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11-26-2007, 05:20 AM
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#1 (permalink)
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Regular
Join Date: 08-07-07
Location: Bangalore
Country: 
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Secularism on trial
Quote:
Secularism on trial
Business Standard / New Delhi November 26, 2007
The decision by the West Bengal government to throw out Taslima Nasreen, the exiled Bangladeshi writer being hounded by Muslim fundamentalists, tarnishes its image further. This calls into question the CPI(M)’s commitment to one of its twin pillars of belief, secularism. The other, socialism, has already been shaken by the happenings in Nandigram where it found itself pitted against poor cultivators. The two issues have become entangled because many of the cultivators in Nandigram are Muslims. Ms Nasreen was forced to leave West Bengal after there was widespread rioting in Muslim areas of Kolkata during a protest organised by an obscure group against the CPI(M)’s violent role in Nandigram and also its decision to allow Ms Nasreen to stay in the state. She was recently attacked by Muslim fundamentalists in Hyderabad while she was being felicitated at the local press club (the journalists present physically saved her), and bundled out of the state. Ms Nasreen is accused by Muslim activists of blasphemy for her critical reference to Prophet Mohammed in one of her books.
She is well known for two books focusing on the condition of the Hindu minority in Bangladesh and the status of women in general in the Muslim-majority country. She is not considered a great writer but her courage in speaking up, for which she has been exiled from her country, is obvious. After spending time in Europe, she had come to West Bengal in the hope that she would find safety among fellow Bengalis under a secular dispensation. But that is not to be. What should further embarrass the CPI(M) is that she had to be bundled out of the state with the help of a group of businessmen originally from Rajasthan and taken to that BJP-ruled state before being moved to Delhi.
One issue here is the genuineness of the secularism professed by parties who have been traditionally accused by the BJP of pseudo-secularism, that is pandering to communal elements among Muslims in order to get their votes. The CPI(M) move vindicates the BJP stand and the party has been quick to send one of its functionaries to see Ms Nasreen in Delhi. The BJP itself has been quite easy with M F Husain being unable to enter the country because of court cases in which he is accused of showing disrespect to Hindu deities in his works. It is undeniable that secular beliefs cannot be strengthened if politicians keep pandering to backward-looking elements within the Muslim community. It is argued that the move to modernise practices among Indian Muslims must come from within the community, but that becomes impossible when regressive forces get their way through street violence. The more problematic issue, facing more than one democracy, is the question of whether freedom of expression should be absolute, or limited for both Ms Nasreen and Mr Husain by laws on blasphemy
Secularism on trial
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BJP is as opportunistic as it was, trying to en-cash the political situation.
The Tasleema case raises few serious questions,
1) Is Indian political parties have surrendered to the fundamentalists.
2) Is India really a secular country? (Based on these politics)
3) India's chief opposition party alleged that while the centre and the Left Front government in West Bengal were welcoming millions of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh into the country, they have shut the doors on Nasreen due to "vote bank politics".
Is this true?
4) Is Tasleema should be given political refugee status? Is this Indian problem or we(Indians) are unnecessarily stepping in a mess?
Last edited by vinayp : 11-26-2007 at 07:56 AM.
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11-29-2007, 00:41 AM
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#2 (permalink)
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Regular
Join Date: 08-07-07
Location: Bangalore
Country:
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Quote:
Join us, says Muslim group
Swati Das | TNN
Chennai: Dissident Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen has got support from a quarter that she would be hard put to ignore. The world’s first all-woman Muslim Jamaat Committee, based in Pudukottai in Tamil Nadu, has asked Nasreen to work with them for the emancipation of women in general.
“Why is the government making a single woman into an issue? What has Taslima done? Why can’t the Centre act against the West Bengal government? Those opposing Taslima don’t represent voices of all Muslims. It’s a game of 13% Muslim vote. There’s no difference between Gujarat CM Narendra Modi and the Congress. Modi’s is open politics, while Congress’s does things behind the scenes,’’ said an angry committee convener D Sharifa Khannam.
“Taslima doesn’t need protection. I urge her to come here and work with us. We are democratic, and we will show how to live boldly,’’ she said.
Comparing the Taslima issue and the Wakf land scam in Mumbai, Khannam said: “Those who call themselves Muslims are selling Wakf land and property illegally. Are these real Muslims? How can they represent real Muslims? Instead of making Taslima into an issue, the Centre should pay more attention to terrorism, violence and crime,” she said.
Sharifa is appalled that Taslima was shoved out of a Communist state and termed the West Bengal government timid. At the National All-Women’s Conference in Kolkata in September 2006, it was discussed that the West Bengal government would come up with an education project for Muslim women in five districts. “But when there was massive protest, the project was scrapped,’’ she alleged.
Listing out cases from Shah Bano to Imrana and now Taslima, Sharifa says it’s always vote-bank that drives policy. Governments will fight over sharing of Cauvery waters, but won’t lift a finger for women’s rights. The endless debate over 33% reservation for women is a clear example of how politicians talk in public and how in private work together to scupper the Bill, she said.
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12-01-2007, 12:22 PM
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#3 (permalink)
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Military Professional
Join Date: 09-25-07
Location: Megalopolis, US
Country: 
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Some degree of distinction between the governing mechanisms of a people & their respective systemme or systemmes of worshipping is most expedient for goodly living. The removal of this distinction always bodes negatively, whether in Islamdom where liberty is suppressed due to religious inteference with governance or in the West where religious zealots manipulate government for their own malicious theological desires.
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"If we will not be governed by God then we will be ruled by tyrants" -William Penn
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