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Arrested for being seated while national anthem was played in the theatre

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Salman_Zalman

Statement by concerned citizens on the arrest of Salman and demanding his immediate release

On August 20th night 12 pm Salman a student and social activist from Trivandrum was picked up by the police from his home in Peroorkada. The immediate accusation against him was that he had insulted the national anthem while it was being played in a theatre, where he had gone to watch a movie. Later his comments on Facebook where he questions nationalism as a philosophical and political concept were also pointed out as a reason for his arrest. It is also being reported that there was a deliberate attempt to frame him by some right-wing hindutva groups and that they are the ones who are behind his arrest.

There is a lack of clarity regarding his arrest and the way it was conducted, late in the midnight hours of August 20th. It is clear, though, that none of the customary norms were followed during his arrest. Even after it was said that Salman was taken to the Thampanoor station, the police themselves later denied this. For a whole night and the next day even Salman’s parents had no access to him. In fact, Salman was taken from prison to prison like it is usually done with so called ‘notorious terrorists’ and the police refused to give out any information about him both to his parents and to the lawyers who had contacted them. It was onlyon August 21st evening that it was made known that there was an FIR recorded against him and that a case was registered under IPC act 124 A and 66 A charging him of sedition and of sending offensive messages through communicative service. Though there were many other students with him it is surprising that it was only Salman who was picked out and arrested.

The media too automatically reiterated the police version in their reports, without attempting to investigate into the case, in spite of the fact that police injustice towards Muslim youth is growing day by day. Further, we want to bring attention to the fact that vigilante right-wing hindutva groups are at present conducting an extremely abusive hate campaign against Salman on Facebook. The abusive comments on his Facebook wall have become so vicious that some even threaten to rape the women who are in support of him.

We strongly condemn the arrest and inhumane treatment of Salman Zalman at the hands of the Kerala police and call for his immediate release. We consider the charging of IPC 124 A (sedition) on him as a gross over stretching of the sedition act to encroach into the rights of a citizen to criticize the nation.We also condemn the abusive campaign that is being conducted on Facebook against him and the discriminatory nature of the media reporting, which is aiding such human right abuses.

Salman Zalman

Salman Zalman

It must also be noted that whatever the nature of the crime, the withdrawal of constitutionally established human rights is extremely problematic and illegal. We would surely connect the arrest and incarceration of Salman to the way in which Muslim youth in Kerala and elsewhere are being constantly oppressed by the criminal justice system (please remember the case of Muhsin, another trivandramite youth fabricated in a “letter bomb” case from which he was acquitted only after seven years). To avoid such illegal incarceration and delayed justice we demand that he should be allowed to use his fair legal rights as promised by the constitution.

His arrest is all the more troublesome because he was a student who has been a part of many human rights campaigns in the past and was even an artist in the play that was held in protest against UAPA in front of the Secretariat on August 14th. His clandestine arrest and subsequent secret incarceration and denial of legal access for a whole day and night reeks of police impunity, which selectively target the youth who question state ideology. We must remember that, at this moment, it has become a norm to first arrest, torture and incarcerate Muslims before allowing them to seek any kind of justice. This is sheer discrimination and we urge everyone to come together to condemn the arrest of Salman and to demand his immediate release.

Sa'adat Hasan Manto: How I write stories

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Saadat Hasan Manto

–  by Sa’adat Hasan Manto

Honorable ladies and gentlemen!
I’ve been asked to explain how I write stories.
This “how” is problematic. What can I tell you about how I write stories?

It is a very convoluted matter. With this “how” before me I could say I sit on the sofa in my room, take out paper and pen, utter bismillah, and start writing, while all three of my daughters keep making a lot of noise around me. I talk to them as I write, settle their quarrels, make salad for myself, and, if someone drops by for a visit, I show him hospitality. During all this, I don’t stop writing my story.

If I must answer how I write, I would say my manner of writing is no different from my manner of eating, taking a bath, smoking cigarettes, or wasting time.

Now, if one asked why I write short stories, well, I have an answer for that. Here it goes:

I write because I’m addicted to writing, just as I’m addicted to wine. For if I don’t write a story, I feel as if I’m not wearing any clothes, I haven’t bathed, or I haven’t had my wine.

