Essays

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Contents
Not Agan
The Cost Of Lvng
Pubc Power In The Age Of Empre
The End Of Imagnaton
The Greater Common Good
Scmtars In The Sun - Intervew
Come September
A Repy To The Court
Do Turkeys En|oy Thanksgvng?
The Ordnary Persons Gude To Empre
The Day Of The |ackas
Instant-Mx Impera Democracy - Buy One, Get One Free
When The Sants Go Marchng Out
The War That Never Ends
The New Amercan Century
How Deep Sha We Dg?
The Most Cowardy War In Hstory
Baby Bush Go Home
The Agebra Of Infnte |ustce
The Loneness Of Noam Chomsky
Empre And The Corporate Meda - Intervew
The Great Indan Rape Trck
Wnds, Rvers & Ran - Intervew
On Inda, Iraq, U.S. Empre And Dssent - Intervew
And Hs Lfe Shoud Become Extnct
War Is Peace
Hep That Hnders
Lstenng To Grasshoppers
Fascsm's Frm Footprnt n Inda
Newstatesman Intervew: Syed Hamad A
Not Again
Wrters magne that they cu stores from the word. I'm
begnnng to beeve that vanty makes them thnk so. That t's
actuay the other way around. Stores cu wrters from the
word. Stores revea themseves to us. The pubc narratve, the
prvate narratve -- they coonze us. They commsson us. They
nsst on beng tod. Fcton and non-fcton are ony dfferent
technques of story teng. For reasons I do not fuy understand,
fcton dances out of me. Non-fcton s wrenched out by the
achng, broken word I wake up to every mornng.
The theme of much of what I wrte, fcton as we as non-fcton,
s the reatonshp between power and poweressness and the
endess, crcuar confct they're engaged n. |ohn Berger, that
most wonderfu wrter, once wrote: 'Never agan w a snge
story be tod as though t's the ony one'. There can never be a
snge story. There are ony ways of seeng. So when I te a
story, I te t not as an deoogue who wants to pt one absoutst
deoogy aganst another, but as a story-teer who wants to share
her way of seeng. Though t mght appear otherwse, my wrtng
s not reay about natons and hstores, t's about power. About
the paranoa and ruthessness of power. About the physcs of
power. I beeve that the accumuaton of vast unfettered power
by a State or a country, a corporaton or an nsttuton -- or even
an ndvdua, a spouse, frend or sbng -- regardess of deoogy,
resuts n excesses such as the ones I w recount here.
Lvng as I do, as mons of us do, n the shadow of the nucear
hoocaust that the governments of Inda and Pakstan keep
promsng ther bran-washed ctzenry, and n the goba
neghbourhood of the War aganst Terror (what Presdent Bush
rather bbcay cas 'The Task That Never Ends'), I fnd mysef
thnkng a great dea about the reatonshp between ctzens and
the state.
In Inda, those of us who have expressed vews on nucear
bombs, bg dams, corporate gobazaton and the rsng threat of
communa Hndu fascsm -- vews that are at varance wth the
Indan government's -- are branded 'ant-natona'. Whe ths
accusaton does not f me wth ndgnaton, t's not an accurate
descrpton of what I do or how I thnk. An 'ant-natona' s a
person s who s aganst hs/her own naton and, by nference, s
pro some other one. But t sn't necessary to be 'ant-natona' to
be deepy suspcous of a natonasm, to be ant-natonasm.
Natonasm of one knd or another was the cause of most of the
genocde of the 20th century. Fags are bts of cooured coth
that governments use frst to shrnk-wrap peope's mnds and
then as ceremona shrouds to bury the dead. When
ndependent, thnkng peope (and here I do not ncude the
corporate meda) begn to ray under fags, when wrters,
panters, muscans, fm makers suspend ther |udgment and
bndy yoke ther art to the servce of the 'naton', t's tme for a
of us to st up and worry. In Inda we saw t happen soon after
the nucear tests n 1998 and durng the Karg war aganst
Pakstan n 1999. In the US we saw t durng the Guf war and we
see t now, durng the 'War aganst Terror'. That bzzard of
made-n-Chna Amercan fags.
Recenty, those who have crtczed the actons of the US
government (mysef ncuded) have been caed 'ant-Amercan'.
Ant-Amercansm s n the process of beng consecrated nto an
deoogy.
The term 'ant-Amercan' s usuay used by the Amercan
estabshment to dscredt and, not fasey -- but sha we say
naccuratey -- defne ts crtcs. Once someone s branded ant-
Amercan, the chances are that he or she w be |udged before
they're heard and the argument w be ost n the weter of
brused natona prde.
What does the term 'ant-Amercan' mean? Does t mean you're
ant-|azz? Or that you're opposed to free speech? That you don't
deght n Ton Morrson or |ohn Updke? That you have a quarre
wth gant sequoas? Does t mean you don't admre the
hundreds of thousands of Amercan ctzens who marched aganst
nucear weapons, or the thousands of war ressters who forced
ther government to wthdraw from Vetnam? Does t mean that
you hate a Amercans?
Ths sy confaton of Amerca's cuture, musc, terature, the
breathtakng physca beauty of the and, the ordnary peasures
of ordnary peope wth crtcsm of the US government's foregn
pocy (about whch, thanks to Amerca's 'free press', sady most
Amercans know very tte) s a deberate and extremey
effectve strategy. It's ke a retreatng army takng cover n a
heavy popuated cty, hopng that the prospect of httng cvan
targets w deter enemy fre.
There are many Amercans who woud be mortfed to be
assocated wth ther government's poces. The most schoary,
scathng, ncsve, harous crtques of the hypocrsy and the
contradctons n US government pocy come from Amercan
ctzens. When the rest of the word wants to know what the US
government s up to, we turn to Noam Chomsky, Edward Sad,
Howard Znn, Ed Herman, Amy Goodman, Mchae Abert,
Chamers |ohnson, Wam Bum and Anthony Arnove to te us
what's reay gong on.
Smary, n Inda, not hundreds, but mons of us woud be
ashamed and offended f we were n any way mpcated wth the
present Indan government's fascst poces whch, apart from
the perpetraton of state terrorsm n the vaey of Kashmr (n the
name of fghtng terrorsm), have aso turned a bnd eye to the
recent state-supervsed pogrom aganst Musms n Gu|arat. It
woud be absurd to thnk that those who crtcse the Indan
government are 'ant-Indan' -- athough the government tsef
never hestates to take that ne. It s dangerous to cede to the
Indan government or the Amercan government or anyone for
that matter, the rght to defne what 'Inda' or 'Amerca' are, or
ought to be.
To ca someone 'ant-Amercan', ndeed, to be ant-Amercan, (or
for that matter ant-Indan, or ant- Tmbuktuan) s not |ust racst,
t's a faure of the magnaton. An nabty to see the word n
terms other than those that the estabshment has set out for
you: If you're not a Bushe you're a Taban. If you don't ove us,
you hate us. If you're not good you're ev. If you're not wth us,
you're wth the terrorsts.
Last year, ke many others, I too made the mstake of scoffng at
ths post- September 11 rhetorc, dsmssng t as foosh and
arrogant. I've reazed that t's not foosh at a. It's actuay a
canny recrutment drve for a msconceved, dangerous war.
Every day I'm taken aback at how many peope beeve that
opposng the war n Afghanstan amounts to supportng terrorsm,
or votng for the Taban. Now that the nta am of the war --
capturng Osama bn Laden (dead or ave) -- seems to have run
nto bad weather, the goaposts have been moved. It's beng
made out that the whoe pont of the war was to toppe the
Taban regme and berate Afghan women from ther burqas.
We're beng asked to beeve that the US marnes are actuay on
a femnst msson. (If so, w ther next stop be Amerca's mtary
ay Saud Araba?) Thnk of t ths way: In Inda there are some
pretty reprehensbe soca practces, aganst 'untouchabes',
aganst Chrstans and Musms, aganst women. Pakstan and
Bangadesh have even worse ways of deang wth mnorty
communtes and women. Shoud they be bombed? Shoud
Deh, Isamabad, and Dhaka be destroyed? Is t possbe to bomb
bgotry out of Inda? Can we bomb our way to a femnst
paradse? Is that how women won the vote n the US? Or how
savery was aboshed? Can we wn redress for the genocde of
the mons of natve Amercans upon whose corpses the US was
founded by bombng Santa Fe?
None of us need annversares to remnd us of what we cannot
forget. So t s no more than concdence that I happen to be
here, on Amercan so, n September -- ths month of dreadfu
annversares. Uppermost on everybody's mnd of course,
partcuary here n Amerca, s the horror of what has come to be
known as 9/11. Neary three thousand cvans ost ther ves n
that etha terrorst strke. The gref s st deep. The rage st
sharp. The tears have not dred. And a strange, deady war s
ragng around the word. Yet, each person who has ost a oved
one surey knows secrety, deepy, that no war, no act of revenge,
no dasy-cutters dropped on someone ese's oved ones or
someone ese's chdren w bunt the edges of ther pan or brng
ther own oved ones back. War cannot avenge those who have
ded. War s ony a bruta desecraton of ther memory.
To fue yet another war -- ths tme aganst Iraq -- by cyncay
manpuatng peope's gref, by packagng t for TV specas
sponsored by corporatons seng detergent or runnng shoes, s
to cheapen and devaue gref, to dran t of meanng. What we
are seeng now s a vugar dspay of the busness of gref, the
commerce of gref, the pagng of even the most prvate human
feengs for potca purpose. It s a terrbe, voent thng for a
state to do to ts peope.
It's not a cever-enough sub|ect to speak of from a pubc
patform, but what I woud reay ove to tak to you about s oss.
Loss and osng. Gref, faure, brokenness, numbness,
uncertanty, fear, the death of feeng, the death of dreamng.
The absoute, reentess, endess, habtua unfarness of the
word. What does oss means to ndvduas? What does t means
to whoe cutures, whoe peopes who have earned to ve wth t
as a constant companon?
Snce t s September 11 that we're takng about, perhaps t's n
the ftness of thngs that we remember what that date means,
not ony to those who ost ther oved ones n Amerca ast year,
but to those n other parts of the word to whom that date has
ong hed sgnfcance. Ths hstorca dredgng s not offered as
an accusaton or a provocaton. But |ust to share the gref of
hstory. To thn the mst a tte. To say to the ctzens of
Amerca, n the gentest, most human way: wecome to the word.
Twenty-nne years ago, n Che, on the September 11, 1973,
Genera Pnochet overthrew the democratcay eected
government of Savador Aende n a CIA-backed coup. 'Che
shoudn't be aowed to go Marxst |ust because ts peope are
rresponsbe', sad Henry Kssnger, then Presdent Nxon's
natona securty advser.
After the coup Presdent Aende was found dead nsde the
presdenta paace. Whether he was ked or whether he ked
hmsef, we' never know. In the regme of terror that ensued,
thousands of peope were ked. Many more smpy
'dsappeared'. Frng squads conducted pubc executons.
Concentraton camps and torture chambers were opened across
the country. The dead were bured n mne shafts and unmarked
graves. For 17 years the peope of Che ved n dread of the
mdnght knock, of routne 'dsappearances', of sudden arrest and
torture. Cheans te the story of how the muscan Vctor |ara
had hs hands cut off n front of a crowd n the Santago stadum.
Before they shot hm, Pnochet's soders threw hs gutar at hm
and mockngy ordered hm to pay.
In 1999, foowng the arrest of Genera Pnochet n Brtan,
thousands of secret documents were decassfed by the US
government. They contan unequvoca evdence of the CIA's
nvovement n the coup as we as the fact that the US
government had detaed nformaton about the stuaton n Che
durng Genera Pnochet's regn. Yet Kssnger assured the
genera of hs support: 'In the Unted States as you know, we are
sympathetc to what you are tryng to do', he sad, 'We wsh your
government we'.
Those of us who have ony ever known fe n a democracy,
however fawed, woud fnd t hard to magne what vng n a
dctatorshp and endurng the absoute oss of freedom reay
means. It sn't |ust those who Pnochet murdered, but the ves
he stoe from the vng that must be accounted for, too.
Sady, Che was not the ony country n South Amerca to be
snged out for the US government's attentons. Guatemaa,
Costa Rca, Ecuador, Braz, Peru, the Domncan Repubc, Bova,
Ncaragua, Honduras, Panama, E Savador, Peru, Mexco and
Coomba; they've a been the payground for covert -- and overt
-- operatons by the CIA. Hundreds of thousands of Latn
Amercans have been ked, tortured or have smpy dsappeared
under the despotc regmes and tn-pot dctators, drug runners
and arms deaers that were propped up n ther countres. (Many
of them earned ther craft n the nfamous US government-
funded Schoo of Amercas n Fort Bennng, Georga, whch has
produced 60,000 graduates.) If ths were not humaton enough,
the peope of South Amerca have had to bear the cross of beng
branded as a peope who are ncapabe of democracy -- as f
coups and massacres are somehow encrypted n ther genes.
Ths st does not of course ncude countres n Afrca or Asa that
suffered US mtary nterventons -- Vetnam, Korea, Indonesa,
Laos, and Camboda. For how many Septembers for decades
together have mons of Asan peope been bombed, burned,
and saughtered? How many Septembers have gone by snce
August 1945, when hundreds of thousands of ordnary |apanese
peope were obterated by the nucear strkes n Hroshma and
Nagasak? For how many Septembers have the thousands who
had the msfortune of survvng those strkes endured the vng
he that was vsted on them, ther unborn chdren, ther
chdren's chdren, on the earth, the sky, the wnd, the water, and
a the creatures that swm and wak and craw and fy?
September 11 has a tragc resonance n the Mdde East, too. On
September 11, 1922, gnorng Arab outrage, the Brtsh
government procamed a mandate n Paestne, a foow-up to
the 1917 Bafour decaraton, whch mpera Brtan ssued, wth
ts army massed outsde the gates of the cty of Gaza. The
Bafour decaraton promsed European zonsts a natona home
for |ewsh peope. Two years after the decaraton, Lord Bafour,
the Brtsh foregn secretary sad: 'In Paestne we do not propose
to go through the form of consutng the wshes of the present
nhabtants of the country. Zonsm, be t rght or wrong, good or
bad, s rooted n age-od tradtons, n present needs, n future
hopes of far profounder mport than the desres or pre|udces of
the 700,000 Arabs who now nhabt ths ancent and'.
How careessy mpera power decreed whose needs were
profound and whose were not. How careessy t vvsected
ancent cvzatons. Paestne and Kashmr are mpera Brtan's
festerng, bood-drenched gfts to the modern word. Both are
faut-nes n the ragng nternatona confcts of today.
In 1937 Wnston Church sad of the Paestnans: 'I do not agree
that the dog n a manger has the fna rght to the manger even
though he may have an there for a very ong tme. I do not
admt that rght. I do not admt for nstance that a great wrong
has been done to the red Indans of Amerca or the back peope
of Austraa. I do not admt that a wrong has been done to these
peope by the fact that a stronger race, a hgher grade race, a
more wordy wse race to put t that way, has come n and taken
ther pace'. That set the trend for the Israe state's atttude
towards Paestnans. In 1969, Israe Prme Mnster Goda Mer
sad: 'Paestnans do not exst'. Her successor, Prme Mnster
Lev Eshko, sad: 'What are Paestnans? When I came here |to
Paestne| there were 250,000 non-|ews, many Arabs and
Bedouns. It was desert, more than underdeveoped. Nothng'.
Prme Mnster Menachem Begn caed Paestnans 'two-egged
beasts'. Prme Mnster Ytzhak Shamr caed them
'grasshoppers' who coud be crushed. Ths s the anguage of
heads of state, not the words of ordnary peope.
In 1947 the UN formay parttoned Paestne and aotted 55% of
Paestne's and to the zonsts. Wthn a year they had captured
78%. On May 14, 1948, the state of Israe was decared. Mnutes
after the decaraton, the US recognzed Israe. The West Bank
was annexed by |ordan. The Gaza strp came under Egyptan
mtary contro. Formay, Paestne ceased to exst except n the
mnds and hearts of the hundreds of thousands of Paestnan
peope who became refugees.
In the summer of 1967, Israe occuped the West Bank and the
Gaza Strp. Setters were offered state subsdes and
deveopment ad to move nto the occuped terrtores. Amost
every day more Paestnan fames are forced off ther ands and
drven nto refugee camps. Paestnans who contnue to ve n
Israe do not have the same rghts as Israes and ve as second-
cass ctzens n ther former homeand.
Over the decades there have been uprsngs, wars, ntfadas.
Tens of thousands have ost ther ves. Accords and treates
have been sgned, ceasefres decared and voated. But the
boodshed doesn't end. Paestne st remans egay occuped.
Its peope ve n nhuman condtons, n vrtua Bantustans, where
they are sub|ected to coectve punshments, 24-hour curfews,
where they are humated and brutased on a day bass. They
never know when ther homes w be demoshed, when ther
chdren w be shot, when ther precous trees w be cut, when
ther roads w be cosed, when they w be aowed to wak down
to the market to buy food and medcne. And when they w not.
They ve wth no sembance of dgnty. Wth not much hope n
sght. They have no contro over ther ands, ther securty, ther
movement, ther communcaton, ther water suppy. So when
accords are sgned and words ke 'autonomy' and even
'statehood' are banded about, t's aways worth askng: What
sort of autonomy? What sort of state? What sort of rghts w ts
ctzens have? Young Paestnans who cannot contan ther anger
turn themseves nto human bombs and haunt Israe's streets and
pubc paces, bowng themseves up, kng ordnary peope,
n|ectng terror nto day fe, and eventuay hardenng both
socetes' suspcon and mutua hatred of each other. Each
bombng nvtes mercess reprsas and even more hardshp on
Paestnan peope. But then sucde bombng s an act of
ndvdua despar, not a revoutonary tactc. Athough
Paestnan attacks strke terror nto Israe cvans, they provde
the perfect cover for the Israe government's day ncursons nto
Paestnan terrtory, the perfect excuse for od-fashoned, 19th
century coonasm, dressed up as a new-fashoned, 21st century
'war'.
Israe's staunchest potca and mtary ay s and aways has
been the US government. The US government has bocked, aong
wth Israe, amost every UN resouton that sought a peacefu,
equtabe souton to the confct. It has supported amost every
war that Israe has fought. When Israe attacks Paestne, t s
Amercan msses that smash through Paestnan homes. And
every year Israe receves severa bon doars from the US.
What essons shoud we draw from ths tragc confct? Is t reay
mpossbe for |ewsh peope who suffered so cruey themseves
-- more cruey perhaps than any other peope n hstory -- to
understand the vunerabty and the yearnng of those whom
they have dspaced? Does extreme sufferng aways knde
cruety? What hope does ths eave the human race wth? What
w happen to the Paestnan peope n the event of a vctory?
When a naton wthout a state eventuay procams a state, what
knd of state w t be? What horrors w be perpetrated under ts
fag? Is t a separate state that we shoud be fghtng for, or the
rghts to a fe of berty and dgnty for everyone regardess of
ther ethncty or regon?
Paestne was once a secuar buwark n the Mdde East. But now
the weak, undemocratc, by a accounts corrupt but avowedy
non-sectaran PLO, s osng ground to Hamas, whch espouses an
overty sectaran deoogy and fghts n the name of Isam. To
quote from ther manfesto: 'We w be ts soders, and the
frewood of ts fre, whch w burn the enemes'.
The word s caed upon to condemn sucde bombers. But can
we gnore the ong road they have |ourneyed on before they
arrved at ths destnaton? September 11, 1922 to September
11, 2002 -- 80 years s a ong ong tme to have been wagng war.
Is there some advce the word can gve the peope of Paestne?
Some scrap of hope we can hod out? Shoud they |ust sette for
the crumbs that are thrown ther way and behave ke the
grasshoppers or two-egged beasts they've been descrbed as?
Shoud they |ust take Goda Mer's suggeston and make a rea
effort to not exst?
In another part of the Mdde East, September 11 strkes a more
recent chord. It was on September 11, 1990 that George W Bush
Sr, then presdent of the US, made a speech to a |ont sesson of
Congress announcng hs government's decson to go to war
aganst Iraq.
The US government says that Saddam Hussen s a war crmna,
a crue mtary despot who has commtted genocde aganst hs
own peope. That's a fary accurate descrpton of the man. In
1988 he razed hundreds of vages n northern Iraq and used
chemca weapons and machne-guns to k thousands of Kurdsh
peope. Today we know that that same year the US government
provded hm wth $500m n subsdes to buy Amercan farm
products. The next year, after he had successfuy competed hs
genocda campagn, the US government doubed ts subsdy to
$1bn. It aso provded hm wth hgh quaty germ seed for
anthrax, as we as hecopters and dua-use matera that coud
be used to manufacture chemca and boogca weapons.
So t turns out that whe Saddam Hussen was carryng out hs
worst atroctes, the US and the UK governments were hs cose
aes. Even today, the government of Turkey whch has one of
the most appang human rghts records n the word s one of
the US government's cosest aes. The fact that the Turksh
government has oppressed and murdered Kurdsh peope for
years has not prevented the US government from pyng Turkey
wth weapons and deveopment ad. Ceary t was not concern
for the Kurdsh peope that provoked Presdent Bush's speech to
Congress.
What changed? In August 1990, Saddam Hussen nvaded
Kuwat. Hs sn was not so much that he had commtted an act of
war, but that he acted ndependenty, wthout orders from hs
masters. Ths dspay of ndependence was enough to upset the
power equaton n the Guf. So t was decded that Saddam
Hussen be extermnated, ke a pet that has outved ts owner's
affecton.
The frst Aed attack on Iraq took pace n |anuary 1991. The
word watched the prme-tme war as t was payed out on TV. (In
Inda those days, you had to go to a fve- star hote obby to
watch CNN.) Tens of thousands of peope were ked n a month
of devastatng bombng. What many do not know s that the war
dd not end then. The nta fury smmered down nto the ongest
sustaned ar attack on a country snce the Vetnam war. Over
the ast decade Amercan and Brtsh forces have fred thousands
of msses and bombs on Iraq. Iraq's feds and farmands have
been sheed wth 300 tons of depeted uranum. In countres ke
Brtan and Amerca depeted uranum shes are test-fred nto
specay constructed concrete tunnes. The radoactve resdue s
washed off, seaed n cement and dsposed off n the ocean
(whch s bad enough). In Iraq t's amed -- deberatey, wth
macous ntent -- at peope's food and water suppy. In ther
bombng sortes, the Aes specfcay targeted and destroyed
water treatment pants, fuy aware of the fact that they coud not
be repared wthout foregn assstance. In southern Iraq there
has been a four-fod ncrease n cancer among chdren. In the
decade of economc sanctons that foowed the war, Iraq
cvans have been dened food, medcne, hospta equpment,
ambuances, cean water -- the basc essentas.
About haf a mon Iraq chdren have ded as a resut of the
sanctons. Of them, Madeene Abrght, then US Ambassador to
the Unted Natons, famousy sad: 'It's a very hard choce, but we
thnk the prce s worth t.' 'Mora equvaence' was the term that
was used to denounce those who crtcsed the war on
Afghanstan. Madeene Abrght cannot be accused of mora
equvaence. What she sad was |ust straghtforward agebra.
A decade of bombng has not managed to dsodge Saddam
Hussen, the 'Beast of Baghdad'. Now, amost 12 years on,
Presdent George Bush |r has ratcheted up the rhetorc once
agan. He's proposng an a-out war whose goa s nothng short
of a regme change. The New York Tmes says that the Bush
admnstraton s 'foowng a metcuousy panned strategy to
persuade the pubc, the Congress and the aes of the need to
confront the threat of Saddam Hussen'.
Weapons nspectors have confctng reports about the status of
Iraq's weapons of mass destructon, and many have sad ceary
that ts arsena has been dsmanted and that t does not have
the capacty to bud one. However, there s no confuson over
the extent and range of Amerca's arsena of nucear and
chemca weapons. Woud the US government wecome weapons
nspectors? Woud the UK? Or Israe?
What f Iraq does have a nucear weapon, does that |ustfy a pre-
emptve US strke? The US has the argest arsena of nucear
weapons n the word. It's the ony country n the word to have
actuay used them on cvan popuatons. If the US s |ustfed n
aunchng a pre-emptve attack on Iraq, why, then any nucear
power s |ustfed n carryng out a pre-emptve attack on any
other. Inda coud attack Pakstan, or the other way around. If
the US government deveops a dstaste for the Indan Prme
Mnster, can t |ust 'take hm out' wth a pre-emptve strke?
Recenty the US payed an mportant part n forcng Inda and
Pakstan back from the brnk of war. Is t so hard for t to take ts
own advce? Who s guty of feckess morazng? Of preachng
peace whe t wages war? The US, whch George Bush has caed
'the most peacefu naton on earth', has been at war wth one
country or another every year for the ast 50 years.
Wars are never fought for atrustc reasons. They're usuay
fought for hegemony, for busness. And then of course there's
the busness of war. Protectng ts contro of the word's o s
fundamenta to US foregn pocy. The US government's recent
mtary nterventons n the Bakans and Centra Asa have to do
wth o. Hamd Karza, the puppet presdent of Afghanstan
nstaed by the US, s sad to be a former empoyee of Unoca,
the Amercan-based o company. The US government's paranod
patrong of the Mdde East s because t has two-thrds of the
word's o reserves. O keeps Amerca's engnes purrng sweety.
O keeps the free market rong. Whoever contros the word's
o contros the word's market. And how do you contro the o?
Nobody puts t more eeganty than the New York Tmes
coumnst Thomas Fredman. In an artce caed 'Crazness Pays'
he says 'the US has to make t cear to Iraq and US aes
that...Amerca w use force wthout negotaton, hestaton or UN
approva'. Hs advce was we taken. In the wars aganst Iraq
and Afghanstan as we as n the amost day humaton the US
government heaps on the UN. In hs book on gobasaton, The
Lexus and the Olive Tree, Fredman says: 'The hdden hand of the
market w never work wthout a hdden fst. McDonad's cannot
foursh wthout McDonne Dougas.... And the hdden fst that
keeps the word safe for Scon Vaey's technooges to foursh s
caed the US Army, Ar Force, Navy, and Marne Corps'. Perhaps
ths was wrtten n a moment of vunerabty, but t's certany the
most succnct, accurate descrpton of the pro|ect of corporate
gobasaton that I have read.
After September 11, 2001 and the War Aganst Terror, the hdden
hand and fst have had ther cover bown, and we have a cear
vew now of Amerca's other weapon -- the free market -- bearng
down on the deveopng word, wth a cenched unsmng sme.
The task that never ends s Amerca's perfect war, the perfect
vehce for the endess expanson of Amercan mperasm. In
Urdu, the word for proft s fayda. A-qada means the word, the
word of God, the aw. So, n Inda some of us ca the War Aganst
Terror, A-qada vs A-fayda -- the word vs the proft (no pun
ntended).
For the moment t ooks as though A-fayda w carry the day.
But then you never know...
In the ast 10 years of unbrded corporate gobasaton, the
word's tota ncome has ncreased by an average of 2.5% a year.
And yet the numbers of the poor n the word has ncreased by
100 mon. Of the top hundred bggest economes, 51 are
corporatons, not countres. The top 1% of the word has the
same combned ncome as the bottom 57% and the dsparty s
growng. Now, under the spreadng canopy of the War Aganst
Terror, ths process s beng husted aong. The men n suts are
n an unseemy hurry. Whe bombs ran down on us, and cruse
msses skd across the skes, whe nucear weapons are
stockped to make the word a safer pace, contracts are beng
sgned, patents are beng regstered, o ppenes are beng ad,
natura resources are beng pundered, water s beng prvatsed
and democraces are beng undermned.
In a country ke Inda, the 'structura ad|ustment' end of the
corporate gobasaton pro|ect s rppng through peope's ves.
'Deveopment' pro|ects, massve prvatsaton, and abour
'reforms' are pushng peope off ther ands and out of ther |obs,
resutng n a knd of barbarc dspossesson that has few paraes
n hstory. Across the word as the 'free market' brazeny protects
Western markets and forces deveopng countres to ft ther
trade barrers, the poor are gettng poorer and the rch rcher.
Cv unrest has begun to erupt n the goba vage. In countres
ke Argentna, Braz, Mexco, Bova, Inda the resstance
movements aganst corporate gobasaton are growng.
To contan them, governments are tghtenng ther contro.
Protestors are beng abeed 'terrorsts' and then deat wth as
such. But cv unrest does not ony mean marches and
demonstratons and protests aganst gobasaton.
Unfortunatey, t aso means a desperate downward spra nto
crme and chaos and a knds of despar and dsusonment
whch, as we know from hstory (and from what we see
unspoong before our eyes), graduay becomes a ferte breedng
ground for terrbe thngs -- cutura natonasm, regous bgotry,
fascsm and of course, terrorsm.
A these march arm-n-arm wth corporate gobasaton.
There s a noton ganng credence that the free market breaks
down natona barrers, and that corporate gobasaton's
utmate destnaton s a hppe paradse where the heart s the
ony passport and we a ve together happy nsde a |ohn
Lennon song (Imagne there's no country...) Ths s a canard.
What the free market undermnes s not natona soveregnty, but
democracy. As the dsparty between the rch and poor grows,
the hdden fst has ts work cut out for t. Mutnatona
corporatons on the prow for 'sweetheart deas' that yed
enormous profts cannot push through those deas and
admnster those pro|ects n deveopng countres wthout the
actve connvance of state machnery -- the poce, the courts,
sometmes even the army. Today corporate gobasaton needs
an nternatona confederaton of oya, corrupt, preferaby
authortaran governments n poorer countres, to push through
unpopuar reforms and que the mutnes. It needs a press that
pretends to be free. It needs courts that pretend to dspense
|ustce. It needs nucear bombs, standng armes, sterner
mmgraton aws, and watchfu coasta patros to make sure that
t's ony money, goods, patents and servces that are gobased --
not the free movement of peope, not a respect for human rghts,
not nternatona treates on raca dscrmnaton or chemca and
nucear weapons, or greenhouse gas emssons, cmate change,
or God forbd, |ustce. It's as though even a gesture towards
nternatona accountabty woud wreck the whoe enterprse.
Cose to one year after the War Aganst Terror was offcay
fagged off n the runs of Afghanstan, n country after country
freedoms are beng curtaed n the name of protectng freedom,
cv bertes are beng suspended n the name of protectng
democracy. A knds of dssent s beng defned as 'terrorsm'.
A knds of aws are beng passed to dea wth t. Osama Bn
Laden seems to have vanshed nto thn ar. Muah Omar s sad
to have made hs escape on a motor-bke. The Taban may have
dsappeared but ther sprt, and ther system of summary |ustce
s surfacng n the unkeest of paces. In Inda, n Pakstan, n
Ngera, n Amerca, n a the Centra Asan repubcs run by a
manner of despots, and of course n Afghanstan under the US-
backed Northern Aance.
Meanwhe, down at the ma there's a md-season sae.
Everythng's dscounted -- oceans, rvers, o, gene poos, fg
wasps, fowers, chdhoods, aumnum factores, phone
companes, wsdom, wderness, cv rghts, ecosystems, ar -- a
4,600 mon years of evouton. It's packed, seaed, tagged,
vaued and avaabe off the rack. (No returns). As for |ustce --
I'm tod t's on offer too. You can get the best that money can
buy.
Donad Rumsfed sad that hs msson n the War aganst Terror
was to persuade the word that Amercans must be aowed to
contnue ther way of fe. When the maddened kng stamps hs
foot, saves trembe n ther quarters. So, standng here today,
t's hard for me to say ths, but the Amercan way of fe s smpy
not sustanabe. Because t doesn't acknowedge that there s a
word beyond Amerca.
Fortunatey power has a shef fe. When the tme comes, maybe
ths mghty empre w, ke others before t, overreach tsef and
mpode from wthn. It ooks as though structura cracks have
aready appeared. As the War Aganst Terror casts ts net wder
and wder, Amerca's corporate heart s hemorrhagng. For a the
endess empty chatter about democracy, today the word s run
by three of the most secretve nsttutons n the word: The
Internatona Monetary Fund, the Word Bank, and the Word
Trade Organsaton, a three of whch, n turn, are domnated by
the US. Ther decsons are made n secret. The peope who
head them are apponted behnd cosed doors. Nobody reay
knows anythng about them, ther potcs, ther beefs, ther
ntentons. Nobody eected them. Nobody sad they coud make
decsons on our behaf. A word run by a handfu of greedy
bankers and CEOs who nobody eected can't possby ast.
Sovet-stye communsm faed, not because t was ntrnscay
ev but because t was fawed. It aowed too few peope to usurp
too much power. Twenty-frst century market-captasm,
Amercan-stye, w fa for the same reasons. Both are edfces
constructed by human ntegence, undone by human nature.
The tme has come, the warus sad. Perhaps thngs w get
worse and then better. Perhaps there's a sma God up n heaven
readyng hersef for us. Another word s not ony possbe, she's
on her way. Maybe many of us won't be here to greet her, but on
a quet day, f I sten very carefuy, I can hear her breathng.
The Frontne
Feb. 05 - 08, 2000
ESSAY
THE COST OF LlVlNG
ARUNDHATl ROY
FAME s a funny thng. Apart from my frends and famy and of
course some od enemes (what's fe wthout a few od
enemes?), most peope who know of me now, know of me as the
author of that very successfu book - The God of Sma Thngs.
Success, of course, s a funny thng too.
Many are famar wth the pubc story that surrounds the
pubshng of The God of Sma Thngs. As stores go, t has a sort
of coyng, Reader's Dgest rng to t - an unknown wrter who
spent secret years wrtng her frst nove whch was subsequenty
pubshed n 40 anguages, sod severa mon copes and went
on to wn the Booker Prze.
The prvate story, however, s a ess happy one.
When The God of Sma Thngs was frst pubshed I truy en|oyed
accompanyng t on ts |ourney nto the word. I had a hgh od
tme. I spent a year traveng to paces I never dreamed I'd vst. I
was exharated by the dea that a story wrtten by an unknown
person coud make ts way across cutures and anguages and
contnents nto so many watng hearts.
At readngs, when peope asked me what t fet ke to be a wrter
who was pubshed and read n so many anguages, I'd say "The
opposte of what t must fee ke to be a nucear bomb. Lterature
hugs the word and the word hugs t back."
After a year of traveng, I decded I wanted to go back to my od
fe n what was now the New Nucear Inda. But that proved
mpossbe. My od fe had packed ts bags and eft whe I was
away. As the Indan Government gears up to spend mons on
nucear weapons, the and t seeks to protect mouders. Rvers
de, forests dsappear and the ar s gettng mpossbe to breathe.
Deh, the cty I ve n, changes before my eyes. Cars are seeker,
gates are hgher, od, tubercuar watchmen have made way for
young, armed guards. But n the crevces of the cty, n ts fods
and wrnkes, under fyovers, aong sewers and raway tr acks, n
vacant ots, n a the dank, dark paces, the poor are crammed n
ke ce. Ther chdren stak the streets wth wd hearts. The
prveged wear ther sungasses and ook away as they gde
past. Ther prveged chdren don't need sungasses. They don't
need to ook away. They've earned to stop seeng.
A wrter's curse s that he or she cannot easy do that. If you're a
wrter, you tend to keep those achng eyes open. Every day your
face s sammed up aganst the wndowpane. Every day you bear
wtness to the obscenty. Every day you are remnded that there
s no such thng as nnocence. And every day you have to thnk of
new ways of sayng od and obvous thngs. Thngs about ove and
greed. About potcs and governance. About power and
poweressness. About war and peace. About death and beauty.
Th ngs that must be sad over and over agan.
Whe I watch from my wndow, the memory of the years of
peasure I had wrtng The God of Sma Thngs has begun to fade.
The commerca profts from book saes ro n. My bank account
burgeons. I rease that I have accdentay ruptured a hdd en,
mercante ven n the word, or perforated the huge ppene that
crcuates the word's weath amongst the aready weathy, and t
s spewng money at me, brusng me wth ts speed and strength.
I began to fee as though every emoton, every tt e strand of
feeng n The God of Sma Thngs, had been traded n for a sver
con. As though one day, f I wasn't very carefu, I woud turn nto
a tte sver fgurne wth a geamng, sver heart. The debrs
around me woud serve ony to s et off my shnng. These were
my thoughts, ths my frame of mnd when, n February (1999)
there was a rppe of news n the papers announcng that the
Supreme Court of Inda had vacated a four-year-ong ega stay
on the constructon of the controversa , haf-competed, Sardar
Sarovar Dam on the Narmada rver n centra Inda. The court
order came as a body bow to one of the most spectacuar, non-
voent resstance movements snce the freedom strugge. A
movement whch, those of us watchng from a ds tance thought,
had more or ess aready acheved what t set out to.
Internatona attenton had been focussed on the pro|ect. The
Word Bank had been forced to wthdraw from t. It seemed
unkey that the Government woud be abe to cobbe together
the funds to compete the pro|ect. Then suddeny, wth the ftng
of the stay, the scenaro changed. There was goom n the
Narmada Vaey and dancng on the streeets of Gu|arat.
I grew nterested n what was happenng n the Narmada Vaey
because amost everyone I spoke to had a passonate opnon
based on what seemed to me to be very tte nformaton. That
nterested me too, so much passon n the absence of
nformaton.
I substtuted the fcton I ntended to read n the comng months
wth |ournas and books and documentary fms about dams and
why they're but and what they do. I deveoped an nordnate,
unnatura nterest n dranage and rrrgaton. I met some of th e
actvsts who had been workng n the vaey for years wth the
NBA - the extraordnary Narmada Bachao Andoan. What I
earned changed me, fascnated me. It reveaed, n reentess
deta, a Government's hghy evoved, ntrcate way of
puversng a p eope behnd the gena mask of democracy. I
have angered peope n Inda greaty by sayng ths. Compared to
what goes on n other deveopng countres, Inda s paradse, I've
been tod. It's true, Inda s not Tbet, or Afghanstan, or
Indonesa. It's true that the dea of the Indan Army stagng a
mtary coup s amost unmagnabe. Nevertheess, what goes on
n the name of 'natona nterest' s monstrous.
Though there has been a far amount of wrtng on the Narmada
Vaey Deveopment Pro|ect, most of t has been for a 'speca
nterest' readershp. Government documents are cassfed as
secret. Experts and consutants have h|acked varous aspects of
the ssue - dspacement, rehabtaton, hydroogy, dranage,
water-oggng, catchment area treatment, passon, potcs - and
carred them off to ther ars where they guard them fercey
aganst the unauthorsed curosty of nterested aypersons. Soca
anthropoogsts have acrmonous debates wth economsts
about whose |ursdcton R&R fas n. Engneers refuse to dscuss
potcs when they present ther proposas. Dsconnectng the
potcs from the economcs from the emoton and human tragedy
of uprootment s ke breakng up a band. The ndvdua
muscans don't rock n qute the same way. You keep the nose
but ose the musc.
In March I traveed to the Narmada Vaey. I returned ashamed of
how tte I knew about a strugge that had been gong on for so
many years. I returned convnced that the vaey needed a wrter.
Not |ust a wrter, a fcton wrter. A fcton wrter who recognsed
that what was happenng n the vaey was perhaps too vugar for
fcton, but who coud use the craft and rgour of wrtng fcton to
make the separate parts cohere, to te the story n the way t
deserves to be tod. I beeve that the sto ry of the Narmada
Vaey s nothng ess than the story of Modern Inda.
The Narmada Vaey Deveopment Pro|ect s supposed to be the
most ambtous rver vaey deveopment pro|ect n the word.
It envsages budng 3,200 dams that w reconsttute the
Narmada and her 419 trbutares nto a seres of step-reservors -
an mmense starcase of amenabe water. Of these, 30 w be
ma|or dams, 135 medum and the rest sma. Two of the ma|or
dams w be mut-purpose mega dams. The Sardar Sarovar n
Gu|arat and the Narmada Sagar n Madhya Pradesh, w, between
them, hod more water than any other reservor n the Indan
subcontnent.
For better or for worse, the Narmada Vaey Deveopment Pro|ect
w affect the ves of 25 mon peope who ve n the vaey and
w ater the ecoogy of an entre rver basn. It w submerge
sacred groves and tempes and ancent pgrmage routes and
archaeoogca stes that schoars say contan an unnterrupted
record of human occupaton from the Od Stone Age.
The Sardar Sarovar pro|ect beongs frmy n the era of the great
Nehruvan dream. But before I come specfcay to the story of
the Sardar Sarovar, I'd ke to say a tte about the ragng Bg
Dam debate.
For a whoe haf-century after Independence, Nehru's footsoders
sought to equate dam-budng wth Naton-budng. Not ony dd
they bud new dams and rrgaton schemes, they took contro of
sma, tradtona water harvestng systems that had been
managed for thousands of years and aowed them to atrophy. To
compensate the oss they but more and more dams. Today,
Inda s the word's thrd argest dam-buder. Accordng to the
Centra Water Commsson we have 3,600 dams that quafy as
bg dams , 3,300 of them but after Independence. A thousand
more are under constructon.
Nehru's famous statement about dams beng the Tempes of
Modern Inda has made ts way nto prmary schoo textbooks n
every Indan anguage. Bg dams have become an artce of fath
nextrcaby nked wth natonasm. To queston ther utty
amounts amost to sedton. Every schoo chd s taught that Bg
Dams w dever the peope of Inda from hunger and poverty.
But w they? Have they? Are they reay the key to Inda's food
securty?
Today Inda has more rrgated and than any other country n the
word. In the ast 50 years the area under rrgaton ncreased by
about 140 per cent. It's true that n 1947, when Coonasm
formay ended, Inda was food-defcent. In 1951 we produce d
51 mon tonnes of foodgrans. Today we produce cose to 200
mon tonnes. Certany, ths s a tremendous achevement.
(Even though there are worryng sgns that t may not be
sustanabe.) But surey nobody can cam that a the credt for
ncre ased food producton shoud go to Bg Dams. Most of t has
to do wth mechansed expotaton of groundwater, wth the use
of hgh-yedng hybrd seeds and chemca fertzers.
The extraordnary thng s that there are no offca fgures for
exacty what porton of the tota foodgran producton comes from
rrgaton from Bg Dams.
What s ths f not a state's unforgvabe dsregard for ts
sub|ects? Gven that the peope of the Narmada Vaey have been
fghtng for over ffteen years, surey the east the government
coud do s to actuay substantate ts case that Bg Dams are
Inda's ony opton to provde food for her growng popuaton.
The ony study I know of was presented to the Word Commsson
on Dams by Hmanshu Thakker. It estmates that Bg Dams
account for ony 12 per cent of Inda's tota foodgran producton!
12 per cent of the tota produce s 24 mon tonnes. In 1995 the
state granares were overfowng wth 30 mon tonnes of
foodgrans, whe at the same tme 350 mon peope ved beow
the poverty ne.
Accordng to the Mnstry of Food and Cv Suppes, 10 per cent
of Inda's tota foodgran producton, that s 20 mon tonnes, s
ost to rodents and nsects because of bad and nadequate
storage factes. We must be the ony country n the word that
buds dams, uproots communtes and submerges forests n
order to feed rats. Ceary we need better storerooms more
urgenty than we need dams.
Smary, n the case of eectrcty, panners faunt the fact that
Inda consumes 20 tmes more eectrcty today than t dd 50
years ago. And yet over 70 per cent of rura househods have no
access to eectrcty. In the poorest States - Bhar, Uttar Pradesh,
Orssa and Ra|asthan - over 80 per cent of Advas and Dat
househods have no eectrcty. Eectrcty produced n the name
of the poor consumed by the rch wth endess appettes.
Offca estmates say that 22 per cent of the power generated s
ost n transmsson and system neffcences. Exstng dams are
stng up at a speed whch haves and sometmes quarters ther
pro|ected fe-spans.
It seems obvous, surey, that before the government decdes to
bud another dam t ought to do everythng n ts power to
mantan and ncrease the effcency of the systems t aready has
n pace. What happens, n fact, s the reverse.
Dams are but, peope are uprooted, forests are submerged and
then the pro|ect s smpy abandoned. Canas are never
competed... the benefts never accrue (except to the potcans,
the bureaucrats and the contractors nvoved n the constructon).
Th e frst dam that was but on the Narmada s a case n pont -
the Barg Dam n Madhya Pradesh was competed n 1990. It cost
ten tmes more than was budgeted and submerged three tmes
more and than engneers sad t woud. To save the cost and
effort o f dong a survey, the government |ust fed the reservor
wthout warnng anybody. 70,000 peope from 101 vages were
supposed to be dspaced. Instead, 114,000 peope from 162
vages were dspaced. They were evcted from ther homes by
rsng wate rs, chased out ke rats, wth no pror notce. There
was no rehabtaton. Some got a meagre cash compensaton.
Most got nothng. Some ded of starvaton. Others moved to
sums n |abapur. And a for what? Today, ten years after t was
competed, the Barg Dam produces some eectrcty, but rrgates
ony as much and as t submerged. Ony 5 per cent of the and ts
panners camed t woud rrgate. The Government says t has no
money to make the canas. Yet t has aready begun work
downstream, o n the mammoth Narmada Sagar Dam and the
Maheshwar Dam.
Why s ths happenng? How can t be happenng?
Because Bg Dams are monuments to corrupton. To nternatona
corrupton on an nconcevabe scae. Bankers, potcans,
bureaucrats, envronmenta consutants, ad agences - they're a
nvoved n the racket. The peope that they prey on are the poo
rest, most margnased sectons of the popuatons of the poorest
countres n the word. They don't count as peope. Therefore the
costs of Bg Dams don't count as costs. They're not even entered
n the books. What happens nstead s that nternatona
consutants on Resettement (goba experts on despar) are pad
huge saares to devse ever more senstve, ever more humane-
soundng, ever more exqustey wrtten, resettement poces
that are never mpemented. Lke the sayng goes - there's a o t
of money n poverty.
When I was wrtng "The Greater Common Good"* - my essay on
the Narmada Vaey pro|ect - wadng through the fusade of 'pro-
dam' and 'ant-dam' statstcs, what shocked me more than
anythng ese was not the statstcs that are avaabe bu t the
ones that aren't. To me, ths s the most unpardonabe thng of
a. It s unpardonabe on the part of the Indan state as we as on
the part of the nteectua communty.
The Government of Inda has detaed fgures for how many
mon tonnes of foodgrans or edbe os the country produces
and how much more we produce now than we dd n 1947. It can
te you what the tota surface area of the Natona Hghways
adds up to, how many graduates Inda produces every year, how
many men had vasectomes, how many crcket matches we've
ost on a Frday n Shar|ah.
But the Government of Inda does not have a record of the
number of peope that have been dspaced by dams or sacrfced
n other ways at the atars of 'Natona Progress'. Isn't ths
astoundng? How can you measure Progress f you don't know
wha t t costs and who has pad for t? How can the 'market' put a
prce on thngs - food, cothes, eectrcty, runnng water - when t
doesn't take nto account the rea cost of producton?
Unoffca estmates of the number of dspaced peope have
swung from an unsubstantated 2 mon to an unsubstantated
50 mon, and everythng n between. There's penty of scope for
barganng.
When I wrote my Essay, I thought t necessary to try and put a
fgure on how many peope have actuay been dspaced by Bg
Dams. To do a back-of-the-enveope cacuaton. A sort of santy
check. The pont was to at east begn to brng some pers pectve
to the debate. As my startng premse, I used a study of 54 Large
Dams by the Indan Insttute of Pubc Admnstraton (IIPA) based
on fed data from the Centra Water Commsson. The reservors
of these 54 dams, between them, dspaced about 2 .4 mon
peope. The average number of peope dspaced by each dam
came to 44,000. Correctng for the fact that the dams the IIPA
chose to study may have been some of the arger of the Large
Dam pro|ects, I pared down the average number of dspaced p
eope to 10,000 peope per dam. Usng ths scaed-down average,
the tota number of peope dspaced by Large Dams n the ast
ffty years worked out to a scandaous 33 mon peope!
33 mon peope.
Recenty N.C. Saxena, Secretary to the Pannng Commsson,
sad he thought that the number was n the regon of 40 mon
peope.
About 60 per cent of those dspaced are ether Dat or Advas. If
you consder that Dats account for 15 per cent and Advass ony
8 per cent of Inda's popuaton, t opens up a whoe other
dmenson to the story. The ethnc 'otherness' of the vct ms
takes some of the stran off the Naton buders.
What has happened to these mons of peope? Where are they
now? How do they earn a vng? Nobody reay knows. When
hstory s wrtten, they won't be n t, not even as statstcs. When
t comes to resettement, the government's prortes are cear.
Inda does not have a Natona Resettement Pocy. Dspaced
peope are ony entted to a meagre cash compensaton. The
poorest of them, Dats and Advass, who are ether andess or
have no forma tte to ther ands, but whose vehoods depend
entrey on the rver - get nothng. Some of the dspaced have
been subsequenty dspaced three and four tmes - a dam, an
artery proof range, another dam, a uranum mne. Once they
start rong there's no restng pace. The great ma|orty s
eventuay absorbed nto sums on the perphery of our great
ctes, where t coaesces nto an mmense poo of cheap abour
(that buds more pro|ects that dspaces more peope)... and st
the nghtmare doesn't end. They contnue to be uprooted eve n
from ther hesh hoves whenever eectons are comfortngy far
away and the urban rch get twtchy about hygene. In ctes ke
Deh they get shot for shttng n pubc paces, ke three sum
dweers were, not more than two years ago.
On the whoe there's a deafenng sence on the potcs of forced,
nvountary dspacement. It's accepted as a sort of unavodabe
bp n our democratc system. In Karg, whe the Indan Army
fought to regan every nch of terrtory captured by Pak stan
nftrators, hundreds of peope n the Narmada Vaey were beng
forcby fooded out of ther homes by the rsng waters of the
Sardar Sarovar Reservor. The naton rose as one to support the
soders on the front. Mdde-cass housewves hed co okng
festvas to rase money, peope queued up to donate bood, they
coected food, cothng, frst ad. Actors, sportsmen and
ceebrtes swarmed to the border to boster the morae of the
fghtng forces.
There were no such offers of hep for the peope n the Narmada
Vaey.
Some of them had stood n ther homes n chest-deep water for
days on end, protestng the Supreme Court's decson to rase the
heght of the Sardar Sarovar Dam. They were seen as peope who
were unwng to pay the prce for Natona progress. They wer e
abeed ant-natona and ant-deveopment and carted off to |a.
The genera consensus seems to be "Yes t's sad, but hard
decsons have to be made. Someone has to pay the prce for
deveopment."
I often wonder what woud happen f the Government was to
decare that n order to rase funds to compete these mammoth
pro|ects, t was gong to commandeer the assets and bank
accounts of a hundred thousand of ts rchest ctzens. I have no
doubt that t woud become an nternatona scanda. Banner
headnes woud appear n newspapers announcng the death of
democracy. Suddeny the ecoogca and human costs of Bg
Dams woud be Page One news.
In a fash there woud be phenomena, magnatve soutons for
rrgaton and power generaton. Cheaper, qucker, more effcent.
Nucear hawks woud suddeny rease they coud drastcay scae
down the number of bombs they need for a mnmum credbe
deterrent.
So far I have ony dscussed the human and soca costs of Bg
Dams. What about the envronmenta costs? The submerged
forests, the ravaged ecosystems, the destroyed estuares, the
defunct, sted-up reservors, the endangered wdfe, the dsapp
earng bodversty, the mons of hectares of and that are ether
water-ogged or sat-affected. None of ths appears on the
baance sheet. There are no offca assessments of the
cumuatve mpact Bg Dams have had on the envronment.
What we do know s that a study of 300 pro|ects done by an
Expert Commttee on Rver Vaey Pro|ects reported that 270 of
them - that's 90 per cent of them - had voated the
envronmenta gudenes ad down by the Mnstry of
Envronment. The Mnstry has not taken acton or revoked the
sancton of a snge one of them.
The evdence aganst Bg Dams s mountng aarmngy - rrgaton
dsasters, dam-nduced foods, the fact that there are more
drought-prone and food-prone areas today than there were n
1947. The fact that not a snge rver n the pans has potabe wa
ter. The fact that 250 mon peope have no access to safe
drnkng water. And yet there has not been an offca audt, a
comprehensve, honest, thoughtfu, post-pro|ect evauaton of a
snge Bg Dam to see whether or not t has acheved what t s et
out to acheve. Whether or not the costs were |ustfed, or even
what the costs actuay were.
"Ths s exacty why the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ect s dfferent," ts
proponents boast. They ca t the 'most studed pro|ect' n the
word. (You' notce as we go aong, that the story of the
Narmada Vaey s fu of ths sort of superatve - the most
studed pro|ect, the most ambtous rver vaey pro|ect, the best
rehabtaton package... etc.) One of the reasons the Sardar
Sarovar s so 'studed' s because t's aso so controversa.
In 1985, when the Word Bank frst sanctoned a 450-mon-
doar oan to fund the pro|ect, no studes had been done, nobody
had any dea what the human cost or the ecoogca mpact of the
dam woud be. The pont of dong studes now can ony be to |us
tfy what has become a fat accomp. So costs are suppressed
and benefts exaggerated to farcca proportons.
The potcs of the Sardar Sarovar Dam are compcated because
the Narmada fows through three States - nnety per cent of t
through Madhya Pradesh, t then merey skrts the northern
border of Maharashtra and fnay fows through Gu|arat for about
180 kometres before t reaches the Araban Sea.
In order for the three States to arrve at a water-sharng formua,
n 1969 the Centra Government set up a body caed the
Narmada Water Dsputes Trbuna. It took ten years for t to
announce ts Award. Geographcay, the Sardar Sarovar Dam s
ocated n Gu|arat. Its reservor submerges 245 vages, of whch
ony 19 are n Gu|arat. A the rest are n Madhya Pradesh and
Maharashtra. What ths means s that the soca costs are borne
by Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, whe the benefts go to
Gu|arat . Ths s what has sharpened the controversy around t.
The cost-beneft anayss for the Pro|ect s approached n a
frendy, cheerfu way. Amost as though t's a famy board game.
Frst et's take a ook at the 'costs'.
In 1979, when the Narmada Water Dsputes Trbuna announced
ts award, the offca estmate for the number of fames that
woud be dspaced by the Sardar Sarovar Reservor was about
6,000. In 1987 the fgure grew to 12,000. In 1992 t surged to
27,000. Today t hovers between 40,000 and 42,000 fames.
That's about 200,000 peope. And that's |ust the offca estmate.
Accordng to the NBA, the actua number of affected fames s
about 85,000. Cose to haf a mon peope.
The huge dscrepancy between the Government's estmate and
the NBA's has to do wth the defnton of who quafes as 'Pro|ect
Affected'. Accordng to the Government, the ony peope who
quafy as Pro|ect Affected are those whose ands and homes are
su bmerged by the reservor. But when you tear up the fabrc of
an ancent, agraran communty, whch depends on ts ands and
rvers and forests for ts sustenance, the threads begn to unrave
n every drecton. There are severa categores of dspaceme nt
that the Government smpy refuses to acknowedge.
For exampe:
The Sardar Sarovar Pro|ect envsages bendng the ast 180 km of
the Narmada and dvertng t about 90 degrees north, nto a
75,000-sq-km network of canas that panners cam w rrgate a
command area of 1.8 mon hectares. The government has
acqured and for the cana network. 200,000 fames are drecty
affected. Of these 23,000 fames, et's say about 100,000
peope, are serousy affected.
They don't count as pro|ect affected. Not n the offca estmates.
In order to compensate for the submergence of 13,000 hectares
of prme forest, the Government proposes to expand the
Shoopaneshwar Wdfe Sanctuary near the dam ste. Ths woud
mean that about 40,000 Advas peope from about 101 forest
vages wth n the boundares of the park w be 'persuaded' to
eave. They don't count as pro|ect affected.
In addton to the sanctuary, the other mtgatng measure s the
extraordnary process known as Compensatory Afforestaton n
whch the government acqures and and pants three tmes as
much forest as has been submerged by the reservor.
The peope from whom ths and s acqured do not count as
pro|ect affected.
In ts pans for what t s gong to do wth ts share of the Narmada
water, the Gu|arat Government has aocated no water at a - 0
mon acre feet - for the stretch of rver downstream of the dam.
Ths means that n the non-monsoon months there w be no
water n the ast 180 km of the rver. The dam w radcay ater
the ecoogy of the estuary and affect the spawnng of the Hsa
and freshwater prawns. 40,000 fsherfok who ve downstream
depend on the rver for a vng.
They don't count as pro|ect affected.
In 1961, the Gu|arat Government acqured 1,600 acres of and
from 950 Advas fames for the nfrastructure t woud need for
startng work on the dam. Guest houses, offce bocks, housng
for engneers and ther staff, roads eadng to the dam ste an d
warehouses for constructon matera.
Overnght, the vagers became andess abourers. Ther houses
were dsmanted and moved to the perphery of the coony,
where they reman today, squatters on ther own and. Some of
them work as servants n the offcers' bungaows and waters n
the g uest house but on and where ther own houses once stood
Incredby, they do not quafy as pro|ect affected!
In ts pubcty drve, the other seght of hand by the proponents
of the Sardar Sarovar s to portray costs as benefts. For nstance,
there's the repeated asserton that Dspacement s actuay a
postve nterventon, a way of reevng acute deprv aton. That
the state s dong peope a favour by submergng ther ands and
homes, takng them away from ther forests and rver, drownng
ther sacred stes, destroyng ther communty nks and forcby
dspacng them aganst ther wshes. Anybody wh o argues
aganst ths s accused of beng an 'ecoromantc', of wantng to
deny poor and margnased peope the "fruts of modern
deveopment". Of gorfyng the noton of the Nobe Savage.
If the we-beng of Advas peope s what s uppermost n the
Panners' mnds, why s t that for ffty years there have been no
roads, no schoos, no cncs, no wes, no hosptas n the areas
they ve n? Why s t for a these years they ddn't take any
steps to equp the peope they care so deepy about, for the word
they were gong to be dumped n? Why s t that the frst sgn of
'deveopment' - a road - brought ony terror, poce, beatngs,
rape, murder? Why must the offer of Deveopment be condtona,
that s: You gve up your homes, your ands, your fed, your
anguage, your gods, and we' gve you 'deveopment'?
As part of 'the best rehabtaton package n the word', the
Gu|arat Government has offered to rehabtate a the offcay
'pro|ect affected', even those from Madhya Pradesh and
Maharashtra. The Madhya Pradesh Government has fed an
affdavt n c ourt decarng that t has no and to rehabtate
peope dspaced by the Sardar Sarovar Reservor. Ths means
that a the dspaced peope from Madhya Pradesh have no
choce but to move to Gu|arat - not a State known for ts
hosptaty towards 'outs ders'. It's ke dspacng peope n
Engand and forcng them to ve n France. Notwthstandng ts
fegned generosty, n pont of fact the Government of Gu|arat
hasn't even managed to rehabtate peope from the 19 Advas
vages n Gu|arat that a re beng submerged by the reservor, et
aone those from the rest of the 226 vages n the other two
States. The nhabtants of Gu|arat's 19 vages have been
scattered to 175 separate rehabtaton stes. Soca nks have
been smashed, communtes broken up. Not a snge vage has
been resetted, accordng to the drectves of the Trbuna.
Some fames have been gven and, others haven't. Some have
and that s stony and uncutvabe. Some have and that s
rredeemaby water-ogged or nfested wth perncous daab
grass. Some have been drven out by andowners that sod and
to t he Government but hadn't been pad yet.
Some who were resetted on the perpheres of other vages
have been robbed, beaten and chased away by ther host
vagers.
In severa resettement stes, peope have been dumped n rows
of corrugated tn sheds whch are furnaces n summer and
'frdges n wnter. Some of them are ocated n dry rver beds
whch, durng the monsoon, turn nto fast-fowng drfts. I've been
to some of these 'stes'. I've seen fm footage of others:
Shverng chdren, perched ke brds on the edges of charpoys,
whe swrng waters enter ther tn homes. Frghtened, fevered
eyes watch pots and pans carred through the doorway by the
current, foatng out nto the fooded feds, thn fathers swmmng
after them to retreve what they can.
When the waters recede, they eave run. Maara, darrhoea, sck
catte stranded n the sush.
Forty househods were moved from Manbe n Maharashtra to a
resettement ste n Gu|arat. In the frst year, thrty-eght chdren
ded.
In Apr 1999 the papers reported nne deaths from chronc
manutrton n a snge rehabtaton ste n Gu|arat. In the course
of a week. That's 1.2875 peope a day, f you're countng.
Many of those who have been resetted are peope who have
ved a ther ves deep n the forest wth vrtuay no contact
wth money and the modern word. Suddeny they fnd
themseves eft wth the opton of ether starvng to death or
wakng severa kometres to the nearest town, sttng n the
marketpace, (both men and women) offerng themseves as
wage abour, ke goods on sae.
Instead of a forest from whch they gathered everythng they
needed - food, fue, fodder, rope, gum, tobacco, tooth powder,
medcna herbs, housng matera - they earn between ten and
twenty rupees a day wth whch to feed and keep ther fames.
Inst ead of a rver, they have a hand pump. In ther od vages,
certany they were poor, extremey poor, but they were nsured
aganst absoute dsaster. If the rans faed, they had the forests
to turn to. The rver to fsh n. Ther vestock was ther fxed
depost. Wthout a ths, they're a heartbeat away from
desttuton.
For the peope who've been resetted, everythng has to be re-
earned. Every tte thng, every bg thng: from shttng and
pssng (where d'you do t when there's no |unge to hde you?) to
buyng a bus tcket, to earnng a new anguage, to understan
dng money. And worst of a, earnng to be suppcants. Learnng
to take orders. Learnng to have Masters. Learnng to answer ony
when they're addressed.
From beng sef-suffcent and free, to beng further mpovershed
and yoked to the whms of a word you know nothng, nothng
about - what d'you suppose t must fee ke?
In ffteen years, the government has not managed to resette
peope dspaced by haf a dam. What are they gong to do about
the remanng 3,199 dams? There's somethng wrong wth the
scae of the operatons here. Ths s Fascst Maths. It strang es
stores, budgeons deta and manages to bnd perfecty
reasonabe peope wth ts spurous, shnng vson.
So much for pro|ect costs. Now et's take a ook at the benefts.
The stated benefts.
The whoe purpose of the Sardar Sarovar, the Government of
Gu|arat says, s to take water to the drought-prone regons of
Kutch and Saurashtra whch e at the very end of the cana
network. The Sardar Sarovar Narmada Ngam pubcty campagn
s fu of pctures of parched earth and dyng catte. In the name
of Kutch and Saurashtra, t |ustfes usng about 80 per cent of
Gu|arat's rrgaton budget for the Sardar Sarovar. It says,
categorcay, that there s no aternatve to the Sardar Sarovar.
To understand what's reay gong on, the frst thng you must do
s to ook at a map of Gu|arat. Look for two other rvers - the Mah
and the Sabarmat. You' see that both are mes coser to Kutch
and Saurashtra than the Narmada s. Both have been dammed
and the water dverted to Ahmedabad, Mehsana and Kheda, the
Pate-rch, rrgaton rch, potcay powerfu areas of Centra
Gu|arat. The peope of Kutch and Saurashtra haven't seen a drop
of water from these rvers.
When the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ect was frst panned, there was no
menton of drnkng water for the vages n Kutch and
Saurashtra. It was supposed to be prmary an rrgaton pro|ect.
When the pro|ect ran nto potca troube, the Governement
dscov ered the emotve power of thrst. Drnkng water became
the rayng cry of the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ect. Offcay, the
number of peope whose thrst woud be saked fuctuated from
28 mon (1983) to 32.5 mon (1989) to 10 mon (1992) to 25
m on (1993).
The number of vages that woud get drnkng water vared from
zero n 1979 to 8,215 n 1991. When pressed, the Government
admtted that the fgures for 1991 ncuded 236 unnhabted
vages.
Nobody buds Bg Dams to take drnkng water to remote
vages. Of the one bon peope n the word who have no
access to safe drnkng water, 855 mon ve n rura areas. The
cost of nstang an energy-ntensve network of thousands of
kometres of ppenes, aqueducts, pumps and treatment pants
to provde drnkng water to scattered popuatons s prohbtve.
When the members of the Word Bank's Morse Commttee arrved
n Gu|arat to do the Independent Revew, they were mpressed by
the G u|arat Government's commtment to take drnkng water to
the State's remote regons. They asked to see the pans. There
weren't any. They asked f the costs had been worked out.
'A few thousand crores,' was the breezy answer. A bon doars,
s an expert's cacuated guess. But of course, that sn't a part of
the cost-beneft anayss (the beneft-beneft anayss, sha we
ca t?)
As for the rrgaton benefts, when the Government of Gu|arat
argued ts case before the Water Dsputes Trbuna t peaded for
more than ts proportonatey far share of water because t sad t
desperatey needed water to rrgate 11,00,000 hectares of and
n the ard regon of Kutch. The Trbuna accepted the argument
and aotted Gu|arat 9 MAF of water. It dd not specfy how that
water shoud be used. The Gu|arat Government then reduced the
11,00,000 hectares to ess than a tenth of that. To 100,000
hectares. That's 1.8 per cent of the cutvabe area n Kutch. And
that's on paper. On paper t rrgates ony 9 per cent of the
cutvabe and n Saurashtra. If you ask what they're gong to do
about the rest of the drought-prone regons, they tak of
'aternatves'. Water-shed management. Ranwater harvestng.
We-rechargng. The pont s that f there are aternatves whch
are good enough for 98.2 per cent of Kutch and 91 per cent of
Saurashtra, then why won't they work for the whoe 100 per
cent?
There are some other nterestng caveats whch make t unkey
that water from the Narmada w ever get to Kutch and
Saurashtra, stuated as they are at the ta end of the cana.
Frst, there's a ot ess water n the Narmada than the
government says there s.
Before the Trbuna announced ts water-sharng formua, t had
to assess how much water there actuay was n the rver. Snce
there was no actua fow data avaabe at the tme, t
extrapoated t from what was even at the tme thought to be
fauty ra nfa data.
They arrved at a fgure of 27.22 MAF.
In 1992, actua fow data ndcates that there s ony 22.69 MAF of
water n the rver - that's a whoe 18 per cent ess!
Second, the Sardar Sarovar Dam was panned n con|uncton wth
the Narmada Sagar Dam. In the absence of the Narmada Sagar,
on whch constructon has temporary been stopped, the
rrgaton benefts of the Sardar Sarovar drop drastcay.
Thrd, the rrgaton effcency of the cana has been arbtrary
fxed at 60 per cent when the hghest rrgaton effcency ever
acheved n Inda s 35 per cent.
Last, and perhaps most mportant of a, are the competng
cams beng made on the water. The Authortes of the Sardar
Sarovar Narmada Ngam decared that farmers woud not be
aowed to grow sugar-cane n the command area because sugar-
cane s a water -guzzng cash crop and woud use up the share of
water meant for those at the ta end of the cana. But the
Government of Gu|arat has aready gven cences to dozens of
arge sugar ms at the head of the cana. The chef promoter of
one of th em s Sanat Mehta, who was Charman of the Sardar
Sarovar Narmada Ngam - the Dam Authorty - for severa years.
The chef promoter of another was Chman Bha Pate, former
Chef Mnster of Gu|arat, probaby the most ardent promoter of
the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ect. When he ded, hs ashes were
scattered over the dam ste.
Other than the potcay powerfu sugar obby, to get to Kutch
and Saurashtra the cana has to negotate ts way past a seres of
gof-courses, uxury hotes and water parks whch, the
Government says, t has sanctoned n order to rase money to
comp ete the pro|ect!
Apart from a ths, and n compete contraventon of ts own
drectves, the government has aotted the cty of Baroda a
szeabe quantty of water. What Baroda gets, can Ahmedabad
bear to ose? The potca cout of powerfu urban centres w
make s ure they get ther share.
So the chances of the farmers of Kutch and Saurashtra beneftng
from the Narmada get remoter by the day.
Of ate, the peope of Kutch and Saurashtra, who have endured
water-shortages for years, have begun to recognse Government
propaganda for what t s. Cv unease s strrng as reasaton
dawns that the Sardar Sarovar s moppng up ther money but s
not gong to sove ther water probems. That the souton es not
wth the Government but wth themseves. The Gu|arat Land
Deveopment Corporaton estmates that there s at east 15 to 20
MAF of ranwater that can be harvested by oca watershed harv
estng schemes n Kutch and Saurashtra. (The Sardar Sarovar
promses, on paper, 3 MAF to these areas.) In severa vages,
entrey through peopes' ntatves, successfu water-harvestng
schemes are aready under way. Hundreds of thousands of wes
are beng recharged wth ranwater that was fowng away
unused. So much for the Government of Gu|arat's cams that
there are no aternatves to the Sardar Sarovar.
A peope's organsaton has fed a case aganst the Sardar
Sarovar Narmada Ngam, demandng an express cana to Kutch,
wth no desgner stops on the way.
Another huge cost that does not fgure n the beneft-beneft
anayss of the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ect s the cost of nstang
dranage n the command area to prevent water-oggng and
sansaton. The cost of nstang dranage s about fve tmes hg
her than the cost of nstang the rrgaton system. So,
tradtonay dranage costs are eft out n order to make pro|ects
n deveopng countres appear vabe. I'm tod ths s an od Word
Bank practce.
Over the ast fourteen years, the NBA has ponted to these facts
over and over agan, and asked for the pro|ect to be revewed.
After the Word Bank's Independent Revew was pubshed and
the Bank stepped back from the pro|ect, the Gu|arat Government
has systematcay bocked every attempt at a revew. It
prevented the Fve Member Group Commttee from enterng
Gu|arat. It refused permsson to the Word Commsson on Dams
to vst the dam ste. It prevented the Commssoner for
Schedued Castes and Sch edued Trbes from vstng the dam
ste. It prevented the Unon Wefare Mnstry from assessng the
Rehabtaton and Resettement stuaton. It stood by and
watched whe the NBA offce n Baroda was ransacked and ts
documents pubcy burnt.
In May 1994, the NBA fed a petton n the Supreme Court n
whch t sted a the ponts I've taked about, and asked for a
revew of the pro|ect. In eary 1995, on the grounds that the
Resettement of dspaced peope was not satsfactory, the court
ordered a hat to the constructon. Over the years the court has
managed to mt the whoe ssue to resettement. It has cast
tsef n the roe of a sort of Wefare Inspector of Resettement
Coones whose |ursdcton s more or ess restrcted to Gu |arat.
It oversees the resettement of ony those who offcay quafy as
'pro|ect affected'. Unfortunatey, even here t hasn't dstngushed
tsef.
In February 1999, despte the fact that nothng had changed
radcay n the resettement scenaro, despte the fact that
fames who were supposed to have been resetted had returned
n despar to ther orgna vages, the Supreme Court fted the f
our-year-ong stay and aowed constructon of the dam to
contnue.
The peope n the vaey responded by decarng that they woud
drown rather than move from ther homes. The NBA defed the
gag mposed on them by the court. In a statement to the press,
ts eader, Medha Patkar, announced that she woud drown
hersef n the rver f the court permtted any further constructon.
As a response to ths, the Gu|arat Government fed a petton
askng that the NBA be removed as pettoners for commttng
contempt of court and that crmna acton be taken aganst me
for wrtng "The Greater Common Good" whch, they camed,
undermn ed the dgnty of the court and attempted to nfuence
the course of |ustce.
In |uy and August, whe the waters rose n the Narmada, whe
vagers stood n ther homes for days together n chest-deep
water to protest the decson of the court, whe ther crops were
submerged, and whe the NBA ponted out (ctng specfc n
stances) that government offcas had commtted per|ury by
sgnng fase affdavts camng that resettement had been
carred out when t hadn't, the three-|udge bench n the Supreme
Court met over three sessons. The ony sub|ect they dscusse d
was whether or not the dgnty of the court had been
undermned. On the 15th of October, 1999 they ssued an
eaborate order. Here are some extracts.
... |udca process and nsttuton cannot be permtted to be
scandased or sub|ected to contumacous voaton n such a
batant manner n whch t has been done by her (me)... vcous
stutfcaton and vugar debunkng cannot be permtted to po
ute the stream of |ustce... we are unhappy at the way n whch
the eaders of NBA and Ms Arundhat Roy have attempted to
undermne the dgnty of the Court. We expected better
behavour from them... After gvng ths matter thoughtfu
consderaton and keepng n vew the mportance of the ssue of
Resettement and Rehabtaton... we are not ncned to ntate
contempt proceedngs aganst the pettoners, ts eaders or
Arundhat Roy... after the 22nd of |uy 1999... nothng has come
to our notce whch may show that Ms Arundhat Roy has
contnued wth the ob|ectonabe wrtngs nsofar as the |udcary
s concerned. She may have by now reased her mstake.
So. Sha I heed the warnng or persevere wth the contumey?
To heed the warnng mght be prudent, but n my opnon t woud
undermne the dgnty of Art. And, as we a know, there's no
excuse for bad art. |ust as much as the vaey needs a wrter, I
beeve that wrters need the vaey. Not |ust wrters - poets ,
panters, dancers, actors, fm-makers - every knd of artst. If we
are to reman ave, f we are to contnue to work, we need to
recam the potca arena whch we seem to have so wngy
abdcated. If we choose to ook away now, at ths pont -
somehow t doesn't say very much about our art. I'm not
suggestng that everybody must turn out a hectorng, potca
manfesto. I'm a for Matsse and godfsh on a wndow s. A I
mean s that from tme to tme we coud ft our eyes from the
pag e and acknowedge the condton of the word around us.
Acknowedge the prce that someone, somewhere far away s
payng, n order for us to swtch our ghts on, coo our rooms and
run our baths.
Today the Sardar Sarovar Dam s 88 metres hgh. It has
submerged ony a fourth of the area that t w when (f) the dam
reaches ts fu heght of 138 metres. It's true that the
Government has aready spent a ot of money on the pro|ect. But
contnung wth t woud mean spendng about sx tmes that
amount - throwng good money after bad. There s a detaed
engneerng proposa n pace for how the dam can be used at the
current heght n order to take water straght to Kutch and
Saurashtra, f that s ndeed what the Government wants to do.
Restructurng the pro|ect wth ths ower dam heght woud mean
savng hundreds of thousands of peope from certan desttuton.
It woud mean savng thousands of hectares of forest. It woud
mean savng some o f the most ferte agrcutura and n Asa
from submergence. It woud mean havng enough money to fund
oca water-harvestng schemes n every vage n Gu|arat.
It woud mean a vctory for non-voence and the prncpes of
democracy. It woud mean that we st have hope.
Snce ths s the Nehru Memora Lecture, et me end wth a quote
from a speech he made n November 1958 at the Annua Meetng
of the Centra Board of Irrgaton and Power:
For some tme past, however, I have been begnnng to thnk that
we are sufferng from what we may ca the "dsease of
ggantsm". We want to show we can bud bg dams and do bg
thngs. Ths s a dangerous outook deveopng n Inda.... t s the
sma rrgaton pro|ects, the sma ndustres and the sma pants
for eectrc power whch w change the face of ths country far
more than haf a dozen bg pro|ects n haf a dozen paces...
Needess to say, ths speech never made t nto the schoo books.
I've made mysef very unpopuar n Inda by sayng the thngs I
say.
Fortunatey, I'm not standng for eectons. As I wrter, I woud
rather be oved by a rver vaey than by a naton-state.
Any day.
* Cover Story n Frontne, |une 4, 1999.
Copyrght @ Arundhat Roy
The Frontne
Oct. 09 - 22, 2004
COVER STORY
Public Power in the Age of Empire
ARUNDHATl ROY
Modern democracy s n a profound crss - potca space for
peope s reduced and natona governments are poweress
before the rush of corporate gobasaton. What are the avenues
and strateges of protest avaabe to peope who wsh to resst
ths process?
The text of "Pubc Power n the Age of Empre" s based on a
pubc address that Arundhat Roy devered to an overfow crowd
at the Amercan Socoogca Assocaton's 99th Annua Meetng n
San Francsco, Caforna, on August 16, 2004. The theme of the
conference was "Pubc Socooges." The tak qucky ared on C-
Span Book TV, Democracy Now! and Aternatve Rado, reachng
audences throughout North Amerca and beyond, and was
crcuated va e-ma around the word.
WHEN anguage has been butchered and bed of meanng, how
do we understand "pubc power"? When freedom means
occupaton, when democracy means neobera captasm, when
reform means represson, when words ke "empowerment" and
"peacekeepng" make your bood run cod - why, then, "pubc
power" coud mean whatever you want t to mean. A bceps
budng machne, or a Communty Power Shower. So, I' |ust
have to defne "pubc power" as I go aong, n my own sef-
servng sort of way.
In Inda, the word pubc s now a Hnd word. It means peope. In
Hnd, we have sarkar and pubc, the government and the
peope. Inherent n ths use s the underyng assumpton that the
government s qute separate from "the peope." Ths dstncton
has to do wth the fact that Inda's freedom strugge, though
magnfcent, was by no means revoutonary. The Indan ete
stepped easy and eeganty nto the shoes of the Brtsh
mperasts. A deepy mpovershed, essentay feuda socety
became a modern, ndependent naton state. Even today, ffty-
seven years on to the day, the truy vanqushed st ook upon
the government as ma-baap, the parent and provder. The
somewhat more radca, those who st have fre n ther bees,
see t as chor, the thef, the snatcher-away of a thngs.
Ether way, for most Indans, sarkar s very separate from pubc.
However, as you make your way up Inda's compex soca adder,
the dstncton between sarkar and pubc gets burred. The Indan
ete, ke the ete anywhere n the word, fnds t hard to
separate tsef from the state. It sees ke the state, thnks ke the
state, speaks ke the state.
In the Unted States, on the other hand, the burrng of the
dstncton between sarkar and pubc has penetrated far deeper
nto socety. Ths coud be a sgn of a robust democracy, but
unfortunatey, t's a tte more compcated and ess pretty than
that. Among other thngs, t has to do wth the eaborate web of
paranoa generated by the U.S. sarkar and spun out by the
corporate meda and Hoywood. Ordnary peope n the Unted
States have been manpuated nto magnng they are a peope
under sege whose soe refuge and protector s ther government.
If t sn't the Communsts, t's A Oaeda. If t sn't Cuba, t's
Ncaragua. As a resut, ths, the most powerfu naton n the word
- wth ts unmatchabe arsena of weapons, ts hstory of havng
waged and sponsored endess wars, and the ony naton n hstory
to have actuay used nucear bombs - s peoped by a terrfed
ctzenry, |umpng at shadows. A peope bonded to the state not
by soca servces, or pubc heath care, or empoyment
guarantees, but by fear.
Ths synthetcay manufactured fear s used to gan pubc
sancton for further acts of aggresson. And so t goes, budng
nto a spra of sef-fufng hystera, now formay cabrated by
the U.S. government's Amazng Techncoored Terror Aerts:
fuchsa, turquose, samon pnk.
To outsde observers, ths mergng of sarkar and pubc n the
Unted States sometmes makes t hard to separate the actons of
the government from the peope. It s ths confuson that fues
ant-Amercansm n the word. Ant-Amercansm s then sezed
upon and ampfed by the U.S. government and ts fathfu meda
outets. You know the routne: "Why do they hate us? They hate
our freedoms," et cetera. Ths enhances the sense of soaton
among peope n the Unted States and makes the embrace
between sarkar and pubc even more ntmate. Lke Red Rdng
Hood ookng for a cudde n the wof's bed.
Two thousand and one was not the frst year that the U.S.
government decared a "war on terrorsm." As Noam Chomsky
remnds us, the frst "war on terrorsm" was decared by Presdent
Ronad Reagan n the 1980s durng the U.S.-sponsored terrorst
wars across Centra Amerca, the Mdde East, and Afrca. The
Reagan admnstraton caed terrorsm a "pague spread by
depraved opponents of cvsaton tsef." In keepng wth ths
sentment, n 1987, the Unted Natons Genera Assemby
proposed a strongy worded condemnaton of terrorsm. One
hundred and ffty-three countres voted for t. Ony the Unted
States and Israe voted aganst t. They ob|ected to a passage
that referred to "the rght to sef-determnaton, freedom, and
ndependence... of peope forcby deprved of that rght...
partcuary peopes under coona and racst regmes and foregn
occupaton." Remember that n 1987, the Unted States was a
staunch ay of aparthed South Afrca. The Afrcan Natona
Congress and Neson Mandea were sted as "terrorsts." The
term "foregn occupaton" was taken to mean Israe's occupaton
of Paestne.
Over the ast few years, the "war on terrorsm" has mutated nto
the more generc "war on terror." Usng the threat of an externa
enemy to ray peope behnd you s a tred od horse that
potcans have rdden nto power for centures. But coud t be
that ordnary peope are fed up wth that poor od horse and are
ookng for somethng dfferent? There's an od Hnd fm song
that goes yeh pubc ha, yeh sab |aant ha (the pubc, she knows
t a). Woudn't t be ovey f the song were rght and the
potcans wrong?
Before Washngton's ega nvason of Iraq, a Gaup Internatona
po showed that n no European country was the support for a
unatera war hgher than 11 per cent. On February 15, 2003,
weeks before the nvason, more than 10 mon peope marched
aganst the war on dfferent contnents, ncudng North Amerca.
And yet the governments of many supposedy democratc
countres st went to war.
The queston s: s "democracy" st democratc? Are democratc
governments accountabe to the peope who eected them? And,
crtcay, s the pubc n democratc countres responsbe for the
actons of ts sarkar?
If you thnk about t, the ogc that underes the war on terrorsm
and the ogc that underes terrorsm are exacty the same. Both
make ordnary ctzens pay for the actons of ther government. A
Oaeda made the peope of the Unted States pay wth ther ves
for the actons of ther government n Paestne, Saud Araba,
Iraq, and Afghanstan. The U.S. government has made the peope
of Afghanstan pay n the thousands for the actons of the Taban
and the peope of Iraq pay n the hundreds of thousands for the
actons of Saddam Hussen.
The cruca dfference s that nobody reay eected A Oaeda, the
Taban, or Saddam Hussen. But the Presdent of the Unted
States was eected (we... n a manner of speakng). The Prme
Mnsters of Itay, Span, and the Unted Kngdom were eected.
Coud t then be argued that ctzens of these countres are more
responsbe for the actons of ther government than Iraqs were
for the actons of Saddam Hussen or Afghans for the Taban?
Whose God decdes whch s a "|ust war" and whch sn't? George
Bush senor once sad: "I w never apoogse for the Unted
States. I don't care what the facts are." When the Presdent of the
most powerfu country n the word doesn't need to care what the
facts are, then we can at east be sure we have entered the Age
of Empre.
Fngerprntng a vstor at Los Angees Internatona Arport,
September 30. "Ordnary peope n the Unted States have been
manpuated nto magnng they are a peope under sege whose
soe refuge and protector s ther government."
So what does pubc power mean n the Age of Empre? Does t
mean anythng at a? Does t actuay exst?
In these aegedy democratc tmes, conventona potca
thought hods that pubc power s exercsed through the baot.
Scores of countres n the word w go to the pos ths year. Most
(not a) of them w get the governments they vote for. But w
they get the governments they want?
In Inda ths year, we voted the Hndu natonasts out of offce.
But even as we ceebrated, we knew that on nucear bombs,
neoberasm, prvatsaton, censorshp, bg dams - on every
ma|or ssue other than overt Hndu natonasm - the Congress
and the B|P have no ma|or deoogca dfferences. We know that
t s the ffty-year egacy of the Congress party that prepared the
ground cuturay and potcay for the Far Rght. It was aso the
Congress party that frst opened Inda's markets to corporate
gobasaton. It passed egsaton that encouraged the
prvatsaton of water and power, the dsmantng of the pubc
sector, and the denatonasaton of pubc companes. It enforced
cutbacks n government spendng on educaton and heath, and
weakened abour aws that protected workers' rghts. The B|P
took ths process forward wth ptess abandon.
In ts eecton campagn, the Congress party ndcated that t was
prepared to rethnk some of ts earer economc poces. Mons
of Inda's poorest peope came out n strength to vote n the
eectons. The spectace of the great Indan democracy was
teecast ve - the poor farmers, the od and nfrm, the veed
women wth ther beautfu sver |eweery, makng quant
|ourneys to eecton booths on eephants and cames and buock
carts. Contrary to the predctons of a Inda's experts and
posters, the Congress won more votes than any other party.
Inda's Communst partes won the argest share of the vote n
ther hstory. Inda's poor had ceary voted aganst
neoberasm's economc "reforms" and growng fascsm. As soon
as the votes were counted, the corporate meda dspatched them
ke bady pad extras on a fm set. Teevson channes featured
spt screens. Haf the screen showed the chaos outsde the home
of Sona Gandh, the eader of the Congress party, as the coaton
government was cobbed together. The other haf showed
frenzed stockbrokers outsde the Bombay Stock Exchange,
panckng at the thought that the Congress party mght actuay
honour ts promses and mpement ts eectora mandate. We
saw the Sensex stock ndex move up and down and sdeways.
The meda, whose own pubcy sted stocks were pummetng,
reported the stock market crash as though Pakstan had aunched
ICBMs on New Deh.
Even before the new government was formay sworn n, senor
Congress potcans made pubc statements reassurng nvestors
and the meda that prvatsaton of pubc uttes woud contnue.
Meanwhe the B|P, now n Opposton, has cyncay, and
comcay, begun to oppose foregn drect nvestment and the
further openng of Indan markets.
Ths s the spurous, evovng daectc of eectora democracy.
As for the Indan poor, once they've provded the votes, they are
expected to bugger off home. Pocy w be decded despte
them.
AND what of the U.S. eectons? Do U.S. voters have a rea
choce?
It's true that f |ohn Kerry becomes Presdent, some of the o
tycoons and Chrstan fundamentasts n the Whte House w
change. Few w be sorry to see the backs of Dck Cheney or
Donad Rumsfed or |ohn Ashcroft or an end to ther batant
thuggery. But the rea concern s that n the new admnstraton
ther poces w contnue. That we w have Bushsm wthout
Bush. Those postons of rea power - the bankers, the CEOs - are
not vunerabe to the vote (and n any case, they fund both
sdes).
Unfortunatey, the U.S. eectons have deterorated nto a sort of
personaty contest, a squabbe over who woud do a better |ob of
overseeng Empre. |ohn Kerry beeves n the dea of Empre as
ferventy as George Bush does. The U.S. potca system has
been carefuy crafted to ensure that no one who questons the
natura goodness of the mtary-ndustra-corporate structure w
be aowed through the portas of power.
Gven ths, t's no surprse that n ths eecton you have two Yae
Unversty graduates, both members of Sku and Bones, the
same secret socety, both monares, both payng at soder-
soder, both takng up war, and argung amost chdshy about
who w ead the war on terror more effectvey.
Lke Presdent B Cnton before hm, Kerry w contnue the
expanson of U.S. economc and mtary penetraton nto the
word. He says he woud have voted to authorse Bush to go to
war n Iraq even f he had known that Iraq had no weapons of
mass destructon. He promses to commt more troops to Iraq. He
sad recenty that he supports Bush's poces toward Israe and
Are Sharon "competey." He says he' retan 98 per cent of
Bush's tax cuts.
So, underneath the shr exchange of nsuts, there s amost
absoute consensus. It ooks as though even f peope n the
Unted States vote for Kerry, they' st get Bush. Presdent |ohn
Kerbush or Presdent George Berry. It's not a rea choce. It's an
apparent choce. Lke choosng a brand of detergent. Whether
you buy Ivory Snow or Tde, they're both owned by Proctor &
Gambe.
Ths doesn't mean that one takes a poston that s wthout
nuance, that the Congress and the B|P, New Labour and the
Tores, the Democrats and Repubcans are the same. Of course,
they're not. Nether are Tde and Ivory Snow. Tde has oxy-
boostng and Ivory Snow s a gente ceanser.
In Inda, there s a dfference between an overty fascst party
(the B|P) and a party that syy pts one communty aganst
another (Congress), and sows the seeds of communasm that are
then so aby harvested by the B|P. There are dfferences n the
I.Os and eves of ruthessness between ths year's U.S.
presdenta canddates. The ant-war movement n the Unted
States has done a phenomena |ob of exposng the es and
venaty that ed to the nvason of Iraq, despte the propaganda
and ntmdaton t faced. Ths was a servce not |ust to peope
here, but to the whoe word.
But why s t that the Democrats do not even have to pretend to
be aganst the nvason and occupaton of Iraq? If the ant-war
movement openy campagns for Kerry, the rest of the word w
thnk that t approves of hs poces of "senstve" mperasm. Is
U.S. mperasm preferabe f t s supported by the Unted
Natons and European countres? Is t preferabe f the U.N. asks
Indan and Pakstan soders to do the kng and dyng n Iraq
nstead of U.S. soders? Is the ony change that Iraqs can hope
for that French, German, and Russan companes w share n the
spos of the occupaton of ther country?
Is ths actuay better or worse for those of us who ve n sub|ect
natons? Is t better for the word to have a smarter emperor n
power or a stupder one? Is that our ony choce?
I'm sorry, I know that these are uncomfortabe, even bruta
questons, but they must be asked. The fact s that eectora
democracy has become a process of cynca manpuaton. It
offers us a very reduced potca space today. To beeve that ths
space consttutes rea choce woud be nave.
The crss n modern democracy s a profound one. Free eectons,
a free press, and an ndependent |udcary mean tte when the
free market has reduced them to commodtes avaabe on sae
to the hghest bdder.
On the goba stage, beyond the |ursdcton of soveregn
governments, nternatona nstruments of trade and fnance
oversee a compex web of mutatera aws and agreements that
have entrenched a system of appropraton that puts coonasm
to shame. Ths system aows the unrestrcted entry and ext of
massve amounts of specuatve capta - hot money - nto and
out of Thrd Word countres, whch then effectvey dctates ther
economc pocy. Usng the threat of capta fght as a ever,
nternatona capta nsnuates tsef deeper and deeper nto
these economes. Gant transnatona corporatons are takng
contro of ther essenta nfrastructure and natura resources,
ther mneras, ther water, ther eectrcty. The Word Trade
Organsaton, the Word Bank, the Internatona Monetary Fund,
and other fnanca nsttutons ke the Asan Deveopment Bank,
vrtuay wrte economc pocy and paramentary egsaton.
Wth a deady combnaton of arrogance and ruthessness, they
take ther sedgehammers to frage, nterdependent, hstorcay
compex socetes, and devastate them.
A ths goes under the futterng banner of "reform."
As a consequence of ths reform, n Afrca, Asa, and Latn
Amerca, thousands of sma enterprses and ndustres have
cosed down, mons of workers and farmers have ost ther |obs
and and. Anyone who crtcses ths process s mocked for beng
"ant-reform," ant-progress, ant-deveopment. Somehow a
Luddte.
The Spectator newspaper n London assures us that "|w|e ve n
the happest, heathest and most peacefu era n human hstory."
Bons wonder: who's "we"? Where does he ve? What's hs
Chrstan name?
Once the economes of Thrd Word countres are controed by
the free market, they are enmeshed n an eaborate, carefuy
cabrated system of economc nequaty. For exampe, Western
countres that together spend more than a bon doars a day on
subsdes to farmers demand that poor countres wthdraw a
agrcutura subsdes, ncudng subsdsed eectrcty. Then they
food the markets of poor countres wth ther subsdsed
agrcutura goods and other products wth whch oca producers
cannot possby compete.
Countres that have been pundered by coonsng regmes are
steeped n debt to these same powers, and have to repay them
at the rate of about $382 bon a year. Ergo, the rch get rcher
and the poor get poorer - not accdentay, but by desgn. By
ntenton.
To put a vugar pont on a of ths - the truth s gettng more
vugar by the mnute - the combned weath of the word's
bonares n 2004 (587 "ndvduas and famy unts"), accordng
to Forbes magazne, s $1.9 tron. Ths s more than the gross
domestc product of the word's 135 poorest countres combned.
The good news s that there are 111 more bonares ths year
than there were n 2003. Isn't that fun?
The thng to understand s that modern democracy s safey
premsed on an amost regous acceptance of the naton state.
But corporate gobasaton s not. Lqud capta s not. So, even
though capta needs the coercve powers of the naton state to
put down revots n the servants' quarters, ths set-up ensures
that no ndvdua naton can oppose corporate gobasaton on
ts own.
Tme and agan we have seen the heroes of our tmes, gants n
opposton, suddeny dmnshed. Presdent Lua of Braz was the
hero of the Word Soca Forum n |anuary 2002. Now he's busy
mpementng IMF gudenes, reducng penson benefts and
purgng radcas from the Workers' Party. Lua has a worthy
predecessor n the former Presdent of South Afrca, Neson
Mandea, who nsttuted a massve programme of prvatsaton
and structura ad|ustment that has eft thousands of peope
homeess, |obess, and wthout water and eectrcty. When Harry
Oppenhemer ded n August 2000, Mandea caed hm "one of
the great South Afrcans of our tme." Oppenhemer was the head
of Ango-Amercan, one of South Afrca's argest mnng
companes, whch made ts money expotng cheap back abour
made avaabe by the repressve aparthed regme.
Why does ths happen? It s nether true nor usefu to dsmss
Mandea or Lua as weak or treacherous peope. It's mportant to
understand the nature of the beast they were up aganst. The
moment they crossed the foor from the opposton nto
government they became hostage to a spectrum of threats -
most maevoent among them the threat of capta fght, whch
can destroy any government overnght. To magne that a
eader's persona charsma and hstory of strugge w dent the
corporate carte s to have no understandng of how captasm
works, or for that matter, how power works.
Radca change cannot and w not be negotated by
governments; t can ony be enforced by peope. By the pubc. A
pubc who can nk hands across natona borders.
So when we speak of pubc power n the Age of Empre, I hope
t's not presumptuous to assume that the ony thng that s worth
dscussng serousy s the power of a dssentng pubc. A pubc
that dsagrees wth the very concept of Empre. A pubc that has
set tsef aganst ncumbent power - nternatona, natona,
regona, or provnca governments and nsttutons that support
and servce Empre.
Of course those of us who ve n Empre's sub|ect natons are
aware that n the great ctes of Europe and the Unted States,
where a few years ago these thngs woud ony have been
whspered, there s now open tak about the benefts of
mperasm and the need for a strong empre to poce an unruy
word. It wasn't ong ago that coonasm aso sanctfed tsef as
a "cvsng msson". So we can't gve these pundts hgh marks
for orgnaty.
We are aware that New Imperasm s beng marketed as a
"esser ev" n a ess-than-perfect word. Occasonay some of us
are nvted to "debate" the merts of mperasm on "neutra"
patforms provded by the corporate meda. It's ke debatng
savery. It sn't a sub|ect that deserves the dgnty of a debate.
What are the avenues of protest avaabe to peope who wsh to
resst Empre? By resst I don't mean ony to express dssent, but
to effectvey force change.
Empre has a range of cang cards. It uses dfferent weapons to
break open dfferent markets. There sn't a country on God's
earth that s not caught n the cross hars of the U.S. cruse
msse and the IMF checkbook. Argentna s the mode f you
want to be the poster boy of neobera captasm, Iraq f you're
the back sheep.
For poor peope n many countres, Empre does not aways
appear n the form of cruse msses and tanks, as t has n Iraq or
Afghanstan or Vetnam. It appears n ther ves n very oca
avatars - osng ther |obs, beng sent unpayabe eectrcty bs,
havng ther water suppy cut, beng evcted from ther homes
and uprooted from ther and. A ths overseen by the repressve
machnery of the state, the poce, the army, the |udcary. It s a
process of reentess mpovershment wth whch the poor are
hstorcay famar. What Empre does s to further entrench and
exacerbate aready exstng nequates.
Even unt qute recenty, t was sometmes dffcut for peope to
see themseves as vctms of Empre. But now oca strugges
have begun to see ther roe wth ncreasng carty. However
grand t mght sound, the fact s, they are confrontng Empre n
ther own, very dfferent ways. Dfferenty n Iraq, n South Afrca,
n Inda, n Argentna, and dfferenty, for that matter, on the
streets of Europe and the Unted States.
Mass resstance movements, ndvdua actvsts, |ournasts,
artsts, and fmmakers have come together to strp Empre of ts
sheen. They have connected the dots, turned cash-fow charts
and boardroom speeches nto rea stores about rea peope and
rea despar. They have shown how the neobera pro|ect has
cost peope ther homes, ther and, ther |obs, ther berty, ther
dgnty. They have made the ntangbe tangbe. The once
seemngy ncorporea enemy s now corporea.
Ths s a huge vctory. It was forged by the comng together of
dsparate potca groups, wth a varety of strateges. But they a
recognsed that the target of ther anger, ther actvsm, and ther
doggedness s the same. Ths was the begnnng of rea
gobasaton. The gobasaton of dssent.
Broady speakng, there are two knds of mass resstance
movements n Thrd Word countres today. The andess peope's
movement n Braz, the ant-dam movement n Inda, the
Zapatstas' n Mexco, the Ant-Prvatsaton Forum n South
Afrca, and hundreds of others, are fghtng ther own soveregn
governments, whch have become agents of the neobera
pro|ect. Most of these are radca strugges, fghtng to change
the structure and chosen mode of "deveopment" of ther own
socetes.
Then there are those fghtng forma and bruta neocoona
occupatons n contested terrtores whose boundares and faut
nes were often arbtrary drawn ast century by the mperast
powers. In Paestne, Tbet, Chechnya, Kashmr, and severa
States n Inda's northeastern provnces, peope are wagng
strugges for sef-determnaton.
Severa of these strugges mght have been radca, even
revoutonary when they began, but often the brutaty of the
represson they face pushes them nto conservatve, even
retrogressve spaces where they use the same voent strateges
and the same anguage of regous and cutura natonasm used
by the states they seek to repace.
Many of the foot soders n these strugges w fnd, ke those
who fought aparthed n South Afrca, that once they overcome
overt occupaton, they w be eft wth another batte on ther
hands - a batte aganst covert economc coonasm.
Meanwhe, the rft between rch and poor s beng drven deeper
and the batte to contro the word's resources ntensfes.
Economc coonasm through forma mtary aggresson s
stagng a comeback.
Iraq today s a tragc ustraton of ths process. An ega
nvason. A bruta occupaton n the name of beraton. The
rewrtng of aws that aow the shameess appropraton of the
country's weath and resources by corporatons aed to the
occupaton, and now the charade of a oca "Iraq government."
For these reasons, t s absurd to condemn the resstance to the
U.S. occupaton n Iraq as beng mastermnded by terrorsts or
nsurgents or supporters of Saddam Hussen. After a, f the
Unted States were nvaded and occuped, woud everybody who
fought to berate t be a terrorst or an nsurgent or a Bushte?
The Iraq resstance s fghtng on the frontnes of the batte
aganst Empre. And therefore that batte s our batte.
Lke most resstance movements, t combnes a motey range of
assorted factons. Former Baathsts, beras, Isamsts, fed up
coaboratonsts, communsts, etc. Of course, t s rdded wth
opportunsm, oca rvary, demagoguery, and crmnaty. But f
we are ony gong to support prstne movements, then no
resstance w be worthy of our purty.
A whoe ndustry of deveopment experts, academcs, and
consutants have but an ndustry on the back of goba soca
movements n whch they are not drect partcpants. Many of
these "experts," who earn ther vngs studyng the strugges of
the word's poor, are funded by groups ke the Ford Foundaton,
the Word Bank, and weathy unverstes such Harvard, Stanford,
and Corne. From a safe dstance, they offer us ther nsghtfu
crtques. But the same peope who te us that we can reform the
Word Bank from wthn, that we change the IMF by workng
nsde t, woud not themseves seek to reform a resstance
movement by workng wthn t.
Ths s not to say that we shoud never crtcse resstance
movements. Many of them suffer from a ack of democracy, from
the consaton of ther "eaders," a ack of transparency, a ack of
vson and drecton. But most of a they suffer from vfcaton,
represson, and ack of resources.
