Truth about the Gujarat genocide unravelled

Tehelka has called it the truth about Gujarat 2002 in the words of the men who did it. And what is ‘it’? It refers to how:
- a pregnant woman’s womb was indeed pierced with a sword and the foetus wrenched out.
- Muslims hiding in a gutter in the hope that they would survive were killed.
- the former Congress MP Ehsan Jafri was hacked limb by limb and burned, in the Gulbarg Society massacre – a first-hand account
- dozens of Muslims hiding in a pit and clinging together in fear in Naroda Patiya were doused with kerosene and burnt alive.
and much, much more….

The press release of the investigation by Tehelka (which has all been recorded on camera) has claimed that “the investigation brings confirmation that the Gujarat murder of Muslims was not a spontaneous swell of anger, but a planned genocide strategised and executed by top functionaries of the RSS, the VHP, the Bajrang Dal and the state authorities, with the knowledge and sanction of Chief Minister Narendra Modi”. To read the whole press release, click here

Well, if Tehelka has unearthed this clinching evidence, they need to be congratulated. They have trodden where nobody in this large ‘democratic’ country has dared to tread. Governments have changed… people threw out the then incumbent government at the centre, hoping that the new one would look into the matter. But all we got was stoic silence from the new rulers. No action, no reaction and the perpetrators of the mass murders continued to rule. Tehelka has bucked the trend and followed up on an old and forgotten ’story’.

Well, what does it say about Indian democracy? It says that there are still a few (handful) of people who are willing to stake their lives in pursuit of the truth, while the rest of us get on with our lives, forgetting all about the terrible genocide which happened in front of our eyes.

It is amazing to see the discussions in leading newspapers about the revelations. It is more about ‘who will gain in the elections by these revelations’, rather than how can the perpetrators of the mass murders and their cheer-leaders contest in the election and continue to ‘rule’. This is a total dumbing down of our democracy…

The shoe-stink of privatisation

If you thought, you had seen the worst of privatisation, think again – Central Railways is going to privatise shoe-shining in 6 zones along the Central and Harbour Railway lines in Mumbai. Those who know the tremendous crowds on Mumbai’s local train stations are also familiar with the shoeshine worker sitting calmly in the surging wave of pushing humanity, waiting patiently for their next shoe to shine. The ‘tick tick tick’ sound of them hitting the shoe-brush against their wooden handy box makes their location known to those who are looking to have their shoes polished.

The regular Mumbaikar may not notice then, because they are as much a part of the local railway station, as the ubiquitous weighing machines in most railway stations. But even they will be surprised to know the shoeshine workers pay the railways Rs.75 every month through their co-operative societies. The railways makes about Rs.75,000 per months from these shoeshine workers considering that there are about 1,000 shoeshine workers on Mumbai’s railway stations.

Now, the livelihood of these 1,000 shoeshine workers are at risk, because in accordance with the national policy (what else!), railways has issues a tender inviting “open bidding” from interested private parties to run shoeshine stalls in six zones along the Central and Harbour Railway lines in Mumbai. The railways expects to make about Rs.15 lakhs per month from the privatisation. The shoneshine workers, some of whom have been in this profession for over 40 years, are willing to pay the reserve price quoted in the tender, through their cooperatives, but they are being outbid because of the open bidding system. The office bearers of these co-operatives, who are shoeshine workers themselves in various platforms of Mumbai’s railway stations claim that none of the private firms who have bid for the shoeshine stalls have anything to do with the shoeshine industry. The Central Railways will finalise the bids on October 28, 2007. Their representative, when contacted by the media, said that “it was an internal matter of the railways”.

India is yet again going to shine for some private moneybag, leaving 1000 more families in the dark.

Bloodshot eyes… year after year

We are now a small and a sick family. We have all fallen victim to Conjunctivitis (commonly called “pinkeye” or “Madras Eye” in India). It started off with my dad, and then spread to the entire family, including our little daughter. Newspapers in Mumbai are full of Conjunctivitis news. It is that time of the year, when Conjunctivitis is rampant in the city. When I called up my colleagues in Bangalore, two of them had also fallen ill and had not reported for work. So, if this is so common all over the country, and if people are not reporting for work, and there is say 2- 3 lost working days per person, imagine the gross loss of productivity. Forget the productivity; what is greater is the suffering and pain that one experiences. In an earlier posting,  I had written about the cost of treatment for diarrhoea in children. Now, treatment of Conjunctivitis is not cheap either. I think more than the medicine cost is the cost of consulting an eye specialist. So, in addition to the lost work days and pain and suffering, is the cost of treatment.

