Dilip Simeon's blog

We finally have a mantra that ensures unity in diversity: Jai Shri Ram What is striking is the impunity in the air. As if the crowd is collecting evidence, recording it. The camera is repeatedly brought close to Tabrez’s face. The crowd puts his statement on record. It is an act of vigilantism. My friends from Jharkhand sent me a video of a man – to be exact, a Muslim – being lynched. I avoided opening it. Then a message followed – that the man being beaten up on camera  has now died . They were at the police station and were meeting senior officers later. I decided to watch the video. It is a long clip: ten minutes and 49 seconds. In it, you see a man – a young man – tied to a pole. He is half bent. You can see that he is writhing in pain. His head is unsteady and his legs twisted. There is darkness around him, but there is also some light – from the mobiles being flashed at him, to keep him in focus. There are sounds. Human sounds. Abuses. People moving.  Jharkhand ...

The Arab world is turning its back on religion and on US relations, according to the largest public opinion survey ever carried out in the region. A survey of more than 25,000 people across 10 countries and the  Palestinian territories  found that trust in religious leaders has plummeted in recent years. The study, compiled by BBC News Arabic and Arab Barometer, a Princeton University-based research network, also identified a marked rise in the proportion of people describing themselves as “not religious” – from 11% in 2012-2014 to 18% this year. Just 12% of the countries surveyed – which included Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya,  Morocco , Palestine, Sudan, Tunisia and Yemen – had a positive view of Donald Trump. More than twice as many (28%) felt positively towards Russia’s Vladimir Putin, while Turkey’s Recep Erdogan fared the best (51%).  At least 60% of respondents in eight of the 11 places surveyed said violence against the US was a logi...

Erdogan likes to say 'whoever wins Istanbul, wins Turkey.' His party's defeat is a crushing blow Change, hope, and a new beginning. That's the promise of  Istanbul's newly elected mayor  Ekrem Imamoglu. His slogan, "Everything will be great," is on everyone's lips in Turkey. Imamoglu's win in the repeat of the  mayoral vote  invigorates Turkey's fatigued opposition. It breathes new life into a part of the Turkish electorate that had lost all hope of a victory at the ballot box, but still believed in safeguarding the country's democracy. The revote was less about the office of the mayor and more about the question of whether or not the most basic and indisputable part of the democratic process, the ballot box, would survive the tenure of  President Recep Tayyip Erdogan .  Not only did it survive, it also sent a very clear message by giving Imamoglu the power over Turkey's financial heart. But to view his victory only as a win for t...

NB : Thanks to Sanjay Tickoo for circulating this news item.  DS Qazigund, June 23 (KNO) : In a display of communal brotherhood which has existed in Kashmir for centuries, the locals of Levdoors area in Qazigund of south Kashmir on Sunday afternoon rescued a Kashmiri pandit from the wrath of Security forces in the area. Sources told KNO that a Pandit, Krishan Ji Raina, who has been living in the locality since childhood was rounded up by a patrolling party of the CRPF in the Levdoora area without any provocation. “Security forces initially questioned him for living in Kashmir despite being a Hindu?” after which they started erecting bamboo sticks on him,” they said. Krishan Jee son of Gopi Nath Raina of Levdoora has sustained multiple injuries during the assault by CRPF men, the front window of his car has also been smashed as well Speaking about the incident with KNO he said that he was on way to Qazigund market to get medicines for his ill wife, when the CRPF men intercepted...

NB: Here we go again. .. welcome to the republic of lynchers.. A 24-year-old man named Tabrez Ansari was attacked by a mob in Jhankhand’s Kharsawan district and beaten up mercilessly for hours on 18 June. He died in the hospital on 22 June, allegedly from the injuries.  The SP of Kharsawan told HuffPost India that Tabrez was handed over to the police after being beaten up and was in judicial custody since June 18. On the morning of 22 June, his condition worsened and he was taken to the hospital where he died. While many people were involved in the mob that beat up Tabrez, the primary accused - one Pappu Mandal - was arrested after his death. Jharkhand man dies days after he was assaulted for ‘theft’, made to chant Jai Shri Ram “Tabrez was with two other men who had gone there to steal. The villagers caught them. While two of the men fled, Tabrez was caught by the villagers and beaten up,” Chandan Kumar Sinha, SP of Seraikella-Kharsawan told HuffPost India. The incident took...

Even as late as the 1920s, squabbling sisters in households across Bengal were rebuked thus - Gaang-e gaang-e dekha hoy, kintu bon-e bon-e dekha hoy na . Meaning, even rivers meet but not sisters - they are married off early and have to go separate ways. The subtext, therefore, being don’t quarrel so. The olden reprimand remains poignant to date, as much for the memory of siblings wrenched apart in a differently wired society, as for the reminder that once upon a time this geography was river-rich. Bengal, the only state in India that has snowy mountains to its north and the sea to the south, bears a natural slope. This helps hundreds of rivers flow through the land and towards the Bay of Bengal. This also helps develop countless other water bodies. Dakshinbanga Matsyajibi Forum (DMF) has been organising the river fishing communities in their struggle to save the rivers and and protect their livelihood. Nadia district has been unique in coming together of river activists with fi...

NB : Are some of India's leaders planning something similar? A prominent  private militia to replace several functions of the police; mass membership drives etc - are all these steps toward a 'patriotic' home guard, internal 'moral' police, military duty for youth etc? The militarisation of civil society is a step toward tyranny. Whether you see this or not is your choice. Some call it 'civilisational renewal'.  Incidentally, Italian fascism in the 1920's and 30's also saw itself as ' civilisational renewal'. DS The Basij was established on November 26, 1979. A year later, the Islamic Consultative Assembly (Majlis) formally recognized the organization as part of its mission to fulfill Ayatollah Khomeini’s wish to have an army of 20 million soldiers. The cabinet passed the bill to make the Basij a governmental organization on April 30, 1980. According to the bill,  “ the National Organization of Basij is under the supervision of the comma...