Before we prescrbe how a prstne Iraq resstance must conduct
a secuar, femnst, democratc, nonvoent batte, we shoud
shore up our end of the resstance by forcng the U.S.
government and ts aes to wthdraw from Iraq.
THE frst mtant confrontaton n the Unted States between the
goba |ustce movement and the neobera |unta took pace
famousy at the WTO conference n Seatte n December 1999. To
many mass movements n deveopng countres that had ong
been fghtng oney, soated battes, Seatte was the frst
deghtfu sgn that ther anger and ther vson of another knd of
word was shared by peope n the mperast countres.
In |anuary 2001, n Porto Aegre, Braz, 20,000 actvsts,
students, fmmakers - some of the best mnds n the word -
came together to share ther experences and exchange deas
about confrontng Empre. That was the brth of the now hstorc
Word Soca Forum. It was the frst forma comng together of an
exctng, anarchc, unndoctrnated, energetc, new knd of "pubc
power." The rayng cry of the WSF s "Another Word s Possbe."
The forum has become a patform where hundreds of
conversatons, debates, and semnars have heped to hone and
refne a vson of what knd of word t shoud be. By |anuary
2004, when the fourth WSF was hed n Mumba, Inda, t
attracted 200,000 deegates. I have never been part of a more
eectrfyng gatherng. It was a sgn of the soca forum's success
that the manstream meda n Inda gnored t competey. But
now the WSF s threatened by ts own success. The safe, open,
festve atmosphere of the forum has aowed potcans and non-
governmenta organsatons that are mbrcated n the potca
and economc systems that the forum opposes to partcpate and
make themseves heard.
Another danger s that the WSF, whch has payed such a vta
roe n the movement for goba |ustce, runs the rsk of becomng
an end unto tsef. |ust organsng t every year consumes the
energes of some of the best actvsts. If conversatons about
resstance repace rea cv dsobedence, then the WSF coud
become an asset to those whom t was created to oppose. The
forum must be hed and must grow, but we have to fnd ways to
channe our conversatons there back nto concrete acton.
As resstance movements have begun to reach out across
natona borders and pose a rea threat, governments have
deveoped ther own strateges of how to dea wth them. They
range from cooptaton to represson.
I'm gong to speak about three of the contemporary dangers that
confront resstance movements: the dffcut meetng pont
between mass movements and the mass meda, the hazards of
the NGO-saton of resstance, and the confrontaton between
resstance movements and ncreasngy repressve states.
The pace n whch the mass meda meets mass movements s a
compcated one. Governments have earned that a crss-drven
meda cannot afford to hang about n the same pace for too ong.
Lke a busness needs cash turnover, the meda need crses
turnover. Whoe countres become od news. They cease to exst,
and the darkness becomes deeper than before the ght was
brefy shone on them. We saw t happen n Afghanstan when the
Sovets wthdrew. And now, after Operaton Endurng Freedom
put the CIA's Hamd Karza n pace, Afghanstan has been thrown
to ts warords once more. Another CIA operatve, Iyad Aaw, has
been nstaed n Iraq, so perhaps t's tme for the meda to move
on from there, too.
Whe governments hone the art of watng out crses, resstance
movements are ncreasngy beng ensnared n a vortex of crss
producton, seekng to fnd ways of manufacturng them n easy
consumabe, spectator-frendy formats. Every sef-respectng
peope's movement, every "ssue," s expected to have ts own
hot ar baoon n the sky advertsng ts brand and purpose. For
ths reason, starvaton deaths are more effectve advertsements
for mpovershment than mons of manourshed peope, who
don't qute make the cut. Dams are not newsworthy unt the
devastaton they wreak makes good teevson. (And by then, t's
too ate.)
Standng n the rsng water of a reservor for days on end,
watchng your home and beongngs foat away to protest aganst
a bg dam used to be an effectve strategy, but sn't any more.
The meda s dead bored of that one. So the hundreds of
thousands of peope beng dspaced by dams are expected to
ether con|ure new trcks or gve up the strugge.
Resstance as spectace, as potca theatre, has a hstory.
Gandh's sat march n 1931 to Dand s among the most
exharatng exampes. But the sat march wasn't theatre aone. It
was the symboc part of a arger act of rea cv dsobedence.
When Gandh and an army of freedom fghters marched to
Gu|arat's coast and made sat from seawater, thousands of
Indans across the country began to make ther own sat, openy
defyng mpera Brtan's sat tax aws, whch banned oca sat
producton n favour of Brtsh sat mports. It was a drect strke
at the economc underpnnng of the Brtsh Empre.
The dsturbng thng nowadays s that resstance as spectace has
cut oose from ts orgns n genune cv dsobedence and s
begnnng to become more symboc than rea. Coourfu
demonstratons and weekend marches are vta but aone are not
powerfu enough to stop wars. Wars w be stopped ony when
soders refuse to fght, when workers refuse to oad weapons
onto shps and arcraft, when peope boycott the economc
outposts of Empre that are strung across the gobe.
If we want to recam the space for cv dsobedence, we w
have to berate ourseves from the tyranny of crss reportage
and ts fear of the mundane. We have to use our experence, our
magnaton, and our art to nterrogate those nstruments of state
that ensure that "normaty" remans what t s: crue, un|ust,
unacceptabe. We have to expose the poces and processes that
make ordnary thngs - food, water, sheter and dgnty - such a
dstant dream for ordnary peope. The rea pre-emptve strke s
to understand that wars are the end resut of a fawed and un|ust
peace.
As far as mass resstance movements are concerned, the fact s
that no amount of meda coverage can make up for mass
strength on the ground. There s no opton, reay, to od-
fashoned, back-breakng potca mobsaton. Corporate
gobasaton has ncreased the dstance between those who
make decsons and those who have to suffer the effects of those
decsons. Forums ke the WSF enabe oca resstance
movements to reduce that dstance and to nk up wth ther
counterparts n rch countres. That aance s a formdabe one.
For exampe, when Inda's frst prvate dam, the Maheshwar Dam,
was beng but, aances between the Narmada Bachao Andoan
(the NBA), the German organsaton Urgewad, the Berne
Decaraton n Swtzerand, and the Internatona Rvers Network
n Berkeey worked together to push a seres of nternatona
banks and corporatons out of the pro|ect. Ths woud not have
been possbe had there not been a rock sod resstance
movement on the ground. The voce of that oca movement was
ampfed by supporters on the goba stage, embarrassng
nvestors and forcng them to wthdraw.
An nfnte number of smar aances, targetng specfc pro|ects
and specfc corporatons woud hep to make another word
possbe. We shoud begn wth the corporatons who dd busness
wth Saddam Hussen and now proft from the devastaton and
occupaton of Iraq.
A second hazard facng mass movements s the NGO-saton of
resstance. It w be easy to twst what I'm about to say nto an
ndctment of a NGOs. That woud be a fasehood. In the murky
waters of fake NGOs set up to sphon off grant money or as tax
dodges (n States ke Bhar, they are gven as dowry), of course
there are NGOs dong vauabe work. But t's mportant to turn
our attenton away from the postve work beng done by some
ndvdua NGOs, and consder the NGO phenomenon n a broader
potca context.
In Inda, for nstance, the funded NGO boom began n the ate
1980s and 1990s. It concded wth the openng of Inda's markets
to neoberasm. At the tme, the Indan state, n keepng wth the
requrements of structura ad|ustment, was wthdrawng fundng
from rura deveopment, agrcuture, energy, transport, and
pubc heath. As the state abdcated ts tradtona roe, NGOs
moved n to work n these very areas. The dfference, of course, s
that the funds avaabe to them are a mnuscue fracton of the
actua cut n pubc spendng. Most arge we-funded NGOs are
fnanced and patronsed by ad and deveopment agences, whch
are n turn funded by Western governments, the Word Bank, the
U.N., and some mutnatona corporatons. Though they may not
be the very same agences, they are certany part of the same
oose, potca formaton that oversees the neobera pro|ect and
demands the sash n government spendng n the frst pace.
Why shoud these agences fund NGOs? Coud t be |ust od-
fashoned mssonary zea? Gut? It's a tte more than that.
NGOs gve the mpresson that they are fng the vacuum
created by a retreatng state. And they are, but n a materay
nconsequenta way. Ther rea contrbuton s that they defuse
potca anger and doe out as ad or benevoence what peope
ought to have by rght. They ater the pubc psyche. They turn
peope nto dependent vctms and bunt the edges of potca
resstance. NGOs form a sort of buffer between the sarkar and
pubc. Between Empre and ts sub|ects. They have become the
arbtrators, the nterpreters, the factators of the dscourse. They
pay out the roe of the "reasonabe man" n an unfar,
unreasonabe war.
In the ong run, NGOs are accountabe to ther funders, not to the
peope they work among. They're what botansts woud ca an
ndcator speces. It's amost as though the greater the
devastaton caused by neoberasm, the greater the outbreak of
NGOs. Nothng ustrates ths more pognanty than the
phenomenon of the U.S. preparng to nvade a country and
smutaneousy readyng NGOs to go n and cean up the
devastaton.
In order to make sure ther fundng s not |eopardsed and that
the governments of the countres they work n w aow them to
functon, NGOs have to present ther work - whether t's n a
country devastated by war, poverty or an epdemc of dsease -
wthn a shaow framework more or ess shorn of a potca or
hstorca context. At any rate, an nconvenent hstorca or
potca context. It's not for nothng that the "NGO perspectve" s
becomng ncreasngy respected.
Apotca (and therefore, actuay, extremey potca) dstress
reports from poor countres and war zones eventuay make the
(dark) peope of those (dark) countres seem ke pathoogca
vctms. Another manourshed Indan, another starvng Ethopan,
another Afghan refugee camp, another mamed Sudanese... n
need of the whte man's hep. They unwttngy renforce racst
stereotypes and re-affrm the achevements, the comforts, and
the compasson (the tough ove) of Western cvsaton, mnus
the gut of the hstory of genocde, coonasm, and savery.
They're the secuar mssonares of the modern word.
Eventuay - on a smaer scae, but more nsdousy - the capta
avaabe to NGOs pays the same roe n aternatve potcs as
the specuatve capta that fows n and out of the economes of
poor countres. It begns to dctate the agenda.
It turns confrontaton nto negotaton. It depotcses resstance.
It nterferes wth oca peope's movements that have tradtonay
been sef-reant. NGOs have funds that can empoy oca peope
who mght otherwse be actvsts n resstance movements, but
now can fee they are dong some mmedate, creatve good (and
earnng a vng whe they're at t). Charty offers nstant
gratfcaton to the gver, as we as the recever, but ts sde
effects can be dangerous. Rea potca resstance offers no such
short cuts.
The NGO-saton of potcs threatens to turn resstance nto a
we-mannered, reasonabe, saared, 9-to-5 |ob. Wth a few perks
thrown n.
Rea resstance has rea consequences. And no saary.
Ths brngs us to a thrd danger I want to speak about tonght: the
deady nature of the actua confrontaton between resstance
movements and ncreasngy repressve states. Between pubc
power and the agents of Empre.
Whenever cv resstance has shown the sghtest sgns of
evovng from symboc acton nto anythng remotey
threatenng, the crackdown s mercess. We've seen what
happened n the demonstratons n Seatte, n Mam, n
Gothenburg, n Genoa.
In the Unted States, you have the USA PATRIOT Act, whch has
become a bueprnt for ant-terrorsm aws passed by
governments around the word. Freedoms are beng curbed n the
name of protectng freedom. And once we surrender our
freedoms, to wn them back w take a revouton.
Some governments have vast experence n the busness of
curbng freedoms and st smeng sweet. The government of
Inda, an od hand at the game, ghts the path. Over the years
the Indan government has passed a pethora of aws that aow t
to ca amost anyone a terrorst, an nsurgent, a mtant. We
have the Armed Forces Speca Powers Act, the Pubc Securty
Act, the Speca Areas Securty Act, the Gangster Act, the
Terrorst and Dsruptve Actvtes (Preventon) Act (whch has
formay apsed, but under whch peope are st facng tra), and,
most recenty, POTA (the Preventon of Terrorsm Act), the broad-
spectrum antbotc for the dsease of dssent.
There are other steps that are beng taken, such as court
|udgments that n effect curta free speech, the rght of
government workers to go on strke, the rght to fe and
vehood. Courts have begun to mcro-manage our ves n Inda.
And crtcsng the courts s a crmna offence.
But comng back to the counterterrorsm ntatves, over the ast
decade the number of peope who have been ked by the poce
and securty forces runs nto the tens of thousands. In the state of
Andhra Pradesh (the pn-up gr of corporate gobasaton n
Inda), an average of about 200 "extremsts" are ked n what
are caed "encounters" every year. The Mumba poce boast of
how many "gangsters" they have ked n "shoot outs." In
Kashmr, n a stuaton that amost amounts to war, an estmated
80,000 peope have been ked snce 1989. Thousands have
smpy "dsappeared." In the northeastern provnces, the stuaton
s smar.
In recent years, the Indan poce have opened fre on unarmed
peope at peacefu demonstratons, mosty Dat and Advas. The
preferred method s to k them and then ca them terrorsts.
Inda s not aone, though. We have seen smar thngs happen n
countres such Bova and Che. In the era of neoberasm,
poverty s a crme and protestng aganst t s more and more
beng defned as terrorsm.
In Inda, the Preventon of Terrorsm Act (POTA) s often caed the
Producton of Terrorsm Act. It's a versate, hod-a aw that coud
appy to anyone from an A Oaeda operatve to a dsgrunted bus
conductor. As wth a ant-terrorsm aws, the genus of POTA s
that t can be whatever the government wants. For exampe, n
Tam Nadu, t has been used to mprson and sence crtcs of the
State government. In |harkhand 3,200 peope, mosty poor
Advass accused of beng Maosts, have been named n crmna
compants under POTA. In Gu|arat and Mumba, the Act s used
amost excusvey aganst Musms. After the 2002 state-asssted
pogrom n Gu|arat, n whch an estmated 2,000 Musms were
savagey ked by Hndu mobs and 150,000 drven from ther
homes, 287 peope have been accused under POTA. Of these,
286 are Musm and one s a Skh.
POTA aows confessons extracted n poce custody to be
admtted as |udca evdence. In effect, torture tends to repace
nvestgaton. The South Asa Human Rghts Documentaton
Centre reports that Inda has the hghest number of torture and
custoda deaths n the word. Government records show that
there were 1,307 deaths n |udca custody n 2002 aone.
A few months ago, I was a member of a peope's trbuna on
POTA. Over a perod of two days, we stened to harrowng
testmones of what s happenng n our wonderfu democracy. It's
everythng - from peope beng forced to drnk urne, beng
strpped, humated, gven eectrc shocks, burned wth cgarette
butts, havng ron rods put up ther anuses, to peope beng
beaten and kcked to death.
The new government has promsed to repea POTA. I'd be
surprsed f that happens before smar egsaton under a
dfferent name s put n pace.
When every avenue of nonvoent dssent s cosed down, and
everyone who protests aganst the voaton of ther human rghts
s caed a terrorst, shoud we reay be surprsed f vast parts of
the country are overrun by those who beeve n armed strugge
and are more or ess beyond the contro of the state: n Kashmr,
the northeastern provnces, arge parts of Madhya Pradesh,
Chhattsgarh, |harkhand, and Andhra Pradesh. Ordnary peope n
these regons are trapped between the voence of the mtants
and the state.
In Kashmr, the Indan Army estmates that 3,000 to 4,000
mtants are operatng at any gven tme. To contro them, the
Indan government depoys about 500,000 soders. Ceary, t
sn't |ust the mtants the Army seeks to contro, but a whoe
popuaton of humated, unhappy peope who see the Indan
Army as an occupaton force. The prmary purpose of aws ke
POTA s not to target rea terrorsts or mtants, who are usuay
smpy shot. Ant-terrorsm aws are used to ntmdate cv
socety. Inevtaby, such represson has the effect of fueng
dscontent and anger.
The Armed Forces Speca Powers Act aows not |ust offcers, but
even |unor commssoned offcers and non-commssoned offcers
of the army, to use force and even k any person on suspcon of
dsturbng pubc order. It was frst mposed on a few dstrcts n
the State of Manpur n 1958. Today, t appes to vrtuay a of
the northeast and Kashmr. The documentaton of nstances of
torture, dsappearances, custoda deaths, rape, and summary
executon by securty forces s enough to turn your stomach.
In Andhra Pradesh, n Inda's heartand, the mtant Marxst-
Lennst Peope's War Group - whch for years has been engaged
n a voent armed strugge and has been the prncpa target of
many of the Andhra poce's fake "encounters" - hed ts frst
pubc meetng n years on |uy 28, 2004, n the town of Waranga.
The former Chef Mnster of Andhra Pradesh, N. Chandrababu
Nadu, ked to ca hmsef the CEO of the State. In return for hs
enthusasm n mpementng structura ad|ustment, Andhra
Pradesh receved mons of doars of ad from the Word Bank
and deveopment agences such as Brtan's Department for
Internatona Deveopment. As a resut of structura ad|ustment,
Andhra Pradesh s now best known for two thngs: the hundreds
of sucdes by farmers who were steeped n debt and the
spreadng nfuence and growng mtancy of the Peope's War
Group. Durng Nadu's term n offce, the PWG were not arrested,
or captured, they were summary shot.
In response, the PWG campagned actvey, and et t be sad,
voenty, aganst Nadu. In May, the Congress won the State
eectons. The Nadu government ddn't |ust ose, t was
humated n the pos. When the PWG caed a pubc meetng, t
was attended by hundreds of thousands of peope. Under POTA,
a of them are consdered terrorsts. Are they a gong to be
detaned n some Indan equvaent of Guantanamo Bay? The
whoe of the northeast and the Kashmr Vaey s n ferment. What
w the government do wth these mons of peope?
One does not endorse the voence of these mtant groups.
Nether moray nor strategcay. But to condemn t wthout frst
denouncng the much greater voence perpetrated by the state
woud be to deny the peope of these regons not |ust ther basc
human rghts, but even the rght to a far hearng. Peope who
have ved n stuatons of confct are n no doubt that mtancy
and armed strugge provokes a massve escaaton of voence
from the state. But vng as they do, n stuatons of unbearabe
n|ustce, can they reman sent forever?
THERE s no dscusson takng pace n the word today that s
more cruca than the debate about strateges of resstance. And
the choce of strategy s not entrey n the hands of the pubc. It
s aso n the hands of sarkar.
After a, when the U.S. nvades and occupes Iraq n the way t
has done, wth such overwhemng mtary force, can the
resstance be expected to be a conventona mtary one? (Of
course, even f t were conventona, t woud st be caed
terrorst.) In a strange sense, the U.S. government's arsena of
weapons and unrvaed ar and fre power makes terrorsm an a-
but-nescapabe response. What peope ack n weath and power,
they w make up for wth steath and strategy.
In the twenty-frst century, the connecton between corporate
gobasaton, regous fundamentasm, nucear natonasm, and
the paupersaton of whoe popuatons s becomng mpossbe to
gnore. The unrest has myrad manfestatons: terrorsm, armed
strugge, nonvoent mass resstance, and common crme.
In ths restve, desparng tme, f governments do not do a they
can to honour nonvoent resstance, then by defaut they
prvege those who turn to voence. No government's
condemnaton of terrorsm s credbe f t cannot show tsef to be
open to change by nonvoent dssent. But nstead nonvoent
resstance movements are beng crushed. Any knd of mass
potca mobsaton or organsaton s beng bought off, broken,
or smpy gnored.
Meanwhe, governments and the corporate meda, and et's not
forget the fm ndustry, avsh ther tme, attenton, funds,
technoogy, research, and admraton on war and terrorsm.
Voence has been defed. The message ths sends s dsturbng
and dangerous: If you seek to ar a pubc grevance, voence s
more effectve than nonvoence.
As the rft between the rch and poor grows, as the need to
approprate and contro the word's resources to feed the great
captast machne becomes more urgent, the unrest w ony
escaate.
For those of us who are on the wrong sde of Empre, the
humaton s becomng unbearabe. Each of the Iraq chdren
ked by the Unted States was our chd. Each of the prsoners
tortured n Abu Ghrab was our comrade. Each of ther screams
was ours. When they were humated, we were humated.
The U.S. soders fghtng n Iraq - mosty vounteers n a poverty
draft from sma towns and poor urban neghbourhoods - are
vctms, |ust as much as the Iraqs, of the same horrendous
process, whch asks them to de for a vctory that w never be
thers.
The mandarns of the corporate word, the CEOs, the bankers, the
potcans, the |udges and generas ook down on us from on hgh
and shake ther heads sterny. "There's no aternatve," they say,
and et sp the dogs of war.
Then, from the runs of Afghanstan, from the rubbe of Iraq and
Chechnya, from the streets of occuped Paestne and the
mountans of Kashmr, from the hs and pans of Coomba, and
the forests of Andhra Pradesh and Assam, comes the chng
repy: "There's no aternatve but terrorsm." Terrorsm. Armed
strugge. Insurgency. Ca t what you want.
Terrorsm s vcous, ugy, and dehumansng for ts perpetrators
as we as ts vctms. But so s war. You coud say that terrorsm
s the prvatsaton of war. Terrorsts are the free marketers of
war. They are peope who don't beeve that the state has a
monopoy on the egtmate use of voence.
Human socety s |ourneyng to a terrbe pace.
Of course, there s an aternatve to terrorsm. It's caed |ustce.
It's tme to recognse that no amount of nucear weapons, or fu-
spectrum domnance, or "dasy cutters," or spurous governng
councs and oya |rgas, can buy peace at the cost of |ustce.
The urge for hegemony and preponderance by some w be
matched wth greater ntensty by the ongng for dgnty and
|ustce by others.
Exacty what form that batte takes, whether t s beautfu or
boodthrsty, depends on us.
2004 Arundhat Roy
Arundhat Roy s the author of the nove, The God of Sma
Thngs, for whch she was awarded the Booker Prze n 1997. She
has aso pubshed four essay coectons: An Ordnary Person's
Gude to Empre, War Tak, Power Potcs, and The Cost of Lvng,
and s the sub|ect of The Checkbook and the Cruse Msse:
Intervews wth Arundhat Roy, edted by Davd Barsaman. Roy
receved the 2002 Lannan Award for Cutura Freedom from the
Lannan Foundaton. Traned as an archtect, Roy ves n New
Deh, Inda.
The Frontne
Aug. 1 - 14, 1998
THE END OF lMAGlNATlON
ARUNDHATl ROY
"The desert shook," the Covernment of lndia informed us (its
people).
"The whole mountain turned white," the Covernment of Pakistan
replied.
8y afternoon the wind had fallen silent over Pokhran. At 3.45
p.m., the timer detonated the three devices. Around 200 to 300
m deep in the earth, the heat generated was equivalent to a
million degrees centigrade - as hot as temperatures on the sun.
lnstantly, rocks weighing around a thousand tons, a mini
mountain underground, vapourized... shockwaves from the blast
began to lift a mound of earth the size of a football field by
several metres. One scientist on seeing it said, "l can now believe
stories of Lord lrishna lifting a hill."
- Inda Today.
MAY 1998. It' go down n hstory books, provded, of course, we
have hstory books to go down n. Provded, of course, we have a
future.
There's nothng new or orgna eft to be sad about nucear
weapons. There can be nothng more humatng for a wrter of
fcton to have to do than restate a case that has, over the years,
aready been made by other peope n other parts of the word,
and made passonatey, eoquenty and knowedgeaby.
I am prepared to grove. To humate mysef ab|ecty, because, n
the crcumstances, sence woud be ndefensbe. So those of you
who are wng: et's pck our parts, put on these dscarded
costumes and speak our second-hand nes n ths sad second-
hand pay. But et's not forget that the stakes we're payng for
are huge. Our fatgue and our shame coud mean the end of us.
The end of our chdren and our chdren's chdren. Of everythng
we ove. We have to reach wthn ourseves and fnd the strength
to thnk. To fght.
Once agan we are ptfuy behnd the tmes - not |ust
scentfcay and technoogcay (gnore the hoow cams), but
more pertnenty n our abty to grasp the true nature of nucear
weapons. Our Comprehenson of the Horror Department s
hopeessy obsoete. Here we are, a of us n Inda and n
Pakstan, dscussng the fner ponts of potcs, and foregn pocy,
behavng for a the word as though our governments have |ust
devsed a newer, bgger bomb, a sort of mmense hand grenade
wth whch they w annhate the enemy (each other) and
protect us from a harm. How desperatey we want to beeve
that. What wonderfu, wng, we-behaved, gube sub|ects we
have turned out to be. The rest of humanty (Yes, yes, I know, I
know, but et's gnore Them for the moment. They forfeted ther
votes a ong tme ago), the rest of the rest of humanty may not
forgve us, but then the rest of the rest of humanty, dependng
on who fashons ts vews, may not know what a tred, de|ected
heart-broken peope we are. Perhaps t doesn't reaze how
urgenty we need a mrace. How deepy we yearn for magc.
If ony, f ony, nucear war was |ust another knd of war. If ony t
was about the usua thngs - natons and terrtores, gods and
hstores. If ony those of us who dread t are |ust worthess mora
cowards who are not prepared to de n defence of our beefs. If
ony nucear war was the knd of war n whch countres batte
countres and men batte men. But t sn't. If there s a nucear
war, our foes w not be Chna or Amerca or even each other.
Our foe w be the earth hersef. The very eements - the sky, the
ar, the and, the wnd and water - w a turn aganst us. Ther
wrath w be terrbe.
Our ctes and forests, our feds and vages w burn for days.
Rvers w turn to poson. The ar w become fre. The wnd w
spread the fames. When everythng there s to burn has burned
and the fres de, smoke w rse and shut out the sun. The earth
w be enveoped n darkness. There w be no day. Ony
ntermnabe nght. Temperatures w drop to far beow freezng
and nucear wnter w set n. Water w turn nto toxc ce.
Radoactve faout w seep through the earth and contamnate
groundwater. Most vng thngs, anma and vegetabe, fsh and
fow, w de. Ony rats and cockroaches w breed and mutpy
and compete wth foragng, rect humans for what tte food
there s.
What sha we do then, those of us who are st ave? Burned and
bnd and bad and , carryng the cancerous carcasses of our
chdren n our arms, where sha we go? What sha we eat? What
sha we drnk? What sha we breathe?
The Head of the Heath, Envronment and Safety Group of the
Bhabha Atomc Research Centre n Bombay has a pan. He
decared n an ntervew (The Poneer, Apr 24, 1998) that Inda
coud survve nucear war. Hs advce s that f there s a nucear
war, we take the same safety measures as the ones that
scentsts have recommended n the event of accdents at nucear
pants.
Take odne ps, he suggests. And other steps such as remanng
ndoors, consumng ony stored water and food and avodng mk.
Infants shoud be gven powdered mk. "Peope n the danger
zone shoud mmedatey go to the ground foor and f possbe to
the basement."
What do you do wth these eves of unacy? What do you do f
you're trapped n an asyum and the doctors are a dangerousy
deranged?
Ignore t, t's |ust a novest's navete, they' te you, Doomsday
Prophet hyperboe. It' never come to that. There w be no war.
Nucear weapons are about peace, not war. 'Deterrence' s the
buzz word of the peope who ke to thnk of themseves as
hawks. (Nce brds, those. Coo. Stysh. Predatory. Pty there
won't be many of them around after the war. Extncton s a word
we must try and get used to.) Deterrence s an od thess that has
been resurrected and s beng recyced wth added oca favour.
The Theory of Deterrence cornered the credt for havng
prevented the Cod War from turnng nto a Thrd Word War. The
ony mmutabe fact about The Thrd Word War s that f there's
gong to be one, t w be fought after the Second Word War. In
other words, there's no fxed schedue. In other words, we st
have tme. And perhaps the pun (The Thrd Word War) s
prescent. True, the Cod War s over, but et's not be hoodwnked
by the ten-year u n nucear posturng. It was |ust a crue |oke. It
was ony n remsson. It wasn't cured. It proves no theores. After
a, what s ten years n the hstory of the word? Here t s agan,
the dsease. More wdespread and ess amenabe to any sort of
treatment than ever. No, the Theory of Deterrence has some
fundamenta faws.
Faw Number One s that t presumes a compete, sophstcated
understandng of the psychoogy of your enemy. It assumes that
what deters you (the fear of annhaton) w deter them. What
about those who are not deterred by that? The sucde bomber
psyche - the 'We' take you wth us' schoo - s that an outandsh
thought? How dd Ra|v Gandh de?
In any case who's the 'you' and who's the 'enemy'? Both are ony
governments. Governments change. They wear masks wthn
masks. They mout and re-nvent themseves a the tme. The
one we have at the moment, for nstance, does not even have
enough seats to ast a fu term n offce, but demands that we
trust t to do prouettes and party trcks wth nucear bombs even
as t scrabbes around for a foothod to mantan a smpe ma|orty
n Parament.
Faw Number Two s that Deterrence s premsed on fear. But fear
s premsed on knowedge. On an understandng of the true
extent and scae of the devastaton that nucear war w wreak. It
s not some nherent, mystca attrbute of nucear bombs that
they automatcay nspre thoughts of peace. On the contrary, t
s the endess, treess, confrontatona work of peope who have
had the courage to openy denounce them, the marches, the
demonstratons, the fms, the outrage - that s what has averted,
or perhaps ony postponed, nucear war. Deterrence w not and
cannot work gven the eves of gnorance and teracy that hang
over our two countres ke dense, mpenetrabe ves. (Wtness
the VHP wantng to dstrbute radoactve sand from the Pokhran
desert as prasad a across Inda. A cancer yatra?) The Theory of
Deterrence s nothng but a perous |oke n a word where odne
ps are prescrbed as a prophyactc for nucear rradaton.
Inda and Pakstan have nucear bombs now and fee entrey
|ustfed n havng them. Soon others w too. Israe, Iran, Iraq,
Saud Araba, Norway, Nepa (I'm tryng to be ecectc here),
Denmark, Germany, Bhutan, Mexco, Lebanon, Sr Lanka, Burma,
Bosna, Sngapore, North Korea, Sweden, South Korea, Vetnam,
Cuba, Afghanstan, Uzbekstan... and why not? Every country n
the word has a speca case to make. Everybody has borders and
beefs. And when a our arders are burstng wth shny bombs
and our bees are empty (Deterrence s an exorbtant beast), we
can trade bombs for food. And when nucear technoogy goes on
the market, when t gets truy compettve and prces fa, not |ust
governments, but anybody who can afford t can have ther own
prvate arsena - busnessmen, terrorsts, perhaps even the
occasona rch wrter (ke mysef). Our panet w brste wth
beautfu msses. There w be a new word order. The
dctatorshp of the pro-nuke ete. We can get our kcks by
threatenng each other. It' be ke bungee-|umpng when you
can't rey on the bungee cord, or payng Russan rouette a day
ong. An addtona perk w be the thr of Not Knowng What To
Beeve. We can be vctms of the predatory magnaton of every
green card-seekng charatan who surfaces n the West wth
concocted stores of mmnent msse attacks. We can deght at
the prospect of beng hed to ransom by every petty troube-
maker and rumour-monger, the more the merrer f truth be tod,
anythng for an excuse to make more bombs. So you see, even
wthout a war, we have a ot to ook forward to.
But et us pause to gve credt where t's due. Whom must we
thank for a
The Men who made t happen. The Masters of the Unverse.
Lades and gentemen, The Unted States of Amerca! Come on up
here foks, stand up and take a bow. Thankyou for dong ths to
the word. Thank you for makng a dfference. Thank you for
showng us the way. Thank you for aterng the very meanng of
fe.
From now on t s not dyng we must fear, but vng.
It s such supreme foy to beeve that nucear weapons are
deady ony f they're used. The fact that they exst at a, ther
very presence n our ves, w wreak more havoc than we can
begn to fathom. Nucear weapons pervade our thnkng. Contro
our behavour. Admnster our socetes. Inform our dreams. They
bury themseves ke meat hooks deep n the base of our brans.
They are purveyors of madness. They are the utmate coonser.
Whter than any whte man that ever ved. The very heart of
whteness.
A I can say to every man, woman and sentent chd here n
Inda, and over there, |ust a tte way away n Pakstan, s: Take t
personay. Whoever you are - Hndu, Musm, urban, agraran - t
doesn't matter. The ony good thng about nucear war s that t s
the snge most egataran dea that man has ever had. On the
day of reckonng, you w not be asked to present your
credentas. The devastaton w be ndscrmnate. The bomb
sn't n your backyard. It's n your body. And mne. Nobody, no
naton, no government, no man, no god, has the rght to put t
there. We're radoactve aready, and the war hasn't even begun.
So stand up and say somethng. Never mnd f t's been sad
before. Speak up on your own behaf. Take t very personay.
THE BOMB AND I
In eary May (before the bomb), I eft home for three weeks. I
thought I woud return. I had every ntenton of returnng. Of
course, thngs haven't worked out qute the way I had panned.
Whe I was away, I met a frend of mne whom I have aways
oved for, among other thngs, her abty to combne deep
affecton wth a frankness that borders on savagery.
"I've been thnkng about you," she sad, "about The God of Sma
Thngs - what's n t, what's over t, under t, around t, above t..."
She fe sent for a whe. I was uneasy and not at a sure that I
wanted to hear the rest of what she had to say. She, however,
was sure that she was gong to say t. "In ths ast year - ess than
a year actuay - you've had too much of everythng - fame,
money, przes, aduaton, crtcsm, condemnaton, rdcue, ove,
hate, anger, envy, generosty - everythng. In some ways t's a
perfect story. Perfecty baroque n ts excess. The troube s that
t has, or can have, ony one perfect endng." Her eyes were on
me, brght wth a santng, probng brance. She knew that I
knew what she was gong to say. She was nsane.
She was gong to say that nothng that happened to me n the
future coud ever match the buzz of ths. That the whoe of the
rest of my fe was gong to be vaguey unsatsfyng. And,
therefore, the ony perfect endng to the story woud be death.
My death.
The thought had occurred to me too. Of course t had. The fact
that a ths, ths goba dazze - these ghts n my eyes, the
appause, the fowers, the photographers, the |ournasts fegnng
a deep nterest n my fe (yet struggng to get a snge fact
straght), the men n suts fawnng over me, the shny hote
bathrooms wth endess towes - none of t was key to happen
agan. Woud I mss t? Had I grown to need t? Was I a fame-
|unke? Woud I have wthdrawa symptoms?
The more I thought about t, the cearer t became to me that f
fame was gong to be my permanent condton t woud k me.
Cub me to death wth ts good manners and hygene. I' admt
that I've en|oyed my own fve mnutes of t mmensey, but
prmary because t was |ust fve mnutes. Because I knew (or
thought I knew) that I coud go home when I was bored and
ggge about t. Grow od and rresponsbe. Eat mangoes n the
moonght. Maybe wrte a coupe of faed books - worstseers - to
see what t fet ke. For a whoe year I've cartwheeed across the
word, anchored aways to thoughts of home and the fe I woud
go back to. Contrary to a the enqures and predctons about my
mpendng emgraton, that was the we I dpped nto. That was
my sustenance. My strength.
I tod my frend there was no such thng as a perfect story. I sad
n any case hers was an externa vew of thngs, ths assumpton
that the tra|ectory of a person's happness, or et's say fufment,
had peaked (and now must trough) because she had accdentay
stumbed upon 'success'. It was premsed on the unmagnatve
beef that weath and fame were the mandatory stuff of
everybody's dreams.
You've ved too ong n New York, I tod her. There are other
words. Other knds of dreams. Dreams n whch faure s
feasbe. Honourabe. Sometmes even worth strvng for. Words
n whch recognton s not the ony barometer of brance or
human worth. There are penty of warrors that I know and ove,
peope far more vauabe than mysef, who go to war each day,
knowng n advance that they w fa. True, they are ess
'successfu' n the most vugar sense of the word, but by no
means ess fufed.
The ony dream worth havng, I tod her, s to dream that you w
ve whe you're ave and de ony when you're dead.
(Prescence? Perhaps.)
"Whch means exacty what?" (Arched eyebrows, a tte
annoyed.)
I tred to expan, but ddn't do a very good |ob of t. Sometmes I
need to wrte to thnk. So I wrote t down for her on a paper
napkn. Ths s what I wrote: To ove. To be oved. To never forget
your own nsgnfcance. To never get used to the unspeakabe
voence and the vugar dsparty of fe around you. To seek |oy n
the saddest paces. To pursue beauty to ts ar. To never smpfy
what s compcated or compcate what s smpe. To respect
strength, never power. Above a, to watch. To try and
understand. To never ook away. And never, never to forget.
I've known her for many years, ths frend of mne. She's an
archtect too.
She ooked dubous, somewhat unconvnced by my paper napkn
speech. I coud te that structuray, |ust n terms of the seek,
narratve symmetry of thngs, and because she oves me, her
thr at my 'success' was so keen, so generous, that t weghed n
eveny wth her (antcpated) horror at the dea of my death. I
understood that t was nothng persona. |ust a desgn thng.
Anyhow, two weeks after that conversaton, I returned to Inda.
To what I thnk/thought of as home. Somethng had ded but t
wasn't me. It was nfntey more precous. It was a word that has
been ang for a whe, and has fnay breathed ts ast. It's been
cremated now. The ar s thck wth ugness and there's the
unmstakabe stench of fascsm on the breeze.
Day after day, n newspaper edtoras, on the rado, on TV chat
shows, on MTV for heaven's sake, peope whose nstncts one
thought one coud trust - wrters, panters, |ournasts - make the
crossng. The ch seeps nto my bones as t becomes panfuy
apparent from the essons of everyday fe that what you read n
hstory books s true. That fascsm s ndeed as much about
peope as about governments. That t begns at home. In drawng
rooms. In bedrooms. In beds. "Exposon of sef-esteem", "Road to
Resurgence", "A Moment of Prde", these were headnes n the
papers n the days foowng the nucear tests. "We have proved
that we are not eunuchs any more," sad Mr Thackeray of the
Shv Sena. (Whoever sad we were? True, a good number of us
are women, but that, as far as I know, sn't the same thng.)
Readng the papers, t was often hard to te when peope were
referrng to Vagra (whch was competng for second pace on the
front pages) and when they were takng about the bomb - "We
have superor strength and potency." (Ths was our Mnster for
Defence after Pakstan competed ts tests.)
"These are not |ust nucear tests, they are natonasm tests," we
were repeatedy tod.
Ths has been hammered home, over and over agan. The bomb
s Inda. Inda s the bomb. Not |ust Inda, Hndu Inda. Therefore,
be warned, any crtcsm of t s not |ust ant-natona, but ant-
Hndu. (Of course, n Pakstan the bomb s Isamc. Other than
that, potcay, the same physcs appes.) Ths s one of the
unexpected perks of havng a nucear bomb. Not ony can the
Government use t to threaten the Enemy, they can use t to
decare war on ther own peope. Us.
In 1975, one year after Inda frst dpped her toe nto the nucear
sea, Mrs Gandh decared the Emergency. What w 1999 brng?
There's tak of ces beng set up to montor ant-natona actvty.
Tak of amendng cabe aws to ban networks 'harmng natona
cuture' (The Indan Express, |uy 3). Of churches beng struck off
the st of regous paces because 'wne s served' (announced
and retracted, The Indan Express, |uy 3, The Tmes of Inda, |uy
4). Artsts, wrters, actors, and sngers are beng harassed,
threatened (and succumbng to the threats). Not |ust by goon
squads, but by nstruments of the government. And n courts of
aw. There are etters and artces crcuatng on the Net - creatve
nterpretatons of Nostradamus' predctons camng that a
mghty, a-conquerng Hndu naton s about to emerge - a
resurgent Inda that w "burst forth upon ts former oppressors
and destroy them competey." That "the begnnng of the terrbe
revenge (that w wpe out a Mosems) w be n the seventh
month of 1999." Ths may we be the work of some one nut, or a
bunch of arcane god-squadders. The troube s that havng a
nucear bomb makes thoughts ke these seem feasbe. It creates
thoughts ke these. It bestows on peope these uttery mspaced,
uttery deady notons of ther own power. It's happenng. It's a
happenng. I wsh I coud say 'sowy but surey' - but I can't.
Thngs are movng at a pretty far cp.
Why does t a seem so famar? Is t because, even as you
watch, reaty dssoves and seamessy rushes forward nto the
sent, back and whte mages from od fms - scenes of peope
beng hounded out of ther ves, rounded up and herded nto
camps. Of massacre, of mayhem, of endess coumns of broken
peope makng ther way to nowhere? Why s there no sound-
track? Why s the ha so quet? Have I been seeng too many
fms? Am I mad? Or am I rght? Coud those mages be the
nevtabe cumnaton of what we have set nto moton? Coud
our future be rushng forward nto our past? I thnk so. Uness, of
course, nucear war settes t once and for a.
When I tod my frends that I was wrtng ths pece, they
cautoned me. "Go ahead," they sad, "but frst make sure you're
not vunerabe. Make sure your papers are n order. Make sure
your taxes are pad."
My papers are n order. My taxes are pad. But how can one not
be vunerabe n a cmate ke ths? Everyone s vunerabe.
Accdents happen. There's safety ony n acquescence. As I wrte,
I am fed wth forebodng. In ths country, I have truy known
what t means for a wrter to fee oved (and, to some degree,
hated too). Last year I was one of the tems beng paraded n the
meda's end-of-the-year Natona Prde Parade. Among the others,
much to my mortfcaton, were a bomb-maker and an
nternatona beauty queen. Each tme a beamng person stopped
me on the street and sad 'You have made Inda proud' (referrng
to the prze I won, not the book I wrote), I fet a tte uneasy. It
frghtened me then and t terrfes me now, because I know how
easy that swe, that tde of emoton, can turn aganst me.
Perhaps the tme for that has come. I'm gong to step out from
under the fary ghts and say what's on my mnd.
It's ths:
If protestng aganst havng a nucear bomb mpanted n my
bran s ant-Hndu and ant-natona, then I secede. I hereby
decare mysef an ndependent, mobe repubc. I am a ctzen of
the earth. I own no terrtory. I have no fag. I'm femae, but have
nothng aganst eunuchs. My poces are smpe. I'm wng to
sgn any nucear non-proferaton treaty or nucear test ban
treaty that's gong. Immgrants are wecome. You can hep me
desgn our fag.
My word has ded. And I wrte to mourn ts passng.
Admttedy t was a fawed word. An unvabe word. A scarred
and wounded word. It was a word that I mysef have crtcsed
unsparngy, but ony because I oved t. It ddn't deserve to de. It
ddn't deserve to be dsmembered. Forgve me, I rease that
sentmentaty s uncoo - but what sha I do wth my desoaton?
I oved t smpy because t offered humanty a choce. It was a
rock out at sea. It was a stubborn chnk of ght that nssted that
there was a dfferent way of vng. It was a functonng possbty.
A rea opton. A that's gone now. Inda's nucear tests, the
manner n whch they were conducted, the euphora wth whch
they have been greeted (by us) s ndefensbe. To me, t sgnfes
dreadfu thngs. The end of magnaton. The end of freedom
actuay, because, after a, that's what freedom s. Choce.
On the 15th of August ast year we ceebrated the ffteth
annversary of Inda's ndependence. Next May we can mark our
frst annversary n nucear bondage.
Why dd they do t?
Potca expedency s the obvous, cynca answer, except that t
ony rases another, more basc queston: Why shoud t have
been potcay expedent?
The three Offca Reasons gven are: Chna, Pakstan and
Exposng Western Hypocrsy.
Taken at face vaue, and examned ndvduay, they're
somewhat baffng. I'm not for a moment suggestng that these
are not rea ssues. Merey that they aren't new. The ony new
thng on the od horzon s the Indan Government. In hs
appangy cavaer etter to the U.S. Presdent (why bother to
wrte at a f you're gong to wrte ke ths?) our Prme Mnster
says Inda's decson to go ahead wth the nucear tests was due
to a "deteroratng securty envronment". He goes on to menton
the war wth Chna n 1962 and the "three aggressons we have
suffered n the ast ffty years (from Pakstan). And for the ast ten
years we have been the vctm of unremttng terrorsm and
mtancy sponsored by t... especay n |ammu and Kashmr."
The war wth Chna s thrty-fve years od. Uness there's some
vta state secret that we don't know about, t certany seemed
as though matters had mproved sghty between us. |ust a few
days before the nucear tests Genera Fu Ouanyou, Chef of
Genera Staff of the Chnese Peope's Lberaton Army, was the
guest of our Chef of Army Staff. We heard no words of war.
The most recent war wth Pakstan was fought twenty-seven
years ago. Admttedy Kashmr contnues to be a deepy troubed
regon and no doubt Pakstan s geefuy fannng the fames. But
surey there must be fames to fan n the frst pace? Surey the
kndng s crackng and ready to burn? Can the Indan State wth
even a modcum of honesty absove tsef competey of havng a
hand n Kashmr's troubes? Kashmr, and for that matter, Assam,
Trpura, Nagaand - vrtuay the whoe of the Northeast -
|harkhand, Uttarakhand and a the troube that's st to come -
these are symptoms of a deeper maase. It cannot and w not
be soved by pontng nucear msses at Pakstan.
Even Pakstan can't be soved by pontng nucear msses at
Pakstan. Though we are separate countres, we share skes, we
share wnds, we share water. Where radoactve faout w and
on any gven day depends on the drecton of the wnd and ran.
Lahore and Amrtsar are thrty mes apart. If we bomb Lahore,
Pun|ab w burn. If we bomb Karach - then Gu|arat and
Ra|asthan, perhaps even Bombay, w burn. Any nucear war wth
Pakstan w be a war aganst ourseves.
As for the thrd Offca Reason: Exposng Western Hypocrsy -
how much more exposed can they be? Whch decent human
beng on earth harbours any usons about t? These are peope
whose hstores are spongy wth the bood of others. Coonasm,
aparthed, savery, ethnc ceansng, germ warfare, chemca
weapons - they vrtuay nvented t a. They have pundered
natons, snuffed out cvzatons, extermnated entre
popuatons. They stand on the word's stage stark naked but
entrey unembarrassed, because they know that they have more
money, more food and bgger bombs than anybody ese. They
know they can wpe us out n the course of an ordnary workng
day. Personay, I'd say t s more arrogance than hypocrsy.
We have ess money, ess food and smaer bombs. However, we
have, or had, a knds of other weath. Deghtfu, unquantfabe.
What we've done wth t s the opposte of what we thnk we've
done. We've pawned t a. We've traded t n. For what? In order
to enter nto a contract wth the very peope we cam to despse.
In the arger scheme of thngs, we've agreed to pay ther game
and pay t ther way. We've accepted ther terms and condtons
unquestonngy. The CTBT an't nothn' compared to ths.
A n a, I thnk t s far to say that we're the hypocrtes. We're
the ones who've abandoned what was arguaby a mora poston,
.e.: We have the technoogy, we can make bombs f we want to,
but we won't. We don't beeve n them.
We're the ones who have now set up ths craven camourng to
be admtted nto the cub of Superpowers. (If we are, we w no
doubt gady sam the door after us, and say to he wth
prncpes about fghtng Dscrmnatory Word Orders.) For Inda
to demand the status of a Superpower s as rdcuous as
demandng to pay n the Word Cup fnas smpy because we
have a ba. Never mnd that we haven't quafed, or that we
don't pay much soccer and haven't got a team.
Snce we've chosen to enter the arena, t mght be an dea to
begn by earnng the rues of the game. Rue number one s
Acknowedge the Masters. Who are the best payers? The ones
wth more money, more food, more bombs.
Rue number two s Locate Yoursef n Reaton to Them, .e.:
Make an honest assessment of your poston and abtes. The
honest assessment of ourseves (n quantfabe terms) reads as
foows:
We are a naton of neary a bon peope. In deveopment terms
we rank No. 138 out of the 175 countres sted n the UNDP's
Human Deveopment Index. More than 400 mon of our peope
are terate and ve n absoute poverty, over 600 mon ack
even basc santaton and over 200 mon have no safe drnkng
water.
So the three Offca Reasons, taken ndvduay, don't hod much
water. However, f you nk them, a knd of twsted ogc reveas
tsef. It has more to do wth us than them.
The key words n our Prme Mnster's etter to the U.S. Presdent
were 'suffered' and 'vctm'. That's the substance of t. That's our
meat and drnk. We need to fee ke vctms. We need to fee
beeaguered. We need enemes. We have so tte sense of
ourseves as a naton and therefore constanty cast about for
targets to defne ourseves aganst. Prevaent potca wsdom
suggests that to prevent the State from crumbng, we need a
natona cause, and other than our currency (and, of course,
poverty, teracy and eectons), we have none. Ths s the heart
of the matter. Ths s the road that has ed us to the bomb. Ths
search for sefhood. If we are ookng for a way out, we need
some honest answers to some uncomfortabe questons. Once
agan, t sn't as though these questons haven't been asked
before. It's |ust that we prefer to mumbe the answers and hope
that no one's heard.
Is there such a thng as an Indan dentty?
Do we reay need one?
Who s an authentc Indan and who sn't?
Is Inda Indan?
Does t matter?
Whether or not there has ever been a snge cvzaton that
coud ca tsef 'Indan Cvzaton', whether or not Inda was, s,
or ever w become a cohesve cutura entty, depends on
whether you dwe on the dfferences or the smartes n the
cutures of the peope who have nhabted the subcontnent for
centures. Inda, as a modern naton state, was marked out wth
precse geographca boundares, n ther precse geographca
way, by a Brtsh Act of Parament n 1899. Our country, as we
know t, was forged on the anv of the Brtsh Empre for the
entrey unsentmenta reasons of commerce and admnstraton.
But even as she was born, she began her strugge aganst her
creators. So s Inda Indan? It's a tough queston. Let's |ust say
that we're an ancent peope earnng to ve n a recent naton.
What s true s that Inda s an artfca State - a State that was
created by a government, not a peope. A State created from the
top down, not the bottom up. The ma|orty of Inda's ctzens w
not (to ths day) be abe to dentfy her boundares on a map, or
say whch anguage s spoken where or whch god s worshpped
n what regon. Most are too poor and too uneducated to have
even an eementary dea of the extent and compexty of ther
own country. The mpovershed, terate agraran ma|orty have
no stake n the State. And ndeed, why shoud they, how can
they, when they don't even know what the State s? To them,
Inda s, at best, a nosy sogan that comes around durng the
eectons. Or a montage of peope on Government TV
programmes wearng regona costumes and sayng Mera Bharat
Mahan.
The peope who have a vta stake (or, more to the pont, a
busness nterest) n Inda havng a snge, ucd, cohesve
natona dentty are the potcans who consttute our natona
potca partes. The reason sn't far to seek, t's smpy because
ther strugge, ther career goa, s - and must necessary be - to
become that dentty. To be dentfed wth that dentty. If there
sn't one, they have to manufacture one and persuade peope to
vote for t. It sn't ther faut. It comes wth the terrtory. It s
nherent n the nature of our system of centrazed government. A
congenta defect n our partcuar brand of democracy. The
greater the numbers of terate peope, the poorer the country
and the more moray bankrupt the potcans, the cruder the
deas of what that dentty shoud be. In a stuaton ke ths,
teracy s not |ust sad, t's downrght dangerous. However, to be
far, cobbng together a vabe pre-dgested 'Natona Identty' for
Inda woud be a formdabe chaenge even for the wse and the
vsonary. Every snge Indan ctzen coud, f he or she wants to,
cam to beong to some mnorty or the other. The fssures, f you
ook for them, run vertcay, horzontay, ayered, whored,
crcuar, spra, nsde out and outsde n. Fres when they're t
race aong any one of these schsms, and n the process, reease
tremendous bursts of potca energy. Not unke what happens
when you spt an atom.
It s ths energy that Gandh sought to harness when he rubbed
the magc amp and nvted Ram and Rahm to partake of human
potcs and Inda's war of ndependence aganst the Brtsh. It
was a sophstcated, magnfcent, magnatve strugge, but ts
ob|ectve was smpe and ucd, the target hghy vsbe, easy to
dentfy and succuent wth potca sn. In the crcumstances, the
energy found an easy focus. The troube s that the
crcumstances are entrey changed now, but the gene s out of
ts amp, and won't go back n. (It coud be sent back, but nobody
wants t to go, t's proved tsef too usefu.) Yes, t won us
freedom. But t aso won us the carnage of Partton. And now, n
the hands of esser statesmen, t has won us the Hndu Nucear
Bomb.
To be far to Gandh and to other eaders of the Natona
Movement, they dd not have the beneft of hndsght, and coud
not possby have known what the eventua, ong-term
consequences of ther strategy woud be. They coud not have
predcted how qucky the stuaton woud careen out of contro.
They coud not have foreseen what woud happen when they
passed ther famng torches nto the hands of ther successors,
or how vena those hands coud be.
It was Indra Gandh who started the rea sde. It s she who made
the gene a permanent State Guest. She n|ected the venom nto
our potca vens. She nvented our partcuary ve oca brand
of potca expedency. She showed us how to con|ure enemes
out of thn ar, to fre at phantoms that she had carefuy
fashoned for that very purpose. It was she who dscovered the
benefts of never buryng the dead, but preservng ther putrd
carcasses and trundng them out to worry od wounds when t
suted her. Between hersef and her sons she managed to brng
the country to ts knees. Our new Government has |ust kcked us
over and arranged our heads on the choppng bock.
The B|P s, n some senses, a spectre that Indra Gandh and the
Congress created. Or, f you want to be ess harsh, a spectre that
fed and reared tsef n the potca spaces and communa
suspcon that the Congress nourshed and cutvated. It has put a
new compexon on the potcs of governance. Whe Mrs Gandh
payed hdden games wth potcans and ther partes, she
reserved a shr convent schoo rhetorc, repete wth tred
pattudes, to address the genera pubc. The B|P, on the other
hand, has chosen to ght ts fres drecty on the streets and n
the homes and hearts of peope. It s prepared to do by day what
the Congress woud do ony by nght. To egtmze what was
prevousy consdered unacceptabe (but done anyway). There s
perhaps a frage case to be made here n favour of hypocrsy.
Coud the hypocrsy of the Congress Party, the fact that they
conduct ther wretched affars surrepttousy nstead of openy,
coud that possby mean there s a tny gmmer of gut
somewhere? Some sma fragment of remembered decency?
Actuay, no.
No.
What am I dong? Why am I foragng for scraps of hope?
The way t has worked - n the case of the demoton of the Babr
Mas|d as we as n the makng of the nucear bomb - s that the
Congress sowed the seeds, tended the crop, then the B|P stepped
n and reaped the hdeous harvest. They watz together, ocked n
each other's arms. They're nseparabe, despte ther professed
dfferences. Between them they have brought us here, to ths
dreadfu, dreadfu pace.
The |eerng, hootng young men who battered down the Babr
Mas|d are the same ones whose pctures appeared n the papers
n the days that foowed the nucear tests. They were on the
streets, ceebratng Inda's nucear bomb and smutaneousy
'condemnng Western Cuture' by emptyng crates of Coke and
Peps nto pubc drans. I'm a tte baffed by ther ogc: Coke s
Western Cuture, but the nucear bomb s an od Indan tradton?
Yes, I've heard - the bomb s n the Vedas. It mght be, but f you
ook hard enough, you' fnd Coke n the Vedas too. That's the
great thng about a regous texts. You can fnd anythng you
want n them - as ong as you know what you're ookng for.
But returnng to the sub|ect of the non-vedc nneteen nnetes:
We storm the heart of whteness, we embrace the most daboca
creaton of western scence and ca t our own. But we protest
aganst ther musc, ther food, ther cothes, ther cnema and
ther terature. That's not hypocrsy. That's humour.
It's funny enough to make a sku sme.
We're back on the od shp. The S.S. Authentcty & Indanness.
If there s gong to be a pro-authentcty/ant-natona drve,
perhaps the government ought to get ts hstory straght and ts
facts rght. If they're gong to do t, they may as we do t
propery.
Frst of a, the orgna nhabtants of ths and were not Hndu.
Ancent though t s, there were human bengs on earth before
there was Hndusm. Inda's trba peope have a greater cam to
beng ndgenous to ths and than anybody ese, and how are
they treated by the State and ts mnons? Oppressed, cheated,
robbed of ther ands, shunted around ke surpus goods. Perhaps
a good pace to start woud be to restore to them the dgnty that
was once thers. Perhaps the Government coud make a pubc
undertakng that more dams ke the Sardar Sarovar on the
Narmada w not be but, that more peope w not be dspaced.
But, of course, that woud be nconcevabe, woudn't t? Why?
Because t's mpractca. Because trba peope don't reay
matter. Ther hstores, ther customs, ther detes are
dspensabe. They must earn to sacrfce these thngs for the
greater good of the Naton (that has snatched from them
everythng they ever had).
Okay, so that's out.
"So stand up and say somethng...Take t very personay."
For the rest, I coud compe a practca st of thngs to ban and
budngs to break. It' need some research, but off the top of my
head, here are a few suggestons.
They coud begn by bannng a number of ngredents from our
cusne: ches (Mexco), tomatoes (Peru), potatoes (Bova),
coffee (Morocco), tea, whte sugar, cnnamon (Chna)... they coud
then move nto recpes. Tea wth mk and sugar, for nstance
(Brtan).
Smokng w be out of the queston. Tobacco came from North
Amerca.
Crcket, Engsh and Democracy shoud be forbdden. Ether
kabadd or kho-kho coud repace crcket. I don't want to start a
rot, so I hestate to suggest a repacement for Engsh (Itaan...?
It has found ts way to us va a knder route: Marrage, not
Imperasm). We have aready dscussed (earer n ths essay)
the emergng, apparenty acceptabe aternatve to democracy.
A hosptas n whch western medcne s practsed or prescrbed
shoud be shut down. A natona newspapers dscontnued. The
raways dsmanted. Arports cosed. And what about our newest
toy - the mobe phone? Can we ve wthout t, or sha I suggest
that they make an excepton there? They coud put t down n the
coumn marked 'Unversa'? (Ony essenta commodtes w be
ncuded here. No musc, art or terature.)
Needess to say, sendng your chdren to unversty n the U.S.,
and rushng there yoursef to have your prostate operated upon
w be a cognzabe offence.
The budng demoton drve coud begn wth the Rashtrapat
Bhavan and graduay spread from ctes to the countrysde,
cumnatng n the destructon of a monuments (mosques,
churches, tempes) that were but on what was once trba or
forest and.
It w be a ong, ong st. It woud take years of work. I coudn't
use a computer because that woudn't be very authentc of me,
woud t?
I don't mean to be facetous, merey to pont out that ths s
surey the shortcut to he. There's no such thng as an Authentc
Inda or a Rea Indan. There s no Dvne Commttee that has the
rght to sancton one snge, authorzed verson of what Inda s or
shoud be. There s no one regon or anguage or caste or regon
or person or story or book that can cam to be ts soe
representatve. There are, and can ony be, vsons of Inda,
varous ways of seeng t - honest, dshonest, wonderfu, absurd,
modern, tradtona, mae, femae. They can be argued over,
crtczed, prased, scorned, but not banned or broken. Not hunted
down.
Rang aganst the past w not hea us. Hstory has happened.
It's over and done wth. A we can do s to change ts course by
encouragng what we ove nstead of destroyng what we don't.
There s beauty yet n ths bruta, damaged word of ours. Hdden,
ferce, mmense. Beauty that s unquey ours and beauty that we
have receved wth grace from others, enhanced, re-nvented and
made our own. We have to seek t out, nurture t, ove t. Makng
bombs w ony destroy us. It doesn't matter whether we use
them or not. They w destroy us ether way.
Inda's nucear bomb s the fna act of betraya by a rung cass
that has faed ts peope.
However many garands we heap on our scentsts, however
many medas we pn to ther chests, the truth s that t's far
easer to make a bomb than to educate four hundred mon
peope.
Accordng to opnon pos, we're expected to beeve that there's
a natona consensus on the ssue. It's offca now. Everybody
oves the bomb. (Therefore the bomb s good.)
Is t possbe for a man who cannot wrte hs own name to
understand even the basc, eementary facts about the nature of
nucear weapons? Has anybody tod hm that nucear war has
nothng at a to do wth hs receved notons of war? Nothng to
do wth honour, nothng to do wth prde. Has anybody bothered
to expan to hm about therma basts, radoactve faout and the
nucear wnter? Are there even words n hs anguage to descrbe
the concepts of enrched uranum, fsse matera and crtca
mass? Or has hs anguage tsef become obsoete? Is he trapped
n a tme capsue, watchng the word pass hm by, unabe to
understand or communcate wth t because hs anguage never
took nto account the horrors that the human race woud dream
up? Does he not matter at a, ths man? Sha we |ust treat hm
ke some knd of a cretn? If he asks any questons, py hm wth
odne ps and parabes about how Lord Krshna fted a h or
how the destructon of Lanka by Hanuman was unavodabe n
order to preserve Sta's vrtue and Ram's reputaton? Use hs own
beautfu stores as weapons aganst hm? Sha we reease hm
from hs capsue ony durng eectons, and once he's voted,
shake hm by the hand, fatter hm wth some busht about the
Wsdom of the Common Man, and send hm rght back n?
I'm not takng about one man, of course, I'm takng about
mons and mons of peope who ve n ths country. Ths s
ther and too, you know. They have the rght to make an
nformed decson about ts fate and, as far as I can te, nobody
has nformed them about anythng. The tragedy s that nobody
coud, even f they wanted to. Truy, teray, there's no anguage
to do t n. Ths s the rea horror of Inda. The orbts of the
powerfu and the poweress spnnng further and further apart
from each other, never ntersectng, sharng nothng. Not a
anguage. Not even a country.
Who the he conducted those opnon pos? Who the he s the
Prme Mnster to decde whose fnger w be on the nucear
button that coud turn everythng we ove - our earth, our skes,
our mountans, our pans, our rvers, our ctes and vages - to
ash n an nstant? Who the he s he to reassure us that there w
be no accdents? How does he know? Why shoud we trust hm?
What has he ever done to make us trust hm? What have any of
them ever done to make us trust them?
The nucear bomb s the most ant-democratc, ant-natona, ant-
human, outrght ev thng that man has ever made.
If you are regous, then remember that ths bomb s Man's
chaenge to God.
It's worded qute smpy: We have the power to destroy
everythng that You have created.
If you're not (regous), then ook at t ths way. Ths word of ours
s four thousand, sx hundred mon years od.
It coud end n an afternoon.
Arundhat Roy |uy 15th 1998
The Frontne
May. 22 - |une 04, 1999
COVER ESSAY
THE GREATER COMMON GOOD
ARUNDHATl ROY
"lf you are to suffer, you should suffer in the interest of the
country."
- |awahara Nehru, speakng to vagers who were to be
dspaced by the Hrakud Dam, 1948.
I stood on a h and aughed out oud.
I had crossed the Narmada by boat from |asndh and cmbed
the headand on the opposte bank from where I coud see,
ranged across the crowns of ow, bad hs, the trba hamets of
Skka, Surung, Neemgavan and Domkhed. I coud see ther ary,
frage, homes. I coud see ther feds and the forests behnd
them. I coud see tte chdren wth tter goats scuttng across
the andscape ke motorsed peanuts. I knew I was ookng at a
cvsaton oder than Hndusm, sated - sanctoned (by the
hghest court n the and) - to be drowned ths monsoon when the
waters of the Sardar Sarovar reservor w rse to submerge t.
Why dd I augh?
Because I suddeny remembered the tender concern wth whch
the Supreme Court |udges n Deh (before vacatng the ega stay
on further constructon of the Sardar Sarovar Dam) had enqured
whether trba chdren n the resettement coones woud have
chdren's parks to pay n. The awyers representng the
Government had hastened to assure them that ndeed they
woud, and, what's more, that there were seesaws and sdes and
swngs n every park. I ooked up at the endess sky and down at
the rver rushng past and for a bref, bref moment the absurdty
of t a reversed my rage and I aughed. I meant no dsrespect.
Let me say at the outset that I'm not a cty-basher. I've done my
tme n a vage. I've had frst-hand experence of the soaton,
the nequty and the potenta savagery of t. I'm not an ant-
deveopment |unke, nor a proseytser for the eterna uphodng
of custom and tradton. What I am, however, s curous. Curosty
took me to the Narmada Vaey. Instnct tod me that ths was the
bg one. The one n whch the batte-nes were ceary drawn, the
warrng armes massed aong them. The one n whch t woud be
possbe to wade through the congeaed morass of hope, anger,
nformaton, dsnformaton, potca artfce, engneerng
ambton, dsngenuous socasm, radca actvsm, bureaucratc
subterfuge, msnformed emotonasm and, of course, the
pervasve, nvaraby dubous, potcs of Internatona Ad.
Instnct ed me to set asde |oyce and Nabokov, to postpone
readng Don DeLo's bg book and substtute t wth reports on
dranage and rrgaton, wth |ournas and books and documentary
fms about dams and why they're but and what they do.
My frst tentatve questons reveaed that few peope know what
s reay gong on n the Narmada Vaey. Those who know, know
a ot. Most know nothng at a. And yet, amost everyone has a
passonate opnon. Nobody's neutra. I reased very qucky that I
was strayng nto mned terrtory.
In Inda over the ast ten years the fght aganst the Sardar
Sarovar Dam has come to represent far more than the fght for
one rver. Ths has been ts strength as we as ts weakness.
Some years ago, t became a debate that captured the popuar
magnaton. That's what rased the stakes and changed the
compexon of the batte. From beng a fght over the fate of a
rver vaey t began to rase doubts about an entre potca
system. What s at ssue now s the very nature of our
democracy. Who owns ths and? Who owns ts rvers? Its forests?
Its fsh? These are huge questons. They are beng taken hugey
serousy by the State. They are beng answered n one voce by
every nsttuton at ts command - the army, the poce, the
bureaucracy, the courts. And not |ust answered, but answered
unambguousy, n btter, bruta ways.
For the peope of the vaey, the fact that the stakes were rased
to ths degree has meant that ther most effectve weapon -
specfc facts about specfc ssues n ths specfc vaey - has
been bunted by the debate on the bg ssues. The basc premse
of the argument has been nfated unt t has burst nto bts that
have, over tme, bobbed away. Occasonay a dsconnected pece
of the puzze foats by - an emotonay charged account of the
Government's caous treatment of dspaced peope; an outburst
at how the Narmada Bachao Andoan (NBA), 'a handfu of
actvsts', s hodng the naton to ransom; a ega correspondent
reportng on the progress of the NBA's wrt petton n the
Supreme Court.
Though there has been a far amount of wrtng on the sub|ect,
most of t s for a 'speca nterest' readershp. News reports tend
to be about soated aspects of the pro|ect. Government
documents are cassfed as 'Secret'. I thnk t's far to say that
pubc percepton of the ssue s pretty crude and s dvded
crudey, nto two categores:
On the one hand, t s seen as a war between modern, ratona,
progressve forces of 'Deveopment' versus a sort of neo-Luddte
mpuse - an rratona, emotona 'Ant-Deveopment' resstance,
fueed by an arcadan, pre-ndustra dream.
On the other, as a Nehru vs Gandh contest. Ths fts the whoe
sorry busness out of the bog of decet, es, fase promses and
ncreasngy successfu propaganda (whch s what t's reay
about) and confers on t a fase egtmacy. It makes out that both
sdes have the Greater Good of the Naton n mnd - but merey
dsagree about the means by whch to acheve t.
Both nterpretatons put a tred spn on the dspute. Both str up
emotons that coud the partcuar facts of ths partcuar story.
Both are ndcatons of how urgenty we need new heroes, new
knds of heroes, and how we've overused our od ones (ke we
overbow our bowers).
The Nehru vs Gandh argument pushes ths very contemporary
ssue back nto an od botte. Nehru and Gandh were generous
men. Ther paradgms for deveopment are based on assumptons
of nherent moraty. Nehru's on the paterna, protectve moraty
of the Sovet-stye Centrased State. Gandh's on the nurturng,
materna moraty of romantcsed vage Repubcs. Both woud
work perfecty, f ony we were better human bengs. If ony we a
wore khad and suppressed our base urges - sex, shoppng,
dodgng spnnng essons and beng unknd to the ess fortunate.
Ffty years down the ne, t's safe to say that we haven't made
the grade. We haven't even come cose. We need an updated
nsurance pan aganst our own basc natures.
It's possbe that as a naton we've exhausted our quota of heroes
for ths century, but whe we wat for shny new ones to come
aong, we have to mt the damage. We have to support our
sma heroes. (Of these we have many. Many.) We have to fght
specfc wars n specfc ways. Who knows, perhaps that's what
the twenty-frst century has n store for us. The dsmantng of the
Bg. Bg bombs, bg dams, bg deooges, bg contradctons, bg
countres, bg wars, bg heroes, bg mstakes. Perhaps t w be
the Century of the Sma. Perhaps rght now, ths very mnute,
there's a sma god up n heaven readyng hersef for us. Coud t
be? Coud t possby be? It sounds fnger-ckng good to me.
I was drawn to the vaey because I sensed that the fght for the
Narmada had entered a newer, sadder phase. I went because
wrters are drawn to stores the way vutures are drawn to ks.
My motve was not compasson. It was sheer greed. I was rght. I
found a story there.
And what a story t s.
"Peope say that the Sardar Sarovar Dam s an expensve pro|ect.
But t s brngng drnkng water to mons. Ths s our fene.
Can you put a prce on ths? Does the ar we breathe have a
prce? We w ve. We w drnk. We w brng gory to the state
of Gu|arat."
- Urmaben Pate, wfe of Gu|arat Chef Mnster Chmanbha
Pate, speakng at a pubc ray n Deh n 1993.
"We w request you to move from your houses after the dam
comes up. If you move t w be good. Otherwse we sha reease
the waters and drown you a."
- Morar| Desa, speakng at a pubc meetng n the submergence
zone of the Pong Dam n 1961.
"Why ddn't they |ust poson us? Then we woudn't have to ve n
ths sht-hoe and the Government coud have survved aone wth
ts precous dam a to tsef."
In the ffty years snce Independence, after Nehru's famous
"Dams are the Tempes of Modern Inda" speech (one that he
grew to regret n hs own fetme), hs footsoders threw
themseves nto the busness of budng dams wth unnatura
fervour. Dam-budng grew to be equated wth Naton-budng.
Ther enthusasm aone shoud have been reason enough to make
one suspcous. Not ony dd they bud new dams and new
rrgaton systems, they took contro of sma, tradtona systems
that had been managed by vage communtes for thousands of
years, and aowed them to atrophy. To compensate the oss, the
Government but more and more dams. Bg ones, tte ones, ta
ones, short ones. The resut of ts exertons s that Inda now
boasts of beng the word's thrd argest dam buder. Accordng
to the Centra Water Commsson, we have three thousand sx
hundred dams that quafy as Bg Dams, three thousand three
hundred of them but after Independence. One thousand more
are under constructon. Yet one-ffth of our popuaton - 200
mon peope - does not have safe drnkng water and two-thrds
- 600 mon - ack basc santaton.
Bg Dams started we, but have ended bady. There was a tme
when everybody oved them, everybody had them - the
Communsts, Captasts, Chrstans, Musms, Hndus, Buddhsts.
There was a tme when Bg Dams moved men to poetry. Not any
onger. A over the word there s a movement growng aganst
Bg Dams. In the Frst Word they're beng de-commssoned,
bown up. The fact that they do more harm than good s no onger
|ust con|ecture. Bg Dams are obsoete. They're uncoo. They're
undemocratc. They're a Government's way of accumuatng
authorty (decdng who w get how much water and who w
grow what where). They're a guaranteed way of takng a farmer's
wsdom away from hm. They're a brazen means of takng water,
and and rrgaton away from the poor and gftng t to the rch.
Ther reservors dspace huge popuatons of peope, eavng
them homeess and desttute. Ecoogcay, they're n the
doghouse. They ay the earth to waste. They cause foods, water-
oggng, santy, they spread dsease. There s mountng
evdence that nks Bg Dams to earthquakes.
Bg Dams haven't reay ved up to ther roe as the monuments
of Modern Cvsaton, embems of Man's ascendancy over
Nature. Monuments are supposed to be tmeess, but dams have
an a-too-fnte fetme. They ast ony as ong as t takes Nature
to f them wth st. It's common knowedge now that Bg Dams
do the opposte of what ther Pubcty Peope say they do - the
Loca Pan for Natona Gan myth has been bown wde open.
For a these reasons, the dam-budng ndustry n the Frst Word
s n troube and out of work. So t's exported to the Thrd Word n
the name of Deveopment Ad, aong wth ther other waste ke
od weapons, superannuated arcraft carrers and banned
pestcdes.
On the one hand, the Indan Government, every Indan
Government, ras sef-rghteousy aganst the Frst Word, and on
the other, actuay pays to receve ther gft-wrapped garbage.
Ad s |ust another praetoran busness enterprse. Lke
Coonasm was. It has destroyed most of Afrca. Bangadesh s
reeng from ts mnstratons. We know a ths, n numbng deta.
Yet n Inda our eaders wecome t wth savsh smes (and make
nucear bombs to shore up ther faggng sef-esteem).
Over the ast ffty years Inda has spent Rs.80,000 crores on the
rrgaton sector aone. Yet there are more drought-prone areas
and more food-prone areas today than there were n 1947.
Despte the dsturbng evdence of rrgaton dsasters, dam-
nduced foods and rapd dsenchantment wth the Green
Revouton (decnng yeds, degraded and), the government has
not commssoned a post-pro|ect evauaton of a snge one of ts
3,600 dams to gauge whether or not t has acheved what t set
out to acheve, whether or not the (aways phenomena) costs
were |ustfed, or even what the costs actuay were.
The Government of Inda has detaed fgures for how many
mon tonnes of foodgran or edbe os the country produces
and how much more we produce now than we dd n 1947. It can
te you how much bauxte s mned n a year or what the tota
surface area of the Natona Hghways adds up to. It's possbe to
access mnute-to-mnute nformaton about the stock exchange
or the vaue of the rupee n the word market. We know how
many crcket matches we've ost on a Frday n Shar|ah. It's not
hard to fnd out how many graduates Inda produced, or how
many men had vasectomes n any gven year. But the
Government of Inda does not have a fgure for the number of
peope that have been dspaced by dams or sacrfced n other
ways at the atars of 'Natona Progress'. Isn't ths astoundng?
How can you measure Progress f you don't know what t costs
and who pad for t? How can the 'market' put a prce on thngs -
food, cothes, eectrcty, runnng water - when t doesn't take nto
account the rea cost of producton?
Accordng to a detaed study of 54 Large Dams done by the
Indan Insttute of Pubc Admnstraton, the average number of
peope dspaced by a Large Dam s 44,182. Admttedy, 54 dams
out of 3,300 s not a bg enough sampe. But snce t's a we
have, et's try and do some rough arthmetc. A frst draft. To err
on the sde of cauton, et's have the number of peope. Or, et's
err on the sde of abundant cauton and take an average of |ust
10,000 peope per Large Dam. It's an mprobaby ow fgure, I
know, but ...never mnd. Whp out your cacuators. 3,300 x
10,000 =
33 mon. That's what t works out to. Thrty-three mon peope.
Dspaced by bg dams aone n the ast ffty years What about
those that have been dspaced by the thousands of other
Deveopment Pro|ects? At a prvate ecture, N.C. Saxena,
Secretary to the Pannng Commsson, sad he thought the
number was n the regon of 50 mon (of whch 40 mon were
dspaced by dams). We daren't say so, because t sn't offca. It
sn't offca because we daren't say so. You have to murmur t for
fear of beng accused of hyperboe. You have to whsper t to
yoursef, because t reay does sound unbeevabe. It can't be,
I've been teng mysef. I must have got the zeroes mudded. It
can't be true. I barey have the courage to say t aoud. To run the
rsk of soundng ke a 'sxtes hppe droppng acd ("It's the
System, man!"), or a paranod schzophrenc wth a persecuton
compex. But t s the System, man. What ese can t be?
Ffty mon peope.
Go on, Government, qubbe. Bargan. Beat t down. Say
somethng.
I fee ke someone who's |ust stumbed on a mass grave.
_
Ffty mon s more than the popuaton of Gu|arat. Amost three
tmes the popuaton of Austraa. More than three tmes the
number of refugees that Partton created n Inda. Ten tmes the
number of Paestnan refugees. The Western word today s
convused over the future of one mon peope who have fed
from Kosovo.
A huge percentage of the dspaced are trba peope (57.6 per
cent n the case of the Sardar Sarovar Dam). Incude Dats and
the fgure becomes obscene. Accordng to the Commssoner for
Schedued Castes and Trbes, t's about 60 per cent. If you
consder that trba peope account for ony eght per cent, and
Dats ffteen per cent, of Inda's popuaton, t opens up a whoe
other dmenson to the story. The ethnc 'otherness' of ther
vctms takes some of the pressure off the Naton Buders. It's
ke havng an expense account. Someone ese pays the bs.
Peope from another country. Another word. Inda's poorest
peope are subsdsng the festyes of her rchest.
Dd I hear someone say somethng about the word's bggest
democracy?
What has happened to a these mons of peope? Where are
they now? How do they earn a vng? Nobody reay knows. (Last
month's papers had an account of how trba peope dspaced by
the Nagar|unasagar Dam Pro|ect are seng ther babes to
foregn adopton agences. The Government ntervened and put
the babes n two pubc hosptas where sx babes ded of
negect.) When t comes to Rehabtaton, the Government's
prortes are cear. Inda does not have a Natona Rehabtaton
Pocy. Accordng to the Land Acquston Act of 1894 (amended n
1984), the Government s not egay bound to provde a
dspaced person anythng but a cash compensaton. Imagne
that. A cash compensaton, to be pad by an Indan government
offca to an terate trba man (the women get nothng) n a
and where even the postman demands a tp for a devery! Most
trba peope have no forma tte to ther and and therefore
cannot cam compensaton anyway. Most trba peope, or et's
say most sma farmers, have as much use for money as a
Supreme Court |udge has for a bag of fertzer.
The mons of dspaced peope don't exst anymore. When
hstory s wrtten they won't be n t. Not even as statstcs. Some
of them have subsequenty been dspaced three and four tmes -
a dam, an artery proof range, another dam, a uranum mne, a
power pro|ect. Once they start rong, there's no restng pace.
The great ma|orty s eventuay absorbed nto sums on the
perphery of our great ctes, where t coaesces nto an mmense
poo of cheap constructon abour (that buds more pro|ects that
dspace more peope). True, they're not beng annhated or
taken to gas chambers, but I can warrant that the quaty of ther
accommodaton s worse than n any concentraton camp of the
Thrd Rech. They're not captve, but they re-defne the meanng
of berty.
And st the nghtmare doesn't end. They contnue to be uprooted
even from ther hesh hoves by government budozers that fan
out on cean-up mssons whenever eectons are comfortngy far
away and the urban rch get twtchy about hygene. In ctes ke
Deh, they run the rsk of beng shot by the poce for shttng n
pubc paces - ke three sum-dweers were, not more than two
years ago.
In the French Canadan wars of the 1770s, Lord Amherst
extermnated most of Canada's Natve Indans by offerng them
bankets nfested wth the sma-pox vrus. Two centures on, we
of the Rea Inda have found ess obvous ways of achevng
smar ends.
The mons of dspaced peope n Inda are nothng but refugees
of an unacknowedged war. And we, ke the ctzens of Whte
Amerca and French Canada and Hter's Germany, are condonng
t by ookng away. Why? Because we're tod that t's beng done
for the sake of the Greater Common Good. That t's beng done n
the name of Progress, n the name of Natona Interest (whch, of
course, s paramount). Therefore gady, unquestonngy, amost
gratefuy, we beeve what we're tod. We beeve that t benefts
us to beeve.
Aow me to shake your fath. Put your hand n mne and et me
ead you through the maze. Do ths, because t's mportant that
you understand. If you fnd reason to dsagree, by a means take
the other sde. But pease don't gnore t, don't ook away.
It sn't an easy tae to te. It's fu of numbers and expanatons.
Numbers used to make my eyes gaze over. Not any more. Not
snce I began to foow the drecton n whch they pont.
Trust me. There's a story here.
It's true that Inda has progressed. It's true that n 1947, when
Coonasm formay ended, Inda was food-defct. In 1950 we
produced 51 mon tonnes of foodgran. Today we produce cose
to 200 mon tonnes.
It's true that n 1995 the state granares were overfowng wth 30
mon tonnes of unsod gran. It's aso true that at the same
tme, 40 per cent of Inda's popuaton - more than 350 mon
peope - were vng beow the poverty ne. That's more than the
country's popuaton n 1947.
Indans are too poor to buy the food ther country produces.
Indans are beng forced to grow the knds of food they can't
afford to eat themseves. Look at what happened n Kaahand
Dstrct n Western Orssa, best known for ts starvaton deaths. In
the drought of '96, peope ded of starvaton (16 accordng to the
Government, over a 100 accordng to the press). Yet that same
year rce producton n Kaahand was hgher than the natona
average! Rce was exported from Kaahand Dstrct to the Centre.
Certany Inda has progressed but most of ts peope haven't.
Our eaders say that we must have nucear msses to protect us
from the threat of Chna and Pakstan. But who w protect us
from ourseves?
What knd of country s ths? Who owns t? Who runs t? What's
gong on?
It's tme to sp a few State Secrets. To puncture the myth about
the neffcent, bumbng, corrupt, but utmatey gena,
essentay democratc, Indan State. Careessness cannot account
for ffty mon dsappeared peope. Nor can Karma. Let's not
deude ourseves. There s method here, precse, reentess and
one hundred per cent man-made.
The Indan State s not a State that has faed. It s a State that
has succeeded mpressvey n what t set out to do. It has been
ruthessy effcent n the way t has approprated Inda's
resources - ts and, ts water, ts forests, ts fsh, ts meat, ts
eggs, ts ar - and re-dstrbuted t to a favoured few (n return, no
doubt, for a few favours). It s superby accompshed n the art of
protectng ts cadres of pad-up ete. Consummate n ts methods
of puversng those who nconvenence ts ntentons. But ts
fnest feat of a s the way t acheves a ths and emerges
smeng nce. The way t manages to keep ts secrets, to contan
nformaton that vtay concerns the day ves of one bon
peope, n government fes, accessbe ony to the keepers of the
fame - Mnsters, bureaucrats, state engneers, defence
strategsts. Of course, we make t easy for them, we, ts
benefcares. We take care not to dg too deep. We don't reay
want to know the grsy detas.
Thanks to us, Independence came (and went), eectons come
and go, but there has been no shuffng of the deck. On the
contrary, the od order has been consecrated, the rft fortfed.
We, the Ruers, won't pause to ook up from our heavng tabe.
We don't seem to know that the resources we're feastng on are
fnte and rapdy depetng. There's cash n the bank, but soon
there' be nothng eft to buy wth t. The food's runnng out n the
ktchen. And the servants haven't eaten yet. Actuay, the
servants stopped eatng a ong tme ago.
Inda ves n her vages, we're tod, n every other
sanctmonous pubc speech. That's busht. It's |ust another fg
eaf from the Government's bugng wardrobe. Inda doesn't ve
n her vages. Inda des n her vages. Inda gets kcked around
n her vages. Inda ves n her ctes. Inda's vages ve ony to
serve her ctes. Her vagers are her ctzens' vassas and for that
reason must be controed and kept ave, but ony |ust.
Ths mpresson we have of an overstretched State, struggng to
cope wth the sheer weght and scae of ts probems, s a
dangerous one. The fact s that t's creatng the probem. It's a
gant poverty-producng machne, masterfu n ts methods of
pttng the poor aganst the very poor, of fngng crumbs to the
wretched, so that they dsspate ther energes fghtng each
other, whe peace (and advertsng) regns n the Master's
Lodgngs.
Unt ths process s recognsed for what t s, unt t s addressed
and attacked, eectons - however fercey they're contested - w
contnue to be mock battes that serve ony to further entrench
unspeakabe nequty. Democracy (our verson of t) w contnue
to be the benevoent mask behnd whch a pestence fourshes
unchaenged. On a scae that w make od wars and past
msfortunes ook ke controed aboratory experments. Aready
ffty mon peope have been fed nto the Deveopment M and
have emerged as ar-condtoners and popcorn and rayon suts -
subsdsed ar-condtoners and popcorn and rayon suts (f we
must have these nce thngs, and they are nce, at east we
shoud be made to pay for them).
There's a hoe n the fag that needs mendng.
It's a sad thng to have to say, but as ong as we have fath - we
have no hope. To hope, we have to break the fath. We have to
fght specfc wars n specfc ways and we have to fght to wn.
Lsten then, to the story of the Narmada Vaey. Understand t.
And, f you wsh, enst. Who knows, t may ead to magc.
The Narmada wes up on the pateau of Amarkantak n the
Shahdo dstrct of Madhya Pradesh, then wnds ts way through
1,300 kometres of beautfu broad-eaved forest and perhaps the
most ferte agrcutura and n Inda. Twenty-fve mon peope
ve n the rver vaey, nked to the ecosystem and to each other
by an ancent, ntrcate web of nterdependence (and, no doubt,
expotaton). Though the Narmada has been targeted for "water
resource deveopment" for more than ffty years now, the reason
t has, unt recenty, evaded beng captured and dsmembered s
because t fows through three states - Madhya Pradesh,
Maharashtra and Gu|arat. (Nnety per cent of the rver fows
through Madhya Pradesh; t merey skrts the northern border of
Maharashtra, then fows through Gu|arat for about 180 km before
emptyng nto the Araban sea at Bharuch.)
As eary as 1946, pans had been afoot to dam the rver at Gora
n Gu|arat. In 1961, Nehru ad the foundaton stone for a 49.8-
metre-hgh dam - the mdget progentor of the Sardar Sarovar.
Around the same tme, the Survey of Inda drew up new,
modernsed topographca maps of the rver basn. The dam
panners n Gu|arat studed the new maps and decded that t
woud be more proftabe to bud a much bgger dam. But ths
meant hammerng out an agreement frst wth neghbourng
states.
The three states bckered and baked but faed to agree on a
water-sharng formua. Eventuay, n 1969, the Centra
Government set up the Narmada Water Dsputes Trbuna. It took
the Trbuna ten years to announce ts Award. The peope whose
ves were gong to be devastated were nether nformed nor
consuted nor heard.
To apporton shares n the waters, the frst, most basc thng the
Trbuna had to do was to fnd out how much water there was n
the rver. Usuay ths can ony be estmated accuratey f there s
at east forty years of recorded data on the voume of actua fow
n the rver. Snce ths was not avaabe, they decded to
extrapoate from ranfa data. They arrved at a fgure of 27.22
MAF (mon acre feet). Ths fgure s the statstca bedrock of the
Narmada Vaey Pro|ects. We are st vng wth ts egacy. It
more or ess determnes the overa desgn of the Pro|ects - the
heght, ocaton and number of dams. By nference, t determnes
the cost of the Pro|ects, how much area w be submerged, how
many peope w be dspaced and what the benefts w be. In
1992 actua observed fow data for the Narmada whch was now
avaabe for 44 years (1948 -1992) showed that the yed from
the rver was ony 22.69 MAF - eghteen per cent ess! The
Centra Water Commsson admts that there s ess water n the
Narmada than had prevousy been assumed. The Government of
Inda says: It may be noted that cause II (of the Decson of the
Trbuna) reatng to determnaton of dependabe fow as 28 MAF
s non-revewabe.(!)
In other words, the Narmada s egay bound by human decree to
produce as much water as the Government of Inda commands t
to produce.
Its proponents boast that the Narmada Vaey Pro|ect s the most
ambtous rver vaey pro|ect ever conceved n human hstory.
They pan to bud 3,200 dams that w reconsttute the Narmada
and her 41 trbutares nto a seres of step reservors - an
mmense starcase of amenabe water. Of these, 30 w be ma|or
dams, 135 medum and the rest sma. Two of the ma|or dams
w be mut-purpose mega dams. The Sardar Sarovar n Gu|arat
and the Narmada Sagar n Madhya Pradesh w, between them,
hod more water than any other reservor on the Indan sub-
contnent.
Whchever way you ook at t, the Narmada Vaey Deveopment
Pro|ect s Bg. It w ater the ecoogy of the entre rver basn of
one of Inda's bggest rvers. For better or for worse, t w affect
the ves of twenty-fve mon peope who ve n the vaey. Yet,
even before the Mnstry of Envronment ceared the pro|ect, the
Word Bank offered to fnance the ynch-pn of the pro|ect - the
Sardar Sarovar Dam (whose reservor dspaces peope n Madhya
Pradesh and Maharashtra, but whose benefts go to Gu|arat). The
Bank was ready wth ts cheque-book before any costs were
computed, before any studes had been done, before anybody
had any dea of what the human cost or the envronmenta
mpact of the dam woud be!
_
Note: Incudes assstance from both the Internatona Bank for
Reconstructon and Deveopment (IBRD) and the Internatona
Deveopment Assocaton (IDA); Detas may not add to totas
because of roundng.
Source: Word Bank Annua Reports for varous years.
The 450-mon-doar oan for the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects was
sanctoned and n pace n 1985. Mnstry of Envronment
cearance for the pro|ect came ony n 1987! Tak about
enthusasm. It fary borders on evangesm. Can anybody care so
much?
Why were they so keen?
Between 1947 and 1994 the Bank receved 6,000 appcatons for
oans from around the word. They ddn't turn down a snge one.
Not a snge one. Terms ke 'Movng money' and 'Meetng oan
targets' suddeny begn to make sense.
Today, Inda s n a stuaton where t pays back more money to
the Bank n nterest and repayments of prncpa than t receves
from t. We are forced to ncur new debts n order to be abe to
repay our od ones. Accordng to the Word Bank Annua Report,
ast year (1998), after the arthmetc, Inda pad the Bank 478
mon doars more than t receved. Over the ast fve years ('93
to '98) Inda pad the Bank 1.475 bon doars more than t
receved. The reatonshp between us s exacty ke the
reatonshp between a andess abourer steeped n debt and the
oca Bana - t s an affectonate reatonshp, the poor man oves
hs Bana because he's aways there when he's needed. It's not
for nothng that we ca the word a Goba Vage. The ony
dfference between the andess abourer and the Government of
Inda s that one uses the money to survve. The other |ust
funnes t nto the prvate coffers of ts offcers and agents,
pushng the country nto an economc bondage that t may never
overcome.
The nternatona Dam Industry s worth 20 bon doars a year.
If you foow the tras of bg dams the word over, wherever you
go - Chna, |apan, Maaysa, Thaand, Braz, Guatemaa - you'
rub up aganst the same story, encounter the same actors: the
Iron Trange (dam-|argon for the nexus between potcans,
bureaucrats and dam constructon companes), the racketeers
who ca themseves Internatona Envronmenta Consutants
(who are usuay drecty empoyed by or subsdares of dam-
buders), and, more often than not, the frendy, neghbourhood
Word Bank. You' grow to recognse the same nfated rhetorc,
the same nobe 'Peopes' Dam' sogans, the same swft, bruta
represson that foows the frst sgn of cv nsubordnaton. (Of
ate, especay after ts experence n the Narmada Vaey, The
Bank s more cautous about choosng the countres n whch t
fnances pro|ects that nvove mass dspacement. At present,
Chna s ther Most Favoured cent. It's the great rony of our
tmes - Amercan ctzens protest the massacre n Tananmen
Square, but the Bank w use ther money to fund the Three
Gorges Dam n Chna whch s gong to dspace 1.3 mon
peope.)
It's a skfu crcus and the acrobats know each other we.
Occasonay they' swap parts - a bureaucrat w |on The Bank,
a Banker w surface as a Pro|ect Consutant. At the end of pay, a
huge percentage of what's caed 'Deveopment Ad' s re-
channeed back to the countres t came from, masqueradng as
equpment cost or consutants' fees or saares to the agences'
own staff. Often 'Ad' s openy 'ted'. (As n the case of the
|apanese oan for the Sardar Sarovar Dam, ted to a contract for
purchasng turbnes from Sumtomo Corporaton.) Sometmes the
connectons are more seazy. In 1993 Brtan fnanced the Pergau
Dam n Maaysa wth a subsdsed oan of 234 mon pounds,
despte an Overseas Deveopment Admnstraton report that sad
that the dam woud be a 'bad buy' for Maaysa. It ater emerged
that the oan was offered to 'encourage' Maaysa to sgn a 1.3-
bon-pound contract to buy Brtsh Arms.
In 1994, U.K. consutants earned 2.5 bon doars on overseas
contracts. The second bggest sector of the market after Pro|ect
Management was wrtng what are caed EIAs (Envronmenta
Impact Assessments). In the Deveopment racket, the rues are
pretty smpe. If you get nvted by a Government to wrte an EIA
for a bg dam pro|ect and you pont out a probem (say, for
nstance, you qubbe about the amount of water avaabe n a
rver, or, God forbd, you suggest that perhaps the human costs
are too hgh), then you're hstory. You're an OOWC. An Out Of
Work Consutant. And Oops! There goes your Range Rover. There
goes your hoday n Tuscany. There goes your chdren's prvate
boardng schoo. There's good money n poverty. Pus Perks.
In keepng wth Bg Dam tradton, concurrent wth the
constructon of the 138.68-metre-hgh Sardar Sarovar Dam began
the eaborate Government pantomme of conductng studes to
estmate the actua pro|ect costs and the mpact t woud have on
peope and the envronment. The Word Bank partcpated whoe-
heartedy n the charade - occasonay they kntted ther brows
and rased feebe requests for more nformaton on ssues ke the
resettement and rehabtaton of what they ca PAPs - Pro|ect
Affected Persons. (They hep, these acronyms, they manage to
mutate musce and bood nto cod statstcs. PAPs soon cease to
be peope.)
The merest crumbs of nformaton satsfed The Bank and they
proceeded wth the pro|ect. The mpct, unwrtten but fary
obvous understandng between the concerned agences was that
whatever the costs - economc, envronmenta or human - the
pro|ect woud go ahead. They woud |ustfy t as they went aong.
They knew fu we that eventuay, n a courtroom or to a
commttee, no argument works as we as a Fat Accomp. (M'
ord, the country s osng two crores a day due to the deay.) The
Government refers to the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects as the 'Most
Studed Pro|ect n Inda', yet the game goes somethng ke ths:
When the Trbuna frst announced ts Award, and the Gu|arat
Government announced ts pan of how t was gong to use ts
share of water, there was no menton of drnkng water for
vages n Kutch and Saurashtra, the ard areas of Gu|arat. When
the pro|ect ran nto potca troube, the Government suddeny
dscovered the emotve power of Thrst. Suddeny, quenchng the
thrst of parched throats n Kutch and Saurashtra became the
whoe pont of the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects. (Never mnd that
water from two rvers - the Sabarmat and the Mah, both of whch
are mes coser to Kutch and Saurashtra than the Narmada, have
been dammed and dverted to Ahmedabad, Mehsana and Kheda.
Nether Kutch nor Saurashtra has seen a drop of t.) Offcay the
number of peope who w be provded drnkng water by the
Sardar Sarovar Cana fuctuates from 28 mon (1983) to 32.5
mon (1989) - nce touch, the decma pont! - to 40 mon
(1992) and down to 25 mon (1993).
The number of vages that woud receve drnkng water was
zero n 1979, 4,719 n the eary eghtes, 7,234 n 1990 and 8,215
n 1991. When chaenged, the Government admtted that these
fgures for 1991 ncuded 236 unnhabted vages!
Every aspect of the pro|ect s approached n ths amost cavaer
manner, as f t's a famy board game. Even when t concerns the
ves and futures of vast numbers of peope.
In 1979 the number of fames that woud be dspaced by the
Sardar Sarovar reservor was estmated to be a tte over 6,000.
In 1987 t grew to 12,000. In 1991 t surged to 27,000. In 1992
the Government decared that 40,000 fames woud be affected.
Today, t hovers between 40,000 and 41,500. (Of course, even
ths s an absurd fgure, because the reservor sn't the ony thng
that dspaces peope. Accordng to the NBA the actua fgure s
85,000 fames - about haf a mon peope.)
The estmated cost of the pro|ect bounced up from Rs.6,000
crores to Rs.20,000 crores (offcay). The NBA says that t w
cost Rs.40,000 crores. (Haf the entre rrgaton budget of the
whoe country over the ast ffty years.)
The Government cams the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects w produce
1450 Mega Watts of power. The thng about mut-purpose dams
ke the Sardar Sarovar s that ther 'purposes' (rrgaton, power
producton and food-contro) confct wth each other. Irrgaton
uses up the water you need to produce power. Food contro
requres you to keep the reservor empty durng the monsoon
months to dea wth an antcpated surfet of water. And f there's
no surfet, you're eft wth an empty dam. And ths defeats the
purpose of rrgaton, whch s to store the monsoon water. It's
ke the rdde of tryng to ford a rver wth a fox, a chcken and a
bag of gran. The resut of these mutuay confctng ams,
studes say, s that when the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects are
competed, and the scheme s fuy functona, t w end up
producng ony 3 per cent of the power that ts panners say t
w. 50 Mega Watts.
In an od war, everybody has an axe to grnd. So how do you pck
your way through these cams and counter-cams? How do you
decde whose estmate s more reabe? One way s to take a ook
at the track record of Indan Dams.
The Barg Dam near |abapur was the frst dam on the Narmada
to be competed (1990). It cost ten tmes more than was
budgeted and submerged three tmes more and than the
engneers sad t woud. About 70,000 peope from 101 vages
were supposed to be dspaced, but when they fed the reservor
(wthout warnng anybody), 162 vages were submerged. Some
of the resettement stes but by the Government were
submerged as we. Peope were fushed out ke rats from the
and they had ved on for centures. They savaged what they
coud, and watched ther houses beng washed away. 114,000
peope were dspaced. There was no rehabtaton pocy. Some
were gven meagre cash compensatons. Many got absoutey
nothng. A few were moved to government rehabtaton stes.
The ste at Gorakhpur s, accordng to Government pubcty, an
'dea vage'. Between 1990 and 1992, fve peope ded of
starvaton there. The rest ether returned to ve egay n the
forests near the reservor, or moved to sums n |abapur. The
Barg Dam rrgates ony as much and as t submerged n the frst
pace - and ony 5 per cent of the area that ts panners camed t
woud rrgate. Even that s water-ogged.
Tme and agan, t's the same story - the Andhra Pradesh
Irrgaton II scheme camed t woud dspace 63,000 peope.
When competed, t dspaced 150,000 peope. The Gu|arat
Medum Irrgaton II scheme dspaced 140,000 peope nstead of
63,600. The revsed estmate of the number of peope to be
dspaced by the Upper Krshna rrgaton pro|ect n Karnataka s
240,000 aganst ts nta cams of dspacng ony 20,000.
These are Word Bank fgures. Not the NBA's. Imagne what ths
does to our conservatve estmate of thrty-three mon.
Constructon work on the Sardar Sarovar Dam ste, whch had
contnued sporadcay snce 1961, began n earnest n 1988. At
the tme, nobody, not the Government, nor the Word Bank were
aware that a woman caed Medha Patkar had been wanderng
through the vages sated to be submerged, askng peope
whether they had any dea of the pans the Government had n
store for them. When she arrved n the vaey a those years
ago, opposng the constructon of the dam was the furthest thng
from her mnd. Her chef concern was that dspaced vagers
shoud be resetted n an equtabe, humane way. It graduay
became cear to her that the Government's ntentons towards
them were far from honourabe. By 1986 word had spread and
each state had a peopes' organsaton that questoned the
promses about resettement and rehabtaton that were beng
banded about by Government offcas. It was ony some years
ater that the fu extent of the horror - the mpact that the dams
woud have, both on the peope who were to be dspaced and the
peope who were supposed to beneft - began to surface. The
Narmada Vaey Deveopment Pro|ect came to be known as
Inda's Greatest Panned Envronmenta Dsaster. The varous
peopes' organsatons massed nto a snge organsaton and the
Narmada Bachao Andoan - the extraordnary NBA - was born.
