Indian Subcontinent Watch Thread

[caltrek]

Gandhian Institute in Varanasi Taken Over, Residents Evicted, Bulldozer to Follow
July 30, 2023

Introduction:

(SabrangIndia via Janata Weekly) On July 22, another legacy of India’s history met with an unfortunate end, and soon, every evidence of its existence will be erased. On Saturday, the Sarva Seva Sangh (SSS), a well-known Gandhian institute that serves as the central office of its various branches all over India, was sealed by the Uttar Pradesh Administration. In an unexpected move, the district officials of Varanasi arrived at the centre around 7 in the morning with over 500 police men with guns, including Rapid Action Force. With the help of some 200 laborers, the police forcibly entered each house in the 12.5 acre campus and removed its residents’ belongings. Thousands of books published by the Sarvodaya publications have been thrown out by the police that now remain lying in the open air wet in the rain. People evicted, with whatever things they could carry, have moved out to their acquaintances.

The said Gandhian institute in Varanasi housed and ran the Kasturba Balvadi School, leaving over 100 poor school children aged 3 to 12 suddenly facing a threat to their education. The SSS conducts a kindergarten school giving free education for the poor children around. When the children arrived for the morning classes on July 22, they found their class room locked by the police.

The Varanasi unit has about 50 members, mostly elderly Gandhians who pay a membership fee and are associated with the Sangh’s work. Some of them taught at its school. The Sangh’s employees too were left jobless and homeless when the police asked them to immediately vacate the premises, where they had lived and worked for 10 to 30 years.

Saturday’s police action came after the railways pasted demolition notices on all the Sangh’s offices on June 27, days after the local administration declared that the land belonged to the railways. The Northern Railways served a notice to the people living in the Sarva Sewa Sangh and alleged that they had encroached upon the land of Northern Railways, adjacent to GT Road, at the northern end of Kashi railway station here.

Read more here: https://janataweekly.org/up-gandhian-i ... o-follow/

[caltrek]

Modi’s Independence Day Speech Reveals His 2024 Election Strategy
by P. K. Balachandran
August 18, 2023

Introduction:

(Eurasia Review) Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Independence Day address from the ramparts of the Red Fort clearly indicated his ideological strategy to defeat the opposition combine “INDIA” helmed by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in the 2024 parliamentary elections.
Faced with the rising popular tide in favour of Rahul Gandhi, Modi is on a campaign to appropriate historical stalwarts of the Congress party other than Jawaharlal Nehru, Rahul’s great grandfather and the icon of the post-independence Congress Party.

Modi’s long oration made no mention of the contribution of Nehru and his dynasty to the building of post-independence India. But he made copious references to other historical personages such as Mahatma Gandhi, Sardar Patel, B.R.Ambedkar, Jaiprakash Narayan, Sri Aurobindo and Swami Vivekananda.

The strategy is to make a claim to the legacy of the Indian freedom movement without acknowledging the contribution of Nehru and his family. It was ironical that no mention was made of Nehru’s contribution to science and technology at a time when India’s moon probe Chandrayaan 3 was on its journey to the moon as the culmination of the space program Nehru initiated.

The erasure of Nehru was stark last Wednesday when the hallowed Nehru Memorial Museum and Library in New Delhi was renamed “Prime Ministers’ Memorial Museum and Library” on the specious plea that it should be a museum of all Prime Ministers and not just Nehru.

Read more here: https://www.eurasiareview.com/18082023 ... alysis/

[weatheriscool]

India Quarterly GDP Growth was 8.5% Up from 6.1% in Prior Quarter
August 23, 2023 by Brian Wang

https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2023/08/i ... arter.html

ICRA Ratings reports India’s economic growth will accelerate to 8.5% in the April-June period of the current fiscal from the 6.1% growth rate witnessed in the preceding January-March quarter.

ICRA has projected the year-on-year (YoY) growth of the GDP to improve to 8.5% in Q1 FY2024 from 6.1% in Q4 FY2023, boosted by the supportive base of Q1 FY2023, which saw the Indian economy normalizing after the Covid19 pandemic. The GVA growth is seen at 8.1% in Q1 FY2024 (+6.5% in Q4 FY2023), driven by the recovery in the services sector (+9.7% vs. +6.9%), even as improved margins are likely to have shielded the industry (+7.3% vs. +6.3%) from weak external demand, with a relatively lower growth foreseen in agriculture (+4.0% vs. +5.5%).

ICRA projects the GFCF expansion (Gross Fixed Capital Formation is a measure of national investment) in Q1 FY2024 in double digits, based on the robust YoY growth performance of a majority of the investment-related indicators. For instance, the aggregate capital outlay and net lending of 23 state governments (except Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Goa, Manipur and Meghalaya), and the Government of India’s (GoI’s) gross capital expenditure expanded by a sharp 76% to Rs. 1.2 trillion and 59.1% to Rs. 2.8 trillion, respectively, in Q1 FY2024.