The fact is, I don’t write stories; stories write me. I’m a man of modest education. And although I have written more than twenty books, there are times when I wonder about this one who has written such fine stories – stories that frequently land me in the courts of law.

Minus my pen, I’m merely Saadat Hasan, who knows neither Urdu, nor Persian, English or French.

Stories don’t reside in my mind; they reside in my pocket, totally unbeknownst to me. Try as hard as I might to strain my mind hoping for some story to pop out, trying equally hard to be a short story writer, smoke cigarette after cigarette, but my mind fails to produce a story. Exhausted, I lie down like a woman who cannot conceive a baby.

As I’ve already collected the remuneration in advance for a promised but still unwritten story, I feel quite vexed. I keep turning over restlessly in bed, get up to feed my birds, push my daughters on their swing, collect trash from the house, pick up little shoes scattered throughout the house and put them neatly in one place – but the blasted short story taking it easy in my pocket refuses to travel to my mind, which makes me feel very edgy and agitated.

When my agitation peaks, I dash to the toilet. That doesn’t help either. It is said that every great man does all his thinking in the toilet. Experience has convinced me that I’m no great man, because I can’t think even inside a toilet. Still, I’m a great short story writer of Pakistan and Hindustan – amazing, isn’t it?

Well, all I can say is that either my critics have a grossly inflated opinion of me, or else I’m blinding them in the clear light of day, or casting a spell over them.

Forgive me, I went to the toilet…The plain fact is, and I say this in the presence of my Lord, I haven’t the foggiest idea how I write stories.

Often when my wife finds me feeling totally defeated and out of my wits, she says, “Don’t think, just pick up your pen and start writing.”

So advised by her I pick up my pen and start writing, with my mind totally blank but my pocket crammed full of stories. All of a sudden a story pops out on its own.

This being the case, I’m forced to think of myself as not so much a writer of stories but more as a pickpocket who picks his own pocket and then hands over its contents to you. You can travel the whole world but you won’t find a greater idiot than me.

Translated by Muhammad Umar Memon, Department of Languages and Cultures of Asia, UW-Madison; 2013. These translations were published in The Journal of Urdu Studies. This English translation was first published online by Scroll.

This short story has been published under the Creative Commons license.

U. R. Ananthamurthy no more

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U. R. Ananthamurthy (Photo credit: Roy Sanai/Tehelka)

Bangalore: Renowned writer and Jnanpith awardee U. R. Ananthamurthy, passed away in a hospital here on Friday, where he was undergoing dialysis for kidney failure.

The condition of 82-year-old writer, admitted 10 days ago, had deteriorated for the past few days and was closely monitored for infection and fever, and was undergoing treatment on multi-support system.

“…Ananthamurthy has been unwell for a while, he had multiple problems including kidney disease for which he had been on dialysis for the last few years…,” Manipal Hospital Medical Director & Chairman – Medical Advisory Board H Sudarshan Ballal told reporters earlier today.

According to doctors, Mr. Murthy’s “condition had deteriorated in the last day or so.”

Born on December 21, 1932 in Melige, a tiny hamlet near Thirthahalli taluk of Shimoga district, Udupi Rajgopalacharya Ananthamurthy was the sixth of the eight Jnanpith awardees from Karnataka. For his readers and admirers, his work came to symbolize humanity and its courage in questioning cultural norms. Best known is his 1966 novel, Samskara, a story that asks: Can culture survive only if it is followed with blind fervour?

A Padma Bhushan award winner, Ananthamurthy was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize in 2013. The Man Booker committee called him as, “one of the most important representatives of the “Navya” or “New Movement” in the literature of the Kannada language.”

A vocal opponent of mindless bigotry and fascism of every kind, Ananthamurthy became an ardent critic of Narendra Modi during the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, and said he would leave the country if Modi won the election and became the Prime Minister of India. Explaining his views on Modi, he wrote that, “Modi symbolises all the greed that development has brought—heartlessness, the lack of sense of duty, and intelligence. It has all been lost to development. And they become blind to hungry children and mothers, schools without teachers, bad roads. It is a nightmare. Modi stands for that more than anyone else…Modi has built his political fortune by giving a big bali during the Gujarat riots. He silenced the Muslims.”