In 1988 the NBA formay caed for a work on the Narmada
Vaey Deveopment Pro|ects to be stopped. Peope decared that
they woud drown f they had to, but woud not move from ther
homes. Wthn two years, the strugge had burgeoned and had
support from other resstance movements. In September 1989,
some 50,000 peope gathered n the Vaey at Harsud from a
over Inda to pedge to fght Destructve Deveopment. The dam
ste and ts ad|acent areas, aready under the Indan Offca
Secrets Act, was camped under Secton 144 whch prohbts the
gatherng of groups of more than fve peope. The whoe area was
turned nto a poce camp. Despte the barrcades, one year ater,
on the 28th of September 1990, thousands of vagers made
ther way on foot and by boat to a tte town caed Badwan, n
Madhya Pradesh, to reterate ther pedge to drown rather than
agree to move from ther homes. News of the peope's opposton
to the Pro|ects spread to other countres. The |apanese arm of
Frends of the Earth mounted a campagn n |apan that
succeeded n gettng the Government of |apan to wthdraw ts 27-
bon-yen oan to fnance the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects. (The
contract for the turbnes st hods.) Once the |apanese wthdrew,
nternatona pressure from varous Envronmenta Actvst groups
who supported the strugge began to mount on the Word Bank.
Ths, of course, ed to an escaaton of represson n the vaey.
Government pocy, descrbed by a partcuary artcuate
Mnster, was to 'food the vaey wth khakh'.
On Chrstmas Day n 1990, some 6,000 men and women waked
over a hundred kometres, carryng ther provsons and ther
beddng, accompanyng a seven-member sacrfca squad who
had resoved to ay down ther ves for the rver. They were
stopped at Ferkuwa on the Gu|arat border by battaons of armed
poce and crowds of peope from the cty of Baroda, many of
whom were hred, some of whom perhaps genuney beeved
that the Sardar Sarovar was 'Gu|arat's fene'. It was an
nterestng confrontaton. Mdde Cass Urban Inda versus a
Rura, predomnanty Trba Army. The marchng peope
demanded they be aowed to cross the border and wak to the
dam ste. The poce refused them passage. To stress ther
commtment to non-voence, each vager had hs or her hands
bound together. One by one, they defed the battaons of poce.
They were beaten, arrested and dragged nto watng trucks n
whch they were drven off and dumped some mes away, n the
wderness. They |ust waked back and began a over agan.
The confrontaton contnued for amost two weeks. Fnay, on the
7th of |anuary 1991, the seven members of the sacrfca squad
announced that they were gong on an ndefnte hunger strke.
Tenson rose to dangerous eves. The Indan and Internatona
Press, TV camera crews and documentary fm-makers, were
present n force. Reports appeared n the papers amost every
day. Envronmenta Actvsts stepped up the pressure n
Washngton. Eventuay, acutey embarrassed by the gare of
unfavourabe meda coverage, the Word Bank announced that t
woud nsttute an Independent Revew of the Sardar Sarovar
Pro|ects - unprecedented n the hstory of Bank Behavour.
When the news reached the vaey, t was receved wth dstrust
and uncertanty. The peope had no reason to trust the Word
Bank. But st, t was a vctory of sorts. The vagers,
understandaby upset by the frghtenng deteroraton n the
condton of ther comrades who had not eaten for 22 days,
peaded wth them to ca off the fast. On the 28th of |anuary, the
fast at Ferkuwa was caed off, and the brave, ragged army
returned to ther homes shoutng "Hamara Gaon Men Hamara
Ra|!" (Our Rue n Our Vages).
There has been no army qute ke ths one, anywhere ese n the
word. In other countres - Chna (Charman Mao got a Bg Dam
for hs 77th brthday), Braz, Maaysa, Guatemaa, Paraguay -
every sgn of revot has been snuffed out amost before t began.
Here n Inda, t goes on and on. Of course, the State woud ke to
take credt for ths too. It woud ke us to be gratefu to t for not
crushng the movement competey, for aowng t to exst. After
a what s a ths, f not a sgn of a heathy functonng
democracy n whch the State has to ntervene when ts peope
have dfferences of opnon?
I suppose that's one way of ookng at t. (Is ths my cue to crnge
and say 'Thankyou, thankyou, for aowng me to wrte the thngs
I wrte?')
We don't need to be gratefu to the State for permttng us to
protest. We can thank ourseves for that. It s we who have
nssted on these rghts. It s we who have refused to surrender
them. If we have anythng to be truy proud of as a peope, t s
ths.
The strugge n the Narmada Vaey ves, despte the State.
The Indan State makes war n devous ways. Apart from ts
apparent benevoence, ts other bg weapon s ts abty to wat.
To ro wth the punches. To wear out the opposton. The State
never tres, never ages, never needs a rest. It runs an endess
reay.
But fghtng peope tre. They fa , they grow od. Even the
young age prematurey. For twenty years now, snce the
Trbuna's award, the ragged army n the vaey has ved wth the
fear of evcton. For twenty years, n most areas there has been
no sgn of 'deveopment' - no roads, no schoos, no wes, no
medca hep. For twenty years, t has borne the stgma 'sated for
submergence' - so t's soated from the rest of socety (no
marrage proposas, no and transactons). They're a bt ke the
Hbakushas n |apan (the vctms and ther descendants of the
bombng n Hroshma and Nagasak). The 'fruts of modern
deveopment', when they fnay came, brought ony horror.
Roads brought surveyors. Surveyors brought trucks. Trucks
brought pocemen. Pocemen brought buets and beatngs and
rape and arrest and, n one case, murder. The ony genune 'frut'
of modern deveopment that reached them, reached them
nadvertenty - the rght to rase ther voces, the rght to be
heard. But they have fought for twenty years now. How much
onger w they ast?
The strugge n the vaey s trng. It's no onger as fashonabe as
t used to be. The nternatona camera crews and the radca
reporters have moved (ke the Word Bank) to newer pastures.
The documentary fms have been screened and apprecated.
Everybody's sympathy s a used up. But the dam goes on. It's
gettng hgher and hgher...
Now, more than ever before, the ragged army needs
renforcements. If we et t de, f we aow the strugge to be
crushed, f we aow the peope to be punshed, we w ose the
most precous thng we have: Our sprt, or what's eft of t.
"Inda w go on," they' te you, the sage phosophers who don't
want to be troubed by pddng Current Affars. As though 'Inda'
s somehow more vauabe than her peope.
Od Nazs probaby soothe themseves n smar ways.
The war for the Narmada Vaey s not |ust some exotc trba war
or a remote rura war or even an excusvey Indan war. It's a war
for the rvers and the mountans and the forests of the word. A
sorts of warrors from a over the word, anyone who wshes to
enst, w be honoured and wecomed. Every knd of warror w
be needed. Doctors, awyers, teachers, |udges, |ournasts,
students, sportsmen, panters, actors, sngers, overs... The
borders are open, foks! Come on n.
Anyway, back to the story.
In |une 1991, the Word Bank apponted Bradford Morse, a former
head of the Unted Natons Deveopment Program, as Charman
of the Independent Revew. Hs bref was to make a thorough
assessment of the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects. He was guaranteed
free access to a secret Bank documents reatng to the Pro|ects.
In September 1991, Bradford Morse and hs team arrved n Inda.
The NBA, convnced that ths was yet another set-up, at frst
refused to meet them. The Gu|arat Government wecomed the
team wth a red carpet (and a nod and a wnk) as covert aes.
A year ater, n |une 1992, the hstorc Independent Revew
(known aso as the Morse Report) was pubshed.
It unpees the pro|ect decatey, ayer by ayer, ke an onon.
Nothng was too bg, and nothng too sma for them to enqure
nto. They met Mnsters and bureaucrats, they met NGOs
workng n the area, went from vage to vage, from
resettement ste to resettement ste. They vsted the good
ones. The bad ones. The temporary ones, the permanent ones.
They spoke to hundreds of peope. They traveed extensvey n
the submergence area and the command area. They went to
Kutch and other drought-ht areas n Gu|arat. They commssoned
ther own studes. They examned every aspect of the pro|ect:
hydroogy and water management, the upstream envronment,
sedmentaton, catchment area treatment, the downstream
envronment, the antcpaton of key probems n the command
area - water-oggng, santy, dranage, heath, the mpact on
wdfe.
What the Morse Report reveas, n temperate, measured tones
(whch I admre, but cannot acheve) s scandaous. It s the most
baanced, un-based, yet damnng ndctment of the reatonshp
between the Indan State and the Word Bank. Wthout appearng
to, perhaps even wthout ntendng to, the report cuts through to
the cosy core, to the space where they ve together and ove
each other (somewhere between what they say and what they
do).
The core recommendaton of the 357-page Independent Revew
was unequvoca and whoy unexpected:
"We thnk the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects as they stand are fawed,
that resettement and rehabtaton of a those dspaced by the
Pro|ects s not possbe under prevang crcumstances, and that
envronmenta mpacts of the Pro|ects have not been propery
consdered or adequatey addressed. Moreover we beeve that
the Bank shares responsbty wth the borrower for the stuaton
that has deveoped... t seems cear that engneerng and
economc mperatves have drven the Pro|ects to the excuson of
human and envronmenta concerns... Inda and the states
nvoved... have spent a great dea of money. No one wants to
see ths money wasted. But we cauton that t may be more
wastefu to proceed wthout fu knowedge of the human and
envronmenta costs. We have decded that t woud be
rresponsbe for us to patch together a seres of
recommendatons on mpementaton when the faws n the
Pro|ects are as obvous as they seem to us. As a resut, we thnk
that the wsest course woud be for the Bank to step back from
the Pro|ects and consder them afresh. The faure of the bank's
ncrementa strategy shoud be acknowedged."
Four commtted, knowedgeabe, truy ndependent men - they do
a ot to make up for fath eroded by hundreds of other vena ones
who are pad to do smar |obs.
The Bank, however, was st not prepared to gve up. It contnued
to fund the pro|ect. Two months after the Independent Revew, t
sent out the Pamea Cox Commttee whch dd exacty what the
Morse Revew had cautoned the Bank aganst. It suggested a
sort of patchwork remedy to try and savage the operaton. In
October 1992, on the recommendaton of the Pamea Cox
Commttee, the Bank asked the Indan Government to meet some
mnmum, prmary condtons wthn a perod of sx months. Even
that much the Government coudn't do. Fnay, on the 30th of
March 1993, the Word Bank pued out of the Sardar Sarovar
Pro|ects. (Actuay, techncay, on the 29th of March, one day
before the deadne they'd been gven, the Indan Government
asked the Word Bank to wthdraw.) Detas. Detas.
No one has ever managed to make the Word Bank step back
from a pro|ect before. Least of a a rag-tag army of the poorest
peope n one of the word's poorest countres. A group of peope
whom Lews Preston, then Presdent of The Bank, never managed
to ft nto hs busy schedue when he vsted Inda. Sackng The
Bank was and s a huge mora vctory for the peope n the vaey.
The euphora ddn't ast. The Government of Gu|arat announced
that t was gong to rase the 200-mon-doar shortfa on ts
own and contnue wth the pro|ect. Durng the perod of the
Revew, and after t was pubshed, confrontaton between peope
and the Authortes contnued unabated n the vaey -
humaton, arrests, ath charges. Indefnte fasts termnated by
temporary promses and permanent betrayas. Peope who had
agreed to eave the vaey and be resetted had begun returnng
to ther vages from ther resettement stes. In Manbe, a
vage n Maharashtra and one of the nerve-centres of the
resstance, hundreds of vagers partcpated n a Monsoon
Satyagraha. In 1993, fames n Manbe remaned n ther homes
as the waters rose. They cung to wooden posts wth ther
chdren n ther arms and refused to move. Eventuay pocemen
prsed them oose and dragged them away. The NBA decared
that f the Government dd not agree to revew the pro|ect, on the
6th of August 1993 a band of actvsts woud drown themseves n
the rsng waters of the reservor. On the 5th of August, the Unon
Government consttuted yet another commttee caed the Fve
Member Group (FMG) to revew the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects.
The Government of Gu|arat refused them entry nto Gu|arat. The
FMG report (a "desk report") was submtted the foowng year. It
tacty endorsed the grave concerns of the Independent Revew.
But t made no dfference. Nothng changed. Ths s another of
the State's tested strateges. It ks you wth commttees.
In February 1994, the Government of Gu|arat ordered the
permanent cosure of the suce gates of the dam.
In May 1994, the NBA fed a wrt petton n the Supreme Court
questonng the whoe bass of the Sardar Sarovar Dam and
seekng a stay on the constructon.
That monsoon, when the water eve n the reservor rose and
smashed down on the other sde of the dam, 65,000 cubc metres
of concrete and 35,000 cubc metres of rock were torn out of a
stng basn, eavng a 65-metre crater. The rverbed powerhouse
was fooded. The damage was kept secret for months. Reports
started appearng about t n the press ony n |anuary of 1995.
In eary 1995, on the grounds that the rehabtaton of dspaced
peope had not been adequate, the Supreme Court ordered work
on the dam to be suspended unt further notce. The heght of
the dam was 80 metres above Mean Sea Leve.
Meanwhe, work had begun on two more dams n Madhya
Pradesh: the Narmada Sagar (wthout whch the Sardar Sarovar
oses 17-30 per cent of ts effcency) and the Maheshwar Dam.
The Maheshwar Dam s next n ne, upstream from the Sardar
Sarovar. The Government of Madhya Pradesh has sgned a Power
Purchase Agreement wth a prvate company - S.Kumars - one of
Inda's eadng texte magnates.
Tenson n the Sardar Sarovar area abated temporary and the
batte moved upstream, to Maheshwar, n the ferte pans of
Nmad.
The case pendng n the Supreme Court ed to a papabe easng
of represson n the vaey. Constructon work had stopped on the
dam, but the rehabtaton charade contnued. Forests (sated for
submergence) contnued to be cut and carted away n trucks,
forcng peope who depended on them for a vehood to move
out.
Even though the dam s nowhere near ts eventua, pro|ected
heght, ts mpact on the envronment and the peope vng aong
the rver s aready severe.
Around the dam ste and the nearby vages, the number of
cases of maara has ncreased sx-fod.
Severa kometres upstream from the Sardar Sarovar Dam, huge
deposts of st, hp-deep and over two hundred metres wde,
have cut off access to the rver. Women carryng water pots now
have to wak mes, teray mes, to fnd a negotabe entry
pont. Cows and goats get stranded n t and de. The tte snge-
og boats that trba peope use have become unsafe on the
rratona crcuar currents caused by the barrcade downstream.
Further upstream, where the st deposts have not yet become a
probem, there's another probem. Landess peope
(predomnanty trba peope and Dats) have tradtonay
cutvated rce, frut and vegetabes on the rch, shaow st banks
the rver eaves when t recedes n the dry months. Every now
and then, the engneers mannng the Barg Dam (way upstream,
near |abapur) reease water from the reservor wthout warnng.
Downstream, the water eve n the rver suddeny rses.
Hundreds of fames have had ther crops washed away severa
tmes, eavng them wth no vehood.
Suddeny they can't trust ther rver anymore. It's ke a oved one
who has deveoped symptoms of psychoss. Anyone who has
oved a rver can te you that the oss of a rver s a terrbe,
achng thng. But I' be rapped on the knuckes f I contnue n
ths ven. When we're dscussng the Greater Common Good
there's no pace for sentment. One must stck to facts. Forgve
me for ettng my heart wander.
The State Governments of Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra
contnue to be competey cavaer n ther deangs wth
dspaced peope. The Government of Gu|arat has a rehabtaton
pocy (on paper) that makes the other two states ook medeva.
It boasts of beng the best rehabtaton package n the word. It
offers and for and to dspaced peope from Maharashtra and
Madhya Pradesh and recognses the cams of 'encroachers'
(usuay trba peope wth no papers). The decepton, however,
es n ts defnton of who quafes as 'Pro|ect Affected'.
In pont of fact, the Government of Gu|arat hasn't even managed
to rehabtate peope from ts own 19 vages sated for
submergence, et aone the rest of the 226 n the other two
states. The nhabtants of these 19 vages have been scattered
to 175 separate rehabtaton stes. Soca nks have been
smashed, communtes broken up.
In practce, the resettement story (wth a few 'dea vage'
exceptons) contnues to be one of caousness and broken
promses. Some peope have been gven and, others haven't.
Some have and that s stony and uncutvabe. Some have and
that s rredeemaby water-ogged. Some have been drven out by
andowners who sod and to the Government but haven't been
pad yet.
Some who were resetted on the perpheres of other vages
have been robbed, beaten and chased away by ther host
vagers. There have been occasons when dspaced peope from
two dfferent dam pro|ects have been aotted contguous ands.
In one case, dspaced peope from three dams - the Uka Dam,
the Sardar Sarovar Dam and the Kar|an Dam - were resetted n
the same area. In addton to fghtng amongst themseves for
resources - water, grazng and, |obs - they had to fght a group of
andess abourers who had been sharecroppng the and for
absentee andords who had subsequenty sod t to the
Government.
There's another category of dspaced peope - peope whose
ands have been acqured by the Government for Resettement
Stes. There's a peckng order even amongst the wretched -
Sardar Sarovar 'oustees' are more gamorous than other 'oustees'
because they're occasonay n the news and have a case n
court. (In other Deveopment Pro|ects where there's no press, no
NBA, no court case, there are no records. The dspaced eave no
tra at a.)
In severa resettement stes, peope have been dumped n rows
of corrugated tn sheds whch are furnaces n summer and
'frdges n wnter. Some of them are ocated n dry rver beds
whch, durng the monsoon, turn nto fast-fowng drfts. I've been
to some of these 'stes'. I've seen fm footage of others: shverng
chdren, perched ke brds on the edges of charpas, whe
swrng waters enter ther tn homes. Frghtened, fevered eyes
watch pots and pans carred through the doorway by the current,
foatng out nto the fooded feds, thn fathers swmmng after
them to retreve what they can.
When the waters recede they eave run. Maara, darrhoea, sck
catte stranded n the sush. The ancent teak beams dsmanted
from ther prevous homes, carefuy stacked away ke postponed
dreams, now spongy, rotten and unusabe.
Forty househods were moved from Manbe to a resettement
ste n Maharashtra. In the frst year, thrty-eght chdren ded.
In today's papers (The Indan Express, 26th Apr '99) there's a
report about nne deaths n a snge rehabtaton ste n Gu|arat.
In the course of a week. That's 1.2875 PAPs a day, f you're
countng.
Many of those who have been resetted are peope who have
ved a ther ves deep n the forest wth vrtuay no contact
wth money and the modern word. Suddeny they fnd
themseves eft wth the opton of starvng to death or wakng
severa kometres to the nearest town, sttng n the marketpace
(both men and women), offerng themseves as wage abour, ke
goods on sae.
Instead of a forest from whch they gathered everythng they
needed - food, fue, fodder, rope, gum, tobacco, tooth powder,
medcna herbs, housng matera - they earn between ten and
twenty rupees a day wth whch to feed and keep ther fames.
Instead of a rver, they have a hand pump. In ther od vages,
they had no money, but they were nsured. If the rans faed,
they had the forests to turn to. The rver to fsh n. Ther vestock
was ther fxed depost. Wthout a ths, they're a heartbeat away
from desttuton.
In Vada|, a resettement ste I vsted near Baroda, the man who
was takng to me rocked hs sck baby n hs arms, cumps of fes
gathered on ts seepng eyeds. Chdren coected around us,
takng care not to burn ther bare skn on the scorchng tn was
of the shed they ca a home. The man's mnd was far away from
the troubes of hs sck baby. He was makng me a st of the frut
he used to pck n the forest. He counted forty-eght knds. He
tod me that he ddn't thnk he or hs chdren woud ever be abe
to afford to eat any frut agan. Not uness he stoe t. I asked hm
what was wrong wth hs baby. He sad t woud be better for the
baby to de than to have to ve ke ths. I asked what the baby's
mother thought about that. She ddn't repy. She |ust stared.
For the peope who've been resetted, everythng has to be re-
earned. Every tte thng, every bg thng: from shttng and
pssng (where d'you do t when there's no |unge to hde you?) to
buyng a bus tcket, to earnng a new anguage, to understandng
money. And worst of a, earnng to be suppcants. Learnng to
take orders. Learnng to have Masters. Learnng to answer ony
when you're addressed.
In addton to a ths, they have to earn how to make wrtten
representatons (n trpcate) to the Grevance Redressa
Commttee or the Sardar Sarovar Narmada Ngam for any
partcuar probems they mght have. Recenty, 3,000 peope
came to Deh to protest ther stuaton - traveng overnght by
tran, vng on the bazng streets. The Presdent woudn't meet
them because he had an eye nfecton. Maneka Gandh, the
Mnster for Soca |ustce and Empowerment, woudn't meet them
but asked for a wrtten representaton (Dear Maneka, Pease don't
bud the dam, Love, The Peope). When the representaton was
handed to her, she scoded the tte deegaton for not havng
wrtten t n Engsh.
From beng sef-suffcent and free, to beng mpovershed and
yoked to the whms of a word you know nothng, nothng about -
what d'you suppose t must fee ke? Woud you ke to trade your
beach house n Goa for a hove n Pahargan|? No? Not even for
the sake of the Naton?
Truy, t s |ust not possbe for a State Admnstraton, any State
Admnstraton, to carry out the rehabtaton of a peope as
frage as ths, on such an mmense scae. It's ke usng a par of
hedge-shears to trm an nfant's fnger nas. You can't do t
wthout shearng ts fngers off. Land for and sounds ke a
reasonabe swap, but how do you mpement t? How do you
uproot 200,000 peope (the offca bnkered estmate) of whch
117,000 are trba peope, and reocate them n a humane
fashon? How do you keep ther communtes ntact, n a country
where every nch of and s fought over, where amost a
tgaton pendng n courts has to do wth and dsputes?
Where s a ths fne, unoccuped but arabe and that s watng
to receve these ntact communtes?
The smpe answer s that there sn't any. Not even for the
'offcay' dspaced of ths one dam.
What about the rest of the three thousand two hundred and
nnety-nne dams?
What about the remanng thousands of 'PAPs' earmarked for
annhaton? Sha we |ust put the Star of Davd on ther doors
and get t over wth?
|aud, n the Nmad pans of Madhya Pradesh, s the frst of sxty
vages that w be submerged by the reservor of the
Maheshwar Dam. |aud s not a trba vage, and s therefore
rven wth the shamefu caste dvsons that are the scourge of
every ordnary Hndu vage. A ma|orty of the and-ownng
farmers (the ones who quafy as PAPs) are Ra|puts. They farm
some of the most ferte so n Inda. Ther houses are ped wth
sacks of wheat and daa and rce. They boast so much about the
thngs they grow on ther and that f t weren't so tragc, t coud
get on your nerves. Ther houses have aready begun to crack
wth the mpact of the dynamtng on the dam ste.
Tweve fames, mosty Dats, who had sma hodngs n the
vcnty of the dam ste had ther and acqured. They tod me how
when they ob|ected, cement was poured nto ther water ppes,
ther standng crops were budozed, and the poce occuped the
and by force. A 12 fames are now andess and work as wage
abour.
The area that the peope of |aud are gong to be moved to s a
few kometres nand, away from the rver, ad|onng a
predomnanty Dat and trba vage caed Samra|. I saw the
huge tract of and that had been marked off for them. It was a
hard, stony hock wth stubby grass and scrub, on whch
truckoads of st were beng unoaded and spread out n a thn
ayer to make t ook ke rch, back cotton so. The story goes
ke ths: at the nstance of the S. Kumars (Texte Tycoons turned
Naton Buders), the Dstrct Magstrate acqured the hock,
whch was actuay vage common grazng and that beonged to
the peope of Samra|. In addton to ths, the and of 10 Dat
vagers was acqured. No compensaton was pad.
The vagers, whose man source of ncome was ther vestock,
had to se ther goats and buffaoes because they no onger had
anywhere to graze them. Ther ony remanng source of ncome
es (ay) on the banks of a sma ake on the edge of the vage.
In summer, when the water eve recedes, t eaves a shaow rng
of rch st on whch the vagers grow (grew) rce, meons and
cucumber.
The S. Kumars have excavated ths st to cosmetcay cover the
stony grazng ground (that the peope of |aud don't want). The
banks of the ake are now steep and uncutvabe.
The aready mpovershed peope of Samra| have been eft to
starve, whe ths photo-opportunty s beng readed for German
funders and Indan courts and anybody ese who cares to pass
that way.
Ths s how Inda works. Ths s the geness of the Maheshwar
Dam. The story of the frst vage. What w happen to the other
ffty-nne? May bad uck pursue ths dam. May budozers turn
upon the Texte Tycoons.
Nothng can |ustfy ths knd of behavour.
In crcumstances ke these, even to entertan a debate about
Rehabtaton s to take the frst step towards settng asde the
Prncpes of |ustce. Resettng 200,000 peope n order to take
(or pretend to take) drnkng water to 40 mon - there's
somethng very wrong wth the scae of operatons here. Ths s
Fascst Maths. It stranges stores. Budgeons deta. And
manages to bnd perfecty reasonabe peope wth ts spurous,
shnng vson.
When I arrved on the banks of the Narmada n ate March (1999),
t was a month after the Supreme Court suddeny vacated the
stay on constructon work of the Sardar Sarovar Dam. I had read
pretty much everythng I coud ay my hands on (a those 'secret'
Government documents). I had a cear dea of the ay of the and
- of what had happened where and when and to whom. The story
payed tsef out before my eyes ke a tragc fm whose actors I'd
aready met. Had I not known ts hstory, nothng woud have
made sense. Because n the vaey there are stores wthn stores
and t's easy to ose the carty of rage n the sudge of other
peopes' sorrow.
I ended my |ourney n Kevada Coony, where t a began. Thrty-
eght years ago, ths s where the Government of Gu|arat decded
to ocate the nfrastructure t woud need for startng work on the
dam: guest houses, offce bocks, accommodaton for engneers
and ther staff, roads eadng to the dam ste, warehouses for
constructon matera.
It s ocated on the cusp of what s now the Sardar Sarovar
reservor and the Wonder Cana, Gu|arat's 'fene' , whch s
gong to quench the thrst of mons.
Nobody knows ths, but Kevada Coony s the key to the Word.
Go there, and secrets w be reveaed to you.
In the wnter of 1961, a government offcer arrved n a vage
caed Kothe and nformed the vagers that some of ther and
woud be needed to construct a hepad. In a few days a budozer
arrved and fattened standng crops. The vagers were made to
sgn papers and were pad a sum of money, whch they assumed
was payment for ther destroyed crops. When the hepad was
ready, a hecopter anded on t, and out came Prme Mnster
Nehru. Most of the vagers coudn't see hm because he was
surrounded by pocemen. Nehru made a speech. Then he
pressed a button and there was an exposon on the other sde of
the rver. After the exposon he few away. That was the
nauguraton of the earest avatar of the Sardar Sarovar Dam.
Coud Nehru have known when he pressed that button that he
had uneashed an ncubus?
After Nehru eft, the Government of Gu|arat arrved n strength. It
acqured 1,600 acres of and from 950 fames from sx vages.
The peope were Tadv trbas, but because of ther proxmty to
the cty of Baroda, not entrey unversed n the ways of a market
economy. They were sent notces and tod that they woud be
pad cash compensaton and gven |obs on the dam ste. Then the
nghtmare began. Trucks and budozers roed n. Forests were
feed, standng crops destroyed. Everythng turned nto a whr of
|eeps and engneers and cement and stee. Mohan Bha Tadv
watched eght acres of hs and wth standng crops of |owar,
toovar and cotton beng eveed. Overnght he became a andess
abourer. Three years ater he receved hs cash compensaton of
250 rupees an acre n three nstaments.
Dersukh Bha Vesa Bha's father was gven 3,500 rupees for hs
house and fve acres of and wth ts standng crops and a the
trees on t. He remembers wakng a the way to Ra|ppa (the
dstrct headquarters) as a tte boy, hodng hs father's hand. He
remembers how terrfed they were when they were caed n to
the Tehsdar's offce. They were made to surrender ther
compensaton notces and sgn a recept. They were terate, so
they ddn't know how much the recept was made out for.
Everybody had to go to Ra|ppa but they were aways summoned
on dfferent days, one by one. So they coudn't exchange
nformaton or compare amounts.
Graduay, out of the dust and budozers, an offensve, dffuse
confguraton emerged. Kevada Coony. Row upon row of ugy
cement fats, offces, guest houses, roads. A the graceess
nfrastructure of Bg Dam constructon. The vagers' houses were
dsmanted and moved to the perphery of the coony, where they
reman today, squatters on ther own and. Those that created
troube were ntmdated by the poce and the constructon
company. The vagers tod me that n the contractor's
headquarters they have a 'ock-up' ke a poce ock-up, where
recactrant vagers are ncarcerated and beaten.
The peope who were evcted to bud Kevada Coony do not
quafy as 'Pro|ect-Affected' n Gu|arat's Rehabtaton package.
Some of them work as servants n the offcers' bungaows and
waters n the guest house but on the and where ther own
houses once stood. Can there be anythng more pognant?
Those who had some and eft tred to cutvate t, but the
Kevada muncpaty ntroduced a scheme n whch they brought
n pgs to eat uncoected refuse on the streets. The pgs stray
nto the vagers' feds and destroy ther crops.
In 1992, after thrty years, each famy has been offered a sum of
12,000 rupees per hectare, up to a maxmum of 36,000 rupees,
provded they agree to eave ther homes and go away! Yet 40
per cent of the and that was acqured s yng unused. The
government refuses to return t. Eeven acres acqured from
Devben, who s a wdow now, have been gven over to the Swam
Narayan Trust (a bg regous sect). On a sma porton of t, the
Trust runs a tte schoo. The rest t cutvates, whe Devben
watches through the barbed wre fence. On the 200 acres
acqured n the vage of Gora, vagers were evcted and bocks
of fats were but. They ay empty for years. Eventuay the
Government hred t for a nomna fee to |a Prakash Assocates,
the dam contractors, who, the vagers say, sub-et t prvatey for
32,000 rupees a month. (|a Prakash Assocates, the bggest dam
contractors n the country, the rea naton-buders, own the
Sddharth Contnenta and the Vasant Contnenta n Deh.)
On an area of about 30 acres there s an absurd cement PWD
'repca' of the ancent Shoopaneshwar tempe that was
submerged n the reservor. The same potca formaton that
punged a whoe naton nto a boody, medeva nghtmare
because t nssted on destroyng an od mosque to dg up a non-
exstent tempe thnks nothng of submergng a haowed
pgrmage route and hundreds of tempes that have been
worshpped n for centures.
It thnks nothng of destroyng the sacred hs and groves, the
paces of worshp, the ancent homes of the gods and demons of
trba peope.
It thnks nothng of submergng a vaey that has yeded fosss,
mcroths and rock pantngs, the ony vaey n Inda, accordng
to archaeoogsts, that contans an unnterrupted record of
human occupaton from the Od Stone Age.
What can one say?
In Kevada Coony, the most barbarc |oke of a s the wdfe
museum. The Shoopaneshwar Sanctuary Interpretaton Centre
gves you a quck, comprehensve pcture of the Government's
commtment to Conservaton.
The Sardar Sarovar reservor, when the dam s at ts fu heght, s
gong to submerge about 13,000 hectares of prme forest and.
(In antcpaton of submergence, the forest began to be feed
many greedy years ago.) Envronmentasts and conservatonsts
were qute rghty aarmed at the extent of oss of bodversty
and wdfe habtat that the submergence woud cause. To
mtgate ths oss, the Government decded to expand the
Shoopaneshwar Wdfe Sanctuary that straddes the dam on the
south sde of the rver. There s a hare-braned scheme that
envsages drownng anmas from the submerged forests
swmmng ther way to 'wd-fe corrdors' that w be created for
them, and settng up home n the New! Improved!
Shoopaneshwar Sanctuary. Presumaby wdfe and bodversty
can be protected and mantaned ony f human actvty s
restrcted and tradtona rghts to use forest resources curtaed.
Forty thousand trba peope from 101 vages wthn the
boundares of the Shoopaneshwar Sanctuary depend on the
forest for a vehood. They w be 'persuaded' to eave. They are
not ncuded n the defnton of Pro|ect Affected.
Where w they go? I magne you know by now.
Whatever ther troubes n the rea word, n the Shoopaneshwar
Sanctuary Interpretaton Centre (where an od stuffed eopard
and a moudy soth bear have to make do wth a shared corner)
the trba peope have a whoe room to themseves. On the was
there are cumsy wooden carvngs - Government-approved trba
art, wth sgns that say 'Trba Art'. In the centre, there s a fe-
szed thatched hut wth the door open. The pot's on the fre, the
dog s aseep on the foor and a's we wth the word. Outsde, to
wecome you, are Mr. and Mrs. Trba. A umpy, paper mache
coupe, smng.
Smng. They're not even permtted the grace of rage. That's
what I can't get over.
Oh, but have I got t wrong? What f they're smng vountary,
burstng wth Natona Prde? Brmmng wth the |oy of havng
sacrfced ther ves to brng drnkng water to thrsty mons n
Gu|arat?
For twenty years now, the peope of Gu|arat have wated for the
water they beeve the Wonder Cana w brng them. For years
the Government of Gu|arat has nvested 85 per cent of the
State's rrgaton budget nto the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects. Every
smaer, qucker, oca, more feasbe scheme has been set asde
for the sake of ths. Eecton after eecton has been contested
and won on the 'water tcket'. Everyone's hopes are pnned to the
Wonder Cana. W she fuf Gu|arat's dreams?
From the Sardar Sarovar Dam, the Narmada fows through 180
km of rch owand nto the Araban Sea n Bharuch. What the
Wonder Cana does, more or ess, s to re-route most of the rver,
turnng t amost 90 degrees northward. It's a pretty drastc thng
to do to a rver. The Narmada estuary n Bharuch s one of the
ast known breedng paces of the Hsa, probaby the hottest
contender for Inda's favourte fsh. The Staney Dam wped out
Hsa from the Cauvery Rver n South Inda, and Pakstan's
Ghuam Mohammed Dam destroyed ts spawnng area on the
Indus. Hsa, ke the samon, s an anadromous fsh - born n
freshwater, mgratng to the ocean as a smot and returnng to
the rver to spawn. The drastc reducton n water fow, the
change n the chemstry of the water because of a the sedment
trapped behnd the dam, w radcay ater the ecoogy of the
estuary and modfy the decate baance of fresh water and sea
water whch s bound to affect the spawnng. At present, the
Narmada estuary produces 13,000 tonnes of Hsa and freshwater
prawn (whch aso breed n bracksh water). Ten thousand fsher
fames depend on t for a vng.
The Morse Commttee was appaed to dscover that no studes
had been done of the downstream envronment - no
documentaton of the rverne ecosystem, ts seasona changes,
boogca speces or the pattern of how ts resources are used.
The dam-buders had no dea what the mpact of the dam woud
be on the peope and the envronment downstream, et aone any
deas on what steps to take to mtgate t.
The government smpy says that t w aevate the oss of Hsa
fsheres by stockng the reservor wth hatchery-bred fsh. (Who'
contro the reservor? Who' grant the commerca fshng to ts
favourte payng customers?) The ony htch s that so far,
scentsts have not managed to breed Hsa artfcay. The
rearng of Hsa depends on gettng spawn from wd aduts, whch
w, n a kehood be emnated by the dam. Dams have ether
emnated or endangered one-ffth of the word's freshwater fsh.
So! Ouz queston - where w the 40,000 fsher fok go?
E-ma your answers to the government_that_cares.com
At the rsk of osng readers (I've been warned severa tmes -
'How can you wrte about rrgaton? Who the he s nterested?'),
et me te you what the Wonder Cana s - and what she's meant
to acheve. Be nterested, f you want to snatch your future back
from the sweaty pams of the Iron Trange.
Most rvers n Inda are monsoon-fed. About 80-85 per cent of the
fow takes pace durng the rany months - usuay between |une
and September. The purpose of a dam, an rrgaton dam, s to
store monsoon water n ts reservor and then use t |udcousy
for the rest of the year, dstrbutng t across dry and through a
system of canas. The area of and rrgated by the cana network
s caed the command area. How w the command area,
accustomed ony to seasona rrgaton, ts entre ecoogy
desgned for that snge puse of monsoon ran, react to beng
rrgated the whoe year round? Perenna cana rrgaton does to
so roughy what anaboc sterods do to the human body.
Sterods can turn an ordnary athete nto an Oympc meda-
wnner, perenna rrgaton can convert so whch produced ony
a snge crop a year nto so that yeds severa crops a year.
Lands on whch farmers tradtonay grew crops that don't need a
great dea of water (maze, met, barey, and a whoe range of
puses) suddeny yed water-guzzng cash crops - cotton, rce,
soya bean, and the bggest guzzer of a (ke those fnned 'fftes
cars), sugar-cane. Ths competey aters tradtona crop-patterns
n the command area. Peope stop growng thngs that they can
afford to eat, and start growng thngs that they can ony afford to
se. By nkng themseves to the 'market' they ose contro over
ther ves.
Unfortunatey, ecoogcay, ths s a posonous payoff. Even f the
markets hod out, the so doesn't. Over tme t becomes too poor
to support the extra demands made on t. Graduay, n the way
the sterod-usng athete becomes an nvad, the so becomes
depeted and degraded, the agrcutura yeds begn to wnd
down. In Inda, and rrgated by we water s now amost twce as
productve as and rrgated by canas. Certan knds of so are
ess sutabe for perenna rrgaton than others. Perenna cana
rrgaton rases the eve of the water-tabe. As the water moves
up through the so, t absorbs sats. Sane water s drawn to the
surface by capary acton, and the and becomes water-ogged.
The 'ogged' water (to con a phrase) s then breathed nto the
atmosphere by pants, causng an even greater concentraton of
sats n the so. When the concentraton of sats n the so
reaches one per cent, that so becomes toxc to pant fe. Ths s
what's caed sanzaton.
A study by the Centre for Resource and Envronmenta Studes at
the Austraan Natona Unversty says that one-ffth of the
word's rrgated and s sat-affected.
By the md-80s, 25 mon of the 37 mon hectares under
rrgaton n Pakstan were estmated to be ether sanzed or
water-ogged or both. In Inda the estmates vary between 6 and
10 mon hectares. Accordng to 'secret' government studes,
more than 52 per cent of the Sardar Sarovar command area s
prone to water-oggng and sanzaton.
And that's not the end of the bad news.
The 460-kometre-ong, concrete-ned Sardar Sarovar Wonder
Cana and ts 75,000-kometre network of branch canas and sub-
branch canas s desgned to rrgate a tota of two mon
hectares of and spread over 12 dstrcts. The dstrcts of Kutch
and Saurashtra (the bboards of Gu|arat's Thrst campagn) are
at the very ta end of ths network.
The system of canas supermposes an arbtrary concrete grd on
the exstng pattern of natura dranage n the command area. It's
a tte ke re-organsng the pattern of retcuate vens on the
surface of a eaf. When a cana cuts across the path of a natura
dran, t bocks the natura fow of the seasona water and eads to
water-oggng. The engneerng souton to ths s to map the
pattern of natura dranage n the area and repace t wth an
aternate, artfca dranage system that s but n con|uncton
wth the canas. The probem, as you can magne, s that dong
ths s enormousy expensve. The cost of dranage s not ncuded
as part of the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ects. It usuay sn't, n most
rrgaton pro|ects.
Davd Hopper, the Word Bank's vce-presdent for South Asa, has
admtted that the Bank does not usuay ncude the cost of
dranage n ts rrgaton pro|ects n South Asa because rrgaton
pro|ects wth adequate dranage are not economcay vabe. It
costs fve tmes as much to provde adequate dranage as t does
to rrgate the same amount of and. The Bank's souton to the
probem s to put n the rrgaton system and wat for santy and
water-oggng to set n. When a the money's spent, and the and
s devastated, and the peope are n despar, who shoud pop by?
Why, the frendy neghbourhood Banker! And what's that buge
n hs pocket? Coud t be a oan for a Dranage Pro|ect?
In Pakstan the Word Bank fnanced the Tarbea (1977) and
Manga Dam (1967) Pro|ects on the Indus. The command areas
are water-ogged. Now The Bank has gven Pakstan a 785-
mon-doar oan for a dranage pro|ect. In Inda, n Pun|ab and
Haryana t's dong the same.
Irrgaton wthout dranage s ke havng a system of arteres and
no vens. Pretty damn pontess.
Snce the Word Bank stepped back from the Sardar Sarovar
Pro|ects, t's a tte uncear where the money for the dranage s
gong to come from. Ths hasn't deterred the Government from
gong ahead wth the Cana work. The resut s that even before
the dam s ready, before the Wonder Cana has been
commssoned, before a snge drop of rrgaton water has been
devered, water-oggng has set n. Among the worst affected
areas are the resettement coones.
There s a dfference between the panners of the Sardar Sarovar
rrgaton scheme and the panners of prevous pro|ects. At east
they acknowedge that water-oggng and sanzaton are rea
probems and need to be addressed.
Ther soutons, however, are corny enough to send a Hooock
Gbbon to a hootng hospta.
They pan to have a seres of eectronc groundwater sensors
paced n every 100 square kometres of the command area.
(That works out to about 1,800 ground sensors.) These w be
nked to a centra computer whch w anayse the data and send
out commands to the cana heads to stop water fowng nto
areas that show sgns of water-oggng. A network of 'Ony-
rrgaton', 'Ony-dranage' and 'Irrgaton-cum dranage' tube-
wes w be sunk, and eectroncay synchronsed by the centra
computer. The sane water w be pumped out, mxed wth
mathematcay computed quanttes of freshwater and re-
crcuated nto a network of surface and sub-surface drans (for
whch more and w be acqured). To acheve the rrgaton
effcency that they cam they' acheve, accordng to a study
done by Dr. Rahu Ram for Kapavrksh, 82 per cent of the water
that goes nto the Wonder Cana network w have to be pumped
out agan!
They've never mpemented an eectronc rrgaton scheme
before, not even as a pot pro|ect. It hasn't occurred to them to
experment wth some aready degraded and, |ust to see f t
works. No, they' use our money to nsta t over the whoe of the
two mon hectares and then see f t works. What f t doesn't? If
t doesn't, t won't matter to the panners. They' st draw the
same saares. They' st get ther penson and ther gratuty and
whatever ese you get when you retre from a career of nfctng
mayhem on a peope.
How can t possby work? It's ke sendng n a rocket scentst to
mk a troubesome cow. How can they manage a ggantc
eectronc rrgaton system when they can't even ne the was of
the canas wthout havng them coapse and cause untod
damage to crops and peope?
When they can't even prevent the Bg Dam tsef from breakng
off n bts when t rans?
To quote from one of ther own studes, "The desgn, the
mpementaton and management of the ntegraton of
groundwater and surface water n the above crcumstance s
compex."
Agreed. To say the east. Ther recommendaton of how to dea
wth the compexty:
"It w ony be possbe to mpement such a system f a
groundwater and surface water suppes are managed by a snge
authorty."
Aha!
It's begnnng to make sense now. Who w own the water? The
Snge Authorty. Who w se the water? The Snge Authorty.
Who w proft from the saes? The Snge Authorty. The Snge
Authorty has a scheme whereby t w se water by the tre, not
to ndvduas but to farmers' co-operatves (whch don't exst |ust
yet, but no doubt the Snge Authorty can create co-operatves
and force farmers to co-operate?) Computer water, unke
ordnary rver water, s expensve. Ony those who can afford t
w get t.
Graduay, sma farmers w get edged out by bg farmers, and
the whoe cyce of uprootment w begn a over agan.
The Snge Authorty, because t owns the computer water, w
aso decde who w grow what. It says that farmers gettng
computer water w not be aowed to grow sugarcane because
they' use up the share of the thrsty mons at the ta end of
the cana. But the Snge Authorty has aready gven cences to
ten arge sugar ms rght near the head of the cana. On an
earer occason, the Snge Authorty sad that ony 30 per cent of
the command area of the Uka Dam woud be used for sugarcane.
But sugarcane grows on 75 per cent of t (and 30 per cent s
water-ogged). In Maharashtra, thanks to a dfferent branch of the
Snge Authorty, the potcay powerfu sugar-obby that
occupes one-tenth of the state's rrgated and uses haf the
state's rrgaton water.
In addton to the sugar growers, the Snge Authorty has recenty
announced a scheme that envsages a seres of fve-star hotes,
gof-courses and water parks that w come up aong the Wonder
Cana. What earthy reason coud possby |ustfy ths?
The Snge Authorty says t's the ony way to rase money to
compete the pro|ect!
I reay worry about those mons of good peope n Kutch and
Saurashtra.
W the water ever reach them?
Frst of a, we know that there's a ot ess water n the rver than
the Snge Authorty cams there s.
Second of a, n the absence of the Narmada Sagar Dam, the
rrgaton benefts of the Sardar Sarovar drop by a further 17-30
per cent.
Thrd of a, the rrgaton effcency of the Wonder Cana (the
actua amount of water devered by the system) has been
arbtrary fxed at 60 per cent. The hghest rrgaton effcency n
Inda, takng nto account system eaks and surface evaporaton,
s 35 per cent. Ths means t's key that ony haf of the
Command Area w be rrgated. Whch haf? The frst haf.
Fourth, to get to Kutch and Saurashtra, the Wonder Cana has to
negotate ts way past the ten sugar ms, the gof-courses, the
fve-star hotes, the water parks and the cash-crop growng,
potcay powerfu, Pate-rch dstrcts of Baroda, Kheda,
Ahmedabad, Gandhnagar and Mehsana. (Aready, n compete
contraventon of ts own drectves, the Snge Authorty has
aotted the cty of Baroda a szeabe quantty of water. When
Baroda gets, can Ahmedabad be eft behnd? The potca cout of
powerfu urban centres n Gu|arat w ensure that they get ther
share.)
Ffth, even n the (one hundred per cent) unkey event that
water gets there, t has to be pped and dstrbuted to those eght
thousand watng vages.
It's worth knowng that of the one bon peope n the word who
have no access to safe drnkng water, 855 mon ve n rura
areas. Ths s because the cost of nstang an energy-ntensve
network of thousands of kometres of ppenes, aqueducts,
pumps and treatment pants that woud be needed to provde
drnkng water to scattered rura popuatons s prohbtve.
Nobody buds Bg Dams to provde drnkng water to rura
peope. Nobody can afford to.
When the Morse Commttee frst arrved n Gu|arat they were
mpressed by the Gu|arat Government's commtment to takng
drnkng water to such dstant, rura outposts. They asked to see
the detaed drnkng water pans.
There weren't any. (There st aren't any.)
They asked f any costs had been worked out. "A few thousand
crores," was the breezy answer. A bon doars s an expert's
cacuated guess. It's not ncuded as part of the pro|ect cost. So
where s the money gong to come from?
Never mnd. |us' askn'.
It's nterestng that the Farakka Barrage that dverts water from
the Ganga to Cacutta Port has reduced the drnkng water
avaabty for 40 mon peope who ve downstream n
Bangadesh.
At tmes there's somethng so precse and mathematcay chng
about natonasm.
Bud a dam to take water away from 40 mon peope. Bud a
dam to pretend to brng water to 40 mon peope.
Who are these gods that govern us? Is there no mt to ther
powers?
The ast person I met n the vaey was Bha| Bha. He s a Tadv
trba from Undava, one of the frst vages where the
government began to acqure and for the Wonder Cana and ts
75,000 kometre network. Bha| Bha ost seventeen of hs
nneteen acres to the Wonder Cana. It crashes through hs and,
700 feet wde ncudng ts wakways and steep, sopng
embankments, ke a veodrome for gant bcycsts.
The Cana network affects more than two hundred thousand
fames. Peope have ost wes and trees, peope have had ther
houses separated from ther farms by the cana, forcng them to
wak two or three kometres to the nearest brdge and then two
or three kometres back aong the other sde. Twenty-three
thousand fames, et's say a hundred thousand peope, w be,
ke Bha| Bha, serousy affected. They don't count as 'Pro|ect-
affected' and are not entted to rehabtaton.
Lke hs neghbours n Kevada Coony, Bha| Bha became a
pauper overnght.
Bha| Bha and hs peope, forced to sme for photographs on
government caendars. Bha| Bha and hs peope, dened the
grace of rage. Bha| Bha and hs peope, squashed ke bugs by
ths country they're supposed to ca ther own.
It was ate evenng when I arrved at hs house. We sat down on
the foor and drank over-sweet tea n the dyng ght. As he
spoke, a memory strred n me, a sense of de|a vu. I coudn't
magne why. I knew I hadn't met hm before. Then I reased
what t was. I ddn't recognse hm, but I remembered hs story.
I'd seen hm n an od documentary fm, shot more than ten
years ago, n the vaey. He was fraer now, hs beard softened
wth age. But hs story hadn't aged. It was st young and fu of
passon. It broke my heart, the patence wth whch he tod t. I
coud te he had tod t over and over and over agan, hopng,
prayng, that one day, one of the strangers passng through
Undava woud turn out to be Good Luck. Or God.
Bha| Bha, Bha| Bha, when w you get angry? When w you
stop watng? When w you say `That's enough!' and reach for
your weapons, whatever they may be? When w you show us the
whoe of your resonant, terrfyng, nvncbe strength?
When w you break the fath? W you break the fath? Or w
you et t break you?
* * *
To sow a beast, you break ts mbs. To sow a naton, you break
ts peope. You rob them of voton. You demonstrate your
absoute command over ther destny. You make t cear that
utmatey t fas to you to decde who ves, who des, who
prospers who doesn't. To exhbt your capabty you show off a
that you can do, and how easy you can do t. How easy you
coud press a button and annhate the earth. How you can start
a war, or sue for peace. How you can snatch a rver away from
one and gft t to another. How you can green a desert, or fe a
forest and pant one somewhere ese. You use caprce to fracture
a peope's fath n ancent thngs - earth, forest, water, ar. Once
that's done, what do they have eft? Ony you. They w turn to
you, because you're a they have. They w ove you even whe
they despse you. They w trust you even though they know you
we. They w vote for you even as you squeeze the very breathe
from ther bodes. They w drnk what you gve them to drnk.
They w breathe what you gve them to breathe. They w ve
where you dump ther beongngs. They have to. What ese can
they do? There's no hgher court of redress. You are ther mother
and ther father. You are the |udge and the |ury. You are the
Word. You are God.
Power s fortfed not |ust by what t destroys, but aso by what t
creates. Not |ust by what t takes, but aso by what t gves. And
Poweressness reaffrmed not |ust by the hepessness of those
who have ost, but aso by the grattude of those who have (or
thnk they have) ganed.
Ths cod, contemporary cast of power s couched between the
nes of nobe-soundng causes n democratc-soundng
consttutons. It's weded by the eected representatves of an
ostensby free peope. Yet no monarch, no despot, no dctator n
any other century n the hstory of human cvsaton has had
access to weapons ke these.
Day by day, rver by rver, forest by forest, mountan by
mountan, msse by msse, bomb by bomb - amost wthout our
knowng t, we are beng broken.
Bg Dams are to a Naton's 'Deveopment' what Nucear Bombs
are to ts Mtary Arsena. They're both weapons of mass
destructon. They're both weapons Governments use to contro
ther own peope. Both Twenteth Century embems that mark a
pont n tme when human ntegence has outstrpped ts own
nstnct for survva. They're both magnant ndcatons of
cvsaton turnng upon tsef. They represent the severng of the
nk, not |ust the nk - the understandng - between human bengs
and the panet they ve on. They scrambe the ntegence that
connects eggs to hens, mk to cows, food to forests, water to
rvers, ar to fe and the earth to human exstence.
Can we unscrambe t?
Maybe. Inch by nch. Bomb by bomb. Dam by dam. Maybe by
fghtng specfc wars n specfc ways. We coud begn n the
Narmada Vaey.
Ths |uy w brng the ast monsoon of the Twenteth Century.
The ragged army n the Narmada Vaey has decared that t w
not move when the waters of the Sardar Sarovar reservor rse to
cam ts ands and homes. Whether you ove the dam or hate t,
whether you want t or you don't, t s n the ftness of thngs that
you understand the prce that's beng pad for t. That you have
the courage to watch whe the dues are ceared and the books
are squared.
Our dues. Our books. Not thers.
Be there.
ARUNDHATI ROY
Apr 1999
Frontne
|an. 06 - 19, 2001
SClMlTARS lN THE SUN
N. RAM ntervews ARUNDHATI ROY on a wrter's pace n potcs.
Arundhat Roy's debut nove, The God of Sma Thngs, pubshed
n 1997, took the terary word by storm, wnnng among other
thngs the 1997 Booker Prze and accoades from eadng wrters
and crtcs. It contnues to be one of the best-oved an d best-read
recent works of terary fcton round the word. It has sod sx
mon copes n 40 anguages.
Snce then, the novest has pubshed (aways, frst n Indan
pubcatons) three ma|or potca essays - The End of
Imagnaton, The Greater Common Good, and Power Potcs. Each
has addressed a bg and crtca ssue, an ssue that has mattered
to mons of peope and to the present and future of Inda. The
frst s a passonatey argued, unaterast, ant-chauvnst,
uncompromsng mora protest aganst nucear weaponsaton n
Inda and Pakstan. The second s an extensvey researched, but
equay passonate descrpton of what the Sardar Sarovar
megadam beng but on the Narmada Rver - and Bg Dams
generay - have meant to the ves and future of mons of
peope n Inda. The thrd essay argues aganst the prvatsaton
and corporatsaton of essenta nfrastructure, examnng n
partcuar the prvatsaton of the power sector, whch s at the
top of the Bharatya |anata Party-ed government's agenda today.
Each branty wrtten essay has represented a powerfu -
wrtery and persona - nterventon n a controversa arena.
Frontne and Outook magaznes pubshed, more or ess
smutaneousy and as Cover Stores, the frst and second essays
(n August 1998 and |une 1999); Frontne pubshed (n February
2000) The Cost of Lvng, the text of the novest's Nehru Lecture
gven at Cambrdge Unversty at the nvtaton of Amartya Sen;
and Outook pubshed (n Novembe r 2000) Power Potcs.
Interestngy, Roy has turned over the substanta royates from
the book pubcaton of these essays to the movements they
espouse. The Booker Prze money was aso gven to the Narmada
Bachao Andoan (NBA) n 1999.
There has been a profound change of context snce The Greater
Common Good was pubshed a year and a haf ago. When
Frontne and Outook cover-featured Roy's ndctment of Bg
Dams n Inda and the Narmada Vaey n partcuar, t seemed
that the ssue had attracted a whoe new consttuency, some of t
nternatona. The Sardar Sarovar dam was once agan back on
the front pages of Indan newspapers. Hope was rased among
the actvsts, and the peope of the Narmada Vaey, that wt h
ther great resstance movement - the NBA - fndng support from
an nternatonay renowned wrter and new aes and
sympathsers, postve thngs coud be acheved. The trend of
some of the hearngs n the Supreme Court appeared to boster
ths hope .
However, n October 2000 the apex court - the movement's ast
'nsttutona' resort - sammed the door n ts face. The NBA has
denounced the |udgment but does not seem to have a new game
pan. Recenty, Roy has been sharpy crtcsed, notaby by the
hstoran-cum-crcketoogst Ramachandra Guha, for her wrtng
as we as her persona support for the movement, and aso for
her nterventon on the nucear and prvatsaton ssues. Guha, n
fact, has pubcy advsed her to confne hersef to fcton.
Roy has rarey gven extended ntervews on her wrtng or the
sub|ects she wrtes about. She ponts out that what she wants to
say s contaned n the wrtng. She made an excepton by gvng
ths extended ntervew, n her New Deh home, to Frontne's
Edtor, N. Ram. In ths excusve, whch s our Cover Story, the
wrter speaks about the ssues she espouses, her response to her
crtcs, and her vews on a wrter's pace n socety. She aso
answers some questons reatng to The God of Sma Thngs,
reveang why the nove has not been, and perhaps w never be,
made nto a fm.
N. Ram: Arundhat Roy, the Supreme Court |udgment s
unambguous n ts support for the Sardar Sarovar dam. Is t a
over? Are you, as the sayng goes, runnng on empty?
Arundhati Roy: There are troubed tmes ahead, and yes, I thnk
we - when I say 'we', I don't mean to speak on behaf of the NBA,
I |ust generay mean peope who share ther pont of vew - yes, I
thnk we are up aganst t. We do have our backs to the wa... but
then, as another sayng goes, 'It an't over t the fat ady sngs'
|smes|. Remember, there are a tota of 30 Bg Dams panned n
the Narmada Vaey. Upstream from the Sardar Sarovar, the
peope fghtng the Maheshwar dam are wnnng vctory after
vctory. Protests n the Nmad regon have forced severa foregn
nvestors - Bayernwerk, Pacgen, Semens - to pu out. Recenty,
they managed to make Ogden Energy Group, an Amercan
company, wthdraw from the pro|ect. There's a fu-bown cv
dsobedence movement on there.
But yes, the Supreme Court |udgment on the Sardar Sarovar s a
tremendous bow - the aftershocks w be fet not |ust n the
Narmada Vaey, but a over the country. Wse men - L.C. |an,
Ramaswamy Iyer - have done brant anayses of the |udgment.
The worryng thng s not |ust that the Court has aowed
constructon of the dam to proceed, but the manner n whch t
dsregarded the evdence paced before t. It gnored the fact that
condtona envronmenta cearance for the pro|ect was gven
before a snge comprehensve study of the pro|ect was done. It
gnored the government of Madhya Pradesh's affdavt that t has
no and to resette the oustees, that n a these years M.P. has
not produced a snge hectare of agrcutura an d for ts oustees.
It gnored the fact that not one vage has been resetted
accordng to the drectves of the Narmada Water Dsputes
Trbuna Award, the fact that 13 years after the pro|ect was gven
condtona cearance, not a snge condton has been fufed,
that there sn't even a rehabtaton Master Pan - et aone
proper rehabtaton. Most mportanty, most urgenty, t aowed
constructon to proceed to 90 metres despte the fact that the
Court was fuy aware that fames dspaced at the current
heght of the dam have not yet been rehabtated - some of them
haven't even had ther and acqured yet! It has, n effect,
ordered the voaton of the Trbuna Award, t has ndrecty
endorsed the voaton of human rghts to fe and vehood.
There w be mayhem n the Narmada Vaey ths monsoon f t
rans - and of course, mayhem f t doesn't, because then there'
be drought. Ether way the peope are trapped - between the Ran
Gods and the Supre me Court Gods.
For the Supreme Court of Inda to sancton what amounts to
submergence wthout rehabtaton s an extraordnary thng.
Thnk of the mpcatons - today, the Inda Country study done for
the Word Commsson on Dams |WCD| says that Bg Dams coud
have dspaced up to 56 mon peope n ths country n the ast
50 years! So far there has been, f nothng ese at east a
pretence, that rehabtaton has been carred out, even though
we know that akhs of peope dspaced haf a century ago by the
famous Bhakra Nanga Dam have st not been resetted. But now
t ooks as though we're gong to drop even the charade of
rehabtaton.
But the most worryng thng n the Sardar Sarovar |udgment s
the part where t says that once government begns work on a
pro|ect, after t has ncurred costs, the Court ought to have no
further roe to pay. Ths, after the very same Court found enough
cause n 1994 to hod up constructon work for sx whoe years...
Wth ths snge statement, the Supreme Court of Inda s
abdcatng ts supreme responsbty. If the Court has no roe to
pay n arbtratng between the state and ts ctzens n the matter
of voatons of human rghts, then what s t here for? If |ustce
sn't a court's busness, then what s?
Why do you thnk thngs have come to ths pass? Ths fgure you
have spoken of severa tmes - between 33 mon and 56 mon
peope dspaced by bg dams n the ast 50 years - t s hard to
magne somethng of ths magntude happenng n another
country wthout t beng somehow taken nto serous account...
Wthout t beng taken nto account, wthout t gvng pause for
thought, wthout t affectng the nature of our country's decson-
makng process. The government doesn't even have a record of
dspaced peope, they don't even count as statstcs, t's c hng.
Terrfyng. After everythng that has been wrtten, sad and done,
the Indan government contnues to turn a deaf ear to the
protests. 695 bg dams - 40 per cent of a the bg dams beng
but n the word - are beng but n Inda as we speak . Yet Inda
s the ony country n the word that refused to aow the Word
Commsson on Dams to hod a pubc hearng here. The Gu|arat
Government banned ts entry nto Gu|arat and threatened ts
representatves wth arrest! The Word Commsso n on Dams was
an ndependent commsson set up to study the mpact of arge
dams. There were tweve commssoners, some of them
representatves of the nternatona dam ndustry, some were
mdde-of-the-roaders and some were campagners aganst da
ms. It was the frst comprehensve study of ts knd ever done.
The report was reeased n London n November by Neson
Mandea. It's vauabe because t's a negotated document,
negotated between two warrng camps and sgned by a the
commssoners. I don't agree wth everythng that the WCD
Report says, not by a ong shot - but compared to the Supreme
Court |udgment that euogses the vrtues of bg dams based on
no evdence whatsoever, the WCD Report s postvey
enghtened. It's as though the two were wrtten n dfferent
centures. One n the Dark Ages, one now. But t makes no
dfference here. There was a tny rppe of nterest n the news for
a coupe of days. Even that's ded down. We're back to busness
as usua. As they say n the army - 'Bash On Regardess'.
Lteray!
You must have an expanaton, a persona theory perhaps, of why
the government s so mpacabe, so unwng to sten?
Part of the expanaton - the reatvey nnocent part, I'd say - has
to do wth the fact that beef n Bg Dams has become a refex
artce of fath. Some peope - partcuary oder panners and
engneers - have nternased the Nehruvan thng about Bg
Dams beng the Tempes of Modern Inda. Dams have become
Inda's secuar gods - fath n them s mpervous to argument.
Another mportant part of the expanaton has to do wth the
smpe matter of corrupton. Bg Dams are god mnes for
potcans , bureaucrats, the constructon ndustry... But the
reay sad, ugy part has ess to do wth government than wth the
way our socety s structured. More than 60 per cent of the
mons of peope dspaced by dams are Dat and Advas. But
Advass ac count for ony 8 per cent and Dats about 15 per cent
of our popuaton. So you see what's happenng here - a vast
ma|orty of dspaced peope don't even wegh n as rea peope.
And another thng - what percentage of the peope who pan
these mammoth pro|ects are Dat, Advas or even rura? Zero.
There s no egataran soca contact whatsoever between the
two words. Deep at the heart of the horror of what's gong on,
es the caste system: ths ayered, horzontay dvded socety
wth no vertca bots, no gue - no ntermarrage, no soca
mngng, no human - humane - nteracton that hods the ayers
together. So when the bottom haf of socety smpy sh ears off
and fas away, t happens senty. It doesn't create the torson,
the upheava, the bowout, the sheer structura damage that t
mght, had there been the equvaent of vertca bots. Ths works
perfecty for the supporters of these pro|ects.
But even those of us who do understand and sympathse wth the
ssue, even f we fee concern, schoary concern, wrtery
concern, |ournastc concern - the press has done a reasonaby
persstent |ob of keepng t n the news - st, for the most part ,
there's no rea empathy wth those who pay the prce. Empathy
woud ead to passon, to ncandescent anger, to wd ndgnaton,
to acton. Concern, on the other hand, eads to artces, books,
Ph.Ds, feowshps. Of course, t s dspassonate enqury that has
created the pe-up of ncrmnatng evdence aganst Bg Dams.
But now that the evdence s avaabe and s n the pubc
doman, t's tme to do somethng about t.
Instead, what's happenng now s that the reatonshp between
concern and empathy s becomng oppostona, confrontatona.
When concern turns on empathy and says 'ths town sn't bg
enough for the two of us,' then we're n troube, bg troube. It me
ans somethng ugy s afoot. It means concern has become a
professona enterprse, a proftabe busness that's protectng ts
nterests ke any other. Peope have set up shop, they don't want
the furnture dsturbed. That's when ths potcs becomes murky,
dangerous and manpuatve. Ths s exacty what's happenng
now - any dspay of feeng, of sentment, s beng frowned upon
by some worthy keepers of the fame. Every emoton must be
stfed, must appear at the hgh tabe dressed for dnner. No
body's aowed to voate the dress code or, god forbd, appear
naked. The guests must not be embarrassed. The feast must go
on...
But to come back to your queston: as ong as the protest
remans cv and we-mannered, as ong as we - the sef-
apponted opnon-makers - a contnue to behave n respectabe
ways, as ong as we contnue to mndessy defer to nsttutons
that hav e themseves begun to cyncay drop any pretence of
beng mora, |ust, or respectabe - why shoud the government
sten? It's dong |ust fne.
Speakng of embarrassment, you have been crtcsed for
embarrassng the NBA, for beng tactess n your comments about
the Supreme Court, for cang Inda a Banana Repubc, for
comparng the Supreme Court |udgment to the NATO bombng of
Yugosava. ..
I'm beng arragned for bad behavour |aughs|. I wear that
crtcsm as a badge of honour. If 'tactess' was a I was about
that |udgment, then I'm guty of an extreme form of moderaton.
As for embarrassng the NBA - the NBA has sad and done far mor
e radca thngs than I have... After the |udgment, Baba Amte sad
- et me read ths out - "the |udcary at tmes wearng the coak of
presthood, suffocates the human rghts of the poor. Corrupton
and capta are gven egtmacy nstead of adher ng to the rue
of aw..." Its eader Medha Patkar was arrested for pcketng the
gates of the Supreme Court.
Anybody who thnks that I have been ntemperate has ther ear
very far from the ground. They have no dea how peope n the
vaey reacted to the |udgment. Days after t came out, a
spontaneous processon of youngsters bured t n a fthy pubc
gutter n Badwan. I was there, I saw t happen - the rayng
sogan was 'Supreme Court ne kya kya? Nyaya ka satyanaash
kya' - (What has the Supreme Court done? It has destroyed
|ustce!)
But I want to make t qute cear that I am an ndependent ctzen.
I don't have a Party ne. I stated my opnon. Not careessy, I
mght add, I sad what I thought. If that embarrassed anybody,
t's a pty, but t's too bad. But perhaps my crtcs sho ud check
back wth the NBA before vocng ther touchng concern.
But n the tme-honoured tradton of our worst potcans, may I
carfy what I actuay sad? I was takng to the press about the
fact that the Supreme Court |udgment had made thngs worse for
the NBA than they were before t went to court. Th e Court
ordered that the fna arbter of any dspute woud be the Prme
Mnster. Ths s so ceary n contraventon of the drectves ad
down by the Narmada Water Dsputes Trbuna Award. I sad that
a country n whch t s eft to the Prme Mnst er to cear a arge
dam pro|ect wthout any scentfc studes beng done; n whch t
s eft to the Prme Mnster to decde the fna heght of a dam
regardess of how much water there s n the rver; n whch t s
eft to the Prme Mnster to dec de whether or not there s and
avaabe for resettement - sounds very much ke a Banana
Repubc to me. What's the pont of commttees and Mnstres
and authortes f t's a up to Bg Daddy n the end?
As for the busness about the NATO bombng - I was takng to a
not-very-brght |ournast, t turns out. I sad that when the
deveoped countres were ndustrasng, most of them had
coones whch they cannbased on ther way up. We, on the
other h and, have no coones, so we turn upon ourseves and
begn to gnaw at the edges of our own socetes. I tod hm that t
remnded me of the tger n the Begrade zoo whch, drven
nsane wth fear by the NATO bombng, began to eat ts own
mbs. Ths was twsted nto the absurd statement that was
eventuay pubshed. But t's my faut. I shoud have known
better than to try and expan ths to a dsnterested |ournast.
What next? Where does the strugge go from here?
I don't know, reay. It has to move nto a dfferent gear. A our
eyes are on the NBA, watng for ts next move. It w take some
tme to evove a strategy. But they are extraordnary peope -
brant. I have never met a group of peope wth ther range of
sks - ther mobsaton abtes, ther nteectua rgour, ther
potca acumen. Ther abty to move effortessy from a dharna
n |asndh to argung a subte ega pont n the Supreme Court,
to makng a presentaton about the stu aton n the vaey whch
eaves the Word Bank no opton but to pu out. The monsoon w
be a terrbe tme for them - f t rans, peope w need hep on an
emergency footng. The whoe Advas bet w go under.
You see, whe the rest of us st around argung about how much
we ought to respect the Supreme Court |udgment, the peope n
the vaey have no opton. They can hardy be expected to
respectfuy accept ther own dspossesson . They w fght -
How? s the queston, and a very mportant one. The |udgment,
apart from what t says about the Sardar Sarovar, has sent out
another very grave sgna. After a, the 15-year-od strugge n
the vaey has so far been a spectacuary non-voent one. Now f
that has come to naught, yeded nothng, I fear to thnk about
what must be gong through peopes' heads. They watch as the
word around them gets more and more voent - as kdnappngs,
h|ackngs and the events that unfod n a nother vaey further
north grab the attenton of the government and yed nstant
resuts. Aready extremst groups have taken up poston n parts
of Madhya Pradesh. I'm sure they're watchng the Narmada
Vaey wth great nterest. I don't know what wo ud happen f the
NBA were to ose ground. I worry. I reay do...
It's somethng the government must thnk very serousy about. A
15-year-od non-voent peopes' movement s an extraordnary,
magnfcent thng. If t s dsmssed n ths contemptuous fashon,
f voence s the ony thng that forces the government t o the
negotatng tabe, then anarchy urks around the corner.
Meanwhe n Gu|arat, nterestng, predctabe thngs are
happenng. The fase propaganda, the deberate msnformaton
about the Sardar Sarovar s a comng home to roost. As ong as
the pro|ect was staed, as ong as t was a potenta dam, t was
easy to se to voters as a mrace dam - the Sardar Sarovar w
mend your bad knee, w produce your daughter's dowry, w
serve you breakfast n bed. But ma|or dsputes over the water
have aready begun. Peope n Kutch and Saurashtra are wakng
up to the Bg Con. The Kutch and Saurashtra branch of the B|P
boycotted the nauguraton of constructon ceremony at the dam
ste. You know what happened there - three B|P Mnsters had
ther offca Ceos burnt by an rate B|P mob, one Mnster was
hurt and had to be arfted out. The Kutch |a Sankat Nvaran
Samt has a case aganst the government n court askng for
constructon to be stayed unt Kutch s gven ts far share of
water. But a most nterestng deveopment s that the
spokesperson of the Sardar Sarovar dam, the pubc face of the
pro-dam obby - Narmada Mnster |a Naran Vyas - was
unceremonousy sacked recenty. In the ong run, t's probaby
good for Vyas - he' be assocated wth the 'vctory', but not wth
the murky potcs of who gets the water. You can see t
happenng before your eyes: consensus n Gu|arat s qucky
comng unstuck.
St, the honest answer to your queston s: I don't reay know
what next. The answer w come, shoud come, from the peope
of the Narmada Vaey.
Have you read Ramachandra Guha's trade aganst you n The
Hndu?
|Smes| Trades. Pura. Yes, yes, of course I have. He's become
ke a staker who shows up at my doorstep every other Sunday.
Some days he comes aone. Some days he brngs hs frends and
famy, they a chant and stamp... It's an angry tte cottage
ndustry that seems to have sprung up around me. Lke a bunch
of keenng god-squadders, they nk hands to keep ther courage
up and egg each other on - Aunt Sushy the novest who's hated
me for years, Unce Defence Mnstry who oves bg dams, Ltte
Mss Muffet who thnks I shoud watch my mouth. Actuay, I've
grown qute fond of them and I' mss them when they're gone.
It's funny, when I wrote The God of Sma Thngs, I was attacked
by the Left - when I wrote The End of Imagnaton, by the Rght.
Now I'm accused by Guha and hs Ra-Ra cub of beng -
smutaneousy - extreme eft, extreme rght, extreme green,
RSS, Swadesh |agran Manch and by some devsh seght of
hand, on Guha's sde too! Goodness, he's skddng on hs own
ta!
I don't know what t s wth me and these academcs-cum-crcket
statstcans - Guha's the thrd one that I seem to have sent nto
an ncensed orbt. Coud t be my bad bowng acton?...|aughs|
Why have you chosen not to respond to Guha? Do you, as many
others seem to, dsmss t as |ust a bad case of envy?
No, no, not at a. That woud be too convenent, too easy. One
coud end up sayng that about everybody who was crtca. No, I
thnk that woud be unfar. I'd say t's far more compex and
nterestng than that. Guha's outburst s dressed up as an attack
on my 'stye' - but t's not reay that at a. If you part the
nvectve, you' see that our dfferences are serous, and
serousy potca. Chttaroopa Pat of the NBA has done a
wonderfu dssecton of Guha's potcs n her artce "The
hstoran as gatekeeper" |Frontne, |anuary 5, 2001|.
My stye, my anguage, s not somethng superfca, ke a coat
that I wear when I go out. My stye s me - even when I'm at
home. It's the way I thnk. My stye s my potcs. Guha cams
that we - he and I - are 'ob|ectvey' on the same sde. I
competey dsagree. We are words apart, our potcs, our
arguments. I'm ncned to put as great a dstance as possbe
between the Guhas of the word and mysef.
Take hs book - hs bography of Verrer Ewn. It's competent and
ceany wrtten. But our potca dfferences begn wth hs choce
of sub|ect - personay, I thnk we've had enough, come on,
enough stores about whte men, however nterestng they are,
and ther adventures n the heart of darkness. As a sub|ect for a
bography, franky, I'm much more nterested n Kos Ewn, hs
Gond wfe.
And the tte of hs book! - Savagng the Cvzed: Verrer Ewn,
Hs Trbas, and Inda. Hs trbas! Hs trbas? For heaven's sake!
Dd he own them? Dd he buy them? There's a bog, a marsh, a
whoe potca swampand stretchng between us rght here. But
t's hs other work, hs hstory books - he cas hmsef an
ecoogca hstoran, you know that, don't you?
Yes, I beeve so...
We, he's co-authored two books. One cams to be An Ecoogca
Hstory of Inda, nothng ess, the other he cas Ecoogy and
Equty. The sub-tte s The Use and Abuse of Nature n
Contemporary Inda and t was pubshed as recent y as 1995. In
hs ecoogca hstory, bg dams don't mert so much as a
menton. The other one has a thumbna sketch of the strugge
aganst bg dams, and a cursory, superfca account of the
strugge n the Narmada Vaey. For someone who sets hmsef up
as a chroncer of the ecoogca hstory of a country that s the
thrd argest buder of bg dams n the word, that has 3,600 bg
dams whch have dspaced maybe up to 56 mon peope, that
have submerged mons of acres of pr me forest and, that have
ed to the wateroggng and sansaton of vast areas, that have
destroyed estuarne ecosystems and drastcay atered the
ecoogy of amost every rver n ths country - woudn't you say
that the man has mssed a wee thng or two! For goodness' sake -
today, bg dams are the stagng ground for the most contentous
debates on ecoogy, equty, soca |ustce, bureaucratc and
potca ntrgue, nternatona fnance and corrupton on an
unmagnabe scae. Why does none of ths mert attenton from
ths ecoogca hstoran?
I' te you why: no amount of research, however panstakng, can
make up for potca vacuousness. If you don't ask the rght
questons, you don't get the rght answers. If your potcs s cear,
f you had your ear to the ground, you woudn't, you c oudn't
possby, mss your mark so competey.
Look at the work of peope ke Ashsh Kothar, Ramesh Borey,
Caude Avarez, Hmanshu Thakker, Shrpad Dharmadhkary, and
further afed, Edward Godsmth, Nchoas Hdeyard, Patrck
McCuy - McCuy's book, Senced Rvers, s a dazzng an ayss
of the ecoogy and potcs of bg dams. Even someone ke An
Agarwa, though hs vews on the sub|ect dffer from those of the
NBA - at east he engages wth the ssue. Ther work s out there,
t's vta stuff, t occupes centre-stage n the debate - but et's
face t, a of ths puts Mr. Guha n an extremey embarrassng
poston. He's ke one of the creatures that ddn't make t onto
the ark. An ecoogca hstoran who mssed the boat competey.
Submatng shame nto anger, we a know, s a common human
fang. So what does Guha do? He pcks the most vsbe target
from amongst those who he fees are embarrassng hm, and ets
fy. If he had dsputed my facts, f he had taken apart my
argument, I coud have respected hm. I ook forward to that
devastatng, ncsve, ogca tearng apart of my argument...
Actuay, that's a compete e, I'm qute gratefu that Guha's
made such a spectace of hmsef. Does he have anythng
substanta to say? Apart from nsutng me personay,
deberatey, wfuy, macousy, Guha has no argument aganst
my argument, nothng to say about my facts. So he tres to
egsate on how I ought to fee about them. Never was there a
more passonate ndctment of passon, a more hysterca
denuncaton of hystera - he's rght, I am hysterca. I'm
screamng from the boody rooftops. And he and hs smug tte
cub are gong Shhhh... you' wake the neghbours! But I want to
wake the neghbours, that's my whoe pont. I want everybody to
open ther eyes.
Anyway, as far as I am concerned, t's not hs nsuts I fnd as
corny as the rest of t - hs pronouncements about what's good
for the envronmenta movement and what's not - the
quntessence of whch s, that he's good for the movement and
I'm n ot. Hs pronouncements on what consttutes good wrtng.
Hs does, mne doesn't. Hs unsocted advce - advce to the NBA
to dsengage from me, advce to me to stop wrtng potca
essays and go back to terature. I mean apart from beng
someone wth the |urassc noton that potcs and terature are
mutuay excusve, who s he - the headboy? Cupboard captan?
What's next? Is he gong to put me on a det? Choose my
wardrobe? Sentence me to mustard bebottoms for a whoe
month?
Why have you not responded to Guha's charges?
We, for one because I thought that four Sundays n a row (he's
aready used up three) dscussng Arundhat Roy's work woud be
a bt much for readers... and anyway, how does one respond to a
Punch and |udy show?
Guha hasn't reay read my work - he's ransacked t, wearng
enses so thck wth anmus that they bur hs vson. He's vrtuay
magned the essays he wshes I'd wrtten n order for hm to
demosh wth hs percng wt and nteect, whe hs frends and
coeagues nod and grn. Any response from me woud end up
soundng ke - oh, I ddn't say ths, I ddn't mean that... But f he
can't be bothered to read my work carefuy, why bother wth a
response?
Let me gve you an exampe of what I mean: Guha tres to
rdcue me for comparng bg dams to nucear bombs. But I've
never done that - my essay says ... here's exacty what t says -
|reads|:
"Bg Dams are to a naton's 'deveopment' what nucear
bombs are to ts mtary arsena. They are both weapons of mass
destructon, both weapons governments use to contro ther own
peope, both twenteth century embems that mark a pont n
tme when human ntegence has outstrpped ts own nstnct for
survva..."
Surey Guha ought to know that ths, n the Engsh anguage, s
what's caed a reatve anaogy. In a reatve anaogy, one s
comparng two reatonshps. I'm sayng that bg dams and
nucear bombs are both potca nstruments, extremey
undemocratc potca nstruments. But I'm not sayng bombs are
dams. I'm not sayng that dams are radoactve when they
expode or that nucear bombs rrgate agrcutura and. If I say
Amtabh Bachchan s to fm stars what Coke s to fzzy drnks, I'm
not comparng Amtabh Bachchan to a Coke or sayng that fm
stars are fzzy drnks. In agebra, f I say x:y what w:r, t doesn't
mean I'm sayng x = w.
Ths s |ust one sma exampe, there are other more snster
ones. For nstance, he pcks out one sentence from my new essay
Power Potcs that was pubshed recenty n Outook. It says:
"When the hstory of Inda's mracuous eap to the forefront of
the Informaton Revouton s wrtten, et t be sad that 56 mon
Indans (and ther chdren and ther chdren's chdren) pad for t
wth everythng they ever had."
Here's how Guha scores one of the more tragc 'own goas' snce
Escobar - you know what happened to Escobar! Guha soates the
sentence out of context and kcks t towards hs own goa, then
fes to the goa post to stage a spectacuar save. He has to use
hs nstnct to decde whether to dve to hs eft or rght. He dves
- surprse surprse - to hs extreme rght. It's not the horror of 56
mon dspaced peope that bothers hm. It's my reference to the
Informaton Revouton, whch was used to compare the meteorc
deveopment of one sector of the Indan economy wth the
horrfc dspossesson of another. Guha gratutousy makes out
that I'm attackng - not |ust attackng - beng "grossy sanderous"
to the IT gants, Tata, Wpro and I forget wh o ese - he actuay
names partcuar companes... I don't! Havng nvented the nsut,
our ntrepd knght n shnng armour raes to ther defence. Is he
rea? Is he ookng for frends n hgh paces? Or has he |ust
stunned hmsef on the goapost?
Takng about your essay The Greater Common Good, crtcs ke
Guha and B.G. Verghese say that t's sentmenta wthout beng
factua, that t romantcses Advas fe-styes...
That's pretty rch comng from the ecoogst who mssed the ark! I
don't want to sound arrogant - ths s the troube about defendng
onesef, mmodesty goes wth the terrtory! Sentmenta wthout
beng factua? Look, |ust because I don't wave my footnotes n
peopes' faces and don't do the academc heavy breathng stuff,
t doesn't mean I haven't studed the sub|ect n depth. I don't
beeve that there's a snge fact or argument - soca, ecoogca,
economc or potca - about the Sardar Sarovar dam that's
mssng, or that has not been addressed, n my essay. For ths I
have to thank the NBA for makng avaabe to me every
document at ts dsposa - and a the peope who've pubshed
wonderfu work on ths ssue over the years. I'm takng of H
manshu Thakker, L.C. |an, the FMG Report, Ramaswamy Iyer,
Shrpad Dharmadhkary, the Morse Commttee Report, Rahu
Ram's booket Muddy Waters, Ashsh Kothar... I owe a ot to ong,
sparky conversatons wth brant peope n the vaey, to Kase
|eebo re - |harana |haver and Anurag Sngh's documentary fm,
whch frst sent me on my traves n the Narmada Vaey... It's a
ong, ong st, and t's been more vta and nsghtfu and
nstructve than dong years of research n a brary.
As for the charge of romantcsng Advas fe-styes - I thought
the tme when that sort of thng sent a frsson of exctement
through the academc communty had come and gone. I mean,
come on - even the good od Gu|arat Government feeds at that
foetd trough. When I was wrtng The Greater Common Good I
was acutey aware of two thngs: One, that I was not gong to
wrte on 'behaf' of anyone but mysef because I thnk that's the
most honest thng to do - n our socety partcuary, the potcs of
'representaton' s compcated and fraught wth danger and
dshonesty. Two, I was not wrtng an anthropoogca account of
the festyes of peope that I knew very tte about. I was wrtng
about soca |ustce, about the potcs of nvountary
dspacement, about what happens to peope who are forcby
uprooted from an envronment they know we and dumped n a
word they know nothng about - a word n whch, nstead of a
forest and a rver and farmands, they have unempoyment and a
tn s hack. It's an unfar, unequa bargan for anybody - Advas or
Aggarwa. At no pont n my essay have I even attempted to
descrbe Advas festye, et aone romantcse t. Here's an eary
passage from The Greater Common Good |reads|:
"... Let me say at the outset that I'm not a cty-basher. I've
done my tme n a vage. I've had frst-hand experence of the
soaton, the nequty and the potenta savagery of t. I'm not an
ant-deveopment |unke or a proseytser for the eterna
uphodng of custom and tradton..."
Does that sound partcuary romantc? The fact s I grew up n a
vage - not an Advas vage, but a vage nevertheess. As a
chd, a I ever dreamed of was escapng. I don't need to do
'research' or 'fed-work' or wrte a Ph.D. to fgure out w hat goes
on. Anyone who's read The God of Sma Thngs coud work that
out. If I do romantcse anythng, t's the freedom, the anonymty
of urban fe...
I'm sorry to go on about ths, but Guha aso denounces your work
as sef-ndugent and unorgna. A serous charge aganst a fcton
wrter, woudn't you say?
Sef-ndugence s not the knd of charge that one can refute. If I
am sef-ndugent then... what can I say? I' stand n the corner
and hang my head n shame! |aughs| But I thnk that the
accusaton has reay to do wth the fact that I often wrte n the
frst person. Lke I sad, I do that deberatey. I guess academcs
and |ournasts are traned to beeve that sayng "I" s somehow
anathema - because they're supposed to come across as
ob|ectve. Of course that's nonsense - a person who conceas hs
or her dentty s no more ob|ectve than a person who reveas t.
Any cued-n anthropoogst shoud know that. For an artst, a
panter, a wrter, a snger, ntrospecton - contempatng the sef,
pacng yoursef n the pcture to see where you ft - s often what
art s a about. For a wrter, to use the frst person s a common
narratve devce. It's not |ust crudty, t's a faacy, to equate ths
wth sef-ndugence. Mnd you, ths s not the ony tme that Guha
shows a refexve hostty towards wrters and an opacty to
terature.
There's a fne but mportant dfference between sef-ndugence
and sef-awareness. Sef-awareness, n ths case, s beng aware -
when you wrte - that you are compct, that you are a
benefcary of the terrbe potcs of the socety n whch you ve.
When you revea who you are and how you have benefted. Sef-
ndugence s when, masqueradng as a concerned academc, you
f the Sunday papers wth persona nvectve aganst somebody
you don't ke, and foow that up by seectvey pubshng yo ur
frends' persona etters of support, and then your re|onder that
supports ther support... and so on.
As for the charge of beng unorgna - when one s wrtng to
advocate a potca poston, or n support of a peopes'
movement that has been yeng ts ungs out for the ast ffteen
years, one s not tryng to be orgna, one s addng one' s voce
to thers n order for them to be heard. Amost by defnton, one
s reteratng what they are sayng. My essays are not about me
or my brance or my orgnaty or ack of t. They're not meant
to be a career move - they're about re-s tatng the ssue, they're
about sayng the same thngs over and over agan...
You actuay do say somethng about ths n your essays...
Yes, I'm fattered that you remember. Here, from The End of
Imagnaton (Frontne, August 14, 1998) |reads|:
"There can be nothng more humatng for a wrter of fcton
to have to do than to re-state a case that has, over the years,
aready been made by other peope... and made passonatey,
eoquenty and knowedgeaby. But I am prepared to grove. To
hum ate mysef ab|ecty, because n the crcumstances, sence
woud be ndefensbe..."
RA|EEV BHATT
"She's the good one, I'm the bad one, and the bad news s that
we're frends."
And agan, n The Cost of Lvng |Frontne, February 18, 2000|,
my Nehru Lecture on Bg Dams:
"If you're a wrter, you tend to keep those achng eyes
open ... Every day you are remnded that there s no such thng
as nnocence. And every day you have to thnk of new ways of
sayng od and obvous thngs. Thngs about ove and greed.
Thngs about potcs and governance. About power and
poweressness... thngs that must be sad over and over agan..."
You see, once agan Guha s guty of fabby concusons drawn
from soppy readng. Franky, between hs suspect potcs and
sapdash schoarshp, a woman's spoed for choce. Does anyone
have the rght to defame someone n such careess, wanton
fasho n? I thnk he owes me a pubc apoogy.
What about the charge that you smpfy thngs, express them n
back and whte?
I don't smpfy thngs. I try and expan compcated thngs n
smpe anguage. That's an entrey dfferent enterprse. I fnd t
offensve, ths noton that thngs are too compcated to expan to
an ordnary reader - agan, ths coter e, ths cub-mentaty. I
wrte about thngs that vtay affect peopes' ves. To say that
thngs are too compcated to expan s |ust not good enough.
They must be expaned. Experts ove to h|ack varous aspects of
an ssue - dspacement, rehabtaton, dranage, hydroogy - and
carry them off to ther ars where they guard them aganst the
curosty of the nterested ayperson. But eventuay t's not
rocket scence. It's about our day ves. A these thngs must be
understood, con nected up and expaned - smpy and cogenty.
It's not enough to accuse me of smpfyng thngs - how? what?
where? Be specfc. I can hande t. Everybody needs to know and
understand what's gong on. Not |ust the headboy and cupboard
captan or the p eope who went to good schoos. Not expanng
somethng s a way of wrestng power and hodng onto t. It's a
way of makng yoursef seem mportant, of tryng to sound
ceverer than you are. Of course I understand, there's |obs and
money n that. But b eyond a pont, t becomes vugar...
As for my monochromatc vson, thngs are more back and whte
than we ke to admt. The subtety s seepng out of our ves at a
pretty nfty pace.
One of the more persstent crtcsms of the NBA and you s that
you are Negatvsts, Nay sayers...
Ah yes, that's the "Has Medha Patkar ever made a gobar gas
pant?" schoo of thought. I |ust don't understand t. Bg Dams
wreak havoc. They have dspaced mons of peope, destroyed
rvers and estuares, submerged forests. The Narmada Vaey
pro|ect aone w submerge 4,000 square kometres of forest.
How does the fght to save ths count as negatvty? If there's a
forest fre ragng and someone's tryng to put t out, s t
negatvsm or s t conservaton? If everythng s destroyed
there' be nothng eft to conserve! The NBA has been an
nspraton to peopes' movements a over the word - how can
you knock ths? Any one of ts actvsts s worth more natona
prde than a the Mss Words and Mss Unverses put together a
thousand tmes over. There are amazng peope dong the most
wonderfu work n water-harvestng and water management a
over Inda. Prem|bha Pate of Upeta, Manubha Mehta of
Savarkunda, the Tarun Bharat Sangh n Awar and hundreds of
others dotted across the country. But the fre-fghters and the
water-harvesters are both part of the aternatve souton. Nether
woud be much good wthout the other. One makes space for the
other. The NBA s ke an ce-breaker - a shp that cears the way t
hrough cffs of ce for other shps to sa through. There's no need
for Medha Patkar to prove hersef by desgnng a gobar gas pant,
or for Ra|nder Sngh of the Tarun Bharat Sangh to prove hmsef
by eadng a dharna. They both do what they do wonderfuy we.
Pttng them aganst each other s sma-mnded, and t's
destructve.
And whe crtcsng the NBA, what does Mr. Guha hod up as hs
aternatve vson? Dr. Pushpangadan, who coects rare medcna
pants - there won't be many of those around f the forests
dsappear. And |FM ||ont Forest Management| schemes n
Benga. I mean: what's he tryng to say? That the Word Bank and
the Ford Foundaton are the new radcas n town? The new
peopes' movements? What's ths? A wonky wordvew? Or a
gratefu nudge and a wnk to od frends?
In hs attack on your new essay Power Potcs pubshed n
Outook (November 27, 2000), Guha says - and I quote:
"...nstead of turnng on gobasaton... we shoud come to terms
wth t, bend t as best we can to our nterests - f we want to hod
our own aganst foregn capta, we must encourage nnovaton
by our technoogsts and entrepreneurs, not mock them as Roy
does." Your comment?
I'm gettng a bt tred of ths boke. You know, I thnk he must
have read someone ese's essay. Because I haven't yet - at east
not that I'm aware of - wrtten an essay on gobasaton. Power
Potcs, for anyone who's prepared to read t and n ot |ust the
burb on the cover of Outook, s an essay that argues specfcay
aganst the prvatsaton and corporatsaton of essenta
nfrastructure. The word 'gobasaton' s not mentoned n the
entre essay, not once. Howev er, f and when I do wrte about
gobasaton, I can assure you that my vews on the sub|ect w
be very dfferent from Guha's.
But to answer hs charge that I have mocked our technoogsts -
take a ook at ths, t's a passage from Power Potcs:
"The Frst Word needs to se, the Thrd Word needs to buy -
t ought to be a reasonabe busness proposton. But t sn't. For
many years, Inda has been more or ess sef-suffcent n power
equpment. The Indan pubc sector company, Bharat Heavy
Eectrcas Ltd |BHEL|, manufactured and even exported word-
cass power equpment. A that's changed now. Over the years,
our own government has starved t of orders, cut off funds for
research and deveopment and more or ess edged t out of a
dgnf ed exstence. Today BHEL s no more than a sweat shop. It
s beng forced nto '|ont ventures' (one wth GE, one wth
Semens) where ts ony roe s to provde cheap abour whe they
provde the equpment and the technoogy. Why? Why does more
expens ve, mported foregn equpment sut our bureaucrats and
potcans better? We a know why. Because graft s factored nto
the dea. Buyng equpment from your oca store s |ust not the
same thng."
Does ths sound ke I'm mockng our technoogsts? Serousy, are
we takng about the same essay? Is there some other Arundhat
Roy? Arundhat Rao? Aradhana Roy? Does she wrte essays for
Outook and Frontne? And ths man ectures me about
nteectua probty?
The gobasaton debate has a very nterestng spn on t - a ts
admrers, from B Cnton, Kof Annan, A.B. Va|payee to the
cheerng brokers n the stas, a of them say the same ofty
thngs: f we have the rght nsttutons of governance n p ace -
effectve courts, good aws, honest potcans, partcpatve
democracy, a transparent admnstraton that respects human
rghts and gves peope a say n decsons that affect ther ves -
then the gobasaton pro|ect w work for the poor as we.
My pont s that f a ths was n pace, then amost anythng
woud succeed: socasm, communsm, you name t. Everythng
works n Paradse, even a poor od Banana Repubc! But n an
mperfect word, s t gobasaton that's gong to brng us a t hs
bounty? Is that what's happenng here now that Inda s on the
fast track to the free market? Does any one thng on that ofty st
appy to the Narmada ssue? Has the Supreme Court been |ust
and accountabe? State nsttutons transparent? Ha ve peope
had a say, have they even been nformed of decsons that vtay
affect ther ves? The answer s no, no, no... And strange to say -
n ths beeaguered democracy, s t the votares of gobasaton
who are out there on the streets de mandng accountabty and
responsbe government? Of course not! And when someone ese
does - the NBA, or another peopes' movement, or an unfortunate
prvate ctzen, and has to contend wth the poce or, worse,
academcs wth dubous potcs - do th ese guys sprng to ther
defence?
Peope have sad that your essay Power Potcs s sef-
contradctory because t s an argument aganst the market and
gobasaton by one who s paced at the heart of the goba
market for ceebrty-hood.
Peope have sad? |chuckes| It's the od boy agan, sn't t -
what's hs thess ths tme? That a ceebrtes must support
gobasaton? Or that a wrters who se more than a certan
number of copes of a book must support g obasaton? What's
the cut-off? Thrty thousand copes? Do anguage edtons count?
Audo books? Brae?
I earned that The God of Sma Thngs has sod sx mon copes
n some forty anguages. Your agent, Davd Godwn, aso tes me
that you've turned down offers for fm rghts from a over the
word, ncudng Hoywood. Are you watng for the rght drector?
Can we ever expect to see a fm verson of your nove?
No... t's not about the rght drector. I don't thnk my book woud
make a good fm. Besdes, I don't thnk cnema has to be the ast
stop for terature, for noves. I had wrtten two feature
screenpays before I started wrtng The God of S ma Thngs. I
was feeng a tte confned by the 'externaty' of cnema. I
wanted to be free to wrte from wthn, from nsde peopes'
hearts and heads. I wanted to fee free to wrte a whoe page
descrbng the moon and the trees n the rver, not |ust have to
wrte Scene 21. Ext. Nght. Rver.
Perhaps because I was a screenwrter, I set out to wrte a
stubborny vsua but unfmabe book. And I dd. The most vsua
thng about The God of Sma Thngs are the feengs. How woud
you fm oney, frghtened tte Rahe com munng wth a
kangaroo-shaped waste bn n Cochn Arport? I don't see cnema
capturng the magc whsper, the hecopter ksses, the secret
breathng of a cement kangaroo. Not uness you were makng the
Wat Dsney verson.
Aso, I thnk that each reader of The God of Sma Thngs has hs
or her own verson of the fm runnng nsde ther heads - there
are sx mon dfferent versons of the fm. It woud be a pty,
don't you thnk, to et a snge fm-maker ext ngush and
approprate a those versons, and force-ft them nto a snge,
defntve one. Ths decentrased democracy s fne by me
|smes|.
And ths may sound sy, but I coudn't bear the dea of seeng
actors pay Estha, Rahe, Veutha, Ammu, Chacko... t woud k
me. I ove them too much. I aways w.
It's nterestng that Prme Mnster Va|payee has been vacatonng
n a resort n Keraa made nternatonay famous by The God of
Sma Thngs. The meda have been fu of ths connecton...
|smes|... yes. "The Hstory House. Whose doors were ocked and
wndows open. Wth coo stone foors and dm was and bowng
shp-shaped shadows on the was. Where pump, transucent
zards ved behnd od pctures and waxy, crumbng ancestor s
wth tough toe-nas and breath that smeed of yeow maps
gossped n sbant, papery whspers..." I know that bt by heart.
When I was a chd t was an od, abandoned, crumbng house
that fed my magnaton. It's odd, when the Prme Mnst er goes
vacatonng n the settng of your worst, most prvate, chdhood
terrors. But wasn't t Ton Morrson who sad somethng ke
"terature s a very prvate thng, fashoned for pubc
consumpton"? It's funny how my terrors have become a tourst
paradse... but t's okay. I'm a bg gr now |aughs|.
Comng back to the ssue of ceebrty-hood - what's your
reatonshp wth t? How does t affect your wrtng? How do you
dea wth t?
Ceebrty-hood - I hate that word. How do I dea wth t? When
Rock Hudson's career was on the skds, f he heard of a frend or
coeague who was dong we, he'd say "Damn hm, I hope he
des." That's a bt how I fee about my ceebrty-hood. When I se e
a pcture of mysef n the papers, I fee hoste towards my pubc
sef and say "Damn her, I hope she des"...|smes|.
But actuay, t's a very, very dffcut thng for a person to come
to terms wth. For a whe I thought t woud drve me cean crazy.
But I thnk I'm begnnng to get the hang of t now. I worked t out
from frst prncpes - I'm a wrter frst and a ceebrty next. I'm a
wrter who happens to have become, for the moment, a ceebrty.
As a matter of prncpe, I never do anythng because I'm a
ceebrty. I don't naugurate thngs, I don't appear as a chef guest
anywhere, I don't 'grac e' occasons, I don't do chat shows, I don't
do ntervews - uness of course I'm rubbshng ecoogca
hstorans! - or have somethng very specfc to say.
But I aso don't not do the thngs I want to do. I ve, I ove, I bum
around, but above a, I wrte. And I support what I wrte. The
ceebrty part |ust tras aong behnd me makng a heck of a
nose - ke a tn can attached to a cat's ta. I can't take t off - but
t' fa off on ts own sooner or ater. For now, I try to gnore t. Of
course, t's not that smpe. Every tme I show up at an NBA
dharna - and whether or not I show up s aways a coectve
decson taken wth them - the Press nvaraby reports that I 'ed'
t aong wth Medha. Now that's rdcuous! Rdcuous to equate
us n any way, rdcuous to mpy that I ead anythng, eave
aone the NBA. Fortunatey, both Medha and I are aware of the
doube -edged nature of meda attenton. As I keep sayng, she's
the good one, I'm the bad one, and the bad news s that we're
frends!
How does a ths affect your wrtng? It's gven you a ot of space
to say what you want to say. Does that put any pressure on you?
Do you run the rsk of becomng a ragbag of good causes?
Make no mstake, t's not the tn can, not ceebrty-hood, that's
gven me the space. It's my wrtng. I'm very cear on that one.
I'm a ceebrty because I'm a wrter, not the other way around.
After a, you or Vnod Mehta of Outook - yo u're not runnng a
soup ktchen, are you? You gve me the space because t's worth
t to you, because you know that I am read.
