Category: Columns

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Enough said

Why are we silent on Gaza?

Not only is India and its Government not reacting to the Gaza killings, it is punishing protestors here in brutal ways.
by Humra Quraishi

It is a strange situation – the country says nothing about the ongoing crisis in Gaza, where the death toll has already reached over 600 people, but it quickly quashes any form of protests.

I would like to know why security forces killed an unarmed 14-year-old om the Kashmir Valley. The boy was protesting against Israel’s brutal killings of Palestinians in the Gaza settlement. At least the young boy had the courage to speak out on a subject most of us are silent on. But what happened? He got killed for exercising his basic right to protest.

Gaza under attackThe bigger question is: even as besieged Palestinians in Gaza are killed, why is the world so removed from their pain? Where is our human instinct to react to genocides of this scale? Of course, why talk of the world when our own political rulers are not outraged enough?

Minister of External Affairs, Sushma Swaraj, has already categorically stated that the Government will not react to the current Israel-Palestine crisis. Why? Is Israel such a major force in the Indian scheme of things? Is it donating or selling arms technology to India? What is its hold on the Government?

Throughout a long career in journalism, I have been interviewing Palestinian envoys and the severe crises their countrymen have been facing for decades. One of the first Palestinian envoys to India, Dr Khaled El-Sheikh, was a member of the Al-Fatah movement for freedom before he joined the diplomatic service. The turning point came for him when his 18-year-old nephew was killed by the Israeli occupation forces, leaving him devastated. He was succeeded by Osama Musa, a former Air Force Chief of Palestine who was a blunt speaker. After Yasser Arafat’s death, he had said to me, “We are occupied, slaves to the masters – Americans and Israelis – to such an extent that we had to take permission from them to bury our leader Arafat.

He had spoken about America’s role in the long-simmering situation. “Can’t America see the killings taking place on a daily basis? Without America’s support, Israel is zero. Israel cannot survive a day if America does not support it.”

In the mean time, how about if we in India protest in a non-violent way and shun Israel-made goods?

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist and the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Pictures courtesy 972mag.com, todaysinsightnews.blogspot.com)

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Overdose

People, celebrate your daughters

Why do many parents call their successful daughters the ‘sons’ of the family? Do they think it is high praise?
Jatin Sharmaby Jatin Sharma | @jatiin_sharma on Twitter

A friend recently informed me that two weeks ago was Daughters’ Week. Being a bit of a dreamer, I was lost for a few minutes with thoughts of how fathers must feel when they see their daughters. Do they feel a pride they cannot always express? Do they struggle to hide their tears when their daughters get married? Do they recall their daughters’ first milestones with fond nostalgia, smiling to themselves even as they go about their daily lives?

I have many female friends and some of them claim that they come from ‘forward thinking’ families. Till now, I confess I haven’t really understood this term ‘forward thinking’. These people I know are not the Jetsons of our age, nor do they use James Bond-style gadgets in daily life.

The ‘forward thinking’ tag comes because the men in their families allow their daughters to study, let them have nights out with friends, and are cool with them having boys or men as their friends. And if the girl fell in love with a boy, they would ‘allow’ her to marry him.

I am not okay with this. But let me tell you what happened recently.

I met the parents of a friend, and I was appalled by something they said. They were justifiably proud of their daughter – she had been a Fathers and daughtersStraight A student, had finished her MBA studies with good marks, she had a good job in an MNC. On her part, she was the quintessential ‘good girl’ – always obedient, to the extent that she let her parents pick a suitable boy for her. Besides, she never ‘took advantage’ of her freedom and liberty.

All was well till both the parents looked at their daughter and proudly announced, “My daughter is my son!” Everyone beamed at everyone else at this atrocious statement, including the daughter, who probably felt rewarded for her ‘goodness’. Then I realised that this is a statement most fathers and mothers of women achievers make – they feel they have given the highest praise when they call their daughter their son, signifying that she is (almost) as good as the son they never had.