U. R. Ananthamurthy was said to be not keeping well for more than a year now. In one of his last interviews published by Mint in April this year, the writer said that, “I have lost my kidneys. I was on peritoneal dialysis for a year. The man who attended to me had to wash his hands 10 times or have gloves on, which was very expensive.”

He is survived by his wife, Esther, and two children, Sharat and Anuradha.

My story of captivity

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– by Hafeez Nomani

Hafeez NaumaniThirty five years ago when this scribe was not even 35, on 13 May 1966, first part of the story of my captivity was published in Nida-e-Millat. This was based on those nine months day-and-night observations and experiences during captivity that was our ‘reward’ from the government for bringing out a special issue on Aligarh Muslim University.

In those days not only did the Government not like Nida-e-Millat but it was brazenly hostile. The proofs of its hostility were the 25 cases filed, after this episode, against my elder brother Maulana Atiqur Rehman Sanbhali as the editor and against this scribe as the printer and publisher in all of which the Government had to bite dust.

I have not used the word, ‘hostile’ on impulse. Among dozens of proofs of it is a particular case that substantiates my point. The known freedom fighter Mrs. Subhadra Joshi had published an article in the weekly Link. We carried the translation of this write up in Nida-e-Millat mentioning the names of the writer and the publication.

When the case against us for publishing this essay was brought before the court, we produced, in our defence, original copy of the newspaper in which it had been carried. But even such a concrete proof had no impact on the outcome. When one of the most Islamophobic Chief Judicial Magistrates of his time who was presiding over the case was asked by our benefactor and lawyer Mr. Abdul Mannan if there was any piece of legislation that allowed criticism against the Government in Hindi and English but made such exposition a criminal act if published in Urdu, he had no answer. May be he was just a puppet whose strings were being pulled by the very hands that had the power to promote, demote and transfer him and thus he was forced to defile the judge’s chair in the name of justice.

At about 9pm the door of my residence was forced opened and, with torches in their hands, half a dozen of high officials of CID, Incharges of Qaisar Bagh, Ameenabad and Hazrat Gang police stations, along with 115 armed personnel of Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC), barged in without any permission or warning. With them was also a fruit seller who lived at the back of my house and was so heavily drunk that he fell unconscious at the door. We later found out that he was a ‘great witness’ of the great police who was brought to his thumb impression on the documents recording the proceedings of the police.

Syed Muhammad Haleem and Muhammad Hakeem Warsi were with me at that time as, because of the work going on, I had sent my wife and children to my father’s house.

‘Who is Hafeez Noumani?’ One of them enquired. I came forward and introduced myself. In response he said that he was the DYSP CID and showing me official orders told us that none of us was allowed to touch even a single piece of paper in the office. He further said that the Administration had learnt from sources that some of the contents in this issue were objectionable and, for the time being, their publication was being stopped.

‘Shall we consider ourselves under arrest?’ I enquired, upon which he replied that no decision had been taken by then and that was to be decided after consultation with High Officials. From his response it was obvious to us that we were in custody. We explained to them everything about the newspaper and handed over the complete and incomplete newspaper to them.

Six officers came downstairs one of them holding a copy in his hand. He asked me to open its page number 33. I told him quite bluntly that after the newspaper being taken in custody it was his property. ‘I will not even touch it’. One of them then suggested to his colleague that someone who could read Urdu be called. They ran upstairs and then went outside enquiring if some Urdu-knowing person was available. One constable told them that a Head Constable at Ameenabad Police Station could read Urdu. A Jeep was sent for him. When he arrived he was handed the newspaper and asked to read. It was a poem by Akhtar Bastavi. With his poor knowledge of Urdu the wretched person readout what he could, some of which could hardly be understood by anyone. However, he was asked to stop at a word, ‘Raqeeb’ (meaning rival).

‘What does it mean?’ He was asked.

‘Dus[h]man’ [enemy] came the answer.

‘That is enough.’ The DYSP opined; ie a word wrongly translated, wrongly pronounced and wrongly read would serve the purpose. And this is what happened. On the basis of one word, Raqeeb, we were arrested.