But f you're askng whether the fact that I know the space s
avaabe puts pressure on me - t does. At tmes. Because for me,
to say nothng s as potca an act as to say what I do say. There
are these two voces vrtuay at war wt hn me - one that wants
me to dve underground and work on another book, another that
refuses to et me ook away, that drags me deep nto the heart of
what's gong on around me. As for becomng a ragbag of good
causes - you're rght, the pressure s tre mendous. Smpy
because horror urks around every corner, and t's hard to sten
to an account of t and then say that you can do nothng to hep.
But, you know, for me to become an ambassador of good causes
woud do n|ustce to the causes and a great voence to my
wrtng sef - and that's somethng that I w not sacrfce. At any
cost. A snger sngs, a panter pants, a wrter wrtes. For some t's
a professon. For others t's a cang. One does t because one
must.
It sounds ke a oney pace that you work from. What do you fnd
most dffcut about beng who you are and dong what you do?
We, every wrter - good, bad, successfu or not - who's sttng at
a desk ookng at a bank pece of paper, s oney. It's probaby
the oneest work n the word. But once the work s done, t's
dfferent. I'm not oney at a - I'm the opposte o f oney. How
can I, of a peope, compan? I ke to thnk that f by chance I
were to become competey desttute, I coud spend the rest of
my fe wakng nto peope's homes and sayng, "I wrote The God
of Sma Thngs, w you gve me un ch?" It's a wonderfu feeng.
When I go to the Narmada Vaey, I see my essay beng read n
Hnd, n Gu|arat, n Marath - even transated oray nto Bha. I
see parts of t beng performed as a pay. What more coud a
wrter ask for? How much es s oney can I be?
It's true that I wrte about contentous thngs. Coser to home,
there's some hostty. Each tme I step out I hear the sncker-
snack of knves beng sharpened, I catch the gnt of scmtars n
the sun. But that's good. It keeps me sharp - ft, aert, t focusses
my thought, hones my argument, makes me very carefu about
what I say and how I say t. On the whoe, t sn't a bad unversty
to go to. I don't have the uxury of careessness that some of my
crtcs do.
We, even Ramachandra Guha appauds you for your courage
and the NBA for ts oyaty to you.
Courage and oyaty? They sound ke knd words for a good
horse. D'you thnk that's what he meant when he caed us
'negh-sayers'? |aughs hepessy|... Sorry about that, Ram!
COME SEPTEMBER
ARUNDHATl ROY
A writer's reflections on the U.5.-decreed `War Against Terror',
the conflict between power and powerlessness, and a better
world on its way.
Oute often these days, I fnd mysef beng descrbed as a "soca
actvst." Those who agree wth my vews, ca me "courageous."
Those who don't, ca me a knds of rude names whch I won't
repeat. I am not a soca actvst, nether am I partcuary
courageous.... So pease do not underestmate the trepdaton
wth whch I stand here to say what I must say.
Wrters magne that they cu stores from the word. I'm
begnnng to beeve that vanty makes them thnk so. That t's
actuay the other way around. Stores cu wrters from the word.
Stores revea themseves to us. The pubc narratve, the prvate
narratve - they coonse us. They commsson us. They nsst on
beng tod. Fcton and non-fcton are ony dfferent technques of
storyteng. For reasons I do not fuy understand, fcton dances
out of me. Non-fcton s wrenched out by the achng, broken
word I wake up to every mornng.
The theme of much of what I wrte, fcton as we as non-fcton,
s the reatonshp between power and poweressness and the
endess, crcuar confct they're engaged n. |ohn Berger, that
most wonderfu wrter, once wrote: Never agan w a snge story
be tod as though t's the ony one. There can never be a snge
story. There are ony ways of seeng. So, when I te a story, I te
t not as an deoogue who wants to pt one absoutst deoogy
aganst another, but as a storyteer who wants to share her way
of seeng. Though t mght appear otherwse, my wrtng s not
reay about natons and hstores, t's about power. About the
paranoa and ruthessness of power. About the physcs of power. I
beeve that the accumuaton of vast unfettered power by a state
or a country, a corporaton or an nsttuton - or even an
ndvdua, a spouse, frend or sbng - regardess of deoogy,
resuts n excesses such as the ones I w recount here.
Lvng as I do, as mons of us do, n the shadow of the nucear
hoocaust that the governments of Inda and Pakstan keep
promsng ther bran-washed ctzenry, and n the goba
neghbourhood of the War Aganst Terror (what Presdent Bush
rather bbcay cas `The Task That Never Ends'), I fnd mysef
thnkng a great dea about the reatonshp between Ctzens and
the State.
In Inda, those of us who have expressed vews on Nucear
Bombs, Bg Dams, Corporate Gobasaton and the rsng threat of
communa Hndu fascsm - vews that are at varance wth the
Indan Government's - are branded `ant-natona'. Whe ths
accusaton does not f me wth ndgnaton, t's not an accurate
descrpton of what I do or how I thnk. An `ant-natona' s a
person who s aganst hs/her own naton and, by nference, s pro
some other one. But t sn't necessary to be `ant-natona' to be
deepy suspcous of a natonasm, to be ant-natonasm.
Natonasm of one knd or another was the cause of most of the
genocde of the twenteth century. Fags are bts of cooured coth
that governments use frst to shrnk-wrap peopes' mnds and
then as ceremona shrouds to bury the dead. When ndependent,
thnkng peope (and here I do not ncude the corporate meda)
begn to ray under fags, when wrters, panters, muscans, fm-
makers suspend ther |udgment and bndy yoke ther art to the
servce of the `Naton', t's tme for a of us to st up and worry. In
Inda we saw t happen soon after the Nucear tests n 1998 and
durng the Karg War aganst Pakstan n 1999. In the Unted
States we saw t durng the Guf War and we see t now, durng
the `War aganst Terror'. That bzzard of Made-n-Chna Amercan
fags.
Recenty, those who have crtcsed the actons of the U.S.
Government (mysef ncuded) have been caed `ant-Amercan'.
Ant-Amercansm s n the process of beng consecrated nto an
deoogy.
The term `ant-Amercan' s usuay used by the Amercan
estabshment to dscredt and, not fasey - but sha we say
naccuratey - defne ts crtcs. Once someone s branded ant-
Amercan, the chances are that he or she w be |udged before
they're heard and the argument w be ost n the weter of
brused natona prde.
What does the term `ant-Amercan' mean? Does t mean you're
ant-|azz? Or that you're opposed to free speech? That you don't
deght n Ton Morrson or |ohn Updke? That you have a quarre
wth gant Sequoas? Does t mean you don't admre the hundreds
of thousands of Amercan ctzens who marched aganst nucear
weapons, or the thousands of war ressters who forced ther
government to wthdraw from Vetnam? Does t mean that you
hate a Amercans?
Ths sy confaton of Amerca's cuture, musc, terature, the
breathtakng physca beauty of the and, the ordnary peasures
of ordnary peope wth crtcsm of the U.S. Government's foregn
pocy (about whch, thanks to Amerca's "free press," sady most
Amercans know very tte) s a deberate and extremey
effectve strategy. It's ke a retreatng army takng cover n a
heavy popuated cty, hopng that the prospect of httng cvan
targets w deter enemy fre.
There are many Amercans who woud be mortfed to be
assocated wth ther government's poces. The most schoary,
scathng, ncsve, harous crtques of the hypocrsy and the
contradctons n U.S. Government pocy come from Amercan
ctzens. When the rest of the word wants to know what the U.S.
Government s up to, we turn to Noam Chomsky, Edward Sad,
Howard Znn, Ed Herman, Amy Goodman, Mchae Abert,
Chamers |ohnson, Wam Bum and Anthony Arnove to te us
what's reay gong on.
Smary, n Inda, not hundreds, but mons of us woud be
ashamed and offended f we were n any way mpcated wth the
present Indan Government's fascst poces, whch, apart from
the perpetraton of state terrorsm n the Vaey of Kashmr (n the
name of fghtng terrorsm), have aso turned a bnd eye to the
recent state-supervsed pogrom aganst Musms n Gu|arat. It
woud be absurd to thnk that those who crtcse the Indan
Government are `ant-Indan' - athough the Government tsef
never hestates to take that ne. It s dangerous to cede to the
Indan Government or the Amercan Government or anyone for
that matter, the rght to defne what `Inda' or `Amerca' are, or
ought to be.
To ca someone `ant-Amercan', ndeed, to be ant-Amercan, (or
for that matter ant-Indan, or ant-Tmbuktuan) s not |ust racst,
t's a faure of the magnaton. An nabty to see the word n
terms other than those that the estabshment has set out for
you: If you're not a Bushe you're a Taban. If you don't ove us,
you hate us. If you're not Good you're Ev. If you're not wth us,
you're wth the terrorsts.
Last year, ke many others, I too made the mstake of scoffng at
ths post-September 11th rhetorc, dsmssng t as foosh and
arrogant. I've reased that t's not foosh at a. It's actuay a
canny recrutment drve for a msconceved, dangerous war.
Every day I'm taken aback at how many peope beeve that
opposng the war n Afghanstan amounts to supportng terrorsm,
or votng for the Taban. Now that the nta am of the war -
capturng Osama Bn Laden (dead or ave) - seems to have run
nto bad weather, the goa posts have been moved. It's beng
made out that the whoe pont of the war was to toppe the
Taban regme and berate Afghan women from ther burqas.
We're beng asked to beeve that the U.S. marnes are actuay
on a femnst msson. (If so, w ther next stop be Amerca's
mtary ay Saud Araba?) Thnk of t ths way: In Inda there are
some pretty reprehensbe soca practces, aganst
`untouchabes', aganst Chrstans and Musms, aganst women.
Pakstan and Bangadesh have even worse ways of deang wth
mnorty communtes and women. Shoud they be bombed?
Shoud Deh, Isamabad, and Dhaka be destroyed? Is t possbe
to bomb bgotry out of Inda? Can we bomb our way to a femnst
paradse? Is that how women won the vote n the U.S.? Or how
savery was aboshed? Can we wn redress for the genocde of
the mons of Natve Amercans upon whose corpses the Unted
States was founded by bombng Santa Fe?
None of us need annversares to remnd us of what we cannot
forget. So t s no more than concdence that I happen to be here,
on Amercan so, n September - ths month of dreadfu
annversares. Uppermost on everybody's mnd of course,
partcuary here n Amerca, s the horror of what has come to be
known as Nne Eeven. Neary three thousand cvans ost ther
ves n that etha terrorst strke. The gref s st deep. The rage
st sharp. The tears have not dred. And a strange, deady war s
ragng around the word. Yet, each person who has ost a oved
one surey knows secrety, deepy, that no war, no act of revenge,
no dasy-cutters dropped on someone ese's oved ones or
someone ese's chdren w bunt the edges of ther pan or brng
ther own oved ones back. War cannot avenge those who have
ded. War s ony a bruta desecraton of ther memory.
To fue yet another war - ths tme aganst Iraq - by cyncay
manpuatng peope's gref, by packagng t for TV specas
sponsored by corporatons seng detergent or runnng shoes, s
to cheapen and devaue gref, to dran t of meanng. What we are
seeng now s a vugar dspay of the busness of gref, the
commerce of gref, the pagng of even the most prvate human
feengs for potca purpose. It s a terrbe, voent thng for a
state to do to ts peope.
It's not a cever-enough sub|ect to speak of from a pubc
patform, but what I woud reay ove to tak to you about s Loss.
Loss and osng. Gref, faure, brokenness, numbness,
uncertanty, fear, the death of feeng, the death of dreamng.
The absoute, reentess, endess, habtua unfarness of the
word. What does oss mean to ndvduas? What does t mean to
whoe cutures, whoe peopes who have earned to ve wth t as
a constant companon?
Snce t s September 11th that we're takng about, perhaps t's
n the ftness of thngs that we remember what that date means,
not ony to those who ost ther oved ones n Amerca ast year,
but to those n other parts of the word to whom that date has
ong hed sgnfcance. Ths hstorca dredgng s not offered as
an accusaton or a provocaton. But |ust to share the gref of
hstory. To thn the mst a tte. To say to the ctzens of Amerca,
n the gentest, most human way: Wecome to the Word.
Twenty-nne years ago, n Che, on the 11th of September 1973,
Genera Pnochet overthrew the democratcay eected
government of Savador Aende n a CIA-backed coup. ``Che
shoudn't be aowed to go Marxst |ust because ts peope are
rresponsbe," sad Henry Kssnger, Nobe Peace Laureate, then
the U.S. Secretary of State.
After the coup Presdent Aende was found dead nsde the
presdenta paace. Whether he was ked or whether he ked
hmsef, we' never know. In the regme of terror that ensued,
thousands of peope were ked. Many more smpy
`dsappeared'. Frng squads conducted pubc executons.
Concentraton camps and torture chambers were opened across
the country. The dead were bured n mne shafts and unmarked
graves. For seventeen years, the peope of Che ved n dread of
the mdnght knock, of routne `dsappearances', of sudden arrest
and torture. Cheans te the story of how the muscan Vctor |ara
had hs hands cut off n front of a crowd n the Santago stadum.
Before they shot hm, Pnochet's soders threw hs gutar at hm
and mockngy ordered hm to pay.
In 1999, foowng the arrest of Genera Pnochet n Brtan,
thousands of secret documents were decassfed by the U.S.
Government. They contan unequvoca evdence of the CIA's
nvovement n the coup as we as the fact that the U.S.
Government had detaed nformaton about the stuaton n Che
durng Genera Pnochet's regn. Yet Kssnger assured the
genera of hs support: ``In the Unted States as you know, we are
sympathetc to what you are tryng to do," he sad, ``we wsh
your government we."
Those of us who have ony ever known fe n a democracy,
however fawed, woud fnd t hard to magne what vng n a
dctatorshp and endurng the absoute oss of freedom reay
means. It sn't |ust those who Pnochet murdered, but the ves he
stoe from the vng that must be accounted for too.
Sady, Che was not the ony country n South Amerca to be
snged out for the U.S. Government's attentons. Guatemaa,
Costa Rca, Ecuador, Braz, Peru, the Domncan Repubc, Bova,
Ncaragua, Honduras, Panama, E Savador, Peru, Mexco and
Coomba - they've a been the payground for covert - and
overt - operatons by the CIA. Hundreds of thousands of Latn
Amercans have been ked, tortured or have smpy dsappeared
under the despotc regmes and tn-pot dctators, drug runners
and arms deaers that were propped up n ther countres. (Many
of them earned ther craft n the nfamous U.S. Government-
funded Schoo of Amercas n Fort Bennng, Georga, whch has
produced 60,000 graduates.) If ths were not humaton enough,
the peope of South Amerca have had to bear the cross of beng
branded as a peope who are ncapabe of democracy - as f
coups and massacres are somehow encrypted n ther genes.
Ths st does not of course ncude countres n Afrca or Asa that
suffered U.S. mtary nterventons - Vetnam, Korea, Indonesa,
Laos, and Camboda. For how many Septembers for decades
together have mons of Asan peope been bombed, burned,
and saughtered? How many Septembers have gone by snce
August 1945, when hundreds of thousands of ordnary |apanese
peope were obterated by the nucear strkes n Hroshma and
Nagasak? For how many Septembers have the thousands who
had the msfortune of survvng those strkes endured the vng
he that was vsted on them, ther unborn chdren, ther
chdren's chdren, on the earth, the sky, the wnd, the water, and
a the creatures that swm and wak and craw and fy? Not far
from here, n Abuquerque, s the Natona Atomc Museum where
Fat Man and Ltte Boy (the affectonate ncknames for the bombs
that were dropped on Hroshma and Nagasak) were avaabe as
souvenr earrngs. Funky young peope wore them. A massacre
dangng n each ear. But I am strayng from my theme. It's
September that we're takng about, not August.
September 11th has a tragc resonance n the Mdde East (West
Asa) too. On the 11th of September 1922, gnorng Arab outrage,
the Brtsh Government procamed a mandate n Paestne, a
foow up to the 1917 Bafour Decaraton, whch Impera Brtan
ssued, wth ts army massed outsde the gates of the cty of
Gaza. The Bafour Decaraton promsed European Zonsts a
natona home for |ewsh peope. (At the tme, the Empre on
whch the Sun Never Set was free to snatch and bequeath
natona homes ke the schoo buy dstrbutes marbes.) Two
years after the decaraton, Lord Bafour, the Brtsh Foregn
Secretary sad, ``In Paestne we do not propose to go through
the form of consutng the wshes of the present nhabtants of
the country. Zonsm, be t rght or wrong, good or bad, s rooted
n age-od tradtons, n present needs, n future hopes of far
profounder mport than the desres or pre|udces of the 700,000
Arabs who now nhabt ths ancent and."
How careessy mpera power decreed whose needs were
profound and whose were not. How careessy t vvsected
ancent cvsatons. Paestne and Kashmr are Impera Brtan's
festerng, bood-drenched gfts to the modern word. Both are
faut-nes n the ragng nternatona confcts of today.
In 1937, Wnston Church sad of the Paestnans: ``I do not
agree that the dog n a manger has the fna rght to the manger
even though he may have an there for a very ong tme. I do not
admt that rght. I do not admt for nstance that a great wrong
has been done to the Red Indans of Amerca or the back peope
of Austraa. I do not admt that a wrong has been done to these
peope by the fact that a stronger race, a hgher-grade race, a
more wordy-wse race to put t that way, has come n and taken
ther pace." That set the trend for the Israe state's atttude
towards Paestnans. In 1969, Israe Prme Mnster Goda Mer
sad, ``Paestnans do not exst." Her successor, Prme Mnster
Lev Eshko sad, ``What are Paestnans? When I came here |to
Paestne| there were 250,000 non-|ews, many Arabs and
Bedouns. It was desert, more than underdeveoped. Nothng."
Prme Mnster Menachem Begn caed Paestnans ``two-egged
beasts". Prme Mnster Ytzhak Shamr caed them
``grasshoppers" who coud be crushed. Ths s the anguage of
Heads of State, not the words of ordnary peope.
In 1947, the Unted Natons formay parttoned Paestne and
aotted 55 per cent of Paestne's and to the Zonsts. Wthn a
year they had captured 76 per cent. On the 14th of May 1948 the
state of Israe was decared. Mnutes after the decaraton, the
U.S. recognsed Israe. The West Bank was annexed by |ordan.
The Gaza Strp came under Egyptan mtary contro. Formay,
Paestne ceased to exst except n the mnds and hearts of the
hundreds of thousands of Paestnan peope who became
refugees.
In the summer of 1967, Israe occuped the West Bank and the
Gaza Strp. Setters were offered state subsdes and
deveopment ad to move nto the occuped terrtores. Amost
every day more Paestnan fames are forced off ther ands and
drven nto refugee camps. Paestnans who contnue to ve n
Israe do not have the same rghts as Israes and ve as second
cass ctzens n ther former homeand.
Over the decades, there have been uprsngs, wars, ntfadas.
Tens of thousands have ost ther ves. Accords and treates have
been sgned. Ceasefres decared and voated. But the boodshed
doesn't end. Paestne st remans egay occuped. Its peope
ve n nhuman condtons, n vrtua Bantustans, where they are
sub|ected to coectve punshments, twenty-four hour curfews,
where they are humated and brutased on a day bass. They
never know when ther homes w be demoshed, when ther
chdren w be shot, when ther precous trees w be cut, when
ther roads w be cosed, when they w be aowed to wak down
to the market to buy food and medcne. And when they w not.
They ve wth no sembance of dgnty. Wth not much hope n
sght. They have no contro over ther ands, ther securty, ther
movement, ther communcaton, ther water suppy. So when
accords are sgned and words ke `autonomy' and even
`statehood' are banded about, t's aways worth askng: What
sort of autonomy? What sort of state? What sort of rghts w ts
ctzens have?
Young Paestnans who cannot contan ther anger turn
themseves nto human bombs and haunt Israe's streets and
pubc paces, bowng themseves up, kng ordnary peope,
n|ectng terror nto day fe, and eventuay hardenng both
socetes' suspcon and mutua hatred of each other. Each
bombng nvtes mercess reprsas and even more hardshp on
Paestnan peope. But then sucde bombng s an act of
ndvdua despar, not a revoutonary tactc. Athough Paestnan
attacks strke terror nto Israe cvans, they provde the perfect
cover for the Israe Government's day ncursons nto
Paestnan terrtory, the perfect excuse for od-fashoned,
nneteenth-century coonasm, dressed up as a new-fashoned,
twenty-frst century "war."
Israe's staunchest potca and mtary ay s and aways has
been the U.S. Government. The U.S. Government has bocked,
aong wth Israe, amost every U.N. resouton that sought a
peacefu, equtabe souton to the confct. It has supported
amost every war that Israe has fought. When Israe attacks
Paestne, t s Amercan msses that smash through Paestnan
homes. And every year Israe receves severa bon doars from
the U.S.
What essons shoud we draw from ths tragc confct? Is t reay
mpossbe for |ewsh peope who suffered so cruey themseves
- more cruey perhaps than any other peope n hstory - to
understand the vunerabty and the yearnng of those whom
they have dspaced? Does extreme sufferng aways knde
cruety? What hope does ths eave the human race wth? What
w happen to the Paestnan peope n the event of a vctory?
When a naton wthout a state eventuay procams a state, what
knd of state w t be? What horrors w be perpetrated under ts
fag? Is t a separate state that we shoud be fghtng for, or the
rghts to a fe of berty and dgnty for everyone regardess of
ther ethncty or regon?
Paestne was once a secuar buwark n the Mdde East. But now
the weak, undemocratc, by a accounts corrupt, but avowedy
non-sectaran Paestne Lberaton Organsaton, s osng ground
to Hamas, whch espouses an overty sectaran deoogy and
fghts n the name of Isam. To quote from ther manfesto: "We
w be ts soders, and the frewood of ts fre, whch w burn the
enemes."
The word s caed upon to condemn sucde bombers. But can we
gnore the ong road they have |ourneyed on before they arrved
at ths destnaton? September 11th 1922 to September 11th
2002 - eghty years s a ong ong tme to have been wagng
war. Is there some advce the word can gve the peope of
Paestne? Some scrap of hope we can hod out? Shoud they |ust
sette for the crumbs that are thrown ther way and behave ke
the grasshoppers or two-egged beasts they've been descrbed
as? Shoud they |ust take Goda Mer's suggeston and make a
rea effort to not exst?
In another part of the Mdde East, September 11th strkes a more
recent chord. It was on the 11th of September 1990 that George
W. Bush Sr., then Presdent of the U.S., made a speech to a |ont
sesson of Congress announcng hs Government's decson to go
to war aganst Iraq.
The U.S. Government says that Saddam Hussen s a war crmna,
a crue mtary despot who has commtted genocde aganst hs
own peope. That's a fary accurate descrpton of the man. In
1988, he razed hundreds of vages n northern Iraq and used
chemca weapons and machne-guns to k thousands of Kurdsh
peope. Today we know that that same year the U.S. Government
provded hm wth 500 mon doars n subsdes to buy
Amercan farm products. The next year, after he had successfuy
competed hs genocda campagn, the U.S. Government doubed
ts subsdy to 1 bon doars. It aso provded hm wth hgh
quaty germ seed for anthrax, as we as hecopters and dua-use
matera that coud be used to manufacture chemca and
boogca weapons.
So t turns out that whe Saddam Hussen was carryng out hs
worst atroctes, the U.S. and the U.K. Governments were hs
cose aes. Even today, the Government of Turkey whch has one
of the most appang human rghts records n the word s one of
the U.S. Government's cosest aes. The fact that the Turksh
Government has oppressed and murdered Kurdsh peope for
years has not prevented the U.S. Government from pyng Turkey
wth weapons and Deveopment Ad. Ceary, t was not concern
for the Kurdsh peope that provoked Presdent Bush's speech to
Congress.
What changed? In August 1990, Saddam Hussen nvaded Kuwat.
Hs sn was not so much that he had commtted an act of war, but
that he acted ndependenty, wthout orders from hs masters.
Ths dspay of ndependence was enough to upset the power
equaton n the Guf. So t was decded that Saddam Hussen be
extermnated, ke a pet that has outved ts owner's affecton.
The frst Aed attack on Iraq took pace n |anuary 1991. The
word watched the prme-tme war as t was payed out on TV. (In
Inda those days, you had to go to a fve star hote obby to watch
CNN.) Tens of thousands of peope were ked n a month of
devastatng bombng. What many do not know s that the war dd
not end then. The nta fury smmered down nto the ongest
sustaned ar attack on a country snce the Vetnam War. Over
the ast decade, Amercan and Brtsh forces have fred thousands
of msses and bombs on Iraq. Iraq's feds and farmands have
been sheed wth 300 tons of depeted uranum. In countres ke
Brtan and Amerca, depeted uranum shes are test-fred nto
specay constructed concrete tunnes. The radoactve resdue s
washed off, seaed n cement and dsposed off n the ocean
(whch s bad enough). In Iraq t's amed - deberatey, wth
macous ntent - at peope's food and water suppy. In ther
bombng sortes, the Aes specfcay targeted and destroyed
water treatment pants, fuy aware of the fact that they coud not
be repared wthout foregn assstance. In southern Iraq there has
been a fourfod ncrease n cancer among chdren. In the decade
of economc sanctons that foowed the war, Iraq cvans have
been dened food, medcne, hospta equpment, ambuances,
cean water - the basc essentas.
About haf a mon Iraq chdren have ded as a resut of the
sanctons. Of them, Madeene Abrght, then U.S. Ambassador to
the U.N., famousy sad, "It's a very hard choce, but we thnk the
prce s worth t." `Mora equvaence' was the term that was used
to denounce those who crtcsed the war on Afghanstan.
Madeene Abrght cannot be accused of mora equvaence.
What she sad was |ust straght forward agebra.
A decade of bombng has not managed to dsodge Saddam
Hussen, the `Beast of Baghdad'. Now, amost tweve years on,
Presdent George Bush |r. has ratcheted up the rhetorc once
agan. He's proposng an a-out war whose goa s nothng short
of a regme change. The New York Tmes says that the Bush
admnstraton s "foowng a metcuousy panned strategy to
persuade the pubc, the Congress and the aes of the need to
confront the threat of Saddam Hussen." Andrew H. Card, |r., the
Whte House Chef of Staff, descrbed how the admnstraton was
steppng up ts war pans for the fa: "From a marketng pont of
vew,' he sad, "you don't ntroduce new products n August.' Ths
tme the catch-phrase for Washngton's "new product' s not the
pght of Kuwat peope but the asserton that Iraq has weapons
of mass destructon. "Forget the feckess morasng of the peace
obbes," wrote Rchard Pere, a former advser to Presdent Bush,
"we need to get hm before he gets us."
Weapons nspectors have confctng reports about the status of
Iraq's Weapons of Mass Destructon, and many have sad ceary
that ts arsena has been dsmanted and that t does not have
the capacty to bud one. However, there s no confuson over the
extent and range of Amerca's arsena of nucear and chemca
weapons. Woud the U.S. Government wecome weapons
nspectors? Woud the U.K.? Or Israe?
What f Iraq does have a nucear weapon, does that |ustfy a pre-
emptve U.S. strke? The U.S. has the argest arsena of nucear
weapons n the word. It's the ony country n the word to have
actuay used them on cvan popuatons. If the U.S. s |ustfed
n aunchng a pre-emptve attack on Iraq, why, then any nucear
power s |ustfed n carryng out a pre-emptve attack on any
other. Inda coud attack Pakstan, or the other way around. If the
U.S. Government deveops a dstaste for the Indan Prme
Mnster, can t |ust `take hm out' wth a pre-emptve strke?
Recenty the U.S. payed an mportant part n forcng Inda and
Pakstan back from the brnk of war. Is t so hard for t to take ts
own advce? Who s guty of feckess morasng? Of preachng
peace whe t wages war? The U.S., whch George Bush has
caed "the most peacefu naton on earth," has been at war wth
one country or another every year for the ast ffty years.
Wars are never fought for atrustc reasons. They're usuay
fought for hegemony, for busness. And then of course there's the
busness of war. Protectng ts contro of the word's o s
fundamenta to U.S. foregn pocy. The U.S. Government's recent
mtary nterventons n the Bakans and Centra Asa have to do
wth o. Hamd Karza, the puppet presdent of Afghanstan
nstaed by the U.S., s sad to be a former empoyee of Unoca,
the Amercan-based o company. The U.S. Government's
paranod patrong of the Mdde East s because t has two-thrds
of the word's o reserves. O keeps Amerca's engnes purrng
sweety. O keeps the Free Market rong. Whoever contros the
word's o contros the word's market. And how do you contro
the o?
Nobody puts t more eeganty than The New York Tmes'
coumnst Thomas Fredman. In an artce caed "Crazness Pays"
he says "the U.S. has to make t cear to Iraq and U.S. aes that...
Amerca w use force wthout negotaton, hestaton or U.N.
approva." Hs advce was we taken. In the wars aganst Iraq and
Afghanstan as we as n the amost day humaton the U.S.
Government heaps on the U.N. In hs book on gobasaton, The
Lexus and the Ove Tree, Fredman says, "The hdden hand of the
market w never work wthout the hdden fst. McDonad's
cannot foursh wthout McDonne Dougas... and the hdden fst
that keeps the word safe for Scon Vaey's technooges to
foursh s caed the U.S. Army, Ar Force, Navy and Marne Corp."
Perhaps ths was wrtten n a moment of vunerabty, but t's
certany the most succnct, accurate descrpton of the pro|ect of
Corporate Gobasaton that I have read.
After September 11th, 2001 and the War Aganst Terror, the
hdden hand and fst have had ther cover bown - and we have
a cear vew now of Amerca's other weapon - the Free Market -
bearng down on the Deveopng Word, wth a cenched
unsmng sme. `The Task That Never Ends' s Amerca's perfect
war, the perfect vehce for the endess expanson of Amercan
Imperasm. In Urdu, the word for Proft s fayda. A Oaeda means
The Word, The Word of God, The Law. So, n Inda some of us ca
the War Aganst Terror, A Oaeda Vs A Fayda - The Word Vs The
Proft (no pun ntended).
For the moment t ooks as though A Fayda w carry the day.
But then you never know...
In the ast ten years of unbrded Corporate Gobasaton, the
word's tota ncome has ncreased by an average of 2.5 per cent
a year. And yet the numbers of the poor n the word has
ncreased by 100 mon. Of the top hundred bggest economes,
51 are corporatons, not countres. The top 1 per cent of the
word has the same combned ncome as the bottom 57 per cent
and the dsparty s growng. Now, under the spreadng canopy of
the War Aganst Terror, ths process s beng husted aong. The
men n suts are n an unseemy hurry. Whe bombs ran down on
us, and cruse msses skd across the skes, whe nucear
weapons are stockped to make the word a safer pace,
contracts are beng sgned, patents are beng regstered, o
ppenes are beng ad, natura resources are beng pundered,
water s beng prvatsed and democraces are beng undermned.
In a country ke Inda, the `structura ad|ustment' end of the
Corporate Gobasaton pro|ect s rppng through peope's ves.
"Deveopment" pro|ects, massve prvatsaton, and abour
"reforms" are pushng peope off ther ands and out of ther |obs,
resutng n a knd of barbarc dspossesson that has few paraes
n hstory. Across the word, as the "Free Market" brazeny
protects Western markets and forces deveopng countres to ft
ther trade barrers, the poor are gettng poorer and the rch
rcher. Cv unrest has begun to erupt n the goba vage. In
countres ke Argentna, Braz, Mexco, Bova, Inda the
resstance movements aganst Corporate Gobasaton are
growng. To contan them, governments are tghtenng ther
contro. Protestors are beng abeed `terrorsts' and then beng
deat wth as such. But cv unrest does not ony mean marches
and demonstratons and protests aganst gobasaton.
Unfortunatey, t aso means a desperate downward spra nto
crme and chaos and a knds of despar and dsusonment
whch, as we know from hstory (and from what we see
unspoong before our eyes), graduay becomes a ferte breedng
ground for terrbe thngs - cutura natonasm, regous
bgotry, fascsm and of course, terrorsm.
A these march arm n arm wth Corporate Gobasaton.
There s a noton ganng credence that the Free Market breaks
down natona barrers, and that Corporate Gobasaton's
utmate destnaton s a hppe paradse where the heart s the
ony passport and we a ve together happy nsde a |ohn
Lennon song (Imagne there's no country...). Ths s a canard.
What the Free Market undermnes s not natona soveregnty, but
democracy. As the dsparty between the rch and poor grows, the
hdden fst has ts work cut out for t. Mutnatona corporatons
on the prow for `sweetheart deas' that yed enormous profts
cannot push through those deas and admnster those pro|ects n
deveopng countres wthout the actve connvance of the state
machnery - the poce, the courts, sometmes even the army.
Today, Corporate Gobasaton needs an nternatona
confederaton of oya, corrupt, preferaby authortaran
governments n poorer countres, to push through unpopuar
reforms and que the mutnes. It needs a press that pretends to
be free. It needs courts that pretend to dspense |ustce. It needs
nucear bombs, standng armes, sterner mmgraton aws, and
watchfu coasta patros to make sure that t's ony money, goods,
patents and servces that are gobased - not the free
movement of peope, not a respect for human rghts, not
nternatona treates on raca dscrmnaton or chemca and
nucear weapons, or greenhouse gas emssons, cmate change,
or god forbd, |ustce. It's as though even a gesture towards
nternatona accountabty woud wreck the whoe enterprse.
Cose to one year after the War Aganst Terror was offcay
fagged off n the runs of Afghanstan, n country after country,
freedoms are beng curtaed n the name of protectng freedom,
cv bertes are beng suspended n the name of protectng
democracy. A knds of dssent s beng defned as `terrorsm'. A
knds of aws are beng passed to dea wth t. Osama Bn Laden
seems to have vanshed nto thn ar. Muah Omar s sad to have
made hs escape on a motor-bke (They coud have sent Tn-Tn
after hm). The Taban may have dsappeared, but ther sprt,
and ther system of summary |ustce, s surfacng n the
unkeest of paces. In Inda, n Pakstan, n Ngera, n Amerca,
n a the Centra Asan Repubcs run by a manner of despots,
and of course n Afghanstan under the U.S.-backed Northern
Aance.
Meanwhe, down at the Ma there's a md-season sae.
Everythng's dscounted - oceans, rvers, o, gene poos, fg
wasps, fowers, chdhoods, aumnum factores, phone
companes, wsdom, wderness, cv rghts, ecosystems, ar - a
4,600 mon years of evouton. It's packed, seaed, tagged,
vaued and avaabe off the rack. (No returns). As for |ustce -
I'm tod t's on offer too. You can get the best that money can
buy.
Donad Rumsfed sad that hs msson n the War Aganst Terror
was to persuade the word that Amercans must be aowed to
contnue ther way of fe. When the maddened Kng stamps hs
foot, saves trembe n ther quarters. So, standng here today, t's
hard for me to say ths, but `The Amercan Way of Lfe' s smpy
not sustanabe. Because t doesn't acknowedge that there s a
word beyond Amerca.
Fortunatey, power has a shef-fe. When the tme comes, maybe
ths mghty empre w, ke others before t, overreach tsef and
mpode from wthn. It ooks as though structura cracks have
aready appeared. As the War Aganst Terror casts ts net wder
and wder, Amerca's corporate heart s haemorrhagng. For a
the endess empty chatter about democracy, today the word s
run by three of the most secretve nsttutons n the word: the
Internatona Monetary Fund, the Word Bank, and the Word
Trade Organsaton, a three of whch, n turn, are domnated by
the U.S. Ther decsons are made n secret. The peope who head
them are apponted behnd cosed doors. Nobody reay knows
anythng about them, ther potcs, ther beefs, ther ntentons.
Nobody eected them. Nobody sad they coud make decsons on
our behaf. A word run by a handfu of greedy bankers and CEOs
who nobody eected can't possby ast.
Sovet-stye communsm faed, not because t was ntrnscay
ev but because t was fawed. It aowed too few peope to usurp
too much power. Twenty-frst century market-captasm,
Amercan-stye, w fa for the same reasons. Both are edfces
constructed by human ntegence, undone by human nature.
The tme has come, the Warus sad. Perhaps thngs w get
worse and then better. Perhaps there's a sma god up n heaven
readyng hersef for us. Another word s not ony possbe, she's
on her way. Maybe many of us won't be here to greet her, but on
a quet day, f I sten very carefuy, I can hear her breathng.
Ths s the text of a ecture devered on September 18, 2002 at
the Lannan Foundaton n Santa Fe, New Mexco, Unted States.
Arundhat Roy, 2002.
A reply to the court
The foowng s the text of the repy fed by Arundhat Roy before
the Supreme Court, n response to a notce ssued to her n
September.
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF INDIA ORIGINAL |URISDICTION
In the matter of
CONTEMPT PETITION (CRL) NO. 10 OF 2001
(Suo motu Contempt Proceedngs under Rue 3(a) of the Rues to
reguate proceedngs for Contempt of the Supreme Court 1975
ntated on the bass of Affdavt dated 16.4.2001 fed on
17.4.2001 n Contempt Petton (Cr) No. 2/2001 tted |.R.
Parashar and Others Versus Prasant Bhushan and Others.)
Affdavt n Response of the respondent/notcee
I, Arundhat Roy, daughter of Mary Roy, resdent of 2A Kautya
Marg, New Deh 110021, do hereby state and affrm as foows:
That I have read and understood the contents of the Contempt
Notce ssued to me dated 5th September 2001 and my repy to t
s as under:
1. The Contempt Notce aeges that three paragraphs n my
Affdavt dated 16.4.2001 are grossy contemptuous, that they
attrbute mproper motves to the Court and therefore amount to
Crmna Contempt of the Court as defned under Secton 2(c) of
the Contempt of Court Act read wth Artce 129 of the
Consttuton of Inda. In ths partcuar nstance I understand
"Crmna Contempt of the Court" to mean "the pubcaton of any
matter or the dong of any other act whatsoever whch
scandazes or tends to scandaze or owers or tends to ower the
authorty of, any court."
The aegedy offendng paragraphs from my affdavt are
reproduced beow:
"On the grounds that |udges of the Supreme Court were too busy,
the Chef |ustce of Inda refused to aow a sttng |udge to head
the |udca enqury nto the Teheka scanda, even though t
nvoves matters of natona securty and corrupton n the hghest
paces.
Yet, when t comes to an absurd, despcabe, entrey
unsubstantated petton n whch a the three respondents
happen to be peope who have pubcy - though n markedy
dfferent ways -questoned the poces of the government and
severey crtczed a recent |udgement of the Supreme Court, the
Court dspays a dsturbng wngness to ssue notce.
It ndcates a dsquetng ncnaton on the part of the court to
sence crtcsm and muzze dssent, to harass and ntmdate
those who dsagree wth t. By entertanng a petton based on an
FIR that even a oca poce staton does not see ft to act upon,
the Supreme Court s dong ts own reputaton and credbty
consderabe harm."
2. I submt that there has been a msreadng and compete
msunderstandng of my affdavt n genera and of the above
three paragraphs n partcuar. I have not attrbuted any mproper
motve to any partcuar |udge. I have not sad anythng that
scandazes or tends to scandaze or owers or tends to ower the
authorty of the Court. I have not asserted as a fact that the Court
wshes to muzze dssent. I have sad that by admttng a fawed
petton aganst three peope who had recenty and pubcy
crtcsed the Supreme Court |udgement n the Sardar Sarovar
case, the Court creates ths mpresson. Therefore, I sad, by ts
own acton, the Court s harmng ts credbty and reputaton. In
a democracy, t s a ctzen's duty to pont ths out.
3. If Supreme Court |udges are too busy to be spared to head a
|udca enqury nto a matter concernng natona securty and
corrupton n the hghest paces, t s far and vad to assume that
they are busy wth matters of equa, f not greater mportance.
4. It s for ths reason that I was dstressed that an aready
overburdened Court had tme to entertan an obvousy fase and
fawed petton such as the one fed by |.R Parashar and others
(Cr No. 2/2001 tted |.R. Parashar and Others Versus Prasant
Bhushan and Others). In our affdavts n repy, Medha Patkar,
Prashant Bhushan, as we as I mysef ponted out the reasons
why, n our opnon, the petton was fase, contaned mutpe
faws, was a deberate attempt to msead the Court and dd not
have the approva of the Attorney Genera whch s mandatory n
a Contempt of Court case.
5. Subsequenty the Court tsef n ts order dated August 28th
2001, whe dsmssng the petton, sad that t voated "amost
every one of the Rues framed by ths Court" and was "shabby
drafted, proceduray grossy defectve."
6. The order aso says "Apart from the defectve nature of the
petton, the unexpaned reuctance on the part of the four
pettoners to affrm an affdavt verfyng the facts contaned n
the petton, the faure to even attempt to obtan the consent of
the Soctor Genera and most mportanty the refusa of the
poce staton to record an FIR on the bass of the compant
odged by the pettoner No.1 are teng crcumstances aganst
the case n the petton. Admttedy, the poce personne were
present at the tme of the ncdent. Ther refusa to record the FIR
on the petton's compant s, therefore, sgnfcant."
7. Addressng the ssue of why such a petton was admtted by
the Court n the frst pace, the order says: "When a matter s
sted before the Court, the Court assumes that the formates n
connecton wth the fng have been scrutnzed by the Regstry
of ths Court that the proper procedure has been foowed as t s
the duty of the Regstry to scrutnse the petton to see whether
t s n order before pacng t before the Court for consderaton.
There s no occason for ths Court to assume the task of the
Regstry before consderng the merts of each matter. Had our
attenton been drawn to the procedura defects, we woud have
had no hestaton n re|ectng the appcaton n mne on ths
ground aone." The Court appears to be as - f not more -
outraged than the Respondents at the nature of the petton and
the grossy defectve procedure by whch t came to be admtted
to the hghest court n the and.
8. As an ordnary ctzen, I cannot and coud not have been
expected to make a dstncton between the Regstry and the
Court. In my eyes, the Court s responsbe for the functonng of
ts Regstry. Together they decde the prortzaton of |udca
resources, together they decde whch pettons are admtted and
whch are not. For a common ctzen, the Regstry of the Supreme
Court s the threshod to |ustce tsef. If ctzens cannot have fath
n the proper functonng of the Regstry, t s bound to undermne
ther fath n the Court tsef. Gven the crcumstances, t seems
perfecty |ustfabe for someone n my poston to wonder why
such an obvousy defectve petton had been admtted by the
Court. It seemed perfecty approprate to ar my vew that n ths
partcuar nstance, the Court, by aowng certan ctzens to
grossy abuse ts process n ths way, creates the dsturbng
mpresson that there s an ncnaton on the part of the Court to
sence crtcsm and muzze dssent. Ths does not, and was not
meant to mpute motves to any partcuar |udges. It does not, nor
was t meant to undermne the dgnty of the Court. I was smpy
statng the honest mpresson that had formed n my mnd.
9. Issung a Crmna Contempt Notce may be a routne, everyday
matter for the Court. However, for an ordnary ctzen who
receves one, t nvoves consderabe trava and humaton. To
begn wth, one has to engage awyers and spend a great dea of
tme brefng them, and draftng affdavts. Hrng awyers aso
nvoves a ma|or expense. For a workng person, beng asked to
schedue one's entre fe around enforced court appearances, as
though one s a common crmna, s humatng and damagng to
one's professona fe. It s therefore ncumbent on the Court to
see that a petton on the bass of whch Notce s ssued, passes
at east a mnmum credbty test.
10. Other than the facts pertanng to the petton (Cr No. 2/2001
tted |.R. Parashar and Others Versus Prasant Bhushan and
Others), the manner n whch t was admtted, and the travas
that recevng a Contempt Notce from the Supreme Court of
Inda entas, there were some other saent facts present n my
mnd when I fed my affdavt dated 16.4.2001 whch w aso
expan the reasons for wrtng what I dd.
11. In May 1999, my essay tted "The Greater Common Good"
was pubshed n Outook and Frontne magaznes. On 15th
October 1999, the Supreme Court made the foowng remarks
aganst me: "|udca process and nsttuton cannot be permtted
to be scandazed or sub|ected to contumacous voaton n such
a batant manner n whch t has been done by her.... Vcous
stutfcaton and vugar debunkng cannot be permtted to poute
the stream of |ustce.... We are unhappy at the way n whch the
eaders of the NBA and Ms Arundhat Roy have attempted to
undermne the dgnty of the court. We expected better
behavour from them."
The order aso sad "Whatever may be the motve of Ms Arundhat
Roy, t s qute obvous that she decded to use her terary fame
by msnformng the pubc and pro|ectng n a totay ncorrect
manner how the proceedng reatng to Resettement and
Rehabtaton had shaped n the Court...."
12. I was not a party to the case on the Sardar Sarovar Pro|ect.
The order was passed wthout gvng me an opportunty to be
heard and was therefore n voaton of the Prncpes of Natura
|ustce.
13. It s certany true that I had (and contnue to have) a dfferent
opnon from that contaned n the ma|orty - and therefore
operatve - |udgement on the Sardar Sarovar ssue. But so do
mons of peope n the word, as dd one of the |udges on that
partcuar bench who wrote an admrabe, dssentng |udgement.
"Vugar debunkng" and "vcous stutfcaton" are strong words
ndeed to descrbe a dfference of opnon.
14. The Greater Common Good has been pubshed and reprnted
n severa countres and severa anguages across the word. Each
fact and fgure has been backed up wth notes and references
and maps. So far no one has ponted out a snge factua error n
the essay, nor have I been made aware of any nstance of
deberate 'msnformaton'. It was un|ustfed on the part of the
court to suggest that I deberatey 'decded' to use my 'terary
fame' to msnform the pubc. A baseess comment ke ths does
not behove the august offces of the Apex Court.
15. Ths ncdent contrbuted n no sma measure to the
mpresson that I stated n my affdavt.
16. A person can perhaps be forced under duress to wthdraw a
statement, or apoogze for statng an opnon. However, a person
cannot be coerced nto changng hs or her mnd. That can ony
happen through persuason. The mpresson I had of the Court's
actons n ths case woud have been corrected, and n fact,
competey dspeed had the Court done a or any of the
foowng thngs:
a. Dsmssed the petton at the nta stage, wthout ssung
notce.
b. Ordered an enqury nto the functonng of the Regstry to
estabsh how such a 'procedura apse' coud have taken pace.
c. Taken acton aganst the Pettoners for fng a fase case and
deberatey attemptng to msead the Court.
17. Sady, the events that occurred subsequent to the fng of my
affdavt have done nothng to dspe an aready unfortunate
mpresson that has been created. The events are:
a. At each hearng, the presence of a arge poce force ensured
that no members of the pubc were aowed nto what s
supposed to be a pubc courtroom.
b. At the hearng on 2nd August 2001, one of the pettoners, Shr
R.K. Vrman, whe attemptng to avod answerng a queston
posed by one of the |udges, stood up and shouted that he had
ost fath n the sttng Bench and that he wanted the |udges
changed. Ths was a cear case of mputng mproper motves and
commttng gross Contempt n the face of the Court. No acton
was taken aganst hm.
c. Instead, based on a msreadng of my affdavt, a Notce for
Crmna Contempt of Court was ssued to me on 5th September
2001.
d. A Press Report (Frontne September 28th 2001) by
V.Venkatesan aong wth edtora nputs from Frontne's edtor
N.Ram, reveas that the Regstry had ndeed refused to st the
petton before the Court n vew of ts mutpe faws. The artce
says that the Attorney Genera had been approached and that he
had decned to dea wth the matter. It goes on to say that the
Pettoners then requested the Court to take suo motu acton
whch the Court dd not do. Fnay, and nexpcaby, wthout
meetng any of the forma requrements, wthout passng even a
mnma test of credbty, the petton was admtted and notce
was ssued drectng the Respondents to appear n person before
the Court.
If these facts are correct, they rase further questons about how
ths petton came to be admtted to the Supreme Court.
18. I do not beeve that the crtcsm of the Court or ts process
by an ndvdua, whoever that ndvdua mght be, can possby
ower the dgnty of an nsttuton as powerfu and venerabe as
the Supreme Court of Inda. If the crtcsm s random and
unfounded, t w automatcay rebound on the reputaton and
credbty of the ndvdua who eveed t. If, on the other hand,
the crtcsm s substanta or vad, the Court cannot hope to
restore ts dgnty by punshng or sencng the crtc. Indeed,
dong so w have the opposte effect. The dgnty, the authorty
and the reputaton of the Court depend entrey on the conduct of
ts |udges and the quaty of ther |udgements. The standng of an
nsttuton whose reputaton has been but up on the bass of
actons and |udgements over more than haf a century cannot be
undermned by crtcsm from an ndvdua.
19. It has aways been accepted that the |udgements and actons
of the courts can be sub|ected to the most severe and trenchant
crtcsm. Any serous |ursprudenta anayss of the evouton and
deveopment of aw woud necessary nvove an attempt to
understand why the Court has acted n the manner that t has.
Hghy respected |udges and serous academc schoars have
aways done ths knd of anayss of the courts. Books ke The
Potcs of the |udcary by |.A.G. Grffth are earned attempts to
understand how the potca vews of ndvdua |udges have
atered the course of the nterpretaton of aw. Studes ke ths
woud necessary nvove an attempt to understand and dscuss
the motvaton of |udges and how ths has affected ther
|udgements, and thus, the deveopment of Law. If such dscusson
s prohbted on pan of contempt t w render the entre anayss
of the |udcary competey stere.
20. Certan nterpretatons of Secton 2(c) of the Contempt of
Court Act tend to be nconsstent wth the Rght to Free Speech.
Keepng n mnd the reasons mentoned n Para 8 above, n case
of a confct between the Law of Contempt and the Rght to Free
Speech, the far and |udcous thng for the Court to do woud be
to err on the sde of protectng Free Speech.
Wth reference to the present case, t s submtted that ths
Court's aegaton that three paragraphs n my affdavt dated
16.4.2001 amount to a crmna offense under Secton 2 (c) of the
Contempt of Court Act s an ncorrect nterpretaton of the aw.
Other ndvduas have made smar f not more trenchant
crtcsms of the functonng of the Court and have not been found
guty of commttng Contempt of Court: Durng a speech he gave
at a meetng of the Bar Counc n Hyderabad, Shr P. Shv
Shankar, then Mnster of Law, |ustce and Company Affars sad
that because |udges had an "unconceaed sympathy for the
'haves"' they nterpreted the expresson "compensaton" n the
way they dd. He went on to say "Ant-soca eements .e.: FERA
voators, brde-burners and whoe hordes of reactonares have
found ther haven n the Supreme Court." A case for Contempt of
Court was fed aganst hm. In the order by |ustces Sabyasach
Mukher|ee and S. Ranganathan |.|, dated Apr 15th 1988, the Law
Mnster was absoved of the charge of Contempt of Court.
21. Whmsca nterpretatons of the same Law eave ctzens at
the mercy of ndvdua |udges. If the three paragraphs of my
affdavt dated 16.4.2001 are deemed to be a crmna offense
under secton 2(c) of the Contempt of Court Act, t w have the
chng effect of gaggng the Press and preventng t from
reportng on and anaysng matters that vtay concern the ves
of mons of Indan ctzens. Ths w be an unfortunate bow to
one of the most responsbe, most robust nsttutons of Indan
democracy.
22. In a democracy, a Free Press s, or ought to be, as chershed
an nsttuton as a Far |udcary. A democracy must have an
arena n whch contendng deas and pura, competng and
dssentng opnons can be freey voced. The Free Press s the
breathng machne - the ungs - of a democracy. There cannot be
a democracy wthout a Free Press. There cannot be a truy Free
Press f every snge ctzen's Rght to Free Speech s not ardenty
protected, even when t reates to the actons of the |udcary.
The prospect of havng to undergo a engthy and exorbtant
process of tgaton, and the threat of an eventua prson
sentence, w effectvey restran the Press from wrtng about or
anaysng the actons of the |udcary. It w render the |udcary
accountabe to no-one but tsef. As I have sad n my affdavt
dated 16.4.2001, f the |udcary removes tsef from pubc
scrutny and accountabty, and severs ts nks wth the socety
that t was set up to serve n the frst pace, t w mean that yet
another par of Indan democracy w eventuay crumbe.
23. In concuson, may I take the berty of sayng that the
process of ths tra and a that t entas, s as much, f not more
of a punshment than the sentence tsef. If the Court sentences a
wrter to a short spe n prson for the aeged 'crme' of statng a
reasonabe and honest mpresson, her mnd can foat through
the bars to freedom. But yoke her to ths 'cause' for ong enough -
these endess meetngs wth awyers, ths draftng and re-draftng
of affdavts, enforced Court appearances that make her fee ke
a crmna, ths fearfu study of aw books before wrtng a snge
ne, the apprehenson that each new pece of wrtng w nvte
more tgaton - and perhaps a wrter w graduay ose the
abty, the spontanety, and perhaps even the w to wrte at a.
In my case, I rease that ths w come as a reef to many and
few w mourn the oss. However, I w mourn the oss of my
wrtng sef.
DEPONENT
VERIFICATION: I the deponent abovenamed do hereby verfy that
the contents of the above affdavt are true to my knowedge and
nothng matera has been conceaed therefrom. Verfed at New
Deh on ths the 15th Day of October 2001.
DEPONENT
The Hndu - Inda's Natona Newspaper
Sunday, |an 18, 2004
Do turkeys enjoy thanksgiving7
By Arundhati Roy
It's not good enough to be rght. Sometmes, f ony n order to
test our resove, t's mportant to wn somethng. In order to wn
somethng, we need to agree on somethng." After a tour
d'horzon, the author of The God of Sma Thngs cas for a "
mnmum agenda" as we as a pan of acton that prortses
goba resstance to the U.S. occupaton of Iraq. Here s the text of
her speech at the openng Penary of the Word Soca Forum n
Mumba on |anuary 16, 2004:
Arundhat Roy
LAST |ANUARY thousands of us from across the word gathered n
Porto Aegre n Braz and decared - reterated - that "Another
Word s Possbe". A few thousand mes north, n Washngton,
George Bush and hs ades were thnkng the same thng.
Our pro|ect was the Word Soca Forum. Thers - to further what
many ca The Pro|ect for the New Amercan Century.
In the great ctes of Europe and Amerca, where a few years ago
these thngs woud ony have been whspered, now peope are
openy takng about the good sde of Imperasm and the need
for a strong Empre to poce an unruy word. The new
mssonares want order at the cost of |ustce. Dscpne at the
cost of dgnty. And ascendancy at any prce. Occasonay some
of us are nvted to `debate' the ssue on `neutra' patforms
provded by the corporate meda. Debatng Imperasm s a bt
ke debatng the pros and cons of rape. What can we say? That
we reay mss t?
In any case, New Imperasm s aready upon us. It's a
remodeed, streamned verson of what we once knew. For the
frst tme n hstory, a snge Empre wth an arsena of weapons
that coud obterate the word n an afternoon has compete,
unpoar, economc and mtary hegemony. It uses dfferent
weapons to break open dfferent markets. There sn't a country
on God's earth that s not caught n the cross hars of the
Amercan cruse msse and the IMF chequebook. Argentna's the
mode f you want to be the poster-boy of neobera captasm,
Iraq f you're the back sheep.
Poor countres that are geo-potcay of strategc vaue to
Empre, or have a `market' of any sze, or nfrastructure that can
be prvatzed, or, god forbd, natura resources of vaue - o,
god, damonds, cobat, coa - must do as they're tod, or
become mtary targets. Those wth the greatest reserves of
natura weath are most at rsk. Uness they surrender ther
resources wngy to the corporate machne, cv unrest w be
fomented, or war w be waged. In ths new age of Empre, when
nothng s as t appears to be, executves of concerned
companes are aowed to nfuence foregn pocy decsons. The
Centre for Pubc Integrty n Washngton found that nne out of
the 30 members of the Defence Pocy Board of the U.S.
Government were connected to companes that were awarded
defence contracts for $ 76 bon between 2001 and 2002.
George Shutz, former U.S. Secretary of State, was Charman of
the Commttee for the Lberaton of Iraq. He s aso on the Board
of Drectors of the Bechte Group. When asked about a confct of
nterest, n the case of a war n Iraq he sad, " I don't know that
Bechte woud partcuary beneft from t. But f there's work to
be done, Bechte s the type of company that coud do t. But
nobody ooks at t as somethng you beneft from." After the war,
Bechte sgned a $680 mon contract for reconstructon n Iraq.
Ths bruta bueprnt has been used over and over agan, across
Latn Amerca, Afrca, Centra and South-East Asa. It has cost
mons of ves. It goes wthout sayng that every war Empre
wages becomes a |ust War. Ths, n arge part, s due to the roe
of the corporate meda. It's mportant to understand that the
corporate meda doesn't |ust support the neo-bera pro|ect. It s
the neo-bera pro|ect. Ths s not a mora poston t has chosen
to take, t's structura. It's ntrnsc to the economcs of how the
mass meda works.
Most natons have adequatey hdeous famy secrets. So t sn't
often necessary for the meda to e. It's what's emphassed and
what's gnored. Say for exampe Inda was chosen as the target
for a rghteous war. The fact that about 80,000 peope have been
ked n Kashmr snce 1989, most of them Musm, most of them
by Indan Securty Forces (makng the average death to about
6000 a year); the fact that ess than a year ago, n March of 2003,
more than two thousand Musms were murdered on the streets
of Gu|arat, that women were gang-raped and chdren were
burned ave and a 150,000 peope drven from ther homes whe
the poce and admnstraton watched, and sometmes actvey
partcpated; the fact that no one has been punshed for these
crmes and the Government that oversaw them was re-eected ...
a of ths woud make perfect headnes n nternatona
newspapers n the run-up to war.
Next we know, our ctes w be eveed by cruse msses, our
vages fenced n wth razor wre, U.S. soders w patro our
streets and, Narendra Mod, Pravn Togada or any of our popuar
bgots coud, ke Saddam Hussen, be n U.S. custody, havng
ther har checked for ce and the fngs n ther teeth examned
on prme-tme TV.
But as ong as our `markets' are open, as ong as corporatons
ke Enron, Bechte, Haburton, Arthur Andersen are gven a free
hand, our `democratcay eected' eaders can fearessy bur the
nes between democracy, ma|ortaransm and fascsm.
Our government's craven wngness to abandon Inda's proud
tradton of beng Non-Agned, ts rush to fght ts way to the
head of the queue of the Competey Agned (the fashonabe
phrase s `natura ay' - Inda, Israe and the U.S. are `natura
aes'), has gven t the eg room to turn nto a repressve regme
wthout compromsng ts egtmacy.
A government's vctms are not ony those that t ks and
mprsons. Those who are dspaced and dspossessed and
sentenced to a fetme of starvaton and deprvaton must count
among them too. Mons of peope have been dspossessed by
`deveopment' pro|ects. In the past 55 years, Bg Dams aone
have dspaced between 33 mon and 55 mon peope n Inda.
They have no recourse to |ustce.
In the ast two years there has been a seres of ncdents when
poce have opened fre on peacefu protestors, most of them
Advas and Dat. When t comes to the poor, and n partcuar
Dat and Advas communtes, they get ked for encroachng on
forest and, and ked when they're tryng to protect forest and
from encroachments - by dams, mnes, stee pants and other
`deveopment' pro|ects. In amost every nstance n whch the
poce opened fre, the government's strategy has been to say the
frng was provoked by an act of voence. Those who have been
fred upon are mmedatey caed mtants.
Across the country, thousands of nnocent peope ncudng
mnors have been arrested under POTA (Preventon of Terrorsm
Act) and are beng hed n |a ndefntey and wthout tra. In the
era of the War aganst Terror, poverty s beng syy confated
wth terrorsm. In the era of corporate gobasaton, poverty s a
crme. Protestng aganst further mpovershment s terrorsm.
And now, our Supreme Court says that gong on strke s a crme.
Crtcsng the court of course s a crme, too. They're seang the
exts.
Lke Od Imperasm, New Imperasm too rees for ts success on
a network of agents - corrupt, oca etes who servce Empre.
We a know the sordd story of Enron n Inda. The then
Maharashtra Government sgned a power purchase agreement
whch gave Enron profts that amounted to sxty per cent of
Inda's entre rura deveopment budget. A snge Amercan
company was guaranteed a proft equvaent to funds for
nfrastructura deveopment for about 500 mon peope!
Unke n the od days the New Imperast doesn't need to trudge
around the tropcs rskng maara or dahorrea or eary death.
New Imperasm can be conducted on e-ma. The vugar, hands-
on racsm of Od Imperasm s outdated. The cornerstone of New
Imperasm s New Racsm.
The tradton of `turkey pardonng' n the U.S. s a wonderfu
aegory for New Racsm. Every year snce 1947, the Natona
Turkey Federaton presents the U.S. Presdent wth a turkey for
Thanksgvng. Every year, n a show of ceremona magnanmty,
the Presdent spares that partcuar brd (and eats another one).
After recevng the presdenta pardon, the Chosen One s sent to
Fryng Pan Park n Vrgna to ve out ts natura fe. The rest of
the 50 mon turkeys rased for Thanksgvng are saughtered
and eaten on Thanksgvng Day. ConAgra Foods, the company
that has won the Presdenta Turkey contract, says t trans the
ucky brds to be socabe, to nteract wth dgntares, schoo
chdren and the press. (Soon they' even speak Engsh!)
That's how New Racsm n the corporate era works. A few
carefuy bred turkeys - the oca etes of varous countres, a
communty of weathy mmgrants, nvestment bankers, the
occasona Con Powe, or Condoeezza Rce, some sngers, some
wrters (ke mysef) - are gven absouton and a pass to Fryng
Pan Park. The remanng mons ose ther |obs, are evcted from
ther homes, have ther water and eectrcty connectons cut, and
de of AIDS. Bascay they're for the pot. But the Fortunate Fows
n Fryng Pan Park are dong fne. Some of them even work for the
IMF and the WTO - so who can accuse those organsatons of
beng ant-turkey? Some serve as board members on the Turkey
Choosng Commttee - so who can say that turkeys are aganst
Thanksgvng? They partcpate n t! Who can say the poor are
ant-corporate gobasaton? There's a stampede to get nto
Fryng Pan Park. So what f most persh on the way?
Part of the pro|ect of New Racsm s New Genocde. In ths new
era of economc nterdependence, New Genocde can be
factated by economc sanctons. It means creatng condtons
that ead to mass death wthout actuay gong out and kng
peope. Denns Haday, the U.N. humantaran coordnator n Iraq
between '97 and '98 (after whch he resgned n dsgust), used
the term genocde to descrbe the sanctons n Iraq. In Iraq the
sanctons outdd Saddam Hussen's best efforts by camng more
than haf a mon chdren's ves.
In the new era, Aparthed as forma pocy s antquated and
unnecessary. Internatona nstruments of trade and fnance
oversee a compex system of mutatera trade aws and fnanca
agreements that keep the poor n ther Bantustans anyway. Its
whoe purpose s to nsttutonase nequty. Why ese woud t be
that the U.S. taxes a garment made by a Bangadesh
manufacturer 20 tmes more than t taxes a garment made n the
U.K.? Why ese woud t be that countres that grow 90 per cent of
the word's cocoa bean produce ony 5 per cent of the word's
chocoate? Why ese woud t be that countres that grow cocoa
bean, ke the Ivory Coast and Ghana, are taxed out of the market
f they try and turn t nto chocoate? Why ese woud t be that
rch countres that spend over a bon doars a day on subsdes
to farmers demand that poor countres ke Inda wthdraw a
agrcutura subsdes, ncudng subsdsed eectrcty? Why ese
woud t be that after havng been pundered by coonsng
regmes for more than haf a century, former coones are
steeped n debt to those same regmes, and repay them some $
382 bon a year?
For a these reasons, the derang of trade agreements at
Cancun was cruca for us. Though our governments try and take
the credt, we know that t was the resut of years of strugge by
many mons of peope n many, many countres. What Cancun
taught us s that n order to nfct rea damage and force radca
change, t s vta for oca resstance movements to make
nternatona aances. From Cancun we earned the mportance
of gobasng resstance.
No ndvdua naton can stand up to the pro|ect of Corporate
Gobasaton on ts own. Tme and agan we have seen that when
t comes to the neo-bera pro|ect, the heroes of our tmes are
suddeny dmnshed. Extraordnary, charsmatc men, gants n
Opposton, when they seze power and become Heads of State,
they become poweress on the goba stage. I'm thnkng here of
Presdent Lua of Braz. Lua was the hero of the Word Soca
Forum ast year. Ths year he's busy mpementng IMF
gudenes, reducng penson benefts and purgng radcas from
the Workers' Party. I'm thnkng aso of ex-Presdent of South
Afrca, Neson Mandea. Wthn two years of takng offce n 1994,
hs government genufected wth hardy a caveat to the Market
God. It nsttuted a massve programme of prvatsaton and
structura ad|ustment, whch has eft mons of peope homeess,
|obess and wthout water and eectrcty.
Why does ths happen? There's tte pont n beatng our breasts
and feeng betrayed. Lua and Mandea are, by any reckonng,
magnfcent men. But the moment they cross the foor from the
Opposton nto Government they become hostage to a spectrum
of threats - most maevoent among them the threat of capta
fght, whch can destroy any government overnght. To magne
that a eader's persona charsma and a c.v. of strugge w dent
the Corporate Carte s to have no understandng of how
Captasm works, or for that matter, how power works. Radca
change w not be negotated by governments; t can ony be
enforced by peope.
Ths week at the Word Soca Forum, some of the best mnds n
the word w exchange deas about what s happenng around
us. These conversatons refne our vson of the knd of word
we're fghtng for. It s a vta process that must not be
undermned. However, f a our energes are dverted nto ths
process at the cost of rea potca acton, then the WSF, whch
has payed such a cruca roe n the Movement for Goba |ustce,
runs the rsk of becomng an asset to our enemes. What we need
to dscuss urgenty s strateges of resstance. We need to am at
rea targets, wage rea battes and nfct rea damage. Gandh's
Sat March was not |ust potca theatre. When, n a smpe act of
defance, thousands of Indans marched to the sea and made
ther own sat, they broke the sat tax aws. It was a drect strke
at the economc underpnnng of the Brtsh Empre. It was rea.
Whe our movement has won some mportant vctores, we must
not aow non-voent resstance to atrophy nto neffectua, fee-
good, potca theatre. It s a very precous weapon that needs to
be constanty honed and re-magned. It cannot be aowed to
become a mere spectace, a photo opportunty for the meda.
It was wonderfu that on February 15th ast year, n a spectacuar
dspay of pubc moraty, 10 mon peope n fve contnents
marched aganst the war on Iraq. It was wonderfu, but t was not
enough. February 15th was a weekend. Nobody had to so much
as mss a day of work. Hoday protests don't stop wars. George
Bush knows that. The confdence wth whch he dsregarded
overwhemng pubc opnon shoud be a esson to us a. Bush
beeves that Iraq can be occuped and coonsed - as
Afghanstan has been, as Tbet has been, as Chechnya s beng,
as East Tmor once was and Paestne st s. He thnks that a he
has to do s hunker down and wat unt a crss-drven meda,
havng pcked ths crss to the bone, drops t and moves on. Soon
the carcass w sp off the best-seer charts, and a of us
outraged foks w ose nterest. Or so he hopes.
Ths movement of ours needs a ma|or, goba vctory. It's not
good enough to be rght. Sometmes, f ony n order to test our
resove, t's mportant to wn somethng. In order to wn
somethng, we - a of us gathered here and a tte way away at
Mumba Resstance - need to agree on somethng. That
somethng does not need to be an over-archng pre-ordaned
deoogy nto whch we force-ft our deghtfuy factous,
argumentatve seves. It does not need to be an unquestonng
aegance to one or another form of resstance to the excuson of
everythng ese. It coud be a mnmum agenda.
If a of us are ndeed aganst Imperasm and aganst the pro|ect
of neo-berasm, then et's turn our gaze on Iraq. Iraq s the
nevtabe cumnaton of both. Penty of ant-war actvsts have
retreated n confuson snce the capture of Saddam Hussen. Isn't
the word better off wthout Saddam Hussen? they ask tmdy.
Let's ook ths thng n the eye once and for a. To appaud the
U.S. army's capture of Saddam Hussen and therefore, n
retrospect, |ustfy ts nvason and occupaton of Iraq s ke
defyng |ack the Rpper for dsemboweng the Boston Stranger.
And that - after a quarter century partnershp n whch the
Rppng and Strangng was a |ont enterprse. It's an n-house
quarre. They're busness partners who fe out over a drty dea.
|ack's the CEO.
So f we are aganst Imperasm, sha we agree that we are
aganst the U.S. occupaton and that we beeve that the U.S.
must wthdraw from Iraq and pay reparatons to the Iraq peope
for the damage that the war has nfcted?
How do we begn to mount our resstance? Let's start wth
somethng reay sma. The ssue s not about supportng the
resstance n Iraq aganst the occupaton or dscussng who
exacty consttutes the resstance. (Are they od Ker Ba'athsts,
are they Isamc Fundamentasts?)
We have to become the goba resstance to the occupaton.
Our resstance has to begn wth a refusa to accept the
egtmacy of the U.S. occupaton of Iraq. It means actng to make
t materay mpossbe for Empre to acheve ts ams. It means
soders shoud refuse to fght, reservsts shoud refuse to serve,
workers shoud refuse to oad shps and arcraft wth weapons. It
certany means that n countres ke Inda and Pakstan we must
bock the U.S. government's pans to have Indan and Pakstan
soders sent to Iraq to cean up after them.
I suggest that at a |ont cosng ceremony of the Word Soca
Forum and Mumba Resstance, we choose, by some means, two
of the ma|or corporatons that are proftng from the destructon
of Iraq. We coud then st every pro|ect they are nvoved n. We
coud ocate ther offces n every cty and every country across
the word. We coud go after them. We coud shut them down. It's
a queston of brngng our coectve wsdom and experence of
past strugges to bear on a snge target. It's a queston of the
desre to wn.
The Pro|ect For The New Amercan Century seeks to perpetuate
nequty and estabsh Amercan hegemony at any prce, even f
t's apocayptc. The Word Soca Forum demands |ustce and
survva.
For these reasons, we must consder ourseves at war.
Arundhat Roy
Frontne Apr 12 - 25, 2003
COVER STORY
THE ORDlNARY PERSON'S GUlDE TO EMPlRE
ARUNDHATl ROY
MESOPOTAMIA. Babyon. The Tgrs and Euphrates. How many
chdren, n how many cassrooms, over how many centures,
have hang-gded through the past, transported on the wngs of
these words?
And now the bombs are fang, ncneratng and humatng that
ancent cvsaton.
On the stee torsos of ther msses, adoescent Amercan soders
scraw coourfu messages n chdsh handwrtng: For Saddam,
from the Fat Boy Posse. A budng goes down. A marketpace. A
home. A gr who oves a boy. A chd who ony ever wanted to
pay wth hs oder brother's marbes.
On March 21, the day after Amercan and Brtsh troops began
ther ega nvason and occupaton of Iraq, an "embedded" CNN
correspondent ntervewed an Amercan soder. "I wanna get n
there and get my nose drty," Prvate A| sad. "I wanna take
revenge for 9/11."
To be far to the correspondent, even though he was "embedded"
he dd sort of weaky suggest that so far there was no rea
evdence that nked the Iraq government to the September 11
attacks. Prvate A| stuck hs teenage tongue out a the way down
to the end of hs chn. "Yeah, we that stuff's way over my head,"
he sad.
Accordng to a New York Tmes/CBS News survey, 42 per cent of
the Amercan pubc beeves that Saddam Hussen s drecty
responsbe for the September 11 attacks on the Word Trade
Centre and the Pentagon. And an ABC news po says that 55 per
cent of Amercans beeve that Saddam Hussen drecty supports
A Oaeda. What percentage of Amerca's armed forces beeve
these fabrcatons s anybody's guess.
It s unkey that Brtsh and Amercan troops fghtng n Iraq are
aware that ther governments supported Saddam Hussen both
potcay and fnancay through hs worst excesses.
But why shoud poor A| and hs feow soders be burdened wth
these detas? It does not matter any more, does t? Hundreds of
thousands of men, tanks, shps, choppers, bombs, ammunton,
gas masks, hgh-proten food, whoe arcraft ferryng toet paper,
nsect repeent, vtamns and botted mnera water, are on the
move. The phenomena ogstcs of Operaton Iraq Freedom make
t a unverse unto tsef. It doesn't need to |ustfy ts exstence any
more. It exsts. It s.
Presdent George W. Bush, commander n chef of the Unted
States army, navy, arforce and marnes, has ssued cear
nstructons: "Iraq. W. Be. Lberated." (Perhaps he means that
even f Iraq peope's bodes are ked, ther sous w be
berated.) Amercan and Brtsh ctzens owe t to the supreme
commander to forsake thought and ray behnd ther troops.
Ther countres are at war.
And what a war t s.
After usng the "good offces" of U.N. dpomacy (economc
sanctons and weapons nspectons) to ensure that Iraq was
brought to ts knees, ts peope starved, haf a mon of ts
chdren ked, ts nfrastructure severey damaged, after makng
sure that most of ts weapons have been destroyed, n an act of
cowardce that must surey be unrvaed n hstory, the
"Aes"/"Coaton of the Wng" (better known as the Coaton of
the Bued and Bought) - sent n an nvadng army!
Operaton Iraq Freedom? I don't thnk so. It's more ke Operaton
Let's Run a Race, but Frst Let Me Break Your Knees.
So far the Iraq army, wth ts hungry, -equpped soders, ts od
guns and ageng tanks, has somehow managed to temporary
confound and occasonay even outmanoeuvre the "Aes". Faced
wth the rchest, best-equpped, most powerfu armed forces the
word has ever seen, Iraq has shown spectacuar courage and has
even managed to put up what actuay amounts to a defence. A
defence whch the Bush/Bar Par have mmedatey denounced
as decetfu and cowardy. (But then decet s an od tradton wth
us natves. When we are nvaded/ coonsed/occuped and
strpped of a dgnty, we turn to gue and opportunsm.)
Even aowng for the fact that Iraq and the "Aes" are at war, the
extent to whch the "Aes" and ther meda cohorts are prepared
to go s astoundng to the pont of beng counterproductve to
ther own ob|ectves.
When Saddam Hussen appeared on natona TV to address the
Iraq peope after the faure of the most eaborate assassnaton
attempt n hstory - "Operaton Decaptaton" - we had Geoff
Hoon, the Brtsh Defence Secretary, derdng hm for not havng
the courage to stand up and be ked, cang hm a coward who
hdes n trenches. We then had a furry of Coaton specuaton -
Was t reay Saddam, was t hs doube? Or was t Osama wth a
shave? Was t pre-recorded? Was t a speech? Was t back
magc? W t turn nto a pumpkn f we reay, reay want t to?
An ant-war protester, hs son on hs shouders, s arrested by the
poce n San Francsco. "More than one-thrd of Amerca's ctzens
have survved the reentess propaganda they've been sub|ected
to, and many thousands are actvey fghtng ther own
government."
After droppng not hundreds, but thousands of bombs on
Baghdad, when a marketpace was mstakeny bown up and
cvans ked - a U.S. army spokesman mped that the Iraqs
were bowng themseves up! "They're usng very od stock. Ther
msses go up and come down."
If so, may we ask how ths squares wth the accusaton that the
Iraq regme s a pad-up member of the Axs of Ev and a threat
to word peace?
When the Arab TV staton a-|azeera shows cvan casuates t's
denounced as "emotve" Arab propaganda amed at orchestratng
hostty towards the "Aes", as though Iraqs are dyng ony n
order to make the "Aes" ook bad. Even French teevson has
come n for some stck for smar reasons. But the awed,
breathess footage of arcraft carrers, steath bombers and cruse
msses arcng across the desert sky on Amercan and Brtsh TV
s descrbed as the "terrbe beauty" of war.
When nvadng Amercan soders (from the army "that's ony
here to hep") are taken prsoner and shown on Iraq TV, George
Bush says t voates the Geneva conventon and "exposes the
ev at the heart of the regme". But t s entrey acceptabe for
U.S. teevson statons to show the hundreds of prsoners beng
hed by the U.S. government n Guantanamo Bay, kneeng on the
ground wth ther hands ted behnd ther backs, bnded wth
opaque gogges and wth earphones camped on ther ears, to
ensure compete vsua and aura deprvaton. When questoned
about the treatment of these prsoners, U.S. government offcas
don't deny that they're beng -treated. They deny that they're
"prsoners of war"! They ca them "unawfu combatants",
mpyng that ther -treatment s egtmate! (So what's the party
ne on the massacre of prsoners n Mazar-e-Sharf, Afghanstan?
Forgve and forget? And what of the prsoner tortured to death by
the speca forces at the Bagram arforce base? Doctors have
formay caed t homcde.)
When the "Aes" bombed the Iraq teevson staton (aso,
ncdentay, a contraventon of the Geneva Conventon), there
was vugar |ubaton n the Amercan meda. In fact Fox TV had
been obbyng for the attack for a whe. It was seen as a
rghteous bow aganst Arab propaganda. But manstream
Amercan and Brtsh TV contnue to advertse themseves as
"baanced" when ther propaganda has acheved haucnatory
eves.
Why shoud propaganda be the excusve preserve of the Western
meda? |ust because they do t better? Western |ournasts
"embedded" wth troops are gven the status of heroes reportng
from the frontnes of war. Non-"embedded" |ournasts (such as
the BBC's Rageh Omaar, reportng from beseged and bombed
Baghdad, wtnessng, and ceary affected by the sght of bodes
of burned chdren and wounded peope) are undermned even
before they begn ther reportage: "We have to te you that he s
beng montored by the Iraq authortes."
Increasngy, on Brtsh and Amercan TV, Iraq soders are beng
referred to as "mta" (e: rabbe). One BBC correspondent
portentousy referred to them as "quas-terrorsts". Iraq defence
s "resstance" or worse st, "pockets of resstance", Iraq mtary
strategy s decet. (The U.S government buggng the phone nes
of U.N. Securty Counc deegates, reported by The Observer, s
hard-headed pragmatsm.) Ceary for the "Aes", the ony
moray acceptabe strategy the Iraq army can pursue s to
march out nto the desert and be bombed by B-52s or be mowed
down by machne-gun fre. Anythng short of that s cheatng.
And now we have the sege of Basra. About a mon and a haf
peope, 40 per cent of them chdren. Wthout cean water, and
wth very tte food. We're st watng for the egendary Sha
"uprsng", for the happy hordes to stream out of the cty and ran
roses and hosannahs on the "beratng" army. Where are the
hordes? Don't they know that teevson productons work to tght
schedues? (It may we be that f Saddam's regme fas there w
be dancng on the streets of Basra. But then, f the Bush regme
were to fa, there woud be dancng on the streets the word
over.)
After days of enforcng hunger and thrst on the ctzens of Basra,
the "Aes" have brought n a few trucks of food and water and
postoned them tantasngy on the outskrts of the cty.
Desperate peope fock to the trucks and fght each other for
food. (The water, we hear, s beng sod. To revtase the dyng
economy, you understand.) On top of the trucks, desperate
photographers fought each other to get pctures of desperate
peope fghtng each other for food. Those pctures w go out
through photo agences to newspapers and gossy magaznes
that pay extremey we. Ther message: The messahs are at
hand, dstrbutng fshes and oaves.
As of |uy ast year the devery of $5.4 bon worth of suppes to
Iraq was bocked by the Bush/Bar Par. It ddn't reay make the
news. But now under the ovng caress of ve TV, 450 tonnes of
humantaran ad - a mnuscue fracton of what's actuay needed
(ca t a scrpt prop) - arrved on a Brtsh shp, the Sr Gaahad.
Its arrva n the port of Umm Oasr merted a whoe day of ve TV
broadcasts. Barf bag, anyone?
Nck Guttmann, head of emergences for Chrstan Ad, wrtng for
The Independent on Sunday sad that t woud take 32 Sr
Gaahads a day to match the amount of food Iraq was recevng
before the bombng began.
We oughtn't to be surprsed though. It's od tactcs. They've been
at t for years. Consder ths moderate proposa by |ohn
McNaughton from the Pentagon Papers, pubshed durng the
Vetnam war:
"Strkes at popuaton targets (per se) are key not ony to
create a counterproductve wave of revuson abroad and at
home, but greaty to ncrease the rsk of enargng the war wth
Chna or the Sovet Unon. Destructon of ocks and dams,
however - f handed rght - mght offer promse. It shoud be
studed. Such destructon does not k or drown peope. By
shaow-foodng the rce, t eads after tme to wdespread
starvaton (more than a mon?) uness food s provded - whch
we coud offer to do `at the conference tabe'."
Tmes haven't changed very much. The technque has evoved
nto a doctrne. It's caed "Wnnng Hearts and Mnds".
So, here's the mora maths as t stands: 200,000 Iraqs estmated
to have been ked n the frst Guf war. Hundreds of thousands
dead because of the economc sanctons. (At east that ot has
been saved from Saddam Hussen.) More beng ked every day.
Tens of thousands of U.S. soders who fought the 1991 war
offcay decared "dsabed" by a dsease caed the Guf war
syndrome, beeved n part to be caused by exposure to depeted
uranum.
It hasn't stopped the "Aes" from contnung to use depeted
uranum.
And now ths tak of brngng the U.N. back nto the pcture.
But that od U.N. gr - t turns out that she |ust an't what she was
cracked up to be. She's been demoted (athough she retans her
hgh saary). Now she's the word's |antor. She's the Phppno
ceanng ady, the Indan |amadarn, the posta brde from
Thaand, the Mexcan househod hep, the |amacan au par.
She's empoyed to cean other peopes' sht. She's used and
abused at w.
Despte Bar's earnest submssons, and a hs fawnng, Bush has
made t cear that the U.N. w pay no ndependent part n the
admnstraton of post-war Iraq. The U.S. w decde who gets
those |ucy "reconstructon" contracts. But Bush has appeaed to
the nternatona communty not to "potcse" the ssue of
humantaran ad. On March 28, after Bush caed for the
mmedate resumpton of the U.N.'s o-for-food programme, the
U.N. Securty Counc voted unanmousy for the resouton. Ths
means that everybody agrees that Iraq money (from the sae of
Iraq o) shoud be used to feed Iraq peope who are starvng
because of U.S.-ed sanctons and the ega U.S.-ed war.
Contracts for the "reconstructon" of Iraq we're tod, n
dscussons on the busness news, coud |ump-start the word
economy. It's funny how the nterests of Amercan corporatons
are so often, so successfuy and so deberatey confused wth
the nterests of the word economy. Whe the Amercan peope
w end up payng for the war, o companes, weapons
manufacturers, arms deaers, and corporatons nvoved n
"reconstructon" work w make drect gans from the war. Many
of them are od frends and former empoyers of the Bush/
Cheney/Rumsfed/Rce caba. Bush has aready asked Congress
for $75 bon. Contracts for "reconstructon" are aready beng
negotated. The news doesn't ht the stands because much of the
U.S. corporate meda s owned and managed by the same
nterests.
Operaton Iraq Freedom, Tony Bar assures us s about returnng
Iraq o to the Iraq peope. That s, returnng Iraq o to the Iraq
peope va corporate mutnatonas. Lke She, ke Chevron, ke
Haburton. Or are we mssng the pot here? Perhaps Haburton
s actuay an Iraq company? Perhaps U.S. vce-presdent Dck
Cheney (who s a former drector of Haburton) s a coset Iraq?
As the rft between Europe and Amerca deepens, there are sgns
that the word coud be enterng a new era of economc boycotts.
CNN reported that Amercans are emptyng French wne nto
gutters, chantng, "We don't want your stnkng wne." We've
heard about the re-baptsm of French fres. Freedom fres they're
caed now. There's news trckng n about Amercans boycottng
German goods. The thng s that f the faout of the war takes ths
turn, t s the U.S. who w suffer the most. Its homeand may be
defended by border patros and nucear weapons, but ts
economy s strung out across the gobe. Its economc outposts
are exposed and vunerabe to attack n every drecton. Aready
the Internet s buzzng wth eaborate sts of Amercan and Brtsh
government products and companes that shoud be boycotted.
Apart from the usua targets, Coke, Peps and McDonad's -
government agences such as USAID, the Brtsh Department for
Internatona Deveopment, Brtsh and Amercan banks, Arthur
Anderson, Merr Lynch, Amercan Express, corporatons such as
Bechte, Genera Eectrc, and companes such as Reebok, Nke
and Gap - coud fnd themseves under sege. These sts are
beng honed and refned by actvsts across the word. They coud
become a practca gude that drects and channes the
amorphous, but growng fury n the word. Suddeny, the
"nevtabty" of the pro|ect of corporate gobasaton s
begnnng to seem more than a tte evtabe.
It's become cear that the war aganst terror s not reay about
terror, and the war on Iraq not ony about o. It's about a
superpower's sef-destructve mpuse towards supremacy,
strangehod, goba hegemony. The argument s beng made that
the peope of Argentna and Iraq have both been decmated by
the same process. Ony the weapons used aganst them dffer: In
one case t's an IMF chequebook. In the other, cruse msses.
Fnay, there's the matter of Saddam's arsena of weapons of
mass destructon. (Oops, neary forgot about those!)
In the fog of war - one thng's for sure - f Saddam's regme
ndeed has weapons of mass destructon, t s showng an
astonshng degree of responsbty and restrant n the teeth of
extreme provocaton. Under smar crcumstances (say f Iraq
troops were bombng New York and ayng sege to Washngton
DC), coud we expect the same of the Bush regme? Woud t
keep ts thousands of nucear warheads n ther wrappng paper?
What about ts chemca and boogca weapons? Its stocks of
anthrax, smapox and nerve gas? Woud t?
Excuse me whe I augh.
In the fog of war we're forced to specuate: Ether Saddam s an
extremey responsbe tyrant. Or - he smpy does not possess
weapons of mass destructon. Ether way, regardess of what
happens next, Iraq comes out of the argument smeng sweeter
than the U.S. government.
So here's Iraq - rogue state, grave threat to word peace, pad-up
member of the Axs of Ev. Here's Iraq, nvaded, bombed,
beseged, bued, ts soveregnty shat upon, ts chdren ked by
cancers, ts peope bown up on the streets. And here's a of us
watchng. CNN-BBC, BBC-CNN ate nto the nght. Here's a of us,
endurng the horror of the war, endurng the horror of the
propaganda and endurng the saughter of anguage as we know
and understand t. Freedom now means mass murder (or, n the
U.S., fred potatoes). When someone says "humantaran ad" we
automatcay go ookng for nduced starvaton. "Embedded" I
have to admt, s a great fnd. It's what t sounds ke. And what
about "arsena of tactcs?" Nce!
In most parts of the word, the nvason of Iraq s beng seen as a
racst war. The rea danger of a racst war uneashed by racst
regmes s that t engenders racsm n everybody - perpetrators,
vctms, spectators. It sets the parameters for the debate, t ays
out a grd for a partcuar way of thnkng. There s a tda wave of
hatred for the U.S. rsng from the ancent heart of the word. In
Afrca, Latn Amerca, Asa, Europe, Austraa. I encounter t every
day. Sometmes t comes from the most unkey sources.
Bankers, busnessmen, yuppe students, and they brng to t a
the crassness of ther conservatve, bera potcs. That absurd
nabty to separate governments from peope: Amerca s a
naton of morons, a naton of murderers, they say (wth the same
careessness wth whch they say, "A Musms are terrorsts").
Even n the grotesque unverse of racst nsut, the Brtsh make
ther entry as add-ons. Arse-ckers, they're caed.
Suddeny, I, who have been vfed for beng "ant-Amercan" and
"ant-west", fnd mysef n the extraordnary poston of defendng
the peope of Amerca. And Brtan.
Those who descend so easy nto the pt of racst abuse woud do
we to remember the hundreds of thousands of Amercan and
Brtsh ctzens who protested aganst ther country's stockpe of
nucear weapons. And the thousands of Amercan war ressters
who forced ther government to wthdraw from Vetnam. They
shoud know that the most schoary, scathng, harous crtques
of the U.S. government and the "Amercan way of fe" comes
from Amercan ctzens. And that the funnest, most btter
condemnaton of ther Prme Mnster comes from the Brtsh
meda. Fnay they shoud remember that rght now, hundreds of
thousands of Brtsh and Amercan ctzens are on the streets
protestng the war. The Coaton of the Bued and Bought
conssts of governments, not peope. More than one-thrd of
Amerca's ctzens have survved the reentess propaganda
they've been sub|ected to, and many thousands are actvey
fghtng ther own government. In the utra-patrotc cmate that
prevas n the U.S., that's as brave as any Iraq fghtng for hs or
her homeand.
Whe the "Aes" wat n the desert for an uprsng of Sha
Musms on the streets of Basra, the rea uprsng s takng pace
n hundreds of ctes across the word. It has been the most
spectacuar dspay of pubc moraty ever seen.
Most courageous of a, are the hundreds of thousands of
Amercan peope on the streets of Amerca's great ctes -
Washngton, New York, Chcago, San Francsco. The fact s that
the ony nsttuton n the word today that s more powerfu than
the Amercan government, s Amercan cv socety. Amercan
ctzens have a huge responsbty rdng on ther shouders. How
can we not saute and support those who not ony acknowedge
but act upon that responsbty? They are our aes, our frends.
At the end of t a, t remans to be sad that dctators ke
Saddam Hussen, and a the other despots n West Asa, n the
centra Asan repubcs, n Afrca and Latn Amerca, many of
them nstaed, supported and fnanced by the U.S. government,
are a menace to ther own peope. Other than strengthenng the
hand of cv socety (nstead of weakenng t as has been done n
the case of Iraq), there s no easy, prstne way of deang wth
them. (It's odd how those who dsmss the peace movement as
utopan, don't hestate to proffer the most absurdy dreamy
reasons for gong to war: to stamp out terrorsm, nsta
democracy, emnate fascsm, and most entertanngy, to "rd
the word of ev-doers".)
Regardess of what the propaganda machne tes us, these tn-
pot dctators are not the greatest threat to the word. The rea
and pressng danger, the greatest threat of a s the ocomotve
force that drves the potca and economc engne of the U.S.
government, currenty poted by George Bush. Bush-bashng s
fun, because he makes such an easy, sumptuous target. It's true
that he s a dangerous, amost sucda pot, but the machne he
handes s far more dangerous than the man hmsef.
Despte the pa of goom that hangs over us today, I'd ke to fe
a cautous pea for hope: n tmes of war, one wants one's
weakest enemy at the hem of hs forces. And Presdent George
W. Bush s certany that. Any other even averagey ntegent
U.S. Presdent woud have probaby done the very same thngs,
but woud have managed to smoke-up the gass and confuse the
opposton. Perhaps even carry the U.N. wth hm. Bush's tactess
mprudence and hs brazen beef that he can run the word wth
hs rot squad, has done the opposte. He has acheved what
wrters, actvsts and schoars have strven to acheve for
decades. He has exposed the ducts. He has paced on fu pubc
vew the workng parts, the nuts and bots of the apocayptc
apparatus of the Amercan empre.
Now that the bueprnt (The Ordnary Person's Gude to Empre)
has been put nto mass crcuaton, t coud be dsabed qucker
than the pundts predcted.
Brng on the spanners.
The Day Of The ]ackals
By Arundhati Roy
03 |une , 2003
Mesopotama. Babyon. The Tgrs and Euphrates. How many
chdren, n how many cassrooms, over how many centures,
have hang-gded through the past, transported on the wngs of
these words?
And now the bombs have faen, ncneratng and humatng that
ancent cvzaton.
On the stee torsos of ther msses, adoescent Amercan soders
scrawed coorfu messages n chdsh handwrtng: "For Saddam,
from the Fat Boy Posse."
A budng went down. A market pace. A home. A gr who oved a
boy. A chd who ony ever wanted to pay wth hs oder brothers
marbes.
On the March 21--the day after Amercan and Brtsh troops
began ther ega nvason and occupaton of Iraq--an
"embedded" CNN correspondent ntervewed an Amercan soder.
"I wanna get n there and get my nose drty," Prvate A.|. sad. "I
wanna take revenge for 9/11."
To be far to the correspondent, even though he was
"embedded," he dd sort of weaky suggest that so far there was
no rea evdence that nked the Iraq government to the
September 11, 2001, attacks. Prvate A.|. stuck hs teenage
tongue out a the way down to the end of hs chn. "Yeah, we,
that stuffs way over my head," he sad.
When the Unted States nvaded Iraq, a New York Tmes/CBS
News survey estmated that 42 percent of the Amercan pubc
beeved that Saddam Hussen was drecty responsbe for the
September 11 attacks on the Word Trade Center and the
Pentagon. And an ABC news po sad that 55 percent of
Amercans beeved that Saddam Hussen drecty supported a-
Oaeda. None of ths opnon s based on evdence (because there
snt any). A of t s based on nsnuaton, auto-suggeston and
outrght es crcuated by the U.S. corporate meda.
Pubc support n the U.S. for the war aganst Iraq was founded on
a mut-tered edfce of fasehood and decet, coordnated by the
U.S. government and fathfuy ampfed by the press.
We had the nvented nks between Iraq and a-Oaeda. We had
the manufactured frenzy about Iraqs "weapons of mass
destructon." No weapons of mass destructon have been found.
Not even a tte one.
Now--after the war has been fought and won, and the contracts
for reconstructon have been sgned and seaed--the New York
Tmes reports that "The Centra Integence Agency has begun a
revew to try to determne whether the Amercan ntegence
communty erred n ts prewar assessments of Saddam Hussens
government and Iraqs weapons programs."
Meanwhe, n passng, an ancent cvzaton has been casuay
decmated by a very recent, casuay bruta naton.
Throughout more than a decade of war and sanctons, Amercan
and Brtsh forces fred thousands of msses and bombs on Iraq.
Iraqs feds and farmands were sheed wth three hundred tons
of depeted uranum.
In ther bombng sortes, the Aes targeted and destroyed water
treatment pants, aware of the fact that they coud not be
repared wthout foregn assstance. In southern Iraq, there was a
fourfod ncrease n cancer among chdren.
In the decade of economc sanctons that foowed the war, Iraq
cvans were dened medcne, hospta equpment, ambuances,
cean water--the basc essentas.
About haf a mon Iraq chdren ded as a resut of the
sanctons.
The corporate meda payed a sterng roe n keepng news of the
devastaton of Iraq and ts peope away from the Amercan pubc.
It has now begun preparng the ground wth the same routne of
es and hystera for a war aganst Syra and Iran--and, who
knows, perhaps even Saud Araba.
Perhaps the next war w be the |ewe n the crown of George
Bushs 2004 eecton campagn. Though he may not need to go to
such great engths snce the Democrats have announced that
ther strategy for the 2004 eecton s to charge that the
Repubcans are weak on natona securty. Its ke a sma-town
teenage buy teng the Mafa t has too many scrupes.
Amercas presdenta eecton sounds as though t w be a
compete waste of everybodys tme. Athough thats not exacty
breakng news.
The U.S. nvason of Iraq was perhaps the most cowardy war ever
fought n hstory.
After usng the "good offces" of UN dpomacy (economc
sanctons and weapons nspectons) to ensure that Iraq was
brought to ts knees, after makng sure that most of ts weapons
had been destroyed, the "Coaton of the Wng"--better known
as the Coaton of the Bued and Bought--sent n an nvadng
army.
Then the corporate meda goated that the Unted States had won
a |ust and astonshng vctory!
TV watchers wtnessed the |oy that the U.S. Army brought to
ordnary Iraqs. A those newy berated peope wavng Amercan
fags, whch they must have somehow hoarded durng the years
of sanctons.
Never mnd that the toppng of the statue of Saddam Hussen n
Frdos Square (shown over and over on TV) turned out to be a
carefuy choreographed charade payed out by a handfu of hred
extras coordnated by the U.S. Marnes. Robert Fsk caed t the
"most staged photo-op snce Iwo |ma."
Never mnd that n the days that foowed, Amercan soders fred
nto a crowd of peacefu, unarmed Iraq demonstrators who were
demandng that U.S. troops eave ther country. Ffteen peope
were shot dead.
Never mnd that a few days ater, U.S. soders ked two more
and n|ured severa peope who were protestng the fact that
peacefu demonstrators were beng ked. Never mnd that they
murdered 17 more peope n Mosu.
Never mnd that n the days to come, the kng w contnue.
(But t wont be on TV.)
Never mnd that a secuar country s beng drven to regous
sectaransm.
Never mnd that the U.S. government heped Saddam Hussens
rse to power and supported hm through hs worst excesses,
ncudng the eght-year war aganst Iran and the 1988 gassng of
Kurdsh peope n Haab|a, crmes whch 14 years ater were
reheated and served up as reasons to |ustfy gong to war aganst
Iraq.
Never mnd that after the frst Guf War, the Aes fomented an
uprsng of Shas n Basra, and then ooked away whe Saddam
Hussen crushed the revot and saughtered thousands n an act
of vengefu reprsa.
After the nvason of Iraq, Western TV channes ghoush nterest
n the mass graves they dscovered evaporated qucky when
they reazed that the bodes were of Iraqs who had been ked n
the war aganst Iran and the Sha uprsng...The search for an
approprate mass grave contnues.
Never mnd that U.S. and Brtsh troops had orders to k peope,
but not to protect them. Ther prortes were cear. The safety
and securty of Iraq peope was not ther busness.
The securty of whatever tte remaned of Iraqs nfrastructure
was not ther busness. But the securty and safety of Iraqs
ofeds was. The ofeds were "secured" amost before the
nvason began.
Its worth notng that the reconstructon of Afghanstan, whch s
n far worse condton than Iraq, hasnt merted the same
evangeca enthusasm n reconstructon that Iraq has. Even the
money that was so pubcy promsed to Afghanstan has not for
the most part been handed over.
Coud t be because Afghanstan has no o? It has a route for a
ppene, true, but no o. So there snt much money to be
extracted from that vanqushed country.
On the other hand, we were tod that contracts for the
reconstructon of Iraq coud |umpstart the word economy. Its
funny how the nterests of Amercan corporatons are so often, so
successfuy, and so deberatey confused wth the nterests of
the word economy.
The tak about Iraqs o for Iraqs and a war of beraton and
democracy and representatve government had ts tme and
pace. It had ts uses. But thngs have changed now...
Havng escorted a 7,000-year-od cvzaton nto anarchy,
George Bush has announced that the U.S. s n Iraq to stay
"ndefntey." The U.S., n effect, has sad that Iraq can ony have
a representatve government f t represents the nterests of
Ango-Amercan o companes. In other words, you can have free
speech as ong as you say what I want you to say.
On May 17, the New York Tmes sad, "In an abrupt reversa, the
Unted States and Brtan have ndefntey put off ther pan to
aow Iraq opposton forces to form a natona assemby and an
nterm government by the end of the month. Instead, top
Amercan and Brtsh dpomats eadng reconstructon efforts
here tod exe eaders n a meetng tonght that aed offcas
woud reman n charge of Iraq for an ndefnte perod."
Long before the nvason began, the words busness communty
was tngng wth exctement about the scae of money that the
reconstructon of Iraq woud nvove. It has been bed as "the
bggest reconstructon effort snce the Marsha Pan rebut
Europe after Word War Two."
Bechte Corp., based n San Francsco, s eadng the pack of
|ackas movng n to Iraq.
Concdentay, former Secretary of State George Schutz s on the
board of drectors of Bechte, and happens aso to have served as
the charman of the advsory board of the Commttee for the
Lberaton of Iraq.
When asked by the New York Tmes whether he was concerned
about the appearance of a confct of nterest, Shutz sad, "I dont
know that Bechte woud partcuary beneft from t. But f theres
work to be done, Bechte s the type of company that coud do t.
But nobody ooks at t as somethng you beneft from."
Bechte aready has a contract for $680 mon, but, accordng to
the New York Tmes, "|I|ndependent estmates are that the fna
cost for the reconstructon effort of the extent outned n
Bechtes contract wth USAID woud be $20 bon."