I want to ask these parents: if you let your daughter be an independent individual, why do you drill it into her head that she must not ‘take advantage’ of the liberty and freedom that you have so graciously given her? Do you think you are doing her a favour by letting her breathe or go out with her friends? And what gives you the right to speak this way to your daughter – a woman who is responsible, understanding of your problems and pain, and the rock of your home – and call her the ‘man’ of the house? Will it kill you to acknowledge her as a woman?

Why does a daughter become a son in parents’ eyes, when she more than meets their expectations?

I didn’t smile when my friend’s parents spoke that revolting statement. They were a little puzzled, and Aunty asked me, “Beta, is something wrong?”

I said, “She is not your son, she is an amazing daughter. I don’t think a son can do what she has done. And if he was ever as fabulous as her, you wouldn’t say to him, ‘You are the daughter of the house’, would you?”

They thought I was extremely rude. The father probably gave a talking-to to his daughter about her choice of friends. In fact, my friend later spoke to me and said I shouldn’t have said what I said, that her parents hadn’t “meant it”.

I did not answer. But I am writing it here today, to all parents, “If you don’t mean it, don’t say it.” Will it hurt you to respect your daughters? Or does a woman deserve respect only when she exhibits ‘manly’ attributes of success?

Jatin Sharma is a media professional who doesn’t want to grow up, because if he grows up, he will be like everybody else. ‘Overdose’ is his take on Mumbai’s quirks and quibbles.

(Pictures courtesy rayaprolu.wordpress.com, indianshaadi.org)

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Enough said

Dastangoi with Zohra Sehgal

Zohra Sehgal, the country’s longest living actress had seen a turbulent, traumatic life, but always emerged smiling, energetic and vivacious.
Humra Quraishiby Humra Quraishi

I have very fond memories of Zohra Sehgal.

Zohra Sehgal, probably the country’s longest living actress, was defined by her feisty personality, her talent, her grit and her sheer outspokenness. The legendary lady died last week, a couple of months after celebrating her 102nd birthday on April 27, 2014.

On the occasions I interacted with her, I was impressed by her spontaneity, and her disarming habit of talking about even in her personal life. What impressed me even more was that she always told these details in the dastangoi (story telling) format, chatting informally as we’d known each other for years.

She never shied away from revealing the details of the financial lows she experienced after her husband, Kamleshwar Sehgal, killed himself. His death left her and her children traumatised, and brought a highly turbulent phase to her life. At that juncture, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru helped her and her career move on.

Thereafter, she left Bombay to reestablish herself in the UK, only to return to New Delhi a few years later. Back in India, she embarked on another long phase of work, struggle and more twists and turns in the tapestry of her life.

I’ve always wondered – in the age of biopics and the fact that the film industry is always looking for good subjects, why hasn’t anyone made a film on the life and times of ZohraZohra Sehgal yet?

A few years ago, in the summer of 2012, the book Zohra Sehgal: ‘Fatty’ was released. It is written by her daughter Kiran (former spouse of artist Jatin Das) who is an accomplished dancer, and offers a deep look at the life of Zohra Sehgal.

I quote from the forward of this book: “When someone asked me to write a book on my mother, I wondered, ‘What can I write about her? She is my mother and that’s it.’ Most important, I am not a writer – far from it. I can only dance and nothing else! Then the seed was sown and I kept thinking about it as days went by.

“That was in 2006 – almost six years ago. My mind travelled in reverse gear to my childhood; with her, my father Kamleshwar Sehgal, and my brother Pawan, in 41 Pali Hill, Mumbai (then Bombay). What a happy family we were. Her strictness, my father’s laughter, the get-togethers with the neighbours, my friends and I running all over the place, going to school and of course to Prithvi Theatre with her. My first dance lessons and training were with my mother and I learnt a lot from watching her ‘dance’…

“I have written this book not as a historian or as an experienced writer but as a daughter who has been with her mother throughout her mother’s ups and downs, her struggle, her tragedies and her several moods! My mother has also been a great friend to me. We’ve had our fights, disagreements and criticism of each other – more her than me – our jokes on ourselves and on others. It has been wonderful. On 27 April, 2012, my mother Zohra Sehgal completes a hundred years of excitement in dance, theatre, films, television and this journey we call life. She exclaims, ‘I have hundred years of history in me!’ Congratulations, Ammi!”

