like to know if you are ashamed of this criminal role of RSS in the assassination of Gandhiji. You cannot be neutral on this issue.

RSS believed that South Indian Hindus belong to inferior Race

VC Madam,

You claim to be a proud Hindu and a proud member of the Sangh. You also happen to be from South India. Do you know that RSS believed that the Race Hindus of South India needed to be improved? I am reproducing a speech of Guru Golwalkar on this issue in context of Kerala Hindus. He was invited to address the students of the School of Social Science of Gujarat University on December 17, 1960. In this address, while underlying his firm belief in the Race Theory, he touched upon the issue of cross-breeding of human beings in the Indian society in history. He shamelessly stated:

“Today experiments in cross-breeding are made only on animals. But the courage to make such experiments on human beings is not shown even by the so-called modern scientist of today. If some human cross-breeding is seen today it is the result not of scientific experiments but of carnal lust. Now let us see the experiments our ancestors made in this sphere. In an effort to better the human species through cross-breeding the Namboodri Brahamanas of the North were settled in Kerala and a rule was laid down that the eldest son of a Namboodri family could marry only the daughter of Vaishya, Kashtriya or Shudra communities of Kerala. Another still more courageous rule was that the first off-spring of a married woman of any class must be fathered by a Namboodri Brahman and then she could beget children by her husband. Today this experiment will be called adultery but it was not so, as it was limited to the first child.” [M. S. Golwalkar cited in Organizer, January 2, 1961.]

Through this brazen Racist statement made not in the presence of some lumpen elements but an august gathering of leading Gujarat academics Guruji argued that Brahmans of the North (India) and specially Namboodri Brahamans, belonged to a superior Race. Due to this quality, Namboodri Brahamanas were sent from the North to Kerala to improve the breed of inferior Hindus there. Interestingly, this was being argued by a person who claimed to uphold the unity of Hindus world over. Thirdly, Golwalkar as a male chauvinist believed that a Namboodri Brahman male belonging to a superior Race from the North only could improve the inferior human Race from South. For him wombs of Kerala’s Hindu women enjoyed no sanctity and were simply objects of improving breed through intercourse with Namboodri Brahamanas who in no way were related to them.

Please respond to it, Madam VC! Do you uphold such criminal views of Golwalkar; the most prominent ideologue of RSS?

In RSS male cadres are swayamsevaks (volunteers) but female cadres are sevikas (servants/maids)

Respected Santishree Pandit Madam,

When you declare that you are proud member of the Sangh, you must be familiar with the organizational structure of RSS (the English equivalent being national volunteer association) is an exclusive male organization. The female organization was created in 1936 with the name, Rashtr Sevika Samiti (the English equivalent being society of female servants/maids for the nation). Thus male members are all India volunteers whereas female members are female servants. It is not the only difference. The Sevikas take oath to remain faithful, modest, guard virginity and honour but no such oath is prescribed for RSS cadres.

Madam, please enlighten us about your take on this naked male chauvinistic attitude of the Sangh. You owe this explanation to the nation as a woman too! Is not it a fact that Sangh and Islamic chauvinists are two sides of the same coin so far as denigration of women is concerned?

I would end by requesting your kind self to respond to the above issues as fate of one of the best Universities and future of Indian higher education is at stake. I have relied solely on RSS archives for bringing to your kind notice the anti-humanism, anti-colonial struggle and anti- Indian democracy beliefs and actions of the Sangh. I am ready to face defamation proceedings if you find I have misquoted or reported fake RSS documents.

With regards,

Shamsul Islam

September 27, 2023

Link for some of S. Islam’s writings in English, Hindi, Urdu, Marathi, Malayalam, Kannada, Bengali, Punjabi, Gujarati and video interviews/debates:

http://du-in.academia.edu/ShamsulIslam

27 September 2023

Source: countercurrents.org

Rising Islamophobia and Communal Discord: An Alarming Trend in BJP-Ruled States

By Mohd Ziyaullah Khan

In recent years, India has witnessed a concerning surge in hate speech and Islamophobia, particularly within states governed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). This unsettling trend, highlighted  In a report by Hindutva Watch based in Washington, sheds light on the distressing reality that a staggering 80% of recorded hate speech incidents in the country occurred in BJP-ruled states. The report attributes many of these incidents to groups affiliated with the ruling BJP, such as the Bajrang Dal, Vishwa Hindu Parishad, and Sakal Hindu Samaj, all of which have ties to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a prominent right-wing Hindu nationalist organization.