In an artce appropratey headned "Feedng Frenzy Under Way,
as Companes From A Over Seek a Pece of the Acton," the
Tmes notes (wthout rony) that "governments around the word
and the companes whose causes they support have beseged
Washngton n a campagn to wn a pece of the reconstructon
acton n Iraq."
"The Brtsh," the artce notes, "though ther appeas are
understated, offer what some Bush admnstraton offcas argue
s the most convncng case: that they shed bood n Iraq."
Whose bood was shed has not been carfed. Surey they ddnt
mean Brtsh bood, or Amercan bood. They must have meant
the Brtsh heped the Amercans to shed Iraq bood.
So "the most convncng case" for reconstructon contracts s
when a country can argue that t s a co-murderer of Iraqs.
Lady Smmons, the deputy eader of the UK House of Lords,
recenty traveed to Amerca wth four eaders of Brtsh ndustry.
Apart from stakng ther cam to contracts based on ther status
as co-murderers, the Brtsh deegaton aso nvoked ther coona
past, agan wthout rony, makng the case that Brtsh companes
"had a ong and cose reatonshp wth Iraq and Iraq busness
from the mpera days n the eary 20th century unt
nternatona sanctons were mposed n the 1990s." Gossng
over, of course, that ths meant Brtan had supported Saddam
Hussen through the 1970s and 1980s.
Those of us who beong to former coones thnk of mperasm as
rape. So you rape. Then you k. Then you demand the rght to
rape the corpse. Thats usuay known as necropha.
Extendng ths horrbe anaogy, Rchard Pere sad recenty,
"Iraqs are freer today and we are safer. Reax and en|oy t."
A few days nto the war, the news anchor Tom Brokaw sad: "One
of the thngs we dont want to do...s to destroy the nfrastructure
of Iraq because n a few days were gong to own that country."
Now the ownershp deeds are beng sgned. Iraq s no onger a
country. Its an asset.
Its no onger rued. Its owned.
And t s owned for the most part by Bechte. Maybe Haburton
and a Brtsh company or two w get a few bones.
Our batte has to be aganst both the occupers and the new
owners of Iraq.
lnstant-Mix lmperial Democracy.
Buy One, Get One Free
By Arundhati Roy
18 May, 2003
Full text of the Center for Economic and 5ocial Rights (CE5R)-
sponsored lecture delivered by Arundhati Roy at the Riverside
Church in Harlem, New York, on May J3.
In these tmes when we have to race to keep abreast of the
speed at whch our freedoms are beng snatched from us, and
when few can afford the uxury of retreatng from the streets for
a whe n order to return wth an exquste, fuy formed potca
thess repete wth footnotes and references, what profound gft
can I offer you tonght? As we urch from crss to crss, beamed
drecty nto our brans by satete TV, we have to thnk on our
feet. On the move. We enter hstores through the rubbe of war.
Runed ctes, parched feds, shrnkng forests and dyng rvers
are our archves. Craters eft by dasy-cutters, our brares. So
what can I offer you tonght? Some uncomfortabe thoughts about
money, war, empre, racsm and democracy. Some worres that
ft around my bran ke a famy of persstent moths that keep
me awake at nght.
Some of you w thnk t bad manners for a person ke me,
offcay entered n the Bg Book of Modern Natons as an "Indan
ctzen", to come here and crtcse the US government. Speakng
for mysef, I'm no fag-waver, no patrot, and am fuy aware that
venaty, brutaty, and hypocrsy are mprnted on the eaden sou
of every state. But when a country ceases to be merey a country
and becomes an empre, then the scae of operatons changes
dramatcay. So may I carfy that tonght I speak as a sub|ect of
the Amercan Empre? I speak as a save who presumes to
crtcse her kng.
Snce ectures must be caed somethng, mne tonght s caed:
lnstant-Mix lmperial Democracy.
Buy One, Get One Free
Way back n 1988, on |uy 3, the USS Vncennes, a msse cruser
statoned n the Persan Guf, accdentay shot down an Iranan
arner and ked 290 cvan passengers. George Bush the Frst,
who was at the tme on hs presdenta campagn, was asked to
comment on the ncdent. He sad qute subty, "I w never
apoogse for the Unted States. I dont care what the facts are."
I dont care what the facts are. What a perfect maxm for the New
Amercan Empre. Perhaps a sght varaton on the theme woud
be more apposte: The facts can be whatever we want them to
be.
When the Unted States nvaded Iraq, a New York Tmes/CBS
News survey estmated that 42 per cent of the Amercan pubc
beeved that Saddam Hussen was drecty responsbe for the
September 11 attacks on the Word Trade Center and the
Pentagon.
And an abc News po sad that 55 per cent of Amercans beeved
that Saddam Hussen drecty supported A Oaeda. None of ths
opnon s based on evdence (because there snt any). A of t s
based on nsnuaton, auto-suggeston and outrght es crcuated
by the US corporate meda, otherwse known as the Free Press,
that hoow par on whch contemporary Amercan democracy
rests.
Pubc support n the US for the war aganst Iraq was founded on
a mut-tered edfce of fasehood and decet, coordnated by the
US government and fathfuy ampfed by the corporate meda.
Apart from the nvented nks between Iraq and A Oaeda, we had
the manufactured frenzy about Iraqs Weapons of Mass
Destructon.
George Bush the Lesser went to the extent of sayng t woud be
"sucda" for the US not to attack Iraq. We once agan wtnessed
the paranoa that a starved, bombed, beseged country was
about to annhate amghty Amerca. (Iraq was ony the atest n
a successon of countres-earer there was Cuba, Ncaragua,
Lbya, Grenada, Panama). But ths tme t wasnt |ust your
ordnary brand of frendy neghbourhood frenzy. It was Frenzy
wth a Purpose. It ushered n an od doctrne n a new botte: the
Doctrne of Pre-emptve Strke, aka The Unted States Can Do
Whatever The He It Wants, And Thats Offca.
The war aganst Iraq has been fought and won and no Weapons
of Mass Destructon have been found. Not even a tte one.
Perhaps they have to be panted before theyre dscovered. And
then, the more troubesome amongst us w need an expanaton
for why Saddam Hussen ddnt use them when hs country was
beng nvaded.
Of course, there be no answers. True Beevers w make do
wth those fuzzy TV reports about the dscovery of a few barres
of banned chemcas n an od shed. There seems to be no
consensus yet about whether they are reay chemcas, whether
they are actuay banned, and whether the vesses theyre
contaned n can techncay be caed barres. (There were
unconfrmed rumours that a teaspoonfu of potassum
permanganate and an od harmonca were found there too.)
Meanwhe, n passng, an ancent cvsaton has been casuay
decmated by a very recent, casuay bruta naton.
Then there are those who say, so what f Iraq had no chemca
and nucear weapons? So what f there s no A Oaeda
connecton? So what f Osama bn Laden hates Saddam Hussen
as much as he hates the Unted States? Bush the Lesser has sad
Saddam Hussen was a Homcda Dctator. And so, the
reasonng goes, Iraq needed a "regme change". Of course,
there be no answers. True Beevers w make do wth those
fuzzy TV reports about the dscovery of a few barres of banned
chemcas n an od shed. There seems to be no consensus yet
about whether they are reay chemcas, whether they are
actuay banned, and whether the vesses theyre contaned n
can techncay be caed barres. (There were unconfrmed
rumours that a teaspoonfu of potassum permanganate and an
od harmonca were found there too.)
Meanwhe, n passng, an ancent cvsaton has been casuay
decmated by a very recent, casuay bruta naton.
Then there are those who say, so what f Iraq had no chemca
and nucear weapons? So what f there s no A Oaeda
connecton? So what f Osama bn Laden hates Saddam Hussen
as much as he hates the Unted States? Bush the
Lesser has sad Saddam Hussen was a Homcda Dctator. And
so, the reasonng goes, Iraq needed a "regme change".
Never mnd that forty years ago, the CIA, under Presdent |ohn F.
Kennedy, orchestrated a regme change n Baghdad. In 1963,
after a successfu coup, the Baath party came to power n Iraq.
Usng sts provded by the CIA, the new Baath regme
systematcay emnated hundreds of doctors, teachers, awyers
and potca fgures known to be eftsts. An entre nteectua
communty was saughtered. (The same technque was used to
massacre hundreds of thousands of peope n Indonesa and East
Tmor.) The young Saddam Hussen was sad to have had a hand
n supervsng the boodbath. In 1979, after factona nfghtng
wthn the Baath Party, Saddam Hussen became the Presdent of
Iraq.
Never mnd that forty years ago, the CIA, under Presdent |ohn F.
Kennedy, orchestrated a regme change n Baghdad. In 1963,
after a successfu coup, the Baath party came to power n Iraq.
Usng sts provded by the CIA, the new Baath regme
systematcay emnated hundreds of doctors, teachers, awyers
and potca fgures known to be eftsts. An entre nteectua
communty was saughtered. (The same technque was used to
massacre hundreds of thousands of peope n Indonesa and East
Tmor.) The young Saddam Hussen was sad to have had a hand
n supervsng the boodbath. In 1979, after factona nfghtng
wthn the Baath Party, Saddam Hussen became the Presdent of
Iraq.
In Apr 1980, whe he was massacrng Shas, the US Natona
Securty Advsor Zbgnew Brzeznks decared, "We see no
fundamenta ncompatbty of nterests between the Unted
States and Iraq." Washngton and London overty and coverty
supported Saddam Hussen. They fnanced hm, equpped hm,
armed hm and provded hm wth dua-use materas to
manufacture weapons of mass destructon. They supported hs
worst excesses fnancay, materay and moray. They
supported the eght-year war aganst Iran and the 1988 gassng
of Kurdsh peope n Haab|a, crmes whch 14 years ater were re-
heated and served up as reasons to |ustfy nvadng Iraq. After
the frst Guf War, the Aes fomented an uprsng of Shas n
Basra and then ooked away whe Saddam Hussen crushed the
revot and saughtered thousands n an act of vengefu revenge
The pont s, f Saddam Hussen was ev enough to mert the
most eaborate, openy decared assassnaton attempt n hstory
(the openng move of Operaton Shock and Awe), then surey
those who supported hm ought at east to be tred for war
crmes? Why arent the faces of US and UK government offcas
on the nfamous pack of cards of wanted men and women?
Because when t comes to Empre, facts dont matter. Yes, but a
thats n the past, were tod. Saddam Hussen s a monster who
must be stopped now. And ony the US can stop hm. Its an
effectve technque, ths use of the urgent moraty of the present
to obscure the daboca sns of the past and the maevoent
pans for the future. Indonesa, Panama, Ncaragua, Iraq,
Afghanstan-the st goes on and on. Rght now there are bruta
regmes beng groomed for the future-Egypt, Saud Araba,
Turkey, Pakstan, the Centra Asan Repubcs.
US Attorney Genera |ohn Ashcroft recenty decared that US
freedoms are "not the grant of any government or document,
but...our endowment from God". (Why bother wth the Unted
Natons when God hmsef s on hand?)
So here we are, the peope of the word, confronted wth an
Empre armed wth a mandate from heaven (and, as added
nsurance, the most formdabe arsena of weapons of mass
destructon n hstory).
Here we are, confronted wth an Empre that has conferred upon
tsef the rght to go to war at w, and the rght to dever peope
from corruptng deooges, from regous fundamentasts,
dctators, sexsm, and poverty by the age-od, tred-and-tested
practce of extermnaton. Empre s on the move, and Democracy
s ts sy new war cry. Democracy, home-devered to your
doorstep by dasy-cutters. Death s a sma prce for peope to pay
for the prvege of sampng ths new product: Instant-Mx
Impera Democracy (brng to a bo, add o, then bomb).
But then perhaps chnks, negroes, dnks, gooks and wogs dont
reay quafy as rea peope. Perhaps our deaths dont quafy as
rea deaths. Our hstores dont quafy as hstory. They never
have.
Speakng of hstory, n these past months, whe the word
watched, the US nvason and occupaton of Iraq was broadcast
on ve TV. Lke Osama bn Laden and the Taban n Afghanstan,
the regme of Saddam Hussen smpy dsappeared. Ths was
foowed by what anaysts caed a "power vacuum". Ctes that
had been under sege, wthout food, water and eectrcty for
days, ctes that had been bombed reentessy, peope who had
been starved and systematcay mpovershed by the UN
sanctons regme for more than a decade, were suddeny eft wth
no sembance of urban admnstraton. A 7,000-year-od
cvsaton sd nto anarchy. On ve TV.
Vandas pundered shops, offces, hotes and hosptas. Amercan
and Brtsh soders stood by and watched. They sad they had no
orders to act. In effect, they had orders to k peope, but not to
protect them. Ther prortes were cear. The safety and securty
of Iraq peope was not ther busness. The securty of whatever
tte remaned of Iraqs nfrastructure was not ther busness. But
the securty and safety of Iraqs o feds were. Of course they
were. The o feds were secured amost before the nvason
began.
On CNN and BBC the scenes of the rampage were payed and
repayed.
TV commentators, army and government spokespersons
portrayed t as a berated peope ventng ther rage at a
despotc regme. US Defence Secretary Donad Rumsfed sad:
"Its untdy. Freedoms untdy and free peope are free to commt
crmes and make mstakes and do bad thngs." Dd anybody know
that Donad Rumsfed was an anarchst? I wonder-dd he hod
the same vew durng the rots n Los Angees foowng the
beatng of Rodney Kng? Woud he care to share hs thess about
the Untdness of Freedom wth the two mon peope beng hed
n US prsons rght now? (The words freest country has the
hghest number of prsoners n the word.) Woud he dscuss ts
merts wth young Afrcan-Amercan men, 28 per cent of whom
w spend some part of ther adut ves n |a? Coud he expan
why he serves under a presdent who oversaw 152 executons
when he was governor of Texas?
Kng Hammurab of Babyon was the frst to codfy aws
governng the soca fe of ctzens. It was a code n whch
abandoned women, prosttutes, saves, and even anmas had
rghts. The Hammurab code s acknowedged not |ust as the brth
of egaty, but the begnnng of an understandng of the concept
of soca |ustce. The US government coud not have chosen a
more napproprate and n whch to stage ts ega war and
dspay ts grotesque dsregard for |ustce.
Before the war on Iraq began, the Offce of Reconstructon and
Humantaran Assstance (ORHA) sent the Pentagon a st of 16
cruca stes to protect. The Natona Museum was second on that
st. Yet the Museum was not |ust ooted, t was desecrated. It was
a repostory of an ancent cutura hertage. Iraq as we know t
today was part of the rver vaey of Mesopotama. The cvsaton
that grew aong the banks of the Tgrs and the Euphrates
produced the words frst wrtng, frst caendar, frst brary, frst
cty, and yes, the words frst democracy.
At a Pentagon brefng durng the days of ootng, Secretary
Rumsfed, Prnce of Darkness, turned on hs meda cohorts who
had served hm so oyay through the war. "The mages you are
seeng on teevson, you are seeng over and over and over, and
ts the same pcture, of some person wakng out of some
budng wth a vase, and you see t twenty tmes and you say,
My god, were there that many vases? Is t possbe that there
were that many vases n the whoe country?."
Laughter rpped through the press room. Woud t be arght for
the poor of Harem to oot the Metropotan Museum? Woud t be
greeted wth smar mrth?
The ast budng on the ORHA st of 16 stes to be protected was
the Mnstry of O.
It was the ony one that was gven protecton. Perhaps the
occupyng army thought that n Musm countres sts are read
upsde down? Teevson tes us that Iraq has been berated
and that Afghanstan s we on ts way to becomng a paradse for
women-thanks to Bush and Bar, the 21st centurys eadng
femnsts. In reaty, Iraqs nfrastructure has been destroyed. Its
peope brought to the brnk of starvaton. Its food stocks
depeted. And ts ctes devastated by a compete admnstratve
breakdown. Iraq s beng ushered n the drecton of a cv war
between Shas and Sunns. Meanwhe, Afghanstan has apsed
back nto the pre-Taban era of anarchy, and ts terrtory has
been carved up nto fefdoms by hoste warords. Undaunted by
a ths, on May 2, Bush the Lesser aunched hs 2004 campagn
hopng to be fnay eected US Presdent. In what probaby
consttutes the shortest fght n hstory, a mtary |et anded on
an arcraft carrer, the USS Abraham Lncon, whch was so cose
to shore that, accordng to the Assocated Press, admnstraton
offcas acknowedged "postonng the massve shp to provde
the best TV ange for Bushs speech, wth the sea as hs
background nstead of the San Dego coastne". Presdent Bush,
who never served hs term n the mtary, emerged from the
cockpt n fancy dress-a US mtary bomber |acket, combat
boots, fyng gogges, hemet. Wavng to hs cheerng troops, he
offcay procamed vctory over Iraq. He was carefu to say that
t was "|ust one vctory n a war on terror...(whch) st goes on".
It was mportant to avod makng a straghtforward vctory
announcement, because under the Geneva Conventon a
vctorous army s bound by ega obgatons of an occupyng
force, a responsbty that the Bush admnstraton does not want
to burden tsef wth. Aso, coser to the 2004 eectons, n order
to woo waverng voters, another vctory n the War on Terror
mght become necessary. Syra s beng fattened for the k.
It was Herman Goerng, that od Naz, who sad, "Peope can
aways be brought to the bddng of the eaders.... A you have to
do s te them theyre beng attacked and denounce the pacfsts
for a ack of patrotsm and exposng the country to danger. It
works the same way n any country."
Hes rght. Its dead easy. Thats what the Bush regme banks on.
The dstncton between eecton campagns and war, between
democracy and ogarchy, seems to be cosng fast.
The ony caveat n these campagn wars s that US ves must not
be ost. It shakes voter confdence. But the probem of US soders
beng ked n combat has been cked. More or ess.
At a meda brefng before Operaton Shock and Awe was
uneashed, Genera Tommy Franks announced, "Ths campagn
w be ke no other n hstory." Maybe hes rght.
Im no mtary hstoran, but when was the ast tme a war was
fought ke ths?
After usng the good offces of UN dpomacy (economc
sanctons and weapons nspectons) to ensure that Iraq was
brought to ts knees, ts peope starved, haf a mon chdren
dead, ts nfrastructure severey damaged, after makng sure that
most of ts weapons had been destroyed, n an act of cowardce
that must surey be unrvaed n hstory, the Coaton of the
Wng (better known as the Coaton of the Bued and Bought)
sent n an nvadng army!
Operaton Iraq Freedom? I dont thnk so. It was more ke
Operaton Lets Run a Race, but Frst Let Me Break Your Knees.
As soon as the war began, the governments of France, Germany
and Russa, whch refused to aow a fna resouton egtmsng
the war to be passed n the UN Securty Counc, fe over each
other to say how much they wanted the Unted States to wn.
Presdent |acques Chrac offered French arspace to the Ango-
Amercan ar force. US mtary bases n Germany were open for
busness. German foregn mnster |oschka Fscher pubcy hoped
for the rapd coapse of the Saddam Hussen regme.
Vadmr Putn pubcy hoped for the same. These are
governments that couded n the enforced dsarmng of Iraq
before ther dastardy rush to take the sde of those who attacked
t. Apart from hopng to share the spos, they hoped Empre
woud honour ther pre-war o contracts wth Iraq. Ony the very
nave coud expect od Imperasts to behave otherwse. Leavng
asde the cheap thrs and the ofty mora speeches made n the
UN durng the run-up to the war, eventuay, at the moment of
crss, the unty of Western governments-despte the opposton
from the ma|orty of ther peope-was overwhemng.
When the Turksh government temporary bowed to the vews of
90 per cent of ts popuaton, and turned down the US
governments offer of bons of doars of bood money for the
use of Turksh so, t was accused of ackng "democratc
prncpes". Accordng to a Gaup Internatona po, n no
European country was support for a war carred out "unateray
by Amerca and ts aes" hgher than 11 per cent. But the
governments of Engand, Itay, Span, Hungary and other
countres of Eastern Europe were prased for dsregardng the
vews of the ma|orty of ther peope and supportng the ega
nvason. That, presumaby, was fuy n keepng wth democratc
prncpes. Whats t caed? New Democracy? (Lke Brtans New
Labour?) In stark contrast to the venaty dspayed by ther
governments, on February 15, weeks before the nvason, n the
most spectacuar dspay of pubc moraty the word has ever
seen, more than 10 mon peope marched aganst the war on
fve contnents. Many of you, Im sure, were among them.
They-we-were dsregarded wth utter dsdan. When asked to
react to the ant-war demonstratons, Presdent Bush sad, "Its
ke decdng, we, Im gong to decde pocy based upon a focus
group. The roe of a eader s to decde pocy based upon the
securty, n ths case the securty of the peope."
Democracy, the modern words hoy cow, s n crss. And the
crss s a profound one. Every knd of outrage s beng commtted
n the name of democracy. It has become tte more than a
hoow word, a pretty she, empted of a content or meanng. It
can be whatever you want t to be. Democracy s the Free Words
whore, wng to dress up, dress down, wng to satsfy a whoe
range of taste, avaabe to be used and abused at w.
Unt qute recenty, rght up to the 1980s, democracy dd seem
as though t mght actuay succeed n deverng a degree of rea
soca |ustce.
But modern democraces have been around for ong enough for
neo-bera captasts to earn how to subvert them. They have
mastered the technque of nftratng the nstruments of
democracy-the ndependent |udcary, the free press,
parament-and moudng them to ther purpose. The pro|ect of
corporate gobasaton has cracked the code. Free eectons, a
free press and an ndependent |udcary mean tte when the free
market has reduced them to commodtes avaabe on sae to the
hghest bdder.

To fuy comprehend the extent to whch democracy s under
sege, t mght be an dea to ook at what goes on n some of our
contemporary democraces. The Words Largest: Inda (whch I
have wrtten about at some ength and therefore w not speak
about tonght). The Words Most Interestng: South Afrca. The
words most powerfu: the U.S.A. And, most nstructve of a, the
pans that are beng made to usher n the words newest: Iraq.
In South Afrca, after 300 years of bruta domnaton of the back
ma|orty by a whte mnorty through coonasm and aparthed, a
non-raca, mut-party democracy came to power n 1994.
It was a phenomena achevement. Wthn two years of comng to
power, the Afrcan Natona Congress had genufected wth no
caveats to the Market God. Its massve programme of structura
ad|ustment, prvatsaton and berasaton has ony ncreased the
hdeous dspartes between the rch and the poor. More than a
mon peope have ost ther |obs. The corporatsaton of basc
servces-eectrcty, water and housng-has meant that 10
mon South Afrcans, amost a quarter of the popuaton, has
been dsconnected from water and eectrcty. Two mon have
been evcted from ther homes.
Meanwhe, a sma whte mnorty that has been hstorcay
prveged by centures of bruta expotaton s more secure than
ever before. They contnue to contro the and, the farms, the
factores and the abundant natura resources of that country. For
them the transton from aparthed to neo-berasm barey
dsturbed the grass. Its aparthed wth a cean conscence. And t
goes by the name of Democracy.
Democracy has become Empres euphemsm for neo-bera
captasm.
In countres of the frst word, too, the machnery of democracy
has been effectvey subverted. Potcans, meda barons, |udges,
powerfu corporate obbes and government offcas are
mbrcated n an eaborate underhand confguraton that
competey undermnes the atera arrangement of checks and
baances between the consttuton, courts of aw, parament, the
admnstraton and, perhaps most mportant of a, the
ndependent meda that form the structura bass of a
paramentary democracy.
Increasngy, the mbrcaton s nether subte nor eaborate.
Itaan Prme Mnster Svo Beruscon, for nstance, has a
controng nterest n ma|or Itaan newspapers, magaznes,
teevson channes and pubshng houses. The Fnanca Tmes
reported that he contros about 90 per cent of Itays TV
vewershp. Recenty, durng a tra on brbery charges, whe
nsstng he was the ony person who coud save Itay from the
eft, he sad, "How much onger do I have to keep vng ths fe of
sacrfces?" That bodes for the remanng 10 per cent of Itays
TV vewershp. What prce Free Speech? Free Speech for whom?
In the Unted States, the arrangement s more compex. Cear
Channe Wordwde Incorporated s the argest rado staton
owner n the country. It runs more than 1,200 channes, whch
together account for 9 per cent of the market. Its CEO
contrbuted hundreds of thousands of doars to Bushs eecton
campagn. When hundreds of thousands of Amercan ctzens
took to the streets to protest aganst the war on Iraq, Cear
Channe organsed pro-war patrotc Raes for Amerca across
the country. It used ts rado statons to advertse the events and
then sent correspondents to cover them as though they were
breakng news. The era of manufacturng consent has gven way
to the era of manufacturng news. Soon meda newsrooms w
drop the pretence, and start hrng theatre drectors nstead of
|ournasts.
As Amercas show busness gets more and more voent and war-
ke, and Amercas wars get more and more ke show busness,
some nterestng crossovers are takng pace. The desgner who
but the 250,000-doar set n Oatar from whch Genera Tommy
Franks stage-managed news coverage of Operaton Shock and
Awe aso but sets for Dsney, MGM and Good Mornng Amerca.
It s a crue rony that the US, whch has the most ardent,
vocferous defenders of the dea of Free Speech, and (unt
recenty) the most eaborate egsaton to protect t, has so
crcumscrbed the space n whch that freedom can be expressed.
In a strange, convouted way, the sound and fury that
accompanes the ega and conceptua defence of Free Speech n
Amerca serves to mask the process of the rapd eroson of the
possbtes of actuay exercsng that freedom.
The news and entertanment ndustry n the US s for the most
part controed by a few ma|or corporatons-AOL-Tme Warner,
Dsney, Vacom, News Corporaton. Each of these corporatons
owns and contros TV statons, fm studos, record companes
and pubshng ventures. Effectvey, the exts are seaed.
Amercas meda empre s controed by a tny cotere of peope.
Charman of the Federa Communcatons Commsson Mchae
Powe, the son of Secretary of State Con Powe, has proposed
even further dereguaton of the communcaton ndustry, whch
w ead to even greater consodaton.
So here t s-the Words Greatest Democracy, ed by a man who
was not egay eected. Amercas Supreme Court gfted hm hs
|ob. What prce have Amercan peope pad for ths spurous
presdency?
In the three years of George Bush the Lessers term, the
Amercan economy has ost more than two mon |obs.
Outandsh mtary expenses, corporate wefare and tax
gveaways to the rch have created a fnanca crss for the US
educatona system. Accordng to a survey by the Natona
Counc of State Legsatures, US states cut $49 bon n pubc
servces, heath, wefare benefts and educaton n 2002. They
pan to cut another $25.7 bon ths year. That makes a tota of
$75 bon. Bushs nta budget request to Congress to fnance
the war n Iraq was $80 bon.
So whos payng for the war? Amercas poor. Its students, ts
unempoyed, ts snge mothers, ts hospta and home-care
patents, ts teachers and heath workers. And whos actuay
fghtng the war?
Once agan, Amercas poor. The soders who are bakng n Iraqs
desert sun are not the chdren of the rch. Ony one of a the
representatves n Congress and the Senate has a chd fghtng n
Iraq. Amercas vounteer army n fact depends on a poverty
draft of poor whtes, Backs, Latnos and Asans ookng for a way
to earn a vng and get an educaton. Federa statstcs show that
Afrcan-Amercans make up 21 per cent of the tota armed forces
and 29 per cent of the US army. They count for ony 12 per cent
of the genera popuaton. Its ronc, snt t-the
dsproportonatey hgh representaton of Afrcan-Amercans n
the army and prson? Perhaps we shoud take a postve vew,
and ook at ths as affrmatve acton at ts most effectve. Neary
4 mon Amercans (2 per cent of the popuaton) have ost the
rght to vote because of feony convctons. Of that number, 1.4
mon are Afrcan-Amercans, whch means that 13 per cent of a
votng-age Back peope have been dsenfranchsed.
For Afrcan-Amercans theres aso affrmatve acton n death. A
study by the economst Amartya Sen shows that Afrcan-
Amercans as a group have a ower fe expectancy than peope
born n Chna, n the Indan state of Keraa (where I come from),
Sr Lanka or Costa Rca. Bangadesh men have a better chance of
makng t to the age of forty than Afrcan-Amercan men from
here n Harem.
Ths year on what woud have been Martn Luther Kng |rs 74th
brthday, Presdent Bush denounced the Unversty of Mchgans
affrmatve acton programme favourng Backs and Latnos. He
caed t "dvsve", "unfar" and "unconsttutona".
The successfu effort to keep Backs off the votng ros n the
State of Forda n order that George Bush be eected was of
course nether unfar nor unconsttutona. I dont suppose
affrmatve acton for Whte Boys From Yae ever s.
So we know whos payng for the war. We know whos fghtng t.
But who w beneft from t? Who s homng n on the
reconstructon contracts estmated to be worth up to one
hundred bon doars? Coud t be Amercas poor and
unempoyed and sck? Coud t be Amercas snge mothers? Or
Amercas Back and Latno mnortes?
Operaton Iraq Freedom, George Bush assures us, s about
returnng Iraq o to the Iraq peope. That s, returnng Iraq o to
the Iraq peope va Corporate Mutnatonas. Lke Bechte, ke
Chevron, ke Haburton.
Once agan t s a sma, tght crce that connects corporate,
mtary, and government eadershp to one another. The
promscuousness, the cross-ponaton s outrageous.
Consder ths: The Defence Pocy Board s a government-
apponted group that advses the Pentagon on defence pocy. Its
members are apponted by the under-secretary of defence and
approved by Donad Rumsfed. Its meetngs are cassfed. No
nformaton s avaabe for pubc scrutny.
The Washngton-based Center for Pubc Integrty found that nne
out of the 30 members of the Defence Pocy Board are
connected to companes that were awarded defence contracts
worth $76 bon between the years 2001 and 2002.
One of them, |ack Sheehan, a retred marne corps genera, s a
senor vce presdent at Bechte, the gant nternatona
engneerng outft. Rey Bechte, the company charman, s on
the Presdents Export Counc. Former secretary of state George
Shutz, who s aso on the Board of Drectors of the Bechte
Group, s the charman of the advsory board of the Commttee
for the Lberaton of Iraq. When asked by the New York Tmes
whether he was concerned about the appearance of a confct of
nterest, he sad, "I dont know that Bechte woud partcuary
beneft from t. But f theres work to be done, Bechte s the type
of company that coud do t."
Bechte has been awarded a $680 mon reconstructon contract
n Iraq. Accordng to the Center for Responsve Potcs, Bechte
contrbuted $1.3 mon towards the 1999-2000 Repubcan
Campagn.
Arcng across ths subterfuge, dwarfng t by the sheer magntude
of ts maevoence, s Amercas ant-terrorsm egsaton. The
USA Patrot Act, passed on October 13, 2001, has become the
bueprnt for smar ant-terrorsm bs n countres across the
word. It was passed n the House of Representatves by a
ma|orty vote of 337 to 79. Accordng to the New York Tmes,
"Many awmakers sad t had been mpossbe to truy debate or
even read the egsaton."
The Patrot Act ushers n an era of systemc automated
surveance. It gves the government the authorty to montor
phones and computers and spy on peope n ways that woud
have seemed competey unacceptabe a few years ago. It gves
the FBI the power to seze a of the crcuaton, purchasng and
other records of brary users and bookstore customers on the
suspcon that they are part of a terrorst network. It burs the
boundares between speech and crmna actvty, creatng the
space to construe acts of cv dsobedence as voatng the aw.
Aready hundreds of peope are beng hed ndefntey as
"unawfu combatants". (In Inda, the number s n the thousands.
In Israe, 5,000 Paestnans are now beng detaned). Non-
ctzens, of course, have no rghts at a. They can smpy be
dsappeared ke the peope of Che under Washngtons od
ay, Genera Pnochet. More than one thousand peope, many of
them Musm or of Mdde Eastern orgn, have been detaned,
some wthout access to ega representatves.
Apart from payng the actua economc costs of war, Amercan
peope are payng for these wars of beraton wth ther own
freedoms. For the ordnary Amercan, the prce of New
Democracy n other countres s the death of rea democracy at
home.
Fght from Basra: home-devered democracy, anyone?
Meanwhe, Iraq s beng groomed for beraton. (Or dd they
mean berasaton a aong?) The Wa Street |ourna reports
that "the Bush admnstraton has drafted sweepng pans to
remake Iraqs economy n the US mage". Iraqs consttuton s
beng redrafted. Its trade aws, tax aws and nteectua property
aws rewrtten n order to turn t nto an Amercan-stye captast
economy.
The Unted States Agency for Internatona Deveopment has
nvted US companes to bd for contracts that range between
road-budng, water systems, textbook dstrbuton and cephone
networks.
Soon after Bush the Second announced that he wanted Amercan
farmers to feed the word, Dam Amstutz, a former senor
executve of Carg, the bggest gran exporter n the word, was
put n charge of agrcutura reconstructon n Iraq.
Kevn Watkn, Oxfams pocy drector, sad, "Puttng Dam
Amstutz n charge of agrcutura reconstructon n Iraq s ke
puttng Saddam Hussen n the char of a human rghts
commsson."
The two men who have been shortsted to run operatons for
managng Iraq o have worked wth She, BP and Fuer. Fuer s
embroed n a awsut by Back South Afrcan workers who have
accused the company of expotng and brutasng them durng
the aparthed era. She, of course, s we known for ts
devastaton of the Ogon trba ands n Ngera.
Tom Brokaw (one of Amercas best-known TV anchors) was
nadvertenty succnct about the process. "One of the thngs we
dont want to do," he sad, "s to destroy the nfrastructure of Iraq
because n a few days were gong to own that country."
Now that the ownershp deeds are beng setted, Iraq s ready for
New Democracy.
So, as Lenn used to ask: What Is To Be Done?
We...
We mght as we accept the fact that there s no conventona
mtary force that can successfuy chaenge the Amercan war
machne.
Terrorst strkes ony gve the US government an opportunty that
t s eagery awatng to further tghten ts strangehod. Wthn
days of an attack you can bet that Patrot II woud be passed. To
argue aganst US mtary aggresson by sayng that t w
ncrease the possbtes of terrorst strkes s fute. Its ke
threatenng Brer Rabbt that you throw hm nto the brambe
bush. Anybody who has read the document caed The Pro|ect for
the New Amercan Century can attest to that. The governments
suppresson of the Congressona Commttee Report on
September 11, whch found that there was ntegence warnng of
the strkes that was gnored, aso attests to the fact that, for a
ther posturng, the terrorsts and the Bush regme mght as we
be workng as a team. They both hod peope responsbe for the
actons of ther governments. They both beeve n the doctrne of
coectve gut and coectve punshment. Ther actons beneft
each other greaty.
The US government has aready dspayed n no uncertan terms
the range and extent of ts capabty for paranod aggresson. In
human psychoogy, paranod aggresson s usuay an ndcator of
nervous nsecurty. It coud be argued that ts no dfferent n the
case of the psychoogy of natons. Empre s paranod because t
has a soft underbey.
Its homeand may be defended by border patros and nucear
weapons, but ts economy s strung out across the gobe. Its
economc outposts are exposed and vunerabe. Aready the
Internet s buzzng wth eaborate sts of Amercan and Brtsh
government products and companes that shoud be boycotted.
Apart from the usua targets-Coke, Peps, McDonads-
government agences ke USAID, the Brtsh DFID, Brtsh and
Amercan banks, Arthur Andersen, Merr Lynch, Amercan
Express coud fnd themseves under sege. These sts are beng
honed and refned by actvsts across the word. They coud
become a practca gude that drects the amorphous but growng
fury n the word.Suddeny, the nevtabty of the pro|ect of
Corporate Gobasaton s begnnng to seem more than a tte
evtabe.
It woud be nave to magne that we can drecty confront
Empre. Our strategy must be to soate Empres workng parts
and dsabe them one by one. No target s too sma. No vctory
too nsgnfcant. We coud reverse the dea of the economc
sanctons mposed on poor countres by Empre and ts Aes. We
coud mpose a regme of Peopes Sanctons on every corporate
house that has been awarded wth a contract n post-war Iraq,
|ust as actvsts n ths country and around the word targeted
nsttutons of aparthed. Each one of them shoud be named,
exposed and boycotted. Forced out of busness. That coud be our
response to the Shock and Awe campagn. It woud be a great
begnnng.
Another urgent chaenge s to expose the corporate meda for
the boardroom buetn that t reay s. We need to create a
unverse of aternatve nformaton. We need to support
ndependent meda ke Democracy Now, Aternatve Rado, South
End Press.
The batte to recam democracy s gong to be a dffcut one. Our
freedoms were not granted to us by any governments. They were
wrested from them by us. And once we surrender them, the
batte to retreve them s caed a revouton.It s a batte that
must range across contnents and countres. It must not
acknowedge natona boundares, but, f t s to succeed, t has to
begn here. In Amerca. The ony nsttuton more powerfu than
the US government s Amercan cv socety. The rest of us are
sub|ects of save natons. We are by no means poweress, but you
have the power of proxmty. You have access to the Impera
Paace and the Emperors chambers. Empres conquests are
beng carred out n your name, and you have the rght to refuse.
You coud refuse to fght. Refuse to move those msses from the
warehouse to the dock. Refuse to wave that fag. Refuse the
vctory parade.
You have a rch tradton of resstance. You need ony read
Howard Znns A Peopes Hstory of the Unted States to remnd
yoursef of ths.
Hundreds of thousands of you have survved the reentess
propaganda you have been sub|ected to, and are actvey fghtng
your own government. In the utra-patrotc cmate that prevas
n the Unted States, thats as brave as any Iraq or Afghan or
Paestnan fghtng for hs or her homeand.
If you |on the batte, not n your hundreds of thousands, but n
your mons, you w be greeted |oyousy by the rest of the
word. And you w see how beautfu t s to be gente nstead of
bruta, safe nstead of scared. Befrended nstead of soated.
Loved nstead of hated.
I hate to dsagree wth your presdent. Yours s by no means a
great naton. But you coud be a great peope.
Hstory s gvng you the chance.
Seze the tme.
When The Saints Go Marching Out
By Arundhati Roy
Ths s the 40th annversary of the March on Washngton, when
Martn Luther Kng |r. gave hs famous "I have a dream" speech.
Perhaps t's tme to refect - agan - on what has become of
that dream.
It's nterestng how cons, when ther tme has passed, are
commodfed and approprated (some vountary, others
nvountary) to promote the pre|udce, bgotry and nequty they
batted aganst. But then n an age when everythng's up for sae,
why not cons? In an era when a of humanty, when every
creature on God's earth, s trapped between the Internatona
Monetary Fund (IMF) cheque book and the Amercan cruse
msse, can cons stage a getaway?
Martn Luther Kng |r. s part of a trnty. So t's hard to thnk of
hm wthout two others ebowng ther way nto the pcture:
Mohandas Gandh and Neson Mandea. The three hgh prests of
non-voent resstance. Together they represent (to a greater or
esser extent) the 20th Century's non-voent beraton strugges
(or shoud we say "negotated settements"?): Of the coonsed
aganst coonser, former save aganst save owner.
Today the etes of the very socetes and peopes n whose name
the battes for freedom were waged use them as mascots to
entce new masters.
Mohandas, Mandea, Martn.
Inda, South Afrca, the Unted States.
Broken dreams, betraya, nghtmares.
A quck snapshot of the supposedy "Free Word" today.
Last March n Inda, n Gu|arat - Gandh's Gu|arat - rght-wng
Hndu mobs murdered 2,000 Musms n a chngy effcent orgy
of voence. Women were gang-raped and burned ave. Musm
tombs and shrnes were razed to the ground. More than a
hundred and ffty thousand Musms have been drven from ther
homes. The economc base of the communty has been
destroyed. Eye-wtness accounts and severa fact-fndng
commssons have accused the State Government and the poce
of couson n the voence. I was present at a meetng where a
group of vctms kept wang, "Pease save us from the poce!
That's a we ask... "
In December 2002, the same State Government was voted back
to offce. Narendra Mod, who was wdey accused of havng
orchestrated the rots, has embarked on hs second term as Chef
Mnster of Gu|arat. On August 15, Independence Day, he hosted
the Indan fag before thousands of cheerng peope. In a gesture
of menacng symbosm he wore the back Rashtrya
Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) cap - whch procams hm as a
member of the Hndu natonast gud that has not been shy of
admrng Hter and hs methods.
One hundred and thrty mon Musms - not to menton the
other mnortes, Dats, Chrstans, Skhs, Advass - ve n Inda
under the shadow of Hndu natonasm.
As hs confdence n hs potca future brms over, Narendra
Mod, master of sezng the potca moment, nvted Neson
Mandea to Gu|arat to be the Chef Guest at the ceebraton of
Gandh's brth annversary on October 2. Fortunatey the
nvtaton was turned down.
And what of Mandea's South Afrca? Otherwse known as the
Sma Mrace, the Ranbow Naton of God? South Afrcans say
that the ony mrace they know of s how qucky the ranbow has
been prvatsed, sectoned off and auctoned to the hghest
bdders. Wthn two years of takng offce n 1994, the Afrcan
Natona Congress genufected wth hardy a caveat to the Market
God. In ts rush to repace Argentna as neo-berasm's poster
boy, t has nsttuted a massve programme of prvatsaton and
structura ad|ustment. The government's promse to re-dstrbute
agrcutura and to 26 mon andess peope has remaned n
the ream of dark humour. Whe 60 per cent of the popuaton
remans andess, amost a agrcutura and s owned by 60,000
whte farmers. (Sma wonder that George Bush on hs recent vst
to South Afrca referred to Thabo Mbek as hs "pont man" on the
Zmbabwe ssue.) Post-aparthed, the ncome of 40 per cent of
the poorest back fames has dmnshed by about 20 per cent.
Two mon have been evcted from ther homes. Sx hundred de
of AIDS every day. Forty per cent of the popuaton s unempoyed
and that number s rsng sharpy. The corporatsaton of basc
servces has meant that mons have been dsconnected from
water and eectrcty.
A fortnght ago, I vsted the home of Teresa Nadoo n
Chatsworth, Durban. Her husband had ded the prevous day of
AIDS. She had no money for a coffn. She and her two sma
chdren are HIV-postve. The Government dsconnected her
water suppy because she was unabe to pay her water bs and
her rent arrears for her tny counc fat. The Government
dsmsses her troubes and those of mons ke her as a "cuture
of non-payment".
In what ought to be an nternatona scanda, ths same
government has offcay asked the |udge n a U.S court case to
rue aganst forcng companes to pay reparatons for the roe
they payed durng aparthed. It's reasonng s that reparatons -
n other words |ustce - w dscourage foregn nvestment. So
South Afrca's poorest must pay aparthed's debts, so that those
who amassed proft by expotng back peope durng aparthed
can proft even more from the goodw generated by Neson
Mandea's Ranbow Naton of God. Presdent Thabo Mbek s st
caed "comrade" by hs coeagues n government. In South
Afrca, Orwean parody goes under the genre of Rea Lfe.
What's eft to say about Martn Luther Kng |r.'s Amerca? Perhaps
t's worth askng a smpe queston: Had he been ave today,
woud he have chosen to stay warm n hs undsputed pace n the
pantheon of Great Amercans? Or woud he have stepped off hs
pedesta, shrugged off the empty hosannas and waked out onto
the streets to ray hs peope once more?
On Apr 4, 1967, one year before he was assassnated, Martn
Luther Kng |r. spoke at the Rversde Church n New York Cty.
That evenng he sad (I can ony paraphrase hm because hs
pubc speeches are now prvate property) that he coud never
agan speak out aganst the voence of those vng n the ghettos
wthout frst speakng out aganst hs own government, whch he
caed the greatest purveyor of voence n the modern word.
Has anythng happened n the 36 years between 1967 and 2003
that woud have made hm change hs mnd? Or woud he be
douby confrmed n hs opnon after the overt and covert wars
and acts of mass kng that successve governments of hs
country, both Repubcan and Democrat, have engaged n snce
then?
Let's not forget that Martn Luther Kng |r. ddn't start out as a
mtant. He began as a Persuader, a Beever. In 1964 he won the
Nobe Peace Prze. He was hed up by the meda as an exempary
back eader, unke, say, the more mtant Macom X. It was ony
three years ater that Martn Luther Kng |r. pubcy connected
the U.S. government's racst war n Vetnam wth ts racst
poces at home. In 1967, n an uncompromsng, mtant speech,
he denounced the Amercan nvason of Vetnam. He spoke wth
heart-rendng eoquence about the crue rony of the TV mages
of back and whte boys burnng the huts of a poor vage n
bruta sodarty, kng and dyng together for a naton that
woudn't even seat them together at the same tabes. Hs
denuncaton of the war n Vetnam was treated as an act of
perfdy. He was condemned by hs former aes and attacked
vcousy by the Amercan press. The Washngton Post wrote, "He
has dmnshed hs usefuness to hs cause, hs country and hs
peope."
The New York Tmes had some wonderfu counter-ogc to offer
the growng ant-war sentment among back Amercans: "In
Vetnam," t sad, "the Negro, for the frst tme, has been gven
the chance to do hs share of fghtng for hs country."
It omtted to menton Martn Luther Kng |r.'s observaton that
there were twce as many backs as whtes dyng n Vetnam n
proporton to ther number n the popuaton. It omtted to
menton that when the body bags came home, some of the back
soders were bured n segregated graveyards n the South.
What woud Martn Luther Kng |r. say today about the fact that
federa statstcs show that Afrcan Amercans, who count for 12
per cent of Amerca's popuaton, make up 21 per cent of the
tota armed forces and 29 per cent of the U.S. army?
Perhaps he woud take a postve vew and ook at ths as
affrmatve acton at ts most effectve?
What woud he say about the fact that havng fought so hard to
wn the rght to vote, today 1.4 mon Afrcan Amercans, whch
means 13 per cent of a votng age back peope, have been
dsenfranchsed because of feony convctons?
But the most pertnent queston of a s: What woud Martn
Luther Kng |r. say to those back men and women who make up
a ffth of Amerca's armed forces and cose to a thrd of the U.S.
army?
To back soders fghtng n Vetnam, Martn Luther Kng |r. sad
they ought to understand Amerca's roe n Vetnam and consder
the opton of conscentous ob|ecton.
In Apr 1967 at a massve ant-war demonstraton n Manhattan,
Stokey Carmchae descrbed the draft as "whte peope sendng
back peope to make war on yeow peope n order to defend
and they stoe from red peope."
What's changed? Except of course the compusory draft has
become a poverty draft - a dfferent knd of compuson.
Woud Martn Luther Kng |r. say today that the nvason and
occupaton of Iraq and Afghanstan are n any way moray
dfferent from the U.S. government's nvason of Vetnam? Woud
he say that t was |ust and mora to partcpate n these wars?
Woud he say that t was rght for the U.S. government to have
supported a dctator ke Saddam Hussen potcay and
fnancay for years whe he commtted hs worst excesses
aganst Kurds, Iranans and Iraqs n the 1980s, when he was an
ay aganst Iran?
And that when that dctator began to chafe at the bt, as Saddam
Hussen dd, woud he say t was rght to go to war aganst Iraq,
to fre severa hundred tonnes of depeted uranum nto ts feds,
to degrade ts water suppy systems, to nsttute a regme of
economc sanctons that resuts n the death of haf a mon
chdren, to use Unted Natons weapons nspectors to force t to
dsarm, to msead the pubc about an arsena of weapons of
mass destructon that coud be depoyed n a matter of mnutes,
and then, when the country was on ts knees, to send n an
nvadng army to conquer t, occupy t, humate ts peope, take
contro of ts natura resources and nfrastructure, and award
contracts worth hundreds of mons of doars to Amercan
corporatons ke Bechte?
When he spoke out aganst the Vetnam War, Martn Luther Kng
|r. drew some connectons that many these days shy away from
makng. He expcty descrbed the nterconnectons between
racsm, economc expotaton and war. Woud he te peope
today that t s rght for the U.S. government to export ts
cruetes - ts racsm, ts economc buyng and ts war machne
to poorer countres?
Woud he say that back Amercans must fght for ther far share
of the Amercan pe and the bgger the pe, the better ther share
- never mnd the terrbe prce that the peope of Afrca, Asa,
the Mdde East and Latn Amerca are payng for the Amercan
Way of Lfe? Woud he support the graftng of the Great Amercan
Dream onto hs own dream, whch was a very dfferent, very
beautfu sort of dream? Or woud he see that as a desecraton of
hs memory and everythng that he stood for?
The back Amercan strugge for cv rghts gave us some of the
most magnfcent potca fghters, thnkers, pubc speakers and
wrters of our tmes. Martn Luther Kng |r., Macom X, Fanne Lou
Hamer, Ea Baker, |ames Badwn, and of course the marveous,
magca, mythca Muhammad A.
Who has nherted ther mante?
Coud t be the kes of Con Powe? Condoeeza Rce? Mchae
Powe?
They're the exact opposte of cons or roe modes. They appear
to be the embodment of back peopes' dreams of matera
success, but n actua fact they represent the Great Betraya.
They are the vered doormen guardng the portas of the
gtterng baroom aganst the press and swr of the darker
races. Ther roe and purpose s to be trotted out by the Bush
admnstraton ookng for browne ponts n ts racst wars and
Afrcan safars.
If these are back Amerca's new cons, then the od ones must be
dspensed wth because they do not beong n the same
pantheon. If these are back Amerca's new cons, then perhaps
the hauntng mage that Mke Marqusee descrbes n hs beautfu
book Redempton Song - an od Muhammad A affcted wth
Parknson's dsease, advertsng a retrement penson -
symboses what has happened to back Power, not |ust n the
Unted States but the word over.
If back Amerca genuney wshes to pay homage to ts rea
heroes, and to a those unsung peope who fought by ther sde
- f the word wshes to pay homage, then t's tme to march on
Washngton. Agan. Keepng hope ave - for a of us.
This is the text for a J5-minute radio essay broadcast by Radio 4,
88C.
Arundhati Roy is the author of The Cod of 5mall Things.


'The War That Never Ends'
By Arundhati Roy And Anthony Arnove
War Tmes
30 September, 2003
O. THE WAR ON IRAO HAS BECOME AN OCCUPATION. IS IRAO A
NEW COLONY?
Yes, but t's provng to be a pretty recactrant one. Maybe we
shoud rethnk the noton that Iraq has been "conquered."
Amercan soders are dyng every day, more now than durng the
war.
O. THE U.S. GOVERNMENT HAS BEEN THREATENING IRAN, SYRIA
AND NORTH KOREA. DO YOU THINK IRAO WAS |UST A PRELUDE?
In ths partcuar chapter of War and Empre, the war on
Afghanstan was the rea preude. Bascay "The War on Terror" s
Bush's perfect war, the war that never ends. The weapons deas
that never stop. The o feds that never dry up.
But maybe those who supported the wars n Afghanstan and Iraq
were too quck to decare vctory. In both countres now, U.S.
troops are bogged down n a knd of quck sand. That's why the
U.S. government s tryng to coerce other countres ke Inda and
Pakstan to cean up the mess t has eft behnd.
If the Unted States now attacks Iran, Syra, or North Korea, ts
troops w be further strung out across the gobe. But then the
physcs of Empre seems to be encrypted n some way--overreach
and mpode. Maybe that's what w happen. But the downsde s
that the U.S. arsena of nucear weapons mght ensure that the
Amercan Empre s the ast empre the human race w ever
know.
O. HALLIBURTON |UST ANNOUNCED INCREASED PROFITS
LARGELY BECAUSE OF ITS IRAO OPERATIONS. WHO'S PROFITING
FROM THIS WAR AND WHO ISN'T?
Haburton s an od payer n Iraq. It's not every corporaton that
can boast of havng the army and the entre mtary mght of the
most powerfu country on earth at ts dsposa, rskng fe and
mb n order to ncrease ts margns of proft.
If I were a U.S. soder, rskng my fe and santy n the 100-pus-
degree deserts of Iraq, I'd be askng some pretty serous
questons of the CEOs of companes ke Haburton. How much
do you earn? How much do I earn? What do you rsk? What do I
rsk?
Equay, f I were a student, or a schoo teacher, or a heath
worker or a snge mother n the Unted States, readng about the
huge cuts n pubc spendng, I'd be askng a very smpe queston
about ths war: Who pays, who profts?
I thnk what I fnd most nsutng of a s the compete confdence
wth whch George Bush the Lesser and hs henchmen do what
they do, assumng that Amercan peope are |ust pan stupd, and
that pubc memory s fcke.
Amerca's poor are beng expoted and put on the frontnes to
ensure further profts for Amerca's rch. It's for ths reason that
t's rdcuous and sef-defeatng to be "ant-Amercan." Amerca s
not one homogenous mass of brutaty.
One-ffth of the armed forces are Afrcan Amercan. I don't
magne anywhere cose to one ffth of the profts of ths war go to
Afrcan Amercan peope. Asans and Latnos are n the army,
hopng to get ctzenshp. What a great system. Get the Backs,
Asans, Latnos, and poor whtes to fght your boardroom battes
for you.
O. IRAO IS BEING OPENED UP FOR PRIVATIZATION IN THE NAME
OF DEMOCRACY. WHAT IS PRIVATIZATION ABOUT?
It's qute unbeevabe. The knds of thngs that are beng done
these days n the name of "democracy" woud be aughabe f t
weren't so savage. Prvatzaton s the ant-thess of democracy. It
s the process of transferrng pubc assets, hed n trust for the
pubc good, to prvate companes to amass prvate proft. It s
smpy unacceptabe.
O. SOLDIERS AND THEIR FAMILIES ARE SPEAKING OUT AGAINST
THE OCCUPATION. WILL THIS HELP RALLY INTERNATIONAL
OPPOSITION?
I thnk speakng out aganst the occupaton s the bravest thng
that a soder can do. I have aways admred the U.S. soders who
spoke out aganst the Vetnam War. In fact, n paces ke Inda,
when peope get randomy racst and ant-Amercan, I aways ask
them: When do you ast remember Indan soders speakng out
aganst a war, any war, n Inda?
When soders speak out, peope reay st up and sten. I cannot
thnk of a better way of rayng nternatona opposton to the
occupaton. To those Amercan soders who have had the
courage to speak out, I send my heartfet saaams.
O. PRESIDENT BUSH HAS ASKED INDIA TO SEND TROOPS TO HELP
"CONTROL" IRAO. WHAT IS YOUR REACTION?
Bush probaby knows that rghtwng regous fundamentasts,
regardess of what regon they subscrbe to, are brothers n
arms. George Bush, Osama bn Laden, Are Sharon, the muahs
of Pakstan and the L.K. Advan's and Narendra Mod's of Inda
have no troube understandng each other.
In Inda, the present government s not |ust rght wng, t s
skatng very cose to fascsm. For the frst tme n the hstory of
ndependent Inda, the Indan government (the coaton ed by
the Bharatya |anata Party) s tryng hard to agn tsef wth the
U.S.-Israe axs. It s not a concdence that the massacre of
Musms n Gu|arat, conducted wth the brazen couson of the
government and the poce, took pace so soon after Sept. 11.
Nether s t a concdence that the case s cosed nternatonay,
because kng Musms now, after Sept. 11 s somehow seen as
acceptabe.
If Indan troops aren't sent to Iraq, the reason won't be a ack of
w on the part of the Indan government. It w be because the
proposa has caused serous outrage among Indan peope, a
ma|orty of whom were aso ncensed by the war n Iraq.
Anthony Arnove s the edtor of Iraq Under Sege: The Deady
Impact of Sanctons and War and Terrorsm and War (ntervews
wth Howard Znn). He s an edtor at Internatona Socast
Revew.
The New American Century
By Arundhati Roy
This article appeared in the February 9, 2004 edition of The
Nation.
january 22, 2004
In |anuary 2003 thousands of us from across the word gathered
n Porto Aegre n Braz and decared--reterated--that "Another
Word Is Possbe." A few thousand mes north, n Washngton,
George W. Bush and hs ades were thnkng the same thng.
Our pro|ect was the Word Soca Forum. Thers--to further what
many ca the Pro|ect for the New Amercan Century.
In the great ctes of Europe and Amerca, where a few years ago
these thngs woud ony have been whspered, now peope are
openy takng about the good sde of mperasm and the need
for a strong empre to poce an unruy word. The new
mssonares want order at the cost of |ustce. Dscpne at the
cost of dgnty. And ascendancy at any prce. Occasonay some
of us are nvted to "debate" the ssue on "neutra" patforms
provded by the corporate meda. Debatng mperasm s a bt
ke debatng the pros and cons of rape. What can we say? That
we reay mss t?
In any case, New Imperasm s aready upon us. It's a
remodeed, streamned verson of what we once knew. For the
frst tme n hstory, a snge empre wth an arsena of weapons
that coud obterate the word n an afternoon has compete,
unpoar, economc and mtary hegemony. It uses dfferent
weapons to break open dfferent markets. There sn't a country
on God's earth that s not caught n the cross-hars of the
Amercan cruse msse and the IMF checkbook. Argentna's the
mode f you want to be the poster boy of neobera captasm,
Iraq f you're the back sheep. Poor countres that are
geopotcay of strategc vaue to Empre, or have a "market" of
any sze, or nfrastructure that can be prvatzed, or, God forbd,
natura resources of vaue--o, god, damonds, cobat, coa--must
do as they're tod or become mtary targets. Those wth the
greatest reserves of natura weath are most at rsk. Uness they
surrender ther resources wngy to the corporate machne, cv
unrest w be fomented or war w be waged.
In ths new age of empre, when nothng s as t appears to be,
executves of concerned companes are aowed to nfuence
foregn pocy decsons. The Center for Pubc Integrty n
Washngton found that at east nne out of the thrty members of
the Bush Admnstraton's Defense Pocy Board were connected
to companes that were awarded mtary contracts for $76 bon
between 2001 and 2002. George Shutz, former Secretary of
State, was charman of the Commttee for the Lberaton of Iraq.
He s aso on the board of drectors of the Bechte Group. When
asked about a confct of nterest n the case of war n Iraq he
sad, "I don't know that Bechte woud partcuary beneft from t.
But f there's work to be done, Bechte s the type of company
that coud do t. But nobody ooks at t as somethng you beneft
from." In Apr 2003, Bechte sgned a $680 mon contract for
reconstructon.
Ths bruta bueprnt has been used over and over agan across
Latn Amerca, n Afrca and n Centra and Southeast Asa. It has
cost mons of ves. It goes wthout sayng that every war
Empre wages becomes a |ust War. Ths, n arge part, s due to
the roe of the corporate meda. It's mportant to understand that
the corporate meda don't |ust support the neobera pro|ect.
They are the neobera pro|ect. Ths s not a mora poston they
have chosen to take; t's structura. It's ntrnsc to the economcs
of how the mass meda work.
Most natons have adequatey hdeous famy secrets. So t sn't
often necessary for the meda to e. It's a n the edtng--what's
emphaszed and what's gnored. Say, for exampe, Inda was
chosen as the target for a rghteous war. The fact that about
80,000 peope have been ked n Kashmr snce 1989, most of
them Musm, most of them by Indan securty forces (makng the
average death to about 6,000 a year); the fact that n February
and March of 2002 more than 2,000 Musms were murdered on
the streets of Gu|arat, that women were gang-raped and chdren
were burned ave and 150,000 drven from ther homes whe the
poce and admnstraton watched and sometmes actvey
partcpated; the fact that no one has been punshed for these
crmes and the government that oversaw them was re-
eected...a of ths woud make perfect headnes n nternatona
newspapers n the run-up to war.
Next thng we know, our ctes w be eveed by cruse msses,
our vages fenced n wth razor wre, US soders w patro our
streets, and Narendra Mod, Pravn Togada or any of our popuar
bgots w, ke Saddam Hussen, be n US custody havng ther
har checked for ce and the fngs n ther teeth examned on
prme-tme TV.
But as ong as our "markets" are open, as ong as corporatons
ke Enron, Bechte, Haburton and Arthur Andersen are gven a
free hand to take over our nfrastructure and take away our |obs,
our "democratcay eected" eaders can fearessy bur the nes
between democracy, ma|ortaransm and fascsm.
Our government's craven wngness to abandon Inda's proud
tradton of beng non-agned, ts rush to fght ts way to the head
of the queue of the Competey Agned (the fashonabe phrase s
"natura ay"--Inda, Israe and the Unted States are "natura
aes"), has gven t the eg room to turn nto a repressve regme
wthout compromsng ts egtmacy.
A government's vctms are not ony those t ks and mprsons.
Those who are dspaced and dspossessed and sentenced to a
fetme of starvaton and deprvaton must count among them
too. Mons of peope have been dspossessed by "deveopment"
pro|ects. In the past ffty-fve years, bg dams aone have
dspaced between 33 mon and 55 mon n Inda. They have
no recourse to |ustce. In the past two years there have been a
seres of ncdents n whch poce have opened fre on peacefu
protesters, most of them Advas and Dat. When t comes to the
poor, and n partcuar Dat and Advas communtes, they get
ked for encroachng on forest and, and ked when they're
tryng to protect forest and from encroachments--by dams,
mnes, stee pants and other "deveopment" pro|ects. In amost
every nstance n whch the poce opened fre, the government's
strategy has been to say the frng was provoked by an act of
voence. Those who have been fred upon are mmedatey caed
mtants.
Across the country, thousands of nnocent peope, ncudng
mnors, have been arrested under the Preventon of Terrorsm Act
and are beng hed n |a ndefntey and wthout tra. In the era
of the War aganst Terror, poverty s beng syy confated wth
terrorsm. In the era of corporate gobazaton, poverty s a
crme. Protestng aganst further mpovershment s terrorsm.
And now our Supreme Court says that gong on strke s a crme.
Crtczng the court s a crme too, of course. They're seang the
exts.
Lke Od Imperasm, New Imperasm rees for ts success on a
network of agents--corrupt oca etes who servce Empre. We a
know the sordd story of Enron n Inda. The then-Maharashtra
government sgned a power purchase agreement that gave Enron
profts that amounted to 60 percent of Inda's entre rura
deveopment budget. A snge Amercan company was
guaranteed a proft equvaent to funds for nfrastructura
deveopment for about 500 mon peope!
Unke n the od days, the New Imperast doesn't need to trudge
around the tropcs rskng maara or darrhea or eary death. New
Imperasm can be conducted on e-ma. The vugar, hands-on
racsm of Od Imperasm s outdated. The cornerstone of New
Imperasm s New Racsm.
The best aegory for New Racsm s the tradton of "turkey
pardonng" n the Unted States. Every year snce 1947, the
Natona Turkey Federaton has presented the US Presdent wth a
turkey for Thanksgvng. Every year, n a show of ceremona
magnanmty, the Presdent spares that partcuar brd (and eats
another one). After recevng the presdenta pardon, the Chosen
One s sent to Fryng Pan Park n Vrgna to ve out ts natura
fe. The rest of the 50 mon turkeys rased for Thanksgvng are
saughtered and eaten on Thanksgvng Day. ConAgra Foods, the
company that has won the Presdenta Turkey contract, says t
trans the ucky brds to be socabe, to nteract wth dgntares,
schoo chdren and the press. (Soon they' even speak Engsh!)
That's how New Racsm n the corporate era works. A few
carefuy bred turkeys--the oca etes of varous countres, a
communty of weathy mmgrants, nvestment bankers, the
occasona Con Powe or Condoeezza Rce, some sngers, some
wrters (ke mysef)--are gven absouton and a pass to Fryng
Pan Park. The remanng mons ose ther |obs, are evcted from
ther homes, have ther water and eectrcty connectons cut, and
de of AIDS. Bascay they're for the pot. But the Fortunate Fows
n Fryng Pan Park are dong fne. Some of them even work for the
IMF and the WTO--so who can accuse those organzatons of
beng antturkey? Some serve as board members on the Turkey
Choosng Commttee--so who can say that turkeys are aganst
Thanksgvng? They partcpate n t! Who can say the poor are
ant-corporate gobazaton? There's a stampede to get nto
Fryng Pan Park. So what f most persh on the way?
As part of the pro|ect of New Racsm we aso have New Genocde.
New Genocde n ths new era of economc nterdependence can
be factated by economc sanctons. New Genocde means
creatng condtons that ead to mass death wthout actuay
gong out and kng peope. Dens Haday, who was the UN
humantaran coordnator n Iraq between 1997 and 1998 (after
whch he resgned n dsgust), used the term genocde to descrbe
the sanctons n Iraq. In Iraq the sanctons outdd Saddam
Hussen's best efforts by camng more than haf a mon
chdren's ves.
In the new era, aparthed as forma pocy s antquated and
unnecessary. Internatona nstruments of trade and fnance
oversee a compex system of mutatera trade aws and fnanca
agreements that keep the poor n ther bantustans anyway. Its
whoe purpose s to nsttutonaze nequty. Why ese woud t be
that the US taxes a garment made by a Bangadesh
manufacturer twenty tmes more than a garment made n
Brtan? Why ese woud t be that countres that grow cocoa
beans, ke the Ivory Coast and Ghana, are taxed out of the
market f they try to turn t nto chocoate? Why ese woud t be
that countres that grow 90 percent of the word's cocoa beans
produce ony 5 percent of the word's chocoate? Why ese woud
t be that rch countres that spend over a bon doars a day on
subsdes to farmers demand that poor countres ke Inda
wthdraw a agrcutura subsdes, ncudng subsdzed
eectrcty? Why ese woud t be that after havng been pundered
by coonzng regmes for more than haf a century, former
coones are steeped n debt to those same regmes and repay
them some $382 bon a year?
For a these reasons, the derang of trade agreements at
Cancn was cruca for us. Though our governments try to take
the credt, we know that t was the resut of years of strugge by
many mons of peope n many, many countres. What Cancn
taught us s that n order to nfct rea damage and force radca
change, t s vta for oca resstance movements to make
nternatona aances. From Cancn we earned the mportance
of gobazng resstance.
No ndvdua naton can stand up to the pro|ect of corporate
gobazaton on ts own. Tme and agan we have seen that when
t comes to the neobera pro|ect, the heroes of our tmes are
suddeny dmnshed. Extraordnary, charsmatc men, gants n
the opposton, when they seze power and become heads of
state, are rendered poweress on the goba stage. I'm thnkng
here of Presdent Lua of Braz. Lua was the hero of the Word
Soca Forum ast year. Ths year he's busy mpementng IMF
gudenes, reducng penson benefts and purgng radcas from
the Workers' Party. I'm thnkng aso of the former presdent of
South Afrca, Neson Mandea. Wthn two years of takng offce n
1994, hs government genufected wth hardy a caveat to the
Market God. It nsttuted a massve program of prvatzaton and
structura ad|ustment that has eft mons of peope homeess,
|obess and wthout water and eectrcty.
Why does ths happen? There's tte pont n beatng our breasts
and feeng betrayed. Lua and Mandea are, by any reckonng,
magnfcent men. But the moment they cross the foor from the
opposton nto government they become hostage to a spectrum
of threats--most maevoent among them the threat of capta
fght, whch can destroy any government overnght. To magne
that a eader's persona charsma and a c.v. of strugge w dent
the corporate carte s to have no understandng of how
captasm works or, for that matter, how power works. Radca
change cannot be negotated by governments; t can ony be
enforced by peope.
At the Word Soca Forum some of the best mnds n the word
come together to exchange deas about what s happenng
around us. These conversatons refne our vson of the knd of
word we're fghtng for. It s a vta process that must not be
undermned. However, f a our energes are dverted nto ths
process at the cost of rea potca acton, then the WSF, whch
has payed such a cruca roe n the movement for goba |ustce,
runs the rsk of becomng an asset to our enemes. What we need
to dscuss urgenty s strateges of resstance. We need to am at
rea targets, wage rea battes and nfct rea damage. Gandh's
sat march was not |ust potca theater. When, n a smpe act of
defance, thousands of Indans marched to the sea and made
ther own sat, they broke the sat tax aws. It was a drect strke
at the economc underpnnng of the Brtsh Empre. It was rea.
Whe our movement has won some mportant vctores, we must
not aow nonvoent resstance to atrophy nto neffectua, fee-
good, potca theater. It s a very precous weapon that must be
constanty honed and remagned. It cannot be aowed to
become a mere spectace, a photo opportunty for the meda.
It was wonderfu that on February 15 ast year, n a spectacuar
dspay of pubc moraty, 10 mon peope on fve contnents
marched aganst the war on Iraq. It was wonderfu, but t was not
enough. February 15 was a weekend. Nobody had to so much as
mss a day of work. Hoday protests don't stop wars. George
Bush knows that. The confdence wth whch he dsregarded
overwhemng pubc opnon shoud be a esson to us a. Bush
beeves that Iraq can be occuped and coonzed as Afghanstan
has been, as Tbet has been, as Chechnya s beng, as East Tmor
once was and Paestne st s. He thnks that a he has to do s
hunker down and wat unt a crss-drven meda, havng pcked
ths crss to the bone, drops t and moves on. Soon the carcass
w sp off the bestseer charts, and a of us outraged foks w
ose nterest. Or so he hopes.
Ths movement of ours needs a ma|or, goba vctory. It's not
good enough to be rght. Sometmes, f ony n order to test our
resove, t's mportant to wn somethng. In order to wn
somethng, we need to agree on somethng. That somethng does
not need to be an overarchng preordaned deoogy nto whch
we force-ft our deghtfuy factous, argumentatve seves. It
does not need to be an unquestonng aegance to one or
another form of resstance to the excuson of everythng ese. It
coud be a mnmum agenda.
If a of us are ndeed aganst mperasm and aganst the pro|ect
of neoberasm, then et's turn our gaze on Iraq. Iraq s the
nevtabe cumnaton of both. Penty of antwar actvsts have
retreated n confuson snce the capture of Saddam Hussen. Isn't
the word better off wthout Saddam Hussen? they ask tmdy.
Let's ook ths thng n the eye once and for a. To appaud the US
Army's capture of Saddam Hussen, and therefore n retrospect
|ustfy ts nvason and occupaton of Iraq, s ke defyng |ack the
Rpper for dsemboweng the Boston Stranger. And that after a
quarter-century partnershp n whch the Rppng and Strangng
was a |ont enterprse. It's an n-house quarre. They're busness
partners who fe out over a drty dea. |ack's the CEO.
So f we are aganst mperasm, sha we agree that we are
aganst the US occupaton and that we beeve the Unted States
must wthdraw from Iraq and pay reparatons to the Iraq peope
for the damage that the war has nfcted?
How do we begn to mount our resstance? Let's start wth
somethng reay sma. The ssue s not about supportng the
resstance n Iraq aganst the occupaton or dscussng who
exacty consttutes the resstance. (Are they od ker Baathsts,
are they Isamc fundamentasts?)
We have to become the goba resstance to the occupaton.
Our resstance has to begn wth a refusa to accept the
egtmacy of the US occupaton of Iraq. It means actng to make
t materay mpossbe for Empre to acheve ts ams. It means
soders shoud refuse to fght, reservsts shoud refuse to serve,
workers shoud refuse to oad shps and arcraft wth weapons. It
certany means that n countres ke Inda and Pakstan we must
bock the US government's pans to have Indan and Pakstan
soders sent to Iraq to cean up after them.
I suggest we choose by some means two of the ma|or
corporatons that are proftng from the destructon of Iraq. We
coud then st every pro|ect they are nvoved n. We coud ocate
ther offces n every cty and every country across the word. We
coud go after them. We coud shut them down. It's a queston of
brngng our coectve wsdom and experence of past strugges
to bear on a snge target. It's a queston of the desre to wn.
The Pro|ect for the New Amercan Century seeks to perpetuate
nequty and estabsh Amercan hegemony at any prce, even f
t's apocayptc. The Word Soca Forum demands |ustce and
survva.
For these reasons, we must consder ourseves at war.
How deep shall we dig7
By Arundhati Roy
An essay on a country that s caught n the cross-currents of neo-
berasm and Hndu natonasm.
Arundhat Roy speaks out aganst POTA at a semnar n New Deh
on September 25, 2003.
RECENTLY, A young Kashmr frend was takng to me about fe
n Kashmr. Of the morass of potca venaty and opportunsm,
the caous brutaty of the securty forces, of the osmotc,
nchoate edges of a socety saturated n voence, where
mtants, poce, ntegence offcers, government servants,
busnessmen and even |ournasts encounter each other, and
graduay, over tme, become each other. He spoke of havng to
ve wth the endess kng, the mountng `dsappearances', the
whsperng, the fear, the unresoved rumours, the nsane
dsconnecton between what s actuay happenng, what
Kashmrs know s happenng and what the rest of us are tod s
happenng n Kashmr. He sad, "Kashmr used to be a busness.
Now t's a menta asyum."
The more I thnk about that remark, the more apposte a
descrpton t seems for a of Inda. Admttedy, Kashmr and the
North East are separate wngs that house the more perous
wards n the asyum. But n the heartand too, the schsm
between knowedge and nformaton, between what we know and
what we're tod, between what s unknown and what s asserted,
between what s conceaed and what s reveaed, between fact
and con|ecture, between the `rea' word and the vrtua word,
has become a pace of endess specuaton and potenta nsanty.
It's a posonous brew whch s strred and smmered and put to
the most ugy, destructve, potca purpose.
Each tme there s a so-caed `terrorst strke', the Government
rushes n, eager to assgn cupabty wth tte or no
nvestgaton. The burnng of the Sabarmat Express n Godhra,
the December 13th attack on the Parament budng, or the
massacre of Skhs by so caed `terrorsts' n Chttsnghpura are
ony a few, hgh profe exampes. In each of these cases, the
evdence that eventuay surfaced rased very dsturbng
questons and so was mmedatey put nto cod storage. Take the
case of Godhra: as soon as t happened the Home Mnster
announced t was an ISI pot. The VHP says t was the work of a
Musm mob throwng petro bombs. Serous questons reman
unanswered. There s endess con|ecture. Everybody beeves
what they want to beeve, but the ncdent s used to cyncay
and systematcay whp up communa frenzy.
The U.S. Government used the es and dsnformaton generated
around the September 11th attacks to nvade not |ust one
country, but two - and heaven knows what ese s n store.
The Indan Government uses the same strategy not wth other
countres, but aganst ts own peope.
Over the ast decade, the number of peope who have been ked
by the poce and securty forces runs nto the tens of thousands.
Recenty severa Bombay pocemen spoke openy to the press
about how many `gangsters' they had emnated on `orders'.
Andhra Pradesh chaks up an average of about 200 `extremsts'
n `encounter' deaths a year. In Kashmr n a stuaton that amost
amounts to war, an estmated 80,000 peope have been ked
snce 1989. Thousands have smpy `dsappeared'. Accordng to
the records of the Assocaton of Parents of Dsappeared Peope
(APDP) n Kashmr more than 3,000 peope have been ked n
2003, of whom 463 were soders. Snce the Muft Mohammed
Sayeed Government came to power n October 2002 on the
promse of brngng a `heang touch', the APDP says there have
been 54 custoda deaths. But n ths age of hyper-natonasm, as
ong as the peope who are ked are abeed gangsters,
terrorsts, nsurgents or extremsts, ther kers can strut around
as crusaders n the natona nterest, and are answerabe to no
one.
The Indan state's procvty to harass and terrorse peope has
been nsttutonased by the enactment of the Preventon of
Terrorsm Act (POTA). It has been promugated n 10 States. A
cursory readng of POTA w te you that t s draconan and
ubqutous. It's a versate, hod-a aw that coud appy to anyone
- from an A-Oaeda operatve caught wth a cache of exposves
to an Advas payng hs fute under a neem tree, to you or me.
The genus of POTA s that t can be anythng the Government
wants t to be. We ve on the sufferance of those who govern us.
In Tam Nadu t has been used to stfe crtcsm of the State
Government. In |harkhand 3,200 peope, mosty poor Advass
accused of beng Maosts, have been named n FIRs under POTA.
In eastern Uttar Pradesh the Act s used to camp down on those
who dare to protest about the aenaton of ther and and
vehood rghts. In Gu|arat and Mumba t s used amost
excusvey aganst Musms. In Gu|arat after the 2002 state-
asssted pogrom n whch an estmated 2000 Musms were ked
and 150,000 drven from ther homes, 287 peope have been
accused under POTA. Of these, 286 are Musm and one s a Skh!
POTA aows confessons extracted n poce custody to be
admtted as |udca evdence. In effect, under the POTA regme,
poce torture tends to repace poce nvestgaton. It's qucker,
cheaper and ensures resuts. Tak of cuttng back on pubc
spendng.
Last month I was a member of a peopes' trbuna on POTA. Over
a perod of two days we stened to harrowng testmones of what
goes on n our wonderfu democracy. Let me assure you that n
our poce statons t's everythng: from peope beng forced to
drnk urne, to beng strpped, humated, gven eectrc shocks,
burned wth cgarette butts, havng ron rods put up ther anuses
to beng beaten and kcked to death.
POTA courts are not open to pubc scrutny. POTA nverts the
accepted dctum of crmna aw - that a person s nnocent unt
proven guty. Under POTA you cannot get ba uness you can
prove you are nnocent - of a crme that you have not been
formay charged wth. Techncay, we are a naton watng to be
accused. It woud be nave to magne that POTA s beng
`msused'. On the contrary. It s beng used for precsey the
reasons t was enacted. Of course f the recommendatons of the
Mamath Commttee are mpemented, POTA w soon become
redundant. The Mamath Commttee recommends that n certan
respects norma crmna aw be brought n ne wth the
provsons of POTA. There' be no more crmnas then. Ony
terrorsts. It's knd of neat.
Today n |ammu and Kashmr and many North Eastern States the
Armed Forces Speca Powers Act aows not |ust offcers but even
|unor Commssoned Offcers and Non-Commssoned Offcers of
the army to use force on (and even k) any person on suspcon
of dsturbng pubc order or carryng a weapon. On suspcon of!
Nobody who ves n Inda can harbour any usons about what
that eads to. The documentaton of nstances of torture,
dsappearances, custoda deaths, rape and gang-rape (by
securty forces) s enough to make your bood run cod. The fact
that despte a ths Inda retans ts reputaton as a egtmate
democracy n the nternatona communty and amongst ts own
mdde cass s a trumph.
The Armed Forces Speca Powers Act s a harsher verson of the
Ordnance that Lord Lnthgow passed n 1942 to hande the Out
Inda Movement. In 1958 t was camped on parts of Manpur
whch were decared `dsturbed areas'. In 1965 the whoe of
Mzoram, then st part of Assam, was decared `dsturbed'. In
1972 the Act was extended to Trpura. By 1980 the whoe of
Manpur had been decared `dsturbed'. What more evdence
does anybody need to rease that repressve measures are
counter-productve and ony exacerbate the probem?
|uxtaposed aganst ths unseemy eagerness to repress and
emnate peope, s the Indan state's barey hdden reuctance to
nvestgate and brng to tra, cases n whch there s penty of
evdence: the massacre of 3000 Skhs n Deh n 1984, the
massacre of Musms n Bombay n 1993 and n Gu|arat n 2002
(not one convcton to date!); the murder a few years ago of
Chandrashekhar, former presdent of the |NU students unon; the
murder 12 years ago of Shankar Guha Nyog of the Chhattsgarh
Mukt Morcha are |ust a few exampes. Eyewtness accounts and
masses of ncrmnatng evdence are not enough when a of the
state machnery s stacked aganst you.
Meanwhe, economsts cheerng from the pages of corporate
newspapers nform us that the GDP growth rate s phenomena,
unprecedented. Shops are overfowng wth consumer goods.
Government storehouses are overfowng wth foodgran. Outsde
ths crce of ght, farmers steeped n debt are commttng sucde
n ther hundreds. Reports of starvaton and manutrton come n
from across the country. Yet the Government aowed 63 mon
tonnes of gran to rot n ts granares. 12 mon tonnes were
exported and sod at a subsdsed prce the Indan Government
was not wng to offer the Indan poor. Utsa Patnak, the we
known agrcutura economst, has cacuated foodgran
avaabty and foodgran absorpton n Inda for neary a century,
based on offca statstcs. She cacuates that n the perod
between the eary 1990s and 2001, foodgran absorpton has
dropped to eves ower than durng the Word War-II years,
ncudng durng the Benga Famne n whch 3 mon peope ded
of starvaton. As we know from the work of Professor Amartya
Sen, democraces don't take kndy to starvaton deaths. They
attract too much adverse pubcty from the `free press'.
So dangerous eves of manutrton and permanent hunger are
the preferred mode these days. 47 per cent of Inda's chdren
beow three suffer from manutrton, 46 per cent are stunted.
Utsa Patnak's study reveas that about 40 per cent of the rura
popuaton n Inda has the same foodgran absorpton eve as
Sub-Saharan Afrca. Today, an average rura famy eats about
100 kg ess food n a year than t dd n the eary 1990s. The ast
fve years have seen the most voent ncrease n rura-urban
ncome nequates snce ndependence.
But n urban Inda, wherever you go, shops, restaurants, raway
statons, arports, gymnasums, hosptas, you have TV montors
n whch eecton promses have aready come true. Inda's
Shnng, Feeng Good. You ony have to cose your ears to the
sckenng crunch of the poceman's boot on someone's rbs, you
ony have to rase your eyes from the squaor, the sums, the
ragged broken peope on the streets and seek a frendy TV
montor and you w be n that other beautfu word. The
sngngdancng word of Boywood's permanent pevc thrusts, of
permanenty prveged, permanenty happy Indans wavng the
tr-coour and Feeng Good. It's becomng harder and harder to
te whch one's the rea word and whch one's vrtua. Laws ke
POTA are ke buttons on a TV. You can use t to swtch off the
poor, the troubesome, the unwanted.
There s a new knd of secessonst movement takng pace n
Inda. Sha we ca t New Secessonsm? It's an nverson of Od
Secessonsm. It's when peope who are actuay part of a whoe
dfferent economy, a whoe dfferent country, a whoe dfferent
panet, pretend they're part of ths one. It s the knd of secesson
n whch a reatvey sma secton of peope become mmensey
weathy by appropratng everythng - and, rvers, water,
freedom, securty, dgnty, fundamenta rghts ncudng the rght
to protest - from a arge group of peope. It's a vertca
secesson, not a horzonta, terrtora one. It's the rea Structura
Ad|ustment - the knd that separates Inda Shnng from Inda.
Inda Pvt. Ltd. from Inda the Pubc Enterprse.
It's the knd of secesson n whch pubc nfrastructure,
productve pubc assets - water, eectrcty, transport,
teecommuncatons, heath servces, educaton, natura
resources - assets that the Indan state s supposed to hod n
trust for the peope t represents, assets that have been but and
mantaned wth pubc money over decades - are sod by the
state to prvate corporatons. In Inda 70 per cent of the
popuaton - 700 mon peope - ve n rura areas. Ther
vehoods depend on access to natura resources. To snatch
these away and se them as stock to prvate companes s
begnnng to resut n dspossesson and mpovershment on a
barbarc scae.
Inda Pvt. Ltd. s on ts way to beng owned by a few corporatons
and of course ma|or mutnatonas. The CEOs of these companes
w contro ths country, ts nfrastructure and ts resources, ts
meda and ts |ournasts, but w owe nothng to ts peope. They
are competey unaccountabe - egay, socay, moray,
potcay. Those who say that n Inda a few of these CEOs are
more powerfu than the Prme Mnster know exacty what they're
takng about.
Oute apart from the economc mpcatons of a ths, even f t
were a that t s cracked up to be (whch t sn't) - mracuous,
effcent, amazng, etc. - s the potcs of t acceptabe to us? If
the Indan state chooses to mortgage ts responsbtes to a
handfu of corporatons, does t mean that ths theatre of
eectora democracy that s unfodng around us rght now n a
ts shrness s entrey meanngess? Or does t st have a roe to
pay?
The Free Market (whch s actuay far from free) needs the state
and needs t bady. As the dsparty between the rch and the
poor grows, n poor countres states have ther work cut out for
them. Corporatons on the prow for `sweetheart deas' that yed
enormous profts cannot push through those deas and
admnster those pro|ects n deveopng countres wthout the
actve connvance of the state machnery. Today Corporate
Gobasaton needs an nternatona confederaton of oya,
corrupt, preferaby authortaran governments n poorer
countres, to push through unpopuar reforms and que the
mutnes. It's caed `Creatng a Good Investment Cmate.'
When we vote n these eectons we w be votng to choose
whch potca party we woud ke to nvest the coercve,
repressve powers of the state n.
Rght now n Inda we have to negotate the dangerous cross-
currents of neo-bera captasm and communa neo-fascsm.
Whe the word captasm hasn't competey ost ts sheen yet,
usng the word fascsm often causes offence. So we must ask
ourseves, are we usng the word oosey? Are we exaggeratng
our stuaton, does what we are experencng on a day bass
quafy as fascsm?
When a government more or ess openy supports a pogrom
aganst members of a mnorty communty n whch up to 2,000
peope are brutay ked, s t fascsm? When women of that
communty are pubcy raped and burned ave, s t fascsm?
When authortes see to t that nobody s punshed for these
crmes, s t fascsm? When a 150,000 peope are drven from
ther homes, ghettosed and economcay and socay boycotted,
s t fascsm? When the cutura gud that runs hate camps across
the country commands the respect and admraton of the Prme
Mnster, the Home Mnster, the Law Mnster, the Dsnvestment
Mnster, s t fascsm? When panters, wrters, schoars and
fmmakers who protest are abused, threatened and have ther
work burned, banned and destroyed, s t fascsm? When a
government ssues an edct requrng the arbtrary ateraton of
schoo hstory textbooks, s t fascsm? When mobs attack and
burn archves of ancent hstorca documents, when every mnor
potcan masquerades as a professona medeva hstoran and
archaeoogst, when panstakng schoarshp s rubbshed usng
baseess popust asserton, s t fascsm? When murder, rape,
arson and mob |ustce are condoned by the party n power and ts
stabe of stock nteectuas as an approprate response to a rea
or perceved hstorca wrong commtted centures ago, s t
fascsm? When the mdde-cass and the we-heeed pause a
moment, tut-tut and then go on wth ther ves, s t fascsm?
When the Prme Mnster who presdes over a of ths s haed as
a statesman and vsonary, are we not ayng the foundatons for
fu-bown fascsm?
That the hstory of oppressed and vanqushed peope remans for
the arge part unchronced s a trusm that does not appy ony to
Savarna Hndus. If the potcs of avengng hstorca wrong s our
chosen path, then surey the Dats and Advass of Inda have the
rght to murder, arson and wanton destructon?
In Russa they say the past s unpredctabe. In Inda, from our
recent experence wth schoo hstory textbooks, we know how
true that s. Now a `pseudo-secuarsts' have been reduced to
hopng that archaeoogsts dggng under the Babr Mas|d
woudn't fnd the runs of a Ram tempe. But even f t were true
that there s a Hndu tempe under every mosque n Inda, what
was under the tempe? Perhaps another Hndu tempe to another
god. Perhaps a Buddhst stupa. Most key an Advas shrne.
Hstory ddn't begn wth Savarna Hndusm, dd t? How deep
sha we dg? How much shoud we overturn? And why s t that
whe Musms who are socay, cuturay and economcay an
unaenabe part of Inda are caed outsders and nvaders and
are cruey targeted, the Government s busy sgnng corporate
deas and contracts for Deveopment Ad wth a government that
coonsed us for centures? Between 1876 and 1892, durng the
great famnes, mons of Indans ded of starvaton whe the
Brtsh Government contnued to export food and raw materas to
Engand. Hstorca records put the fgure between 12 mon and
29 mon peope. That shoud fgure somewhere n the potcs of
revenge, shoud t not? Or s vengeance ony fun when ts vctms
are vunerabe and easy to target?
Successfu fascsm takes hard work. And so does Creatng a Good
Investment Cmate.
It's nterestng that |ust around the tme Manmohan Sngh, the
then Fnance Mnster, was preparng Inda's markets for neo-
berasm, L.K. Advan was makng hs frst Rath Yatra, fueng
communa passon and preparng us for neo-fascsm. In
December 1992 rampagng mobs destroyed the Babr Mas|d. In
1993, the Congress Government of Maharashtra sgned a power
purchase agreement wth Enron. It was the frst prvate power
pro|ect n Inda. The Enron contract, dsastrous as t has turned
out, kck-started the era of Prvatsaton n Inda. Now, as the
Congress whnes from the sde-nes, the B|P has wrested the
baton from ts hands. The Government s conductng an
extraordnary dua orchestra. Whe one arm s busy seng the
naton's assets off n chunks, the other, to dvert attenton, s
arrangng a bayng, howng, deranged chorus of cutura
natonasm. The nexorabe ruthessness of one process feeds
drecty nto the nsanty of the other.
Economcay too, the dua orchestra s a vabe mode. Part of the
enormous profts generated by the process of ndscrmnate
prvatsaton (and the accruas of `Inda Shnng') heps to fnance
Hndutva's vast army - the RSS, the VHP, the Ba|rang Da and
the myrad other chartes and trusts whch run schoos, hosptas
and soca servces. Between them they have tens of thousands
of shakhas across the country. The hatred they preach, combned
wth the unmanageabe frustraton generated by the reentess
mpovershment and dspossesson of the Corporate Gobasaton
pro|ect, fues the voence of poor on poor - the perfect
smokescreen to keep the structures of power ntact and
unchaenged.
However, drectng peopes' frustratons nto voence s not
aways enough. In order to `Create a Good Investment Cmate'
the state often needs to ntervene drecty.
In recent years the poce has repeatedy opened fre on unarmed
peope, mosty Advass at peacefu demonstratons. In Nagarnar,
|harkhand; n Mehnd Kheda, Madhya Pradesh; n Umergaon,
Gu|arat; n Rayagara and Chka, Orssa; n Muthanga, Keraa.
Peope have been ked.
In amost every nstance, those who have been fred upon are
mmedatey caed mtants (PWG, MCC, ISI, LTTE). The
represson goes on and on - |ambudweep, Kashpur, Makan|.
When vctms refuse to be vctms, they are caed terrorsts and
are deat wth as such. POTA s the broad-spectrum antbotc for
the dsease of dssent. Ths year 181 countres voted n the U.N.
for ncreased protecton of human rghts n the era of the War on
Terror. Even the U.S. voted n favour of t. Inda abstaned. The
stage s beng set for a fu scae assaut on human rghts.
So how can ordnary peope counter the assaut of an ncreasngy
voent state?
The space for non-voent cv dsobedence has atrophed. After
struggng for severa years, severa non-voent peopes'
resstance movements have come up aganst a wa and fee
qute rghty, they have to now change drecton. Vews about
what that drecton shoud be are deepy poarsed. There are
some who beeve that an armed strugge s the ony avenue eft.
Others ncreasngy are begnnng to fee they must partcpate n
eectora potcs - enter the system, negotate from wthn.
(Smar s t not, to the choces peope faced n Kashmr?) The
thng to remember s that whe ther methods dffer radcay,
both sdes share the beef that (to put t crudey) - Enough s
Enough. Ya Basta.
There s no debate takng pace n Inda that s more cruca than
ths one. Its outcome w, for better or for worse, change the
quaty of fe n ths country. For everyone. Rch, poor, rura,
urban.
Armed strugge provokes a massve escaaton of voence from
the state. We have seen the morass t has ed to n Kashmr and
across the North East.
So then, shoud we do what our Prme Mnster suggests we do?
Renounce dssent and enter the fray of eectora potcs? |on the
roadshow? Partcpate n the shr exchange of meanngess
nsuts whch serve ony to hde what s otherwse an amost
absoute consensus? Let's not forget that on every ma|or ssue -
nucear bombs, bg dams, the Babr Mas|d controversy, and
prvatsaton - the Congress sowed the seeds and the B|P swept
n to reap the hdeous harvest.
Ths does not mean that the Parament s of no consequence and
eectons shoud be gnored. Of course there s a dfference
between an overty communa party wth fascst eanngs and an
opportunstcay communa party. Of course there s a dfference
between a potcs that openy, proudy preaches hatred and a
potcs that syy pts peope aganst each other.
And of course we know that the egacy of one has ed us to the
horror of the other. Between them they have eroded any rea
choce that paramentary democracy s supposed to provde. The
frenzy, the far-ground atmosphere created around eectons
takes centre-stage n the meda because everybody s secure n
the knowedge that regardess of who wns, the status quo w
essentay reman unchaenged. (After the mpassoned
speeches n Parament, repeang POTA doesn't seem to be a
prorty n any party's eecton campagn. They a know they need
t, n one form or another.)
Whatever they say durng eectons or when they're n the
Opposton, no government at the State or Centre, no potca
party rght/eft/centre/sdeways has managed to stay the hand of
neo-berasm. There w be no radca change from "wthn".
Personay, I don't beeve that enterng the eectora fray s a
path to aternatve potcs. Not because of that mdde-cass
squeamshness - `potcs s drty' or `a potcans are corrupt',
but because I beeve that strategcay battes must be waged
from postons of strength, not weakness.
The targets of the dua assaut of communa fascsm and neo-
berasm are the poor and the mnorty communtes (who, as
tme goes by are graduay beng mpovershed.) As neo-
berasm drves ts wedge between the rch and the poor,
between Inda Shnng and Inda, t becomes ncreasngy absurd
for any manstream potca party to pretend to represent the
nterests of both the rch and the poor, because the nterests of
one can ony be represented at the cost of the other. My
"nterests" as a weathy Indan (were I to pursue them) woud
hardy concde wth the nterests of a poor farmer n Andhra
Pradesh.
A potca party that represents the poor w be a poor party. A
party wth very meagre funds. Today t sn't possbe to fght an
eecton wthout funds. Puttng a coupe of we known soca
actvsts nto Parament s nterestng, but not reay potcay
meanngfu. Not a process worth channesng a our energes
nto. Indvdua charsma, personaty potcs, cannot effect
radca change.
However, beng poor s not the same as beng weak. The strength
of the poor s not ndoors n offce budngs and courtrooms. It's
outdoors, n the feds, the mountans, the rver vaeys, the cty
streets and unversty campuses of ths country. That's where
negotatons must be hed. That's where the batte must be
waged.
Rght now those spaces have been ceded to the Hndu Rght.
Whatever anyone mght thnk of ther potcs, t cannot be dened
that they're out there, workng extremey hard. As the state
abrogates ts responsbtes and wthdraws funds from heath,
educaton and essenta pubc servces, the foot soders of the
Sangh Parvar have moved n. Aongsde ther tens of thousands
of shakhas dssemnatng deady propaganda, they run schoos,
hosptas, cncs, ambuance servces, dsaster management
ces. They understand poweressness. They aso understand that
peope, and partcuary poweress peope, have needs and
desres that are not ony practca humdrum day to day needs,
but emotona, sprtua, recreatona. They have fashoned a
hdeous crucbe nto whch the anger, the frustraton, the
ndgnty of day fe, and dreams of a dfferent future can be
decanted and drected to deady purpose. Meanwhe the
tradtona, manstream Left st dreams of `sezng power', but
remans strangey unbendng, unwng to address the tmes. It
has ad sege to tsef and retreated nto an naccessbe
nteectua space, where ancent arguments are proffered n an
archac anguage that few can understand.
The ony ones who present some sembance of a chaenge to the
onsaught of the Sangh Parvar are the grassroots resstance
movements scattered across the country, fghtng the
dspossesson and voaton of fundamenta rghts caused by our
current mode of "Deveopment". Most of these movements are
soated and (despte the reentess accusaton that they are
"foregn funded foregn agents") they work wth amost no money
and no resources at a. They're magnfcent fre-fghters, they
have ther backs to the wa. But they do have ther ears to the
ground. They are n touch wth grm reaty. If they got together, f
they were supported and strengthened, they coud grow nto a
force to reckon wth. Ther batte, when t s fought, w have to
be an deastc one - not a rgdy deoogca one.
At a tme when opportunsm s everythng, when hope seems
ost, when everythng bos down to a cynca busness dea, we
must fnd the courage to dream. To recam romance. The
romance of beevng n |ustce, n freedom and n dgnty. For
everybody. We have to make common cause, and to do ths we
need to understand how ths bg od machne works - who t
works for and who t works aganst. Who pays, who profts.
Many non-voent resstance movements fghtng soated, snge-
ssue battes across the country have reased that ther knd of
speca nterest potcs whch had ts tme and pace, s no onger
enough. That they fee cornered and neffectua s not good
enough reason to abandon non-voent resstance as a strategy. It
s however, good enough reason to do some serous
ntrospecton. We need vson. We need to make sure that those
of us who say we want to recam democracy are egataran and
democratc n our own methods of functonng. If our strugge s
to be an deastc one, we cannot reay make caveats for the
nterna n|ustces that we perpetrate on one another, on women,
on chdren. For exampe, those fghtng communasm cannot
turn a bnd eye to economc n|ustces. Those fghtng dams or
deveopment pro|ects cannot ede ssues of communasm or
caste potcs n ther spheres of nfuence - even at the cost of
short-term success n ther mmedate campagn. If opportunsm
and expedency come at the cost of our beefs, then there s
nothng to separate us from manstream potcans. If t s |ustce
that we want, t must be |ustce and equa rghts for a - not ony
for speca nterest groups wth speca nterest pre|udces. That s
non-negotabe.
We have aowed non-voent resstance to atrophy nto fee-good
potca theatre, whch at ts most successfu s a photo
opportunty for the meda, and at ts east successfu, smpy
gnored.
We need to ook up and urgenty dscuss strateges of resstance,
wage rea battes and nfct rea damage. We must remember
that the Dand March was not |ust fne potca theatre. It was a
strke at the economc underpnnng of the Brtsh Empre.
We need to re-defne the meanng of potcs. The `Ngo'saton of
cv socety ntatves s takng us n exacty the opposte
drecton. It's de-potcsng us. Makng us dependant on ad and
hand-outs. We need to re-magne the meanng of cv
dsobedence.
Perhaps we need an eected shadow parament outsde the Lok
Sabha, wthout whose support and affrmaton Parament cannot
easy functon. A shadow parament that keeps up an
underground drumbeat, that shares ntegence and nformaton
(a of whch s ncreasngy unavaabe n the manstream
meda). Fearessy, but non-voenty we must dsabe the workng
parts of ths machne that s consumng us.
We're runnng out of tme. Even as we speak the crce of voence
s cosng n. Ether way, change w come. It coud be boody, or
t coud be beautfu. It depends on us.
Arundhat Roy
(Ths s based on the frst I.G. Khan Memora Lecture devered at
Agarh Musm Unversty on Apr 6, 2004.)
The Most Cowardly War in History
by Arundhati Roy
Goba Research, |une 28, 2005
Openng Statement of Arundhat Roy on behaf of the |ury of
conscence of the word trbuna of Iraq.
Istanbu, Turkey
26 |une 2005

Ths s the cumnatng sesson of the Word Trbuna on Iraq. It s
of partcuar sgnfcance that t s beng hed here n Turkey,
where the Unted States used Turksh ar bases to aunch
numerous bombng mssons to degrade Iraq's defenses before
the March 2003 nvason; and has sought and contnues to seek
potca support from the Turksh government, whch t regards
as an ay. A ths was done n the face of enormous popuar
opposton by the Turksh peope. As a spokesperson for the |ury
of conscence, t woud make me uneasy f I dd not menton that
the government of Inda s aso, ke the government of Turkey,
postonng tsef as an ay of the Unted States n ts economc
poces and the so-caed War on Terror.
The testmones at the prevous sessons of the Word Trbuna on
Iraq n Brusses and New York, have demonstrated that even
those of us who have tred to foow the war n Iraq cosey are not
aware of a fracton of the horrors that have been uneashed n
Iraq.
