South Asia Citizens Web

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India is seen as a shining example of a secular state but in reality the Indian state actually privileges Hinduism over other religions and religious communities. The Indian state is in fact the defender of the dharma for at least five reasons.
The world community has rightly regarded Pakistan and Bangladesh as examples of theocratic states practicing policies of harsh discrimination against Hindus and other minorities. Sri Lanka’s Singhala-centric policies have (…)

On 24th January in Mangalore, a large group of men invited the media as witness and openly molested and beat up women who were sitting in a private establishment. They claimed to be doing this to preserve Indian culture.
Any cultured society would have hung its head in shame and disgust, and unequivocally condemned the men who besmirched its culture. Instead, our chief ministers, ministers, politicians across the political spectrum, public figures, and even members of the National (…)

Judges, Advocates and Terrorists
K G Kannabiran *
Every judge of the Supreme Court before entering takes an oath where he says that he will bear true faith and allegiance to the Constitution , that he will uphold the Sovereignty and Integrity of India and that he will duly and faith fully and to the best of his ability, knowledge and judgment perform the duties of office without fear or favour or ill-will and he will uphold the Constitution and the laws. Justice Mr. Passayat has taken (…)

Governments have always lied. They naturally deny it, even long after it is abundantly clear that they have lied, trailing multiple red herrings, dismissing inconvenient evidence, implying that there is counter-evidence they are not free to produce. When a lie can no longer be credibly denied it is justified, usually by an appeal to the national interest. Governments of modern representative democracies are no different, even if they are more liable than dictators to be exposed. Colin Leys, (…)

Terror creates strange conundrums. When it strikes, it stops time and stupefies the storyteller. It freezes time by making everyday acts irrelevant. Terror demands a ferocity of focused attention, bawling like a monster child for an immediate response. In fact, its demands are almost coquettish – insisting on this and refusing that, threatening to ruthlessly terminate the relationship if the blandishments are not right. In terms of action, it demands reflexes which are immediate, trained, coordinated, but in terms of thought, it demands a quietness of reflection. Terror freezes thought. Instead of horror, we respond with hysteria. Instead of coherence, we seek to mimic its action, producing incoherence, a jaggedness of narratives that would intrigue any psychiatrist. This essay is organized in three segments. The first opens with the opera of Hindu Terrorism, the second with the media during the Mumbai terror and the third deals with the middle class attitudes to terror.