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Pictures courtesy workdoneinphotoshop.blogspot.com, www.rediff.com)

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Enough said

The spirit truly lies within

Does it make sense for us to wait for the Government to help us? These trailblazers solved other’s problems on their own.
by Humra Quraishi

The rains continue to wreak havoc in various parts of the country, bringing ruin to crops in some places and drought in others. Hunger and dearth of necessities have become the mainstay in several sections of society…but what are the options for survival?

More to the point, can the present Government do anything about it? How long do we wait before the Government steps in to help?

As always, the solution has to come from us, from within.

aHearteningly, there are hundreds of ‘doers’ present among us, people who have opted to move out of well-paying jobs and a cushy life to reach out to those in distress. In this context, I can think of none better than the husband-wife duo of Bunkar Roy and his spouse Aruna, who gave up their jobs (Aruna quit the IAS) to settle down in Tilonia, a nondescript village of Rajasthan. There, they started by digging up wells to help the villagers, and today, the village is one of the few locales in the country that can boast of being self-reliant in every sense of the term.

The duo has trained the village’s men and women to become engineers, doctors, technicians, craftsmen, teachers and healers.

More recently, I was browsing the details of Dr Dharamvir Gandhi, one of the AAP candidates who win in the recent elections from Punjab. To quote Professor Chaman Lal, who has known Dr Gandhi for years, “As a medical   doctor, he was so popular in the surrounding villages that when he was transferred, people from those villages went to the Punjab Secretariat in Chandigarh, and returned only after getting his transfer cancelled.”

Dr Gandhi (in pic on right) joined Rajindra Medical College Patiala for his post graduate studies and later became Assistant Professor in the Cardiology department. In year 2001, he set up his ownDr Dharamvir Gandhi clinic, where only nominal fees were charged from poor patients. He says he was inspired by Andhra Pradesh and some other States, where such Peoples’ Clinics were established by Leftist doctors to provide health services to peasants and workers.

Meanwhile, as the news of the passing away of former Chief Justice of J&K, Justice Mufti Bahauddin Faruqi came, I was reminded of several meetings I had with him. This was in 1990, when I was reporting from the Valley, and each time I met him, I was impressed by his honesty, his forthright stand on issues, his courage in speaking against injustice.

He said to me once, “The Government is treating each person as a suspect. Even India Today says the total number of militants must be about 600, though I say there are no more than 100. Yet, to locate them, a whole city’s population is being hounded. Searches are done in the most brutal manner, even before dawn the whole area is cordoned off and loudspeakers keep blaring, asking everyone to come out of their homes. The search goes on for the whole day, while families sit outside without food and water, and even women in labour are not allowed to move out!”

He said he was tired of expecting help and relief from the Government, after numerous attempts. And yet, he never shied away from revealing horrifying realities in the region, even if those truths were unpalatable to most others.

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Pictures courtesy heroinas.blogspot.com, www.schumachercollege.org.uk, www.sahilonline.org, kashmirvoice.org)

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Enough said

Does anybody remember the Sachar Committee Report?

Has anything changed for the country’s largest minority group? Meanwhile, the word ‘rape’ has achieved disturbing dimensions among the country’s politicians.
Humra Quraishiby Humra Quraishi

Maharashtra is currently rocked by the news of reservations for Muslims and Marathas. The issue brought to my mind another incident, specifically a report, that created more than its fair share of ripples seven years ago – the Sachar Committee Report.

Headed by Justice Rajinder Sachar and his team, the Report focussed on the current situation of the largest minority community in the country – the Mussalmaans of Hindustan. I still recall the words of the well-known economist and one of the prominent members of this fact-finding team, Dr Abu Saleh Sharief, who had said that in many urban and rural locales, the Muslims are in a more disadvantaged and discriminated position that even the SC and ST communities.