The |ury of Conscence at ths trbuna s not here to dever a
smpe verdct of guty or not guty aganst the Unted States and
ts aes. We are here to examne a vast spectrum of evdence
about the motvatons and consequences of the US nvason and
occupaton, evdence that has been deberatey margnazed or
suppressed. Every aspect of the war w be examned - ts
egaty, the roe of nternatona nsttutons and ma|or
corporatons n the occupaton, the roe of the meda, the mpact
of weapons such as depeted uranum muntons, napam, and
custer bombs, the use of and egtmaton of torture, the
ecoogca mpacts of the war, the responsbty of Arab
governments, the mpact of Iraq's occupaton on Paestne, and
the hstory of US and Brtsh mtary nterventons n Iraq.
Ths trbuna s an attempt to correct the record. To document the
hstory of the war not from the pont of vew of the vctors but of
the temporary - and I repeat the word temporary - anqushed.
Before the testmones begn, I woud ke to brefy address as
straght- forwardy as I can a few questons that have been rased
about ths trbuna.
The frst s that ths trbuna s a Kangaroo Court. That t
represents ony one pont of vew. That t s a prosecuton wthout
a defense. That the verdct s a foregone concuson.
Now ths vew seems to suggest a touchng concern that n ths
harsh word, the vews of the US government and the so-caed
Coaton of the Wng headed by Presdent George Bush and
Prme Mnster Tony Bar have somehow gone unrepresented.
That the Word Trbuna on Iraq sn't aware of the arguments n
support of the war and s unwng to consder the pont of vew
of the nvaders. If n the era of the mutnatona corporate meda
and embedded |ournasm anybody can serousy hod ths vew,
then we truy do ve n the Age of Irony, n an age when satre
has become meanngess because rea fe s more satrca than
satre can ever be.
Let me say categorcay that ths trbuna s the defense. It s an
act of resstance n tsef. It s a defense mounted aganst one of
the most cowardy wars ever fought n hstory, a war n whch
nternatona nsttutons were used to force a country to dsarm
and then stood by whe t was attacked wth a greater array of
weapons than has ever been used n the hstory of war.
Second, ths trbuna s not n any way a defense of Saddam
Hussen. Hs crmes aganst Iraqs, Kurds, Iranans, Kuwats, and
others cannot be dsmssed n the process of brngng to ght
Iraq's more recent and st unfodng tragedy. However, we must
not forget that when Saddam Hussen was commttng hs worst
crmes, the US government was supportng hm potcay and
materay. When he was gassng Kurdsh peope, the US
government fnanced hm, armed hm, and stood by senty.
Saddam Hussen s beng tred as a war crmna even as we
speak. But what about those who heped to nsta hm n power,
who armed hm, who supported hm - and who are now settng up
a trbuna to try hm and absove themseves competey? And
what about other accompces of the Unted States n the regon
that have suppressed Kurdsh peopes and other peopes rghts,
ncudng the government of Turkey?
There are remarkabe peope gathered here who n the face of
ths reentess and bruta aggresson and propaganda have
doggedy worked to compe a comprehensve spectrum of
evdence and nformaton that shoud serve as a weapon n the
hands of those who wsh to partcpate n the resstance aganst
the occupaton of Iraq. It shoud become a weapon n the hands
of soders n the Unted States, the Unted Kngdom, Itay,
Austraa, and esewhere who do not wsh to fght, who do not
wsh to ay down ther ves - or to take the ves of others - for a
pack of es. It shoud become a weapon n the hands of
|ournasts, wrters, poets, sngers, teachers, pumbers, tax
drvers, car mechancs, panters, awyers - anybody who wshes
to partcpate n the resstance.
The evdence coated n ths trbuna shoud, for nstance, be
used by the Internatona Crmna Court (whose |ursdcton the
Unted States does not recognze) to try as war crmnas George
Bush, Tony Bar, |ohn Howard, Svo Beruscon, and a those
government offcas, army generas, and CEOs who partcpated
n ths war and now proft from t.
The assaut on Iraq s an assaut on a of us: on our dgnty, our
ntegence, our humanty, and our future.
We recognze that the |udgment of the Word Trbuna on Iraq s
not bndng n nternatona aw. However, our ambtons far
surpass that. The Word Trbuna on Iraq paces ts fath n the
conscences of mons of peope across the word who do not
wsh to stand by and watch whe the peope of Iraq are beng
saughtered, sub|ugated, and humated.
Baby Bush go home
Arundhati Roy
The Guardan, Wednesday March 1, 2006

On hs trumphast tour of ths part of the word, where he hopes
to wave mperousy at peope he consders potenta sub|ects,
Presdent Bush's tnerary s gettng curouser and curouser. For
hs March 2 pt stop n New Deh, the Indan government tred
very hard to have hm address our Parament. A not
nconsequenta number of MPs threatened to hecke hm, so Pan
One was hasty sheved. Pan Two was that he address the
masses from the ramparts of the magnfcent Red Fort where the
Indan prme mnster tradtonay devers hs Independence Day
address. But the Red Fort, surrounded as t s by the
predomnanty Musm popuaton of Od Deh, was consdered a
securty nghtmare. So now we're nto Pan Three: Presdent
George Bush speaks from Purana Oa, the Od Fort.
Ironc, sn't t, that the ony safe pubc space for a man who has
recenty been so enthusastc about Inda's modernty shoud be a
crumbng medeva fort?
Snce the Purana Oa aso houses the Deh zoo - George Bush's
audence w be a few hundred caged anmas and an approved
st of caged human bengs who n Inda go under the category of
"emnent persons". They're mosty rch fok who ve n our poor
country ke captve anmas, ncarcerated by ther own weath,
ocked and barred n ther gded cages, protectng themseves
from the threat of the vugar and unruy muttudes whom they
have systematcay dspossessed over the centures.
So what's gong to happen to George W Bush? W the goras
cheer hm on? W the gbbons cur ther ps? W the brow-
antered deer sneer? W the chmps make rude noses? W the
ows hoot? W the ons yawn and the graffes bat ther beautfu
eyeashes? W the crocs recognse a kndred sou? W the quas
gve thanks that Bush sn't traveng wth Dck Cheney, hs
huntng partner wth the notorousy bad am? W the CEOs
agree?
Oh, and on March 2 Bush w be taken to vst Gandh's memora
n Ra|ghat. He's by no means the ony war crmna who has been
nvted by the Indan government to ay fowers at Ra|ghat. (Ony
recenty we had the Burmese dctator Genera Than Shwe, no
shrnkng voet hmsef.) But when George Bush paces fowers on
that famous sab of hghy poshed stone, mons of Indans w
wnce. It w be as though he has poured a pnt of bood on the
memory of Gandh.
We reay woud prefer that he ddn't.
It s not n our power stop Bush's vst. It s n our power to protest
t, and we w. The government, the poce and the corporate
press w do everythng they can to mnmse the extent of our
outrage. Nothng the Happy-news Papers say can change the fact
that a over Inda, from the bggest ctes to the smaest vages,
n pubc paces and prvate homes, George W Bush, ncumbent
presdent of the Unted States of Amerca, word nghtmare
ncarnate, s |ust not wecome.
The algebra of infinite justice
Arundhati Roy
Guardan, Saturday September 29, 2001
As the US prepares to wage a new knd of war, Arundhat Roy
chaenges the nstnct for vengeance
In the aftermath of the unconsconabe September 11 sucde
attacks on the Pentagon and the Word Trade Centre, an
Amercan newscaster sad: "Good and ev rarey manfest
themseves as ceary as they dd ast Tuesday. Peope who we
don't know massacred peope who we do. And they dd so wth
contemptuous gee." Then he broke down and wept.
Here's the rub: Amerca s at war aganst peope t doesn't know,
because they don't appear much on TV. Before t has propery
dentfed or even begun to comprehend the nature of ts enemy,
the US government has, n a rush of pubcty and embarrassng
rhetorc, cobbed together an "nternatona coaton aganst
terror", mobsed ts army, ts ar force, ts navy and ts meda,
and commtted them to batte.
The troube s that once Amerca goes off to war, t can't very we
return wthout havng fought one. If t doesn't fnd ts enemy, for
the sake of the enraged foks back home, t w have to
manufacture one. Once war begns, t w deveop a momentum,
a ogc and a |ustfcaton of ts own, and we' ose sght of why
t's beng fought n the frst pace.
What we're wtnessng here s the spectace of the word's most
powerfu country reachng refexvey, angry, for an od nstnct
to fght a new knd of war. Suddeny, when t comes to defendng
tsef, Amerca's streamned warshps, cruse msses and F-16
|ets ook ke obsoete, umberng thngs. As deterrence, ts
arsena of nucear bombs s no onger worth ts weght n scrap.
Box-cutters, penknves, and cod anger are the weapons wth
whch the wars of the new century w be waged. Anger s the
ock pck. It sps through customs unnotced. Doesn't show up n
baggage checks.
Who s Amerca fghtng? On September 20, the FBI sad that t
had doubts about the denttes of some of the h|ackers. On the
same day Presdent George Bush sad, "We know exacty who
these peope are and whch governments are supportng them." It
sounds as though the presdent knows somethng that the FBI
and the Amercan pubc don't.
In hs September 20 address to the US Congress, Presdent Bush
caed the enemes of Amerca "enemes of freedom". "Amercans
are askng, 'Why do they hate us?' " he sad. "They hate our
freedoms - our freedom of regon, our freedom of speech, our
freedom to vote and assembe and dsagree wth each other."
Peope are beng asked to make two eaps of fath here. Frst, to
assume that The Enemy s who the US government says t s,
even though t has no substanta evdence to support that cam.
And second, to assume that The Enemy's motves are what the
US government says they are, and there's nothng to support that
ether.
For strategc, mtary and economc reasons, t s vta for the US
government to persuade ts pubc that ther commtment to
freedom and democracy and the Amercan Way of Lfe s under
attack. In the current atmosphere of gref, outrage and anger, t's
an easy noton to pedde. However, f that were true, t's
reasonabe to wonder why the symbos of Amerca's economc
and mtary domnance - the Word Trade Centre and the
Pentagon - were chosen as the targets of the attacks. Why not
the Statue of Lberty? Coud t be that the stygan anger that ed
to the attacks has ts taproot not n Amercan freedom and
democracy, but n the US government's record of commtment
and support to exacty the opposte thngs - to mtary and
economc terrorsm, nsurgency, mtary dctatorshp, regous
bgotry and unmagnabe genocde (outsde Amerca)? It must be
hard for ordnary Amercans, so recenty bereaved, to ook up at
the word wth ther eyes fu of tears and encounter what mght
appear to them to be ndfference. It sn't ndfference. It's |ust
augury. An absence of surprse. The tred wsdom of knowng that
what goes around eventuay comes around. Amercan peope
ought to know that t s not them but ther government's poces
that are so hated. They can't possby doubt that they
themseves, ther extraordnary muscans, ther wrters, ther
actors, ther spectacuar sportsmen and ther cnema, are
unversay wecomed. A of us have been moved by the courage
and grace shown by frefghters, rescue workers and ordnary
offce staff n the days snce the attacks.
Amerca's gref at what happened has been mmense and
mmensey pubc. It woud be grotesque to expect t to cabrate
or moduate ts angush. However, t w be a pty f, nstead of
usng ths as an opportunty to try to understand why September
11 happened, Amercans use t as an opportunty to usurp the
whoe word's sorrow to mourn and avenge ony ther own.
Because then t fas to the rest of us to ask the hard questons
and say the harsh thngs. And for our pans, for our bad tmng,
we w be dsked, gnored and perhaps eventuay senced.
The word w probaby never know what motvated those
partcuar h|ackers who few panes nto those partcuar
Amercan budngs. They were not gory boys. They eft no
sucde notes, no potca messages; no organsaton has camed
credt for the attacks. A we know s that ther beef n what they
were dong outstrpped the natura human nstnct for survva, or
any desre to be remembered. It's amost as though they coud
not scae down the enormty of ther rage to anythng smaer
than ther deeds. And what they dd has bown a hoe n the word
as we knew t. In the absence of nformaton, potcans, potca
commentators and wrters (ke mysef) w nvest the act wth
ther own potcs, wth ther own nterpretatons. Ths specuaton,
ths anayss of the potca cmate n whch the attacks took
pace, can ony be a good thng.
But war s oomng arge. Whatever remans to be sad must be
sad qucky. Before Amerca paces tsef at the hem of the
"nternatona coaton aganst terror", before t nvtes (and
coerces) countres to actvey partcpate n ts amost godke
msson - caed Operaton Infnte |ustce unt t was ponted out
that ths coud be seen as an nsut to Musms, who beeve that
ony Aah can mete out nfnte |ustce, and was renamed
Operaton Endurng Freedom- t woud hep f some sma
carfcatons are made. For exampe, Infnte |ustce/Endurng
Freedom for whom? Is ths Amerca's war aganst terror n
Amerca or aganst terror n genera? What exacty s beng
avenged here? Is t the tragc oss of amost 7,000 ves, the
guttng of fve mon square feet of offce space n Manhattan,
the destructon of a secton of the Pentagon, the oss of severa
hundreds of thousands of |obs, the bankruptcy of some arne
companes and the dp n the New York Stock Exchange? Or s t
more than that? In 1996, Madeene Abrght, then the US
secretary of state, was asked on natona teevson what she fet
about the fact that 500,000 Iraq chdren had ded as a resut of
US economc sanctons. She reped that t was "a very hard
choce", but that, a thngs consdered, "we thnk the prce s
worth t". Abrght never ost her |ob for sayng ths. She
contnued to trave the word representng the vews and
aspratons of the US government. More pertnenty, the sanctons
aganst Iraq reman n pace. Chdren contnue to de.
So here we have t. The equvocatng dstncton between
cvsaton and savagery, between the "massacre of nnocent
peope" or, f you ke, "a cash of cvsatons" and "coatera
damage". The sophstry and fastdous agebra of nfnte |ustce.
How many dead Iraqs w t take to make the word a better
pace? How many dead Afghans for every dead Amercan? How
many dead women and chdren for every dead man? How many
dead mo|ahedn for each dead nvestment banker? As we watch
mesmersed, Operaton Endurng Freedom unfods on TV
montors across the word. A coaton of the word's superpowers
s cosng n on Afghanstan, one of the poorest, most ravaged,
war-torn countres n the word, whose rung Taban government
s sheterng Osama bn Laden, the man beng hed responsbe
for the September 11 attacks.
The ony thng n Afghanstan that coud possby count as
coatera vaue s ts ctzenry. (Among them, haf a mon
mamed orphans.There are accounts of hobbng stampedes that
occur when artfca mbs are ardropped nto remote,
naccessbe vages.) Afghanstan's economy s n a shambes. In
fact, the probem for an nvadng army s that Afghanstan has no
conventona coordnates or sgnposts to pot on a mtary map -
no bg ctes, no hghways, no ndustra compexes, no water
treatment pants. Farms have been turned nto mass graves. The
countrysde s ttered wth and mnes - 10 mon s the most
recent estmate. The Amercan army woud frst have to cear the
mnes and bud roads n order to take ts soders n.
Fearng an attack from Amerca, one mon ctzens have fed
from ther homes and arrved at the border between Pakstan and
Afghanstan. The UN estmates that there are eght mon Afghan
ctzens who need emergency ad. As suppes run out - food and
ad agences have been asked to eave - the BBC reports that one
of the worst humantaran dsasters of recent tmes has begun to
unfod. Wtness the nfnte |ustce of the new century. Cvans
starvng to death whe they're watng to be ked.
In Amerca there has been rough tak of "bombng Afghanstan
back to the stone age". Someone pease break the news that
Afghanstan s aready there. And f t's any consoaton, Amerca
payed no sma part n hepng t on ts way. The Amercan peope
may be a tte fuzzy about where exacty Afghanstan s (we hear
reports that there's a run on maps of the country), but the US
government and Afghanstan are od frends.
In 1979, after the Sovet nvason of Afghanstan, the CIA and
Pakstan's ISI (Inter Servces Integence) aunched the argest
covert operaton n the hstory of the CIA. Ther purpose was to
harness the energy of Afghan resstance to the Sovets and
expand t nto a hoy war, an Isamc |had, whch woud turn
Musm countres wthn the Sovet Unon aganst the communst
regme and eventuay destabse t. When t began, t was meant
to be the Sovet Unon's Vetnam. It turned out to be much more
than that. Over the years, through the ISI, the CIA funded and
recruted amost 100,000 radca mo|ahedn from 40 Isamc
countres as soders for Amerca's proxy war. The rank and fe of
the mo|ahedn were unaware that ther |had was actuay beng
fought on behaf of Unce Sam. (The rony s that Amerca was
equay unaware that t was fnancng a future war aganst tsef.)
In 1989, after beng booded by 10 years of reentess confct,
the Russans wthdrew, eavng behnd a cvsaton reduced to
rubbe.
Cv war n Afghanstan raged on. The |had spread to Chechnya,
Kosovo and eventuay to Kashmr. The CIA contnued to pour n
money and mtary equpment, but the overheads had become
mmense, and more money was needed. The mo|ahedn ordered
farmers to pant opum as a "revoutonary tax". The ISI set up
hundreds of heron aboratores across Afghanstan. Wthn two
years of the CIA's arrva, the Pakstan-Afghanstan borderand
had become the bggest producer of heron n the word, and the
snge bggest source of the heron on Amercan streets. The
annua profts, sad to be between $100bn and $200bn, were
poughed back nto tranng and armng mtants.
In 1995, the Taban - then a margna sect of dangerous, hardne
fundamentasts - fought ts way to power n Afghanstan. It was
funded by the ISI, that od cohort of the CIA, and supported by
many potca partes n Pakstan. The Taban uneashed a
regme of terror. Its frst vctms were ts own peope, partcuary
women. It cosed down grs' schoos, dsmssed women from
government |obs, and enforced shara aws under whch women
deemed to be "mmora" are stoned to death, and wdows guty
of beng aduterous are bured ave. Gven the Taban
government's human rghts track record, t seems unkey that t
w n any way be ntmdated or swerved from ts purpose by the
prospect of war, or the threat to the ves of ts cvans.
After a that has happened, can there be anythng more ronc
than Russa and Amerca |onng hands to re-destroy Afghanstan?
The queston s, can you destroy destructon? Droppng more
bombs on Afghanstan w ony shuffe the rubbe, scrambe some
od graves and dsturb the dead.
The desoate andscape of Afghanstan was the bura ground of
Sovet communsm and the sprngboard of a unpoar word
domnated by Amerca. It made the space for neocaptasm and
corporate gobasaton, agan domnated by Amerca. And now
Afghanstan s posed to become the graveyard for the unkey
soders who fought and won ths war for Amerca.
And what of Amerca's trusted ay? Pakstan too has suffered
enormousy. The US government has not been shy of supportng
mtary dctators who have bocked the dea of democracy from
takng root n the country. Before the CIA arrved, there was a
sma rura market for opum n Pakstan. Between 1979 and
1985, the number of heron addcts grew from zero to one-and-a-
haf mon. Even before September 11, there were three mon
Afghan refugees vng n tented camps aong the border.
Pakstan's economy s crumbng. Sectaran voence,
gobasaton's structura ad|ustment programmes and drug ords
are tearng the country to peces. Set up to fght the Sovets, the
terrorst tranng centres and madrasahs, sown ke dragon's
teeth across the country, produced fundamentasts wth
tremendous popuar appea wthn Pakstan tsef. The Taban,
whch the Pakstan government has sup ported, funded and
propped up for years, has matera and strategc aances wth
Pakstan's own potca partes.
Now the US government s askng (askng?) Pakstan to garotte
the pet t has hand-reared n ts backyard for so many years.
Presdent Musharraf, havng pedged hs support to the US, coud
we fnd he has somethng resembng cv war on hs hands.
Inda, thanks n part to ts geography, and n part to the vson of
ts former eaders, has so far been fortunate enough to be eft out
of ths Great Game. Had t been drawn n, t's more than key
that our democracy, such as t s, woud not have survved.
Today, as some of us watch n horror, the Indan government s
furousy gyratng ts hps, beggng the US to set up ts base n
Inda rather than Pakstan. Havng had ths rngsde vew of
Pakstan's sordd fate, t sn't |ust odd, t's unthnkabe, that Inda
shoud want to do ths. Any thrd word country wth a frage
economy and a compex soca base shoud know by now that to
nvte a superpower such as Amerca n (whether t says t's
stayng or |ust passng through) woud be ke nvtng a brck to
drop through your wndscreen.
Operaton Endurng Freedom s ostensby beng fought to uphod
the Amercan Way of Lfe. It' probaby end up undermnng t
competey. It w spawn more anger and more terror across the
word. For ordnary peope n Amerca, t w mean ves ved n a
cmate of sckenng uncertanty: w my chd be safe n schoo?
W there be nerve gas n the subway? A bomb n the cnema
ha? W my ove come home tonght? There have been warnngs
about the possbty of boogca warfare - smapox, bubonc
pague, anthrax - the deady payoad of nnocuous crop-duster
arcraft. Beng pcked off a few at a tme may end up beng worse
than beng annhated a at once by a nucear bomb.
The US government, and no doubt governments a over the
word, w use the cmate of war as an excuse to curta cv
bertes, deny free speech, ay off workers, harass ethnc and
regous mnortes, cut back on pubc spendng and dvert huge
amounts of money to the defence ndustry. To what purpose?
Presdent Bush can no more "rd the word of ev-doers" than he
can stock t wth sants. It's absurd for the US government to even
toy wth the noton that t can stamp out terrorsm wth more
voence and oppresson. Terrorsm s the symptom, not the
dsease. Terrorsm has no country. It's transnatona, as goba an
enterprse as Coke or Peps or Nke. At the frst sgn of troube,
terrorsts can pu up stakes and move ther "factores" from
country to country n search of a better dea. |ust ke the mut-
natonas.
Terrorsm as a phenomenon may never go away. But f t s to be
contaned, the frst step s for Amerca to at east acknowedge
that t shares the panet wth other natons, wth other human
bengs who, even f they are not on TV, have oves and grefs and
stores and songs and sorrows and, for heaven's sake, rghts.
Instead, when Donad Rumsfed, the US defence secretary, was
asked what he woud ca a vctory n Amerca's new war, he sad
that f he coud convnce the word that Amercans must be
aowed to contnue wth ther way of fe, he woud consder t a
vctory.
The September 11 attacks were a monstrous cang card from a
word gone horrby wrong. The message may have been wrtten
by Bn Laden (who knows?) and devered by hs courers, but t
coud we have been sgned by the ghosts of the vctms of
Amerca's od wars. The mons ked n Korea, Vetnam and
Camboda, the 17,500 ked when Israe - backed by the US -
nvaded Lebanon n 1982, the 200,000 Iraqs ked n Operaton
Desert Storm, the thousands of Paestnans who have ded
fghtng Israe's occupaton of the West Bank. And the mons
who ded, n Yugosava, Somaa, Hat, Che, Ncaragua, E
Savador, the Domncan Repubc, Panama, at the hands of a
the terrorsts, dctators and genocdsts whom the Amercan
government supported, traned, bankroed and supped wth
arms. And ths s far from beng a comprehensve st.
For a country nvoved n so much warfare and confct, the
Amercan peope have been extremey fortunate. The strkes on
September 11 were ony the second on Amercan so n over a
century. The frst was Pear Harbour. The reprsa for ths took a
ong route, but ended wth Hroshma and Nagasak. Ths tme the
word wats wth bated breath for the horrors to come.
Someone recenty sad that f Osama bn Laden ddn't exst,
Amerca woud have had to nvent hm. But, n a way, Amerca dd
nvent hm. He was among the |hads who moved to Afghanstan
n 1979 when the CIA commenced ts operatons there. Bn Laden
has the dstncton of beng created by the CIA and wanted by the
FBI. In the course of a fortnght he has been promoted from
suspect to prme suspect and then, despte the ack of any rea
evdence, straght up the charts to beng "wanted dead or ave".
From a accounts, t w be mpossbe to produce evdence (of
the sort that woud stand scrutny n a court of aw) to nk Bn
Laden to the September 11 attacks. So far, t appears that the
most ncrmnatng pece of evdence aganst hm s the fact that
he has not condemned them.
From what s known about the ocaton of Bn Laden and the
vng condtons n whch he operates, t's entrey possbe that
he dd not personay pan and carry out the attacks - that he s
the nspratona fgure, "the CEO of the hodng company". The
Taban's response to US demands for the extradton of Bn
Laden has been uncharacterstcay reasonabe: produce the
evdence, then we' hand hm over. Presdent Bush's response s
that the demand s "non-negotabe".
(Whe taks are on for the extradton of CEOs - can Inda put n a
sde request for the extradton of Warren Anderson of the US? He
was the charman of Unon Carbde, responsbe for the Bhopa
gas eak that ked 16,000 peope n 1984. We have coated the
necessary evdence. It's a n the fes. Coud we have hm,
pease?)
But who s Osama bn Laden reay? Let me rephrase that. What s
Osama bn Laden? He's Amerca's famy secret. He s the
Amercan presdent's dark doppeg&aum;nger. The savage twn
of a that purports to be beautfu and cvsed. He has been
scupted from the spare rb of a word ad to waste by Amerca's
foregn pocy: ts gunboat dpomacy, ts nucear arsena, ts
vugary stated pocy of "fu-spectrum domnance", ts chng
dsregard for non-Amercan ves, ts barbarous mtary
nterventons, ts support for despotc and dctatora regmes, ts
mercess economc agenda that has munched through the
economes of poor countres ke a coud of ocusts. Its maraudng
mutnatonas who are takng over the ar we breathe, the ground
we stand on, the water we drnk, the thoughts we thnk. Now that
the famy secret has been sped, the twns are burrng nto one
another and graduay becomng nterchangeabe. Ther guns,
bombs, money and drugs have been gong around n the oop for
a whe. (The Stnger msses that w greet US hecopters were
supped by the CIA. The heron used by Amerca's drug addcts
comes from Afghanstan. The Bush admnstraton recenty gave
Afghanstan a $43m subsdy for a "war on drugs"....)
Now Bush and Bn Laden have even begun to borrow each other's
rhetorc. Each refers to the other as "the head of the snake". Both
nvoke God and use the oose menaran currency of good and
ev as ther terms of reference. Both are engaged n unequvoca
potca crmes. Both are dangerousy armed - one wth the
nucear arsena of the obsceney powerfu, the other wth the
ncandescent, destructve power of the uttery hopeess. The
freba and the ce pck. The budgeon and the axe. The
mportant thng to keep n mnd s that nether s an acceptabe
aternatve to the other.
Presdent Bush's utmatum to the peope of the word - "If you're
not wth us, you're aganst us" - s a pece of presumptuous
arrogance. It's not a choce that peope want to, need to, or
shoud have to make.
Arundhat Roy 2001
The Loneliness Of Noam Chomsky
By Arundhati Roy
The Hndu, 24 August, 2003
Sttng n my home n New Deh, watchng an Amercan TV news
channe promote tsef ("We report. You decde."), I magne
Noam Chomsky's amused, chpped-tooth sme.
Everybody knows that authortaran regmes, regardess of ther
deoogy, use the mass meda for propaganda. But what about
democratcay eected regmes n the "free word"?
Today, thanks to Noam Chomsky and hs feow meda anaysts, t
s amost axomatc for thousands, possby mons, of us that
pubc opnon n "free market" democraces s manufactured |ust
ke any other mass market product - soap, swtches, or sced
bread. We know that whe, egay and consttutonay, speech
may be free, the space n whch that freedom can be exercsed
has been snatched from us and auctoned to the hghest bdders.
Neobera captasm sn't |ust about the accumuaton of capta
(for some). It's aso about the accumuaton of power (for some),
the accumuaton of freedom (for some). Conversey, for the rest
of the word, the peope who are excuded from neoberasm's
governng body, t's about the eroson of capta, the eroson of
power, the eroson of freedom. In the "free" market, free speech
has become a commodty ke everythng ese - - |ustce,
human rghts, drnkng water, cean ar. It's avaabe ony to
those who can afford t. And naturay, those who can afford t use
free speech to manufacture the knd of product, confect the knd
of pubc opnon, that best suts ther purpose. (News they can
use.) Exacty how they do ths has been the sub|ect of much of
Noam Chomsky's potca wrtng.
Prme Mnster Svo Beruscon, for nstance, has a controng
nterest n ma|or Itaan newspapers, magaznes, teevson
channes, and pubshng houses. "|T|he prme mnster n effect
contros about 90 per cent of Itaan TV vewershp," reports the
Fnanca Tmes. What prce free speech? Free speech for whom?
Admttedy, Beruscon s an extreme exampe. In other
democraces - the Unted States n partcuar - meda barons,
powerfu corporate obbes, and government offcas are
mbrcated n a more eaborate, but ess obvous, manner.
(George Bush |r.'s connectons to the o obby, to the arms
ndustry, and to Enron, and Enron's nftraton of U.S.
government nsttutons and the mass meda - a ths s pubc
knowedge now.)
After the September 11, 2001, terrorst strkes n New York and
Washngton, the manstream meda's batant performance as the
U.S. government's mouthpece, ts dspay of vengefu patrotsm,
ts wngness to pubsh Pentagon press handouts as news, and
ts expct censorshp of dssentng opnon became the butt of
some pretty back humour n the rest of the word.
Then the New York Stock Exchange crashed, bankrupt arne
companes appeaed to the government for fnanca baouts, and
there was tak of crcumventng patent aws n order to
manufacture generc drugs to fght the anthrax scare (much more
mportant, and urgent of course, than the producton of genercs
to fght AIDS n Afrca). Suddeny, t began to seem as though the
twn myths of Free Speech and the Free Market mght come
crashng down aongsde the Twn Towers of the Word Trade
Center.
But of course that never happened. The myths ve on.
There s however, a brghter sde to the amount of energy and
money that the estabshment pours nto the busness of
"managng" pubc opnon. It suggests a very rea fear of pubc
opnon. It suggests a persstent and vad worry that f peope
were to dscover (and fuy comprehend) the rea nature of the
thngs that are done n ther name, they mght act upon that
knowedge. Powerfu peope know that ordnary peope are not
aways refexvey ruthess and sefsh. (When ordnary peope
wegh costs and benefts, somethng ke an uneasy conscence
coud easy tp the scaes.) For ths reason, they must be guarded
aganst reaty, reared n a controed cmate, n an atered
reaty, ke broer chckens or pgs n a pen.
Those of us who have managed to escape ths fate and are
scratchng about n the backyard, no onger beeve everythng
we read n the papers and watch on TV. We put our ears to the
ground and ook for other ways of makng sense of the word. We
search for the untod story, the mentoned-n-passng mtary
coup, the unreported genocde, the cv war n an Afrcan country
wrtten up n a one-coumn-nch story next to a fu-page
advertsement for ace underwear.
We don't aways remember, and many don't even know, that ths
way of thnkng, ths easy acuty, ths nstnctve mstrust of the
mass meda, woud at best be a potca hunch and at worst a
oose accusaton, f t were not for the reentess and unswervng
meda anayss of one of the word's greatest mnds. And ths s
ony one of the ways n whch Noam Chomsky has radcay
atered our understandng of the socety n whch we ve. Or
shoud I say, our understandng of the eaborate rues of the
unatc asyum n whch we are a vountary nmates?
Speakng about the September 11 attacks n New York and
Washngton, Presdent George W. Bush caed the enemes of the
Unted States "enemes of freedom". "Amercans are askng why
do they hate us?" he sad. "They hate our freedoms, our freedom
of regon, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and
assembe and dsagree wth each other."
If peope n the Unted States want a rea answer to that queston
(as opposed to the ones n the Idot's Gude to Ant-Amercansm,
that s: "Because they're |eaous of us," "Because they hate
freedom," "Because they're osers," "Because we're good and
they're ev"), I'd say, read Chomsky. Read Chomsky on U.S.
mtary nterventons n Indochna, Latn Amerca, Iraq, Bosna,
the former Yugosava, Afghanstan, and the Mdde East. If
ordnary peope n the Unted States read Chomsky, perhaps ther
questons woud be framed a tte dfferenty. Perhaps t woud
be: "Why don't they hate us more than they do?" or "Isn't t
surprsng that September 11 ddn't happen earer?"
Unfortunatey, n these natonastc tmes, words ke "us" and
"them" are used oosey. The ne between ctzens and the state
s beng deberatey and successfuy burred, not |ust by
governments, but aso by terrorsts. The underyng ogc of
terrorst attacks, as we as "retaatory" wars aganst
governments that "support terrorsm", s the same: both punsh
ctzens for the actons of ther governments.
(A bref dgresson: I rease that for Noam Chomsky, a U.S.
ctzen, to crtcse hs own government s better manners than for
someone ke mysef, an Indan ctzen, to crtcse the U.S.
government. I'm no patrot, and am fuy aware that venaty,
brutaty, and hypocrsy are mprnted on the eaden sou of every
state. But when a country ceases to be merey a country and
becomes an empre, then the scae of operatons changes
dramatcay. So may I carfy that I speak as a sub|ect of the U.S.
empre? I speak as a save who presumes to crtcse her kng.)
If I were asked to choose one of Noam Chomsky's ma|or
contrbutons to the word, t woud be the fact that he has
unmasked the ugy, manpuatve, ruthess unverse that exsts
behnd that beautfu, sunny word "freedom". He has done ths
ratonay and emprcay. The mass of evdence he has
marshaed to construct hs case s formdabe. Terrfyng,
actuay. The startng premse of Chomsky's method s not
deoogca, but t s ntensey potca. He embarks on hs course
of nqury wth an anarchst's nstnctve mstrust of power. He
takes us on a tour through the bog of the U.S. estabshment, and
eads us through the dzzyng maze of corrdors that connects the
government, bg busness, and the busness of managng pubc
opnon.
Chomsky shows us how phrases ke "free speech", the "free
market", and the "free word" have tte, f anythng, to do wth
freedom. He shows us that, among the myrad freedoms camed
by the U.S. government are the freedom to murder, annhate,
and domnate other peope. The freedom to fnance and sponsor
despots and dctators across the word. The freedom to tran,
arm, and sheter terrorsts. The freedom to toppe democratcay
eected governments. The freedom to amass and use weapons of
mass destructon - chemca, boogca, and nucear. The
freedom to go to war aganst any country whose government t
dsagrees wth. And, most terrbe of a, the freedom to commt
these crmes aganst humanty n the name of "|ustce", n the
name of "rghteousness", n the name of "freedom".
Attorney Genera |ohn Ashcroft has decared that U.S. freedoms
are "not the grant of any government or document, but... our
endowment from God". So, bascay, we're confronted wth a
country armed wth a mandate from heaven. Perhaps ths
expans why the U.S. government refuses to |udge tsef by the
same mora standards by whch t |udges others. (Any attempt to
do ths s shouted down as "mora equvaence".) Its technque s
to poston tsef as the we-ntentoned gant whose good deeds
are confounded n strange countres by ther schemng natves,
whose markets t's tryng to free, whose socetes t's tryng to
modernse, whose women t's tryng to berate, whose sous t's
tryng to save.
Perhaps ths beef n ts own dvnty aso expans why the U.S.
government has conferred upon tsef the rght and freedom to
murder and extermnate peope "for ther own good".
When he announced the U.S. ar strkes aganst Afghanstan,
Presdent Bush |r. sad, "We're a peacefu naton." He went on to
say, "Ths s the cang of the Unted States of Amerca, the most
free naton n the word, a naton but on fundamenta vaues,
that re|ects hate, re|ects voence, re|ects murderers, re|ects ev.
And we w not tre."
The U.S. empre rests on a grsy foundaton: the massacre of
mons of ndgenous peope, the steang of ther ands, and
foowng ths, the kdnappng and ensavement of mons of
back peope from Afrca to work that and. Thousands ded on the
seas whe they were beng shpped ke caged catte between
contnents. "Stoen from Afrca, brought to Amerca" - Bob
Marey's "Buffao Soder" contans a whoe unverse of
unspeakabe sadness. It tes of the oss of dgnty, the oss of
wderness, the oss of freedom, the shattered prde of a peope.
Genocde and savery provde the soca and economc
underpnnng of the naton whose fundamenta vaues re|ect hate,
murderers, and ev.
Here s Chomsky, wrtng n the essay "The Manufacture of
Consent," on the foundng of the Unted States of Amerca:
Durng the Thanksgvng hoday a few weeks ago, I took a wak
wth some frends and famy n a natona park. We came across
a gravestone, whch had on t the foowng nscrpton: "Here es
an Indan woman, a Wampanoag, whose famy and trbe gave of
themseves and ther and that ths great naton mght be born
and grow."
Of course, t s not qute accurate to say that the ndgenous
popuaton gave of themseves and ther and for that nobe
purpose. Rather, they were saughtered, decmated, and
dspersed n the course of one of the greatest exercses n
genocde n human hstory... whch we ceebrate each October
when we honour Coumbus - a notabe mass murderer hmsef -
on Coumbus Day.
Hundreds of Amercan ctzens, we-meanng and decent peope,
troop by that gravestone reguary and read t, apparenty wthout
reacton; except, perhaps, a feeng of satsfacton that at ast we
are gvng some due recognton to the sacrfces of the natve
peopes.... They mght react dfferenty f they were to vst
Auschwtz or Dachau and fnd a gravestone readng: "Here es a
woman, a |ew, whose famy and peope gave of themseves and
ther possessons that ths great naton mght grow and prosper."
How has the Unted States survved ts terrbe past and emerged
smeng so sweet? Not by ownng up to t, not by makng
reparatons, not by apoogsng to back Amercans or natve
Amercans, and certany not by changng ts ways (t exports ts
cruetes now). Lke most other countres, the Unted States has
rewrtten ts hstory. But what sets the Unted States apart from
other countres, and puts t way ahead n the race, s that t has
ensted the servces of the most powerfu, most successfu
pubcty frm n the word: Hoywood.
In the best-seng verson of popuar myth as hstory, U.S.
"goodness" peaked durng Word War II (aka Amerca's War
Aganst Fascsm). Lost n the dn of trumpet sound and ange
song s the fact that when fascsm was n fu strde n Europe, the
U.S. government actuay ooked away. When Hter was carryng
out hs genocda pogrom aganst |ews, U.S. offcas refused entry
to |ewsh refugees feeng Germany. The Unted States entered
the war ony after the |apanese bombed Pear Harbour. Drowned
out by the nosy hosannas s ts most barbarc act, n fact the
snge most savage act the word has ever wtnessed: the
droppng of the atomc bomb on cvan popuatons n Hroshma
and Nagasak. The war was neary over. The hundreds of
thousands of |apanese peope who were ked, the countess
others who were crpped by cancers for generatons to come,
were not a threat to word peace. They were cvans. |ust as the
vctms of the Word Trade Center and Pentagon bombngs were
cvans. |ust as the hundreds of thousands of peope who ded n
Iraq because of the U.S.-ed sanctons were cvans. The
bombng of Hroshma and Nagasak was a cod, cacuated
experment carred out to demonstrate Amerca's power. At the
tme, Presdent Truman descrbed t as "the greatest thng n
hstory".
The Second Word War, we're tod, was a "war for peace". The
atomc bomb was a "weapon of peace". We're nvted to beeve
that nucear deterrence prevented Word War III. (That was
before Presdent George Bush |r. came up wth the "pre-emptve
strke doctrne". Was there an outbreak of peace after the Second
Word War? Certany there was (reatve) peace n Europe and
Amerca - but does that count as word peace? Not uness
savage, proxy wars fought n ands where the cooured races ve
(chnks, nggers, dnks, wogs, gooks) don't count as wars at a.
Snce the Second Word War, the Unted States has been at war
wth or has attacked, among other countres, Korea, Guatemaa,
Cuba, Laos, Vetnam, Camboda, Grenada, Lbya, E Savador,
Ncaragua, Panama, Iraq, Somaa, Sudan, Yugosava, and
Afghanstan. Ths st shoud aso ncude the U.S. government's
covert operatons n Afrca, Asa, and Latn Amerca, the coups t
has engneered, and the dctators t has armed and supported. It
shoud ncude Israe's U.S.-backed war on Lebanon, n whch
thousands were ked. It shoud ncude the key roe Amerca has
payed n the confct n the Mdde East, n whch thousands have
ded fghtng Israe's ega occupaton of Paestnan terrtory. It
shoud ncude Amerca's roe n the cv war n Afghanstan n the
1980s, n whch more than one mon peope were ked. It
shoud ncude the embargos and sanctons that have ed drecty,
and ndrecty, to the death of hundreds of thousands of peope,
most vsby n Iraq.
Put t a together, and t sounds very much as though there has
been a Word War III, and that the U.S. government was (or s)
one of ts chef protagonsts.
Most of the essays n Chomsky's For Reasons of State are about
U.S. aggresson n South Vetnam, North Vetnam, Laos, and
Camboda. It was a war that asted more than 12 years. Ffty-
eght thousand Amercans and approxmatey two mon
Vetnamese, Cambodans, and Laotans ost ther ves. The U.S.
depoyed haf a mon ground troops, dropped more than sx
mon tons of bombs. And yet, though you woudn't beeve t f
you watched most Hoywood moves, Amerca ost the war.
The war began n South Vetnam and then spread to North
Vetnam, Laos, and Camboda. After puttng n pace a cent
regme n Sagon, the U.S. government nvted tsef n to fght a
communst nsurgency - Vetcong gueras who had nftrated
rura regons of South Vetnam where vagers were sheterng
them. Ths was exacty the mode that Russa repcated when, n
1979, t nvted tsef nto Afghanstan. Nobody n the "free word"
s n any doubt about the fact that Russa nvaded Afghanstan.
After gasnost, even a Sovet foregn mnster caed the Sovet
nvason of Afghanstan "ega and mmora". But there has been
no such ntrospecton n the Unted States. In 1984, n a stunnng
reveaton, Chomsky wrote:
For the past 22 years, I have been searchng to fnd some
reference n manstream |ournasm or schoarshp to an
Amercan nvason of South Vetnam n 1962 (or ever), or an
Amercan attack aganst South Vetnam, or Amercan aggresson
n Indochna - wthout success. There s no such event n hstory.
Rather, there s an Amercan defence of South Vetnam aganst
terrorsts supported from the outsde (namey from Vetnam).
There s no such event n hstory!
In 1962, the U.S. Ar Force began to bomb rura South Vetnam,
where 80 per cent of the popuaton ved. The bombng asted for
more than a decade. Thousands of peope were ked. The dea
was to bomb on a scae coossa enough to nduce panc
mgraton from vages nto ctes, where peope coud be hed n
refugee camps. Samue Huntngton referred to ths as a process
of "urbansaton". (I earned about urbansaton when I was n
archtecture schoo n Inda. Somehow I don't remember aera
bombng beng part of the syabus.) Huntngton - famous today
for hs essay "The Cash of Cvzatons?"- was at the tme
Charman of the Counc on Vetnamese Studes of the Southeast
Asa Deveopment Advsory Group. Chomsky quotes hm
descrbng the Vetcong as "a powerfu force whch cannot be
dsodged from ts consttuency so ong as the consttuency
contnues to exst". Huntngton went on to advse "drect
appcaton of mechanca and conventona power"- n other
words, to crush a peope's war, emnate the peope. (Or,
perhaps, to update the thess - n order to prevent a cash of
cvzatons, annhate a cvsaton.)
Here's one observer from the tme on the mtatons of Amerca's
mechanca power: "The probem s that Amercan machnes are
not equa to the task of kng communst soders except as part
of a scorched-earth pocy that destroys everythng ese as we."
That probem has been soved now. Not wth ess destructve
bombs, but wth more magnatve anguage. There's a more
eegant way of sayng "that destroys everythng ese as we". The
phrase s "coatera damage".
And here's a frsthand account of what Amerca's "machnes"
(Huntngton caed them "modernsng nstruments" and staff
offcers n the Pentagon caed them "bomb-o-grams") can do.
Ths s T.D. Aman fyng over the Pan of |ars n Laos.
Even f the war n Laos ended tomorrow, the restoraton of ts
ecoogca baance mght take severa years. The reconstructon
of the Pan's totay destroyed towns and vages mght take |ust
as ong. Even f ths was done, the Pan mght ong prove perous
to human habtaton because of the hundreds of thousands of
unexpoded bombs, mnes and booby traps.
A recent fght around the Pan of |ars reveaed what ess than
three years of ntensve Amercan bombng can do to a rura area,
even after ts cvan popuaton has been evacuated. In arge
areas, the prmary tropca coour - brght green - has been
repaced by an abstract pattern of back, and brght metac
coours. Much of the remanng foage s stunted, dued by
defoants.
Today, back s the domnant coour of the northern and eastern
reaches of the Pan. Napam s dropped reguary to burn off the
grass and undergrowth that covers the Pans and fs ts many
narrow ravnes. The fres seem to burn constanty, creatng
rectanges of back. Durng the fght, pumes of smoke coud be
seen rsng from freshy bombed areas.
The man routes, comng nto the Pan from communst-hed
terrtory, are bombed mercessy, apparenty on a non-stop bass.
There, and aong the rm of the Pan, the domnant coour s
yeow. A vegetaton has been destroyed. The craters are
countess.... |T|he area has been bombed so repeatedy that the
and resembes the pocked, churned desert n storm-ht areas of
the North Afrcan desert.
Further to the southeast, Xeng Khouangve - once the most
popuous town n communst Laos - es empty, destroyed. To
the north of the Pan, the tte resort of Khang Khay aso has
been destroyed.
Around the andng fed at the base of Kng Kong, the man
coours are yeow (from upturned so) and back (from napam),
reeved by patches of brght red and bue: parachutes used to
drop suppes.
|T|he ast oca nhabtants were beng carted nto ar transports.
Abandoned vegetabe gardens that woud never be harvested
grew near abandoned houses wth pates st on the tabes and
caendars on the was.
(Never counted n the "costs" of war are the dead brds, the
charred anmas, the murdered fsh, ncnerated nsects, posoned
water sources, destroyed vegetaton. Rarey mentoned s the
arrogance of the human race towards other vng thngs wth
whch t shares ths panet. A these are forgotten n the fght for
markets and deooges. Ths arrogance w probaby be the
utmate undong of the human speces.)
The centrepece of For Reasons of State s an essay caed "The
Mentaty of the Backroom Boys", n whch Chomsky offers an
extraordnary suppe, exhaustve anayss of the Pentagon
Papers, whch he says "provde documentary evdence of a
conspracy to use force n nternatona affars n voaton of aw".
Here, too, Chomsky makes note of the fact that whe the
bombng of North Vetnam s dscussed at some ength n the
Pentagon Papers, the nvason of South Vetnam barey merts a
menton.
The Pentagon Papers are mesmersng, not as documentaton of
the hstory of the U.S. war n Indochna, but as nsght nto the
mnds of the men who panned and executed t. It's fascnatng to
be prvy to the deas that were beng tossed around, the
suggestons that were made, the proposas that were put
forward. In a secton caed "The Asan Mnd - the Amercan
Mnd", Chomsky examnes the dscusson of the mentaty of the
enemy that "stocay accept|s| the destructon of weath and the
oss of ves", whereas "We want fe, happness, weath, power",
and, for us, "death and sufferng are rratona choces when
aternatves exst". So, we earn that the Asan poor, presumaby
because they cannot comprehend the meanng of happness,
weath, and power, nvte Amerca to carry ths "strategc ogc to
ts concuson, whch s genocde". But, then "we" bak because
"genocde s a terrbe burden to bear". (Eventuay, of course,
"we" went ahead and commtted genocde any way, and then
pretended that t never reay happened.)
Of course, the Pentagon Papers contan some moderate
proposas, as we.
Strkes at popuaton targets (per se) are key not ony to create
a counterproductve wave of revuson abroad and at home, but
greaty to ncrease the rsk of enargng the war wth Chna and
the Sovet Unon. Destructon of ocks and dams, however - f
handed rght - mght... offer promse. It shoud be studed. Such
destructon does not k or drown peope. By shaow-foodng the
rce, t eads after tme to wdespread starvaton (more than a
mon?) uness food s provded - whch we coud offer to do "at
the conference tabe".
Layer by ayer, Chomsky strps down the process of decson-
makng by U.S. government offcas, to revea at ts core the
ptess heart of the Amercan war machne, competey nsuated
from the reates of war, bnded by deoogy, and wng to
annhate mons of human bengs, cvans, soders, women,
chdren, vages, whoe ctes, whoe ecosystems - wth
scentfcay honed methods of brutaty.
Here's an Amercan pot takng about the |oys of napam:
We sure are peased wth those backroom boys at Dow. The
orgna product wasn't so hot - f the gooks were quck they
coud scrape t off. So the boys started addng poystyrene - now
t stcks ke sht to a banket. But then f the gooks |umped under
water t stopped burnng, so they started addng We Peter
|whte phosphorous| so's to make t burn better. It' even burn
under water now. And |ust one drop s enough, t' keep on
burnng rght down to the bone so they de anyway from
phosphorous posonng.
So the ucky gooks were annhated for ther own good. Better
Dead than Red.
Thanks to the seductve charms of Hoywood and the rresstbe
appea of Amerca's mass meda, a these years ater, the word
vews the war as an Amercan story. Indochna provded the ush,
tropca backdrop aganst whch the Unted States payed out ts
fantases of voence, tested ts atest technoogy, furthered ts
deoogy, examned ts conscence, agonsed over ts mora
demmas, and deat wth ts gut (or pretended to). The
Vetnamese, the Cambodans, and Laotans were ony scrpt
props. Nameess, faceess, st-eyed humanods. They were |ust
the peope who ded. Gooks.
The ony rea esson the U.S. government earned from ts
nvason of Indochna s how to go to war wthout commttng
Amercan troops and rskng Amercan ves. So now we have
wars waged wth ong-range cruse msses, Back Hawks,
"bunker busters". Wars n whch the "Aes" ose more |ournasts
than soders.
As a chd growng up n the state of Keraa, n South Inda -
where the frst democratcay eected Communst government n
the word came to power n 1959, the year I was born - I worred
terrby about beng a gook. Keraa was ony a few thousand mes
west of Vetnam. We had |unges and rvers and rce-feds, and
communsts, too. I kept magnng my mother, my brother, and
mysef beng bown out of the bushes by a grenade, or mowed
down, ke the gooks n the moves, by an Amercan marne wth
musced arms and chewng gum and a oud background score. In
my dreams, I was the burnng gr n the famous photograph
taken on the road from Trang Bang.
As someone who grew up on the cusp of both Amercan and
Sovet propaganda (whch more or ess neutrased each other),
when I frst read Noam Chomsky, t occurred to me that hs
marshang of evdence, the voume of t, the reentessness of t,
was a tte - how sha I put t? - nsane. Even a quarter of the
evdence he had comped woud have been enough to convnce
me. I used to wonder why he needed to do so much work. But
now I understand that the magntude and ntensty of Chomsky's
work s a barometer of the magntude, scope, and reentessness
of the propaganda machne that he's up aganst. He's ke the
wood-borer who ves nsde the thrd rack of my bookshef. Day
and nght, I hear hs |aws crunchng through the wood, grndng t
to a fne dust. It's as though he dsagrees wth the terature and
wants to destroy the very structure on whch t rests. I ca hm
Chompsky.
Beng an Amercan workng n Amerca, wrtng to convnce
Amercans of hs pont of vew must reay be ke havng to tunne
through hard wood. Chomsky s one of a sma band of ndvduas
fghtng a whoe ndustry. And that makes hm not ony brant,
but heroc.
Some years ago, n a pognant ntervew wth |ames Peck,
Chomsky spoke about hs memory of the day Hroshma was
bombed. He was 16 years od:
I remember that I teray coudn't tak to anybody. There was
nobody. I |ust waked off by mysef. I was at a summer camp at
the tme, and I waked off nto the woods and stayed aone for a
coupe of hours when I heard about t. I coud never tak to
anyone about t and never understood anyone's reacton. I fet
competey soated.
That soaton produced one of the greatest, most radca pubc
thnkers of our tme. When the sun sets on the Amercan empre,
as t w, as t must, Noam Chomsky's work w survve.
It w pont a coo, ncrmnatng fnger at a mercess,
Machavean empre as crue, sef-rghteous, and hypocrtca as
the ones t has repaced. (The ony dfference s that t s armed
wth technoogy that can vst the knd of devastaton on the
word that hstory has never known and the human race cannot
begn to magne.)
As a coud've been gook, and who knows, perhaps a potenta
gook, hardy a day goes by when I don't fnd mysef thnkng -
for one reason or another - "Chomsky Zndabad".
Arundhat Roy s the author of The God of Sma Thngs.
Empire And The Corporate Media
By Arundhati Roy and Amy Goodman
Democracy Now
01 |une, 2003
Intervew wth Arundhat Roy on Democracy Now co-hosts Amy
Goodman and |uan Gonzaez
AMY GOODMAN: We t's a great peasure to be abe to see you
face to face and to tak to you n person. We've spoken to you on
the phone many tmes and I very much ook forward to your
address tomorrow nght. We your book has come out now n a
new edton, War Tak and n t, t ncudes one of the speeches
that we have run a ot here and that s your speech "Come
September" that you gave n Santa Fe. |uan mentoned the ssue
of meda centrazaton n ths country. In Inda you see the Unted
States through the ens of--what s t you've sad? Fox s what you
watch?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Fox and CNN I thnk, are the two channes you
get there.
AMY GOODMAN: So what do you thnk? What do you thnk of
Amerca through that ens?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We you know t's t's true that ast year before
I came, I was coerced to come to Amerca because I dd thnk that
there was no need for me to come here and you know be nsuted
and caed names and so on. Because you thnk of t as a
homogenous pace n some way, and I was so deghted to fnd
the opposte. I was so deghted to fnd that we who are
protestng aganst these thngs on the outsde have some of our
staunchest aes n Amerca. And I must say that, t put me n the
extraordnary poston of defendng Amercan ctzens aganst an
assaut whch s absoutey racst sometmes, outsde, because of
these meda channes and because of the poces of the US
government, peope n Amerca are |ust seen as a homogenous
bunch of rabd, natonast bues and that's such a sad thng
because I thnk f we are gong to fght to recam democracy that
fght has to begn here. And a of us have to acknowedge that t
s the peope of Amerca who have access to the mpera paace.
And so, t was wonderfu to come. At the same tme, ths
consodaton of the Amercan meda. I mean I thnk, one of the
good thngs that happened after September 11th, was that ths
myth of free speech and the free market crumbed aong wth the
twn towers you know. Outsde Amerca, the Amercan free press
has become the butt of some pretty dark humor and nobody now
t's contextuazed you know. When you watch CNN and FOX
news--anywaynot everybody, but a ot of peope |ust watch t as
the boardroom buetn of the Whte House you know, and know t
for what t s.
|UAN GONZALEZ: We n your atest book War Tak, you tak
about Empre n a much broader way than perhaps we're
accustomed to dscussng here n the US, cause we're aways
centerng n on the US Empre and the US's roe n word
domnaton but you tak about Empre and a the aes of Empre
n a the dfferent countres around the word ncudng your own.
I'm wonderng f you coud expound on that a tte bt?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, you know there are two ways that Empre
spreads ts tentaces, one s wth the cruse msse and the dasy
cutter and so on, and the other s wth the IMF checkbook. So you
know the argument that s beng made across the word s that
the peope of Argentna and the peope of Iraq have been
decmated by the same process but by dfferent weapons--n one
case the cruse msse, n the other case, the check book. And
what happened was |ust ke the coona enterprse whch needed
the couson of natve etes you know, t wasn't as though Brtan
had huge armes statoned n Inda, t had the Indan ete
coudng wth t. In the same way now, ths pro|ect of corporate
gobazaton has the couson of oca etes n thrd word
countres you know. And so what happens s that you have a
process n whch the whte man doesn't even have to come to the
hot countres and get maara and darrhea and de an eary death
because t s beng managed on ther behaf by governments ke
say the government n Inda or the government n South Afrca
who are wngy genufectng to that process. And a stuaton n
whch, very nterestngy say you ook at a country ke South
Afrca you know, 1994 aparthed offcay ended. By 1996, the
ANC who had fought so hard and peope who had fought so hard
for that freedom ook what's happened to them. Out of a
popuaton of 44 mon, 10 mon have had ther water and
eectrcty cut off and you have the tradtona power, the whte
power n say South Afrca, more secure and happer than t's ever
been cause t's aparthed wth a cean conscence now and t's
caed democracy.
AMY GOODMAN: How do you decde when to wrte fcton and
when to wrte non-fcton?
ARUNDHATI ROY: That's a very, very troubng queston, you
know becausewe I don't decde, t's somehow decded
somewhere ese n the ether. But the fact s that for me, fcton s
my ove. Fcton s what makes me happy. The other wrtng that I
do, each tme I wrte I swear that I' never do t agan. It's sort of
wrenched out of me andt ends up--I end up payng a prce for t
whch I'm not sure that I want to pay. And that's not |ust n prson
sentences, or crtcsm or nsuts whch I have my share of, but
even the other--you know t keeps pushng you nto ths very
pubc pace where you know there are tmes when you don't
want to be. You want to be tentatve and you want to be
uncertan and you don't want to-to--to sort of bang your fst on
the tabe and yet I know that there are tmes n the word when
you can't ook at t as what you want to do or where you want to
be. You have to ntervene. It's ke I never, ever decde to wrte
somethng n terms of my essays, you know. Lke f someone asks
mesome newspaper asks me w you wrte ths or someone asks
me, I w say no. It's |ust when somethng happens and I read
about what's happenng, and then I know that there's somethng
that hasn't been sad whch I want to say and t sets up ths
hammerng n my head and I can't keep quet and I have to do t
and I do t and I--most of the tme regret t mmedatey.
AMY GOODMAN: We have to break for statons to dentfy
themseves but we w be back wth Arundhat Roy here ve n
our frehouse studos |ust bocks from ground zero, from where
the towers of the word trade center once stood.
AMY GOODMAN: I'm Amy Goodman, wth |uan Gonzaez Our
guest s Arundhat Roy. Arundhat Roy's books: The God of Sma
Thngs, a nove; her essays coected as The Cost of Lvng, one
book; Power Potcs and her atest s War Tak, pubshed by
South End Press, an ndependent press n ths country. Arundhat
can you tak about where you grew up, where you were born,
where you grew up, and on ths day after Mother's Day, your
mother, Mary Roy.
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, I was born n a town caed Shong, that
s n the north-east of Inda. You know Inda s ke--more
compcated than the whoe of Europe, so you know, My mother
was--s from South Inda n a state caed Keraa. My father s from
Benga. I was born n Shong whch at the tme was n a state
caed Assam. But now t sn't. And my parents were dvorced
when I was about one or somethng, and I came back wth my
mother to Keraa, where I grew up n a vage caed Aymanam,
whch s the vage n whch The God of Sma Thngs s set. She
comes from a communty of Syran Chrstans who are Chrstans
who beeve they were converted at the tme when St. Thomas
traveed east after the crucfxon of Chrst. But the frst rea
evdence of that s around the 8th century. Anyway t's a very
sma parocha communty and my mother was sort of shunned
for beng ths woman who dared to marry a Hndu outsde her
communty and then got dvorced and came back to the vage
wth her chdren and so on. So I suppose now that that s behnd
me I have to ook at t as fortunate, because I grew up on the
edges of an extremey feuda, suffocatng socety whereyou know
whch was not prepared to assure me, the assurances that t
woud hod out to other sort of you know, chdren who beonged
to that communty. One was outsde t cause you were not of t.
And because I grew up n Keraa whch has tradtonay been a
communst state, t was very nterestng because you had
Chrstanty, Hndusm, Musms, Marxsts a sort of rubbng each
other down and you ved outsde the framework--I ved outsde
the framework of a ths. Growng up n a rura area, but at the
same tme havng, the-- beng educated n the ways that other
peope woud not have been n a rura area. So I keep sayng that
as a wrter t was a ucky pace to be at the top of the bottom of
the heap. Somehow, wthout the perspectve, ths sort of tunne
vson of the competey oppressed. Wthout the paranoa of the
co|mpeteyof the oppressors. Somehow you grew up n -- the
cracks between ths very compex socety.
|UAN GONZALEZ: And why was t that Keraa, beng as you
mentoned, such a feuda and rura pace coud then deveop to
have a communst admnstraton so eary on. What were the
condtons and dynamcs that gave rse to that? What knd of
mpact dd that have on your conscousness?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, don't make the mstake of assumng that
the communsts aren't feuda. They are more progressve than
others, so what they dd was to harness that feudasm to knd of
not chaenge t n some way. So the rony of course s that the
communsts are a upper caste peope and very nteectua and
so on. But the stuaton sthat's what The God of Sma Thngs s
a about, you know, where you have a Keraa s the ony pace n
Inda where they cam a hundred percent teracy and yet the
knd ofthe knd of oppresson that you see there or the knd of
atttudes towards women that you see there s so suffocatng you
know. My mother s, I ddn't tak about her. She s a remarkabe
woman. Aso someone who I often thnk knd of escaped from the
sets of a Fen fm but that's a separate thng. And she reay t
was a combnaton of her beng n ths pace where she was
shunned and you know rdcued for who she was, and so I never
grew up beng tod that I shoud pay by the rues, you know,
whch s very ucky for me. But I fnd mysef n ths reay strange
poston cause so many years of my fe I spent fghtng to escape
the suffocaton of tradton as an Indan woman, and I got there
ony to be up aganst the bestaty of the modern word whch I
don't want ether, you know so you're somehow n ths narrow
aey between these two monothc, monstrous thngs and you
know sometmes, you don't know where to go wth t. Every
snge decson that you make s a decson and a potca one,
you know, for that reason.
AMY GOODMAN: Your mother ran a schoo and aso stood up for
women's rghts n Inda?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Yeah, my mother runs a schoo. I studed there.
She started t when she eft my father. She started t wth seven
chdren, two of whom were her own. It used to be what I caed
the sdng, fodng schoo cause t used to be n the premses of
the Rotary cub. In the evenngs the men used to meet and drnk
and smoke cgarettes and throw the butts and ther drty gasses
on the foor. In the mornng we woud come and cean t a up
and you know, open up the furnture and t used to be the schoo
and then n the evenng they woud come and drty t up agan.
Now of course t's a beautfu schoo on the outskrts of ths tte
town caed Kotayem and yeah, she st runs t. It's a fabuous
pace. She became very we known my mother because you
know, she fed a case, a pubc tgaton case n the Supreme
Court of Inda, chaengng a aw whch sad that Syran Chrstan
women coud nhert one fourth of ther father's property or fve
thousand rupees whch s aboutwhch s ess than a hundred
doars, whchever s ess. So she chaenged that and sad t was
unconsttutona and the aw was changed wth retrospectve
effect gvng women equa rghts. So that was a very, very bg
thng then. Not that t has made such a huge dfference cause
whatthat was a aw n case a man ddn't eave a w, n case a
father ddn't eave a w. So now of course they are takng w-
makng casses on how to dsnhert ther daughters.
AMY GOODMAN: And now, ke t or not, Arundhat Roy, you've
ended up n court yoursef on severa occasons. One had to do
wth your own book as peope -- men n Keraa caed The God of
Sma Thngs obscene, or at east n some sectons of t. And then
n your own actvsm around the ssue of dams n Inda. Can you
tak about both?
ARUNDHATI ROY: In The God of Sma Thngs, I was accused of
corruptng pubc moraty whch the case s st n court actuay
and I keep sayng there s a technca ega ssue here because at
east t shoud have been "further corruptng pubc moraty"
snce I can't beeve pubc moraty was pure unt I came aong.
But--In Inda the ega system s ke ths umberng thng. It's
partke 75% of t s about harassment. It's not about convcton.
It's not about what w happen at the end. It's about court
appearances and payng awyers and dsruptng your fe and so
on. You know t's used for that reason. For me to go from Deh to
Keraa to appear t's amost ke gong from Deh to London t's so
far away. And I' go there and the |udge w arrve and he says
"everybody s ready to argue the case," and he says "everytme
ths case comes before me I get chest pans and I don't want to
decde t." You know cause he knows that everybody s watng
for hm to say somethng and he doesn't want to so, then t's
dsmssed and t's been gong on for years. The other one s much
more serous, was much more serous and s much more serous.
Because, you know there are two ways of ookng at t. One s |ust
personay the court harassng a wrter, a famous wrter or
whatever. But that's not as mportant as f I can expan an ssue
of democracy. Because you see peope now have begun to thnk
of democracy as eectons, you know, that's t. That's the ony
genufecton you have to make n the drecton of democracy. But
n actua fact, t s a atera system of checks and baances wth
varous nsttutons checkng each other and baancng each
other.
Now n Inda, the Supreme Court s perhaps the most powerfu
nsttuton n our so-caed "democracy". And now t takes
decsons whch aret's a mcro-management of Indan socety. It
decdes whether sums shoud be ceared, whether dams shoud
be but, whether ndustry shoud be prvatzed, whether dese
shoud be the pubc fue or t shoud be compressed natura gas,
whether ndustry shoud be moved out of a cty or not, whether
hstory text books shoud contan such and such a chapter or not,
whether ths mosque shoud be but or not. Every snge decson
s taken today by the Supreme Court of Inda. Now there s a aw
caed contempt of court whch says that you cannot crtcze the
Supreme Court. You can crtcze a |udgment, but you can't say,
put a seres of |udgments together and say "ook there's a very
dstnct potcs emergng here." A wde -- you can't queston t
except n ther terms et's say. So that makes t an nsttuton
whch s competey undemocratc. And I was you know haued up
on contempt of court. And I was sayng: "You can't have ths aw.
You can't have ths aw and ca yoursef a democracy. It's a
|udca dctatorshp." And that's what t s. Peope are terrfed,
terrfed of the Supreme Court.
|UAN GONZALEZ: And why do you thnk that that has evoved n
that way, ths |udca dctatorshp? What n the potca
deveopment of Indan socety has aowed the court to exercse
such power?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We I thnk the phosophca answer to that s
we are st a feuda socety who ooks to authorty somehow, you
know. But reay what has happened s that, you know, power
ooks for ways n whch to subvert democracy at a tmes. And so
you have a stuaton where you have a very corrupt potca ete.
You have a meda that s ncreasngy becomng a corporate
meda. And so you have ths court. It's ke you have a system.
You have ths contempt of court now, whch s a aw, whch
means that the court works ke a manhoe, ke a foor trap. It
attracts a the power because t's not accountabe and t's abe to
exercse unaccountabe power. Today, f I had documentary
evdence of a corrupt |udge - say I had evdence of a |udge
havng taken a brbe for makng a partcuar |udgment I can't put
that evdence before the court because t's contempt of court.
Truth s not a defense n contempt of court. So you can magne
the extent of power that s beng exercsed. It's competey
unaccountabe. And now havng put me n |a on ths, what has
happened s that the message has gone out to the Indan meda
that "Don't mess wth us f we can do ths to her, you thnk of
what we can do to a |ournast n a tte town who has no money,
who can't hre a awyer, who doesn't have the protecton of, you
know, beng a pubc fgure." They can |ust be thrown n |a. They
ose ther |obs. They ose everythng. So they |ust aow the court
ths wde berth. And t keeps gong. You know, sometmes t
makes |udgments whch are good. But most of the tme, ts
|udgments, at the moment, are retrogressve, you know? And of
course those |udgments sut the mdde cass; t suts the Indan
ete so the court s a hoy cow. So they say "Oh but how can she,
you know, ke, - there shoud be respect for somethng, you
know? That herarchca way of thnkng.
AMY GOODMAN: We're takng to Arundhat Roy, author of The
God of Sma Thngs. Her atest book s War Tak. We' be back
wth her n a mnute.
musc break)
AMY GOODMAN: Shea Chandra Roots and Wngs here on
Democracy Now!, the War and Peace report. I'm Amy Goodman
and, wth |uan Gonzaez, our guest s the accamed wrter,
Arundhat Roy, author of The God of Sma Thngs, The Cost of
Lvng, Power Potcs, and War Tak. War Tak s her atest book,
coecton of essays. You were |ust takng about gong to court.
Maybe f you coud brefy te us about the ssue of the dams n
Inda. And then we can tak about, for those who watch us on TV
n our breaks, we were |ust showng Gu|arat. You can tak about
what's happenng there.
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, the ssue of bg dams n Inda s reay
somehow a mcrocosm t's not a mcrocosm; t's such a bg ssue
but t tes the story of modern Inda and the mode of
deveopment that that country has chosen to foow. There s a
rver caed the Narmada n centra Inda, whch, you know, on
whch ths Narmada Vaey Deveopment Pro|ect has proposed to
bud 3,200 dams on a snge rver. Now for years, there's been a
very spectacuar resstance movement aganst the budng of
these dams by peope who stand to be dspaced by them. And n
eary 1999, n an nterm |udgment, the Supreme Court decded
to aow ths very controversa dam to be but. And I wrote an
essay caed "The Greater Common Good" where I... you know
when I traveed n the Narmada Vaey and found thngs that
shocked me, shocked me. Among whch were not the facts that
exst but the facts that don't exst. And one of them was that
there were no fgures for how many peope have been dspaced
by bg dams n Inda because bg dams are ke secuar tempes,
you know? And I cacuated that fgure to be 33 mon peope,
whch of course at the tme I wrote the essay, was marked and
peope sad "How can that be?" and so on. Subsequenty, the
Word Commsson on Dams dd an Inda country study where
they paced t at amost 56 mon peope, a of whom are
obvousy the poorest, the "untouchabes," the ndgenous
peopes. And so the whoe thng agan s a crtque of how you
centraze natura resources; how you snatch them from the poor
and redstrbute them to the rch. And that process of course was
carred out pretty successfuy by the corrupt Indan state, as n
a thrd word countres. But now t's become even worse,
because that process s beng prvatzed. And the, you know, t's
ke... everybody thought, "Oh ths doesn't work for us so maybe
prvatzaton w make t a effcent and |ust." And n fact t's ke
gvng a maara patent medcne for |aundce. It's become so
very much worse, so very frghtenng. Thousands of peope are
now beng pushed off ther ands, not |ust by dams but by the
corporatzaton of agrcuture, the prvatzaton of water, you
know, the whoe process of the WTO. And now you have reports
from a over of Indan farmers commttng sucde by the
hundreds because they are not abe to cope. And there's a
drought oomng. So obvousy these are ssues that are compex
and I can't reay, you know, I can't convey anythng but the
urgency on a rado program. But I have wrtten about t n some
depth.
|UAN GONZALEZ: You tak, agan n the speech you dd at Porto
Aegre, whch s reproduced n your book War Tak about not
beng forced to choose between the mad mooahs and the
maevoent Mckey Mouses as a choce that was beng confronted
by many peope n the Thrd Word. But nterestng that I've
mentoned ths on the program severa tmes, the Pakstan
Marxst Tarq A n hs book, Cash of Fundamentasms, ays out
the theory that reay the resurgence of fundamentasm, n the
Mdde East especay, was a drect product of Brtsh and
Amercan mperasm. And ther attempts to prevent the Indan
modernsts, Gandh and others, from movng forward, to prevent
the Egyptan progressves of the 1950s and 60s they supported
the rse of fundamentasm and n essence there s some te
between the contnung process of mperasm, both Brtsh and
US, and the rse of fundamentasm n the Mdde East and n Inda
and Pakstan. I'm wonderng your thoughts about that.
ARUNDHATI ROY: I competey agree, except that he shoud brng
Inda nto t too. If you ook at thngs now, there has never been a
cose assocaton between the US government and any Indan
government before. And today we have what can ony be
descrbed as a very quck march towards fascsm, towards
regous fascsm. And the Indan government and the Indan
government and the Israe government are more or ess agned
on ths, you know? And f you see how there's a connecton, not
|ust between - yeah, we corporate gobazaton s a pro|ect of
mperasm, f you ke. And you see how cosey those two thngs
are aed and you see how what s happenng n Inda the
massacre, the state-supervsed massacre of Musm peope on
the street of Gu|arat s not beng condemned; s beng aowed
to... s amost beng approved of now n the way thngs are gong
there. And of course, there's a nk between... t suts ths pro|ect
reay we, fundamentasm, regous fundamentasm of any
knd.
AMY GOODMAN: Gu|arat. It s between who?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Between Hndus and Musms and...
AMY GOODMAN: But where does the government stand on ths?
ARUNDHATI ROY: (aughs) The Indan government today s the
B|P, whch has t s caed the sang parvar whch n Hnd means
"the famy" you know, of bascay Hndu rght-wng potca
partes, cutura guds, goon squads. And between themseves,
they dvde the abor. But ast year at ths tme, n Gu|arat, the B|P
government headed by a person caed Narendra Mod,
sponsored, supervsed, oversaw the saughter of 2000 Musms on
the streets of Gu|arat. 150,000 were drven from ther homes.
Women were gang-raped and burned ave. And after that, he
won the eectons, you know? It's a very bg crss for our noton of
democracy. Whe that was happenng, whe the saughter was
happenng on the streets of Gu|arat, I was beng put nto prson
for contempt of court by the Supreme Court. Not a snge
murderer, not a snge person there was proceeded aganst. But
they a stood for eectons. And they won. So how do you ca that
democracy? What s the dfference between democracy and
ma|ortaransm and where does t shade nto fascsm? And where
does natonasm ft n a ths?
AMY GOODMAN: You tak about the ma|or forces that peope on
the ground are up aganst when you tak about the dams, when
you tak about gobazaton. If we can end aso on the ssue of
war, nvason, and now, occupaton -- what about the force of the
peope? I thnk of the women, your frends, who are wng to
drown, to stand n the areas that they are supposed to be
dspaced from to say "the waters can rse; we won't eave."
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, you know, I thnk we need to... I'm n a
state rght now where I fee that we need to reexamne our deas
of resstance. I thnk we need to thnk about ths very carefuy,
because we saw perhaps the most spectacuar dspay of pubc
moraty ever on the 15th of February when mons of peope
across fve contnents marched aganst the war. It was dscarded
wth dsdan. Those marches were mportant. Those marches
were mportant for us to ray our forces, to understand our
strengths. But those marches ddn't affect the other sde. So we
need to now understand that the tme has come for cv
dsobedence to become rea. It's no onger symboc. The
marches can ony be the symbo of somethng ese that's rea
that we are dong, you know? Our meetngs n Porto Aegre, our
marches, and our demonstratons are for us. But they are not
weapons when usng aganst them, you know? So we need to now
change our way of thnkng to be effectve. It's enough of beng
rght; now we need to wn. And now we need to wn not
necessary by confrontng empre, but by takng t apart part by
part, and dsabng those parts. I thnk we need to make a st of
every snge company that has benefted from a reconstructon
contract n Iraq and we need to go after them and we need to
shut them down. That's what we need to do. We can't thnk
that...t's beyond the stage of resstance songs and marches;
those are for us. Those are mportant for us. But we need to pck
these peope off one by one because we can't confront empre.
We can't confront t a together. We can't...nobody can dea wth
Amerca's war machne. But we need to reverse those sanctons,
you know. We need to make peope sanctons. We need to ook to
our strengths and do t rght. We need to... undo the nuts and
bots of empre.
|UAN GONZALEZ: And t coud aso be though that the reachng
deeper nto the popuatons of these varous countres so that
those sectors of the popuaton, whether t's peope who work n
these ndustres or the peope who provde the shppng for the
tankersSn other words, at a certan pont a movement w reach
those sectors of the popuaton that have a decsve mpact, f
they're organzed suffcenty, to push back.
ARUNDHATI ROY: Absoutey. You need to get to the peope who
say "We w not move ths msse from the warehouse to the
dock."
|UAN GONZALEZ: (overappng) Or the soders. Or the soders
themseves.
ARUNDHATI ROY: Yeah.
AMY GOODMAN: And do you see that happenng? Is there
somewhere that s gvng you hope?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, I thnk I'm a pre-programmed optmst,
you know? So I'm the wrong person to ask. But I thnk the pont
s, that for peope ke us, we have to do ths anyway. We have to
do what we do anyway, whether there's hope or despar s a way
of seeng. But even f there wasn't hope, I woud st be dong
what I do. Because that's what I do; that's who I am; that's how I
am. So we can't be ony fghtng because there's hope. If there's
ony despar, the reasons to fght are even greater.
AMY GOODMAN: We I want to thank you very much for beng
wth us. When you speak at Rversde Church, what w the name
of your speech be? Have you decded yet?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, t's caed Instant Mx Impera Democracy:
Buy One, Get One Free.
AMY GOODMAN: We, I very much ook forward to seeng t and
hearng you speak then afterwards to Howard Znn. And n NY,
there st s overfow seatng. The tckets sod out wthn hours of
them gong out, I thnk about a month ago. Thousands of peope
have aready gotten tckets. It's up at Rversde Church on the
Upper West Sde of Manhattan f peope want to go tomorrow
nght, Tuesday nght at 7:00. Arundhat Roy, I want to thank you
very much for beng wth us. It's been a prvege.
ARUNDHATI ROY: Thank you, Amy.
AMY GOODMAN: Arundhat Roy, her atest book s War Tak. It s
pubshed by South End Press. And that does t for the program.
Arundhati Roy on Shekhar Kapur's Bandit ueen
The Great lndian Rape-Trick l
At the premere screenng of Bandt Oueen n Deh, Shekhar
Kapur ntroduced the fm wth these words: "I had a choce
between Truth and Aesthetcs. I chose Truth, because Truth s
Pure."
To nsst that the fm tes the Truth s of the utmost
commerca (and crtca) mportance to hm. Agan and agan, we
are assured, n ntervews, n revews, and eventuay n wrtng
on the screen before the fm begns. "Ths s a True Story."
If t weren't the "Truth", what woud redeem t from beng |ust
a cassy verson of your run-of-the-m Rape n' Retrbuton theme
that our fm ndustry churns out every now and then? What
woud save t from the famar accusaton that t doesn't show
Inda n a Proper Lght? Exacty Nothng.
It's the "Truth" that saves t. Every tme. It dves about ke
Superman wth a swss knfe - and snatches the fm straght from
the |aws of unsavoury gnomny. It has bought headnes. Bunted
argument. Drowned crtcsm.
If you say you found the fm dstastefu, you're tod - We
that's what truth s - dstastefu. Manpuatve? That's Lfe -
manpuatve.
Go on. Now you try.
Try...Expotatve. Or.. Gross. Try Gross.
It's a tte ke havng a daogue wth the backs of trucks.
God s Love.
Lfe s Hard.
Truth s Pure.
Sound Horn.
Whether or not t s the Truth s no onger reevant. The pont
s that t w, ( f t hasn't aready) - become the Truth.
Phooan Dev the woman has ceased to be mportant. (Yes of
course she exsts. She has eyes, ears, mbs har etc. Even an
address now) But she s sufferng from a case of Legendts. She's
ony a verson of hersef. There are other versons of her that are
|ostng for attenton. Partcuary Shekhar Kapur's "Truthfu" one,
whch we are currenty beng budgeoned nto beevng.
"... t has the knd of story, whch, f t were a pece of
fcton, woud be dffcut to credt. In fact, t s the true story of
Phooan Dev, the Indan chd brde..."
Derek Macom wrtes n The Guardan.
But s t? The True Story? How does one decde? Who
decdes?
Shekhar Kapur says that the fm s based on Maa Sen's book
- Inda's Bandt Oueen: The True Story of Phooan Dev. The book
reconstructs the story, usng ntervews, newspaper reports,
meetngs wth Phooan Dev and extracts from Phooan's wrtten
account, smugged out of prson by her vstors, a few pages at a
tme.
Sometmes varous versons of the same event - versons that
totay confct wth each other .e: Phooan's verson, a |ournast's
verson, or an eye- wtnesses verson - are a presented to the
reader n the book. What emerges s a compex, ntegent and
human book. Fu of ambguty, fu of concern, fu curosty about
who ths woman caed Phooan Dev reay s.
Shekhar Kapur wasn't curous.
He has openy admtted that he ddn`t fee that he needed to
meet Phooan. Hs producer Bobby Bed supports ths decson
"Shekhar woud have met her f he had fet a need to do so."
(Sunday Observer August 20th |1994|).
It ddn't matter to Shekhar Kapur who Phooan Dev reay
was. What knd of person she was. She was a woman, wasn't
she? She was raped wasn't she? So what dd that make her? A
Raped Woman! You've seen one, you've seen 'em a.
He was n busness.
What the he woud he need to meet her for?
Dd he not stop to thnk that there must have been somethng
very speca about her? That f ths was the norma career graph f
a ow-caste vage woman that was raped, our andscapes woud
be teemng wth femae gangsters?
If there s another bographer any where n the word who has
not done a vng sub|ect the courtesy of meetng her even once -
w you pease stand up and say your name? And havng done
that, w you (and your work) kndy take a runnng |ump?
What does Shekhar Kapur mean when he says the fm s
based on Maa Sen's book? How has he decded whch verson of
whch event s "True" ? On what bass has he made these
choces?
There's a sort of outsh arrogance at work here. A dunce's
courage. Unafrad of what t doesn't know.
What he has done s to rampage through the book pckng up
what suts hm, gnorng and even aterng what doesn't.
I am not suggestng that a fm shoud ncude every fact
that's n the book.
I am suggestng that f you take a ong hard ook at the
choces he has made - at hs ncusons, hs omssons and hs
batant ateratons, a truy dreadfu pattern emerges.
Phooan Dev (n the fm verson), has been kept on a tght
eash. Each tme she strays towards the shadowy marshands
that e between Vctmhood and Brutshness, she has been
rened n. Brought to hee.
It s of consummate mportance to the Emotona Graph of the
fm, that you never, ever, stop ptyng her. That she never
threatens the Power Baance.
I woud have thought that ths was anathema to the whoe
pont of the Phooan Dev story. That t went way beyond the You-
Rape-Me: I'-K- You equaton. That the whoe pont of t was that
she got a tte out of contro. That the Brutazed became the
Brute.
The fm wants no part of ths. Because of what t woud do to
the Emotona Graph. To understand ths, you must try and put
Rape nto ts correct perspectve. The Rape of a nce Woman
(saucy, headstrong, fou-mouthed perhaps, but bascay mora,
sexuay mora) - s one thng. The rape of a nasty/perceved-to-
be-mmora woma, s qute another. It woudn't be qute so bad.
You woudn't fee qute so sorry. Perhaps you woudn't fee sorry
at a.
Any poceman w te you that.
Whenever the poce are accused of custoda rape, they
mmedatey set to work. Not to prove that she wasn't raped. But
to prove that she wasn't nce. To prove that she was a oose
woman A prosttute. A dvorcee. Or an Eopee - e: She asked for
t.
Same dfference.
Bandt Oueen -the fm, does not make a case aganst Rape. It
makes ts case aganst the Rape of nce (read mora), women.
(Never mnd the rest of us that aren't "nce") .
|??The fm s consstenty??| t's on the ookout, ke a worred
hen - savng Phooan Dev from hersef. Meanwhe we, the
audence, are herded aong, ke so much trustng catte. We
cannot argue, (because Truth s Pure. And you can't mess Wth
that).
Every tme the Drector has been faced wth somethng that
coud dsrupt the smpe, pre- fabrcated cacuatons uf hs
coyng moraty pay, t has been tampered wth and forced to ft.
I'm not accusng hm of havng panned ths.
I beeve that t comes from a vson that has been dstorted
by hs own mdde-cass outrage, whch he has then turned on hs
audence ke a fre-fghter's hose.
Accordng to Shekhar Kapur's fm, every andmark - every
decson, every turnng-pont n Phooan Dev's fe, startng wth
how she became a dacot n the frst pace, has to do wth havng
been raped, or avengng rape.
He has |ust bundered through her fe ke a Rape-dvner
You cannot but sense hs horrfed fascnaton at the havoc
that a wee we can wreak. It's a sort of reversed mae sef
absorpton.
Rape s the man dsh. Caste s the sauce that t swms n.
The fm opens wth a pre-credt sequence of Phooan Dev the
chd beng marred off to an oder man who takes her away to hs
vage where he rapes her, and she eventuay runs away. We
see her next as a young gr beng sexuay abused bv Thakur
outs n her vage . When she protests, she s pubcy
humated, externed from the vage, and when she returns to
the vage, ends up n prson. Here too she s raped and beaten,
and eventuay reeased on ba. Soon after her reease, she s
carred away bv dacots. She has n effect become a crmna who
has |umped ba. And so has tte choce but to embark on a fe n
the ravnes.
He has the caste-busness and the rape-busness neaty
ntertwned to kck-start that "swft, dense, dramatc narratve"
(Sun Seth, Poneer August 14th |1994|)
Maa's book tes a dfferent story.
Phooan Dev stages her frst protest aganst n|ustce at the
age of ten. Before she s marred off. In fact t's the reason that
she's marred off so eary. To keep her out of troube.
She ddn't need to be raped to protest. Some of us don't.
She had heard from her mother, the story of how her father's
brusher Bhara and hs son Mayadeen fasfed the and records
and drove her father and musher out of the famy house, forcng
them to ve n a tte hut on the outskrts of the vage.
The angry tte gr accompaned by a frghtened oder sster
marches nto her unce's hora fed where the two of them hang
around wth a combatve ar, munchng hora nuts and puckng
fowers (combatvey). Ther cousn Mayadeen, a young man n
hs twentes, orders the chdren off hs premses. Phooan refuses
to move. Instead ths remarkabe chd taunts hm, and questons
hs cam to the and. She was speca.
She s beaten unconscous wth a brck.
Phooan Dev's frst war, ke amost every dacot's frst war,
was fought for terrtory. It was the cassc begnnng of the
|ourney nto dacotdom.
But does t have rape n t?
Nope.
Caste-voence?
Nope.
So s t worth ncudng n the fm?
Nope.
Accordng to the book, her second protest too, has to do wth
terrtory. And t s ths (not the sexua harassment bv the vage
outs, though that happens too), that ands Phooan Dev n |a
and enters her name n the poce records.
Mayadeen, the book says, was enraged because the property
dspute (thanks to Phooan's peas to the vage panchayat) had
been re-opened and transferred to the Aahabad Hgh Court.
As revenge he destroys Devdeen's (Phooan's father) crop,
and s n the process of hackng down ther Neem tree when
Phooan ntervenes and throws a stone at hm. She s attacked,
trussed up, and handed to the poce.
Soon after she's reeased on ba, she s kdnapped by dacots.
Ths too, accordng to Phooan's verson ( upto, ths pont, there s
no other verson), s engneered by Mayadeen as a ruse to get
her out of hs har.
Mayadeen does not fgure n the fm.
Aready some pretty bg decsons have been made. What
stays, what goes. What s hgh-ghted, what sn't.
Lfe s Rape. The rest s |us' detas.
We then see Phooan n the ravnes, beng repeatedy raped
by Babu Sngh Gu|ar, the Thakur eader of the gang she has been
kdnapped by. Vkram Maah, the second-n-command s
dsgusted by hs behavour and puts a buet through hm.
Accordng to the book the kng happens as a drunken Babu
Gu|ar s threatenng to assaut Phooan. In the fm he's actuay at
t, yng on top of her, hs naked bottoms |erkng. As he breathes
hs ast, Phooan bnks the bood out of her eyes and ooks ong
nto the eyes of her redeemer. |ust so that we get the pont.
After ths we are treated to a sequence of After-rape-
romance. The touchng bts about the frst strrngs of sexua
desre n a much-raped woman. The way t works n the fm s If-
you- touch-me-I'-sap-you-but-I-reay-do-want-to-touch-you.
It's choreographed ke a dusty dance n whch they rub
aganst each other, but whenever he touches her she swats hs
hand away, but nevertheess quvers wth desre. It s such a
crude, obvous, dotsh depcton of confct n a woman who s
attracted to a man, but assocates sex wth humaton. It's not n
the book, so I'm not sure whose verson Shekhar has used. From
the ooks of t, probaby Donad Duck's.
Vkram Maah and Phooan Dev become overs. Whe the
book and the fm agree that he was her one true ove, the book
does not suggest that he was her ony over.
The fm does. She has to be portrayed as a One Man Woman.
Otherwse who's gong to pty her? So t's vrtue or bust. One
over (a dstant cousn) s emnated competey. The other (Man
Sngh), s portrayed as what used to be known n coege as a
Rakh-brother.
From a accounts, Vkram Maah seems to have been the
mdwfe of Phooan's brth nto dacotdom.
He supervses her frst act of retrbuton aganst her husband
Putta.
The fm shows hm bound and gagged, beng beaten by
Phooan Dev wth the butt of her gun, whmperng and cryng
wth remembered rage.
At havng been raped. In the Retrbuton bts, she s aowed a
tte attude. Otherwse, (as we sha see) none at a.
But there's a sy omsson here. Accordng to the book,
accordng to Phooan Dev hersef, there were two vctms that
day. Not one.
The second one was a woman. Vdya, Putta's second wfe.
The fm hasn't tod us about a second experence Phooan
has wth Putta. The tme that Mayadeen forced her to return to
Putta. Phooan arrved at her husband's house to fnd that he
had taken a second wfe. Vdya harassed and humated Phooan
and eventuay forced Putta to send her away.
Her humaton at Vdya's hands s more recent n Phooan's
memory.
Phooan, n her wrtten verson says she wanted to k them
both and eave a note sayng that ths w be the fate of any man
who takes two wves. Later she changed her mnd and decded to
eave them ave to te the tae. She beat them both. And broke
Putta's hands and egs.
But what nce woman woud do that?
Beat up another woman?
How woud you fee sorry for someone ke that?
So, n the fm, Vdya s dumped.
Phooan's affar wth Vkram Maah ends tragcay when he s
shot.
She s captured bv hs Thakur kers, gagged, bound, and
transported to Behma. The stage s set for what has come to be
referred to as the "centerpece" of the fm. The gang-rape.
It s the scene by whch the fm s |udged.
Not surprsngy, Phooan hersef s retcent about what
happened. A she says s un ogo ne me|hse bahut mazaak k.
She mentons beng beaten, humated and paraded from
vage to vage. She mentons another woman dacot Kusuma --
who dsked her, and taunted and abused her. (Of course there's
no sgn of her n the fm. It woud ony serve to confuse the
Woman-as-vctm mora arthmetc.)
Snce Phooan sn't forthcomng, t s the vvd (vcarous)
account n Esqure by an Amercan, |ournast, |on Bradshaw that
has been ensted to structure ths scene.
"... Phooan screamed, strkng out at hm, but he was too
strong. Hodng her down, the stranger raped her. They came n
one by one after that. Ta, sent Thakur men -- and raped her
unt Phooan ost conscousness. For the next three weeks
Phooan was raped severa tmes a nght, and she submtted
senty turnng her face to the wa... she ost a sense of tme... a
oud voce summoned her outsde. Sr Ram ordered Phooan to
fetch water from the we. When she refused, he rpped off her
cothes and kcked her savagey...at ast she mped to the we
whe her tormentors aughed and spat at her. The naked gr was
dragged back to the hut and raped agan."
Whatever Shekhar Kapur's other fangs are, never et t be
sad that he wasn't a trer. He dd hs bt too. He (Poneer Aug
14th, Inda Today August 21st |1994|)ocked hmsef up n a room
- the door openng and cosng as one man after another strode n
- magnng hmsef beng sodomzed!!! After ths feat of nter-
sexua empathy, he arrves at some radca, defntve
concusons. " There s no pan n a gang-rape, no physca pan
after a whe," he assures us "It s about somethng as drty as the
ab|ect humaton of a human beng and the compete
domnaton of ts sou."
Thanks baby. I woud never have guessed.
It's hard to match the sef-rghteousness of a fm-maker wth
a cause. Harder when the fm- maker s a man and the cause s
rape.
And when t's the gang-rape of a ow-caste woman by hgh-
caste men .. don't even try t. Go wth the feeng.
We see a ot of Phooan's face, n tght cose-up, contorted
nto a grmace of fear and pan as she s raped and maued and
buggered. The overwhemng consensus n the press has been
that the rape was branty staged and chng.
That t wasn't expotatve.
Now what does that mean? Shoud we be gratefu to Shekhar
Kapur for not showng us the condton of her breasts and
gentas? Or thers? That he eaves so much to our magnaton?
That he gave us a tastefu rape?
But I thought the whoe pont of ths wonderfu fm was ts no-
hods-barred brutaty? So why stop now? Why the sudden
coyness?
I' te you why. Because t's a about reguatng the Rape-
meter. Ad|ustng t enough to make us a tte preen-at-the-gs.
Skp dnner perhaps . But not mss work.
It's us, We-the-Audence, stuck n our voyeurstc mdde-cass
ves who reay make the decsons about how much or how tte
rape/voence we can take/w appaud, and therefore, are gven.
It sn't about the story. (There are ways and ways of teng a
story) It sn't about the Truth. (There are ways around that too.
Rght?) It sn't about what Reay Happened. It's none of that hgh
fautn' stuff.
It's good od Us. We make the decsons about how much we
woud ke to see. And when the mxture's rght, t thrs us,. And
we purr wth approbaton.
It's a cass thng. If the contros are turned up too hgh, the
hordes w get excted and arrve. To watch the centrepece.
They mght even whste. They won't bother to coak ther
eagerness n concern ke we do.
Ths way, t's fne, It's |ust Us and our Imagnaton.
But hey, I have news for you - the hordes have heard and are
on ther way. They' even pay to watch. It' make money, the
centrepece. It's hot stuff
How does one grade fm-rapes on a scae from Expotatve to
Non-expotatve?
Does t depend on how much skn we see? Or s t a more
compex formua that |ugges exposed skn, gentaa, and bare
breasts?
Expotatve I'd say, s when the whoe pont of the exercse s
to stand on hgh mora ground, and nform us, (as f we ddn't
know), that rape s about ab|ect humaton.
And, as n the case of ths fm, when t expots expotaton.
Phooan has sad (Poneer, August 15 |1994|) that she thnks
they're no better sha the men who raped her. Ths
producer/drector duo.
And they've done t wthout drtyng ther hands. What was
that agan? The compete domnaton of the sou? I guess you
don't need hands to hod sous down.
After the centrepece, the fm rushes through to ts
concuson.
Phooan manages to escape from her captors and arrves at a
cousn's house, where she recuperates and then eventuay
teams up wth Man Sngh who ater becomes her over, (though of
course the fm won't admt t).
On one foray nto a vage wth her new gang, (one of the
ony tmes we see her ndugng n some non-rape-reated
bandtry), we see her wanderng through a vage n a daze, wth
farng nostrs, whe the men oot and punder. She sn't even
scared when the poce arrve. Before she eaves she smashes a
gass case, pcks out a par of sver ankets and gves t to a tte
gr.
Sweet.
When Phooan and her gang, arrve n Behma for the
denouement, everybody fees ndoors except for a baby that s
for some reason, eft by the we, The gang fans out and gathers
the Thakurs who have been marked for death. Suddeny the
coour seeps out of the fm and everythng becomes beached
and dream sequency. It a turns very conceptua. No bruta cose-
ups. No bestaty.
A gr's gotta do what a gr's gotta do.
The twenty-two men are shot The baby waows around n
rvers of bood. Then coour eaches back nto the fm.
And wth that, accordng to the fm, she's more or ess
through wth her busness. The fm certany, s more or ess
through wth her. Because there's no more rape. No more
retrbuton.
Accordng to the book, t s reay ony after the Behma
massacre that Phooan Dev grows to ft her egend. There's a
prce on her head, peope are bayng for her bood, the gang
spnters. Many of them are shot by the poce. Mnsters and
Chef-mnsters are n a fap. The poce are n a panc . Dacots
are beng shot down n fake encounters and ther bodes are
pubcy dspayed ke game. Phooan s hunted ke an anma.
But roncay, t s now, for the frst tme that she s n contro of
her fe. She becomes a eader of men. Man Sngh becomes her
over, but on her terms. She makes decsons. She confounds the
poce. She evades every trap they set for her./ She pays darng
tte games wth them. She undermnes the credbty of the
entre UP poce force. And a ths tme, the poce don't even
know what she reay ooks ke.
Even when the famous Makhan Sngh surrenders, Phooan
doesn't.
Ths goes on for two whoe years. When she fnay does
decde to surrender, t s after severa meetngs wth a persuasve
poceman caed Ra|endra Chaturved, the SP of Bhnd, wth
whom she negotates the terms of her surrender to the
government of Madhya Pradesh.
Is the fm nterested n any of ths?
Go on. Take a wd guess.
In the fm, we see her and Man Sngh on the run, tred,
starved and out of buets. Man Sngh seems concerned, practca
and stoca.
Phooan s cryng and askng for her mother!!!
The next thng we know s that we're at surrender. As she
gves up her gun, she ooks at Man Sngh and he gves her an
approvng nod.
Good Gr! Cever gr!
God Cever Gr
Phooan Dev spent three-and-a-haf years n the ravnes. She
was wanted on 48 counts of ma|or crme, 22 murder, the rest
kdnaps-for-ransom and ootng.
Even smpe mathematcs tes me that we've been tod |ust
haf the story.
But the coo word for Haf-truth s Greater-truth.
Other sgns of crcuar ogc are begnnng to surface.
Such as: Lfe s Art
Art s not Rea
How about changng the tte of the fm to: Phooan Dev's
Rape and Ab|ect Humaton: The True haf-Truth?
How about sendng t off to an underwater fm festva wth
ony one entry?
What responsbty does a bographer have to hs sub|ect?
Partcuary to a vng sub|ect?
None at a?
Does t not matter what she thnks or how ths s gong to
affect her fe?
Is he not even bound to shovv her the work before t s
reeased for pubc consumpton?
If the ssues nvoved are cupabe crmna offenses such
as Murder and Rape - f some of them are st pendng n a court
of aw -- egay, s he aowed to present con|ecture, reasonabe
assumpton and hearsay as the unaoyed "Truth?"
Shekhar Kapur has made an appea to the Censor Board to
aow the fm through wthout a snge cut. He has sad that the
Fm, as a work of Art, s a whoe, f t were censored t woudn't
be the same fm.
What about the Lfe that he has fashoned hs Art from?
He has a competev dfferent set of rues for that.
It's been severa months snce the fm premered at
Cannes. Severa weeks snce the showngs n Bombay and Deh.
Thousands of peope have seen the fm. It's beng nvted to
festvas a over the word.
Phooan Dev hasn't seen the fm. She wasn't nvted.
I met her yesterday. In the mornng papers Bobby Bed had
dsmssed Phooan's statements to the press -- " Let Phooan st
wth me and pont out naccuraces n the fm, I w counter her
accusatons effectvey, " (Sunday Observer, August 21st |1994|).
What s he gong to do? Expan to her how t reay happened?
But t's deeper than that. Hs story to the press s one
thng. To Phooan t's qute another. In front of me she rang hm
up and asked hm when she coud see the fm. He woud not gve
her a defnte date.
What's gong on?
Prvate screenngs have been organsed for powerfu
peope. But not for her.
They hadn't barganed for ths. She was supposed to be
safey n |a. She wasn't supposed to matter. She sn't supposed
to have an opnon.
"Rght now", the Sunday Observer says, "Bobby Bed s
more concerned about the Indan Censor Board than a grumbng
Phooan Dev."
Legay, as thngs stand, n UP the charges aganst her
haven't been dropped. (Muayam Sngh has tred, but an appea
aganst ths s pendng n the Hgh Court).
There are severa versons of what happened at Behma.
Phooan denes that she was there. More mportanty, two of the
men who were shot at but ddn't de say she wasn't there. Other
eye- wtnesses say she was. Nothng has been proved. Everythng
s con|ecture.
By not showng her the fm, but keepng her quet unt t's
too ate to protest (unt t has been passed by the Censors and
the show hts the road), what are they dong to Phooan? By
appearng to reman sent, s she concurrng wth the fm verson
of the massacre at Behma? Whch states, unequvocay, that
Phooan was there. W t appear as though she s admttng
evdence aganst hersef? Does she know that whether or not the
fm tes the Truth t s ony a matter of tme before t becomes
the Truth. And that pubc sympathy for beng shown as a rape-
vctm doesn't get you off the hook for murder?
Are they hepng her to put her head n a noose?
On the one hand the concerned cowboys Messrs Bed &
Kapur are so eager to share wth us the ab|ect humaton and
the domnaton of Phooan Dev's "sou", and o n the other they
seem to be so totay unnterested n her.