The Hindutva Watch Report 

A report by Hindutva Watch, a Washington-based group monitoring attacks on minorities, has unveiled a disturbing trend of escalating anti-Muslim hate speech incidents in India during the first half of 2023. The report, which documented 255 instances of hate speech gatherings targeting Muslims, revealed an average of more than one incident per day during this period. Regrettably, there was no comparative data available for previous years. The report employed the United Nations’ definition of hate speech, characterizing it as “any form of communication… that employs prejudiced or discriminatory language towards an individual or group based on attributes such as religion, ethnicity, nationality, race, color, descent, gender, or other identity factors.”

Notably, around 70% of these hate speech incidents occurred in states slated to conduct elections in 2023 and 2024, underscoring a disturbing correlation between political events and the rise of hate speech targeting the Muslim community. Maharashtra, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Gujarat were identified as the states with the highest number of hate speech gatherings, with Maharashtra alone accounting for 29% of the incidents. These hate speech events predominantly featured conspiracy theories, calls for violence, and socio-economic boycotts against Muslims.

Alarmingly, approximately 80% of these events transpired in areas governed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is widely anticipated to secure victory in the general elections of 2024. This concerning trend necessitates immediate attention and action to curb the propagation of hate speech and foster a more inclusive and harmonious society.

Hindutva Watch monitored online engagements of Hindu nationalist organizations, authenticated hate speech videos circulated on social media, and collated data on individual incidents as reported by various media outlets. However, the Indian government, under Prime Minister Modi’s leadership, refutes allegations of minority abuse. Requests for comments from the Indian embassy in Washington remain unanswered

Beyond the The Hindutva Watch Report

Rather than relying on official data, the Hindutva Watch report sourced information from verifiable social media and news outlets, revealing a deeply concerning pattern of orchestrated hate speech and bigotry against minority communities, particularly Muslims. Senior political figures associated with the BJP have openly expressed prejudiced views, further fueling this divisive narrative.

The Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, for instance, once singled out individuals protesting against the government based on their attire, specifically targeting those wearing traditional Muslim clothing. Prior to the 2019 general election, Amit Shah, the BJP President at the time, derogatorily referred to Bangladeshi Muslim immigrants as “termites” and pledged to forcibly expel them. Islamophobic sentiment is further propagated through social media, often within BJP-curated WhatsApp groups, where the past actions of Muslim rulers are wrongly blamed on the entire Muslim community.

This trend marks a stark departure from previous governments, which aimed to foster communal harmony, support India’s pluralism and diversity, and temper communal passions. The BJP, on the other hand, openly aligns itself with an intolerant majoritarian Hindutva ideology. Leaders within the party and close to the ruling establishment regularly denounce the Muslim minority, branding them a threat to India’s Hindu identity and accusing past governments of appeasement.

Under BJP rule, campaigns have been initiated against interfaith relationships, accusing Muslim men of pursuing “love jihad” to allegedly entrap Hindu women. Additionally, restrictions have been imposed on religious conversions, Muslim marriage practices, and family planning efforts. Discrimination against Muslims is evident in the controversial citizenship law, offering fast-track citizenship to refugees from neighboring Muslim-majority countries, excluding Muslims.

The Damage 

These developments dismay liberals and individuals advocating for secularism in India, revealing the erosion of the country’s constitutional secularism. In just nine years of BJP rule, the cultural pluralism and Hindu-Muslim amity that India once proudly touted have been severely compromised. Muslims, who once held prominent positions as a symbol of India’s unity, now find themselves marginalized in various sectors. Moreover, the rise of Islamophobia has deeply infiltrated north Indian society, while the south has managed to resist to a certain extent. The free press, once a beacon of democracy and inclusivity, has also played a role in erasing the syncretic cultural traditions that India has celebrated for decades.

Wrapping up 

In this climate, the segregation and disempowerment of Muslims are becoming normalized, with Indian society increasingly divided into ‘us’ and ‘them.’ Anti-Muslim bigotry is now publicly expressed and practiced with alarming frequency, desensitizing the populace to this alarming trend. Those who decry these actions are met with derogatory responses, further polarizing the nation. In the face of these challenges, it is vital to address this growing discord and work towards promoting a more inclusive and harmonious society.

Mohd Ziyauallah Khan is based in Nagpur and works with a leading digital marketing company in Nagpur as the Content Head.

27 September 2023

Source: countercurrents.org