The Report had highlighted the dismal living conditions of Indian Muslims, their issues of housing, drinking water and electricity connections, primary and higher education, Government and private jobs, small industrial ventures, farming and agriculture status, etc.

The question is: what did the Government of the time do? Did it take note of these findings, did it act upon them? More to the point, has anything changed?

Meanwhile, the word ‘rape’ is being bandied about those in power in the most shameless ways possible. Whether it is Goa’s Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar (in pic on right)Manohar Parrikar dismissing the enormity of rape as against setting up one’s own enterprise, or a key member of the Mamata Banerjee Government, who seems to prefer rape as a weapon of choice against those who cross him, the word ‘rape’ is being used by these men as if it is an everyday affair!

And these men get away with spewing as much venom as they can, as long as they tender a nicely-worded apology. Since there is no real punishment, what is to stop these men, and several more, from using the word ‘rape’ in the crudest of ways imaginable?

And for those who are not in the know, the Kashmir Valley has been rocked with a new form of violence – from street dogs.

It turns out that dog bite cases now account for 1 per cent of all trauma cases in the Valley’s only tertiary hospital. As per a study conducted by the Department of Plastic Reconstructive Surgery, Sher-e-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences (SKIMS), Soura, “People fom rural areas were attacked more by the dogs than urban people as 65.5 per cent of patients were from the rural background.

“Also, the face was the most commonly affected part of the body, especially among children. In older age groups, limbs were the mostly attacked part. Most of these dog bite cases have been unprovoked. As many as 96.1 per cent of the patients had between one and five injuries all over their body.”

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

 

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Enough said

Still waiting for ‘achche din’

It is now 39 years since the 1975 Emergency, but how different is life today than in those strife-ridden times?
Humra Quraishiby Humra Quraishi

39 whole years have passed by since India declared an Emergency. But till date, June 25-26 stand out as the darkest day in our country’s democracy, in our recent history.

Just like every year, several groups such as the PUCL, CFD, Janhastakshep, the AMIYA and BG Rao Foundation, are observing the Anti Emergency Day in the country. They do this to “remember those dark days when internal Emergency was imposed in the country on the midnight of 25th/25th June 1975, which continued for 19 months. Fundamental rights were suspended, the Press was gagged, voices of dissent were throttled and more than one lakh opposition leaders and critics were detained without trial.”

Today, several activists comment that though the present day situation is not Emergency-like, the ground realities in the country are Sanctions on the Pressstill horrifying, with signs of dictatorship very much alive. Midnight knocks on the door and encounter killings are still a big reality. Innocents are thrown into jail. Non-violent protests are crushed. People’s anger over Government apathy is throttled. Watchdog groups and NGOs are slowly coming under State scrutiny. There seems to be a definite trend to crush critics and their criticism, to silence any rebellious voice.

With these human rights violations are other confusing matters. Currently, Delhi University cannot decide on whether there should be a three or four year course. How can it, when there seems to be little coordinator between the HRD Ministry and the UGC?

This confusion also seems to stretch into foreign policy decisions. Though Right Wing politicians have always been against Bangladeshi refugees in the country, Sushma Swaraj is now taking her first trip to Bangladesh, as Minister for External Affairs. We’re waiting to see what she will have to say in Dhaka vis-à-vis Bangla refugees.

But before this trip, shouldn’t she have flown East, towards Iraq, and seen what is really happening there? After all, hundreds of Indians are stranded in and around Iraq and they need immediate help. Are press briefings on this state of affairs enough? Will they substitute for firm ministerial-level intervention?

Perhaps the only area where there is absolutely no confusion is the area of price rise. Apart from the prices of everyday food items zooming upwards almost daily, there is now a price rise expected in gas, oil and electricity. In the coming months, it is going to difficult to sleep and commute.

Happy days or the supposed ‘achche din’ seem like a distant dream at this point. Frankly, how can we expect achche din when high costs of living come in the way of everyday survival?

Humra Quraishi is a senior political journalist based in Gurgaon. She is the author of Kashmir: The Untold Story and co-author of Simply Khushwant.

(Pictures courtesy theviewspaper.net, www.mtholyoke.edu)

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