In what she thnks of the fm, or what ther fm w do to
her fe and future.
What s she to them? A concept? Or |ust a cunt?
One ast terrfyng thng. Whe she was st n |a, Phooan
was rushed to hospta beedng heavy because of an ovaran
cyst. Her womb was removed. When Maa Sen asked why ths
had been necessary, the prson doctor aughed and sad " We
don't want her breedng any more Phooan Dev's."
The State removed a woman's uterus! Wthout askng
her .Wthout her knowng.
It |ust reached nto her and pucked out a part of her!
It decded to contro who was aowed to breed and who
wasn't.
Was ths even mentoned n the fm?
No. Not even n the rong ttes at the end
When t comes to gettng bums on seats, hysterectomy |ust
doesn't measure up to rape.
- August 22nd, '94
The Great lndian Rape-Trick ll
I've tred.
But I'm afrad I smpy cannot see another pont of vew on
ths whoe busness.
The queston s not whether Bandt Oueen s a good fm or a
bad fm.
The queston s shoud t exst at a?
If t were a work of fcton, f the fm-makers had taken the
rsk that every fcton wrter takes, and tod a story, then we coud
begn to dscuss the fm. Its artstc mert, ts performances, ts
edtng, the convcton behnd ts soca comment...
If ths had been the case, I, as the wrter of fms that have
been nfntey ess successfu, woud not have commented.
The troube s that Bandt Oueen cams nothng ess than
"Truth". The fm-makers have nsured themseves aganst
accusatons of ncompetence, exaggeraton, even gnorance, by
usng a vng human beng.
Unfortunatey, to protect themseves from these
(comparatvey) sma rsks, they had to take one bg one. The
dce were oaded n ther favour. It neary pad off . But then, the
whoy unantcpated happened. Phooan Dev spot everythng
by beng reeased from prson on ba. And now, before our eyes,
n decous sow-moton, the house of cards s coapsng.
As t fods softy to the foor, t poses the Bg Ouestons. Of
Truth. Of |ustce. Of Lberty.
A man who read my essay of ast week, came up to me and
sad "She's scum. Why are you gettng nvoved wth her?"
I'm not sure I know how one defnes scum. But for the sake of
the argument, et's assume that she s.
Phooan Dev (Scum. ) - ke a degree from an unknown
Unversty.
Does Scum have Cv Rghts?
It took a Saman Rushde to make the word dscuss the
Freedom of Expresson. Not an End Byton. And so, to dscuss an
ndvdua's rght to |ustce, t takes a Phooan Dev. Not the Pope.
In yesterday's papers, the Charman of the Censor Board
defended the deay n cearng some fms on Ra|v Gandh. "The
troube wth potca fms", he sad, "s that they are about rea
peope. They must be absoutey true."
In the eyes of the Law, are Ra|v Gandh and Phooan Dev
equay rea?
Or s one a tte more rea that the other?
As we watch the drama unfod n the press, one thng has
become absoutey cear. The most eusve, the most engmatc,
the most ntangbe character of a, s the "Truth". She hardy
appears. She has no nes. Perhaps t's safe to assume that the
pay sn't about her at a. If so, then what are we eft wth?
Versons.
Versons of the story. Versons of the woman hersef.
We have the verson of her n the fm: Poor Phooan. Raped
and re-raped and re-re-raped unt she takes to crme and guns
down twenty-two Thakur Rapsts. (Forgve her, the fm says to us
) We have the verson of her panted by the producers now that
she's protested about ther fm : Manpuatve, cunnng, tryng to
ht them for more money. (Look at the greedy btch!) We have
the verson of her that appears n the papers: Ex-|abrd. Frtng
wth potcs. Tryng to ad|ust to marred fe, manpuated by her
husband and her French Bographers.
And these are ony some of them.
We have versons of her story.
Phooan's verson.
Maa Sen's book that cams to be based on Phooan's
"wrtngs".
Ths fm that cams to be based on Maa Sen's book.
And these are ony some of them.
As aways, when we cannot agree, we must turn to Law.
Study contracts. Examne promses. Scrutnze sgnatures
What does Phooan's contract say? Or, more accuratey, what
do Phooan's contracts say?
They say qute smpy, a three of them, that the fm was to
be based on Phooan's wrtngs, .e. The fm was to be Phooan
Dev's verson of her story.
Not Maa Sen's verson. Not Shekhar Kapur's verson. Not your
or my verson. Not even the "True" verson (f such a thng
exsts), but Phooan's verson.
You see, t turns out that Maa Sen's book was pubshed ong
after the frst contract wth Phooan was sgned.
The frst agreement for the purchase of the rghts to
Phooan's verson was wth |aa Agha's company caed ANANCY
FILMS. It was sgned n 1988. The contract ceary states (under-
ned rght across the top) that t was to be a Documentary fm
"reatng to Indan bandtry and your roe theren." Havng made
ths cear, the contract refers to t as "the Fm"
Another agreement was sgned n 1989 nformng Phooan
that the rghts to her "wrtngs" now beonged to Channe Four.
The thrd etter was ssued n 1992 bv B V Vdeographcs, S.S.
Bed's company, affrmng the agreement between Phooan Dev
and Channe Four, and nformng her that they were the atest n
the ne of successon to the rghts of her story.
The contracts, smugged n and out of prson by Phooan's
famy n tffn carrers, are vague and cursory. Couched n ths
vagueness there s a sort of dsdan. Of the educated for the
terate. Of the rch for the poor. Of the free for the ncarcerated.
It's ke the atttude of a memsahb gettng her ayah to undertake
to vacate the servants' quarter n the event that she's sacked.
Essentay, Phooan Dev seems to have gven Chae Four the
rghts to fm her verson of the story of her fe. In return for the
sum of a tte over fve thousand pounds. Less than one percent
of the sx hundred and ffty thousand pound budget of the fm.
(What was that about her beng greedy?)
Anyway Let us assume that t a started out n god fath. That
they ntended to make a Documentary Fm. Somewhere aong
the way t became a Feature fm. They took care of that n the
sma prnt. Okay.
In the ast cause of the agreement(s), they gave themseves
the rght to "cut, ater and adapt the wrtngs and use aone or
wth other matera and/or accompaned by edtora comment."
Heren (they beeve) es ther savaton.
What dd they mean by ths cause? What dd they ntend
when they ncuded ths n the contract?
To me, as a wrter of fms, t seems far enough. You must
have the rght to cut, ater and adapt your source matera. Of
course you must. Uness you want to make a fm that s exacty
as ong as the fe of your sub|ect.
But does "cut, ater, and adapt" ncude Dstort and Fasfy?
The Producers' (by now pubc, and wrtten) refusa to show
Phooan the orgna verson of the fm (the one that has been
seen and revewed and s now on ts Word Tour) suggests that
they know they have done her a terrbe n|ustce. But they say
they are not worred because they have a "foo-proof" (Inda
Today, August 21st) contract wth her. What does ths mpy?
That they deberatey set out cheat and msead her? That they
conned an terate woman nto sgnng away her rghts? I don't
know. I'm askng.
Surey the fact that they were deang wth an terate
woman ony ncreases ther obgaton to her?
Surey t was up to them, to check and counter-check the
facts wth her? To read her the scrpt, to fne-tune the detas, to
show her the rough-cut before the fm was shown to the rest of
the word?
Instead what do they do? They never meet her once. Not
even to sgn the contracts . They re-nvent her fe. Her oves. Her
rapes. They mpcate her n the murder of twenty-two men that
she denes havng commtted.
Then they try to sther out of showng her the fm!
"Cut, ater and adapt"? -- s that what t's caed?
Coud t be that the fm's success, and the Producers' (and
Drector's) batant expotaton of ths person, both have to do
wth the same thng? That she's a woman, that she's poor, and
terate, and has (they assume) no court of appea? Whch s why
she became a bandt n the frst pace? What they haven't got
yet. The pont that they seem to keep on mssng (n the fm, and
otherwse), s that she's no vctm. She's a fghter. Unfortunatey,
ths tme she's on ther terrtory. Not hers.
After I saw the fm, whch was about three weeks ago, I have
met Phooan severa tmes.
Intay, I dd not speak of the fm to her, because I beeved
that t woud have been wrong of me to nfuence her opnon. The
burden of my song so far, has been Show her the fm. I ony
supported her demand that she had a rght, a ega rght to see
the fm that cams to be the true story of her fe.
My opnon of the fm has nothng to do wth her opnon.
Mne doesn't matter.
Hers does.
More than anyone ese's.
Two days ago, on the 1st of September, when the Producer
reped to Phooan's ega notce, makng t absoutey cear that
he woud not show her the orgna, nternatona verson of the
fm, (the verson that has been wrtten about, and so gowngy
revewed), I sat wth her and tod the sequence of events, scene
by scene.
The dscrepances, the departures, the outrght fabrcatons
are frghtenng. I wrote about some of them ast week. I ddn't
know then |ust how bad t reay was.
Phooan ddn't wrte any prson dares. She coudn't. She
narrated them to someone who was wth her n |a. The wrtngs
were smugged out and gven to Maa Sen. Maa Sen peced them
together, and wrote frst a scrpt, then a book. The book presents
severa versons of the story. Incudng Phooan's. The fm
doesn't, Maa Sen's book, and Bandt Oueen the fm dffer
radcay, not |ust n fact, but n sprt. I beeve that her fm scrpt
was atered by the makers of the fm.
Substantay atered. It departs from the book as we as from
Phooan's verson of her story.
Snce I have not seen Phooan's dares, I can ony read the
extracts pubshed n Maa Sen's book and assume that they are
accurate. Maa Sen quotes her: "...what I am wrtng s read by
many, and wrtten by those I do not know so we..."
What a terrbe poston to be n! What easy meat for |ackas!
Accordng to Maa Sen, Phooan Dev was reuctant to even
dscuss rape:
"There are varous versons of what happened to Phooan
Dev after Vkram Maah's death. When I spoke to her she was
reuctant to speak of her bezath (dshonour) as she put t, at the
hands on the Thakurs. She dd not want to dwe on the detas
and merey sad "Un ogo ne mu|hse bahut mazak k". I was not
surprsed at her retcence to eaborate. Frst of a, because we
had an audence, ncudng members of her famy, other
prsoners and ther reatves. Secondy because we ve n
socetes where a woman who s abused sexuay ends up feeng
deepy humated, knowng that many w thnk that t was her
faut, or party her faut. That she provoked the stuaton n the
frst pace. Phooan Dev, ke many other women a over the
word, fees she w ony add to her own shame f she speaks of
ths experence."
Does ths sound ke a man who woud have agreed to have
her humaton re-created for the word to watch? Does ths
sound ke the book that a fm repete wth rape coud be based
on? Every tme Maa Sen quotes Phooan as sayng " un ogo ne
mu|hse bahut mazaak k the Drector of the fm has assumed
that she meant that she was raped. "How ese can a woman be
expected to express the shame heaped on her...asks Kapur."
(August 31st |1994|, Inda Today) And n the fm he does not shy
away from dweng on detas. Oh no. That's woman stuff. When
Phooan won't provde hm wth the detas, he goes ahead and
uses the whoy vcarous account of some Amercan |ournast
from "Esqure ". The man wrtes wth sk and feeng. Amost as
though he was there. (I've quoted from ths at ength n The Great
Indan Rape-Trck I)
Assumng, for the sake of argument, that whenever Phooan
says "mu|hse mazaak k" she does n fact mean that she was
raped. Do they have the rght to show t? In a t's expct deta?
Ths rases the queston of an Indvdua's Rght to Prvacy. In
Phooan Dev's case, not |ust Prvacy, Sexua Prvacy. And not |ust
nfrngement. Outrght assaut.
In the rape scenes n the fm, (Phooan Dev s shown beng
raped by her husband, raped by Babu Gu||ar, raped by the poce
and gang-raped bv the Thakurs of Behma), her humaton and
degradaton coud not possby, be more expct.
Whe I watched ths, I remember feeng that usng the
dentty of a vng woman, re-creatng her degradaton and
humaton for pubc consumpton, was totay unacceptabe to
me. Dong t wthout her consent, wthout her specfc, wrtten
repeated, whoe-hearted, unambguous, consent, s monstrous. I
cannot beeve that t has happened. I cannot beeve that t s
beng condoned.
I cannot beeve that t s not a crmna offense.
If t were a fctona fm, where rape was beng examned as
an ssue, f t were a fctona character that was beng raped, t
woud be an entrey dfferent ssue. I woud be gad to enter nto
an argument about whether showng the rape was necessary,
whether or not t was "expotatve".
The Accused - a fm that chaenges accepted norms about
what consttutes rape and what doesn't, hardy shows the act of
rape at a!
Bandt Oueen on the other hand, has nothng ntegent to
say about the sub|ect beyond the fact that Rape s degradng and
humatng. Dweng on the Degradaton and the Humaton s
absoutey essenta for the commerca success of the fm.
Wthout t, there woud be no fm. The ntensty of these
emotons s ncreased to fever-ptch because we're tod - She's
rea . Ths happened.
And fathfuy, our crtcs go home and wrte about t. Prase t
to the skes.
Who are we to assess a vng woman's rape? Who are we to
decde how we done t was? How Bruta? How Chng? How
true-to-fe?
Who the he are we?
Had I been raped, perhaps I woud devote my every wakng
hour to ca for stffer egsaton, harsher punshment for rapsts.
Perhaps I'd take essons from Lorena Bobbtt. What I woud never
ever do, and I don't magne that anyone ese has (even those
who oved the fm so much) woud ether -- s to agree to have t
re-created as entertanment coaked n the guse of concern, for
an audence that was gong to pay to watch. It woud be ke
beng raped a over agan. And roncay, the more skfu the
Drector, the greater woud be my shame and humaton.
I am dsgusted that I was nvted to Sr Fort to watch Phooan
Dev beng raped - wthout her permsson. Had I known that she
had not seen the fm, I woud never have gone. I know that there
are vdeo tapes of Bandt Oueen dong the rounds n Deh
drawng rooms. If any of you who reads ths essay has a tape -
Pease Do the rght thng. Show t to Phooan Dev (snce the
Producers won't). Ask her whether she mnds your watchng or
not.
Gven a ths, to ca Phooan Dev's protests and demands to
see the fm " Tantrums" (Amta Mak, 'Sunday', 28th August
|1994|) and "Grumbng" (Sunday Observer, 21st August |1994| s
so sma-mnded, so bnkered that t's unbeevabe. And
unforgveabe.
I've tred so hard to understand how t coud possby be that
so many ntegent peope have not seen through ths charade. I
can ony thnk, that to them a "True Story' s |ust another knd of
story. That "Truth" s merey a more exctng form of fcton.
They don't beeve that Phooan Dev s rea. That she actuay
exsts. That she has feengs. Opnons. A mnd. A Past. A father
that she oved ( who ddn't se her for a second-hand bcyce).
Her fe, or what they know of t, s so mpausbe, so farfetched.
So unke what Lfe means to them. It has very tte to do wth
what they assocate wth beng "human".
They cannot put themseves n her shoes - and thnk what
they'd fee f the fm had done to them what t has done to her.
The more "touched" among them don't dengrate her. They
exat her wth ther pty. From 'Woman' to 'Womanhood'.
"Indeed the strength of the fm s that t goes much
beyond Phooan Dev, who s of course the orgna peg..." (Amta
Mak, 'Sunday', August 28th)
"Kapur's fm s not the story of one extraordnary woman:
t s a manfesto about Indan womanhood." (Aexander Waker,
Evenng News)
When a woman becomes Womanhood, she ceases to be rea.
I don't need to argue ths any further, because my work has
been done for me Every tme they open ther mouths - the
Producer, the Drector and even the Actress of ths ncredbe fm
- every tme they open ther mouths, they damn themseves.
"The West has apped up the fm... t has been very tghty
edted and the essence of chd abuse and caste-dscrmnaton
comes out very strongy. Phooan s |ust a vehce for the
expresson of these..."
(S.S. Bed, 'Sunday', August 28th |1994|)
"The fm was a means of fndng deeper meanng n the
word. It was a means of dscoverng mysef. It heped me
dscover new aspects of mysef."
(Shekhar Kapur, the Drector, 'Sunday' August 28th
|1994|)
"When I was seected for the roe, I read every report on
Phooan and ooked at her pcture for hours on end to understand
her. When I was done wth a ths, I reased that I had formed an
mage of her, and worked out why she had reacted the way she
dd. After ths I dd not want to meet her because I dd not want
any contradctons to the mage I had formed of her."
(Seema Bswas, the Actress, 'Sunday', August 28th
|1994|)
In ther quest for Cassc Cnema, they've strpped a human
beng of her Rghts. Her Dgnty. Her Prvacy. Her Freedom. And
perhaps, as I w argue ater, of her Rght to Lfe tsef.
And so we move from Rape to Murder.
Phooan Dev denes havng murdered twenty-two Thakurs at
Behma. She has dened t n her statement to the Poce.She has
dened t n her "wrtngs". She has dened t to Maa Sen.
Bandt Oueen shows her present and responsbe for the
massacre of twenty-two Thakurs at Behma.
What does ths mean?
Essentay I dd not k these twenty-two men.
Yes you dd.
No I ddn't.
Yes you dd.
Cut, Ater and Adapt ?
Does Bandt Oueen the fm consttute an Interference wth
the Admnstraton of |ustce? It certany does.
Ths February, after eeven years n prson, Phooan Dev
was reeased on ba. Two days after her reease, the wdows of
Behma fed an appea aganst Muayam Sngh Yadav's pans to
drop the charges aganst Phooan Dev for the massacre of ther
husbands. Phooan's tra s st pendng n Indan Courts. If she's
found guty, she coud be hanged.
Very few know what reay happened n Behma on that
cod February nght. There was gun-fre. There were twenty-two
corpses. Those are the facts.
Was Phooan Dev there? Dd she k those men? Two of
the men who were shot but ddn't de have sad she wasn't there.
Other eye-wtnesses say that she was. There s penty of room for
doubt Certany there s that.
A we have for sure, s a Defnte Maybe.
Faced wth ths demma, wth ths great bg hoe n ther
story-ne, (Rape n' Retrbuton) - what does our 'Greatest Indan
Fm Ever Made' do?
It hagges wth the ''Truth'' ke a petty shop-keeper
The case aganst Phooan was sub-|udce and so we took
her statements about the Behma massacre where she sad she
had shot a few peope. (?) But n the fm we have not shown her
kng anybody as we dd not want t to affect her case."
(S.S. Bed, 'Sunday', August 28th |1994|)"
But what f she ddn fact k those men? Is that not an
terrbe n|ustce to the murdered men and ther fames?
Never mnd the fact that accordng to the aw, showng
Phooan Dev present, supervsng and responsbe for the
massacre, whether or not she actuay pued the trgger, does
not make her any ess cupabe.
So, n effect, the resut of ther tte arrangement wth the
"Truth", s that they've managed somethng qute remarkabe
They've got t wrong both ways. They've done both sdes an
n|ustce.
Apart from ths, n other, more subte ways, the
Interference n the Admnstraton of |ustce has aready begun.
Phooan Dev knows that the peope who made the fm
have a ot at stake. She aso knows that they have the Meda
supportng them. She knows that they are powerfu, nfuenta
peope. From where she comes from, they ook as though they
own the word They fy around t a the tme.
And who s she? What has she got to say for hersef?
That she's Inda's best-known bandt?
She's not even a free woman. She's a prsoner, out on ba.
She s terrfed. She fees cornered. She cannot be expected to be
coherent n her protest.
She beeves that a t woud take woud be a nudge here,
a wnk there, and she coud and rght back n |a. Perhaps her
fears are unfounded. But as far as she's concerned, they coud.
So what are her optons? She's caught between a rock and
a hard pace. Shoud she accept ths pubc re-enactment of her
rape, her humaton, her by now mmorta wak to the we?
Shoud she eave uncontested the accusaton that she dd ndeed
k twenty-two men?
What coud she expect n return?
A tte bt of Lberty?
Somewhat shaky, somewhat dangerous, somewhat
temporary?
When Bandt Oueen s reeased n Inda the peope who see
t w beeve that t s the Truth. It w he seen by peope n ctes
and vages. By awyers, by |udges, by |ournasts, by Phooan
Dev's famy, by the reatves of the men who were murdered n
Behma. By peope who's vson and |udgement w drecty affect
Phooan Dev's fe.
It w nfuence Courts of Law. It coud provoke retrbuton
from the Thakur communty whch has every rght to be outraged
at the apparent condonng of ths massacre. And they, |udgng by
the yard-stck of ths fm, woud be entrey |ustfed were they to
take the aw nto ther own. hands
Perhaps not here, n the suburbs of Deh. But away from
here. Where these thngs are rea and end n death.
Bandt Oueen the fm, serousy |eopardses Phooan Dev's
fe. It passes |udgements that ought to be passed n Courts of
Law. Not n Cnema Has.
The threads that connect Truth to Haf-Truths to Les coud
very qucky tghten nto a noose around Phooan Dev's neck. Or
a buet through her head. Or a knfe n her back.
Whe We-the-Audence peep saucer-eyed out of our tte
ves. Not remotey aware of the fact that our superfca
sympathy, our gnorance of the facts and our nteectua soth --
coud grease her way to the gaows.
We makes me sck.
September 3rd, '94.
Winds, rivers & rain
T H E S A L O N I N T E R V I E W
A R U N D H A T I R O Y
THE AUTHOR OF "THE GOD OF SMALL THINGS"
TALKS ABOUT INDIA, THE OBSCENITY CHARGE SHE FACES
AND HOW WRITING IS LIKE ARCHITECTURE.
BY REENA |ANA
She cams she never rewrtes or revses. Her frst nove, "The
God of Sma Thngs," has |ust won the Engsh-speakng word's
most premer honor, the Booker Prze, s pubshed n more than
20 natons, has ht No. 1 on the Sunday Tmes of London's
bestseer st and s cmbng the New York Tmes st. It has
earned her n excess of $1 mon so far and nternatona meda
attenton as she faces obscenty charges n her natve Inda for a
sensua descrpton of nter-caste ovemakng that serves as the
nove's coda. And beyond a ths, she's good. Rea good. Butt-
kckng good. So good, n fact, that |ohn Updke, when revewng
"The God of Sma Thngs" for the New Yorker, compares her
mnd-boggng debut to that of Tger Woods.
She's Arundhat Roy, and she's remarkaby tny -- hoverng
around 5-foot-2 -- despte the back patform shoes she's wearng
and new terary oness persona. An exposon of cury back har
frames her face, whch showcases neary chdke, saucer eyes
and cheekbones that erupt the moment she taks or smes. Now
n her md-30s, Roy grew up n Keraa, the Marxst Indan state n
whch "The God of Sma Thngs" s set. The nove s a
vertgnousy poetc tae of Indan boy-and-gr twns, Estha and
Rahe, and ther famy's tragedes; the story's fucrum s the
death of ther 9-year-od haf-Brtsh cousn, Sophe Mo, vstng
them on hoday.
The daughter of a Syran Chrstan mother, a dvorcee who
managed a tea pantaton (|ust ke the character of Ammu n
Roy's nove), Roy ddn't attend schoo unt she was 10. "I was my
mother's gunea pg," she expans. "She started her own schoo,
and I was her frst student." As a teenager, Roy went on to attend
boardng schoo n southern Inda and wound up at Deh's Schoo
of Pannng and Archtecture. And now, after years of supportng
hersef as an aerobcs nstructor n New Deh, she's one of the
word's most ceebrated novests. We forgve her for not
rewrtng or revsng "The God of Sma Thngs." Thank God she
ddn't. Where woud the word be wthout such a dspay of raw
gfts for sme and metaphor, rhythm and yrc? Wthout Roy's
dzzyng mcrocosm of modern Inda? Wthout such an honest and
wdy creatve (her word pays woud drve Wam Safre and any
sef-respectng dctonary reader mad) expresson of human
yearnng and |oy? Let's not thnk about a word wthout "The God
of Sma Thngs." Let's ask Roy about the word wth t.
A eyes are on Inda rght now, wth the 50th annversary
ceebraton of ts ndependence. At the same tme, a eyes are on
you and ths nove. Peope around the word are askng, "What
does t mean to be an Indan novest today? What does t mean
to be Indan?" W readers fnd the answers to these questons n
"The God of Sma Thngs"?
You know, I thnk that a story s ke the surface of water. And you
can take what you want from t. Its voubty s ts strength. But I
fee rrtated by ths dea, ths search. What do we mean when we
ask, "What s Indan? What s Inda? Who s Indan?" Do we ask,
"What does t mean to be Amercan? What does t mean to be
Brtsh?" as often? I don't thnk that t's a queston that needs to
be asked, necessary. I don't thnk aong those nes, anyway. I
thnk perhaps that the queston we shoud ask s, "What does t
mean to be human?"
I don't even fee comfortabe wth ths need to defne our country.
Because t's bgger than that! How can one defne Inda? There s
no one anguage, there s no one cuture. There s no one regon,
there s no one way of fe. There s absoutey no way one coud
draw a ne around t and say, "Ths s Inda" or, "Ths s what t
means to be Indan." The whoe word s seekng smpfcaton.
It's not that easy. I don't beeve that one cever move or one
cever book can begn to convey what t means to be Indan. Of
course, every wrter of fcton tres to make sense of ther word.
Whch s what I do. There are some thngs that I don't do, though.
Lke try to make cams of what nfuenced my book. And I w
never "defend" my book ether. When I wrte, I ay down my
weapons and gve the book to the reader.
Speakng of nfuences and defenses, your work has been
compared to Saman Rushde's. And now, n Inda, you face
charges of obscenty n Inda for the erotc endng of "The God of
Sma Thngs" -- a controversy remnscent of (but not as severe
as) Rushde's fatwa (death sentence).
I thnk that the comparson to Saman has been |ust a azy
response. When n doubt, f t's an Indan wrter, compare them to
Saman, because he's the best-known Indan wrter! When I say
ths, I fee bad, because I thnk t sounds ke I don't thnk very
hghy of hm, because I do. He's a brant wrter. I thnk crtcs
have a probem when a new wrter comes aong, because they
want to peg an dentty on them. And Saman s the most obvous
one for me. But then readers begn to assume the nfuence, and
ths sn't far.
The comparsons emerge from the need to create an anaogy, a
metaphor for readers to understand the unknown wrter's work ...
I understand that need. But then I don't understand when readers
assume that Indan wrters are "magca reasts" and suddeny
I'm a "magca reast," |ust because Saman Rushde or other
Indan wrters are "magca reasts." Sometmes peope can
msread because of such peggng. For exampe, when Baby
Kochamma s fantaszng or Rahe s observng somethng as a
chd or Ammu s dreamng n my book, t s not me, the wrter,
creatng the "magca reasm." No, what I am wrtng s what the
characters are experencng. What the reader s readng s the
character's own perceptons. Those mages are drven by the
characters. It s never me nvokng magc! Ths s reasm,
actuay, that I am wrtng.
Actuay, t's not |ust Rushde I'm compared to. There's Garca-
Mrquez, |oyce ... and Faukner, aways Faukner. Yes, I'm
compared to Faukner the most. But I've never read Faukner
before! So I can't say anythng about hm. I have, however, read
some other wrters from the Amercan South -- Mark Twan,
Harper S. Lee -- and I thnk that perhaps there's an nfuson or
ntruson of andscape n ther terature that mght be smar to
mne. Ths comparson s not that azy, because t's natura that
wrters from outsde urban areas share an envronment that s
not man-made and s changed by wnds and rvers and ran. I
thnk that human reatonshps and the dvsons between human
bengs are more bruta and straghtforward than those n ctes,
where everythng s hdden behnd was and a veneer of urban
sophstcaton.
The obscenty charges brought forth by an ndvdua awyer,
Sabu Thomas, that you face are n Keraa, the same Indan regon
you depct n your book. Is ths what you mean by "the dvsons
between human bengs are more bruta and straghtforward" n
non-urban areas? And how are you copng wth such a recepton
to your book n the very pace that nspred ts wrtng?
When the charges were frst made, I was very upset. Actuay, the
ndvdua who accused me of obscenty frst dd so when I was on
my frst book tour n the U.S. n |une, and no one tod me about t
because they ddn't want me to be upset on tour. Now, I reaze
that ths s what terature s about. Ths s the faout of terature.
It's more mportant for me to argue that -- on my terrtory. To
state MY case for terature, and freedom of speech. It's far more
mportant for me to do that than to go to book partes or on tours.
That's the rea fght, what t's a about. And that s MY terrtory,
no matter what he s tryng to do, what he s tryng to say aganst
my book. And I am not afrad, I'm capabe of deang wth ths and
dong mysef |ustce. I am gong to stake my cam. In fact, ast
week, I made an appea to the hgh court, and they decded to
gve the case to a ower court. It's a crmna case, you know; and
n Inda, even though a prvate ctzen charged me, the case
becomes "the state" vs. me! It's so unfar, the person who s
accusng me of obscenty ony photocoped the ast three pages
of my book and presented them to the court.
The vernacuar press n Inda has deat wth ths wth vcousness;
my mother, who ves n Keraa, hears of the controversy and
cannot |ust be happy for the nternatona success of the book.
Ths has been a stran. But one cannot hde from the gare of
one's own wrtng.
When I started to read "The God of Sma Thngs," t took me
some tme to fgure out who the protagonst was -- and then I
started to fee t was the pace: Inda, Keraa.
That quest s nterestng -- that quest for one man character.
There s no reason for there to be one. In fact, I thnk the center s
everyone, Ammu, Baby Kochamma, Veutha, Estha, Rahe ... they
a are the core.
Another "core" of the book s the yrcsm of your prose. The
Indan-Amercan wrter (and Saon coumnst) Chtra Baner|ee
Dvakarun has confessed to wrtng to the rhythms of Indan
musc; sometmes she reads her work out oud n pubc wth the
musc payng n the background to enhance the muscaty. Do
you have a smar approach?
I don't sten to musc when I wrte. It's about desgn to me. I'm
traned as an archtect; wrtng s ke archtecture. In budngs,
there are desgn motfs that occur agan and agan, that repeat --
patterns, curves. These motfs hep us fee comfortabe n a
physca space. And the same works n wrtng, I've found. For
me, the way words, punctuaton and paragraphs fa on the page
s mportant as we -- the graphc desgn of the anguage. That
was why the words and thoughts of Estha and Rahe, the twns,
were so payfu on the page ... I was beng creatve wth ther
desgn. Words were broken apart, and then sometmes fused
together. "Later" became "Lay. Ter." "An ow" became "A Now."
"Sour meta sme" became "sourmeta sme."
Repetton I ove, and used because t made me fee safe.
Repeated words and phrases have a rockng feeng, ke a
uaby. They hep take away the shock of the pot -- death, ves
destroyed or the horror of the settngs -- a crazy, chaotc,
emotona house, the snster move theater.
How do you react to revews that anayze your wordpays as
"wrtery" or sef-conscous?
Language s somethng I don't thnk about. At a. In fact, the truth
s that my wrtng sn't sef-conscous at a. I don't rewrte. In ths
whoe book, I changed ony about two pages. I rarey rewrte a
sentence. That's the way I thnk. Wrtng ths nove was a very
ntutve process for me. And peasurabe. So much more
peasurabe than wrtng screenpays. I get so much more
peasure from descrbng a rver than wrtng "CUT TO A RIVER."
You know, I aways beeve that even among the best wrters,
there are sefsh wrters and there are generous ones. Sefsh
wrters eave you wth the memory of ther book. Generous
wrters eave you wth the memory of the word they evoked. To
evoke a word, to communcate t to someone, s ke wrtng a
etter to someone that you ove. It's a very thn ne. For me,
books are gfts. When I read a book, I accept t as a gft from an
author. When I wrote ths book, I presented f as a gft. The reader
w do wth t what they want.
Ths s your frst nove. How dd you start wrtng t? What was
your process? How dd you gude yoursef through t?
If someone tod me ths was how I was gong to wrte a nove
before I started wrtng t, I woudn't beeve them. I wrote t out of
sequence. I ddn't start wth the frst chapter or end wth the ast
chapter. I actuay started wrtng wth a snge mage n my head:
the sky bue Pymouth wth two twns nsde t, a Marxst
processon surroundng t. And t |ust deveoped from there. The
anguage |ust started weavng together, sentence by sentence.
How dd you arrve at the fna sequence that became the nove
n ts fnshed form?
It |ust worked. For nstance, I ddn't know, when I started wrtng,
that ths book woud take pace n exacty one day. I kept movng
back and forth n tme. And then, somehow, I reazed that n
some of the scenes, the kds were grown up, and sometmes they
weren't. I wound up ookng at the scenes as dfferent moments,
moments that were refracted through tme. Reconsttuted
moments. Moments when Estha s read|ustng hs Evs puff of
har. When Estha and Rahe bow sptbas. When Ammu and
Veutha make ove. These moments, and moments ke these n
fe, I reazed, mean somethng more than what they are, than
how they are experenced as mere mnutes. They are the
substance of human happness.
Your bography on the book's dust |acket says you are "traned as
an archtect and the author of two screenpays." By other
pubshed accounts you are an aerobcs nstructor. Why and how
dd you decde to wrte a nove?
From the tme I was a very young chd, I knew n my heart that I
wanted to be a wrter. I never thought I woud be abe to become
one -- I ddn't have the fnanca opportuntes to be a wrter. But
then I started wrtng for fm, and ths started my wrtng career.
St, when I was studyng archtecture, or teachng aerobcs,
these were thngs I reay wanted to do, thngs I focused on
competey. No matter what I dd or what I do, I become absorbed
n t. And that was what happened when I started wrtng "The
God of Sma Thngs." I worked for a ong tme, and fnay, when I
saved enough money to take tme off and take the rsk of wrtng
a nove -- whch took me four and a haf years of my fe, once
agan I was abe to focus on t competey and reay en|oy wrtng
t. I was as nvoved n beng an archtect as I was wrtng ths
nove, and vce versa. I never spent tme |ust dreamng of
becomng a wrter and resentng my present state. No, my secret
was to ve my fe refusng to be a vctm. Faure -- no, I shoudn't
say "faure," rather, the "ack of success" never frghtened me.
Even f ths book never sod or caught any attenton, t woud st
be the same book. Ths book s ths book. At every pont n my
fe, I decded what I coud do and then dd t.
There s no way for any pubsher or wrter to know what w se
and why, even though they are a ookng for formua. Peope are
askng me f I am feeng pressure now, and they ask me f I w
repeat what I acheved n "The God of Sma Thngs." How I hope I
do not! I want to keep changng, growng. I don't accept the
pressure. I don't beeve I must wrte another book |ust because
now I'm a "wrter." I don't beeve anyone shoud wrte uness
they have a book to wrte. Otherwse they shoud |ust shut up.
So you aren't workng on another book?
No. Not now, I am totay free. Rght now t's mportant for me to
accept my own peace; I have no dea what I must do next. I don't
care. I don't fee I must "foow the path." I don't beeve n rues.
One of the worst books I've ever read was "The Craft of Nove
Wrtng." I don't wrte revews, even though peope are askng me
to now. I don't want to anayze too much. I had no dea that a of
ths woud happen. For me, what made wrtng "The God of Sma
Thngs" so worthwhe s that peope a around the word are
connectng wth ths book, that t's somehow httng some deepy
human chord.
SALON Sept. 30, 1997
(Reena |ana contrbutes reguary to the New York Tmes, Wred,
Asan Art News and Fash Art Internatona.)
Democracy Now lnterview,
May 23, 2006
Arundhati Roy on lndia, lraq, U.S. Empire and Dissent
Today we spend the hour wth accamed Indan author and
actvst Arundhat Roy. Her frst nove, "The God of Sma Thngs,"
was awarded the Booker Prze n 1997. It has sod over sx
mons copes and has been transated nto over 20 anguages
wordwde.
Snce then, Arundhat Roy has devoted hersef to potca wrtng
and actvsm. In Inda, shes nvoved n the movement opposng
hydroeectrc dam pro|ects that have dspaced thousands of
peope. In 2002, she was convcted of contempt of court n New
Deh for accusng the court of attemptng to sence protests
aganst the Narmada Dam pro|ect. She receved a symboc one-
day prson sentence. She has aso been a voca opponent of the
Indan governments nucear weapons program as she s of a
nucear programs wordwde. |ncudes rush transcrpt|
Arundhat Roy has aso become known across the gobe for her
powerfu potca essays n books ke "Power Potcs," "War
Tak," "The Checkbook and the Cruse Msse" and her atest, "An
Ordnary Persons Gude to Empre."
In |une of 2005, she served as a Char of |ury of Conscence at the
Word Trbuna on Iraq. She |ons us today n the frehouse studo
for the hour. Wecome to Democracy Now!
* Arundhat Roy, author and actvst.
In |une 2005, a Word Trbuna on Iraq was hed n Istanbu,
Turkey. A 17-member |ury of Conscence at the Trbuna heard
testmones from a pane of advocates and wtnesses who came
from across the word. You were seected as the char of the |ury.
Ths s an excerpt of your address.
* Arundhat Roy, speakng at the Word Trbuna on Iraq.
(Courtesy: Deep Dsh TV from the DVD "The Word Trbuna
on Iraq: The Fna Sesson")
AMY GOODMAN: Today, we spend the hour wth accamed author
and actvst Arundhat Roy. Her frst nove, The God of Sma
Thngs, was awarded the Booker Prze n 1997. Its sod over sx
mon copes, has been transated n over 20 anguages around
the word. Snce then, Roy has devoted hersef to potca wrtng
and actvsm. In Inda, she s nvoved n the movement opposng
hydroeectrc dam pro|ects that have dspaced thousands of
peope. In 2002, she was convcted of contempt of court n New
Deh for accusng the court of attemptng to sence protest
aganst the Narmada Dam pro|ect. She receved a symboc one-
day prson sentence. She has aso been a voca opponent of the
Indan governments nucear weapons program, as she s of a
nucear programs around the word. Arundhat Roy has aso
become known across the gobe for her powerfu potca essays
n books ke Power Potcs, War Tak, The Checkbook and the
Cruse Msse, and her atest, An Ordnary Persons Gude to
Empre. In |une of 2005, she served as char of the |ury of
Conscence at the Word Trbuna on Iraq n Istanbu. She |ons us
today n our Frehouse studo for the hour here n New York.
Wecome to Democracy Now!
ARUNDHATI ROY: Thank you, Amy.
AMY GOODMAN: Its good to have you wth us. What does t fee
to be back n the Unted States? A dfferent perspectve on the
word from here.
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, I thnk the ast tme I was here was |ust
before the eectons, you know, when we were hopng that Bush
woudnt come back. But the pont was that whoever came back
seemed to have been supportng the war n Iraq n some way, so
there was a crss of democracy here, as much as anywhere ese
n the word. Its, I thnk, you know, when you dont come to the
Unted States often, from the outsde, the most mportant thng s
that ts easy to forget. Its easy for us to forget that there s
dssent wthn ths country aganst the system that ts
government stands for. And ts mportant and heartenng for me
to remnd mysef of that, because outsde there s so much anger
aganst Amerca, and obvousy, you know, that confuson
between peope and governments exsts, and t was enhanced
when Bush was voted back to power. Peope started sayng, "Is
there a dfference?"
AMY GOODMAN: We, of course, the way you see Amerca and
Amercans outsde the Unted States s through the meda, as
pro|ected through. Whch channes do you access n Inda? What
do you get to see? And what do you thnk of how the meda deas
wth these ssues?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, n Inda, I thnk you get FOX News and
CNN and, of course, the BBC. But aso a ot of newspapers n Inda
do pubsh Amercan coumnsts, famousy Thomas Fredman.
And, of course, recenty George Bush vsted Inda, whch was a
humatng and very funny epsode at the same tme, you know,
what happened to hm there and how he came and how the
meda reacted.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to get your reacton to that vst, and
actuay frst, though, pay a cp of Presdent Bush when he went
to Inda n March. He promsed to ncrease economc ntegraton
wth the U.S. and sgned an agreement to foster nucear
cooperaton between the two countres.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: We concuded an hstorc
agreement today on nucear power. Its not an easy |ob for the
Prme Mnster to acheve ths agreement. I understand. Its not
easy for the Amercan presdent to acheve ths agreement, but
ts a necessary agreement. Its one that w hep both our
peopes.
AMY GOODMAN: Presdent Bush n Inda.
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, the strange thng was that before he
came, they wanted hm to address a |ont house of Parament,
but some members of Parament sad that they woud hecke hm
and that t woud be embarrassng for hm to come there. So then
they thought they woud ask hm to address a pubc meetng at
the Red Fort, whch s n Od Deh, whch s where the Prme
Mnster of Inda aways gves hs ndependence day speech from,
but that was consdered unsafe, because Od Deh s fu of
Musms, and you know how they thnk of a Musms as
terrorsts. So then they thought, "Okay, we do t n Vgyan
Bhawan, whch s a sort of state audtorum, but that was
consdered too much of a comedown for the U.S. Presdent. So
funny enough, they eventuay setted on hm speakng n
Purana Oa, whch s the Od Fort, whch houses the Deh zoo.
And t was reay from there that-and, of course, t wasnt a
pubc meetng. It was the caged anmas and some caged CEOs
that he addressed. And then he went to Hyderabad, and I thnk
he met a buffao there, some speca knd of buffao, because
there s a pcture of Bush and the buffao n a the papers, but
the pont s that, nsuated from the pubc.
There were massve demonstratons, where hundreds of
thousands of peope showed up. But t ddnt seem to matter
ether to Bush or to the Indan government, whch went ahead
and sgned, you know, deas where ths knd of embrace between
a poorer country or a deveopng country and Amerca. We have
such a tany of the hstory of ncneraton when you embrace the
government of the Unted States. And thats what happened, that
the Indan government, n fu serve mode, has entered nto ths
embrace, has negotated tsef nto a corner, and now contnues
to do ths deady sort of dance.
But I must say that whe Bush was n Deh, at the same tme on
the streets were-I mean apart from the protests, there were 60
wdows that had come from Keraa, whch s the south of Inda,
whch s where I come from, and they had come to Deh because
they were 60 out of the tens of thousands of wdows of farmers
who have commtted sucde, because they have been encrced
by debt. And ths s a fact that s smpy not reported, party
because there are no offca fgures, party because the Indan
government qubbes about what consttutes sucde and what s
a farmer. If a man commts sucde, but the and s n hs od
fathers name, he doesnt count. If ts a woman, she doesnt
count, because women cant be farmers.
AMY GOODMAN: So she counts as someone who commtted
sucde, but not as a farmer who commtted sucde.
ARUNDHATI ROY: Exacty.
AMY GOODMAN: Tens of thousands?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Tens of thousands. And then, anyway, so these
60 women were there on the street askng the Indan government
to wrte off the debts of ther husbands, rght? Across the street
from them, n a fve-star hote were Bushs 16 snffer dogs who
were stayng n ths fve-star hote, and we were a tod that you
cant ca them dogs, because they are actuay offcers of the
Amercan Army, you know. I dont know what the names were.
Sergeant Pepper and Corpora Whatever. So, t wasnt even
possbe to be satrca or wrte back comedy, because t was a
rea.
AMY GOODMAN: Ddnt Presdent Bush vst Gandhs grave?
ARUNDHATI ROY: He vsted Gandhs grave, and frst hs dogs
vsted Gandhs grave. Then, you know, Gandhans were, ke,
wantng to purfy t. And I sad, "Look, I dont mnd the dogs. I
mnd Bush much than the dogs." But Gandhs-you know,
obvousy one can have a knds of opnons about Gandh. Its
not unversa that everybody adores and oves hm, but st he
stood for nonvoence, and here t was reay the equvaent of a
butcher comng and tppng a pot of bood on that memora and
gong away. It was-you know, there was no room eft, as I sad,
for satre or for anythng, because t was so vugar, the whoe of
t. But I have to say the Indan manstream meda was so serve.
You know, you had a newspaper ke the Indan Express sayng,
"He s here, and he has spoken." Im sure he doesnt get
worshpped that much even by the Amercan manstream press,
you know. It was extraordnary.
AMY GOODMAN: Let me pay another cp of Presdent Bush. I
thnk n ths one hes takng about trade n Inda.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: The markets are open, and the
poor are gven a chance to deveop ther taents and abtes.
They can create a better fe for ther fames. They add to the
weath of the word, and they coud begn to afford goods and
servces from other natons. Free and far trade s good for Inda.
Its good for Amerca. And t s good for the word.
In my country, some focus ony on one aspect of our trade
reatonshp wth Inda: outsourcng. Its true that some Amercans
have ost |obs when ther companes move operatons overseas.
Its aso mportant to remember that when someone oses a |ob,
ts an ncredby dffcut perod for the worker and ther fames.
Some peope beeve the answer to ths probem s to wa off our
economy from the word through protectonst poces. I strongy
dsagree.
AMY GOODMAN: Presdent Bush speakng n Inda. Arundhat Roy,
your response?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, ook, ets not forget that ths whoe ca to
the free market started n the ate 19th century n Inda. You
know, that was what coonasm was a about. They kept usng
the words "free market." And we know how free the free market
s. Today, Inda has-I mean, after 15 years of economc
berazaton, we have more than haf of the words
manutrtoned chdren. We have an economy where the
dfferences between the rch and the poor, whch have aways
been huge, has ncreased enormousy. We have a feuda socety
whose feudasm has |ust been renforced by a of ths.
And, you know, ts amazng. |ust n the wake of Bushs vst, you
cant magne whats happenng, say, n a cty ke Deh. You
cant magne the open aggresson of nsttutons of our
democracy. Its reay ke courts, for nstance, who are an od
enemy of mne, are rong up ther seeves and comng after us.
You have n Deh, for exampe-I have |ust come from beng on
the streets for sx weeks, where a knds of protest are takng
pace. But you have a cty thats been |ust-ts |ust turned nto a
cty of budozers and pocemen. Overnght, notces go up sayng
tomorrow or day after tomorrow youre gong to be evcted from
here. The Supreme Court |udges have come out sayng thngs
ke, "If the poor cant afford to ve n the cty, why do they come
here?"
And bascay, behnd t a, there are two facades. One s that n
2008, Deh s gong to host the Commonweath Games. For ths,
hundreds of thousands of peope are beng drven out of the cty.
But the rea agenda came n the wake of Bushs vst, whch s
that the cty s beng prepared for foregn drect nvestment n
reta, whch means Wa-Mart and Kmart and a these peope are
gong to come n, whch means that ths cty of mons of
pavement dweers, hawkers, frut seers, peope who have-ts
a cty thats grown up over centures and centures. Its |ust beng
ceaned out under the guse of sort of ega acton. And at the
same tme, peope from vages are beng drven out of ther
vages, because of the corporatzaton of agrcuture, because of
these bg deveopment pro|ects.
So you have an nsttuton ke-you know, I mean, how do you
subvert democracy? We have a parament, sure. We have
eectons, sure. But we have a supreme court now that
mcromanages our ves. It takes every decson: What shoud be
n hstory books? Shoud ths amb be cured? Shoud ths road be
wdened? What gas shoud we use? Every snge decson s now
taken by a court. You cant crtcze the court. If you do, you w
go to |a, ke I dd. So, you have |udges who are-you have to
read those |udgments to beeve t, you know? Pubc nterest
tgaton has become a weapon that |udges use aganst us.
So, for exampe, a former chef |ustce of Inda, he gave a
decson aowng the Narmada Dam to be but, where 400,000
peope w be dspaced. The same |udge gave a |udgment sayng
sum dweers are pckpockets of urban and. So you dspace
peope from the vages; they come nto the ctes; you ca them
pckpockets. He gave a |udgment shuttng down a knds of
nforma ndustry n Deh. Than he gave a |udgment askng for a
Indas rvers to be nked, whch s a Stanst scheme beyond
magnaton, where mons of peope w be dspaced. And when
he retred, he |oned Coca-Coa. You know, ts ncredbe.
AMY GOODMAN: Arundhat Roy s our guest for the hour. We be
back wth her n a mnute.
|break|
AMY GOODMAN: Our guest today for the hour s Arundhat Roy.
She |ust recenty few n from New Deh, Inda. She s the author
of a number of books, her Booker Prze award-wnnng book, The
God of Sma Thngs, and then her books of essays, The Ordnary
Persons Gude to Empre, The Checkbook and the Cruse Msse
among them. Arundhat, you were |ust takng about what s
happenng n Inda. Thomas Fredman, the we-known, much-
read New York Tmes coumnst and author, taks about the ca
center beng a perfect symbo of gobazaton n a very postve
sense.
ARUNDHATI ROY: Yes, t s the perfect symbo, I thnk, n many
ways. I wsh Fredman woud spend some tme workng n one.
But I thnk ts a very nterestng ssue, the ca center, because,
you know, ets not get nto the psychoss that takes pace nsde
a ca center, the fact that you have peope workng, you know,
accordng to a dfferent body cock and a that and the anguages
and the fact that you have to de-dentfy yoursef.
AMY GOODMAN: And |ust for peope who arent famar wth what
were takng about, the ca center beng paces where, we, you
mght make a ca to nformaton or to some corporaton, you
actuay are makng that ca to Inda, and someone n a ca
center s pckng t up.
ARUNDHATI ROY: But, you know, the thng s that ts a good
exampe of whats gong on. The ca center s surey creatng
|obs for a whoe ot of peope n Inda. But t comes as part of a
package, and that package, whe t gves sort of an Engsh-
speakng mdde or ower mdde cass young person a |ob for a
whe, they can never ast, because ts such a hard |ob. It actuay
s aso part of the corporate cuture, whch s takng away and
and resources and water from mons of rura peope. But youre
gvng the more voca and the better off anyway-the peope who
speak even a tte bt of Engsh are the better off among the
mons of peope n Inda. So, to gve these peope |obs, youre
takng away the vehoods of mons of others, and ths s what
gobazaton does.
It creates-obvousy t creates a very voca consttuency that
supports t, among the ete of poor countres. And so you have n
Inda an ete, an upper caste, upper cass weathy ete who are
fercey oya to the neobera program. And thats exacty,
obvousy, what coonasm has aways done, and ts exacty
what happened n countres n Latn Amerca. But now ts
happenng n Inda, and the rhetorc of democraces n pace,
because they have earned how to hoow out democracy and
make t ose meanng. A t means, t seems, s eectons, where
whoever you vote for, they are gong to do the same thng.
AMY GOODMAN: You mentoned the dams, and a |udge |ust n the
ast week has rued that one of the ma|or dam pro|ects s aowed
to contnue. |ust physcay on the ground, what does t mean,
and who are the peope who are resstng, and what do they do?
ARUNDHATI ROY: I mean, that actuay s somethng that reached
fever ptch n the ast few weeks n Inda, because, you know, the
movement aganst dams s actuay a very beautfu potca
argument, because t combnes envronmenta ssues, ssues of
water, of resources and of dspacement, wth a potca vson for
a new knd of socety. No potca deoogy, cassc potca
deoogy has reay done that propery. Ether ts ony
envronmenta or ts ony about peope. Here somehow, thats
why I got so drawn nto t. But ths strugge was aganst the
noton of bg dams, and ts been a nonvoent strugge for 25
years.
But now, the dams are st beng but, and the argument has
been reduced merey to dspacement. And even there, the courts
are now sayng you bud a dam and |ust gve peope cash and
send them off. But the fact s that these are ndgenous peope.
You know, you cant |ust gve-ots of them are ndgenous
peope. The others are farmers. But you cant-the eves of
dspacement are so huge. Ths dam, the Sardar Sarovar dam
dspaces 400,000, but |ust n the Narmada Vaey youre takng
about mons of peope. A over Inda, youre takng about many
mons who are beng dspaced. So where are they gong to go?
We, the court came out wth a |udgment wth marked a dfferent
era n Inda, where they even stopped pretendng that they were
nterested n resettement or rehabtaton. They |ust sad, "Bud
the dam." So ts very nterestng that peope were watchng ths
nonvoent movement unfod ts weapons on the streets, whch s
the actvsts who went on ndefnte hunger strke. Peope pad
attenton, but then they got kcked n the teeth.
Meanwhe, across Inda, from West Benga to Orssa, to
|harkhand, to Chhattsgarh, to Andhra Pradesh, the Maost
movement has become very, very strong. Its an armed strugge.
Its takng over dstrct after dstrct. The admnstraton cannot
get n there. And the governments response to that s to do what
was done n Peru wth the Shnng Path, whch s to set up armed
defense commttees, whch s reay creatng a stuaton of cv
war. You know, hundreds of vages are beng empted by the
government, and the peope are beng moved nto poce camps.
Peope are beng armed. The Chef Mnster of Chhattsgarh says,
"Youre ether wth the Maosts and Naxates or youre wth the
Sava |udum," whch s ths government-sponsored resstance,
and theres no thrd choce. So ts youre wth us or aganst us.
And what has happened, whch s somethng I have been sayng
for a ong tme, that ths whoe war on terror and the egsaton
that has come up around t s gong to confate terrorsts wth
poor peope. And thats whats happened. In Inda, n |anuary-I
dont know f youve read about t, but t was a terrbe thng that
happened-n Orssa, whch s a state where a these
corporatons have ther greedy eyes fxed, because they have
|ust dscovered huge deposts of bauxte, whch you need to
make aumnum, whch you need to make weapons and panes.
AMY GOODMAN: And where s Orssa n Inda?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Orssa s sort of east, southeast. And ts got a
huge ndgenous popuaton. If you go there, ts ke a poce
state. You know, the poce have surrounded vages. You cant
move from one-vagers are not aowed to move from one
vage to another to organze, because, of course, theres a ot of
resstance. The Maosts have come n. And n Orssa n a pace
caed Kanganagar, where the Tata, whch used to be a sort of
respected ndustrast, but now I cant say, are settng up a stee
factory. So they, the government, took over the ands of
ndgenous peope. The trck s that you ony say about 20% of
them are pro|ect-affected. The rest are a encroachers. Even
these 20% are gven-ther and s taken from them at, say,
35,000 rupees an acre, gven to the Tatas for three-and-a-haf
akhs, you know, whch s ten tmes that amount. And the actua
market prce s four tmes that amount. So you stea from the
poor; you subsdze the rch; then you ca t the "free market."
And when they protested, there was dynamte, you know, n the
ground. Some of them were bown up, ked. Sx of them, I thnk,
were n|ured, taken to hospta, and ther bodes were returned
wth ther hands and breasts and thngs cut off. And those peope
have been bockng the hghway now for sx months, the
ndgenous peope, because t became a bg ssue n Inda. But ts
been happenng everywhere, and they are a caed terrorsts.
You know, peope wth bows and arrows are caed terrorsts.
So, n Inda, the poor are the terrorsts, and even states ke
Andhra Pradesh, we have thousands of peope beng hed as
potca prsoners, caed Maosts, hed as potca prsoners n
unknown paces wthout charges or wth fase charges. We have
the hghest number of custoda deaths n the word. And we have
Thomas Fredman gong on and on about how ths s an deastc
-dea socety, a toerant socety. Hundreds-I mean, tens of
thousands of peope ked n Kashmr. A over the northeast, you
have the Armed Forces Speca Powers Act, where a |unor
noncommssoned offcer can shoot at sght. And that s the
democracy n whch we ve.
AMY GOODMAN: And the Maosts, what are ther demands?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, the Maosts are fghtng on two fronts.
One s that they are fghtng a feuda socety, ther feuda
andords. You have, you know, the whoe caste system whch s
arranged aganst the ndgenous peope and the Dats, who are
the untouchabe caste. And they are fghtng aganst ths whoe
corporatzaton. But they are aso very poor peope, you know,
barefoot wth od rusty weapons. And, you know, what we-say
someone ke mysef, watchng what s happenng n Kashmr,
where-or n the northeast, where exacty what Amerca s dong
n Iraq, you know, where youre fosterng a knd of cv war and
then sayng, "Oh, f we pu out, these peope |ust w massacre
each other."
But the onger you stay, the more youre enforcng these trba
dfferences and creatng a resstance, whch obvousy, on the
one hand, someone ke me does support; on the other hand, you
support the resstance, but you may not support the vson that
they are fghtng for. And I keep sayng, you know, Im doomed to
fght on the sde of peope that have no space for me n ther
soca magnaton, and I woud probaby be the frst person that
was strung up f they won. But the pont s that they are the ones
that are resstng on the ground, and they have to be supported,
because what s happenng s unbeevabe.
AMY GOODMAN: Speakng of Iraq, et me pay a cp of Presdent
Bush n Chcago Monday, where he addressed a gatherng
organzed by the Natona Restaurant Assocaton. In hs remarks,
the Presdent taked about Iraq, whch has |ust formed a new
unty government.
PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH: For most Iraqs, a free
democratc and consttutona government w be a new
experence. For the peope across the broader Mdde East, a free
Iraq w be an nspraton. Iraqs have done more than form a
government. They have proved that the desre for berty n the
heart of the Mdde East s for rea. They have shown dverse
peope can come together and work out ther dfferences and fnd
a way forward, and they have demonstrated that democracy s
the hope of the Mdde East and the destny of a manknd.
The trumph of berty n Iraq s part of a ong and famar
story. The great bographer of Amercan democracy, Aexs de
Tocqueve, wrote, "Freedom s ordnary born n the mdst of
storms. It s estabshed panfuy among cv dscords, and ony
when t s od can one know ts benefts." Years from now, peope
w ook back on the formaton of a unty government n Iraq as a
decsve moment n the story of berty, a moment when freedom
ganed a frm foothod n the Mdde East and the forces of terror
began ther ong retreat.
AMY GOODMAN: Presdent Bush n Chcago. Arundhat Roy from
Inda here n New York, your response?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, you know, how can one respond? I |ust
keep wshng there woud be a augh track, you know, on the sde
of these speeches. But obvousy, you know, the eectons n
Paestne, where you had a democratc government, now
Paestne s beng starved because they have a democracy, under
sege because they have a democracy. But n Iraq, ths fake
busness s caed democracy. Forget about whats happenng n
Saud Araba.
So ts |ust-you know, I thnk the ssue s that peope ke
Presdent Bush and hs advsors, or whats happenng n Inda, the
Indan government, they have understood that you can use the
meda to say anythng from mnute to mnute. It doesnt matter
whats reay gong on. It doesnt matter what happened n the
past. There are a few peope who make the connectons and fa
about aughng at the nonsense that s beng spoken. But for
everybody ese, I thnk the meda tsef, ths mass meda has
become a means of teng the most unbeevabe es or makng
the most unbeevabe statements. And everybody sort of |ust
mbbes t. Its ke a drug, you know, that you put straght nto
your vens. It doesnt matter. And t keeps gong. But what can
you say? What knd of democracy s ths n Iraq?
AMY GOODMAN: What do you thnk has to happen n Iraq?
ARUNDHATI ROY: I thnk that the frst thng that has to happen s
that the Amercan army shoud eave. That has to happen. I have
no doubt about that. Smary, I mean, I keep sayng ths, but,
you know, Amerca, Israe and Inda, and Chna n Tbet, are now
becomng experts n occupaton, and Inda s one of the eadng
experts. Its not that the Amercan army n ts tranng exercse s
teachng the Indan army. The Indans are teachng the
Amercans, too, how to occupy a pace. What do you do wth the
meda? How do you dea wth t? The occupaton of Kashmr has
taken pace over years. And I keep sayng that n Iraq, you have
125,000 or so Amercan troops n a stuaton of war, controng
25 mon Iraqs. In Kashmr, you have 700,000 Indan troops fuy
armed there-you know?-and creatng a stuaton, makng t
worse and worse and worse. So the frst thng that has to happen
s that the army has to come out, you know?
AMY GOODMAN: Were speakng to Arundhat Roy, who has spent
tme n Kashmr, ves n Deh, the accamed author and actvst.
We contnue wth her after ths break.
|break|
AMY GOODMAN: In |une of 2005, Word Trbuna on Iraq was hed
n Istanbu, Turkey. A 17-member |ury of Conscence at the
trbuna heard testmones from a pane of advocates and
wtnesses who came from across the word. Arundhat Roy was
seected as the char of that |ury. She s n our studo today. But
ets watch her n Istanbu. Hear what she has to say.
ARUNDHATI ROY: To ask us why we are dong ths, you know,
why s there a Word Trbuna on Iraq, s ke askng, you know,
someone who stops at the ste of an accdent where peope are
dyng on the road, "Why dd you stop? Why ddnt you keep
wakng ke everybody ese?"
Whe I stened to the testmones yesterday, especay, I must
say that I ddnt know-I mean, not that one has to choose, but
st, you know, I ddnt know what was more chng, you know,
the testmones of those who came from Iraq wth the stores of
the bood and the destructon and the brutaty and the darkness
of what was happenng there or the stores of that cod,
cacuated word where the busness contracts are beng made,
where the aws are beng rewrtten, where a country occupes
another wth no dea of how ts gong to provde protecton to
peope, but wth such a sophstcated dea of how ts gong to
oot t of ts resources. You know, the brutaty or the contrast of
those two thngs was so chng.
There were tmes when I fet, I wsh I wasnt on the |ury,
because I want to say thngs. You know? I mean, I thnk that s
the nature of ths trbuna, that, n a way, one wants to be
everythng. You want to be on the |ury, you want to be on the
other sde, you want to say thngs. And I partcuary wanted to
tak a ot about-whch I wont do now, so dont worry, but I
wanted to tak a ot about my own, you know, now severa years
of experence wth ssues of resstance, strateges of resstance,
the fact that we actuay tend to reach for easy |ustfcatons of
voence and non-voence, easy and not reay very accurate
hstorca exampes. These are thngs we shoud worry about.
But at the end of t, today we do seem to ve n a word where
the Unted States of Amerca has defned an enemy combatant,
someone whom they can kdnap from any country, from anypace
n the word and take for tra to Amerca. An enemy combatant
seems to be anybody who harbors thoughts of resstance. We, f
ths s the defnton, then I, for one, am an enemy combatant.
AMY GOODMAN: Arundhat Roy speakng at the Word Trbuna on
Iraq, head of the |ury there, the |ury of Conscence n |une of
2005. Your thoughts amost a year ater rght now, Arundhat Roy,
as enemy combatant?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Yes, I guess, you know, I thnk one of the thngs
that I worry about s that there s a way n whch, say, somebody
ke me can aso be used by the other sde. You know, I know-Im
very aware of the fact that n Inda, you know, they knd of eak
the potca meanng out of thngs, and they say, "Oh, we have
ths great batsman, crcket batsman, Sachn Tendukar, and we
have Mss Unverse, Ashwarya Ra, and we have ths wrter
Arundhat Roy." And, you know, everythng s teescoped as a
knd of "Look at a the thngs that we have on dspay," and "We
are a democracy, so we aow her to say these thngs, you know,
and go on wth t." And yet these democraces have earned to
|ust stare thngs down, you know? So even n Amerca, eventuay
a of us who are protestng or wrtng or whatever, we can be
commodfed. You know, t can |ust turn nto somethng that were
dong, and yet they carry on what theyre dong. We carry on
dong what were dong. But utmatey, peope are beng
dspaced. Countres are beng occuped. Peope are beng ked.
Laws are beng changed. And the status quo s on ther sde, not
on our sde. You know, so I worry about that a ot, you know?
AMY GOODMAN: I remember when you were ast here, you were
headed off to an ntervew wth Chare Rose. And so I ooked to
see you on Chare Rose, and I wated and I wated, and I never
saw you. What happened?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Oh, t was nterestng. He-we, when the
ntervew began, I reazed that the pan was to do ths reay
aggressve ntervew wth me, and so the frst queston he asked
was, "Te me, Arundhat, do you thnk that Inda shoud have
nucear weapons?" So I sad, "I dont thnk Inda shoud have
nucear weapons. I dont thnk the U.S. shoud have nucear
weapons. I dont thnk Israe shoud have nucear weapons. I
dont thnk anyone shoud have nucear weapons. Its somethng
that I have wrtten a ot about." He sad, "I asked you whether
Inda shoud have nucear weapons." So I sad, "We, I dont thnk
Inda shoud have nucear weapons. I dont thnk the U.S. shoud
have nucear weapons. I dont thnk Israe shoud have nucear
weapons." Then he sad, "W you answer my queston? Shoud
Inda have nucear weapons?" So I sad, "I dont thnk Inda shoud
have nucear weapons. I dont thnk the U.S. shoud have nucear
weapons. I dont thnk Israe shoud have nucear weapons." And I
asked hm, I sad, "What s ths about? Why are you beng so
aggressve? I have answered the queston, you know, ceary. And
I thnk I made my poston extremey cear. Im not some strategc
thnker. Im teng you what I beeve." So after that t |ust sort of
coapsed nto vague questons about word poverty and so on,
and t was never shown. I mean, I woudnt have shown t f I were
hm ether, but-because t was, you know, I dont know, treatng
me ke Im some knd of potcan or somethng.
AMY GOODMAN: Has he nvted you back on n ths new trp that
you have had?
ARUNDHATI ROY: No more, no, no. I dont thnk.
AMY GOODMAN: Have you found that through your ceebrty,
through your wrtng, that youre nvted nto forums, nto varous
paces where when you tak about what you thnk, youre then
shut down?
ARUNDHATI ROY: No. I thnk what happens s that-we, I dont
come to, you know, the U.S. that often, and ke, for nstance, ths
tme I came to do an event wth Eduardo Gaeano, but I reay
wasnt-I ddnt want to do any-except for ths, I made t cear
that I ddnt want to be workng on ths trp, because I want to
thnk about some thngs. But I thnk ts the opposte probem that
I have. I thnk that there are many ways of shuttng peope down,
and one s to ncrease the burners on ths ceebrty thng unt you
become so ceebrty that a you are s ceebrty.
For exampe, I gve you a wonderfu exampe of how t works,
say, n Inda. I was at a meetng n Deh a few months ago, the
Assocaton of Parents for Dsappeared Peope. Now, women had
come down from Kashmr. There are 10,000 or so dsappeared
peope n Kashmr, whch nobody taks about n the manstream
meda at a. Here were these women whose mothers or brothers
or sons or husbands had-Im sorry, not mothers, but whatever-
a these peope who were speakng of ther persona
experences, and there were other speakers, and there was me.
And the next day n ths more-or-ess rghtwng paper caed
Indan Express, there was a bg pcture of me, reay cose so that
you coudnt see the context. You coudnt see who had organzed
the meetng or what t was about, nothng. And underneath t
sad, "Arundhat Roy at the Internatona Day of the
Dsappeared." So, you have the news, but t says nothng, you
know? Thats the knd of thng that can happen.
Actuay, Im somebody who s nvted to manstream forums, and
Im not shunned out. You know, I can say what I have to say. But
the pont s, Amy, that there s a decate ne between |ust beng
so far-you know, |ust beng so soated that you become the
spokesperson for everythng, and ths knd of person that t suts
them to have one person whos sayng somethng and sten to t
and gnore what s beng sad, and I dont want to move so far
away from everybody ese, that f you want to sten to me, then
why dont you sten to so and so? Why dont you speak to so and
so? Why dont you get some other voces, because otherwse t
sounds ke youre ths one brave, amazng person, whch s
unpotca.
AMY GOODMAN: Arundhat Roy, Im |ust ookng at a KMS
newswre story-thats Kashmr Meda Servce-May 23, |ust after
you spoke here n New York. It says, "A human rghts actvst and
promnent Indan wrter, Arundhat Roy, has sad Inda s not a
democratc state. The 1997 Booker wnner, Arundhat Roy,
addressng a book-readng functon n New York, sad Inda s not
a democratc socety." Can you tak about that dea?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, I do thnk that we are reay sufferng a
crss of democracy, you know? And the smpest way I can
expan t s that n 2004, when the genera eectons took pace n
Inda, we were reeng from fve years of rghtwng communa B|P
potcs, the rghtwng Hndu party.
AMY GOODMAN: Woud you make any paraes to potca partes
n the Unted States?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Very, very much so. I mean, t was very smar
to the Repubcans versus the Democrats, and n fact-
AMY GOODMAN: The Congress Party beng the Democrats.
ARUNDHATI ROY: The Congress Party beng the Democrats, and
the Repubcans beng the rghtwng Hndu B|P. And, of course, n
a country-ke n Amerca, ther potcs, apart from affectng
Amercans to a great dea, aso affects the rest of the word. But
n Inda, Inda not beng a word power, however much t wants to
cam t s, turns those energes on ts own peope. So n Gu|arat,
you had n 2002 ths mass kng of Musms on the streets, a
boodbath where peope were burnt ave, women were raped on
the streets, dsmembered, ked n fu pubc vew.
What happened after that, there were eectons, and the man
who engneered a ths won the eectons. So youre thnkng, "Is
t better to have a fascst dctator or a fascst Democrat who has
the approbaton of a these peope?" Contnues to be n power n
Gu|arat. Nothng has happened. Its a Naz type of socety, where
hundreds of thousands of peope are st economcay boycotted
Musms, somethng ke 100,000 drven from ther homes. Poce
wont regster cases. One or two mportant cases are ooked at by
the Supreme Court, but the mass of t s st competey
unresoved. Thats the stuaton, anyway, and whe youre
orchestratng ths communa kng, youre aso seng off to
Enron and to a these prvate companes, and so on the one hand
youre takng about Indan-ness and a ths, and ths natonasm
n ths absurd way, and on the other, youre |ust seng t off n
buk.
But durng the eectons, a of us were watng wth bated breath
to see what woud happen. And when the Congress came to
power, supported by the eft partes from the outsde, obvousy
we aowed ourseves a huge gasp of reef, you know, waked on
our hands n front of the TV for a bt. But the Congress
campagned aganst the neobera poces that t had brought n,
actuay.
But before even we knew whether Sona Gandh was gong to be
the prme mnster or what was gong to happen, there was an
orchestrated drop n the stock market. The medas own stocks
began to drop. The cameras that had been n a these vages,
sayng ook at ths wonderfu democracy, and the cames and the
buock carts and everyone thats comng to vote was outsde the
stock market now. And before the government was formed, both
from the eft and from the Congress, spokesmen had to come out
and say, "We w not dsmante ths neobera regme." And
today we have a prme mnster who has not been eected. He s
a technocrat who has been nomnated. He s part of the
Washngton Consensus.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to ask n our ast 30 seconds: the roe you
see of the artst n a tme of war?
ARUNDHATI ROY: We, I thnk the probem s that artsts are not a
homogenous ot of peope, and some of them are as rghtwng
and estabshment as they can get, you know, so the roe of the
artst s not dfferent from the roe of any human beng. You pck
your sde, and then you fght, you know? But n a country ke
Inda, Im not seeng that many radca postons taken by wrters
or poets or artsts, you know? Its a the seducton of the market
that has shut them up ke a good medeva beheadng never
coud.
AMY GOODMAN: And what do you thnk artsts shoud do?
ARUNDHATI ROY: Exacty what anyone ese shoud do, whch s to
pck your sde, take your poston, and then go for t, you know?
AMY GOODMAN: Arundhat Roy, I want to thank you very much
for beng wth us. Arundhat Roy, author of The God of Sma
Thngs, as we as a number of books of potca essays, ke An
Ordnary Persons Gude to Empre.
'And His Life Should Become Extinct'
The Very Strange Story of the Attack on the lndian
Parliament
Arundhati Roy
We know ths much: On December 13, 2001, the Indan
Parament was n ts wnter sesson. (The NDA government was
under attack for yet another corrupton scanda.) At 11.30 n the
mornng, fve armed men n a whte Ambassador car ftted out
wth an Improvsed Exposve Devce drove through the gates of
Parament House. When they were chaenged, they |umped out
of the car and opened fre. In the gun batte that foowed, a the
attackers were ked. Eght securty personne and a gardener
were ked too.
In ts August 4, 2005, |udgement the Supreme Court ceary says
that there was no evdence that Mohammed Afza beonged to
any terrorst group or organsaton.
The dead terrorsts, the poce sad, had enough exposves to
bow up the Parament budng, and enough ammunton to take
on a whoe battaon of soders. Unke most terrorsts, these fve
eft behnd a thck tra of evdence - weapons, mobe phones,
phone numbers, ID cards, photographs, packets of dry frut, and
even a ove etter.
Not surprsngy, PM A.B. Va|payee sezed the opportunty to
compare the assaut to the September 11 attacks n the US that
had happened ony three months prevousy.
On December 14, 2001, the day after the attack on Parament,
the Speca Ce of the Deh Poce camed t had tracked down
severa peope suspected to have been nvoved n the
conspracy. A day ater, on December 15, t announced that t had
"cracked the case": the attack, the poce sad, was a |ont
operaton carred out by two Pakstan-based terrorst groups,
Lashkar-e-Toba and |ash-e-Mohammed.
The SC goes on to say, "The ncdent... had shaken the entre
naton, and the coectve conscence of the socety w ony be
satsfed f capta punshment s awarded to the offender."
Tweve peope were named as beng part of the conspracy. Ghaz
Baba of the |ash (Usua Suspect I), Mauana Masood Azhar aso of
the |ash (Usua Suspect II); Tarq Ahmed (a "Pakstan"); fve
deceased "Pakstan terrorsts" (we st don't know who they are).
And three Kashmr men, S.A.R. Geean, Shaukat Hussan Guru,
and Mohammed Afza; and Shaukat's wfe Afsan Guru. These
were the ony four to be arrested.
In the tense days that foowed, Parament was ad|ourned. On
December 21, Inda recaed ts hgh commssoner from Pakstan,
suspended ar, ra and bus communcatons and banned over-
fghts. It put nto moton a massve mobsaton of ts war
machnery, and moved more than haf-a-mon troops to the
Pakstan border. Foregn embasses evacuated ther staff and
ctzens, and toursts traveng to Inda were ssued cautonary
trave advsores. The word watched wth bated breath as the
subcontnent was taken to the brnk of nucear war. (A ths cost
Inda an estmated Rs 10,000 crore of pubc money. A few
hundred soders ded |ust n the pancky process of mobsaton.)
Amost three-and-a-haf years ater, on August 4, 2005, the
Supreme Court devered ts fna |udgement n the case. It
endorsed the vew that the Parament attack be ooked upon as
an act of war.
It sad, "The attempted attack on Parament s an undoubted
nvason of the soveregn attrbute of the State ncudng the
Government of Inda whch s ts ater ego... the deceased
terrorsts were roused and mpeed to acton by a strong ant-
Indan feeng as the wrtng on the fake home mnstry stcker
found on the car (Ex PW1/8) reveas." It went on to say "the
modus operand adopted by the hardcore 'fdayeens' are a
demonstratve of aunchng a war aganst the Government of
Inda".
The text on the fake home mnstry stcker read as foows:
"INDIA IS A VERY BAD COUNTRY AND WE HATE INDIA WE WANT
TO DESTROY INDIA AND WITH THE GRACE OF GOD WE WILL DO
IT GOD IS WITH US AND WE WILL TRY OUR BEST. THIS EDIET
WA|PAI AND ADVANI WE WILL KILL THEM. THEY HAVE KILLED
MANY INNOCENT PEOPLE AND THEY ARE VERY BAD PERSONS
THERE BROTHER BUSH IS ALSO A VERY BAD PERSON HE WILL BE
NEXT TARGET HE IS ALSO THE KILLER OF INNOCENT PEOPLE HE
HAVE TO DIE AND WE WILL DO IT."
Ths subty worded stcker-manfesto was dspayed on the
wndscreen of the car bomb as t drove nto Parament. (Gven
the amount of text, t's a wonder the drver coud see anythng at
a. Maybe that's why he coded wth the Vce-Presdent's
cavacade?)
The poce chargesheet was fed n a speca fast-track tra court
desgnated for cases under the Preventon of Terrorsm Act
(POTA). The tra court sentenced Geean, Shaukat and Afza to
death. Afsan Guru was sentenced to fve years of rgorous
mprsonment. The hgh court subsequenty acqutted Geean
and Afsan, but t uphed Shaukat's and Afza's death sentence.
Eventuay, the Supreme Court uphed the acquttas, and
reduced Shaukat's punshment to 10 years of rgorous
mprsonment. However t not |ust confrmed, but enhanced
Mohammed Afza's sentence. He has been gven three fe
sentences and a doube death sentence.
In ts August 4, 2005, |udgement, the Supreme Court ceary says
that there was no evdence that Mohammed Afza beonged to
any terrorst group or organsaton. But t aso says, "As s the
case wth most of the conspraces, there s and coud be no
drect evdence of the agreement amountng to crmna
conspracy. However, the crcumstances, cumuatvey weghed,
woud unerrngy pont to the coaboraton of the accused Afza
wth the san 'fdayeen' terrorsts."
So: No drect evdence, but yes, crcumstanta evdence.
A controversa paragraph n the |udgement goes on to say, "The
ncdent, whch resuted n heavy casuates, had shaken the
entre naton, and the coectve conscence of the socety w
ony be satsfed f capta punshment s awarded to the offender.
The chaenge to the unty, ntegrty and soveregnty of Inda by
these acts of terrorsts and consprators can ony be
compensated by gvng maxmum punshment to the person who
s proved to be the consprator n ths treacherous act" (emphass
mne).
To nvoke the 'coectve conscence of socety' to vadate rtua
murder, whch s what the death penaty s, skates precarousy
cose to vaorsng ynch aw.
Mohammed Afza's story has ts orgns n a war zone whose aws
are beyond the pae of the fne arguments and decate
sensbtes of norma |ursprudence.
For a these reasons t s crtca that we consder carefuy the
strange, sad, and uttery snster story of the December 13
Parament attack. It tes us a great dea about the way the
word's argest 'democracy' reay works. It connects the bggest
thngs to the smaest. It traces the pathways that connect what
happens n the shadowy grottos of our poce statons to what
goes on n the cod, snowy streets of Paradse Vaey; from there
to the mpersona magn fures that brng natons to the brnk of
nucear war.
Thnk about t. On the bass of ega confessons extracted under
torture, hundreds of thousands of soders were moved to the
Pakstan border at huge cost to the exchequer.
It rases specfc questons that deserve specfc, and not
deoogca or rhetorca answers. What hangs n the baance s far
more than the fate of one man.
On October 4 ths year, I was one amongst a very sma group of
peope who had gathered at |antar Mantar n New Deh to protest
aganst Mohammed Afza's death sentence. I was there because I
beeve Mohammed Afza s ony a pawn n a very snster game.
He's not the Dragon he's beng made out to be, he's ony the
Dragon's footprnt. And f the footprnt s made to 'become
extnct', we' never know who the Dragon was. Is.
Not surprsngy, that afternoon there were more |ournasts and
TV crews than there were protesters. Most of the attenton was
on Ghab, Afza's angec ookng tte son. Knd-hearted peope,
not sure of what to do wth a young boy whose father was gong
to the gaows, were pyng hm wth ce-creams and cod drnks.
As I ooked around at the peope gathered there, I noted a sad
tte fact.
Kng peope and fasey dentfyng them as 'foregn terrorsts',
or fasey dentfyng dead peope as 'foregn terrorsts' s not
uncommon among securty forces.
The convener of the protest, the sma, stocky man who was
nervousy ntroducng the speakers and makng the
announcements, was S.A.R. Geean, a young ecturer n Arabc
Lterature at Deh Unversty. Accused Number Three n the
Parament Attack case. He was arrested on December 14, 2001,
a day after the attack, by the Speca Ce of the Deh Poce.
Though Geean was brutay tortured n custody, though hs
famy - hs wfe, young chdren and brother - were egay
detaned, he refused to confess to a crme he hadn't commtted.
Of course you woudn't know ths f you read newspapers n the
days foowng hs arrest. They carred detaed descrptons of an
entrey magnary, non-exstent confesson. The Deh Poce
portrayed Geean as the ev mastermnd of the Indan end of the
conspracy. Its scrptwrters orchestrated a hatefu propaganda
campagn aganst hm, whch was eagery ampfed and
embeshed by a hyper-natonastc, thr-seekng meda. The
poce knew perfecty we that n crmna tras, |udges are not
supposed to take cognsance of meda reports. So they knew that
ther entrey cod-booded fabrcaton of a profe for these
'terrorsts' woud moud pubc opnon, and create a cmate for
the tra. But t woud not come n for any ega scrutny.
Here are some of the macous, outrght es that appeared n the
manstream press:
'Case Cracked: |ash behnd Attack'
The Hndustan Tmes, Dec 16, 2001: Neeta Sharma and Arun
|osh
"In Deh, the Speca Ce detectves detaned a Lecturer n
Arabc, who teaches at Zakr Hussan Coege (Evenng)...after t
was estabshed that he had receved a ca made by mtants on
hs mobe phone." Another coumn n the same paper sad:
"Terrorsts spoke to hm before the attack and the ecturer made
a phone ca to Pakstan after the strke."
'DU Lecturer was terror pan hub'
The Tmes of Inda, Dec 17, 2001
"The attack on Parament on December 13 was a |ont operaton
of the |ash-e-Mohammed (|eM) and Lashkar-e-Toba (LeT)
terrorst groups n whch a Deh Unversty ecturer, Syed A.R.
Gan, was one of the key factators n Deh, Poce
Commssoner A|a Ra| Sharma sad on Sunday."
'Varsty don guded fdayeen'
The Hndu, Dec 17, 2001: Devesh K. Pandey
"Durng nterrogaton Geean dscosed that he was n the know
of the conspracy snce the day the 'fdayeen' attack was
panned."
'Don ectured on terror n free tme'
The Hndustan Tmes, Dec 17, 2001: Sutrtho Patranobs
"Investgatons have reveaed that by evenng he was at the
coege teachng Arabc terature. In hs free tme, behnd cosed
doors, ether at hs house or at Shaukat Hussan's, another
suspect to be arrested, he took and gave essons on terrorsm..."
'Professor's proceeds'
The Hndustan Tmes, Dec 17, 2001
"Geean recenty purchased a house for 22 akhs n West Deh.
Deh Poce are nvestgatng how he came upon such a
wndfa...".
Afza's awyer dd not once vst hs cent n |a to take
nstructons. He dd not summon a snge wtness n Afza's
defence, barey cross-examned the prosecuton's wtnesses.
'Agarh se Engand tak chaatron men aatankwaad ke bee| bo
raha tha Geean (From Agarh to Engand Geean sowed the
seeds of terrorsm)
Rashtrya Sahara, Dec 18, 2001: Su|t Thakur
Trans: "...Accordng to sources and nformaton coected by
nvestgaton agences, Geean has made a statement to the
poce that he was an agent of |ash-e-Mohammed for a ong
tme.... It was because of Geean's artcuaton, stye of workng
and sound pannng that n 2000 |ash-e-Mohammed gave hm the
responsbty of spreadng nteectua terrorsm."
'Terror suspect frequent vstor to Pak msson'
The Hndustan Tmes, Dec 21, 2001: Swat Chaturved
"Durng nterrogaton, Geean has admtted that he had made
frequent cas to Pakstan and was n touch wth mtants
beongng to |ash-e-Mohammed...Geean sad that he had been
provded wth funds by some members of the |ash and tod to
buy two fats that coud be used n mtant operatons."
'Person of the Week'
Sunday Tmes of Inda, Dec 23, 2001:
"A cephone proved hs undong.
Deh Unversty's Syed A.R. Geean was the frst to be arrested n
the December 13 case - a shockng remnder that the roots of
terrorsm go far and deep..."
Zee TV trumped them a. It produced a fm caed December
13th, a 'docudrama' that camed to be the 'truth based on the
poce chargesheet'
The caousness wth whch the nvestgatons were carred out
demonstrate a worryng beef that they woudn't be 'found out',
and f they were, t woudn't matter very much.
(A contradcton n terms, woudn't you say?) The fm was
prvatey screened for Prme Mnster A.B. Va|payee and Home
Mnster L.K. Advan. Both men appauded the fm. Ther
approbaton was wdey reported by the meda.
The Supreme Court dsmssed an appea to stay the broadcast of
the fm on the grounds that |udges are not nfuenced by the
meda. (Woud the Supreme Court concede that even f |udges
are beyond beng nfuenced by meda reports, the 'coectve
conscence of the socety' mght not be?) December 13th was
broadcast on Zee TV's natona network a few days before the
fast-track tra court sentenced Geean, Afza and Shaukat to
death. Geean eventuay spent 18 months n |a, many of them
n sotary confnement on death row.
He was reeased when the hgh court acqutted hm and Afsan
Guru. (Afsan, who was pregnant when she was arrested, had her
baby n prson. Her experence broke her. She now suffers from a
serous psychotc condton.) The Supreme Court uphed the
acqutta. It found absoutey no evdence to nk Geean wth the
Parament attack or wth any terrorst organsaton. Not a snge
newspaper or |ournast or TV channe has seen ft to apoogse to
Geean for ther es. But S.A.R.
Geean's troubes ddn't end there. Hs acqutta eft the Speca
Ce wth a pot, but no 'mastermnd'. Ths, as we sha see,
becomes somethng of a probem. More mportanty, Geean was
a free man now-free to meet the press, tak to awyers, cear hs
name. On the evenng of February 8, 2005, durng the course of
the fna hearngs at the Supreme Court, Geean was makng hs
way to hs awyer's house. A mysterous gunman appeared from
the shadows and fred fve buets nto hs body. Mracuousy, he
survved. It was an unbeevabe new twst to the story. Ceary
somebody was worred about what he knew, what he woud
say....
One woud magne that the poce woud gve ths nvestgaton
top prorty, hopng t woud throw up some vta new eads nto
the Parament attack case. Instead, the Speca Ce treated
Geean as though he was the prme suspect n hs own
assassnaton. They confscated hs computer and took away hs
car. Hundreds of actvsts gathered outsde the hospta and
caed for an enqury nto the assassnaton attempt, whch woud
ncude an nvestgaton nto the Speca Ce tsef. (Of course that
never happened. More than a year has passed, nobody shows
any nterest n pursung the matter. Odd.)
So here he was now, S.A.R. Geean, havng survved ths terrbe
ordea, standng up n pubc at |antar Mantar, sayng that
Mohammed Afza ddn't deserve a death sentence. How much
easer t woud be for hm to keep hs head down, stay at home. I
was profoundy moved, humbed, by ths quet dspay of courage.
Across the ne from S.A.R. Geean, n the |ostng crowd of
|ournasts and photographers, tryng hs best to ook
nconspcuous n a emon T-shrt and gaberdne pants, hodng a
tte tape-recorder, was another Gan. Iftkhar Gan. He had
been n prson too. He was arrested and taken nto poce custody
on |une 9, 2002. At the tme he was a reporter for the |ammu-
based Kashmr Tmes. He was charged under the Offca Secrets
Act. Hs 'crme' was that he possessed obsoete nformaton on
Indan troop depoyment n 'Indan-hed Kashmr'. (Ths
'nformaton', t turns out, was a pubshed monograph by a
Pakstan research nsttute, and was freey avaabe on the
Internet for anybody who wshed to downoad t. ) Iftkhar Gan's
computer was sezed. IB offcas tampered wth hs hard drve,
medded wth the downoaded fe, changed the words 'Indan-
hed Kashmr' to '|ammu and Kashmr' to make t sound ke an
Indan document, and added the words 'Ony for Reference.
Strcty Not For Crcuaton', to make t seem ke a secret
document smugged out of the home mnstry. The drectorate
genera of mtary ntegence - though t had been gven a
photocopy of the monograph - gnored repeated appeas from
Iftkhar Gan's counse, kept quet, and refused to carfy the
matter for a whoe sx months.
Once agan the macous es put out by the Speca Ce were
obedenty reproduced n the newspapers. Here are a few of the
es they tod:
"Iftkhar Gan, 35-year-od son-n-aw of Hurryat hardner Syed
A Shah Geean, s beeved to have admtted n a cty court that
he was an agent of Pakstan's spy agency." -- The Hndustan
Tmes, |une, 11, 2002: Neeta Sharma
"Iftkhar Gan was the pn-pont man of Syed Saahuddn of
Hzbu Mu|ahdeen. Investgatons have reveaed that Iftkhar
used to pass nformaton to Saahuddn about the moves of Indan
securty agences.
He had camoufaged hs rea motves behnd hs |ournast's
facade so we that t took years to unmask hm, we-paced
sources sad." - The Poneer, Pramod Kumar Sngh
"Geean ke damaad ke ghar aaykar chhaapon men behsaab
sampat wa samwadanshe dastawez baramad" (Enormous
weath and senstve documents recovered from the house of
Geean's son-n-aw durng ncome tax rads) -- Hndustan, |une
10, 2002
Never mnd that the poce chargesheet recorded a recovery of
ony Rs 3,450 from hs house.
Meanwhe, other meda reports sad that he had a three-
bedroom fat, an undscosed ncome of Rs 22 akh, had evaded
ncome tax of Rs 79 akh, that he and hs wfe were abscondng to
evade arrest.
But arrested he was.
In |a, Iftkhar Gan was beaten, ab|ecty humated. In hs book
My Days In Prson he tes of how, among other thngs, he was
made to cean the toet wth hs shrt and then wear the same
shrt for days. After sx months of court arguments and obbyng
by hs coeagues, when t became obvous that f the case
aganst hm contnued t woud ead to serous embarrassment,
he was reeased.
Unmoor yoursef conceptuay, f ony for a moment, from the
'Poce s Good/Terrorsts are Ev' deoogy. The evdence, mnus
ts deoogca trappngs, opens up terrfyng possbtes.
Here he was now. A free man, a reporter come to |antar Mantar
to cover a story. It occurred to me that S.A.R. Geean, Iftkhar
Gan and Mohammed Afza woud have been n Thar |a at the
same tme. (Aong wth scores of other ess we known Kashmrs
whose stores we may never earn.)
It can and w be argued that the cases of both S.A.R. Geean
and Iftkhar Gan serve ony to demonstrate the ob|ectvty of the
Indan |udca system and ts capacty for sef-correcton, they do
not dscredt t. That's ony party true. Both Iftkhar Gan and
S.A.R. Geean are fortunate to be Deh-based Kashmrs wth a
communty of artcuate, mdde-cass peers; |ournasts and
unversty teachers, who knew them we and raed around them
n ther tme of need. S.A.R. Geean's awyer Nandta Haksar put
together an A Inda Defence Commttee for S.A.R. Geean (of
whch I was a member).
Even f we don't beeve Afza, gven what we do know about the
tra and the roe of the Speca Ce, t s nexcusabe not to ook
n the drecton he's pontng.
There was a coordnated campagn by actvsts, awyers and
|ournasts to ray behnd Geean. We-known awyers Ram
|ethmaan, K.G. Kannabran, Vrnda Grover represented hm.
They showed up the case for what t was - a pack of absurd
assumptons, suppostons, and outrght es, bostered by
fabrcated evdence. So of course |udca ob|ectvty exsts. But
t's a shy beast that ves somewhere deep n the abyrnth of our
ega system. It shows tsef rarey. It takes whoe teams of top
awyers to coax t out of ts ar and make t come out and pay.
It's what n newspaper-speak woud be caed a Hercuean task.
Mohammed Afza dd not have Hercues on hs sde.
For fve months, from the tme he was arrested to the day the
poce charge-sheet was fed, Mohammed Afza, odged n a hgh-
securty prson, had no ega defence, no ega advce. No top
awyers, no defence commttee (n Inda or Kashmr), and no
campagn. Of a the four accused, he was the most vunerabe.
Hs case was far more compcated than Geean's. Sgnfcanty,
durng much of ths tme, Afza's younger brother Ha was
egay detaned by the Speca Operatons Group (SOG) n
Kashmr. He was reeased after the chargesheet was fed. (Ths s
a pece of the puzze that w ony fa nto pace as the story
unfods.)
In a serous apse of procedure, on December 20, 2001, the
nvestgatng offcer, Asst Commssoner of Poce (ACP) Ra|br
Sngh (affectonatey known as Deh's 'encounter specast' for
the number of 'terrorsts' he has ked n 'encounters'), caed a
press conference at the Speca Ce. Mohammed Afza was made
to 'confess' before the meda. Deputy commssoner of poce
(DCP) Ashok Chand tod the press that Afza had aready
confessed to the poce.
Ths turned out to be untrue. Afza's forma confesson to the
poce took pace ony the next day (after whch he contnued to
reman n poce custody and vunerabe to torture, another
serous procedura apse). In hs meda 'confesson' Afza
ncrmnated hmsef n the Parament attack competey.
Durng the course of ths 'meda confesson' a curous thng
happened. In an answer to a drect queston, Afza ceary sad
that Geean had nothng to do wth the attack and was
competey nnocent.
At ths pont, ACP Ra|br Sngh shouted at hm and forced hm to
shut up, and requested the meda not to carry ths part of Afza's
'confesson'. And they obeyed! The story came out ony three
months ater when the teevson channe Aa| Tak re-broadcast
the 'confesson' n a programme caed Hame Ke Sau Dn
(Hundred Days of the Attack) and somehow kept ths part n.
Meanwhe n the eyes of the genera pubc - who know tte
about the aw and crmna procedure - Afza's pubc 'confesson'
ony confrmed hs gut. The verdct of the 'coectve conscence
of socety' woud not have been hard to second guess.
Truth, n Kashmr, s probaby more dangerous than anythng
ese. The deeper you dg, the worse t gets.
The day after ths 'meda' confesson, Afza's 'offca' confesson
was extracted from hm. The fawessy structured, perfecty
fuent narratve dctated n artcuate Engsh to DCP Ashok Chand
(n the DCP's words, "he kept on narratng and I kept on wrtng")
was devered n a seaed enveope to a |udca magstrate.
In ths confesson, Afza, now the sheet-anchor of the
prosecuton's case, weaves a masterfu tae that connected Ghaz
Baba, Mauana Masood Azhar, a man caed Tarq, and the fve
dead terrorsts; ther equpment, arms and ammunton, home
mnstry passes, a aptop, and fake ID cards; detaed sts of
exacty how many kos of what chemca he bought from where,
the exact rato n whch they were mxed to make exposves; and
the exact tmes at whch he made and receved cas on whch
mobe number. (For some reason, by then Afza had aso
changed hs mnd about Geean and mpcated hm competey
n the conspracy.)
Afza's surrender was treated as a crme and hs fe became a
he. Can Kashmr youth be bamed f the esson they draw from
hs story s that t woud be nsane to surrender?
Each pont of the 'confesson' corresponded perfecty wth the
evdence that the poce had aready gathered. In other words,
Afza's confessona statement spped perfecty nto the verson
that the poce had aready offered the press days ago, ke
Cnderea's foot nto the gass spper. (If t were a fm, you coud
say t was a screenpay, whch came wth ts own box of props.
Actuay, as we know now, t was made nto a fm. Zee TV owes
Afza some royaty payments.)
Eventuay, both the hgh court and the Supreme Court set asde
Afza's confesson ctng 'apses and voatons of procedura
safeguards'. But Afza's confesson somehow survves, the
phantom keystone n the prosecuton's case. And before t was
techncay and egay set asde, the confessona document had
aready served a ma|or extra-ega purpose: On December 21,
2001, when the Government of Inda aunched ts war effort
aganst Pakstan t sad t had 'ncontrovertbe evdence' of
Pakstan's nvovement. Afza's confesson was the ony 'proof' of
Pakstan's nvovement that the government had! Afza's
confesson. And the stcker-manfesto.
Thnk about t. On the bass of ths ega confesson extracted
under torture, hundreds of thousands of soders were moved to
the Pakstan border at huge cost to the pubc exchequer, and the
subcontnent devoved nto a game of nucear brnkmanshp n
whch the whoe word was hed hostage.
Bg Whspered Oueston: Coud t have been the other way
around? Dd the confesson precptate the war, or dd the need
for a war precptate the need for the confesson?
Later, when Afza's confesson was set asde by the hgher courts,
a tak of |ash-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taba ceased. The
ony other nk to Pakstan was the dentty of the fve dead
fdayeen. Mohammed Afza, st n poce custody, dentfed them
as Mohammed, Rana, Ra|a, Hamza and Hader. The home
mnster sad they "ooked ke Pakstans", the poce sad they
were Pakstans, the tra court |udge sad they were Pakstans.
And there the matter rests. Had we been tod that ther names
were Happy, Bouncy, Lucky, |oy and Kdngaman from
Scandnava, we woud have had to accept that too. We st don't
know who they reay are, or where they're from. Is anyone
curous? Doesn't ook ke t. The hgh court sad the "dentty of
the fve deceased thus stands estabshed. Even otherwse t
makes no dfference. What s reevant s the assocaton of the
accused wth the sad fve persons and not ther names."
In hs Statement of the Accused (whch, unke the confesson, s
made n court and not poce custody) Afza says: "I had not
dentfed any terrorst. Poce tod me the names of terrorsts and
forced me to dentfy them." But by then t was too ate for hm.
On the frst day of the tra, the awyer apponted by the tra
court |udge agreed to accept Afza's dentfcaton of the bodes
and the postmortem reports as undsputed evdence wthout
forma proof! Ths baffng move was to have serous
consequences for Afza. To quote from the Supreme Court
|udgement, "The frst crcumstance aganst the accused Afza s
that Afza knew who the deceased terrorsts were. He dentfed
the dead bodes of the deceased terrorsts. On ths aspect the
evdence remans unshattered."
Of course t's possbe that the dead terrorsts were foregn
mtants. But t s |ust as possbe that they were not. Kng
peope and fasey dentfyng them as 'foregn terrorsts', or
fasey dentfyng dead peope as 'foregn terrorsts', or fasey
dentfyng vng peope as terrorsts, s not uncommon among
the poce or securty forces ether n Kashmr or even on the
streets of Deh.
The best known among the many we-documented cases n
Kashmr, one that went on to become an nternatona scanda, s
the kng that took pace after the Chhttsnghpura massacre.
On the nght of Apr 20, 2000, |ust before the US Presdent B
Cnton arrved n New Deh, 35 Skhs were ked n the vage of
Chhttsnghpura by 'undentfed gunmen' wearng Indan Army
unforms. (In Kashmr many peope suspected that Indan securty
forces were behnd the massacre.) Fve days ater the SOG and
the 7th Rashtrya Rfes, a counter-nsurgency unt of the army,
ked fve peope n a |ont operaton outsde a vage caed
Pathrba. The next mornng they announced that the men were
the Pakstan-based foregn mtants who had ked the Skhs n
Chhttsnghpura. The bodes were found burned and dsfgured.
Under ther (unburned) army unforms, they were n ordnary
cvan cothes.
It turned out that they were a oca peope, rounded up from
Anantnag dstrct and brutay ked n cod bood.
There are others:
On October 20, 2003, the Srnagar newspaper A-safa prnted a
pcture of a 'Pakstan mtant' who the 18 Rashtrya Rfes
camed they had ked whe he was tryng to storm an army
camp. A baker n Kupwara, Wa Khan, saw the pcture and
recognsed t as hs son, Farooq Ahmed Khan, who had been
pcked up by soders n a Gypsy two months earer. Hs body was
fnay exhumed more than a year ater.
On Apr 20, 2004, the 18 Rashtrya Rfes posted n the Loab
vaey camed t had ked four foregn mtants n a ferce
encounter. It ater turned out that a four were ordnary abourers
from |ammu, hred by the army and taken to Kupwara. An
anonymous etter tpped off the abourers' fames who traveed
to Kupwara and eventuay had the bodes exhumed.
On November 9, 2004, the army showcased 47 surrendered
'mtants' to the press at Nagrota, |ammu, n the presence of the
Genera Offcer Commandng XVI, Corps and the Drector Genera
of Poce, |&K. The |&K poce ater found that 27 of them were
|ust unempoyed men who had been gven fake names and fake
aases and promsed government |obs n return for payng ther
part n the charade.
These are |ust a few quck exampes to ustrate the fact that n
the absence of any other evdence, the poce's word s |ust not
good enough.
The hearngs n the fast-track tra court began n May 2002. Let's
not forget the cmate n whch the tra took pace. The frenzy
over the 9/11 attacks was st n the ar. The US was goatng
over ts vctory n Afghanstan. Gu|arat was convused by
communa frenzy. A few months prevousy, coach S-6 of the
Sabarmat Express had been set on fre and 58 Hndu pgrms
had been burned ave nsde. As 'revenge' n an orchestrated
pogrom, more than 2,000 Musms were pubcy butchered and
more than 1,50,000 drven from ther homes.