[caltrek]

Study Indicates Groundwater Depletion Rates in India Could Triple in Coming Decades as Climate Warms
September 1, 2023

Introduction:

(Eurekalert) ANN ARBOR—A new University of Michigan-led study finds that farmers in India have adapted to warming temperatures by intensifying the withdrawal of groundwater used for irrigation. If the trend continues, the rate of groundwater loss could triple by 2080, further threatening India's food and water security.

Reduced water availability in India due to groundwater depletion and climate change could threaten the livelihoods of more than one-third of the country's 1.4 billion residents and has global implications. India recently overtook China to become the world's most populous nation and is the second-largest global producer of common cereal grains including rice and wheat.

"We find that farmers are already increasing irrigation use in response to warming temperatures, an adaptation strategy that has not been accounted for in previous projections of groundwater depletion in India," said study senior author Meha Jain, assistant professor at U-M's School for Environment and Sustainability. "This is of concern, given that India is the world's largest consumer of groundwater and is a critical resource for the regional and global food supply."

The lead author is Nishan Bhattarai of the Department of Geography and Environmental Sustainability at the University of Oklahoma, formerly a postdoctoral researcher in Jain's U-M lab.

The study, scheduled for online publication Sept. 1 in the journal Science Advances, analyzed historical data on groundwater levels, climate and crop water stress to look for recent changes in withdrawal rates due to warming. The researchers also used temperature and precipitation projections from 10 climate models to estimate future rates of groundwater loss across India.

Read more of the Eurekalert article here: https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/999997

For the presentation of the study results as published in Science Advances: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adi1401

[wjfox]

Government to bring resolution to rename India as Bharat in Parliament Special Session, say sources

Sept 5, 2023 2:57:24 PM IST (Updated)

India is likely to be renamed Bharat. Buzz on the country's name change gained ground after images of the official invite to the G20 Heads of State and ministers for a dinner being hosted by President Droupadi Murmu came to the fore. The invite shows the invite was from "the President of Bharat".

Soon, sources confirmed to CNBC-TV18 that a resolution is likely to be taken up in the Special Session of Parliament. The move is being seen as a response to a recent bloc of Opposition alliance calling itself INDIA.

[...]

BJP MP Harnath Singh Yadav told news agency ANI, "The entire country is demanding that we should use the word 'Bharat' instead of 'India'...The word 'India' is an abuse given to us by the British whereas the word 'Bharat' is a symbol of our culture...I want there should be a change in our Constitution and the word 'Bharat' should be added to it..."

Congress leader Jairam Ramesh hit out at the Modi government calling the move an assault on the Constitution.

"Mr. Modi can continue to distort history and divide India, that is Bharat, that is a Union of States. But we will not be deterred. After all, what is the objective of INDIA parties? It is BHARAT—Bring Harmony, Amity, Reconciliation And Trust. Judega BHARAT, Jeetega INDIA!" Ramesh said on X.

https://www.cnbctv18.com/politics/india ... 719781.htm

[caltrek]

Terrorising Journalism
October 4, 2023

Introduction:

(The Wire) The arrest of Newsclick editor Prabir Purkayastha and the head of the portal’s HR department, Amit Chakravarty on terrorism charges has pushed the Modi government’s attack on independent journalism on to an entirely new plane.

The arrests came on the evening of October 3, after dramatic swoop downs and ‘raids’ on homes early in the morning. Electronic devices – laptops and telephones – of dozens of journalists were seized by the police. Those targeted included some who have just had fleeting contact with the news portal as occasional contributors. Authors, journalists, satirists, historians and scientists associated with Newsclick were all raided in a clear attempt to show them where unbridled power lay. No proper seizure memos or hash values for the devices were given. It was a brute exercise of power. The intent appeared to be to assert authority and control, and finally a lock was placed at the news portal’s office. A total of 46 persons were questioned by Delhi Police’s special cell.

It has been a dark year in India for those who stand for a free press. The World Press Freedom Index ranks India at 161, in the bottom twenty of the 180 countries whose status it assesses. The fall has been immense and sharp since 2015. India is also the global internet shutdown capital, with by far the highest number of internet closures per year amongst all democracies. India has displayed record democratic backsliding, and the state of the press is a vital component of the deterioration. Unless he means it ironically, Prime Minister Narendra Modi still never fails to talk about ‘Mother of Democracy’ with a straight face.

Read more here: https://thewire.in/media/terrorising- ... ditorial

[caltrek]

On the Biggest Crackdown on the Indian Press by the Indian State – Articles and Statements of Condemnation
by Ajoy Ashirwad Mahaprashasta. et. al.
October 8, 2023

Introduction:

(Janata Weekly) October 3, 2023 will go down in history for the biggest crackdown on Indian journalism by the Indian state. Homes of 46 journalists, including nine women, who are said to be directly and indirectly associated with the news portal NewsClick were raided by the Delhi police’s special cell that usually probes cases of terrorism in the wee hours of Tuesday.