Conjunctivitis is highly contagious and quickly spreads from one to the other, so, just like in our family, the whole household usually gets infected very soon. We were very careful about not touching our eye and then touching each other, washing our hands often, not sharing towels and pillow cases, and so on; yet we all fell ill. So, one can only imagine in the slums where living spaces are so crammed and people have no other option but to share common resources, how easily it can spread.

The fact that Mumbaikars and people in other places around India suffer due to Conjunctivitis EVERY YEAR, around this time of the year (monsoon and post-monsoon) is almost like a foregone conclusion. Nobody even bats an eyelid (no pun intended) when hordes of people fall prey to this infection. In spite of having enough knowledge about the infection and knowing precisely when it strikes, we are unable to do anything to prevent it from happening year after year. So much for public health in our country! 

I had an interesting experience during the treatment of this infection. A drug which is commonly used in Mumbai (and other places also I presume) as first-line treatment for Conjunctivitis is a drug which contains corticosteroids, while the recommended treatment for bacterial Conjunctivitis (the most common, I think) is non-steroidal anti-inflammatory medications and antibiotic eye drops or ointments  I was told that schools here routinely stock the drug containing corticosteroids during monsoons, because of the high number of children who go to school with the infection. In fact, even I was advised by a friend to get this particular drug for Conjunctivitis. I did not not know about its contents. He said that anybody with Conjunctivitis vouches for the efficiency of this drug, and in fact this was most commonly prescribed drug by doctors everywhere. So, I went to the nearest chemist and asked for the drug. He laughed and said, that this drug was out-of-stock and I would have to procure it in black (paying almost double the cost) since there was huge demand for the drug. I walked away from the chemist in anger and went to another one. There, the same story was repeated. Finally, I decided to buy this drug, by paying that extra cost because my eye was hurting badly and I could not walk any further in the hot sun. Just after I had bought the drug, my wife called me to say that I should not use the drug as it contained corticosteroids and that it was usually used in the worst cases to reduce the discomfort from inflammation. On reading the label, I found that drug contained corticosteroids, and the warning said “indiscriminate and prolonged use of the drug could lead to glaucoma, cataract and fungal infections”. In fact, it can even cause permanent eye damage by inducing central serous retinopathy (CSR). Needles to say, the drug was a Schedule H drug (which was to be sold only on the prescription of a Registered Medical Practitioner), but I got it without even a single piece of paper. What is even more shocking is that, it is being used indiscriminately in schools and slums where people go and buy this from the Chemist across the counter at a price that the Chemist decides, because for most of the slum-dwellers, the Chemist also doubles up as their only “doctor”. 

I have uploaded some snaps of my Conjunctivitis-ridden eyes to show you the signs and symptoms. The first one shows the redness and watering from both the eyes, while the second one shows the swelling around the eyes, especially in the mornings. For more snaps, click here.

Free speech with a neighbour

Last night a neighbour invited me over for dinner. He said that we could share some ideas, clarify our thoughts on some issues and also discuss the latest news. I gladly agreed, and went over to his place. As soon as I entered, he began screaming at me, called me all kinds of names and began hurling accusations. I could have easily walked out, but I chose to stay calm and discuss with him, because he was called a “professor” and an “expert on free speech”.

Well, this incident did not happen to me, but a strikingly similar incident happened to a fellow human, who also happened to be the elected President of a sovereign country – Iran. And the professor who invited him to an academic institution and insulted him was somebody who claimed that he was “only a professor, who is also a university president”. The professor – the one who claims publicly to be an expert (Latin), who did the honours, was the President of Columbia University in the US, Prof. Lee Bollinger.

The professor who is called an expert on free speech, probably understood free speech as inviting people over and freely calling them names. Prof. Bollinger in the guise of delivering introductory remarks, used statements like “astonishingly uneducated” and “petty and cruel dictator” to greet and describe President Mr. Ahmadinejad in the academic institution. What a great academic tradition!

Academic honesty would have meant that Mr. Bollinger would have invited President Mr. Ahmadinejad to speak at his university by being upfront about his feelings for him, and stating that clearly in his invitation letter. That letter should have read something like this – Dear astonishingly uneducated President, who exhibits all the signs of a petty and cruel dictator, we would like to invite you to speak at our university. Sincerely, The Free Speech Expert. Then the President would have had a chance to decide whether to accept an invitation from those who thought so highly of him.

I am not a great fan of Iranian policies, but I am with them completely on their opposition to this kind of astonishingly uneducated (to borrow a phrase from the free speech expert) behaviour. There is a strong opinion that Prof. Bollinger went overboard in his criticism of the Iranian President, to silence critics who were upset over the University’s decision to invite the Iranian President. If that is the case, I am amazed much more at the behaviour of the critics who do not like to see debate and dialogue, even in academic institutions.