And thus we riot

In the beginning there was independence brought about by a largely non-violent struggle. Sometime between then and now the non-violence got lost in our protests. Almost all of our social/political protests nowadays take violent turns. The recent Gujjar protests in Rajasthan are a prime example. The question to ask is who is responsible for this state of affairs, people or the rulers of our country i.e. the political class who take turns at the job.

It seems like a chicken and egg problem. Either can be blamed.

One can say that the protesters are not prepared to engage in non-violent civil disobedience and the state is compelled to respond to the violent protests given the loss of life and property that might result if they don't. Seeing the Gujjar protests one feels this.

One can also say that the state never listens to non-violent civil disobedience and hence people are compelled to protest violently since that is the only way they will be heard. One just has to look at the apathy and tyranny of our state in case of the Narmada Bachao Andolan (that for the last several years has engaged in non-violent protests and has been meted out injustice and apathy even by the Supreme Court) and there is a strong case for blaming the state.

Maybe its best to see India as a violent India and a non-violent India rather than just people and state in the context of this issue. We as a society seem to have lost the ethos for non-violent civil disobedience, and having lost it, we find that most of the political class and a lot of our protesters are firmly in the violent camp. Its a shame that the two biggest parties in our country have a history of violence, anti-Sikh riots being the Congress party's achievement and Gujarat the feather in the BJP's cap. Given this then the state is to blame, right? But then it is also said that people get the government they choose and deserve and so the people are to blame. And thus we go round and round in the blame-circle of life. And thus we riot, kill and destroy.

We need one of them to step in and have the patience to break this cycle.

Now that you 've called him Sir, we 'll bomb you!

If you proclaim that two people are your enemies and one of them honours the other, should you raise a storm over it? NO NO NO!! But apparently the Muslim extremists the world over do not get this. The knighthood of Mr. Rushdie is an insult to us and our religion, they say. Here we have a nation that has a colonial legacy and imperialist present (read support for the war on of terror :-) ) , conferring a title on a writer, who in the first place should not have accepted it, and instead of looking at the whole thing as an exercise in stupidity it is perceived as an insult and a hue and cry is raised over it. Someone has also called for a strike in Kashmir, he he he. I wait to hear the liberal voice, preferrably Muslim, denouncing this on national television.

Jesus Stop!!

This is what happens when god is publicised overzealously :-) They end up asking him to stop.. The Jesus sticker can nowadays be found on most of Bangalore's traffic signs.

What Arundhati Roy gets right and what she gets wrong.

I have read two of her socio/political books, The Algebra of Infinite Justice and The Ordinary Person's Guide to Empire. Both are very well written as is expected from an author of her stature. Her tongue is sharp and the vivid picture she paints about the capability of our government for repression of its own people in the stories about the Narmada Bachao Andolan and the dirty world of big business behind it, the IMF, the World Bank and most depressing of all the Indian Supreme court's cavalier judgements in the matter leaves one with a lot of questions. Questions about our way of life and about the crazy comfort zone that we the privileged few live in. And most of all one is left with a sense of helplessness, of frustration and of anger. All this she gets right, spot on.
However, on reading both of the books one cannot but disagree with her views on globalization and private enterprise. It just feels that she does not get it at all. She is critical of the government in almost every paragraph of her writings. However in the same breathe she is also critical of globalization and privatization. I am not claiming that privatization is without its evils. However for me it is the lesser of the two evils where the second happens to be complete government control. I do not want to go into why private enterprise is better. It has been argued and documented by better people before. However just for quick examples look at the telecom industry in India, compare it with the times when about 7 years ago one used to wait for late night calls to ones home (and they still used to cost more than what a prime time call today costs) and you ll know. Her commentary assumes that private business and earning money is inherently vulgar and evil. It is hard for me to digest why she has such an irrational point of view. If one does not approve of private enterprise and also not approve of government enterprise, what is the alternative left, whom do you trust? Should we go back to being a hunter-gatherer society? I remember a certain IITB professor once saying that the industrial revolution has been the single biggest mistake in the history of mankind. Maybe Arundhati Roy will also support that view.