For many of us scribes, the day unfolded like a typical thriller. Our messenger apps, WhatsApp or Signal, didn’t stop buzzing. First, we heard that raids were ongoing in the homes of over 100 journalists. We didn’t know why as the Delhi Police officials refused to divulge any details. Then, one by one, names of those whose houses were being searched started coming in.

“Urmilesh’s house!” I wondered. Urmilesh is one of the most respected senior journalists of the national capital who has been at the forefront of highlighting the failures of state establishments over the last 40 years. Over the last 10 years, he had been particularly critical of the alleged authoritarian policies and measures of the Narendra Modi government.

“Paranjoy, too,” one of my colleagues informed, even as most of us were slowly waking up to the scale of the raids. Paranjoy Guha Thakurta, in the last 40 years, has consistently exposed crony practices of Indian governments. Most recently, he worked on a series of stories about the Adani group’s alleged financial frauds.

By 9 am, it was clear that the police were searching the homes of journalists who were related in some fashion with Newsclick, a portal which has been accused of taking funds from a pro-China lobbyist in the US, Neville Roy Singham. But then, we soon learnt that police had registered a fresh case against under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, a stringent law that should be sparingly used against terrorists.

Read more here: https://janataweekly.org/on-the-bigges ... emnation/

[weatheriscool]

Bangladesh's opposition supporters clash with police as tensions run high ahead of general election

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Police in Bangladesh’s capital fired tear gas to disperse supporters of the main opposition party who threw stones at security forces during a massive rally demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and the transfer of power to a non-partisan caretaker government to oversee general elections next year.

At least one policeman died and dozens of others were injured, alongside scores of opposition supporters, police and witnesses said.

Dhaka police spokesman Faruk Hossain told The Associated Press that violence late Saturday raged in at least 10 spots in Dhaka, where security forces confronted opposition activists who attacked them, vandalized vehicles and torched vehicles.

An opposition spokesman, Zahiruddin Swapan, said more than 1 million activists joined their rally, but Hossain put the number at about 200,000.

https://apnews.com/article/bangladesh-e ... 886c2922ae

[weatheriscool]

Bangladesh sets parliamentary election for Jan 7 amid violent protests

DHAKA, Nov 15 (Reuters) - Bangladesh said it will hold a parliamentary election on Jan. 7 in which the country's longest serving prime minister, Sheikh Hasina, will seek a fifth term, as deadly protests by opposition parties demand her resignation to make way for a caretaker government.

At least four people, including a policeman, were killed and hundreds injured in violent protests across the country in the past two weeks.

The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), whose top leadership is either jailed or in exile, has already said it will boycott the next national election if Hasina does not resign and allow in a caretaker government, two party leaders told Reuters earlier this month.

Boycotting the election will de-legitimise any win for her, they said. The BNP also boycotted the 2014 election but participated in 2018.

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-paci ... 023-11-15/

[caltrek]

Israel’s Brutality Is Stoking the Imagination of India's Far Right
Adrana Gopalani
November 28, 2023

Introduction:

(In These Times) On October 12, as Israeli airstrikes were pummeling Gaza, Israel’s ambassador to India, Naor Gilon, told Asian News International that he had received such an outpouring of support from people in India that he could fill another Israeli army just with Indian volunteers. “Everyone is telling me, ‘I want to volunteer, I want to fight for Israel,’” he said.

Gilon’s remarks came five days after Hamas militants’ attack on Israel claimed 1,200 lives (a number Israel revised down from the initial 1,400); Israel’s response has been an ongoing, genocidal bombing campaign, which killed more than 10,000 Palestinians in Gaza in its first month. Within hours of the Hamas attack, Narendra Modi, India’s far-right prime minister, expressed solidarity with Israel, and ministers throughout his party echoed him, many proclaiming that India and Israel share a common struggle against “terrorism.” Meanwhile, Indian media has inundated hundreds of millions of viewers with relentless pro-Israel coverage, and India’s social media users have created such a flood of anti-Palestinian fake news that the cofounder of an Indian fact-checking nonprofit declared India “the disinformation capital of the world.”

This fever pitch of pro-Israel sentiment among right-wing Indians has deep historical roots. As journalist Azad Essa explains in his new book, Hostile Homelands, the movement to establish India as a Hindu-supremacist homeland — known as Hindutva — has long seen Israeli Zionism as a kindred struggle. Both ethno-nationalist movements draw inspiration from 20th-century European fascism, as well as each other. In a 1923 tract, Hindutva cofounder Vinayak Savarkar wrote, “if the Zionists’ dreams are ever realized — if Palestine becomes a Jewish state — it will gladden us almost as much as our Jewish friends.”

For most of the 20th century, the Hindutva movement struggled to gain a following and its fervor for Israel did not influence Indian politics. Instead, India officially sided with Palestinians. In 1938, Mohandas Gandhi wrote that the Zionist displacement of Palestinian Arabs “cannot be justified by any moral code of conduct.”

In the past four decades, however, Hindu nationalism has become the dominant political ideology in India, and the country’s support for Zionism has risen in tandem.

Read more here: https://inthesetimes.com/article/india ... ar-right