Roodad-e-Qafas has been published in Urdu and Hindi by Alfurqan Book Depot, Nazirabad, Lucknow. This excerpt was translated into English by UrduMediaMonitor.com

Girl gangraped in Bangalore, police arrest three

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(Photo credit: HT)

(Photo credit: Indian Express)

Bangalore: In yet another incident of gross sexual brutality, a 22-year-old woman was allegedly gangraped by three men, and then held captive in a farmhouse near Tippagondanahalli, 35 km west of Bangalore.

The young survivor, who works as a sales woman in the city, has alleged in her compliant that she was raped by three men, who had earlier offered to drop her home, when she was waiting for a bus near Majestic area, after her work shift on Wednesday night.

The men allegedly took her to a farmhouse near Tippagondanahalli  and raped her through the night. The victim has alleged that she was also raped by the caretaker of the farmhouse.

Though pained and traumatized by the violent savagery of her tormentors, the rape survivor managed to escape from the farmhouse, in a semi-nude state, and flagged down a cab driver and reached the  local Tavarekere police station and lodged a complaint.

The rape survivor and the trio were subjected to medical tests. Preliminary investigations confirmed rape, police said.

The alleged abductors and rapists, Arun Narasimhamurthy Gowda (24), and his friend Kempa Narasimha (36), are said to be from affluent families. And Mahadev alias Mahadevaiah (45), was the caretaker of the farm. Arun, a son of a Karnataka Milk Federation (KMF) official, is a cement and steel businessman from Magadi taluk, and Kempa, also from Magadi, is a timber merchant.

“We have arrested all the accused,” DSP (Ramanagar) Lakshmi Ganesh said.

Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar bans Sri Ram Sene in the state

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Manohar Parrikar (Photo credit: HT)

Manohar Parrikar (Photo credit: HT)

Porvorim: The Goa government has banned the entry of hardline Hindutva outfit Sri Ram Sene from the state, chief minister Manohar Parrikar announced on the floor of the House yesterday.

“I had asked police to prepare a report and it was sent to the collector to ban the entry of Sri Ram Sene in the state. We have banned Sri Ram Sene,” Parrikar said.

Sri Ram Sene’s controversial leader, Pramod Muthalik had announced his plans to setup  a unit of his organisation in Goa last year, though he hadn’t revealed a timeline for its operation.

Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the All-India Hindu Convention, Muthalik had said that “we had to postpone the launch of the organisation in Goa due to various reasons including the just concluded assembly elections in Karnataka.” He had said that his Belgaum unit head was in touch with around 200 local youth in the state for the cause.

Responding to a question posed by Fatorda MLA Vijai Sardesai on whether the government had banned the group following opposition demands, Parrikar said Sri Ram Sene has been banned because of its plans to enter the state.

Describing the order banning Sri Ram Sene in Goa as ‘toothless’, Rajya Sabha MP and AICC Secretary Shantaram Naik told reporters that, “the ban order imposed by the Goa Government on Sri Ram Sene is without teeth, unless the order is followed by a regular order by the Central Government under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967.”

Founded in the 1960s, the ring wing Hindu nationalist group came to notoriety in 2009, when its members barged into a pub and attacked young women, accusing them of “indecent behaviour” and “an insult to Hindu culture and tradition”.

The attack which garnered wide spread condemnation, brought Sri Ram Sene to the forthwith of national and international attention, with even RSS favouring a ban on the organisation.

Since then, the group has been involved in a spate of violent speeches and actions especially targeted against women, and the minority Muslim and Christian communities.

In 2012, with a clear intention to flare up communal tensions between different communities, its members had raised Pakistan’s national flag on a government building in  Sindgi, near Bijapur, Karnataka and then accused the Muslim community for the mischief. The incident lead to angry protests by Hindu organisations and the stoning of a mosque. Six members of the group were later arrested for “creating communal disharmony.”

Meanwhile, Sri Ram Sene (SRS) workers burnt effigies of Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar today and staged protests in parts of Karnataka. They said that the group will defy the ban, and added that Muthalik himself would be present for the launch of the unit in Goa.

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