For Afza, everythng that coud go wrong went wrong. He was
ncarcerated n a hgh-securty prson, wth no access to the
outsde word, and no money to hre a awyer professonay.
Three weeks nto the tra the awyer apponted by the court
asked to be dscharged from the case because she had now been
professonay hred to be on the team of awyers for S.A.R.
Geean's defence. The court apponted her |unor, a awyer wth
very tte experence, to represent Afza. He dd not once vst hs
cent n |a to take nstructons. He dd not summon a snge
wtness for Afza's defence and barey cross-questoned any of
the prosecuton wtnesses. Fve days after he was apponted, on
|uy 8, Afza asked the court for another awyer and gave the
court a st of awyers whom he hoped the court mght hre for
hm. Each of them refused. (Gven the frenzy of propaganda n
the meda, t was hardy surprsng. At a ater stage of the tra,
when senor advocate Ram |ethmaan agreed to represent
Geean, Shv Sena mobs ransacked hs Bombay offce.) The |udge
expressed hs nabty to do anythng about ths, and gave Afza
the rght to cross-examne wtnesses. It's astonshng for the
|udge to expect a ayperson to be abe cross-examne wtnesses
n a crmna tra. It's a vrtuay mpossbe task for someone who
does not have a sophstcated understandng of crmna aw,
ncudng new aws that had |ust been passed, ke POTA, and the
amendments to the Evdence Act and the Teegraph Act. Even
experenced awyers were havng to work overtme to brng
themseves up to date.
The case aganst Afza was but up n the tra court on the
strength of the testmones of amost 80 prosecuton wtnesses:
andords, shopkeepers, techncans from ce-phone companes,
the poce themseves.
Ths was a cruca perod of the tra, when the ega foundaton of
the case was beng ad. It requred metcuous back-breakng
ega work n whch evdence needed to be amassed and put on
record, wtnesses for the defence summoned and testmones
from prosecuton wtnesses cross-questoned. Even f the verdct
of the tra court went aganst the accused (tra courts are
notorousy conservatve), the evdence coud then be worked
upon by awyers n the hgher courts. Through ths absoutey
crtca perod, Afza went vrtuay undefended. It was at ths
stage that the bottom fe out of hs case, and the noose
tghtened around hs neck.
Even st, durng the tra, the skeetons began to catter out of
the Speca Ce's cupboard n an embarrassng heap. It became
cear that the accumuaton of es, fabrcatons, forged
documents and serous apses n procedure began from the very
frst day of the nvestgaton. Whe the hgh court and Supreme
Court |udgements have ponted these thngs out, they have |ust
wagged an admontory fnger at the poce, or occasonay caed
t a 'dsturbng feature', whch s a dsturbng feature n tsef. At
no pont n the tra has the poce been serousy reprmanded,
eave aone penased. In fact, amost every step of the way, the
Speca Ce dspayed an egregous dsregard for procedura
norms. The shoddy caousness wth whch the nvestgatons
were carred out demonstrate a worryng beef that they woudn't
be 'found out,' and f they were, t woudn't matter very much.
Ther confdence does not seem to have been mspaced.
There s fudgng n amost every part of the nvestgaton.
Consder the Tme and Pace of the Arrests and Sezures: The
Deh Poce sad that Afza and Shaukat were arrested n Srnagar
based on nformaton gven to them by Geean foowng hs
arrest. The court records show that the message to ook out for
Shaukat and Afza was fashed to the Srnagar poce on
December 15 at 5.45 am. But accordng to the Deh Poce's
records Geean was ony arrested n Deh on December 15 at 10
am-four hours after they had started ookng for Afza and
Shaukat n Srnagar. They haven't been abe to expan ths
dscrepancy. The hgh court |udgement puts t on record that the
poce verson contans a 'matera contradcton' and cannot be
true. It goes down as a 'dsturbng feature.' Why the Deh Poce
needed to e remans unasked, and unanswered.
When the poce arrest somebody, procedure requres them to
have pubc wtnesses for the arrest who sgn an Arrest Memo and
a Sezure Memo for what they may have 'sezed' from those who
have been arrested - goods, cash, documents, whatever. The
poce cam they arrested Afza and Shaukat together on
December 15 at 11 am n Srnagar. They say they 'sezed' the
truck the two men were feeng n (t was regstered n the name
of Shaukat's wfe). They aso say they sezed a Noka mobe
phone, a aptop and Rs 10 akh from Afza. In hs Statement of the
Accused, Afza says he was arrested at a bus stop n Srnagar and
that no aptop, mobe phone or money was 'sezed' from hm.
Scandaousy, the Arrest Memos for both Afza and Shaukat have
been sgned n Deh, by Bsmah, Geean's younger brother,
who was at the tme beng hed n ega confnement at the
Lodh Road Poce Staton. Meanwhe, the two wtnesses who
sgned the sezure memo for the phone, the aptop and the Rs 10
akh are both from the |&K Poce. One of them s Head Constabe
Mohammed Akbar (Prosecuton Wtness 62) who, as we sha see
ater, s no stranger to Mohammad Afza, and s not |ust any od
poceman who happened to be passng by. Even by the |&K
Poce's own admsson they frst ocated Afza and Shaukat n
Parmpura Frut Mand.
For reasons they don't state, the poce ddn't arrest them there.
They say they foowed them to a ess pubc pace - where there
were no pubc wtnesses.
So here's another serous nconsstency n the prosecuton's case.
Of ths the hgh court |udgement says 'the tme of arrest of
accused persons has been serousy dented'. Shockngy, t s at
ths contested tme and pace of arrest that the poce cam to
have recovered the most vta evdence that mpcates Afza n
the conspracy: the mobe phone and the aptop. Once agan, n
the matter of the date and tme of the arrests, and n the aeged
sezure of the ncrmnatng aptop and the Rs 10 akh, we have
ony the word of the poce, aganst the word of a 'terrorst'.
The Sezures Contnued: The sezed aptop, the poce sad,
contaned the fes that created the fake home mnstry pass and
the fake dentty cards. It contaned no other usefu nformaton.
They camed that Afza was carryng t to Srnagar n order to
return t to Ghaz Baba. The Investgatng Offcer, ACP Ra|br
Sngh, sad that the hard dsk of the computer had been seaed
on |anuary 16, 2002 (a whoe month after the sezure). But the
computer shows that t was accessed even after that date. The
courts have consdered ths but taken no cognsance of t. (On a
specuatve note, sn't t strange that the ony ncrmnatng
nformaton found on the computer were the fes used to make
the fake passes and ID cards? And a Zee TV fm cp showng the
Parament Budng. If other ncrmnatng nformaton had been
deeted, why wasn't ths? And why dd Ghaz Baba, Chef of
Operatons of an nternatona terrorst organsaton, need a
aptop - wth bad artwork on t- so urgenty?)
Consder the Mobe phone ca records: Stared at for ong
enough, a ot of the 'hard evdence' produced by the Speca Ce
begns to ook dubous. The backbone of the prosecuton's case
has to do wth the recovery of mobe phones, SIM cards,
computersed ca records, and the testmones of offcas from
cephone companes and shopkeepers who sod the phones and
SIM cards to Afza and hs accompces. The ca records that were
produced to show that Shaukat, Afza , Geean and Mohammad
(one of the dead mtants) had a been n touch wth each other
very cose to the tme of the attack were uncertfed computer
prntouts, not even copes of prmary documents. They were
outputs of the bng system stored as text fes that coud have
been easy doctored and at any tme. For exampe, the ca
records that were produced show that two cas had been made
at exacty the same tme from the same SIM card, but from
separate handsets wth separate IMEI numbers. Ths means that
ether the SIM card had been coned or the ca records were
doctored.
Consder the SIM card: To prop up ts verson of the story, the
prosecuton rees heavy on one partcuar mobe phone number
- 9811489429. The poce say t was Afza's number - the number
that connected Afza to Mohammad, Afza to Shaukat, and
Shaukat to Geean. The poce aso say that ths number was
wrtten on the back of the dentty tags found on the dead
terrorsts. Pretty convenent. Lost Ktten! Ca Mom at
9811489429. (It's worth mentonng that norma procedure
requres evdence gathered at the scene of a crme to be seaed.
The ID cards were never seaed and remaned n the custody of
the poce and coud have been tampered wth at any tme.)
The ony evdence the poce have that 9811489429 was ndeed
Afza's number s Afza's confesson, whch as we have seen s no
evdence at a. The SIM card has never been found. The poce
produced a prosecuton wtness, Kama Kshore, who dentfed
Afza and sad that he had sod hm a Motoroa phone and a SIM
card on December 4, 2001. However, the ca records the
prosecuton reed on show that that partcuar SIM card was
aready n use on the November 6, a whoe month before Afza s
supposed to have bought t! So ether the wtness s yng, or the
ca records are fase. The hgh court gosses over ths
dscrepancy by sayng that Kama Kshore had ony sad that he
sod Afza a SIM card, not ths partcuar SIM card. The Supreme
Court |udgement ofty says "The SIM card shoud necessary
have been sod to Afza pror to 4.12.2001." And that, my frends,
s that.
Consder the Identfcaton of the Accused: A seres of prosecuton
wtnesses, most of them shopkeepers, dentfed Afza as the man
to whom they had sod varous thngs: ammonum ntrate,
aumnum powder, suphur, a Su|ata mxer-grnder, packets of dry
frut and so on. Norma procedure woud requre these
shopkeepers to pck Afza out from a number of peope n a test
dentfcaton parade. Ths ddn't happen. Instead Afza was
dentfed by them when he 'ed' the poce to these shops whe
he was n poce custody and ntroduced to the wtnesses as an
Accused n the Parament Attack. (Are we aowed to specuate
about whether he ed the poce or the poce ed hm to the
shops? After a he was st n ther custody, st vunerabe to
torture. If hs confesson under these crcumstances s egay
suspect, then why not a of ths?)
The |udges have pondered the voaton of these procedura
norms but have not taken them very serousy. They sad that
they dd not see why ordnary members of the pubc woud have
reason to fasey mpcate an nnocent person. But does ths hod
true, gven the orgy of meda propaganda that ordnary members
of the pubc were sub|ected to, partcuary n ths case? Does
ths hod true, f you take nto account the fact that ordnary
shopkeepers, partcuary those who se eectronc goods wthout
recepts n the 'grey market', are competey behoden to the
Deh Poce?
None of the nconsstences that I have wrtten about so far are
the resut of spectacuar detectve work on my part. A ot of them
are documented n an exceent book caed December 13th:
Terror Over Democracy by Nrmaangshu Mukher|; n two reports
(Tra of Errors and Baancng Act) pubshed by the Peopes'
Unon for Democratc Rghts, Deh; and most mportant of a, n
the three thck voumes of |udgements of the tra court, the hgh
court and the Supreme Court. A these are pubc documents,
yng on my desk. Why s t that when there s ths whoe murky
unverse beggng to be reveaed, our TV channes are busy
stagng hoow debates between unnformed peope and graspng
potcans? Why s t that apart from a few sporadc ndependent
commentators, our newspapers carry front-page stores about
who the hangman s gong to be, and macabre detas about the
ength (60 metres) and weght (3.75 kg) of the rope that w be
used to hang Mohammed Afza (Indan Express, October 16,
2006).
Sha we pause for a moment to say a few hosannas for the Free
Press?
It's not an easy thng for most peope to do, but f you can,
unmoor yoursef conceptuay, f ony for a moment, from the
"Poce s Good/Terrorsts are Ev" deoogy. The evdence on
offer mnus ts deoogca trappngs opens up a chasm of
terrfyng possbtes. It ponts n drectons whch most of us
woud prefer not to ook.
The prze for the Most Ignored Lega Document n the entre case
goes to the Statement of the Accused Mohammed Afza under
Secton 313 of the Crmna Procedure Code. In ths document,
the evdence aganst hm s put to hm by the court n the form of
questons. He can ether accept the evdence or dspute t, and
has the opportunty to put down hs verson of hs story n hs own
words. In Afza's case, gven that he has never had any rea
opportunty to be heard, ths document tes hs story n hs voce.
In ths document, Afza accepts certan charges made aganst hm
by the prosecuton. He accepts that he met a man caed Tarq.
He accepts that Tarq ntroduced hm to a man caed
Mohammad. He accepts that he heped Mohammad come to
Deh and heped hm to buy a second-hand whte Ambassador
car. He accepts that Mohammad was one of the fve fdayeen
who was ked n the Attack. The mportant thng about Afza's
Statement of the Accused s that he makes no effort to
competey absove hmsef or cam nnocence. But he puts hs
actons n a context that s devastatng. Afza's statement
expans the perphera part he payed n the Parament attack.
But t aso ushers us towards an understandng of some possbe
reasons for why the nvestgaton was so shoddy, why t pus up
short at the most cruca |unctures and why t s vta that we do
not dsmss ths as |ust ncompetence and shoddness. Even f we
don't beeve Afza, gven what we do know about the tra and
the roe of the Speca Ce, t s nexcusabe not to ook n the
drecton he's pontng. He gves specfc nformaton - names,
paces, dates. (Ths coud not have been easy, gven that hs
famy, hs brothers, hs wfe and young son ve n Kashmr and
are easy meat for the peope he mentons n hs deposton.)
In Afza's words:
"I ve n Sopre |&K and n the year 2000 when I was there Army
used to harass me amost day, then sad once a week. One Ra|a
Mohan Ra used to te me that I shoud gve nformaton to hm
about mtants. I was a surrendered mtant and a mtants
have to mark Attendance at Army Camp every Sunday. I was not
beng physcay torture by me. He used to ony |ust threatened
me. I used to gve hm sma nformaton whch I used to gather
from newspaper, n order to save mysef. In |une/ |uy 2000 I
mgrated from my vage and went to town Baramuah. I was
havng a shop of dstrbuton of Surgca nstruments whch I was
runnng on commsson bass. One day when I was gong on my
scooter S.T.F (State Task Force) peope came and pcked me up
and they contnuousy tortured me for fve days. Somebody had
gven nformaton to S.T.F that I was agan ndugng n mtant
actvtes. That person was confronted wth me and reeased n
my presence. Then I was kept by them n custody for about 25
days and I got mysef reeased by payng Rs 1 akh. Speca Ce
Peope had confrmed ths ncdent. Thereafter I was gven a
certfcate by the S.T.F and they made me a Speca Poce Offcer
for sx months. They were knowng I w not work for them. Tarq
met me n Pahaan S.T.F camp where I was n custody of S.T.F.
Tarq met me ater on n Sr Nagar and tod me he was bascay
workng for S.T.F.
I tod hm I was aso workng for S.T.F. Mohammad who was ked
n Attack on Parament was aong wth Tarq. Tarq tod me he
was from Keran sector of Kashmr and he tod me that I shoud
take Mohammad to Deh as Mohammad has to go out of country
from Deh after some tme. I don't know why I was caught by the
poce of Sr Nagar on 15.12.2001. I was boardng bus at Sr Nagar
bus stop, for gong home when poce caught me. Wtness Akbar
who had deposed n the court that he had apprehended Shaukat
and me n Sr Nagar had conducted a rad at my shop about a
year pror to December 2001 and tod me that I was seng fake
surgca nstruments and he took Rs 5000/- from me. I was
tortured at Speca Ce and one Bhoop Sngh even compeed me
to take urne and I saw famy of S. A.R. Geean aso there,
Geean was n mserabe condton. He was not n a poston to
stand. We were taken to Doctor for examnaton but nstructons
used to be ssued that we have to te Doctor that everythng was
arght wth a threat that f we do not do so we be agan tortured."
He then asks the court's permsson to add some more
nformaton.
"Mohammad the san terrorst of Parament attack had come
aong wth me from Kashmr. The person who handed hm over to
me s Tarq. Tarq s workng wth Securty Force and S.T.F |K
Poce. Tarq tod me that f I face any probem due to Mohammad
he w hep me as he knew the securty forces and S.T.F very
we... Tarq had tod me that I |ust have to drop Mohammad at
Deh and do nothng ese. And f I woud not take Mohammad
wth me to Deh I woud be mpcated n some other case. I
under these crcumstances brought Mohammad to Deh under a
compuson wthout knowng he was a terrorst."
So now we have a pcture emergng of someone who coud be a
key payer. 'Wtness Akbar' (PW 62), Mohd Akbar, Head
Constabe, Parmpora Poce Staton, the |&K poceman who
sgned the Sezure Memo at the tme of Afza's arrest. In a etter
to Sush Kumar, hs Supreme Court awyer, Afza descrbes a
chng moment at one pont n the tra. In the court, Wtness
Akbar, who had come from Srnagar to testfy about the Sezure
Memo, reassured Afza n Kashmr that "hs famy was arght".
Afza mmedatey recognsed that ths was a veed threat. Afza
aso says that after he was arrested n Srnagar he was taken to
the Parmpora poce staton and beaten, and pany tod that hs
wfe and famy woud suffer dre consequences f he dd not co-
operate. (We aready know that Afza's brother Ha had been
hed n ega detenton by the SOG durng some cruca months.)
In ths etter, Afza descrbes how he was tortured n the STF
camp - wth eectrodes on hs gentas and ches and petro n
hs anus. He mentons the name of Dy Superntendent of Poce
Dravnder Sngh who sad he needed hm to do a 'sma |ob' for
hm n Deh. He aso says that some of the phone numbers
mentoned n the chargesheet can be traced to an STF camp n
Kashmr.
It s Afza's story that gves us a gmpse nto what fe s reay
ke n the Kashmr Vaey. It's ony n the Noddy Book verson we
read about n our newspapers that Securty Forces batte Mtants
and nnocent Kashmrs are caught n the cross-fre. In the adut
verson, Kashmr s a vaey awash wth mtants, renegades,
securty forces, doube-crossers, nformers, spooks, backmaers,
backmaees, extortonsts, spes, both Indan and Pakstan
ntegence agences, human rghts actvsts, NGOs and
unmagnabe amounts of unaccounted-for money and weapons.
There are not aways cear nes that demarcate the boundares
between a these thngs and peope, t's not easy to te who s
workng for whom.
Truth, n Kashmr, s probaby more dangerous than anythng
ese. The deeper you dg, the worse t gets. At the bottom of the
pt s the SOG and STF that Afza taks about. These are the most
ruthess, ndscpned and dreaded eements of the Indan
securty apparatus n Kashmr. Unke the more forma forces,
they operate n a twght zone where pocemen, surrendered
mtants, renegades and common crmnas do busness. They
prey upon the oca popuaton, partcuary n rura Kashmr. Ther
prmary vctms are the thousands of young Kashmr men who
rose up n revot n the anarchc uprsng of the eary '90s and
have snce surrendered and are tryng to ve norma ves.
In 1989, when Afza crossed the border to be traned as a
mtant, he was ony 20 years od. He returned wth no tranng,
dsusoned wth hs experence. He put down hs gun and
enroed hmsef n Deh Unversty. In 1993 wthout ever havng
been a practsng mtant, he vountary surrendered to the
Border Securty Force (BSF). Iogcay enough, t was at ths pont
that hs nghtmares began. Hs surrender was treated as a crme
and hs fe became a he. Can young Kashmr men be bamed f
the esson they draw from Afza's story s that t woud be not |ust
stupd, but nsane to surrender ther weapons and submt to the
vast range of myrad cruetes the Indan State has on offer for
them?
The story of Mohammed Afza has enraged Kashmrs because hs
story s ther story too. What has happened to hm coud have
happened, s happenng and has happened to thousands of
young Kashmr men and ther fames. The ony dfference s that
ther stores are payed out n the dngy bowes of |ont
nterrogaton centres, army camps and poce statons where they
have been burned, beaten, eectrocuted, backmaed and ked,
ther bodes thrown out of the backs of trucks for passers-by to
fnd. Whereas Afza's story s beng performed ke a pece of
medeva theatre on the natona stage, n the cear ght of day,
wth the ega sancton of a 'far tra', the hoow benefts of a
'free press' and a the pomp and ceremony of a so-caed
democracy.
If Afza s hanged, we' never know the answer to the rea
queston: Who attacked the Indan Parament? Was t the
Lashkar-e-Toba? The |ash-e-Mohammed? Or does the answer e
somewhere deep n the secret heart of ths country that we a
ve n and ove and hate n our own beautfu, ntrcate, varous,
and thorny ways?
There ought to be a Paramentary Inqury nto the December 13
attack on Parament. Whe the nqury s pendng, Afza's famy
n Sopore must be protected because they are vunerabe
hostages n ths bzarre story.
To hang Mohammed Afza wthout knowng what reay happened
s a msdeed that w not easy be forgotten. Or forgven. Nor
shoud t be.
Notwthstandng the 10% Growth Rate.
War ls Peace
by Arundhati Roy,
October 18, 2001
Orgnay Pubshed on OutookInda.com va Znet.com
The word doesn't have to choose between the Taban and the
US government. A the beauty of the word--terature, musc,
art--es between these two fundamentast poes.
As darkness deepened over Afghanstan on Sunday, October 7,
2001, the US government, backed by the Internatona Coaton
Aganst Terror (the new, amenabe surrogate for the Unted
Natons), aunched ar strkes aganst Afghanstan. TV channes
ngered on computer-anmated mages of Cruse msses, steath
bombers, Tomahawks, 'bunker-bustng' msses and Mark 82
hgh-drag bombs. A over the word, tte boys watched gogge-
eyed and stopped camourng for new vdeo games.
The UN, reduced now to an neffectve abbrevaton, wasn't
evenasked tomandate the ar strkes. (As Madeene Abrght once
sad, "The US acts mutateray when t can, and unateray
when t must.") The 'evdence' aganst the terrorsts was shared
amongst frends n the 'Coaton'. After conferrng, they
announced that t ddn't matter whether or not the 'evdence'
woud stand up n a court of aw. Thus, n an nstant, were
centures of |ursprudence careessy trashed.
Nothng can excuse or |ustfy an act of terrorsm, whether t s
commtted by regous fundamentasts, prvate mta, peope's
resstance movements-or whether t's dressed up as a war of
retrbuton by a recognsed government. The bombng of
Afghanstan s not revenge for New York and Washngton. It s yet
another act of terror aganst the peope of the word. Each
nnocent person that s ked must be added to, not set off
aganst, the grsy to of cvans who ded n New York and
Washngton.
Peope rarey wn wars, governments rarey ose them. Peope get
ked. Governments mout and regroup, hydra-headed. They frst
use fags to shrnk-wrap peopes' mnds and suffocate rea
thought, and then as ceremona shrouds to coak the manged
corpses of the wng dead. On both sdes, n Afghanstan as we
as Amerca, cvans are now hostage to the actons of ther own
governments. Unknowngy, ordnary peope n both countres
share a common bond-they have to ve wth the phenomenon of
bnd, unpredctabe terror. Each batch of bombs that s dropped
on Afghanstan s matched by a correspondng escaaton of mass
hystera n Amerca about anthrax, more h|ackngs and other
terrorst acts.
There s no easy way out of the sprang morass of terror and
brutaty that confronts the word today. It s tme now for the
human race to hod st, to deve nto ts wes of coectve
wsdom, both ancent and modern. What happened on September
11 changed the word forever. Freedom, progress, weath,
technoogy, war-these words have taken on new meanng.
Governments have to acknowedge ths transformaton, and
approach ther new tasks wth a modcum of honesty and
humty. Unfortunatey, up to now, there has been no sgn of any
ntrospecton from the eaders of the Internatona Coaton. Or
the Taban.
When he announced the ar strkes, Presdent George Bush sad,
"We're a peacefu naton." Amerca's favourte ambassador, Tony
Bar, (who aso hods the portfoo of Prme Mnster of the UK),
echoed hm: "We're a peacefu peope."
So now we know. Pgs are horses. Grs are boys. War s Peace.
Speakng at the FBI headquarters a few days ater, Presdent
Bush sad: "Ths s our cang. Ths s the cang of the Unted
States of Amerca. The most free naton n the word. A naton
but on fundamenta vaues that re|ect hate, re|ect voence,
re|ects murderers and re|ects ev. We w not tre."
Here s a st of the countres that Amerca has been at war wth-
and bombed-snce Word War II: Chna (1945-46, 1950-53); Korea
(1950-53); Guatemaa (1954, 1967-69); Indonesa (1958); Cuba
(1959-60); the Began Congo (1964); Peru (1965); Laos (1964-
73); Vetnam (1961-73); Camboda (1969-70); Grenada (1983);
Lbya (1986); E Savador (1980s); Ncaragua (1980s); Panama
(1989), Iraq (1991-99), Bosna (1995), Sudan (1998); Yugosava
(1999). And now Afghanstan.
Certany t does not tre-ths, the Most Free naton n the word.
What freedoms does t uphod? Wthn ts borders, the freedoms
of speech, regon, thought; of artstc expresson, food habts,
sexua preferences (we, to some extent) and many other
exempary, wonderfu thngs. Outsde ts borders, the freedom to
domnate, humate and sub|ugate-usuay n the servce of
Amerca's rea regon, the 'free market'. So when the US
government chrstens a war 'Operaton Infnte |ustce', or
'Operaton Endurng Freedom', we n the Thrd Word fee more
than a tremor of fear. Because we know that Infnte |ustce for
some means Infnte In|ustce for others. And Endurng Freedom
for some means Endurng Sub|ugaton for others.
The Internatona Coaton Aganst Terror s argey a caba of the
rchest countres n the word. Between them, they manufacture
and se amost a of the word's weapons, they possess the
argest stockpe of weapons of mass destructon chemca,
boogca and nucear. They have fought the most wars, account
for most of the genocde, sub|ecton, ethnc ceansng and human
rghts voatons n modern hstory, and have sponsored, armed,
and fnanced untod numbers of dctators and despots. Between
them, they have worshpped, amost defed, the cut of voence
and war. For a ts appang sns, the Taban |ust sn't n the
same eague.
The Taban was compounded n the crumbng crucbe of rubbe,
heron, and andmnes n the backwash of the Cod War. Its odest
eaders are n ther eary 40s. Many of them are dsfgured and
handcapped, mssng an eye, an arm or a eg. They grew up n a
socety scarred and devastated by war. Between the Sovet Unon
and Amerca, over 20 years, about $45 bon worth of arms and
ammunton was poured nto Afghanstan. The atest weaponry
was the ony shard of modernty to ntrude upon a thoroughy
medeva socety. Young boys-many of them orphans-who grew
up n those tmes, had guns for toys, never knew the securty and
comfort of famy fe, never experenced the company of women.
Now, as aduts and ruers, the Taban beat, stone, rape, and
brutase women; they don't seem to know what ese to do wth
them. Years of war have strpped them of genteness, nured
them to kndness and human compasson. They dance to the
percussve rhythms of bombs ranng down around them. Now
they've turned ther monstrosty on ther own peope.
Wth a due respect to Presdent Bush, the peope of the word do
not have to choose between the Taban and the US government.
A the beauty of human cvzaton-our art, our musc, our
terature-es beyond these two fundamentast, deoogca poes.
There s as tte chance that the peope of the word can a
become mdde-cass consumers as there s that they' a
embrace any one partcuar regon. The ssue s not about Good
vs Ev or Isam vs Chrstanty as much as t s about space. About
how to accommodate dversty, how to contan the mpuse
towards hegemony-every knd of hegemony, economc, mtary,
ngustc, regous, and cutura. Any ecoogst w te you how
dangerous and frage a monocuture s. A hegemonc word s ke
havng a government wthout a heathy opposton. It becomes a
knd of dctatorshp. It's ke puttng a pastc bag over the word,
and preventng t from breathng. Eventuay, t w be torn open.
One and a haf mon Afghan peope ost ther ves n the 20
years of confct that preceded ths new war. Afghanstan was
reduced to rubbe, and now, the rubbe s beng pounded nto
fner dust. By the second day of the ar strkes, US pots were
returnng to ther bases wthout droppng ther assgned payoad
of bombs. As one pot put t, Afghanstan s "not a target-rch
envronment". At a press brefng at the Pentagon, Donad
Rumsfed, US defense secretary, was asked f Amerca had run
out of targets.
"Frst we're gong to re-ht targets," he sad, "and second, we're
not runnng out of targets, Afghanstan s..." Ths was greeted
wth gaes of aughter n the Brefng Room.
By the thrd day of the strkes, the US defense department
boasted that t had "acheved ar supremacy over Afghanstan".
(Dd they mean that they had destroyed both, or maybe a 16, of
Afghanstan's panes?)
On the ground n Afghanstan, the Northern Aance-the Taban's
od enemy, and therefore the Internatona Coaton's newest
frend-s makng headway n ts push to capture Kabu. (For the
archves, et t be sad that the Northern Aance's track record s
not very dfferent from the Taban's. But for now, because t's
nconvenent, that tte deta s beng gossed over.) The vsbe,
moderate, "acceptabe" eader of the Aance, Ahmed Shah
Masood, was ked n a sucde-bomb attack eary n September.
The rest of the Northern Aance s a brtte confederaton of
bruta warords, ex-communsts, and unbendng cercs. It s a
dsparate group dvded aong ethnc nes, some of whom have
tasted power n Afghanstan n the past.
Unt the US ar strkes, the Northern Aance controed about 5
per cent of the geographca area of Afghanstan. Now, wth the
Coaton's hep and 'ar cover', t s posed to toppe the Taban.
Meanwhe, Taban soders, sensng mmnent defeat, have
begun to defect to the Aance. So the fghtng forces are busy
swtchng sdes and changng unforms. But n an enterprse as
cynca as ths one, t seems to matter hardy at a. Love s hate,
north s south, peace s war.
Among the goba powers, there s tak of 'puttng n a
representatve government'. Or, on the other hand, of 'restorng'
the Kngdom to Afghanstan's 89-year-od former kng, Zahr
Shah, who has ved n exe n Rome snce 1973. That's the way
the game goes-support Saddam Hussen, then 'take hm out';
fnance the mu|ahdeen, then bomb them to smthereens; put n
Zahr Shah and see f he's gong to be a good boy. (Is t possbe
to 'put n' a representatve government? Can you pace an order
for Democracy-wth extra cheese and |aapeno peppers?)
Reports have begun to trcke n about cvan casuates, about
ctes emptyng out as Afghan cvans fock to the borders whch
have been cosed. Man artera roads have been bown up or
seaed off. Those who have experence of workng n Afghanstan
say that by eary November, food convoys w not be abe to
reach the mons of Afghans (7.5 mon accordng to the UN)
who run the very rea rsk of starvng to death durng the course
of ths wnter. They say that n the days that are eft before wnter
sets n, there can ether be a war, or an attempt to reach food to
the hungry. Not both.
As a gesture of humantaran support, the US government ar
dropped 37,000 packets of emergency ratons nto Afghanstan. It
says t pans to drop a tota of 5,000,000 packets. That w st
ony add up to a snge mea for haf-a-mon peope out of the
severa mon n dre need of food. Ad workers have condemned
t as a cynca, dangerous, pubc-reatons exercse. They say that
ar-droppng food packets s worse than fute. Frst, because the
food w never get to those who reay need t. More dangerousy,
those who run out to retreve the packets rsk beng bown up by
andmnes. A tragc ams race.
Nevertheess, the food packets had a photo-op a to themseves.
Ther contents were sted n ma|or newspapers. They were
vegetaran, we're tod, as per Musm Detary Law(!) Each yeow
packet, decorated wth the Amercan fag, contaned: rce, peanut
butter, bean saad, strawberry |am, crackers, rasns, fat bread,
an appe frut bar, seasonng, matches, a set of pastc cutery, a
servette and ustrated user nstructons.
After three years of unremttng drought, an ar-dropped arne
mea n |aaabad! The eve of cutura nepttude, the faure to
understand what months of reentess hunger and grndng
poverty reay mean, the US government's attempt to use even
ths ab|ect msery to boost ts sef-mage, beggars descrpton.
Reverse the scenaro for a moment. Imagne f the Taban
government was to bomb New York Cty, sayng a the whe that
ts rea target was the US government and ts poces. And
suppose, durng breaks between the bombng, the Taban
dropped a few thousand packets contanng nan and kababs
mpaed on an Afghan fag. Woud the good peope of New York
ever fnd t n themseves to forgve the Afghan government?
Even f they were hungry, even f they needed the food, even f
they ate t, how woud they ever forget the nsut, the
condescenson? Rudy Guan, Mayor of New York Cty, returned a
gft of $10 mon from a Saud prnce because t came wth a few
words of frendy advce about Amercan pocy n the Mdde East.
Is prde a uxury ony the rch are entted to?
Far from stampng t out, gntng ths knd of rage s what creates
terrorsm. Hate and retrbuton don't go back nto the box once
you've et them out. For every 'terrorst' or hs 'supporter' that s
ked, hundreds of nnocent peope are beng ked too. And for
every hundred nnocent peope ked, there s a good chance that
severa future terrorsts w be created.
Where w t a ead?
Settng asde the rhetorc for a moment, consder the fact that
the word has not yet found an acceptabe defnton of what
'terrorsm' s. One country's terrorst s too often another's
freedom fghter. At the heart of the matter es the word's deep-
seated ambvaence towards voence. Once voence s accepted
as a egtmate potca nstrument, then the moraty and
potca acceptabty of terrorsts (nsurgents or freedom fghters)
becomes contentous, bumpy terran. The US government tsef
has funded, armed, and shetered penty of rebes and nsurgents
around the word. The CIA and Pakstan's ISI traned and armed
the mu|ahdeen who, n the 1980s, were seen as terrorsts by the
government n Sovet-occuped Afghanstan. Whe Presdent
Reagan posed wth them for a group portrat and caed them the
mora equvaents of Amerca's foundng fathers. Today, Pakstan-
Amerca's ay n ths new war-sponsors nsurgents who cross the
border nto Kashmr n Inda. Pakstan auds them as 'freedom
fghters', Inda cas them 'terrorsts'. Inda, for ts part, denounces
countres who sponsor and abet terrorsm, but the Indan army
has, n the past, traned separatst Tam rebes askng for a
homeand n Sr Lanka-the LTTE, responsbe for countess acts of
boody terrorsm. (|ust as the CIA abandoned the mu|ahdeen
after they had served ts purpose, Inda abrupty turned ts back
on the LTTE for a host of potca reasons. It was an enraged LTTE
sucde-bomber who assassnated former Indan prme mnster
Ra|v Gandh n 1991.)
It s mportant for governments and potcans to understand that
manpuatng these huge, ragng human feengs for ther own
narrow purposes may yed nstant resuts, but eventuay and
nexoraby, they have dsastrous consequences. Igntng and
expotng regous sentments for reasons of potca expedency
s the most dangerous egacy that governments or potcans can
bequeath to any peope-ncudng ther own. Peope who ve n
socetes ravaged by regous or communa bgotry know that
every regous text-from the Bbe to the Bhagwad Gta-can be
mned and msnterpreted to |ustfy anythng, from nucear war to
genocde to corporate gobasaton.
Ths s not to suggest that the terrorsts who perpetrated the
outrage on September 11 shoud not be hunted down and
brought to book. They must be. But s war the best way to track
them down? W burnng the haystack fnd you the neede? Or
w t escaate the anger and make the word a vng he for a of
us?
At the end of the day, how many peope can you spy on, how
many bank accounts can you freeze, how many conversatons
can you eavesdrop on, how many e-mas can you ntercept, how
many etters can you open, how many phones can you tap? Even
before September 11, the CIA had accumuated more nformaton
than s humany possbe to process. (Sometmes, too much data
can actuay hnder ntegence-sma wonder the US spy
satetes competey mssed the preparaton that preceded
Inda's nucear tests n 1998.)
The sheer scae of the surveance w become a ogstca,
ethca and cv rghts nghtmare. It w drve everybody cean
crazy. And freedom-that precous, precous thng-w be the frst
casuaty. It's aready hurt and hemorrhagng dangerousy.
Governments across the word are cyncay usng the prevang
paranoa to promote ther own nterests. A knds of
unpredctabe potca forces are beng uneashed. In Inda, for
nstance, members of the A Inda Peope's Resstance Forum,
who were dstrbutng ant-war and ant-US pamphets n Deh,
have been |aed. Even the prnter of the eafets was arrested.
The rght-wng government (whe t sheters Hndu extremsts
groups ke the Vshwa Hndu Parshad and the Ba|rang Da) has
banned the Students' Isamc Movement of Inda and s tryng to
revve an ant-terrorst act whch had been wthdrawn after the
Human Rghts Commsson reported that t had been more
abused than used. Mons of Indan ctzens are Musm. Can
anythng be ganed by aenatng them?
Every day that the war goes on, ragng emotons are beng et
oose nto the word. The nternatona press has tte or no
ndependent access to the war zone. In any case, manstream
meda, partcuary n the US, has more or ess roed over,
aowng tsef to be tcked on the stomach wth press hand outs
from mtarymen and government offcas. Afghan rado statons
have been destroyed by the bombng. The Taban has aways
been deepy suspcous of the Press. In the propaganda war,
there s no accurate estmate of how many peope have been
ked, or how much destructon has taken pace. In the absence
of reabe nformaton, wd rumours spread.
Put your ear to the ground n ths part of the word, and you can
hear the thrummng, the deady drumbeat of burgeonng anger.
Pease. Pease, stop the war now. Enough peope have ded. The
smart msses are |ust not smart enough. They're bowng up
whoe warehouses of suppressed fury.
Presdent George Bush recenty boasted: "When I take acton, I'm
not gong to fre a $2 mon msse at a $10 empty tent and ht a
came n the butt. It's gong to be decsve." Presdent Bush
shoud know that there are no targets n Afghanstan that w
gve hs msses ther money's worth. Perhaps, f ony to baance
hs books, he shoud deveop some cheaper msses to use on
cheaper targets and cheaper ves n the poor countres of the
word. But then, that may not make good busness sense to the
Coaton's weapons manufacturers. It woudn't make any sense
at a, for exampe, to the Carye Group-descrbed by the Industry
Standard as 'the word's argest prvate equty frm', wth $12
bon under management. Carye nvests n the defense sector
and makes ts money from mtary confcts and weapons
spendng.
Carye s run by men wth mpeccabe credentas. Former US
defense secretary Frank Carucc s Carye's charman and
managng drector (he was a coege roommate of Donad
Rumsfed's). Carye's other partners ncude former US secretary
of state |ames A. Baker III, George Soros, Fred Maek (George
Bush Sr's campagn manager). An Amercan paper-the Batmore
Chronce and Sentne-says that former Presdent George Bush Sr
s reported to be seekng nvestments for the Carye Group from
Asan markets. He s reportedy pad not nconsderabe sums of
money to make 'presentatons' to potenta government-cents.
Ho Hum. As the tred sayng goes, t's a n the famy.
Then there's that other branch of tradtona famy busness-o.
Remember, Presdent George Bush (|r) and Vce-Presdent Dck
Cheney both made ther fortunes workng n the US o ndustry.
Turkmenstan, whch borders the northwest of Afghanstan, hods
the word's thrd argest gas reserves and an estmated sx bon
barres of o reserves. Enough, experts say, to meet Amercan
energy needs for the next 30 years (or a deveopng country's
energy requrements for a coupe of centures.) Amerca has
aways vewed o as a securty consderaton, and protected t by
any means t deems necessary. Few of us doubt that ts mtary
presence n the Guf has tte to do wth ts concern for human
rghts and amost entrey to do wth ts strategc nterest n o.
O and gas from the Caspan regon currenty moves northward
to European markets. Geographcay and potcay, Iran and
Russa are ma|or mpedments to Amercan nterests. In 1998,
Dck Cheney-then CEO of Haburton, a ma|or payer n the o
ndustry-sad: "I can't thnk of a tme when we've had a regon
emerge as suddeny to become as strategcay sgnfcant as the
Caspan. It's amost as f the opportuntes have arsen overnght."
True enough.
For some years now, an Amercan o gant caed Unoca has
been negotatng wth the Taban for permsson to construct an
o ppene through Afghanstan to Pakstan and out to the
Araban Sea. From here, Unoca hopes to access the ucratve
'emergng markets' n South and Southeast Asa. In December
1997, a deegaton of Taban muahs traveed to Amerca and
even met US State Department offcas and Unoca executves n
Houston. At that tme the Taban's taste for pubc executons
and ts treatment of Afghan women were not made out to be the
crmes aganst humanty that they are now. Over the next sx
months, pressure from hundreds of outraged Amercan femnst
groups was brought to bear on the Cnton admnstraton.
Fortunatey, they managed to scutte the dea. And now comes
the US o ndustry's bg chance.
In Amerca, the arms ndustry, the o ndustry, the ma|or meda
networks, and, ndeed, US foregn pocy, are a controed by the
same busness combnes. Therefore, t woud be foosh to expect
ths tak of guns and o and defense deas to get any rea pay n
the meda. In any case, to a dstraught, confused peope whose
prde has |ust been wounded, whose oved ones have been
tragcay ked, whose anger s fresh and sharp, the nantes
about the 'Cash of Cvsatons' and the 'Good vs Ev' dscourse
home n unerrngy. They are cyncay doed out by government
spokesmen ke a day dose of vtamns or ant depressants.
Reguar medcaton ensures that manand Amerca contnues to
reman the engma t has aways been-a curousy nsuar peope,
admnstered by a pathoogcay meddesome, promscuous
government.
And what of the rest of us, the numb recpents of ths onsaught
of what we know to be preposterous propaganda? The day
consumers of the es and brutaty smeared n peanut butter and
strawberry |am beng ar-dropped nto our mnds |ust ke those
yeow food packets. Sha we ook away and eat because we're
hungry, or sha we stare unbnkng at the grm theatre unfodng
n Afghanstan unt we retch coectvey and say, n one voce,
that we have had enough?
As the frst year of the new mennum rushes to a cose, one
wonders-have we forfeted our rght to dream? W we ever be
abe to re-magne beauty? W t be possbe ever agan to watch
the sow, amazed bnk of a new-born gecko n the sun, or
whsper back to the marmot who has |ust whspered n your ear-
wthout thnkng of the Word Trade Center and Afghanstan?
Help that hinders
By Arundhati Roy
BECAUSE of gobasaton the dstance between decson-makers
and those who endure the effects of those decsons has never
been so great (1). Gatherngs such as the Word Soca Forum
aow oca actvst movements to reduce that dstance and get to
know ther counterparts from weather countres. When the frst
prvate dam was but, at Maheshawar, nks between the
Narmada Bachao Andoan, the organsaton Urgewad (Germany),
the Berne Decaraton (Swtzerand) and the Internatona Rvers
Network (Berkeey, US) made t possbe to dvert many banks
and nternatona companes from the pro|ect. That woud not
have been possbe wthout sod oca resstance and
nternatona support to aow the oca voce to be heard gobay,
whch ed to nvestors wthdrawng from the pro|ect.
One probem faced by mass movements s the NGO-saton of
resstance. It w be easy to twst what I say nto an ndctment of
a NGOs, but that woud be fase. There are NGOs dong vauabe
work; there are aso fake NGOs set up ether to sphon off grant
money or as tax dodges. But ts mportant to consder the NGO
phenomenon n a broader potca context.In Inda the funded
NGO boom began n the ate 1980s and 1990s, concdng wth
the openng of Indas markets to neoberasm.
At the tme the state, n keepng wth the requrements of
structura ad|ustment, was wthdrawng fundng from rura
deveopment, agrcuture, energy, transport and pubc heath.
As the state abdcated ts tradtona roe, NGOs moved n to work
n these areas. But ther avaabe funds are a mnute fracton of
the cut n pubc spendng. Most weathy NGOs are fnanced and
patronsed by ad and deveopment agences, funded by western
governments, the Word Bank, the Unted Natons and
mutnatona corporatons. Though they may not be the same
agences, they are certany part of the same potca formaton
that oversees the neobera pro|ect and demands the sash n
government spendng.
Why shoud these agences fund NGOs? Coud t be mssonary
zea? Gut? Its more than that. NGOs gve the mpresson that
they are fng a vacuum created by a retreatng state. And they
are, but n a materay nconsequenta way. Ther rea
contrbuton s that they defuse potca anger and doe out as ad
or benevoence what peope ought to have by rght. NGOs ater
the pubc psyche. They turn peope nto dependent vctms and
bunt potca resstance. NGOs form a buffer between the sarkar
and pubc (2). Between empre and ts sub|ects. They have
become the arbtrators, the nterpreters, the factators.
In the ong run NGOs are accountabe to ther funders, not to the
peope they work among. Theyre what botansts woud ca an
ndcator speces. The greater the devastaton caused by
neoberasm, the greater the outbreak of NGOs. Nothng
ustrates ths more pognanty than the phenomenon of the US
preparng to nvade a country whe smutaneousy readyng
NGOs to cean up the resutant devastaton.
To ensure ther fundng s not |eopardsed and that the
governments of the countres they work n w aow them to
functon, NGOs have to present themseves n a shaow
framework, more or ess shorn of a potca or hstorca context
(an nconvenent hstorca or potca context anyway). Apotca
- therefore extremey potca - reports of dstress from poor
countres and war zones eventuay make the (dark) peope of
those (dark) countres seem ke pathoogca vctms. Another
manourshed Indan, starvng Ethopan, Afghan refugee camp,
mamed Sudanese n need of the whte mans hep. They
unwttngy renforce racst stereotypes and reaffrm the
achevements, the comforts and the compasson - the tough ove
- of western cvsaton. Theyre the secuar mssonares of the
modern word.
Eventuay, on a smaer scae, but more nsdousy, the capta
avaabe to NGOs pays the same roe n aternatve potcs as
the specuatve capta that fows n and out of the economes of
poor countres. It begns to dctate the agenda. It turns
confrontaton nto negotaton. It depotcses resstance. It
nterferes wth oca peopes movements that have tradtonay
been sef-reant. NGOs have funds to empoy oca peope who
coud be actvsts n resstance movements, but nstead fee they
are dong some mmedate, creatve good whe earnng a vng.
Rea potca resstance offers no such short cuts.
Listening To Grasshoppers-
Genocide, Denial And Celebration
By Arundhati Roy
26 |anuary, 2008
Countercurrents.org
I never met Hrant Dnk, a msfortune that w be mne for tme to
come. From what I know of hm, of what he wrote, what he sad
and dd, how he ved hs fe, I know that had I been here n
Istanbu a year ago I woud have been among the one hundred
thousand peope who waked wth hs coffn n dead sence
through the wntry streets of ths cty, wth banners sayng, "We
are a Armenans", "We are a Hrant Dnk". Perhaps I'd have
carred the one that sad, "One and a haf mon pus one".*
|*One-and-a-haf mon s the number of Armenans who were
systematcay murdered by the Ottoman Empre n the genocde
n Anatoa n the sprng of 1915. The Armenans, the argest
Chrstan mnorty vng under Isamc Turkc rue n the area, had
ved n Anatoa for more than 2,500 years.|
***
In a way, my batte s ke yours. But whe n Turkey there's
sence, n Inda, there s ceebraton.
***
I wonder what thoughts woud have gone through my head as I
waked besde hs coffn. Maybe I woud have heard a reprse of
the voce of Araxe Barsaman, mother of my frend Davd
Barsaman, teng the story of what happened to her and her
famy. She was ten years od n 1915. She remembered the
swarms of grasshoppers that arrved n her vage, Dubne, whch
was north of the hstorc cty Dkranagert, now Dyarbakr. The
vage eders were aarmed, she sad, because they knew n ther
bones that the grasshoppers were a bad omen. They were rght;
the end came n a few months, when the wheat n the feds was
ready for harvestng.
"When we eft...(we were) 25 n the famy," Araxe Barsaman
says. "They took a the men foks. They asked my father, 'Where
s your ammunton?' He says, 'I sod t.' So they says, 'Go get t.'
So he went to the Kurd town to get t, they beat hm and took a
hs cothes. When he came back there - ths my mother tes me
story-when he came back there, naked body, he went n the |a,
they cut hs arms...so he de n |a.
And they took a the mens n the fed, they ted ther hands, and
they shooted, ked every one of them."
Araxe and the other women n her famy were deported. A of
them pershed except Araxe. She was the one survvor.
Ths s, of course, a snge testmony that comes from a hstory
that s dened by the Turksh government, and many Turks as
we.
I am not here to pay the goba nteectua, to ecture you, or to
f the sence n ths country that surrounds the memory (or the
forgettng) of the events that took pace n Anatoa n 1915. That
s what Hrant Dnk tred to do, and pad for wth hs fe.
***
Most genocda kng from the 15th century onwards has been
part of Europe's search for ebensraum.
***
The day I arrved n Istanbu, I waked the streets for many hours,
and as I ooked around, envyng the peope of Istanbu ther
beautfu, mysterous, thrng cty, a frend ponted out to me
young boys n whte caps who seemed to have suddeny
appeared ke a rash n the cty. He expaned that they were
expressng ther sodarty wth the chd-assassn who was
wearng a whte cap when he ked Hrant.
The batte wth the cap-wearers of Istanbu, of Turkey, s not my
batte, t's yours. I have my own battes to fght aganst other
knds of cap-wearers and torchbearers n my country. In a way,
the battes are not a that dfferent. There s one cruca
dfference, though. Whe n Turkey there s sence, n Inda
there's ceebraton, and I reay don't know whch s worse.
In the state of Gu|arat, there was a genocde aganst the Musm
communty n 2002.
I use the word Genocde advsedy, and n keepng wth ts
defnton contaned n Artce 2 of the Unted Natons Conventon
on the Preventon and Punshment of the Crme of Genocde. The
genocde began as coectve punshment for an unsoved crme -
the burnng of a raway coach n whch 53 Hndu pgrms were
burned to death. In a carefuy panned orgy of supposed
retaaton, 2,000 Musms were saughtered n broad dayght by
squads of armed kers, organsed by fascst mtas, and backed
by the Gu|arat government and the admnstraton of the day.
Musm women were gang-raped and burned ave.
Musm shops, Musm busnesses and Musm shrnes and
mosques were systematcay destroyed. Some 1,50,000 peope
were drven from ther homes.
Even today, many of them ve n ghettos-some but on garbage
heaps-wth no water suppy, no dranage, no streetghts, no
heathcare. They ve as second-cass ctzens, boycotted socay
and economcay. Meanwhe, the kers, poce as we as
cvan, have been embraced, rewarded, promoted. Ths state of
affars s now consdered 'norma'. To sea the 'normaty', n
2004, both Ratan Tata and Mukesh Amban, Inda's eadng
ndustrasts, pubcy pronounced Gu|arat a dream destnaton
for fnance capta.
The nta outcry n the natona press has setted down. In
Gu|arat, the genocde has been brazeny ceebrated as the
eptome of Gu|arat prde, Hndu-ness, even Indan-ness. Ths
posonous brew has been used twce n a row to wn state
eectons, wth campagns that have cevery used the anguage
and apparatus of modernty and democracy. The hemsman,
Narendra Mod, has become a fok hero, caed n by the B|P to
campagn on ts behaf n other Indan states.
As genocdes go, the Gu|arat genocde cannot compare wth the
peope ked n the Congo, Rwanda and Bosna, where the
numbers run nto mons, nor s t by any means the frst that
has occurred n Inda. (In 1984, for nstance, 3,000 Skhs were
massacred on the streets of Deh wth smar mpunty, by kers
overseen by the Congress Party.) But the Gu|arat genocde s part
of a arger, more eaborate and systematc vson. It tes us that
the wheat s rpenng and the grasshoppers have anded n
manand Inda.
It's an od human habt, genocde s. It has payed a sterng part
n the march of cvsaton. Amongst the earest recorded
genocdes s thought to be the destructon of Carthage at the end
of the Thrd Punc War n 149 BC. The word tsef-genocde-was
coned by Raphae Lemkn ony n 1943, and adopted by the
Unted Natons n 1948, after the Naz Hoocaust. Artce 2 of the
Unted Natons Conventon on the Preventon and Punshment of
the Crme of Genocde defnes t as:
"Any of the foowng Acts commtted wth ntent to destroy, n
whoe or part, a natona, ethnca, raca or regous group, as
such: kng members of the group; causng serous body or
menta harm to members of the group; deberatey nfctng on
the group condtons of fe, cacuated to brng about ts physca
destructon n whoe or part; mposng measure ntended to
prevent brths wthn the group; |or| forcby transferrng chdren
of the group to another group."
Snce ths defnton eaves out the persecuton of potca
dssdents, rea or magned, t does not ncude some of the
greatest mass murders n hstory. Personay I thnk the defnton
by Frank Chak and Kurt |onassohn, authors of The Hstory and
Socoogy of Genocde, s more apt.
Genocde, they say, "s a form of one-sded mass kng n whch
a state or other authorty ntends to destroy a group, as that
group and membershp n t are defned by the perpetrator."
Defned ke ths, genocde woud ncude, for exampe, the
monumenta crmes commtted by Suharto n Indonesa (1
mon) Po Pot n Camboda (1.5 mon), Stan n the Sovet
Unon (60 mon), Mao n Chna (70 mon).
A thngs consdered, the word extermnaton, wth ts crude
evocaton of pests and vermn, of nfestatons, s perhaps the
more honest, more apposte word. When a set of perpetrators
faces ts vctms, n order to go about ts busness of wanton
kng, t must frst sever any human connecton wth t. It must
see ts vctms as sub-human, as parastes whose eradcaton
woud be a servce to socety. Here, for exampe, s an account of
the massacre of Pequot Indans by Engsh Purtans ed by |ohn
Mason n Connectcut n 1636:
Those that escaped the fre were sane wth the sword; some
hewed to peeces, others rune throw wth ther rapers, so they
were qucky dspatchte, and very few escaped. It was conceved
they thus destroyed about 400 at ths tme. It was a fearfu sght
to see them thus fryng n the fyre, and the streams of bood
quenchng the same, and horrbe was the stncke and sente
thereof, but the vctory seemed a sweete sacrfce....
And here, approxmatey four centures ater, s Babu Ba|rang,
one of the ma|or ynchpns of the Gu|arat genocde, recorded on
camera n the stng operaton mounted by Teheka a few months
ago:
We ddn't spare a snge Musm shop, we set everythng on
fre...hacked, burned, set on fre...we beeve n settng them on
fre because these bastards don't want to be cremated, they're
afrad of t.... I have |ust one ast wsh...et me be sentenced to
death...I don't care f I'm hanged...|ust gve me two days before
my hangng and I w go and have a fed day n |uhapura where
seven or eght akhs of these peope stay...I w fnsh them
off...et a few more of them de...at east 25,000 to 50,000 shoud
de.
I hardy need to say that Babu Ba|rang had the bessngs of
Narendra Mod, the protecton of the poce, and the ove of hs
peope. He contnues to work and prosper as a free man n
Gu|arat. The one crme he cannot be accused of s Genocde
Dena.
Genocde Dena s a radca varaton on the theme of the od,
franky racst, boodthrsty trumphasm. It was probaby evoved
as an answer to the somewhat patchy dua moraty that arose n
the 19th century, when Europe was deveopng mted but new
forms of democracy and ctzens' rghts at home whe
smutaneousy extermnatng peope n ther mons n her
coones. Suddeny countres and governments began to deny or
attempt to hde the genocdes they had commtted. "Dena s
sayng, n effect," says Professor Robert |ay Lfton, author of
Hroshma and Amerca: Ffty Years of Dena, "that the murderers
dd not murder. The vctms weren't ked. The drect
consequence of dena s that t nvtes future genocde."
Of course today, when genocde potcs meets the Free Market,
offca recognton-or dena-of hoocausts and genocdes s a
mutnatona busness enterprse. It rarey has anythng to do to
wth hstorca fact or forensc evdence. Moraty certany does
not enter the pcture. It s an aggressve process of hgh-end
barganng, that beongs more to the Word Trade Organsaton
than to the Unted Natons.
The currency s geopotcs, the fuctuatng market for natura
resources, that curous thng caed futures tradng and pan od
economc and mtary mght.
In other words, genocdes are often dened for the same set of
reasons as genocdes are prosecuted. Economc determnsm
marnated n raca/ethnc/regous/natona dscrmnaton.
Crudey, the owerng or rasng of the prce of a barre of o (or a
tonne of uranum), permsson granted for a mtary base, or the
openng up of a country's economy coud be the decsve factor
when governments ad|udcate on whether a genocde dd or dd
not occur.
Or ndeed whether genocde w or w not occur. And f t does,
whether t w or w not be reported, and f t s, then what sant
that reportage w take. For exampe, the death of two mon n
the Congo goes vrtuay unreported. Why? And was the death of
a mon Iraqs under the sanctons regme, pror to the US
nvason, genocde (whch s what Dens Haday, the UN
Humantaran Coordnator for Iraq, caed t) or was t 'worth t', as
Madeene Abrght, the US ambassador to the UN, camed? It
depends on who makes the rues. B Cnton? Or an Iraq mother
who has ost her chd?
Snce the Unted States s the rchest and most powerfu country
n the word, t has assumed the prvege of beng the Word's
Number One Genocde Dener. It contnues to ceebrate Coumbus
Day, the day Chrstopher Coumbus arrved n the Amercas,
whch marks the begnnng of a Hoocaust that wped out mons
of natve Indans, about 90 per cent of the orgna popuaton.
(Lord Amherst, the man whose dea t was to dstrbute bankets
nfected wth smapox vrus to Indans, has a unversty town n
Massachusetts, and a prestgous bera arts coege named after
hm).
In Amerca's second Hoocaust, amost 30 mon Afrcans were
kdnapped and sod nto savery. We near haf of them ded
durng transportaton. But n 2002, the US deegaton coud st
wak out of the Word Conference Aganst Racsm n Durban,
refusng to acknowedge that savery and the save trade were
crmes. Savery, they nssted, was ega at the tme. The US has
aso refused to accept that the bombng of Tokyo, Hroshma,
Nagasak, Dresden and Hamburg-whch ked hundreds of
thousands of cvans-were crmes, et aone acts of genocde.
(The argument here s that the government ddn't ntend to k
cvans. Ths was the frst stage n the deveopment of the
concept of "coatera damage".) Snce the end of Word War II,
the US government has ntervened overty, mtary, more than
400 tmes n 100 countres, and coverty more than 6,000 tmes.
Ths ncudes ts nvason of Vetnam and the extermnaton, wth
exceent ntentons of course, of three mon Vetnamese
(approxmatey 10 per cent of ts popuaton).
None of these has been acknowedged as war crmes or genocda
acts.
"The queston s," says Robert MacNamara-whose career graph
took hm from the bombng of Tokyo n 1945 (1,00,000 dead
overnght) to beng the archtect of the Vetnam War, to Presdent
of the Word Bank-now sttng n hs comfortabe char n hs
comfortabe home n hs comfortabe country, "the queston s,
how much ev do you have to do n order to do good?"
Coud there be a more perfect ustraton of Robert |ay Lfton's
pont that the dena of genocde nvtes more genocde?
And what when vctms become perpetrators? (In Rwanda, n the
Congo?) What remans to be sad about Israe, created out of the
debrs of one of the crueest genocdes n human hstory? What
of ts actons n the Occuped Terrtores? Its burgeonng
settements, ts coonsaton of water, ts new 'Securty Wa' that
separates Paestnan peope from ther farms, from ther work,
from ther reatves, from ther chdren's schoos, from hosptas
and heathcare? It s genocde n a fshbow, genocde n sow
moton-meant especay to ustrate that secton of Artce 2 of
the Unted Natons Conventon on the Preventon and Punshment
of the Crme of Genocde, whch says that genocde s any act
that s desgned to "deberatey nfct on the group condtons of
fe, cacuated to brng about ts physca destructon n whoe or
part".
The hstory of genocde tes us that t's not an aberraton, an
anomay, a gtch n the human system.
Most of the genocda kng from the 15th century onwards has
been an ntegra part of Europe's search for what the Germans
famousy caed Lebensraum-vng space. Lebensraum was a
word coned by the German geographer and zooogst Fredrch
Ratze to descrbe what he thought of as the domnant human
speces' natura mpuse to expand ts terrtory n ts search for
not |ust space, but sustenance. Ths mpuse to expanson woud
naturay be at the cost of a ess domnant speces, a weaker
speces that Naz deoogues beeved shoud gve way, or be
made to gve way, to the stronger one.
The dea of ebensraum was set out n precse terms n 1901, but
Europe had aready begun her quest for ebensraum 400 years
earer, when Coumbus anded n Amerca. The search for
ebensraum aso took Europeans to Afrca: uneashng hoocaust
after hoocaust. The Germans extermnated amost the entre
popuaton of the Hereros n Southwest Afrca; whe n the Congo,
the Begans' "experment n commerca expanson" cost
10 mon ves. By the ast quarter of the 19th century, the
Brtsh had extermnated the aborgna peope of Tasmana, and
of most of Austraa.
Sven Lndqvst, author of Extermnate the Brutes, argues that t
was Hter's quest for ebensraum-n a word that had aready
been carved up by other European countres-that ed the Nazs to
push through Eastern Europe and on toward Russa. The |ews of
Eastern Europe and western Russa stood n the way of Hter's
coona ambtons. Therefore, ke the natve peope of Afrca and
Amerca and Asa, they had to be ensaved or qudated. So,
Lndqvst says, the Nazs' racst dehumansaton of |ews cannot
be dsmssed as a paroxysm of nsane ev. Once agan, t s a
product of the famar mx: economc determnsm we
marnated n age-od racsm, very much n keepng wth European
tradton of the tme.
It's not a concdence that the potca party that carred out the
Armenan genocde n the Ottoman Empre, was caed the
Commttee for Unon & Progress.
'Unon' (raca/ethnc/regous/natona) and 'Progress' (economc
determnsm) have ong been the twn coordnates of genocde.
Armed wth ths readng of hstory, s t reasonabe to worry about
whether a country that s posed on the threshod of "progress" s
aso posed on the threshod of genocde? Coud the Inda beng
ceebrated a over the word as a mrace of progress and
democracy, possby be posed on the verge of commttng
genocde? The mere suggeston mght sound outandsh and, at
ths pont of tme, the use of the word genocde surey
unwarranted. However, f we ook to the future, and f the Tsars of
Deveopment beeve n ther own pubcty, f they beeve that
There Is No Aternatve to ther chosen mode for Progress, then
they w nevtaby have to k, and k n arge numbers, n order
to get ther way.
Advan's charot of fre: And so the Unon pro|ect was aunched
In bts and peces, as the news trckes n, t seems cear that the
kng and the dyng has aready begun.
It was n 1989, soon after the coapse of the Sovet Unon, that
the Government of Inda turned n ts membershp of the Non-
Agned Movement and sgned up for membershp of the
Competey Agned, often referrng to tsef as the 'natura ay' of
Israe and the Unted States. (They have at east ths one thng n
common-a three are engaged n overt, neo-coona mtary
occupatons: Inda n Kashmr, Israe n Paestne, the US n Iraq.)
Amost ke cockwork, the two ma|or natona potca partes, the
B|P and the Congress, embarked on a |ont programme to
advance Inda's verson of Unon and Progress, whose modern-
day euphemsms are Natonasm and Deveopment. Every now
and then, partcuary durng eectons, they stage nosy fama
squabbes, but have managed to gather nto ther fod even
grumbng reatves, ke the Communst Party of Inda (Marxst).
The Unon pro|ect offers Hndu Natonasm (whch seeks to unte
the Hndu vote, vta you w admt, for a great democracy ke
Inda). The Progress pro|ect ams at a 10 per cent annua growth
rate. Both these pro|ects are encrypted wth genocda potenta.
The Unon pro|ect has been argey entrusted to the RSS, the
deoogca heart, the hodng company of the B|P and ts mtas,
the Vshwa Hndu Parshad and the Ba|rang Da. The RSS was
founded n 1925. By the 1930s, ts founder, Dr Hedgewar, a fan of
Bento Musson, had begun to mode t overty aong the nes of
Itaan fascsm. Hter too was, and s, an nspratona fgure. Here
are some excerpts from the RSS Bbe, We or Our Natonhood
Defned by M.S. Gowakar, who succeeded Dr Hedgewar as head
of the RSS n 1940:
Ever snce that ev day, when Mosems frst anded n Hndustan,
rght up to the present moment, the Hndu Naton has been
gaanty fghtng on to take on these despoers. The Race Sprt
has been awakenng.
Then:
In Hndustan, and of the Hndus, ves and shoud ve the Hndu
Naton.... A others are trators and enemes to the Natona
Cause, or, to take a chartabe vew, dots....
The foregn races n Hndustan...may stay n the country, whoy
subordnated to the Hndu Naton, camng nothng, deservng no
prveges, far ess any preferenta treatment-not even ctzen's
rghts.
And agan:
To keep up the purty of ts race and cuture, Germany shocked
the word by her purgng the country of the Semtc races-the
|ews.
Race prde at ts hghest has been manfested here...a good
esson for us n Hndustan to earn and proft by.
(How do you combat ths knd of organsed hatred? Certany not
wth goofy preachngs of secuar ove.)
By the year 2000, the RSS had more than 45,000 shakhas and an
army of seven mon swayamsevaks preachng ts doctrne
across Inda. They ncude Inda's former prme mnster, Ata
Behar Va|payee, the former home mnster and current eader of
the Opposton, L.K. Advan, and, of course, the three-tmes
Gu|arat chef mnster, Narendra Mod. It aso ncudes senor
peope n the meda, the poce, the army, the ntegence
agences, |udcary and the admnstratve servces who are
nforma devotees of Hndutva-the RSS deoogy. These peope,
unke potcans who come and go, are permanent members of
government machnery.
But the RSS's rea power es n the fact that t has put n decades
of hard work and has created a network of organsatons at every
eve of socety, somethng that no other organsaton can cam.
The B|P s ts potca front. It has a trade unon wng (Bharatya
Mazdoor Sangh), a women's wng (Rashtrya Sevka Samt), a
student wng (Akh Bharatya Vdyarth Parshad) and an
economc wng (Swadesh |agaran Manch).
Its front organsaton Vdya Bharat s the argest educatona
organsaton n the non-governmenta sector. It has 13,000
educatona nsttutes ncudng the Saraswat Vdya Mandr
schoos wth 70,000 teachers and over 1.7 mon students. It has
organsatons workng wth trbas (Vanavas Kayan Ashram),
terature (Akh Bharatya Sahtya Parshad), nteectuas (Pragya
Bharat, Deendaya Research Insttute), hstorans (Bharatya
Ithaas Sankaan Yo|anaaya), anguage (Sanskrt Bhart), sum-
dweers (Seva Bharat, Hndu Seva Pratshthan), heath (Swam
Vvekanand Medca Msson, Natona Medcos Organsaton),
eprosy patents (Bharatya Kushtha Nvaran Sangh), cooperatves
(Sahkar Bharat), pubcaton of newspapers and other
propaganda matera (Bharat Prakashan, Suruch Prakashan,
Lokht Prakashan, Gyanganga Prakashan, Archana Prakashan,
Bharatya Vchar Sadhana, Sadhana Pustak and Akashvan
Sadhana), caste ntegraton (Sama|k Samrasta Manch), regon
and proseytsaton (Vvekananda Kendra, Vshwa Hndu Parshad,
Hndu |agaran Manch, Ba|rang Da). The st goes on and on...
On |une 11, 1989, Congress prme mnster Ra|v Gandh gave the
RSS a gft. He was obgng enough to open the ocks of the
dsputed Babr Mas|d n Ayodhya, whch the RSS camed was the
brthpace of Lord Ram. At the Natona Executve of the B|P, the
party passed a resouton to demosh the mosque and bud a
tempe n Ayodhya. "I'm sure the resouton w transate nto
votes," sad L.K. Advan. In 1990, he crss-crossed the country on
hs Rath Yatra, hs Charot of Fre, demandng the demoton of
the Babr Mas|d, eavng rots and boodshed n hs wake. In
1991, the party won 120 seats n Parament. (It had won two n
1984). The hystera orchestrated by Advan peaked n 1992,
when the mosque was brought down by a maraudng mob. By
1998, the B|P was n power at the Centre. Its frst act n offce was
to conduct a seres of nucear tests. Across the country, fascsts
and corporates, prnces and paupers ake, ceebrated Inda's
Hndu Bomb. Hndutva had transcended petty party potcs.
In 2002, Narendra Mod's government panned and executed the
Gu|arat genocde. In the eectons that took pace a few months
after the genocde, he was returned to power wth an
overwhemng ma|orty. He ensured compete mpunty for those
who had partcpated n the kngs. In the rare case where there
has been a convcton, t s of course the owy footsoders, and
not the mastermnds, who stand n the dock.
Impunty s an essenta prerequste for genocda kng.
Inda has a great tradton of grantng mpunty to mass kers. I
coud f voumes wth the detas.
In a democracy, for mpunty after genocde, you have to "appy
through proper channes". Procedure s everythng. In the case of
severa massacres, the awyers that the Gu|arat government
apponted as pubc prosecutors had actuay aready appeared
for the accused. Severa of them beonged to the RSS or the VHP
and were openy hoste to those they were supposedy
representng. Survvor wtnesses found that, when they went to
the poce to fe reports, the poce woud record ther statements
naccuratey, or refuse to record the names of the perpetrators. In
severa cases, when survvors had seen members of ther fames
beng ked (and burned ave so ther bodes coud not be found),
the poce woud refuse to regster cases of murder.
Ehsan |affr, the Congress potcan and poet who had made the
mstake of campagnng aganst Mod n the Ra|kot eectons, was
pubcy butchered. (By a mob ed by a feow Congressman.) In
the words of a man who took part n the savagery:
Fve peope hed hm, then someone struck hm wth a
sword...chopped off hs hand, then hs egs...then everythng
ese...after cuttng hm to peces, they put hm on the wood
they'd ped and set hm on fre. Burned hm ave.
The Ahmedabad Commssoner of Poce, P.C. Pandey, was knd
enough to vst the neghbourhood whe the mob ynched |affr,
murdered 70 peope, and gang-raped 12 women before burnng
them ave. After Mod was re-eected, Pandey was promoted, and
made Gu|arat's Drector-Genera of Poce. The entre kng
apparatus remans n pace.
The Supreme Court n Deh made a few threatenng noses, but
eventuay put the matter nto cod storage. The Congress and
the Communst partes made a great dea of nose, but dd
nothng.
In the Teheka stng operaton, broadcast recenty on a news
channe at prme tme, apart from Babu Ba|rang, ker after ker
recounted how the genocde had been panned and executed,
how Mod and senor potcans and poce offcers had been
personay nvoved. None of ths nformaton was new, but there
they were, the butchers, on the news networks, not |ust admttng
to, but boastng about ther crmes. The overwhemng pubc
reacton to the stng was not outrage, but suspcon about ts
tmng. Most peope beeved that the expose woud hep Mod
wn the eectons agan. Some even beeved, qute outandshy,
that he had engneered the stng. He dd wn the eectons. And
ths tme, on the tcket of Unon and Progress. A commttee a
unto hmsef. At B|P raes, thousands of adorng supporters now
wear pastc Mod masks, chantng sogans of death. The fascst
democrat has physcay mutated nto a mon tte fascsts.
These are the |oys of democracy. Who n Naz Germany woud
have dared to put on a Hter mask?
Preparatons to recreate the 'Gu|arat bueprnt' are currenty n
dfferent stages n the B|P-rued states of Orssa, Chhattsgarh,
|harkhand, Ra|asthan, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka.
To commt genocde, says Peter Bakan, schoar of the Armenan
genocde, you have to margnase a sub-group for a ong tme.
Ths crteron has been we met n Inda. The Musms of Inda
have been systematcay margnased and have now |oned the
Advass and Dats, who have not |ust been margnased, but
dehumansed by caste Hndu socety and ts scrptures, for years,
for centures. (There was a tme when they were dehumansed n
order to be put to work dong thngs that caste Hndus woud not
do.
Now, wth technoogy, even that abour s becomng redundant.
Part of the RSS's work nvoves settng Dats aganst Musms,
Advass aganst Dats.
Whe the 'peope' were engaged wth the Unon pro|ect and ts
doctrne of hatred, Inda's Progress pro|ect was proceedng
apace. The new regme of prvatsaton and berasaton resuted
n the sae of the country's natura resources and pubc
nfrastructure to prvate corporatons. It has created an
unmagnaby weathy upper cass and growng mdde casses
who have naturay become mtant evangests for the new
dspensaton.
The Progress pro|ect has ts own tradton of mpunty and
subterfuge, no ess horrfc than the eaborate machnery of the
Unon pro|ect. At the heart of t es the most powerfu nsttuton
n Inda, the Supreme Court, whch s rapdy becomng a par of
Corporate Power, ssung order after order aowng for the
budng of dams, the nternkng of rvers, ndscrmnate mnng,
the destructon of forests and water systems. A of ths coud be
descrbed as ecocde-a preude perhaps to genocde. (And to
crtcse the court s a crmna offence, punshabe by
mprsonment).
Ironcay, the era of the free market has ed to the most
successfu secessonst strugge ever waged n Inda-the
secesson of the mdde and upper casses to a country of ther
own, somewhere up n the stratosphere where they merge wth
the rest of the word's ete. Ths Kngdom n the Sky s a
compete unverse n tsef, hermetcay seaed from the rest of
Inda. It has ts own newspapers, fms, teevson programmes,
moraty pays, transport systems, mas and nteectuas. And n
case you are begnnng to thnk t's a |oy-|oy, you're wrong. It
aso has ts own tragedes, ts own envronmenta ssues (parkng
probems, urban ar pouton); ts own cass strugges. An
organsaton caed Youth for Equaty, for exampe, has taken up
the ssue of Reservatons, because t fees Upper Castes are
dscrmnated aganst by Inda's puversed Lower Castes. It has
ts own Peope's Movements and cande-ght vgs (|ustce for
|essca, the mode who was shot n a bar) and even ts own
Peope's Car (the Wagon for the Voks aunched by the Tata
Group recenty). It even has ts own dreams that take the form of
TV advertsements n whch Indan CEOs (smeared wth Far &
Lovey Face Cream, Men's) buy over nternatona corporatons,
ncudng an magnary East Inda Company. They are ushered
nto ther push new offces by fawnng whte women (who ook as
though they're ongng to be ad, the fna prze of conquest) and
appaudng whte men, ready to make way for the new kngs.
Meanwhe, the crowd n the stadum roars to ts feet (wth credt
cards n ts pockets) chantng 'Inda! Inda!'
But there s a probem, and the probem s ebensraum. A
Kngdom needs ts ebensraum. Where w the Kngdom n the
Sky fnd ebensraum? The Sky Ctzens ook towards the Od
Naton. They see Advass sttng on the bauxte mountans of
Orssa, on the ron ore n |harkhand and Chhattsgarh. They see
the peope of Nandgram (Musms, Dats) sttng on prme and,
whch reay ought to be a chemca hub. They see thousands of
acres of farm and, and thnk, these reay ought to be Speca
Economc Zones for our ndustres; they see the rch feds of
Sngur and know ths reay ought to be a car factory for the
Peope's Car. They thnk: that's our bauxte, our ron ore, our
uranum. What are those peope dong on our and? What's our
water dong n ther rvers? What's our tmber dong n ther
trees?
If you ook at a map of Inda's forests, ts mnera weath and the
homeands of the Advas peope, you' see that they're stacked
up over each other.
So, n reaty, those who we ca poor are the truy weathy. But
when the Sky Ctzens cast ther eyes over the and, they see
superfuous peope sttng on precous resources. The Nazs had a
phrase for them-berzahgen Essern, superfuous eaters.
The strugge for ebensraum, Fredrch Ratze sad after cosey
observng the strugge between Natve Indans and ther
European coonsers n North Amerca, s an annhatng strugge.
Annhaton doesn't necessary mean the physca extermnaton
of peope-by budgeonng, beatng, burnng, bayonetng, gassng,
bombng or shootng them. (Except sometmes. Partcuary when
they try to put up a fght. Because then they become Terrorsts.)
Hstorcay, the most effcent form of genocde has been to
dspace peope from ther homes, herd them together and bock
ther access to food and water. Under these condtons, they de
wthout obvous voence and often n far greater numbers. "The
Nazs gave the |ews a star on ther coats and crowded them nto
'reserves'," Sven Lndqvst wrtes, "|ust as the Indans, the
Hereros, the Bushmen, the Amandabee, and a the other
chdren of the stars had been crowded together. They ded on
ther own when food suppy to the reserves was cut off."
The hstoran Mke Davs says that between 12 mon and 29
mon peope starved to death n Inda n the great famne
between 1876 and 1892, whe Brtan contnued to export food
and raw matera from Inda. In a democracy, Amartya Sen says,
we are unkey to have Famne. So n pace of Chna's Great
Famne, we have Inda's Great Manutrton. (Inda hosts 57
mon-more than a thrd-of the word's undernourshed chdren.)
Wth the possbe excepton of Chna, Inda today has the argest
popuaton of nternay dspaced peope n the word. Dams
aone have dspaced more than 30 mon peope. The
dspacement s beng enforced wth court decrees or at gunpont
by pocemen, by government-controed mtas or corporate
thugs. (In Nandgram, even the CPI(M) had ts own armed mta.)
The dspaced are beng herded nto tenements, camps and
resettement coones where, cut off from a means of earnng a
vng, they spra nto poverty.
In the state of Chhattsgarh, beng targeted by corporates for ts
weath of ron ore, there's a dfferent technque. In the name of
fghtng Maost rebes, hundreds of vages have been forcby
evacuated and amost 40,000 peope moved nto poce camps.
The government s armng some of them, and has created Sawa
|udum, a 'peope's mta'. Whe the poorest fght the poorest, n
condtons that approach cv war, the Tata and Essar groups
have been quety negotatng for the rghts to mne ron ore n
Chhattsgarh. Can we estabsh a connecton? We woudn't dream
of t. Even though the Sawa |udum was announced a day after
the Memorandum of Understandng between the Tata Group and
the government was sgned.
It's not surprsng that very tte of ths account of events makes
t nto the verson of the New Inda currenty on the market.
That's because what s on sae s another form of dena-the
creaton of what Robert |ay Lfton cas a "counterfet unverse". In
ths unverse, systemc horrors are converted nto temporary
apses, attrbutabe to fawed ndvduas, and a more 'baanced'
happer word s presented n pace of the rea one. The baance s
spurous: often Unon and Progress are set off aganst each other,
a bera-secuar crtque of the Unon pro|ect beng used to
egtmse the depredatons of the Progress pro|ect. Those at the
top of the food chan, those who have no reason to want to ater
the status quo, are most key to be the manufacturers of the
"counterfet unverse".
Ther |ob s to patro the border, dffuse rage, deegtmse anger,
and broker a ceasefre.
Consder the response of Shahrukh Khan to a queston about
Narendra Mod. "I don't know hm personay...I have no
opnon...," he says. "Personay they have never been unknd to
me." Ramachandra Guha, bera hstoran and foundng member
of the New Inda Foundaton, a corporate-funded trust, advses us
n hs book-as we as n a seres of hghy pubcsed ntervews-
that the Gu|arat government s not reay fascst, and the
genocde was |ust an aberraton that has corrected tsef after
eectons.
Edtors and commentators n the 'secuar' natona press, havng
got over ther outrage at the Gu|arat genocde, now assess Mod's
admnstratve sks, whch most of them are unformy mpressed
by. The edtor of The Hndustan Tmes sad, "Mod may be a mass
murderer, but he's our mass murderer", and went on to ar hs
demmas about how to dea wth a mass murderer who s aso a
"good" chef mnster.
In ths 'counterfet' verson of Inda, n the ream of cuture, n the
new Boywood cnema, n the boom n Indo-Angan terature, the
poor, for the most part, are smpy absent. They have been
erased n advance. (They ony put n an appearance as the
smng benefcares of Mcro-Credt Loans, Deveopment
Schemes and charty meted out by ngos.)
Last summer, I happened to wander nto a coo room n whch
four beautfu young grs wth straghtened har and porcean
skn were oungng, ntroducng ther puppes to one another. One
of them turned to me and sad, "I was on hoday wth my famy
and I found an od essay of yours about dams and stuff? I was
askng my brother f he knew about what a bad tme these Dats
and Advass were havng, beng dspaced and a.... I mean |ust
beng kcked out of ther homes 'n stuff ke that? And you know,
my brother's such a |erk, he sad they're the ones who are
hodng Inda back. They shoud be extermnated. Can you
magne?"
The troube s, I coud. I can.
The puppes were sweet. I wondered whether dogs coud ever
magne extermnatng each other. They're probaby not
progressve enough.
That evenng, I watched Amtabh Bachchan on TV, appearng n a
commerca for The Tmes of Inda's 'Inda Posed' campagn. The
TV anchor ntroducng the campagn sad t was meant to nspre
peope to eave behnd the "constranng ghosts of the past". To
choose optmsm over pessmsm.
"There are two Indas n ths country," Amtabh Bachchan sad, n
hs famous bartone.
One Inda s stranng at the eash, eager to sprng forth and ve
up to a the ad|ectves that the word has been recenty
showerng upon us. The Other Inda s the eash.
One Inda says, "Gve me a chance and I' prove mysef."
The Other Inda says, "Prove yoursef frst, and maybe then, you'
have a chance."
One Inda ves n the optmsm of our hearts; the Other Inda
urks n the sceptcsm of our mnds.
One Inda wants, the Other Inda hopes... One Inda eads, the
Other Inda foows.
These conversons are on the rse.
Wth each passng day, more and more peope from the Other
Inda are comng over to ths sde. ...
And quety, whe the word s not ookng, a pusatng, dynamc,
new Inda s emergng.
And fnay:
Now n our 60th year as a free naton, the rde has brought us to
the edge of tme's great precpce....
And one Inda, a tny tte voce n the back of the head s ookng
down at the ravne and hestatng. The Other Inda s ookng up
at the sky and sayng t's tme to fy.
Here s the counterfet unverse ad bare.
It tes us that the rch don't have a choce (There Is No
Aternatve), but the poor do. They can choose to become rch. If
they don't, t's because they are choosng pessmsm over
optmsm, hestaton over confdence, want over hope. In other
words, they're choosng to be poor. It's ther faut. They are weak.
(And we know what the seekers of ebensraum thnk of the
weak.) They are the 'Constranng Ghost of the Past'. They're
aready ghosts.
"Wthn an ongong counterfet unverse," Robert |ay Lfton says,
"genocde becomes easy, amost natura."
The poor, the so-caed poor, have ony one choce: to resst or to
succumb. Bachchan s rght: they are crossng over, quety, whe
the word's not ookng. Not to where he thnks, but across
another ravne, to another sde. The sde of armed strugge. From
there they ook back at the Tsars of Deveopment and mmc ther
regretfu sogan: 'There Is No Aternatve.'
They have watched the great Gandhan peope's movements
beng reduced and humated, founderng n the quagmre of
court cases, hunger strkes and counter-hunger strkes. Perhaps
these many mon Constranng Ghosts of the Past wonder what
advce Gandh woud have gven the Indans of the Amercas, the
saves of Afrca, the Tasmanans, the Herero, the Hottentots, the
Armenans, the |ews of Germany, the Musms of Gu|arat. Perhaps
they wonder how they can go on hunger strke when they're
aready starvng. How they can boycott foregn goods when they
have no money to buy any goods. How they can refuse to pay
taxes when they have no earnngs.
Stamp out the Naxas: They have no pace n Shnng Inda
Peope who have taken to arms have done so wth fu knowedge
of what the consequences of that decson w be. They have
done so knowng that they are on ther own. They know that the
new aws of the and crmnase the poor and confate resstance
wth terrorsm. (Peacefu actvsts are ogws-overground workers.)
They know that appeas to conscence, bera moraty and
sympathetc press coverage w not hep them now. They know
no nternatona marches, no gobased dssent, no famous
wrters w be around when the buets fy.
Hundreds of thousands have broken fath wth the nsttutons of
Inda's democracy. Large swathes of the country have faen out
of the government's contro. (At ast count, t was supposed to be
25 per cent). The batte stnks of death, t's by no means pretty.
How can t be when the hemsman of the army of Constranng
Ghosts s the ghost of Charman Mao hmsef? (The ray of hope s
that many of the footsoders don't know who he s. Or what he
dd. More Genocde Dena? Maybe). Are they Ideasts fghtng for
a Better Word? We... anythng s better than annhaton.
The Prme Mnster has decared that the Maost resstance s the
"snge argest nterna securty threat". There have even been
appeas to ca out the army. The meda s agog wth breathess
condemnaton.
Here's a typca newspaper report. Nothng out of the ordnary.
Stamp out the Naxas, t s caed.
Ths government s at ast showng some sense n tackng
Naxasm. Less than a month ago, Prme Mnster Manmohan
Sngh asked state governments to "choke" Naxa nfrastructure
and "crppe" ther actvtes through a dedcated force to
emnate the "vrus". It sgnaed a reasaton that Naxasm must
be stamped out through enforcement of aw, rather than wastefu
expense on deveopment.
"Choke". "Crppe". "Vrus". "Infested". "Emnate". "Stamp Out".
Yes. The dea of extermnaton s n the ar. And peope beeve
that faced wth extermnaton, they have the rght to fght back.
By any means necessary.
Perhaps they've been stenng to the grasshoppers.
Fascism's Firm Footprint in lndia
By Arundhati Roy
This article appeared in the 5eptember 30, 2002 edition of The
Nation.
Gu|arat, the ony ma|or state n Inda wth a government headed
by the Bharatya |anata Party (B|P), has for some years been the
petr dsh n whch Hndu fascsm has been fomentng an
eaborate potca experment. In sprng 2002, the nta resuts
were put on pubc dspay.
It began wthn hours of the Godhra outrage--n whch ffty-eght
Hndus were ked when a tran returnng from the dsputed ste
of Ayodhya on February 27 was set aght as t pued out of a
staton n Godhra, n Gu|arat. Even now, months ater, nobody
knows who was responsbe for the crme. The Forensc
Department report ceary says that the fre was started nsde
the coach. Ths rases a huge queston mark over the theory that
the tran was set aght by a Musm mob that had gathered
outsde the tran. However, the then-Home Mnster (now
eevated to the post of Deputy Prme Mnster), L.K. Advan,
mmedatey announced--wth no evdence to back hs
statement--that the attack was a Pakstan pot.
On the evenng of February 27, Hndu natonasts n the Vshva
Hndu Parshad (VHP, the Word Hndu Counc) and the Ba|rang
Da movement put nto moton a metcuousy panned pogrom
aganst the Musm communty. Press reports put the number of
dead at |ust over 800. Human rghts organzatons have sad t s
coser to 2,000. As many as 100,000 peope, drven from ther
homes, now ve n refugee camps. Women were strpped and
gang-raped, and parents were budgeoned to death n front of
ther chdren. In Ahmedabad, the former capta of Gu|arat and
the second-argest ndustra cty n the state, the tomb of Wa
Gu|arat, the founder of the modern Urdu poem, was demoshed
and paved over n the course of a nght. The tomb of the
muscan Ustad Fayaz Khan was desecrated. Arsonsts burned
and ooted shops, homes, hotes, texte ms, buses and cars.
Hundreds of thousands have ost ther |obs.
Newstatesman lnterview: Arundhati Roy
Syed Hamad Ali
Pubshed 06 October 2008
The controversial author speaks to newstatesman.com about
lndia and lashmir and her view that even if he's elected 8arack
Obama will govern like just another white man
Roy beeves that Barack Obama woud govern ke a whte man
Ever snce she shot to goba fame foowng her 1997 wn of the
Booker prze for The God of Sma Thngs, Arundhat Roy seems to
have concentrated her creatve energy on rasng awareness
about pressng soca and potca ssues.
Ths s the woman who descrbed terrorsm as the "prvatsaton
of war" and caed George Bush a "word nghtmare ncarnate."
No surprse then she was dubbed "the Indan author of one good
nove and many peevsh essays" n a New York Tmes artce.
Roy, who s an ant-gobasaton campagner, once famousy sad
that the "ony thng worth gobasng s dssent." As an opponent
of the Iraq nvason she waked a very fne ne of what s
consdered acceptabe when she was quoted urgng peope to
"become the Iraq resstance", abet through non-voent means.
Last month the Indan novest wrote a engthy newspaper artce
cang for Kashmrs freedom n whch she argued: "Inda needs
azad |freedom| from Kashmr |ust as much as - f not more than -
Kashmr needs azad from Inda."
Predctaby, accusatons of "sedton" and of beng a "oose
cannon" were once agan obbed by crtcs nsde the countrys
potca estabshment.
"Here n Inda you have peope sayng that the government
shoud do to Kashmr what the Russans are dong to Chechnya,"
Roy tes the New Statesman. "There s a great admraton for
mtary soutons rght now."
So t comes as no surprse her detractors woud prefer Roy to
keep quet - especay when t comes to Kashmr.
"It s a great trbute to the toerance of Inda's ethos that a person
who openy cas for Bakansaton of the country s not beng
ocked up and the keys thrown away," commented the rung
Congress partys Mansh Twar. Yet Roy seems unfazed. She was
n the troubed state recenty to wtness the mass demonstratons
there by ocas protestng Indan rue. "For me beng there makes
me fee humated as an Indan," she says. "There are very many
beautfu thngs about Inda whch are a cooured by ths."
Snce an nsurgency began n Kashmr back n 1989, at east
40,000-60,000 peope have been ked.
An estmated 400,000 Indan troops are statoned to mpose
Indas grp on the regon. At the same tme around 200,000
Hndu Pandts have aso been uprooted and forced to eave the
argey Musm vaey. Roy says that t was the sght of Kashmrs
themseves protestng, sometmes n the hundreds of thousands,
that she fet actuay gave her the rght to wrte about the ssue.
"They were very cear about what they were sayng," she says.
Even back n Apr when Tbet was the focus of goba attenton,
The Tmes of Inda noted: "the probem of |ammu and Kashmr s
the eephant n the room whch Indans debatng Tbet are dong
ther darndest to gnore."
Many, however, are st determned to cng onto Kashmr. The
opposton B|Ps Genera Secretary, Arun |atey, went so far as to
state openy n a TV ntervew: "I am one of those who frmy
beeve that azad s not even a dstant dream for those
separatsts, t s an mpossbe thng." Inda today s the country
wth the thrd-argest Musm popuaton n the word at cose to
150 mon. As ts ony Musm ma|orty state Kashmr, so the
argument goes, s cruca to the secuar and the mut-ethnc
makeup of the naton. When confronted by such reasonng Roy s
quck to retort: "The Musms of Inda and the Musms of Kashmr
are both hed hostage to each other."
"That s a very specous argument of thers, you ook at whats
been happenng n Inda even now wth the Hndu VHP
massacrng Chrstans n Orssa," contnues Roy whose own
mother has from Keraas Syran Chrstan communty. "The
state s standng back and watchng. In Gu|rat we a know what
happened, they massacred Musms and then came on TV and
boasted about t."
The 2002 rots n the western Gu|rat state eft more than a 1000,
argey Musms, dead wth many accusng the states Chef
Mnster, Narendra Mod, of compcty n the events by turnng a
bnd eye. To date Mod remans a free man and a popuar
governor n hs state. But he s an extremey dvsve fgure. Whe
some ca hm Indas Hter, others specuate he s a future prme
mnstera canddate.
"Ony when t comes to Kashmr suddeny the Indan government
starts trottng out ths busness of t beng secuar," Roy notes.
The novest s |ust as concerned about the dsparty between rch
and poor n Inda. She descrbes the mdde and upper casses as
exstng "n a whoe tte country of ther own". Wth many
cheerng the rse of the "New Inda", as monares and
bonares prop up everywhere, condtons n parts of the country
reman worse than Sub-Saharan Afrca accordng to recent Word
Bank estmates.
Inda s home to a thrd of the words poor wth roughy 75 per
cent of ts popuaton vng on ess then US$2 a day.
Further neary haf of Indas chdren are cncay manourshed.
"What about a socety n whch a mon peope earn ther vng
carryng human sht on ther heads?" adds Roy. "Is t arght
because we have some market and nucear bombs?"
She says athough a batte was fought for Indas ndependence n
1947, n her vew t wasnt reay a revouton. "The peope who
were rung the roost durng the tme of the Brtsh empre
contnued to do that after ndependence," says Roy. "The same
poceman, the same |ustce system, the same brown sahbs
neaty stepped nto the shoes of the whte sahbs. Lke dats, for
exampe, why woudnt they prefer Brtsh masters to upper caste
masters?"
As a fervent opponent of US foregn pocy she supported nether
Bush nor Kerry durng the 2004 eectons.
Roy has kened the choce to an opton of two brands of
detergent owned by the same company.
"I knd of resent the dea that the whoe word has to be
nterested n the Amercan eectons," she says.
Even wth Bush due to make hs much antcpated ext and an ar
of expectaton about the potenta of the frst ever back US
Presdent - assumng he wns of course - Roy remans pessmstc
and refuses to gve her endorsement to ether Obama or McCan.
She predcts the comng months w see Obama turn nto a whte
man and warns aganst expectng a mrace: "He have to prove
that he s whter than the whte man. And f t was Hary Cnton
she woud aso have had to become a whte man."
But surey Obama woud be an mprovement over the more
conservatve, hawksh, McCan? Roy acknowedges the US
presdency s a very powerfu poston but says that she fees
such a compex system has been put nto pace that he s not
reay abe to make decsons hmsef. Roy compares the stuaton
confronted by the US eectorate to the one faced by ther Indan
counterparts n pckng between Congress and B|P. "It s a
humatng choce," she says.
Yet, nspte of a she sees wrong wth the socety she ves n, Roy
s ceary nfatuated wth Inda: "I coud have ved anywhere n
the word now f I wanted to. But every moment of my day s so
absorbng, s so fu of so much rchness. In terms of the debates
and the exctement gong on here. The vared ways n whch t
comes at you and the compextes you have to dea wth. The
competey unpredctabe nature of my fe. Now these are the
thngs I ove."
A counterview
Anil Nair
The idea of apocalypse
I went because wrters are drawn to stores the way vutures are
drawn to ks. My motve was not compasson. It was sheer
greed. I was rght. I found a story there. And what a story t s.'' ---
Arundhat Roy.
Exacty what Nabokov -- whose books, Roy reveas, she
temporary set asde to |ourney to the Narmada vaey -- woud
endorse. Except that the story she so gushes about s one that
shoud do a newspaperman or actvst proud, not a wrter of such
boundess `ecat and terrfyng ubquty as the author of The God
of Sma Thngs.
Post-Booker prze, Roy has become a purveyor of pamphets: two
of them, the End of Imagnaton on Pokhran II, and very recenty,
the Greater Common Good, whch excorates the ev of bg dams,
have created ampe controversy. Even a perfunctory perusa of
these tracts confrms that t s the ceebrty status of the wrter
that has contrbuted more to the controversy than the ogc or
arguments whch are sub-standard and sentmenta.
However, f anythng redeems these tracts t s the occasona
hghy dosyncratc, amost fctve, deas wth whch she
punctuates the narratve. Lke the pustues that break out durng
pox -- the negatve metaphor s to convey the potency -- they
partay compensate for the ongwnded oquacousness of the
remander.
These nchoate deas ought to be the germs of new stores and,
not as Roy seems to want t, the budng bocks of a new potca
manfesto. It s doubtfu f she, n the neophyte's fervour for the
Green cause, s aware that n argung so emotonay and at such
ength aganst the pouton of our ar, water and so she s,
roncay, poutng her own sources of storyteng.
A wrter of fcton, to be sure, can and must react to pubc and
potca happenngs whch he/she fees deepy about. But such
poemcs, however sharp or anguar, shoud never deterorate to
morasng. That way es tract and sermon. When a thess or
framework -- any knd of prescrptveness or tendentousness --
eeches nto a storyteer's sensbty, magnaton fes out of the
door, and wth t the freedom and voatty and rresponsbty
that magnaton both confers and demands.
A novest shoud fee responsbty ony to the comey shape of a
sentence and to the unfettered magnaton, whch sometmes
eads to wd paces va some wd routes. No wrter of stores can
aspre to be a champon of moras because s/he s smpy not
trustworthy or steady enough for that.
The pont here s not the emperor's new cothes. As a wrter Roy
s fuy cad and fuy present: she doesn't pander to mass
deuson, but possesses nstead, n her fcton at east, undenabe
taent whch ensures her (despte |ust one book n the ktty) a
respectabe, f modest, pace n the word of etters.
But we are so nfatonary n our estmates. That s to say she s
st far from beng the 'great' wrter that the dust|acket of her
book and the nnumerabe rave revews of t procam. She mght
never come anywhere cose to what she s capabe of f a she s
gong to hear s such unquafed prase.
To a ths we can magne Roy's retort as she wats at Domkhed
for the Narmada to rse and submerge ths and scores of
neghbourng vages: What s terature compared to the death
by drownng, or hunger, of hundreds of chdren?
T very recenty the answer to ths -- actuay mpct n the
query -- was predctabe. No onger. Roy's nove tsef s, as both
the theme and tte emphasse, a deberate debunkng of the bg
questons: Revouton, Change, Potcs, Regon et a. As she
wrtes n Greater Common Good, ''who knows, perhaps that's
what the 21st century has n store for us. The dsmantng of the
Bg. Bg bombs, bg dams, bg deooges, bg countres, bg
mstakes. Perhaps t w be the Century of the Sma. Perhaps
rght now, ths very mnute, there's a sma god up n heaven
readyng hersef for us. Coud t be? Coud t possby be? It
sounds fnger-ckng good to me.''
The probem s that the sanctfcaton of everythng sma can
turn nto the pursut of somethng bg. Ths s conspcuous n
Roy's poemc. Even as she argues for the cause of sma thngs
and sma battes, they a, ke dverse streams emptyng nto the
sea, ead to a bg dea. An dea not smpy bg but bgger than bg:
the dea of apocaypse.
''We must get used to the dea of extncton,'' she constanty
exhorts. But what s ths dea of extncton? Is t somethng that
can be ratocnated, ke earnng arthmetc or memorsng the
Perodc Tabe? It s ke eght-year-od Rahe n The God of Sma
Thngs askng her mother Ammu when they come out of the
poce staton, ''what does veshya mean?'' Even f Ammu had
condescended to expan the chd woud have ony
comprehended t abstracty.
When t comes to patronsng, to takng on the roe of 'deverng'
peope from ther rea and magned troubes, Roy and her k can
be worse than those powerfu etes she so reves. Indeed the
dea of extncton s nterestng and can become a very vauabe
too to wean peope -- whether ctysckers or trbas -- away from
''the heart of whteness,'' or unmted progress.
But t's an dea that has to be understood ndvduay, prvatey.
It can't be taught or procamed from the pupt, t has to be
ntuted. If at a t can be taught ony experence can do that, but
then such experence can be ncapactatng, whereby ''gettng
used to the dea of extncton'' becomes an oxymoron.
Ths s where fcton and Roy's rea vocaton as a storyteer
comes n handy. It s ony n the stores that thngs can reay be
sma yet sgnfcant. Sma thngs that can rebound from the
page and nsnuate themseves permanenty n the reader's
magnaton. Makng the neffabe graspabe.
Roy shoud go nto hbernaton. She shoud probaby take up a
sma, cosy house on a remote coast and endessy watch the sea,
the waves, the changng patterns of sky and shadows t they are
one wth the rhythm of her breathng.
Or she shoud, ke a mendcant and backpacker combned n one,
become ncognto and roam the outbacks, the far paces. Perhaps
she shoud earn to drve or, n case she aready does, earn to
kayak. A these sma thngs turns one nwards, they are sma
quests n sef-knowedge. They refresh the magnaton, make the
sprng of storyteng we up.
For, n the fna anayss, where the whys and whats and hows of
fe are concerned t s the stores aone that can even begn to
answer them. As the wrter |ames Carro says, ''the very act of
arrangng memory and nventon n the order of narratve s hoy.
It s our stores aone that can save us. The stores are enough.''
Arundhat Roy woud know that better than anyone ese.
An Nar